Question TWO

If the first question we have to answer is, "Who am I?" one that comes in pretty close afterward is "With whom am I?" Another way of putting this is, "Who are my people?" Or, "Where do I belong?"

One answer which might be especially comfortable for progressive folks--and, perhaps, especially for progressive, well-educated, male, European-American, non-gay people--is "I am part of the human family! All of the world's people are "my people" and I belong wherever I am!" And this is, certainly, true in a sense. There is, in a deep way, only one human race and, as it says on the header of my blog, "we are one human family, on one fragile planet, in one miraculous universe, bound by love."

And yet we are also particular people. In the incredible documentary by Lee Mun Wah, The Color of Fear, an African-American man asks a European-American man what it's like to be white. When the man can't answer, the African-American man asks, "Don't you think that's strange?" And it is strange, yet the closer one is to the "cultural norm"--and as a straight, white, well-educated male I'm a veritable poster-child for the dominant culture's norm--the more one is encouraged to see one's own experience as "universal." But a lot of what I've experienced as "universal" has not been the experience of gay people, or black people, or women, or poor people, or people with physical handicaps, or . . . well . . . it turns out . . . most other people!

So yes, of course, we belong to the human family, but this question encourages us to examine the question of who it is with whom we identify, who it is we connect with--who is our particular family within the larger human family? In Richard Bach's wonderfull book, Illusions: adventures of a reluctant messiah, the character of Donald Shimoda carries something called "The Messiah's Handook" (which can now be purchased as a stand-alone book), and among its pithy wisdom is this:

The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy
in each other's life. Rarely do members of one family grow up under the
same roof.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. makes the same point in one of his works--that our real network of identity is far more vast and complex than simple bloodline. But as Jane Howard wrote,

"Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a
family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.”

So Question Two encourages us to ask, "With Whom Am I?"

In Gassho,

RevWik

Joe Bless You, George Carlin

Since learning about the death of George Carlin I've been trying to figure out a way to pay my respects. I grew up on his comedy and think that besides being incredibly funny he also fulfilled many of the important aspects of a true prophet--charging in to challenge, speaking truth to the Powers (whichever "powers" were being particularly stupid at the time.) I never met him, yet in that odd way that happens when celebreties die, I know that I will miss him.

Then I read the UU Blogger Peace Bang's tribute, which essentially consisted of a link to a video clip of one of Carlin's routines about religion that (while having some language some might find offensive) absolutely cracks me up. Maybe you, too. And while I don't agree with the theological conclusion he draws, his analysis of traditional (Christian) religion seems to me to be right on the money.

So check it out for yourself. And may I say,

Joe bless you, George Carlin. Joe bless us all.

(You'll know if you watch the video to the end . . .)

In Gassho,

RevWik

Question ONE

Okay, so yesterday I implied that the only question we need to engage is, "is the universe friendly or not" or one of its variants. And in some ways I believe that that's true.

I also think, though, that there are at least four questions we need to look at or that, at least, we find ourselves drawn to over and over again in our lives and in the recorded history of our species. So maybe we only need to answer the one, but we sure seem to want to answer the other four. Here they are:

• Who Am I?
• Whith Whom Am I?
• Where Am I?
• Whose Am I?

People often answer the first question with a list of their activities and engagements: I'm a Unitarian Universalist minister; I'm a husband and father; I'm an enthusiastic video viewer; I'm a juggler. But these are really answers to the question, "What do you do?" and we're often reminded that "you are not what you do." (You've no doubt seen the bumper sticker, "We are human beings not human doings!")

So going a bit deeper we then usually bring out our relationships: I am Erik, son of Walter, grandson of Frank; husband of Mary; father of Theo and Lester; brother of Patrick and Paul; child of God. And that gets closer, but is it as deep as we can go. Would "I" still be "me" if any of these relationships changed or ended (or never existed)?

