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Please don't post sign ups for things to this list!
by Timothy Wegner 14 Apr '20

14 Apr '20

I very rarely put on my list moderator hat, but occasionally we need a little housekeeping, so here I am. Friendly reminder, please do not respond to posts to sign up for things on the list itself. Examples are the Archives meeting, and a little earlier, signing up for the Terry's Earthrise list. If you email your response to the list, there are two problems. First the right people may not notice, and secondly, you have just subjected every single list member to off-topic noise. Folks who are requesting sign ups have always provided another avenue to sign up. Along the same lines, if you have done this recently (yup, a LOT of you have), know that you are totally forgiven. But if you apologise for this behavior on the list, you have compounded the problem, and your forgiveness will be summarily withdrawn 😅 Tell you what, I hereby offer the following psychological service. I don't NEED anyone to apologise for posting "sign me up" to the lists, but if it makes you feel better, you can apologise to me by private email. I will pass your apology on to the Mystery, and you will then definitely be forgiven. Hope you are well. As an elderly retired person, I am mostly just rocking in my rocking chair, but my activist partner Susan totally packs her days with revolutionary activity. Tim The mostly but not entirely silent list moderator

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Join the ICA Social Research Center Virtual Spring Gathering: May 10-13
by Karen Snyder 14 Apr '20

14 Apr '20

Dear Colleagues, The Covid-19 pandemic has shifted our world, including our desire to be the new reality of the ICA Social Research Center, housing the work of sixty years of EI/ICA archives. Everything now is changed and will be different in the future. We see ourselves in dialogue with what is happening in the world today while identifying our past- archived wisdom that may be informative to the present. We want to link with the many efforts to articulate a new story, a new paradigm that is emerging for our time From the comfort of your home and computer, you are invited to join with one or more of the collection teams during our virtual ICA Social Research Center Spring Gathering. Imagine two hour blocks of time on the collection(s) of your choice: Overall: What is going on in the world today in this area? What do we see emerging from our experiences of the past few months? Reviewing the collection: What questions are raised for you as we look at this collection? What are the gifts of this collection that will sustain and support the new which is being birthed? Beyond our past accomplishments, what did we learn that is informative to today? What additions and changes could be made to this collection for public understanding? ICA SOCIAL RESEARCH CENTER - VIRTUAL SPRING GATHERING May 10: Sunday May 11: Monday May 12: Tuesday May 13: Wednesday (same time) 4:00- 5:00 PM EST 3:00–4:00 PM CST 2:00–3:00 PM MST 1:00-2:00 PM PST Contexting the next three days STRUCTURAL REFORMULATION CONTEXTUAL RE-EDUCATION SPIRIT REMOTIVATION 1 Human Development Doug Druckenmiller ddruckin(a)gmail.com <mailto:ddruckin@gmail.com> 4 Imaginal Education Karen Snyder karen.snyder10(a)gmail.com <mailto:karen.snyder10@gmail.com> 8 Inner Life Jeanette Stanfield jstanfieldica(a)gmail.com <mailto:jstanfieldica@gmail.com> 2 Social Change Jim Wiegel jfwiegel(a)gmail.com <mailto:jfwiegel@gmail.com> 5 Facilitation Methods Beret Griffith beretgriffith(a)gmail.com <mailto:beretgriffith@gmail.com> 9 Spirit Movement Lynda Cock lyndacock(a)gmail.com <mailto:lyndacock@gmail.com> 3 Awakenment Forums OliveAnn Slotta oslotta(a)gmail.com <mailto:oslotta@gmail.com> 6 Collaborative Networking Nelson Stover nstover(a)emergingecology.org <mailto:nstover@emergingecology.org> Summary and Next Steps Daily time for joining the collection dialogues: Eastern Central Mountain Pacific 11:00 – 1:00 1:30 – 3:30 4:00 – 6:00 10:00 -12:00 12:30 - 2:30 3:00 - 5:00 9:00 – 11:00 11:30 – 1:30 2:00 – 4:00 8:00 -10:00 10:30 – 12:30 1:00 – 3:00 We invite you to join us for any or all of the collection dialogues May 10-13. Please contact one of the collection guides you wish to dialogue with to receive the link for being included. To review the website go to https://icaglobalarchives.org/wp-admin/profile.php <https://icaglobalarchives.org/wp-admin/profile.php>. Peace, The Social Research Center Team Lynda Cock, Doug Druckenmiller, Steve Ediger, Jack Gilles, Beret Griffith, Mary Laura Jones, Frank Knutson, Paul Noah, Wendell Refior, Oliveann Slotta, Karen Snyder, Jeanette Stanfield, Nelson Stover, Tim Wegner, Jim Wiegel

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Easter; Coronavirus Letter to Humanity
by Ellie Stock 12 Apr '20

