Sentient beings

Sentient beings

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The truth is that we share this planet with all sorts of sentient beings. And who is to say that the things we consider insentient indeed are so? Our job, quite simply, whether homo sapiens, ursus maritimus, salvia rosmarinus, pegmatite, or canis lupus familiaris, is to live fully, to get along, and to reflect the glory of the one who made us.

As human beings, we like to think ourselves masters of the universe, which is a laughable and ludicrous notion. It takes all we can muster just to hang on for a few brief moments in time. We do better to think ourselves as servants of the small slice of this wide and exuberant and inscrutable world to which we are granted access.

A servant seeks to serve: to enrich, improve, embellish, enable the quality of being for the one served. A servant acts with due caution, with careful consideration, with constant vigilance, with a gentle and measured touch. A servant is happy when the one served is happy.

This is a happy world if we will see it a it is, if we open eyes and ears and fingers to its wonders, if we let it be what it is rather than subverting its dignity to feed our own lust and greed. Look, listen, touch, breathe. Bury your nose in the luxurious grey fur of your Aussie. Stroke the tufts of hair behind her ears and listen to her pleading yelps. Watch her run with utter abandon, flinging herself atop a head-high mound of snow only to press her muzzle deep into its cold and grainy recesses.

Try to experience the world through her eyes and ears and nose and mouth and body: instantly attentive to the sudden call of a crow hundreds of yards away: plunging eagerly into the frigid waters of a spring freshet; drawn with insatiable curiosity to the humanly-undetected scent of a decaying porcupine; standing still, nose in the air, drinking in all the marvels borne on the back of the early spring breeze; grabbing up a branch much too big to handle — but who cares! — running with it, dancing with it, leaping with it, for no purpose other than sheer joy; jumping and barking and turning circles for no other reason than than the one you love, the one who loves you, has come home again.

Dare we say her life is enriched by our love as ours are by hers? Dare we say a vernal pool or pileated woodpecker or quaking aspen or tallgrass prairie or glacial erractic is enriched by our care and attention and appreciation and respect as we are by theirs? We are blessed with them and they with us. And that is what we must remember.

“Our world, and the worlds around and within it, is aflame with shades of brilliance we cannot fathom — and is far more vibrant, far more holy, than we could ever imagine.” (Sy Montgomery)

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What this is

What this is

Limiting press access, usurping congressional authority to create agencies and allocate funds, ignoring the courts, tying disaster relief to a narrow political agenda, ending international cooperation and humanitarian assistance — this is nothing more and nothing less than an all-out assault on American democracy.

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fourteen hundred and forty-six

fourteen hundred and forty-six

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in fourteen hundred and forty-six days
this will be past
anguish and outrage
heartsickness and shame
relics to lay by
against future need

in fourteen hundred and forty-six days
we will move on
gathering shattered shards of
lives torn asunder
rising from the ash heap to
rebuild what we can

in fourteen hundred and forty-six days
we will stand side by side
taking the hand
of friend and stranger
promising truth and
practicing compassion

in fourteen hundred and forty-six days
we will turn the page
showing mercy where
none has been shown
foregoing vengeance
lest its lure ruin us

in fourteen hundred and forty-six days
we will look to the future
mourning the damage
that cannot be undone
but believing the arc
does bend toward justice

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Shame!

Shame!

Shame! Shame! Shame!

This is what we are eliminating: “USAID’s Food for Peace (FFP) Program works for a world free of hunger and poverty, where people live in dignity, peace, and security. FFP and its partners share one mission: to reduce hunger and malnutrition and assure that people everywhere have enough food at all times for healthy, productive lives.” The cost is likely to be tens of millions of lives.

WASHINGTON — Staffers of the U.S. Agency for International Development were instructed to stay out of the agency’s Washington headquarters on Monday, according to a notice distributed to them, after billionaire Elon Musk announced President Donald Trump had agreed with him to shut the agency.

USAID staffers said they also tracked more than 600 employees who reported being locked out of the agency’s computer systems overnight. Those still in the system received emails saying that “at the direction of Agency leadership” the headquarters building “will be closed to Agency personnel on Monday, Feb. 3.”