At its deepest, I think that this first question--who am I?--really encourages us to explore human nature itself. Here are some other ways of getting at this question:

• Am I good or evil, free or determined, some of both, or a blank slate?
• Am I the center of the universe?
• Does life—my life?—have a purpose? (If so, what is it?)
• What do I value?
• What gives me strength and solace and what depletes me?

Try answering these questions sometime. Tomorrow we'll move on to Question Two.

In Gassho,

RevWik

THE question

Albert Einstein once said, "I think the most important question facing humanity is, 'Is the universe a friendly place?' This is the first and most basic question all people must answer for themselves." He continued:

"For if we decide that the universe is an unfriendly place, then we will use our technology, our scientific discoveries and our natural resources to achieve safety and power by creating bigger walls to keep out the unfriendliness and bigger weapons to destroy all that which is unfriendly-- and I believe that we are getting to a place where technology is powerful enough that we may either completely isolate or destroy ourselves as well in this process.

"If we decide that the universe is neither friendly nor unfriendly and that God is essentially 'playing dice with the universe', then we are simply victims to the random toss of the dice and our lives have no real purpose or meaning.

"But if we decide that the universe is a friendly place, then we will use our technology, our scientific discoveries and our natural resources to create tools and models for understanding that universe. Because power and safety will come through understanding its workings and its motives."

Thomas Merton once said, "Either you look at the universe as a very poor creation out of which no one can make anything, or you look at your own life and your own part in the universe as infintely rich, full of inexhaustible interest, opening out into the infitie futher possibilities for study and contemplation and praise."

The good people at Despair, Inc. have created this wonderful pessimist's mug so that you'll know the exact moment at which the glass becomes half-empty. Of course, this assumes an answer to the perennial question--that the glass is half-empty rather than half-full.

And yet, as I've written before, it's both. And, no doubt, the universe is both friendly and unfriendly, a "very poor creation" and "infinitely rich [and] full of inexhaustible interest." We live in a both/and universe--where light is both wave and particle and only "becomes" one when we look at it that way. Which way will you look at life? At your life?

In the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 30, God is remembered as telling the people, "I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. . . . I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses," and God then encourages them to "choose life."

Which do you choose? Which will you choose right now?

In Gassho,

RevWik

The Girl Who Silenced the World at the UN

This video recently came to my attention, and I absolutely must bring it to all of yours. I've written before about people who've inspired me by their courage in "speaking truth to power" and in standing up and doing the something that they can do. (One of the Greek terms that is usually translated in the Christian Scriptures as "sin" actually means, "lying down when you should have been standing up.")

Born and raised in Vancouver, Severn Suzuki has been working on environmental and social justice issues since kindergarten. At age 9, she and some friends started the Environmental Children's Organization (ECO), a small group of children committed to learning and teaching other kids about environmental issues. They traveled to 1992's UN Earth Summit, where 12 year-old Severn gave this powerful speech that deeply affected (and silenced) some of the most prominent world leaders. The speech had such an impact that she has become a frequent invitee to many UN conferences.

Please listen not only to this young person's words, but to the deeper message in the fact that a 12 year-old is speaking them to the United Nations. What could you be doing?

in Gassho,

Rev. Wik

To get a text copy of the speech, click here

Why I'm Voting Republican

Things have been a little tumultous at First Parish in Brewster, since the announcement of my resignation to take a job at the Unitarian Universalist Association in Boston. I'm very excited about the new position--and will write more about it anon--but it has set me off my blogging schedule.

This doesn't quite make up for my missed posts, but since I've now learned how to embedd these YouTube videos, I'll share this one with you as well.

in Gassho,

Rev. Wik

After all these years . . .

I just can't resist posting this so that you, too, can finally learn the answer to the mystery that has plagued the ages . . . just what the heck was Joe Cocker singing at Woodstock in 1969?

A word of warning. This may change the way you hear the song forever. It may also get you interested in probiotics. (Watch, and you'll know why.)

in Gassho,

RevWik

Rev. Wright in a Different Light

The following was written William A. Von Hoene Jr. and published in the Chicago Tribune on March 26, 2008. I think it needs a wider audience.