12 Apr '20

Thanks, Jack, and to all for your sharing. We returned from a nearby park in Ferguson, MO where we usually have our Easter Sunrise Service, which, this year, was not held due to the coronavirus pandemic. However three of us showed up as a symbolic presence, with our butterfly balloons waving in the wind on the west bank of January-Wabash Lake, a fountain of dancing waters greeting this new morning. Rain was forecast. The forecast was spot on--drizzling off and on as we began the liturgy. No trumpet this year. No crowds. No flocks of geese honking. A lone mourning dove in the distance, no visible sun ,now sequestered behind clouds. In the Christian context and poetry and metaphors, the service celebrates the interrelatedness of all beings and our continual dying and rising--the surprise of being resurrected, not necessarily of our own volition, but birthed through the consciousness, care, creativity, courage, compassion, and cooperation of global human and universal creation midwives of the Mystery. Life is resilient. We humans just need to decide if we want to continue to be part of this emerging, unfolding, increasingly diverse, gloriously complex process. Earth will endure. Just as we finished the service, the clouds burst open with lavish, cleansing, liquid joy. A lone goose on the bank nodded its affirmation. Grace and peace, Easter blessings and love to all. Ellie :)elliestock@aol.com [attached: copy of the Easter sunrise service] -----Original Message----- From: Jack Gilles via OE <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> To: OE Listserve <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Cc: Jack Gilles <jackcgilles(a)gmail.com> Sent: Sun, Apr 12, 2020 8:35 am Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] Coronavirus Letter to Humanity Dear Colleagues, The poet’s task is to communicate truth in a ways that cannot be communicated by prose. And I emphasize “cannot”. Language is the tool of the left brain. The rational, verbal scientific paradigm that replaced (or displaced) the two-story paradigm did a great deal for understanding and discourse. We are able to grasp the insight, see mistaken literalism. The right brain is mute. It sees wholes, not parts. But that does not mean that therefore the rational, impersonal, and statistical probability of how this planet functions is truth. That viruses just arise, that the Earth doesn’t consciously (not human thinking consciousness) communicate messages with intent. It does. This planet is alive, all of it, as an integrated system. Pain is real, death is real, and even a fly can sense when it is in danger. That system, that infinitely complex, but totally integrated system communicates by harmony. The even shifting, the ever changing and the ever evolving is a great Dance. And when we, the only part of creation that is capable of destroying the rest of creation do not dance, but march as masters of the fate of what actually sustains and enables us to actually live, then it consciously responds. We discerned a lot of that complexity in our Social Process Triangles. We knew intuitively that every triangle was connected to every other and we saw how our home works, at least the human sociality part. But it is only one triangle of three that actually needs to be grasped as an integrated system. That a is what the very top triangle in the culture does; The Myth Factor. It is about integrating the whole Social Process. And with that Myth Factor we dialogue with two other triangles. The Social Process is about how the human beings organizes themselves into a system. It does not speak anything about either how this Earth functions or how my personal, unique, unrepeatable self functions. I am more than a cog in the social machine, and I am more than just a victim of a unconscious planet. I am a live, free, responsible, creation of a Mystery I will never understand, but who is as close as my breath, and knows every hair. And this Mystery loves his creation with infinite Mercy and Compassion. The whole triangle I call The Human Process. It is a dialogue (dynamic) of The Natural Process, The Social Process and The Individual Process. This particular stream of the OE Dialogue is not where I want to share more detail on this. All I want to communicate is that this glorious Earth is a Great Poem, it is a Great Song, but most of all it is a Great Dance. And I learned that from Judy. Peace, Jack On Apr 12, 2020, at 02:15, the telfords via OE <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: Thank you Bill for your insight. The poet sort of implies that the current virus pandemic is a result of the way we have been treating the earth.Personally I don't believe that to be true. But I think the poet is saying that this is giving us an opportunity to take stock of what is happening to our world as a result of our actions and now is the time tostop being blind to the consequences of what we have been doing - take off the dark glasses and to change our behavior. Certainly in Australia the unprecedented fire season we have just been through has been a real wake-up call to stop our denial of the part we have/are playing in causingthe drying up of the Darling River, the bleaching of the corals on the Great Barrier Reef etc. So we pray that at this time we continue to love our neighbours, and start caring about the earth and all its creatures A pretty appropriate message at Easter time. PeaceJohn On Sat, Apr 11, 2020 at 11:35 PM William Schlesinger via OE <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: So another thought. When some religious figures read Katrina as God's response to gender and sexuality preferences, we did not agree. They created that meaning, and we saw another reality. For those of us in the Christian tradition, our central text contains a story - 'who sinned that this man might be born blind'? And the answer was - 'No one sinned. This is an opportunity to show the works of God' (Matthew's gospel if you needed the citation). Viruses mutate. It's in their nature. And some mutations are more effective than others at spreading, infecting, and not killing the host quickly so they can continue to spread. For some of us, this is not 'caused' by human blindness or fear, but is an opportunity to show compassion, embrace forgiveness, and take responsibility. Care for the earth - but don't use blaming and shaming in the process. Bill SchlesingerProject Vida3607 Rivera AvenueEl Paso, TX 79905(915) 490-6148 cell On Sat, Apr 11, 2020 at 12:02 AM the telfords via OE <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: A friend sent this to us so we thought we would share it with you all. The earth whispered but you did not hear The earth spoke but you did not listen,The earth screamed but you turned her off.And so I was born. I was not born to punish you..I was born to awaken you.. The earth cried out for help.. Massive flooding. But you didn't listen..Burning fires. But you didn't listen..Strong hurricanes. But you didn't listen..Terrifying tornadoes. But you didn't listen.. You still don't listen to the earth when:Ocean animals are dying due to pollutants in the waters..Glaciers melting at an alarming rate. Severe drought..You didn't listen to how much negativity the earth is receiving.. Non-stop wars. Non-stop greed. You just kept going on with your life..No matter how much hate there was.. No matter how many killings daily..It was more important to get that latest iPhone than worry about what theearth was trying to tell you.. But now I am here..And I've made the world stop in its tracks..I've made YOU finally listen.. I've made you take refuge..I've made you stop thinking about materialistic things..Now you are like the earth.. You are only worried about YOUR survival.How does that feel? I give you fever.. as the fires burn the earth.I give you respiratory issues.. Has pollution filled the earth air.I give you weakness as the earth weakens every day.I took away your comforts.. Your outings.The things you would use to forget about the planet and its pain.And I made the world stop.. And now.. China has better quality air..Skies are clear blue because factories are noy spewing pollution into the earth's air.The water in Venice is clan and dolphins are being seen.Because the gondola boats that pollute the water are not being used.YOU are having to take time to reflect on what is important in life.Again I am not here to punish you.. I am here to AWAKEN you..When all this is over and I am gone.. Please remember these moments..Listen to the earth. Listen to your soul. Stop polluting the earth.Stop fighting with each other. Stop caring about materialistic things.And start loving your neighbours. Start caring about the earth and all its creatures.Because next time I may come back even stronger.... by Vivinne R Reich - Feel free to copy and send. Grace & PeaceJohn & Elaine | | Virus-free. www.avast.com | _______________________________________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE TO RECIPIENT: This transmission may contain confidential information belonging to the sender that is legally privileged and proprietary and may be subject to protection under the law, including the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). If you are not the intended recipient of this e-mail, you are prohibited from sharing, copying, or otherwise using or disclosing its contents. If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately by reply e-mail and permanently delete this e-mail and any attachments without reading, forwarding or saving them. Thank you_______________________________________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net _______________________________________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net _______________________________________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net

