What is it like to walk on in
knee-deep snow, in the teeth
of the wind, into the dark
and hungry wilderness?
It is not like being loved, I know,
although it is a
bit like loving.
Where is the arm breath of
the bear? Why sing not the birds?
The rabbit passed before me
and I am compelled to follow.
My boots fill with snow;
I take them off and
lay down. The sky is
soft. I have no fear.
Death is only the smallest thing.
--------------------------------------------------------
I love winter. well, I love all seasons. Winter is my chance to be slow and reflective, to be introverted, even to be sad--which I'm discovering is a very important part of being me. Winter is good for sitting alone inside and reading a book, or for walking alone outside and letting the world be what it is. True, the temperatures--especially when you live on top of a hill--can be a bit prohibitive, but (as my good friend Garrison Keillor would say) that builds character. It gives us something to talk about. I wouldn't want to live in Florida anyways, where you can always walk outside without your eyelashes freezing. I'd get bored.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Friday, January 1, 2010
Friday, December 25, 2009
Merry Christmas...
It's snowing--the whitest Christmas since 1945, I've heard, and maybe whiter. But my mind keeps going back to Bangalore, where my Indian friends (at least the Christian ones) are probably just finishing up Christmas eve dinner. Some of them are walking the streets with a baby on their hips waiting for someone to take pity. And I'm sitting in my giant house, looking forward to a delicious breakfast and an overflow of presents. I don't know what to do with myself.
I know that Jesus is here somewhere, buried under the tinsel and piles of wrapping paper. It's hard to hear him wailing under the blare of "Jingle Bells." Make no mistake--despite what the songs say ("the little lord Jesus, no crying he makes," "silent night, holy night") I'm sure that baby Jesus cried. Wouldn't you, if you were born in a stinky barn with a bed full of hay? And whatever you think about his divinity (the jury's still out on my part, to be honest), this is a baby--and later a man--who knew poverty.
I guess I think that baby Jesus is more alive in Ishwari, the poor baby I held in the streets of Bangalore just before I left, than in all of the "keep Christ in Christmas" bumper stickers and giant plastic light up nativity scenes in the world.
So Merry Christmas. Peace on earth, good will to all.
I know that Jesus is here somewhere, buried under the tinsel and piles of wrapping paper. It's hard to hear him wailing under the blare of "Jingle Bells." Make no mistake--despite what the songs say ("the little lord Jesus, no crying he makes," "silent night, holy night") I'm sure that baby Jesus cried. Wouldn't you, if you were born in a stinky barn with a bed full of hay? And whatever you think about his divinity (the jury's still out on my part, to be honest), this is a baby--and later a man--who knew poverty.
I guess I think that baby Jesus is more alive in Ishwari, the poor baby I held in the streets of Bangalore just before I left, than in all of the "keep Christ in Christmas" bumper stickers and giant plastic light up nativity scenes in the world.
So Merry Christmas. Peace on earth, good will to all.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Oh, come, oh, come, Emmanuel,
And ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!
Oh, come, our Wisdom from on high,
Who ordered all things mightily;
To us the path of knowledge show,
and teach us in her ways to go.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!
Oh, come, Desire of nations, bind
In one the hearts of all mankind;
Oh, bid our sad divisions cease,
And be yourself our King of Peace.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!
-----------------------------------------
So: it's advent. The four weeks before Christmas when we wait and long and hope for the coming of the Christ--for something better. Above are my favorite three verses of a classic advent hymn. I went to two different (VERY different) churches yesterday, and we sang this song at both places.
At St. Joan of Arc, the very liberal Catholic church my dad and I visited, they said that the heart of advent is "finding the extraordinary in the ordinary". I like that. This song has been 'ordinary' for me my whole life, and I've never liked it all that much. A lot of times it sounds suspiciously like a funeral dirge, evoking feelings very different from hope and expectation. This week, though, I found something extraordinary in it. This song is sung from the perspective of the Jewish people (Israel) longing for the Messiah to come. These three verses express hope that the Messiah will "ransom" the enslaved people, show them wisdom and knowledge* and bind their hearts together in peace. Isn't that what we still want? freedom, wisdom, and peace are almost universally desired.