As a preacher myself I know that I've said a few things over the years that, if pulled from their context, would sound far different than they had when I preached them. I've even preached some things that if they were heard in their totality would be controversial.

Why is it so hard for some people to understand that you can be angry--really volcanically angry--without that being all you're capable of? I think of the wonderful scene in the movie The Apostle, in which Robert Duvall's character prays, "I'm mad at you God. I love you. But I'm mad at you." I think, too, of just about every parent I've ever known who at some time(s) or other just wants to kill their kids yet who still love them with every fiber of their being.

Anyway, here's William A. Von Hoene Jr.'s column:

During the last two weeks, excerpts from sermons of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., pastor for more than 35 years at Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's South Side, have flooded the airwaves and dominated our discourse about the presidential campaign and race. Wright has been depicted as a racial extremist, or just a plain racist. A number of political figures and news commentators have attempted to use Sen. Barack Obama's association with him to call into question Obama's judgment and the sincerity of his commitment to unity.I have been a member of Trinity, a church with an almost entirely African-American congregation, for more than 25 years. I am, however, a white male. From a decidedly different perspective than most Trinitarians, I have heard Wright preach about racial inequality many times, in unvarnished and passionate terms.In Obama's recent speech in Philadelphia on racial issues confronting our nation, the senator eloquently observed that Rev. Wright's sermons reflect the difficult experiences and frustrations of a generation.

It is important that we understand the dynamic Obama spoke about.

It also is important that we not let media coverage and political gamesmanship isolate selected remarks by Wright to the exclusion of anything else that might define him more accurately and completely.

I find it very troubling that we have distilled Wright's 35-year ministry to a few phrases; no context whatsoever has been offered or explored.

I do have a bit of personal context. About 26 years ago, I became engaged to my wife, an African-American. She was at that time and remains a member of Trinity. Somewhere between the ring and the altar, my wife had second thoughts and broke off the engagement. Her decision was grounded in race: So committed to black causes, the daughter of parents subjected to unthinkable prejudice over the years, an "up-and-coming" leader in the young black community, how could she marry a white man?

Rev. Wright, whom I had met only in passing at the time and who was equally if not more outspoken about "black" issues than he is today, somehow found out about my wife's decision. He called and asked her to "drop everything" and meet with him at Trinity. He spent four hours explaining his reaction to her decision. Racial divisions were unacceptable, he said, no matter how great or prolonged the pain that caused them. God would not want us to assess or make decisions about people based on race. The world could make progress on issues of race only if people were prepared to break down barriers that were much easier to let stand.

Rev. Wright was pretty persuasive; he presided over our wedding a few months later. In the years since, I have watched in utter awe as Wright has overseen and constructed a support system for thousands in need on the South Side that is far more impressive and effective than any governmental program possibly could approach. And never in my life have I been welcomed more warmly and sincerely than at Trinity. Never.

I hope that as a nation, we take advantage of the opportunity the recent focus on Rev. Wright presents—to advance our dialogue on race in a meaningful and unprecedented way. To do so, however, we need to appreciate that passion born of difficulty does not always manifest itself in the kind of words with which we are most comfortable. We also need to recognize that the basic goodness of people like Jeremiah Wright is not always packaged conventionally.

The problems of race confronting us are immense. But if we sensationalize isolated words for political advantage, casting aside the depth of feeling, circumstances and context which inform them, those problems not only will remain immense, they will be insoluble.

William A. Von Hoene Jr. of Chicago is a member of Trinity United
Church of Christ.

Our popular culture does not seem to do well with complexity and nuance. Life, on the other hand, seems to have pretty much nothing but.