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Re: [Dialogue] [Oe List ...] Coronavirus Letter to Humanity
by Ellie Stock 11 Apr '20

11 Apr '20

Thanks for sharing, John and Elaine. Ellie Stockelliestock(a)aol.com -----Original Message----- From: the telfords via OE <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> To: Order Ecumenical Community <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Cc: the telfords <thetelfords(a)gmail.com> Sent: Sat, Apr 11, 2020 1:02 am Subject: [Oe List ...] Coronavirus Letter to Humanity A friend sent this to us so we thought we would share it with you all. The earth whispered but you did not hear The earth spoke but you did not listen,The earth screamed but you turned her off.And so I was born. I was not born to punish you..I was born to awaken you.. The earth cried out for help.. Massive flooding. But you didn't listen..Burning fires. But you didn't listen..Strong hurricanes. But you didn't listen..Terrifying tornadoes. But you didn't listen.. You still don't listen to the earth when:Ocean animals are dying due to pollutants in the waters..Glaciers melting at an alarming rate. Severe drought..You didn't listen to how much negativity the earth is receiving.. Non-stop wars. Non-stop greed. You just kept going on with your life..No matter how much hate there was.. No matter how many killings daily..It was more important to get that latest iPhone than worry about what theearth was trying to tell you.. But now I am here..And I've made the world stop in its tracks..I've made YOU finally listen.. I've made you take refuge..I've made you stop thinking about materialistic things..Now you are like the earth.. You are only worried about YOUR survival.How does that feel? I give you fever.. as the fires burn the earth.I give you respiratory issues.. Has pollution filled the earth air.I give you weakness as the earth weakens every day.I took away your comforts.. Your outings.The things you would use to forget about the planet and its pain.And I made the world stop.. And now.. China has better quality air..Skies are clear blue because factories are noy spewing pollution into the earth's air.The water in Venice is clan and dolphins are being seen.Because the gondola boats that pollute the water are not being used.YOU are having to take time to reflect on what is important in life.Again I am not here to punish you.. I am here to AWAKEN you..When all this is over and I am gone.. Please remember these moments..Listen to the earth. Listen to your soul. Stop polluting the earth.Stop fighting with each other. Stop caring about materialistic things.And start loving your neighbours. Start caring about the earth and all its creatures.Because next time I may come back even stronger.... by Vivinne R Reich - Feel free to copy and send. Grace & PeaceJohn & Elaine | | Virus-free. www.avast.com | _______________________________________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net

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4/9/20, Progressing Spirituality: Kevin Forrester: Fishing to Friending; Spong revisited
by Ellie Stock 09 Apr '20