But freedom from what? For the Jews of Jesus' day, it was freedom from the Roman empire--in 70 AD there was an armed insurrection which was promptly squashed. In fact, Jesus' non-violent ethic is specifically designed to encourage the oppressed Jews to creatively reclaim their dignity from cruel Roman rule, not through violence but through love. When the song says "Ransom captive Israel" the reference is to the exile, when the Israelites were captured by the mighty Babylonian empire. Many Christians today would read "ransom captive Israel" as a plea to be freed from the shackles of sin. That's all well and good--I certainly believe that we, as flawed humans, are desperately in need of release from cycles of violence, greed, and hate. But it's important too to consider that millions of people the world over are still living in slavery or in exile. Can we plead on their behalf?
The verse about peace can be read with a similar lens. When we privileged people ask God for peace, we are often asking for some kind of personal mental or psychological relief. Many of us, of course, are suffering very acutely from grief, loss, or some other non-peaceful sensation. If that is the case, to pray for peace for oneself is certainly justified. In some ways, though, we, as privileged people, need to be uncomfortable. David Selvaraj, the director of the place I stayed in India, says his work is to "comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable." Those of us with enough food, shelter, education, and dignity need to be disturbed by the fact that many people live without those rights. Can we sing this verse for them? Can we ask God to bind our hearts to theirs, so we too feel the pain of injustice?
The second verse says something to me about this Jesus fellow that we're always talking about. The path of knowledge that's asked for here could be wisdom to resolve an office squabble or successfully navigate relationship land mines (and don't get me wrong, those things are important!) but I think there's more to it than that. When I think about salvation, it's this wisdom that I turn to. Going to heaven is a great idea, and I won't deny that I'd like to end up there, but if that's all that salvation's about then Jesus doesn't mean that much to the world. I believe that salvation is really about Jesus' wisdom--about his social and ethical teachings on love, non-violence, and creative resistance to injustice. If we follow Jesus, really follow him, we can join with God in saving the world, in making it more like heaven here.
So it's advent. The time of hope, expectation, looking for something better. freedom, Wisdom, Peace... so I say, along with the world's poor and marginalized, Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel!
P.S. a little side-note: You know in the "wisdom" verse when it says "teach us in her ways to go"? The reason they use the feminine pronoun there is because in the book of Proverbs, 'Wisdom' is personified as a woman, Sophia. Even the ancient Israelites knew women were pretty rockin.
And ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!
Oh, come, our Wisdom from on high,
Who ordered all things mightily;
To us the path of knowledge show,
and teach us in her ways to go.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!
Oh, come, Desire of nations, bind
In one the hearts of all mankind;
Oh, bid our sad divisions cease,
And be yourself our King of Peace.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!
-----------------------------------------
So: it's advent. The four weeks before Christmas when we wait and long and hope for the coming of the Christ--for something better. Above are my favorite three verses of a classic advent hymn. I went to two different (VERY different) churches yesterday, and we sang this song at both places.
At St. Joan of Arc, the very liberal Catholic church my dad and I visited, they said that the heart of advent is "finding the extraordinary in the ordinary". I like that. This song has been 'ordinary' for me my whole life, and I've never liked it all that much. A lot of times it sounds suspiciously like a funeral dirge, evoking feelings very different from hope and expectation. This week, though, I found something extraordinary in it. This song is sung from the perspective of the Jewish people (Israel) longing for the Messiah to come. These three verses express hope that the Messiah will "ransom" the enslaved people, show them wisdom and knowledge* and bind their hearts together in peace. Isn't that what we still want? freedom, wisdom, and peace are almost universally desired.