In Gassho,

RevWik

The Wisdom of Willie Nelson

A while ago I had the idea of preaching a sermon series called "The Wisdom of . . ." with each week focusing on the wisdom of another figure. The idea came to me one day while I was cleaning the house and having my CD player shuffle through a number of different artists. "Wow! There's a sermon in that!" I kept thinking again and again and again. So I imagined preaching on the Wisdom of Stevie Wonder, the Wisdom of Sting, the Wisdom of Chris Williamson. You get the idea.

The closest I've come to seeing this idea reach fruition is a sermon I called "Willie Nelson and the Non-Toothache," in which I took a stanza from a Willie Nelson song and linked it with a teaching of the Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh about the state of "non-toothache."

Simply put, this teaching is that it's worth noting that most of the time we don't have a toothache. That may not seem overly important, but take a minute to think about that! When we DO have a toothache we're crying and moaning and saying, "If only I didn't have a toothache . . ." Well, unless you have a toothache right now (in which case you need the non-charlie-horse meditation) you are presently in that longed for state. Are you aware of that? Are you appreciating it?

There's a great Willie Nelson song called "Good Times" in which he reminisces about times past that were the kinds of moments from a life that you remember as the good times. The last verse goes like this:

Here I sit with a drink and a memory. / I'm not cold, I'm not wet,
and I'm not hungry. / Classify these as good times. / Good times.

I'm not cold, I'm not wet, and I'm not hungry. I don't have a toothache. And neither, probably, do you.

In Gassho,

RevWik

Can you believe your eyes?

Isn't this amazing? In actual, objective fact this is a static picture. Yet our minds create the sense of movement in it. (If you really want to get it spinning, click on the image to blow it up. You can get it to stop if you stare at one point for a couple of seconds. )

Do you know what's even more amazing? The computer screen on which you're looking at this, the desk on which the computer screen sits, the chair on which you sit--you, yourself, if you want to go all out with this--all seem to be static objects and yet, in actual, objective fact are collectives of infinitesimally small bits of energy whirling and swirling around mind numbingly huge expanses of empty space

I went to see Horton Hears a Who the other day and was reminded of all those late night conversations I had in high school and college about whether or not our whole universe is really a microscopic organism in some giant's big toe. And I recently read an article in a popular science magazine about the lively conversation among scienctists about concepts of a multiverse in which our universe is but one of an infinite number of universes.

What is "real"? Am I, as Chuan Tzu asked, a person dreaming I'm a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming I'm a person? Am I a concrete independent person or a swirling pattern of energy? Am I a static two-dimensional image or a moving picture?

in Gassho,

RevWik

Epiphany

There might be some who would say that Eastertide is the wrong time to be writing about ephiphany. But "epiphany" is not only the Christian holy day twelve days after Christmas. AN epiphany is defined as, "a sudden manifestation of the essence or meaning of something," or, "a comprehension or perception of reality by means of a sudden intuitive realization." For those who remember their Robert Heinlein, an epiphany is extremely similar to the Martian notion of grokking, which means, "to understand so thoroughly that the observer becomes a part of the observed." (That's from Stranger in a Strange Land.)

An epiphany could be described as a spiritual realization, one in which you do not simply understand something new but through which you and the world around you become something new. Once experienced, things are forever different.

I thought of this recently when I found myself musing on an experience I keep having since my partner gave me an ipod for my birthday. I've downloaded a number of songs that I'd listened to growing up, and I keep hearing things--bass lines, drum rhythms--that I hadn't noticed before. Now that I've heard them, though, I can't not hear them, even when I'm listening to my old LPs in less than perfect conditions. What once was inaudible to me, now that I'm aware of it, sings out crystal clear.

And that reminded me of those old optical illusions in which two images are together in one picture. Is this an image of a young woman with her face turned away from us, or is it an elderly woman with her chin tucked into the fur of her coat? Usually people see only one or the other at first. Sometimes it takes a real (and oft times frustrating) effort to see the other. When one does, though, it becomes virtually impossible not to see the image--sometimes to the point of it being hard now to see the image one saw at first.