09 Apr '20

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.yiv6461560254mcnTextContent, #yiv6461560254 #yiv6461560254templateHeader .yiv6461560254mcnTextContent p{ font-size:16px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media only screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv6461560254 #yiv6461560254templateBody .yiv6461560254mcnTextContent, #yiv6461560254 #yiv6461560254templateBody .yiv6461560254mcnTextContent p{ font-size:14px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media only screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv6461560254 #yiv6461560254templateFooter .yiv6461560254mcnTextContent, #yiv6461560254 #yiv6461560254templateFooter .yiv6461560254mcnTextContent p{ font-size:12px !important;line-height:150% !important;} } | | | | View this email in your browser | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Fishing to Friending | | | | | | | | | | Essay by Kevin G. Thew Forrester, PhD April 9, 2020 Fishing As a young boy growing up in southeastern Michigan, several strong stone throws from the banks of the River Raisin, our dad taught us to fish. Dad was a teacher, not of fishing, but of high school kids. But he knew the basics of backyard angling – bamboo rod, red bobber, sinker and hook, and the coup de gras – a nice juicy night crawler. Fishing – setting the bait, lowering the line and unswervingly (well, sort of) staring at the bobber for the slightest slip beneath the lip of flowing water. We were lying in wait to catch the fish unawares. Our hope, often unfulfilled, was to have set a bait so alluring that the passing trout or sunny would be turned from its fishy business and lured to the enticing wriggling worm. Fishing was about luring and catching the fish before its finely tuned nervous system had become alerted to the con. Seduced, it would inadvertently disrupt the line in its surrounding of the creepy crawler with its mouth, signified by the slight sink of bobber. Ever alert, we would attempt to deftly jerk back the rod and set the hook in the completely unsuspecting mouth. Startled by the pain, and driven by millions of years of evolution, the fish would pull back, seeking survival through swimming away as hard and fast as possible. The tug of war was on. Our task was to land the fish, against its primordial drive for survival. Pull it in against the life force animating its soul. Haul it from the water-home which makes its very life possible. Separate its mouth from the hook; and while the fish was bleeding and wriggling in its final futile gasps for survival, kill it. From fish to “it”. Although our angling gear would progress to rod and reel and artificial luminescent bait, seduction into death was the reality of fishing for fish. Metaphors Matter Metaphors matter. Their compressed images contain and convey little (and not so little) worlds of meaning. Metaphors are powerful, because they describe and prescribe our relationships with one another with so few words. Their power lies in their awesome capacity to evoke a world. Metaphors can manifest and deepen our sense of the Holy Mystery, or they can mask and distort. Oftentimes it is a mixture. But the difference is real, and it matters. Some metaphors are so woven into our language and story that they trip off our tongue and evoke emotions without thought, without reflection. They carry the pride and prejudice of untold generations of use. We find reassuring comfort in their evocation. Such is the case with the metaphor found in Matthew 4.19, and employed by teachers and spiritual leaders without a minute’s hesitation: “And he said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.’” But if we do stop for a moment or two and recall the actual experience of fishing for fish, the world carried and conveyed by this common metaphor is neither benign nor gracious. To fish for people? Metaphors matter. To deploy this metaphor as descriptive and prescriptive of authentic and humane human interaction is to draw upon speech that masks and distorts the true expression of boundless love in our relationships. It is a metaphor that masks the distortion of power, masks the distortion of honesty, masks the distortion of the invitation to trust the sacred nature of reality as it already is. I don’t believe that what we are about as spiritual leaders is fishing for people. The metaphor matters and is far from helpful. We don’t “stand” on the bank, or on the corner, or in the sanctuary, or in the pulpit, or on the printed page, or on the radio, or internet, or television, lying in wait for the unsuspecting person to be caught unaware as they pass by. We don’t set bait to capture human beings against their will. We don’t try to find a bait so alluring that it entices a person away from their own sacred unfoldment. We don’t reel human beings in against their own heart’s desire. We don’t seek ways to unsuspectingly set a hook from which another cannot escape without harm to their being – physical, emotional, soulful. Matthew’s metaphor does not travel well across centuries and cultures (and for many scholars the image does not harken back to Jesus). Some metaphors damage more than deliver, and so it is with “fish for people”. Authentic spiritual leadership is not about landing human beings, bleeding and gasping on the shores of a hungry community – no matter how well intentioned. This metaphor misses and distorts the vital truth that all human beings are already always sacred. Each person is already on a journey. It is their own journey. No one, especially a spiritual leader, should abrogate another’s sacred right to discover their own path; authentic leaders do not lure (which is to deceive) in order to get someone on the path they think is the right one for them. Authentic leaders have much greater humility (i.e., respect for sacred reality) than that. Conversation and Friendship Beneath and behind and within the metaphor of “fish for people” is the mistaken assumption that we are here to convert rather than converse. Once we recognize the inherent and integral sacredness of every soul, our response can only be one of longing to converse with the mystery before us. This precious pearl of a person is already a gateway to the Infinite. As such, they are the divine grace of invitation to engage in conversation and inquiry. Their presence calls our heart into joyous curiosity. Such conversation gracefully transforms all involved. Conversation calls us into friendship. Here, Christianity is discovered to be a spiritual path rooted in the courageous capacity to befriend another. Here, is a metaphor that also matters: “I have called you friends” (John 15.15). Christianity is friendship. John’s community discovered in Jesus, the Christ’s invitation to us to befriend one another. Within friendship is a world where relationships mature through mutual regard, mutual affirmation, mutual compassion, mutual tenderness, and mutual maturation. Friendship is a metaphor for the spiritual life that manifests the truth of the inherent dignity of each and every being. Such is the way of Holy Mystery. Friendship is a metaphor that deepens our trust in the experience of the inherent beauty and question that is another. In friendship, one is not baited; one is not lured; one is not hooked; one is not reeled in against one’s will; one does not die as an “it”. In friendship, we meet eye to eye, heart to heart, body to body, soul to soul. We walk toward one another out of mutual trust and affection. Through conversation trust is born and matures. We risk, we initiate, we explore, we fail and fall, we rise, we forgive, we love. Through friendship we are transformed in unimaginable ways. Such is the way of