But freedom from what? For the Jews of Jesus' day, it was freedom from the Roman empire--in 70 AD there was an armed insurrection which was promptly squashed. In fact, Jesus' non-violent ethic is specifically designed to encourage the oppressed Jews to creatively reclaim their dignity from cruel Roman rule, not through violence but through love. When the song says "Ransom captive Israel" the reference is to the exile, when the Israelites were captured by the mighty Babylonian empire. Many Christians today would read "ransom captive Israel" as a plea to be freed from the shackles of sin. That's all well and good--I certainly believe that we, as flawed humans, are desperately in need of release from cycles of violence, greed, and hate. But it's important too to consider that millions of people the world over are still living in slavery or in exile. Can we plead on their behalf?
The verse about peace can be read with a similar lens. When we privileged people ask God for peace, we are often asking for some kind of personal mental or psychological relief. Many of us, of course, are suffering very acutely from grief, loss, or some other non-peaceful sensation. If that is the case, to pray for peace for oneself is certainly justified. In some ways, though, we, as privileged people, need to be uncomfortable. David Selvaraj, the director of the place I stayed in India, says his work is to "comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable." Those of us with enough food, shelter, education, and dignity need to be disturbed by the fact that many people live without those rights. Can we sing this verse for them? Can we ask God to bind our hearts to theirs, so we too feel the pain of injustice?
The second verse says something to me about this Jesus fellow that we're always talking about. The path of knowledge that's asked for here could be wisdom to resolve an office squabble or successfully navigate relationship land mines (and don't get me wrong, those things are important!) but I think there's more to it than that. When I think about salvation, it's this wisdom that I turn to. Going to heaven is a great idea, and I won't deny that I'd like to end up there, but if that's all that salvation's about then Jesus doesn't mean that much to the world. I believe that salvation is really about Jesus' wisdom--about his social and ethical teachings on love, non-violence, and creative resistance to injustice. If we follow Jesus, really follow him, we can join with God in saving the world, in making it more like heaven here.
So it's advent. The time of hope, expectation, looking for something better. freedom, Wisdom, Peace... so I say, along with the world's poor and marginalized, Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel!
P.S. a little side-note: You know in the "wisdom" verse when it says "teach us in her ways to go"? The reason they use the feminine pronoun there is because in the book of Proverbs, 'Wisdom' is personified as a woman, Sophia. Even the ancient Israelites knew women were pretty rockin.
Friday, December 18, 2009
Sweet Home Minnesota...
I'm home.
It's cold here. There's a lot of space and nothing smells bad. It's like the opposite of claustrophobia. I miss waking up to birds singing, and I miss my friends from the program. I've hardly slept in the last 60 hours.
weird.
It's good to see my family though, and my bed is probably the most comfortable thing God ever invented. I'll be ok, but it might take a while to readjust. This requires a whole new kind of cultural sensitivity. Weird.
It's cold here. There's a lot of space and nothing smells bad. It's like the opposite of claustrophobia. I miss waking up to birds singing, and I miss my friends from the program. I've hardly slept in the last 60 hours.
weird.
It's good to see my family though, and my bed is probably the most comfortable thing God ever invented. I'll be ok, but it might take a while to readjust. This requires a whole new kind of cultural sensitivity. Weird.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Pilgrims
We're back in Bangalore now after a month on the road. We've had two units: Environment and Livelihood and Religion and Culture. If you're following along on a map, we've been to Orissa (Koraput district), Hyderabad, Andrha Pradesh (Zahirabad district), Delhi, Agra, and Varanasi.
Varanasi (also called Banaras) is one of the oldest living cities anywhere. It's situated on the Ganges and is probably the holiest site in Hinduism. Some people go to Varanasi when they know that death is near, hoping that it will speed their way to enlightenment. The river is lined all day with funeral pyres, pilgrims bathing in the holy water, and the poor washing clothes. When we were there on a sunrise boat-ride, the river was covered in a flock of migratory white birds. Like everything in India, this place is a paradox--both beautiful and horrifying.