And so it is with the spiritual realization. What at first was unseen or unheard--what was in the background is now the foreground. Take, for instance, the idea that the real question of Eastertime is not "do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus" but "have you experienced resurrection in your own life?" The most important thing to consider this season is not whether or not a Jewish teacher of some two thousand years ago got up and walked out of his tomb, but whether or not you have ever gotten free from the "tomb" of your own experience.

Perhaps that "tomb" was a depression, or the crushing end of a relationship, the loss of a job (or hope), the death of a loved one, an encounter with your own mortality. The real question raised by Easter is whether or not you have ever risen from your tomb, whether you've ever been raised to new life, renewed life.

Once we realize that these ancient stories are our stories, are pointers to our own lived experiences, you and the world around you become something new.

Hallelujah.

In Gassho,

RevWik

Let’s Just Follow The Rules

In this campaign season politicians and commentators on the Right are continuing to maintain that the United States was, is, and always should be “a Christian Nation.” Folks on the left seem to be falling over themselves to establish their own bona fides as God fearing religious women and men. Whether or not this is a good thing is open for debate. It is, however, the way things are. Religion and the religiosity of the candidates is clearly and firmly on the table for discussion. And since this is the way things are, I have a suggestion to make to all of the candidates and all of their supporters: let’s just follow the rules.

I want to be clear, from my perspective as a Unitarian Universalist clergy person I am not talking about the rules laid down by the RNC or the DNC, by the Federal Elections Committee or even the US Constitution. I’m suggesting that the candidates follow THE rule, the so-called “Golden Rule,” the rule that says, “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.” That’s the Christian version of this rule, but it shows up in just about every one of humanity’s religions. Buddhism says, “hurt not others in ways you would find hurtful.” Islam says, “No one of you is a believer until you desire for your brothers and sisters what you desire for yourself.” Judaism says, “What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellows.” The British Humanist Society says, “Don’t do things you wouldn’t want done to you.” From Bah’ai’ to Zoroastrianism there are numerous other variations, yet among them all there is a remarkable consistency in the core message.

And it translates well, I think, into the political realm. So, for all of you candidates—and all of your supporters—for whom being religious is so important, here are some translations of the rules into terms appropriate for you:

• Do not run such ads as you’d call “false” and “misleading” if your opponents ran them about you.
• Do not distort statistics in a way that if your opponent did it you’d call it unfair.
• Do not present your opponent’s positions in ways you’d not want them to do of your own.
• Do not present your own positions in ways you’d begrudge your opponent. (See again the rule about statistics, for instance.)
• Do not decry behavior in your opponent which you yourself (or your supporters) are doing.

This does not mean, of course, that you can’t point out real differences. It just means that you shouldn’t do it by means you wouldn’t want your opponent to use. Naturally you will highlight your strengths and try to obscure your weaknesses. And so will your opponent. It’s human nature. So don’t waste time and energy complaining about it when they do—especially don’t accuse them of being misleading or dishonest, since you know you’re doing it too. And when you do it, don’t do it in a way that if they did it you’d have something to complain about. Follow the rules.

The popular wisdom may be that all that we, the electorate, want is drama, but the truth is that what we’d really like is the solid information we need in order to make a truly informed decision come November. Show us who you really are and not who you think we want you to be. Forget the pretty packaging, and show us the truth. Forget manipulating the data and tell us who you are—warts and all, strengths and weaknesses both. We may dream of a perfect President, yet we know we’re going to have to settle for a human being. So show us who you are, and if you really are the best candidate—with both your flaws and your greatness in place—we’ll know. After all, if you’re elected we’ll find out soon enough.

It’s one thing to be seen showing up at a church or other religious buildings and to put religious words and phrases into your stump speeches, but that’s not what being religious is really all about. As the Jerry Rubin once put it, “Don’t tell me what you believe. Show me what you do 24 hours a day and I’ll tell you what you believe.” If you want to convincince me that you’re a religious person, then run a campaign that follows the rules.