Holy Mystery. In friendship a new kind of world unfolds in which we hold in trust the questioning mind, the searching heart, and the thirsting soul. In friendship no one is killed, but there is dying to smallness and stinginess. Friendship is fruitful and delicious and satisfying. And friendship matters. ~ Kevin G. Thew Forrester, PhD Read online here About the Author Kevin G. Thew Forrester, Ph.D. is an Episcopal priest, a student of the Diamond Approach for over a decade, as well as a certified teacher of the Enneagram in the Narrative Tradition. He is the founder of the Healing Arts Center of St. Paul’s Church in Marquette, Michigan, and the author of five books, including I Have Called You Friends, Holding Beauty in My Soul’s Arms, and My Heart is a Raging Volcano of Love for You and Beyond my Wants, Beyond my Fears: The Soul’s Journey into the Heartland. Visit Kevin’s Blog: Essential Living: For The Soul’s Journey. | | | | | | | | Question & Answer Q: By Geoff It strikes me that the God of the Bible, and most religions, is a changeable God; angry, not angry, satisfied with sacrifice, then finally satiated with the “perfect” sacrifice etc. It seems to me that God should be unchanging and unchangeable. It is no wonder that people are rejecting the God of the Bible. I do too. Fear of a changeable God seems inconsistent with the loving God that Jesus teaches. Is God really that fickle? A: By Rev. Jacqueline J. Lewis, PhD Dear Geoff, I don’t think God is fickle, I think our understanding of God varies with who is doing the writing about God, and when. Once human beings walked out of the cave and into the light, we began “theology.” We wondered about God and climate, crops, fertility, fire. We wondered about God and our sickness, our health, and in the deaths of loved ones. We wondered about God and the storm, the volcano, the earth cracking wide open. We made sacrifices to God, we worked hard to please God. We sometimes thought good fortune came with the power of our sacrifices and good behavior. We were frustrated when God “failed” to do what we wanted, to be Who we wanted. We talked about it with our kin; we told stories; we testified about the God we encountered in our everyday lives. God is good. God is strong. God is a very present help in time of trouble. There is no place away from God we can go. God caused the flood. God opened the sea. God killed our enemies. Did God do all of that? We’re not sure. God cured the cancer; God chose not to. Is that true? We don’t know for sure. But we want to know, we yearn to know. We watch, listen, learn. We grow, we change how we view God. We take more responsibility for the good, the bad and the ugly. That is what changes, our view of the mystery, our understanding of the ineffable. The conclusions we draw about sacrifice, about prayer, about who God is and what God wants—these change. We wrestle with who God is, as did the writers of scripture, as do the composers of music, the authors of poetry, the creators of art. Frozen in a moment, it seems certain: This is who God is, right now! And then, in the next moment: No, in my experience, God is like this. And God? God who is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow, understands our imperfect perceptions, can take our mischaracterizations. And keeps loving us. That is a constant. God can take our changing, our doubts, our wrestling. Because God is God all the time. ~ Rev. Jacqueline J. Lewis, PhD Read and share online here About the Author Rev. Jacqueline J. Lewis, Ph.D. is the Senior Minister of Middle Collegiate Church in New York City. She is a nationally acclaimed activist, author, public theologian, and organizer of an anti-racist multicultural movement of love and justice. She has been featured in The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and on The Today Show, CBS, and MSNBC. She write The Power of Stories: A Guide for Leading Multiracial and Multicultural Communities, and also wrote a book with her husband John called The Pentecost Paradigm: Ten Strategies for Becoming a Multiracial Congregation. | | | | | | | | Please continue to send us your feedback… we are listening. We aim to give voice to many different perspectives that are relevant and inspiring along this spiritually progressing path. We are not here to tell you what to believe or how to act. We are here to support your journey, to share and learn together.Thank you for being a part of this community! | | | | | | Join our FB community today! Spread the word, share with friends. Thanks! | | | | | | | | Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited The Origins of the Bible, Part XXV: The Book of Psalms Essay by Bishop John Shelby Spong April 30, 2009 When I was a child I went with my mother from time to time to Chalmer’s Memorial ARP Church, the church in which she had grown up. Those letters “ARP” identified that church as belonging to the Associate Reformed Presbyterian tradition, an ultra-fundamentalist branch of the most rigid form of Calvinism. What was most unusual to me about this church was that they did not sing any hymns. Hymns, they argued, were made up of human words written by human authors and as such they were considered unfit for use in worship where only “the words of God” were meant to be heard. Instead of hymns, the members of this church set to music the 150 psalms from the Bible, which they claimed were “God’s words.” So the Book of Psalms became the hymnal of this church. For all of the strange literalistic theology that was reflected in this reasoning process, this church had understood correctly the original purpose of the Book of Psalms. It was in fact the hymn book of Judaism, created for use in worship, first in the temple and later in the synagogue. Once this insight is grasped, the language of the Book of Psalms makes sense. There are numerous liturgical references and directions found in the psalms: imploring people “to sing to the Lord a new song,” frequently mentioning the choirmaster and referring to a variety of instruments traditionally used in Jewish worship, such as the trumpet, harp and lyre. The psalms also refer to things like sacrifices, processions, altars, burnt offerings, thanksgivings and sacred vows, all of which are liturgical acts. When one looks at the Book of Psalms through the lens of the worship life of the Jews it also becomes apparent that a number of the psalms were designed for the specific celebrations observed in the annual Jewish liturgical cycle. For example, Psalms 113-118 were used in the three extended festivals that mark the Jewish year: Passover, which was expanded into the Festival of the Unleavened Bread; Sukkoth or Tabernacles, the eight-day harvest festival in the fall; and Dedication, an eight-day festival of light that comes in the dead of winter, originally marking the return of the light of true worship to the synagogue at the time of the Maccabees, and which today we refer to as Hanukkah. Psalm 118 was particularly adapted to use in the great procession that accompanied the harvest festival of Sukkoth. In that procession people waved in their right hands bundles of leafy branches called lulabs, made of willow, myrtle and palm, as they recited the words from this psalm: “Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.” It is clear to see how the Christian observance of Palm Sunday was influenced by this liturgical observance of the Jews. Psalm 119 was probably written originally to be used at the annual Jewish observance of Pentecost or Shavuot, which celebrated the giving of the law to Moses on Mt. Sinai. Shavuot came fifty days after Passover (hence the name Pentecost) and was marked by a twenty-four-hour vigil. It