Over the course of our week in Banaras, we visited about five Buddhist temples, two hindu temples, and a Catholic cathedral. We met with a Buddhist monk, a Hindu monk, a Jain scholar, and a Catholic sister and priest. We heard the bells in the temple of Durga, stood under an offshoot of the tree under which the Buddha achieved enlightenment, planted where he gave his first sermon, and celebrated an intimate mass for the first Sunday in advent. We bought some sweet t-shirts. We learned a lot of philosophy. We watched many, many episodes of "The Office" on someone's laptop.
I wrote the following poem after seeing the Ganges at sunrise. It incorporates (I realized after I wrote it) elements from almost every philosophy or religion we learned about this week.
Pilgrims
The birds, they say, are migratory.
White handfuls of wing and flight that
fling themselves, baptized,
off the water and against the sun
as it rises like blood to the brain.
They have nothing to lose
in such an action.
They are pilgrims like the rest of us.
They come to the holy water
to drink and to eat, to escape
the cold, to churn their muscles
so that they rise, again and again,
from a watery grave.
They are nothing but bellyfulls of
fish, and feathers pasted on cardboard.
They are caused, created by no one
but themselves and by my eyes.
The birds, they say, are migratory.
We are all pilgrims to the river,
and migrants to the world.
We are traveling in skin that
is not our own. We are clay
squeezed by no one's hand.
Our rudimentary minds,
handfuls of muscle,
see birds and river and
self with boundaries
drawn in chalk.
The water
wipes them away, like sin.
Varanasi (also called Banaras) is one of the oldest living cities anywhere. It's situated on the Ganges and is probably the holiest site in Hinduism. Some people go to Varanasi when they know that death is near, hoping that it will speed their way to enlightenment. The river is lined all day with funeral pyres, pilgrims bathing in the holy water, and the poor washing clothes. When we were there on a sunrise boat-ride, the river was covered in a flock of migratory white birds. Like everything in India, this place is a paradox--both beautiful and horrifying.
Over the course of our week in Banaras, we visited about five Buddhist temples, two hindu temples, and a Catholic cathedral. We met with a Buddhist monk, a Hindu monk, a Jain scholar, and a Catholic sister and priest. We heard the bells in the temple of Durga, stood under an offshoot of the tree under which the Buddha achieved enlightenment, planted where he gave his first sermon, and celebrated an intimate mass for the first Sunday in advent. We bought some sweet t-shirts. We learned a lot of philosophy. We watched many, many episodes of "The Office" on someone's laptop.
I wrote the following poem after seeing the Ganges at sunrise. It incorporates (I realized after I wrote it) elements from almost every philosophy or religion we learned about this week.
Pilgrims
The birds, they say, are migratory.
White handfuls of wing and flight that
fling themselves, baptized,
off the water and against the sun
as it rises like blood to the brain.
They have nothing to lose
in such an action.
They are pilgrims like the rest of us.
They come to the holy water
to drink and to eat, to escape
the cold, to churn their muscles
so that they rise, again and again,
from a watery grave.
They are nothing but bellyfulls of
fish, and feathers pasted on cardboard.
They are caused, created by no one
but themselves and by my eyes.
The birds, they say, are migratory.
We are all pilgrims to the river,
and migrants to the world.
We are traveling in skin that
is not our own. We are clay
squeezed by no one's hand.
Our rudimentary minds,
handfuls of muscle,
see birds and river and
self with boundaries
drawn in chalk.
The water
wipes them away, like sin.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
He-Oh, Bessay Nehai!
A month on the road sounds like a long time. Some days it feels like it-- like nothing would be nicer than my own space, my own food, my own people. To turn off India. Other days I can't fathom going home, and the snow and and the sidewalks and the giant houses seem all too close. How can I go back and be happy and well-fed and obscenely rich?
But here we are: one month on the road, two weeks back in Bangalore, and then home for Christmas. If you're following along on a map, we're hitting up Orissa (Koraput district), Hyderabad, Medak, Delhi, Agra, and Varanasi. Lots of planes, trains, and automobiles.