Two government employees who tried to gain access to the USAID offices in the building on Monday morning said they were turned away by security guards, who told them the offices were open but people could not go in. Later in the morning, uniformed Department of Homeland Security officers blocked the lobby of the USAID’s headquarters using yellow tape with the words “do not cross.”

The developments come after Musk, who’s leading an extraordinary civilian review of the federal government with the Republican president’s agreement, said early Monday that he had spoken with Trump about the six-decade U.S. aid and development agency and “he agreed we should shut it down.”

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The greatest commandments

The greatest commandments

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When asked to name the greatest commandment, Jesus answered with two: Love the Lord your God, with all your heart and mind and strength, and love your neighbor as you love yourself.

How do 1) revoking the humanitarian parole of persons fleeing deadly violence in their homelands, 2) denying HIV medications necessary to the well-being and survival of infected patients, 3) forbidding health organizations from inter-agency communication, thus hampering their ability to respond swiftly and smartly to the next national or global pandemic, 4) coveting the territories of other sovereign nations, 5) making disaster assistance contingent on acquiescence to unrelated political agendas — how do any of these actions in any way fulfill the laws Jesus said matter most?

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Denali

Denali

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Denali
pinnacle of the continent
prince among mountains
imposing massif
intimidating summit
bowing to no one
honoring no one
except the One
who laid your foundations
when time began
the One bearing no other name than
“I am”

Denali
long before us
long after us
heedless of politics
careless of human whim
you remain you
you need no name
we might give you
bearing only the name
that is already yours
Dee-naa-lee
“Tall One”

Denali
what you are
is what you are
irrespective of moniker
your dignity
irrevocably bestowed
may we too
wear a dignity unbesmirched
by narrow-minded defamation
each bearing the name shared
with every son of Adam and daughter of Eve
“Child of God”

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A warning

A warning

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When the separation between church and state is erased, the one is subsumed into the other. It is not the state that loses its identity and purpose. It is the church. It is already happening.

When a large part of the evangelical church weds itself to the MAGA agenda, it sacrifices its distinctive message. There is no gospel in Trumpism: no grace, no mercy, no compassion, no love, certainly no love for enemies as Jesus commanded, and even little love for neighbors.

“Be on your guard against false prophets; they come to you looking like sheep on the outside, but on the inside they are really like wild wolves. You will know them by what they do.” (Matthew 7:15-16)

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Whatever shall we do with you, Charlie?

Whatever shall we do with you, Charlie?

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Whatever shall we do with you, Charlie,
Preaching hate in the name of love, Charlie,
Disparaging the least of these, Charlie,
Betraying the Lord you claim, Charlie?

Last Wednesday, Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and a self-identified evangelical Christian, complained about the ASL interpreters taking up half the screen during Los Angeles fire briefings, calling them a distraction. “We can’t do this. We gotta get back to how it used to be … It’s just too much. The reason is they do these emergency briefings for fires or terrorist attacks, and you’re looking at this and you’re not listening. I don’t like it … Closed captioning’s perfectly fine.”

Whatever shall we do with you, Charlie,
Preaching hate in the name of love, Charlie?
But what if your daughter were deaf, Charlie,
Would you be singing a different tune, Charlie?

A year ago, Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and a self-identified evangelical Christian, said: ”If I see a Black pilot, I’m going to be like, ‘Boy, I hope he’s qualified.’”

Whatever shall we do with you, Charlie,
Preaching hate in the name of love, Charlie?
If you broke down on the edge of the road, Charlie,
Would you take help from a man who is black,, Charlie?

At America Fest, in December, 2023, Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and a self-identified evangelical Christian, said: “We made a huge mistake when we passed the Civil Rights Act in the 1960s … The courts have been really weak on this. Federal courts just yield to the Civil Rights Act as if it’s the actual American Constitution.” [It’s] “a way to get rid of the First Amendment.”

Whatever shall we do with you, Charlie,
Preaching hate in the name of love, Charlie?
Shall I hate you in return, Charlie,
Or pray for a change of heart, Charlie?

This last summer, while introducing the Republican presidential candidate at a campaign rally, Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and a self-identified evangelical Christian, said: “I worship a God that defeats evil.”

May God have mercy on your soul, Charlie,
The God who says vengeance is mine, Charlie.
Pray God show grace to you, Charlie,
So much more than ever you’ve shown, Charlie.

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