takes a long psalm to serve a twenty-four-hour vigil and that is why this is the longest psalm in the Bible. It is also a hymn in praise of the glory and beauty of the Torah, which the Jews believed was God’s greatest gift to the world. Psalm 119 is conveniently divided into eight segments of three stanzas each to fit the vigil format of eight three-hour units, thus providing a reading for each part of the vigil. The length of this psalm is not an accident. Other psalms, especially numbers 102, 120, 171 and 130, were used on days of public penitence and some festivals. They are quite reminiscent of the earliest hymns of the Christian Church, which were surely modeled on these psalms. I refer to those songs that Luke puts into the mouths of the major characters in the birth narrative: the song of Zechariah, the song of Mary, the song of the angels and the song of Simeon, the priest. These psalm-like hymns are still used in Christian worship today, though we tend to refer to them by their Latin names: the Benedictus, the Magnificat, the Gloria in Excelsis and the Nunc Dimittis. Most Christians are not consciously aware of the fact that the gospels themselves were actually born in the synagogue and are largely shaped by the liturgical patterns of the Jews. That is why we find some ninety-three references to the psalms wrapped around the story of Jesus in the gospels alone. The story of the crucifixion is in large measure based on Psalm 22. There is a similar tendency in the gospels to relate the life of Jesus to each of the great celebrations of the Jewish year. The story of Jesus’ crucifixion was placed into the Jewish observance of Passover, for example, not because it actually took place at that time but because Passover became the liturgical context in which the death of Jesus was interpreted. From as early as the writings of Paul (51-64 CE), Jesus had come to be seen after the analogy of the newly sacrificed Passover Lamb. When one reads the exodus story, which the Passover liturgy memorializes, one notes that it was the power of the blood of the sacrificed “Lamb of God” on the doorposts of Jewish homes that protected them from death. When the story of the crucifixion of Jesus was told as the sacrifice of the “new” paschal lamb, the cross came to be seen as the doorpost of the world and the blood of Jesus on the cross was viewed as the power that banished death from the lives of believers, thus giving rise to the phrase “saved by the blood.” This intertwining of the story of the cross with the story of the Passover drew the two into the same time frame. It was not a reflection of the memory of history. Other Christian signs that relate to Jewish holy days are that John the Baptist (and his message of repentance) was simply the transformation into a Christian context of the message of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. In both the people gathered and repentance was urged as the way to prepare for the coming of the kingdom of God. The story of the transfiguration of Jesus was adapted to reflect the observance of the mid-winter Feast of Dedication. In Dedication the light of God was said to fall on the Temple and in the story of the transfiguration on Jesus as “the new Temple,” which is what the body of Jesus came to be called. The gospels are clearly the products of the synagogue and as the psalms were a major piece of synagogue worship they inevitably became a major piece of the developing Christian liturgies. Who wrote the Book of Psalms? This question makes no more sense to ask than who wrote the various Christian hymnals. They are both compilations of the worship traditions of the ages. Christian hymnals include the plainsong words and settings of the 13th century, the Reformation words of the 16th century, the social gospel message of the 19th century, the pious evangelical words of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the modern futuristic hymns of the late 20th and in hymnal supplements even the words that express the hopes of the 21st century. Likewise the Book of Psalms reflects the long religious history and pilgrimage of the Jews and thus has no single author. There are psalms dedicated to the beauty of creation, that extol the virtues of the king, that bewail the human condition and that express both the despair of the exile and the joy and hope connected with the return from the exile. Just as our hymnals contain some of the dreadful theology that speaks of blood and sacrifice and the expressions of the wrath of God, so in the Book of Psalms we are frequently embarrassed by the theology of yesterday. We meet in the psalms, for example, some of the worst aspects of a tribal deity who delights in smashing against the rocks the heads of the children of the enemies of the Jews. Contrary to what my mother’s ARP Church thought, the psalms are hardly “the words of God,” unless you want to attribute to God some dreadful aspects of depraved behavior. The psalms are made up of uniquely human words addressed to God expressing uniquely human emotions and feelings. We have no idea how or when the Book of Psalms arrived at the number of 150 as the totality of the psalms that merited inclusion in the sacred text of the people. In one of our earliest complete versions of the Bible, a 4th century work known as the Codex Sinaiticus, the whole set of 150 psalms as we know them today are present. Yet another somewhat later 4th century work, known as Codex Vaticanus, lacks Psalms 49-79. We do know that at some point in Jewish history an order was imposed on the Book of Psalms. From the earliest time they seem to have been divided into five books, each ending with a doxology in the final verse of the last psalm in each section. Book One includes Psalms 1-41; Book Two, Psalms 42-72; Book Three, Psalms 78-89; Book Four, Psalms 90-106; Book Five, Psalms 107-150. That probably represented, once again, a Jewish liturgical adaptation of the use of the Psalter to accompany the five books of the Torah, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, the annual reading of which organized the yearly liturgical calendar of the synagogue. There are other things in the Psalter pointing to a long development over time. The name of God is spelled two ways, reflecting the two centers of Jewish life and history: Jerusalem, where the name Yahweh was primary, and the Northern Kingdom, where the name Elohim was preferred. In the last verse of Psalm 79, we are told that “Here the prayers of David are ended,” as if to say that an incorporated section has come to an end. Verbatim duplications in some of the psalms reflect the fact that they were from more than one source. We now believe the psalms were compiled into more or less their present form by the Jews somewhere between 400-200 BCE. They reflect various times in the Jewish story and obviously various authors. For the record, the authorship of any of the psalms by King David is pious myth not a fact of history. Should the psalms continue to be used in Christian worship? Time does “make ancient good uncouth,” noted the poet James Russell Lowell. Nowhere is that truth better seen than in the Book of Psalms. At best they are a mixed blessing! ~ John Shelby Spong | | | | | | | | Announcements Healing Resources from Andrew Harvey We’ve come to the defining crisis of human history. And if we’re going to get through this, it will only be through a massive and extremely painful and complete transformation.This transformation won’t just be individual, it will have to be structural. It will have to be economic, political, spiritual, and emotional. All at once. And very fast. READ ON... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

