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The Mystery within... |
I treated myself to a new mattress in hopes it will help
alleviate some of my aches and pains.
The sales woman said if my current mattress were in good condition the
store would be able to donate it. That made me feel better about spending the
money. My new mattress was
delivered today. I look forward to
testing its therapeutic qualities tonight but the good feeling about the
donation has been dampened by the great neediness of so many people right here
in my state, not to mention the country, and world.
Earlier in the week my brother sent me a New Yorker magazine
article "Letter From Milwaukee – FORCED OUT – For many poor Americans,
eviction never ends." The
personal account of Milwaukee's poor and their landlords is heart wrenching. The author, Matthew Desmond states,
"For decades, social scientists, journalists, and policy makers have
focused on jobs, public assistance, parenting, and mass incarceration as the
central problems faced by the American poor, overlooking just how deeply
housing is implicated in the creation of poverty."
And a friend sent me this link to a Charlie Rose interview
with Serene Jones, http://www.charlierose.com/watch/60665355 first woman
President of Union Theological Seminary in New York City who laments we are a
nation in a state of moral collapse where we hear cheers for bigotry and
hatred. She calls for depth of
thinking about the human condition and asks that we not be afraid of moral
complexity. She said we have not
even begun to address two hundred years of systematized slavery sanctioned by
church and state. She says the
goal is simple, "Love each other—that's it. Our job is to figure out how do it."
In "God Never Hurries" I write of an encounter
that happened almost thirty years ago. I
was returning to work one day after lunch when I passed a young black man on a
downtown Milwaukee sidewalk. I
smiled and said, "Hi."
He shot back with, "Sure bitch, you can smile on your way back to
your fancy job! And I felt
guilty. I understood the
soulful quality of that encounter through my own experience of tyranny from
both my father and the church.
Listening to my inner voice helped me hear the voices of others
oppressed and disowned. As I worked to free myself through
understanding my complicity in tyranny, I decided I'd rather be the oppressed
than the oppressor. I might get crucified, but so what."
I am grateful for the new mattress I will lay down on
tonight, but I will also feel guilty.
What if we could truly appreciate our complicity in tyranny
and feel guilty?
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