In Gassho,

RevWik

Tell Me Where The Miracles End

I have told the story many times in sermons of a walk in the woods I took once during a silent retreat. I came across a piece of quartz sticking out of the ground--it was about the size of a human head, and it was in a clearing so that it had been soaking in sunshine all morning.

It seemed like an auspicious site to me, so I sat down to meditate. At some point I "heard" the words (that's the only way I can describe it), "Take off your shoes, this is holy ground." I did as I was told, I reverently removed my sneakers and set them aside.

When my meditation was over I decided to continue my walk and was about to put my shoes back on when I suddenly realized that I couldn't tell where the "holy ground" stopped and the regular old ground began. So I kept my shoes off for the rest of the walk.

When I got back to the retreat center I was about to put my shoes back on but wondered why the ground outside was "holy" but the floors inside were not. So I kept my shoes off. I'd like to say that I never put my shoes on again, but I did. Still, to remind myself of this experience I do take my shoes off whenever I preach or lead a workshop. Everything, I'd learned, is holy ground.

Yesterday I was flying back to Cape Cod from a conference I'd been attending in Kentucky. I love to fly, and while I understand the physics of flight it never ceases to be a magical, a miraculous experience for me. During my flight yesterday I started thinking about other magical, miraculous experiences. I started thinking about how amazing our "horseless carriages" are. Or that we can press a button and suddenly see moving pictures . Or that we can flick a switch and have light. Or that we can eat food and turn it into body parts. Or that the energy that makes our hearts beat comes from the Big Bang itself.

Oh, for the most part I understand the science behind these things. Yet tell me, where do the miracles stop? Albert Einstein said that we have a choice between two ways of living in the world--as though nothing is a miracle, or as though everything is.

In Gassho,

Rev Wik

First Tinky Winky . . .

J.K. Rowling, author of the wildly popular Harry Potter books, recently announced that she'd always thought that Albus Dumbledore, the headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, is gay. (Click here to see how Publisher's Weekly reported this story, and here for a New York Times piece about how the blogosphere is responding.)

Some are saying that she should have been more explicit about it; others are calling it much ado about nothing. I, for one, am glad to know and glad that it was never more of an issue. (I'll happily admit to being a huge fan of the series!)

There are so many things that go into a person's identity and our sexual orientation--or "affectional preference"--is but one piece of it. Does my being a one-time french horn player make me unfit for military service, underserving of the same opportunities to rent or buy real estate, or unable to make a life-long commitment? Does my being a lover of comic books make me a poor choice to be a preacher? (There are impressionable youngsters around, you know.)

I know I'm being silly. One's sexual orienation is considerably more important an element of a person's identity than whether or not one plays an instrument or follows the exploits of the Batman. Still, it is only one element, no matter how vigorously some try to make it the defining element.

I am glad to know that Dumbledore is gay. It's one more think I know about this "person" I've come to admire. And I'm glad that I didn't know before this, because there was absolutely no way in which his sexual orientation played any part in the story.

As is so often the case.

In Gassho,

RevWik

All Work and No Play

One of my favorite quotations comes from the poet Louise Bogan. She wrote,

"I cannot believe that the inscrutable universe turns on an axis of suffering;
surely the strange beauty of the world must somwhere rest on pure joy."

I had to post this photo of the Elders as a counterpoint to the more formal shot I used in my last post.

RevWik

A New Day Dawning

I have written before about stories from the news that have given me hope--that someone somewhere is crazy enough to get into a lawn chair rigged with balloons and go for a ride, that someone else will get on a Torro mower and drive from Alaska to Maryland. These things, I've said, have been for me like the sight of a blade of grass that has pushed its way through the asphalt--a reminder and the promise that life will always be free.