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Checking in
by David Dunn 07 Apr '20

07 Apr '20

Here are some words that popped up unexpectedly this morning. All around the world All around the world there are people like doctors and nurses, public health officials, governors and mayors, truck drivers and airplane pilots, therapists and homeless shelter staff, police men and women, ambulance drivers and paramedics, plus a thousand unnamed CEOs, executive directors, politicians and other care givers working toward a common end— to save lives. There must surely be billions of people working with a common aim— to save lives. This must surely be the second coming of all humanity’s saviors, embodied in the one human family, offering their lives for a common cause— to save lives and protect our common home. David …with Burna Dunn, alive and well in Denver [more to follow] — "Mystery, possibility, and the power to choose" David Dunn 740 S Alton Way 9B Denver, CO 80247 720-314-5991 dmdunn1(a)gmail.com

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Re: [Dialogue] Checking in
by Ellie Stock 07 Apr '20

07 Apr '20

Thanks for sharing, David, which catalyzed another image: the global midwives of a groaning Creation, preparing for new birth... Ellie. :)elliestock@aol.com -----Original Message----- From: David Dunn via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> To: ICA Dialogue Listserv <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net>; Order Community Lists <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Cc: David Dunn <dmdunn1(a)gmail.com> Sent: Tue, Apr 7, 2020 03:32 PM Subject: [Dialogue] Checking in Here are some words that popped up unexpectedly this morning. All around the world All around the world there are people like doctors and nurses, public health officials, governors and mayors, truck drivers and airplane pilots, therapists and homeless shelter staff, police men and women, ambulance drivers and paramedics, plus a thousand unnamed CEOs,executive directors, politiciansand other care giversworking toward a common end—to save lives. There must surely be billions of peopleworking with a common aim—to save lives. This must surely be the second comingof all humanity’s saviors,embodied in the one human family,offering their lives for a common cause—to save lives and protect our common home. David…with Burna Dunn, alive and well in Denver[more to follow] — "Mystery, possibility, and the power to choose" David Dunn 740 S Alton Way 9B Denver, CO 80247 720-314-5991 dmdunn1(a)gmail.com _______________________________________________ Dialogue mailing list Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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Final Meaning witness
by Richard Alton 07 Apr '20