One week in and we're spending the weekend in Hyderabad. Last week was Koraput, a hilly rural district dotted with tribal villages. We visited several of them, and even spent the night in one. It was incredible. No advertisements. No trash on the ground. People living in and with the forest, taking from it and giving back. They had a mini-hydro-electric dam which gave them enough energy to run a mill and light their houses but didn't cause much environmental harm at all. They were incredibly kind. I can't explain how beautiful this place was, or the people. I learned to say 'very good' in the tribal language. Bessay Nehai. Yes. Very good.
We had a meeting there on climate change. They told us their story. The people here, who are deeply in tune with the earth's rhythms, noticed that their seasons were changing before they had ever heard the words 'climate change' or 'global warming'. The rainy season here has shrunk and the hot summer has expanded, making agriculture difficult. Wild fruits ripen at different times, and the food is smaller in size and less good to eat than before. Water is less plentiful. The star patterns, which they study to know when to plant and when to celebrate festivals, don't line up with the seasons like they used to. They had been wondering if they were being punished by God for something, that the earth itself is rebelling against them. Slowly, however, they learned that other villages, even other countries, are experiencing the same thing. Now they are worried about how to survive, how their children will survive in future generations. We tel them that they are by no means being punished (except, perhaps, for the actions of others)-- that the way they live in partnership with the earth is admirable, an example for the rest of us. We apologize for the role that we and our culture have contributed to the hardship they are experiencing, and tell them that together we want to try to stop it. And we tell them to keep telling their story—that people like us, too disconnected with the earth to notice these changes, need to hear from them. We need to know that livelihoods are being affected by our consumptive actions now, not just in some distant future. The people of Putsil are innocent in terms of climate-changing behavior, yet they are worried about their survival. Climate change is real, and its urgent. It needs more than our lip-service to change it—it needs our real dedication, our willingness to change our lifestyles, and all the ingenuity we can muster.
But here we are: one month on the road, two weeks back in Bangalore, and then home for Christmas. If you're following along on a map, we're hitting up Orissa (Koraput district), Hyderabad, Medak, Delhi, Agra, and Varanasi. Lots of planes, trains, and automobiles.
One week in and we're spending the weekend in Hyderabad. Last week was Koraput, a hilly rural district dotted with tribal villages. We visited several of them, and even spent the night in one. It was incredible. No advertisements. No trash on the ground. People living in and with the forest, taking from it and giving back. They had a mini-hydro-electric dam which gave them enough energy to run a mill and light their houses but didn't cause much environmental harm at all. They were incredibly kind. I can't explain how beautiful this place was, or the people. I learned to say 'very good' in the tribal language. Bessay Nehai. Yes. Very good.
We had a meeting there on climate change. They told us their story. The people here, who are deeply in tune with the earth's rhythms, noticed that their seasons were changing before they had ever heard the words 'climate change' or 'global warming'. The rainy season here has shrunk and the hot summer has expanded, making agriculture difficult. Wild fruits ripen at different times, and the food is smaller in size and less good to eat than before. Water is less plentiful. The star patterns, which they study to know when to plant and when to celebrate festivals, don't line up with the seasons like they used to. They had been wondering if they were being punished by God for something, that the earth itself is rebelling against them. Slowly, however, they learned that other villages, even other countries, are experiencing the same thing. Now they are worried about how to survive, how their children will survive in future generations. We tel them that they are by no means being punished (except, perhaps, for the actions of others)-- that the way they live in partnership with the earth is admirable, an example for the rest of us. We apologize for the role that we and our culture have contributed to the hardship they are experiencing, and tell them that together we want to try to stop it. And we tell them to keep telling their story—that people like us, too disconnected with the earth to notice these changes, need to hear from them. We need to know that livelihoods are being affected by our consumptive actions now, not just in some distant future. The people of Putsil are innocent in terms of climate-changing behavior, yet they are worried about their survival. Climate change is real, and its urgent. It needs more than our lip-service to change it—it needs our real dedication, our willingness to change our lifestyles, and all the ingenuity we can muster.
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