I've been thinking about the Occupy DC (and sister) movements. I got a chance to visit Freedom Plaza when marching for voting rights last weekend. And it preparation for my platform this Sunday, I've been doing a lot of reading about the national movement--what it wants, what it means, what it tells us about America.
The movement will just be a small part of Sunday's platform, but I have a feeling I'll be thinking more about it in the weeks and months to come. In the meantime, I wanted to share the blog of a WES member who spent a night camping in Freedom Plaza this past week.
Somehow as I think about this I keep coming back to something a college friend said. From a former Soviet Socialist Republic, Irina was a tiny person with a strong accent and a very different experience in the world. As we talked about politics in America, she pointed out that eventually Americans could change the system. "If they don't have enough bread," she said, "they will revolt."
At the time I thought she just didn't understand how America worked, that I couldn't quite see the revolution for bread happening here. Now I wonder if she wasn't just ahead of her time.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Changing Like the Leaves
This seems to be the week that all the trees are suddenly changing color. Everywhere I turn, there's a burst of orange, a flame of red to greet me.
My daughter asked me the other day how the leaves change color, and I realized I didn't know. So we trooped off to the library to look for a book that would tell us, and found a great one that follows a tree's lifespan.
It turns out that leaves change color because, as sun becomes more scarce, they are no longer able to make the chlorophyll that gives them the vibrant green. As the green disappears, we see the oranges, reds, and browns that were already present in the leaf--but masked by the overpowering color of chlorophyll. This was a revelation to me, the idea that those deep and beautiful colors are already in the leaf, hidden away but waiting for their moment to appear. It gave me an interesting way of thinking about change, that sometimes we are not acquiring something new but rather allowing what was always there to come to light.
It made me wonder: what colors do we hold inside ourselves, masked by the green, waiting to show themselves?
My daughter asked me the other day how the leaves change color, and I realized I didn't know. So we trooped off to the library to look for a book that would tell us, and found a great one that follows a tree's lifespan.
It turns out that leaves change color because, as sun becomes more scarce, they are no longer able to make the chlorophyll that gives them the vibrant green. As the green disappears, we see the oranges, reds, and browns that were already present in the leaf--but masked by the overpowering color of chlorophyll. This was a revelation to me, the idea that those deep and beautiful colors are already in the leaf, hidden away but waiting for their moment to appear. It gave me an interesting way of thinking about change, that sometimes we are not acquiring something new but rather allowing what was always there to come to light.
It made me wonder: what colors do we hold inside ourselves, masked by the green, waiting to show themselves?
Friday, October 7, 2011
Mourning Our Innovators
I've been thinking a lot about why so many of us have been affected by Steve Jobs' death. I had a moment of real sadness and shock when I saw the headline, and Facebook lit up that day with people's reactions to his death. Of course any death is sad, but why are we--who didn't know him--so sad?
I can tell you the answer doesn't have to do with how much we like our ipods. Or not exactly, anyway. My sense is that one reason we mourn people like Steve Jobs so deeply is that we are aware of how special he was; we know he was an innovator, a creator, on a scale that we don't see just every day. Just like Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan creator of the Greenbelt movement who also died recently, Steve Jobs was a rare human being.
And somehow, there is something human about us that instinctively recognizes that rarity, that celebrates their place as part of humanity--as giving to humanity in a particular way. Paradoxically, their celebrity in this case is really about our connection to them as fellow human beings, ones that we know have particularly contributed to our humanness writ large.
I can tell you the answer doesn't have to do with how much we like our ipods. Or not exactly, anyway. My sense is that one reason we mourn people like Steve Jobs so deeply is that we are aware of how special he was; we know he was an innovator, a creator, on a scale that we don't see just every day. Just like Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan creator of the Greenbelt movement who also died recently, Steve Jobs was a rare human being.
And somehow, there is something human about us that instinctively recognizes that rarity, that celebrates their place as part of humanity--as giving to humanity in a particular way. Paradoxically, their celebrity in this case is really about our connection to them as fellow human beings, ones that we know have particularly contributed to our humanness writ large.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Apology Accepted?
My daughter goes to a Jewish preschool (sort of by accident--we loved the preschool and then realized it was Jewish), so of course she's been learning a little bit about Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Featured prominently is a song called "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm really really sorry." I heard her singing this at home and thought...oh great, another way for her to get out of doing the right thing.
Wait, what?! That's right, I am annoyed by my daughter saying sorry so much. She's great at apologizing, and I often find myself thinking (and sometimes saying) "Well, it's nice to apologize, but it would be better not to do the bad thing in the first place."
But how does this parenting experience resonate with my broader belief in the power of apology, and in the possibility of redemption? Does it all fall apart when I'm called on to actually walk the walk with a three year old?
I think the answer is found in what can, or should, accompany an apology. The times when I get frustrated are when I observe my daughter repeating the same behavior without trying to change it...and thinking that it's all right if she just apologizes afterward. So the solution, I think, is in the extent to which we are open to actually changing our behavior, to transformation. Mary, the other clergyperson at the Washington Ethical Society, gave a great platform about transformation last Sunday. And it turns out that the song my daughter learned has the idea embedded in it: the last verse goes "I won't do that again."
Apologies are wonderful. Transformations are even better. Here's hoping for both of them in all our lives.
Wait, what?! That's right, I am annoyed by my daughter saying sorry so much. She's great at apologizing, and I often find myself thinking (and sometimes saying) "Well, it's nice to apologize, but it would be better not to do the bad thing in the first place."
But how does this parenting experience resonate with my broader belief in the power of apology, and in the possibility of redemption? Does it all fall apart when I'm called on to actually walk the walk with a three year old?
I think the answer is found in what can, or should, accompany an apology. The times when I get frustrated are when I observe my daughter repeating the same behavior without trying to change it...and thinking that it's all right if she just apologizes afterward. So the solution, I think, is in the extent to which we are open to actually changing our behavior, to transformation. Mary, the other clergyperson at the Washington Ethical Society, gave a great platform about transformation last Sunday. And it turns out that the song my daughter learned has the idea embedded in it: the last verse goes "I won't do that again."
Apologies are wonderful. Transformations are even better. Here's hoping for both of them in all our lives.
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