Yesterday I came across a story that I had heard nothing about but which fills me with true, deep hope for our future as a species and which feels to me a signal that a new day is indeed dawning. In July, on Nelson Mandela's 89th birthday, Mandela and several others announced the formation of a new group--The Elders. Like traditional elders for our global village, these women and men have come together to "support courage where there is fear, foster agreement where there is conflict, and inspire hope where there is despair."\

The list of founding members is indeed illustrious: Nelson Mandela, Graça Machel, Desmond Tutu, Kofi Annan, Ela Bhatt, Lakhdar Brahimi, Gro Brundtland, Jimmy Carter, Fernando H Cardoso, Li Zhaoxing, Mary Robinson, Muhammad Yunus.

"This group," quoting Mandela again, "can speak freely and boldly, working both publicly and behind the scenes on whatever actions need to be taken."

A brief video introduces the group, and a press release gives more details (see "Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu announce The Elders .")

I think a remark from Desmond Tutu, the group's chair, puts it in perspective for me:

"Despite all the ghastliness that is around, human beings are made for goodness. The ones who ought to be held in high regard are not the ones who are militarily powerful, nor even econcomically prosperious. They are the ones who have a commitment to try and make the world a better place. We--the Elders--will endeavor to support those people and do our best for humanity."

This may sound corny, but I really do think I'll sleep better tonight.

In Gassho,

RevWik

Many Lives

I was recently reading a friend's blog and was reminded of the reason Henry David Thoreau gave for leaving his little house on Walden Pond. "I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live, and could not spare any more time for that one." (See chapter 18)

My friend, David Heald, was writing about his decision to leave the parish ministry--check out his Transparent Eyeball Blog entry, "Many More Lives To Live." I've also known people who left careers to become parish ministers. My own older brother, after many years in the computer field, recently became a social worker. All around us there are people who, as Thoreau also said, are living "lives of quiet desperation," yet also all around us there are people who have the courage to strike out and do something new.

One of the things that always appealed to me about the Highlander TV show was the idea of these immortals who'd had "many lifetimes" in which they could pursue many different paths--the same woman or man who'd been a concert pianist, a surgeon, a mercinary, a monk. I always thought it would be a wonderful thing to have the opportunity to live many different lives, and here's old Henry David talking about doing so within his own, limited, lifespan; about leaving one life for any of the "several more" that were waiting for him. And, as it turns out, I've known people who've done it.

I haven't before solicited comments on my blog, but I'm going to try it out. I'd really love to hear from people who've "changed lives":

• How did you know it was time to move on?
• How did you go about doing it?
• What was it like to do something new?
• How do you feel about it now?

There are so many reasons for despair in our world, and there are so many reasons for hope. Which stories would you rather hear?

In Gassho,

RevWik

What a Wonderful World (cont'd.)

Okay, so we have Paul Woods, the guy who's riding across the country on his Torro mower. Now we have Kent Couch, a 47-year old gas station owner who recently settled back and traveled nearly two hundred miles . . . carried by the 105 large helium balloons he'd attached to his lawn chair! [Read the AP story here.]

Mr. Couch is not the first person to go flying in a lawn chair. That honor goes to Larry Walters who, in 1982 flew for a distance of only about ten miles but acheived an altitude of three miles on a lawnchair to which he'd attached forty five weather balloons. This put him up where the airplanes fly, and two pilots radioed air traffic control to report seeing a man flying on a chair. The FAA took this seriously and immdediately reported that they would charge him "as soon as we figure out which part [of the FAA code] he violated." [Check his story out here.]

I've written this before and will no doubt come back to this theme again: we live in a wonderful world.

In Gassho,

RevWik

Doing the Numbers

In every broadcast of American Public Media's Marketplace a point comes when the host says, "Let's do the numbers." And every morning, on my way to work, I hear the media doing numbers of a different kind: the number of casualties from the latest suicide bombing in Iraq, the number of American military killed in the most recent skirmish.

I suppose it's important for us to know about these numbers. They help us to understand what's called "the human cost" of our species' penchant for violence. And if we can think of them as people and not just numbers, perhaps our hearts will be moved to really work for peace. (Remember Stalin's famous remark, "The death of one person is a tragedy; the death of millions is a statistic.")

Yet it seems to me that if we need to know these numbers, there are some other numbers we should know as well:

• The number of children who died since yesterday because of a lack of access to healthcare;
• The number of people of color who were harrassed and arrested simply because of the color of their skin and a police officer's assumptions about that;
• The number of gay, lesbian, and transgender kids who were taunted, shunned, and even beaten just for being who they are;

And better yet, what about these numbers:

• The number of alcoholics who lived one more day of sobriety;
• The number of stressed out, overworked parents who didn't hit their kids;
• The number of people facing seemingly impossible odds who made a decision to change their lives . . . and began to act on it;
• The number of acts of kindness performed without thought to recompense;
• The number of strangers who became friends;
• The number of people who's lives were saved by acts of love

Surely there are many numbers we need to know about in order to make sense out of the world we live in. And, as it's often been noted, what we choose to make the focus of our attention helps determine our experience of that world. So next time you "do the numbers," think carefully about what numbers you do.

In Gassho,

RevWik

What You See Is What You Get

Okay, so let's assume that we agree that the fundamental Big Question is whether or not there is a Go(o)d. What if the answer is both "yes" and "no" and the determination is made when we choose our answer? What if this question is like the poll that's been on this site for so long--is the glass half full or half empty? The answer to that one, of course, is that it is both, or either, and that you and I get to choose which it is.

This may seem to be some kind of wishy-washy cop out. How can there both be and not be a Go(o)d? Certainly the theists or the atheists must be right, one or the other. Certainly there is an answer, how else can we possibly act with any kind of assurance that the answer we've "chosen" is the right one?

I know that it's dangerous to take scientific theories and apply them to philosophies or social constructs, but religious language is essentially poetic; it doesn't deal with facts and figures but with the sense of things. So it seems perfectly appropriate to apply the language of science--as poetry--to the Big Questions we face in our living.

And one of the things we've learned from modern science is that we live in a pretty weird world. The scientist and science fiction writer Arthur C. Clark once wrote, "The universe is not only more strange than you imagine. It is more strange than you can imagine." And it does seem that we live in a fundamentally both/and universe.

Consider light. Physics tells us that there are essentially two distinct states--waves and particles. Yet quantum physics tells us that light appears to be both or, perhaps more confusingly, it can be either depending on what you're looking for. If you conduct an experiment to examine light as a wave, then it shows up as a wave; if your experiment is designed to look at light as a particle, it is there as a particle. And taking this a step further, physicists tell us that it is more accurate to say that light is either, or neither, wave or particle until you look at it as one or the other at which point it becomes precisely what you're looking for.

Hard as this is to wrap our heads around, it seems that it's not only light that can exist in two seemingly discreet and contradictory states simultaneously. Even more weird than the state of protons there is the famous thought experiment that has come to be called Schrodinger's Cat in which a cat is placed in a sealed box along with a mechanism that creates a 50/50 chance of killing the cat. According to an application of quantum law the cat can be meaningfully said to be both alive and dead until an observer opens the box. (Here's an explanation of all this . . . in verse no less!)

Alive and dead; wave and particle; half full and half empty. To paraphrase the Preacher of the Jewish book of Ecclesiastes, "Paradox, paradox! All is paradox."

What if God is the same way? (And here I'll just start using the three-letter version because I hope it's evident by now that I'm not talking that God when I use the term--whatever "that God" is for you.) What if God can be meaningfully said to be both existent and non-existent, both real and a delusion with the determinant being what it is that you're looking for? Like the scientist looking at light it's a particle if that's what the experiment is looking at and it's a wave when that's what's being studied. So God is for those who seek God, and equally is not for those who don't.

Perhaps this is what Jesus meant in the phrase he is remembered as saying so often, "for those who have eyes, let them see . . ." or where comes the certainty in the encouragement, "seek and you will find."

In Gassho,

RevWik