07 Apr '20

I just found this piece going through my files: I was Louise Singleton and her late husband John's Local Church prior and later worked a decade with her on the ICA USA's African ICAs HIV/AIDS work. A little long for a witness but what happens to one who spends a month working on final meanings on the Southside of Chicago. Amazing what we asked of people! Dick THE GROUND SHIFTS UNDER MY FEET SOUTH HOUSE ON BLUE ISLAND AVENUE, CHICAGO I am not sure what I expected when John and I and three others from Montview Presbyterian Church drove to Chicago to attend the Summer Research Assembly at the Ecumenical Institute (EI). It was July, 1971; John and I left four children eleven to three in the care of the Denver Religious House at 1741 Gaylord Street, a big old house that was the home and office of those who worked for the Ecumenical Institute in Denver. John, Paul Hamilton and Don Elliott planned to return to Denver after a short time, but Freda, Don’s wife, and I intended to stay four weeks. I had never been to Chicago and my children would spend those four weeks in a Religious House. I knew essentially nothing about this organization or what I would be doing. What could I have been thinking? The Kent State Massacre had shocked the world on May 4, 1970. The New York Times began publishing the Pentagon Papers in mid-June, 1971. Protests against the Viet Nam War were strident. I had missed the up-endedness of the 60’s – the rebellion against authority, free-form lifestyle, rejection of materialism, and discontented individualism. I had four children in the 60’s and to say that I was busy, distracted, and disconnected from the larger world is to understate the coziness of my cocoon. I ran into Betty Friedan and the Feminine Mystique in 1968 when I was pregnant with Will. I got a glimpse of how my wife and mother role had been meticulously nurtured into me in my Southern upbringing. Yes, I had gone to Boston to business school and happily worked for Polaroid for three years, but still I had no idea that I would want a career, work of my own in the world. I did not feel much responsibility for the world beyond my family and close community. John and I had encountered the Ecumenical Institute at a weekend seminar called RS-1 – Religious Studies I. Its intention was to confront unexamined religious literalism with an intellectual and experiential grounding that had powerful ramifications for how you lived your life. The course focused on four major symbols of the Christian faith – God, Christ, Holy Spirit, and Church. It used writings of four 20th century theologians, Rudolph Bultman, Paul Tillich, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and R. Richard Niebuhr to blow open these well worn church concepts and the words that name them, and ground them in ordinary human experience. It sought to demythologize them and re-symbolize them again. To me, who had grown up in the unquestioned and unquestioning environment of the southern Presbyterian Church, this was radical and exciting stuff. The calling was to live an intentional life of service – not to some reduced god, but to the whole world. This was not a Jesus Loves You, Y’all Come kind of theology; it was insistent demand. Stop worrying about yourself and your soul. Get out there and bring new life to the world. Live your life. I had no idea what a month in Chicago would bring; I was clear there was an interesting world beyond my kitchen sink, and my unexamined life role. We arrived in Chicago at the Ecumenical Institute offices located in an old seminary on West Congress Parkway in the middle of a poor black, angry, rioting community. We were instructed not go on the street – not because we might come to harm, but because there might be an incident which would damage EI’s work in 5th City, a community the Institute was working with to offer paths to change and a sense of hope where very little existed. The first shock was that those of us from Denver were split up and assigned to three different locations. A thousand people were expected to attend, so other buildings were co-opted. John and I were sent to a four story wooden building, an abandoned hotel with rooms around a central shaft on Blue Island Parkway. I have no idea where in Chicago it is because I only left the building to go to assemblies of the whole body once a week and I never walked outside the building. John was assigned to a men’s dorm and I was assigned to a women’s dorm on the 4th floor built around the four-story atrium. The building looked like a firetrap. My room containing bunk beds for six, opened on a hall at the top of this open shaft. I was out on the falling-off-the-wall back porch in tears because there was no way that a responsible mother of four would put herself in such danger. And I was beginning to understand about assignment: it equaled obedience. Charles Moore came along and asked what the problem was. I let him have it – the danger, the negligence, etc, etc. He listened quietly and said wait. In a few minutes he was back with a new room assignment. John and I were assigned together to a small room off the porch on the second floor above the kitchen. I learned later it was his and Pat’s room. Living in a room with five other women would not have been easy, but I might have been less lonely than returning every evening to this small room off the second floor porch, above the kitchen and facing the tenements behind. John stayed for a week and returned to Denver. I knew no one – no one to help make sense of the strange, continuously objectionable expectations in which the rules of engagement were different than any I had ever encountered. The Ecumenical Institute was a family secular order of people who had decided to live a life of radical service. Those who decided to join the Order Ecumenical lived by the ancient monastic vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. Poverty meant receiving a stipend equal to the poverty level wherever one worked. In India, that could be $10 a month. Some people worked outside and their income supported those who staffed the work of the Institute. Chastity had to do with the Kierkegaardian idea of willing one thing. Your life was about the immediate work and intention of the larger group. Obedience was about accepting assignment. These three disciplines – seriously observed – came to me continuously as a shock and an affront. And yet, all these extremely bright, well-organized, compelling people had agreed to live like this. And seemed to think it the most important thing they had every done. And the most important thing I might do. The task for the month was to create the New Social Vehicle. EI expected nothing less than to participate in transforming the world. Huge white banners hanging across the front of the assembly hall read, All the past belongs to all the people. All the wisdom belongs to all the people. All the goods belong to all the people. All the decisions belong to all the people. I wondered if this would show up in my FBI file although it seemed unlikely I had an FBI file. It had not been so long since the days of the McCarthy Hearings; I could believe association with this organization might be hazardous. I also felt an underlying implication that my usual role of wife and mother was inadequate: I needed to commit myself to renewing the local church and helping to re-create the institutions of society to care for all. The day began with Daily Office at 6 am. Wake up call was someone with a gong outside the door shouting Praise the Lord Christ is Risen, to which we were to respond, He is risen indeed as we rolled joyfully out of bed. I was assigned to a working group of about thirty people, which would be home base for the four weeks. We met morning and afternoon, breakfast, lunch and dinner. The Research Assembly of a thousand people gathered staff from all over the country and a few from overseas, plus volunteers and new recruits like us. The purpose of the summer’s research was to figure out what was needed to transform civil society and create the practical programs that those under assignment would implement in the coming year to help bring that about. During the working year those under assignment would apply the thinking and programmatic actions wherever they were assigned, and come back the next summer for another assembly to assess what worked and create the organization’s work for the following year. It was a kind of practical research. It was an astounding operation, better seen from a bird’s eye view than from a hard chair in a working group in the steamy summer heat of Chicago. My bottom developed blisters. The task for that summer assembly was to define the dynamics that occur in any society. It would be used as a tool for understanding and analyzing what the tyrannizing and collapsing social forces were in current realities that need to be corrected. When economic, political, and cultural dynamics are in balance, the New Social Vehicle could emerge. Staff had read 1000 edge books over the last year, trying to discern what was happening in communities in the chaotic time of the ‘60’s and beginning of the ‘70’s. [image: page3image3330531104] Typical of ICA methodology, the task for the third of the assembly meeting at South House was to define the Cultural Commonality in The Social Process triangles. The other two locations would describe Economic and Political Commonalities. Those in south House were asked to figure out what concretely was meant and went on in Communal Wisdom, Communal Styles and Communal Symbols? My working group was assigned Final Meanings under Communal Wisdom. This task required a great deal of brainstorming, discussion, and corporate writing. It is difficult to explain and define the very medium in which you live and operate. As someone said, does a fish know what water is? Corporate writing was a new experience. Three or four people work together to write, getting their wisdom on paper in a process of suggestion and negotiation which can be both long and infuriatingly difficult, particularly if you are defining something called Final Meanings. The day’s work was sent to Room E where leadership decided what the next step would be the following day. This was an evolving process. I was totally disconnected from home, seeming to forget my children for days at a time; I was trying to survive and to contribute; my days were contained as if on an unknown island. There were no computers, cell phones, newspapers or even telephones for general use. Someone reported the news of the day at breakfast. There was a quiet time after lunch when I took my journal and incense to an assigned place and thought deep thoughts. Singing and Psalm conversations were intended to keep spirits up and intention focused on the task. There were regular reporting dynamics with a weekly assembly of the entire gathering and some planned activities or “discontinuity.” Singing by the whole body when they gathered 1000 strong in assembly was without accompaniment – and earthmoving. The primary songs I remember were the hymns For I Know Whom I have Believed, Amazing Grace, The Lord of the Dance, and Why O Lord, Hast Thou Quite Forsaken Me, Those Who Wait on the Lord, and secular songs like Blue Skies and I Don’t Know Why I Love You Like I Do. People wrote visionary words to popular tunes such as On a Clear Day and the Sound of Silence. The nuts and bolts of the assembly were directed by staff and carried out by participants as assigned – to the kitchen, cleaning, print shop, and typing. John worked in the boiler room in the grungy basement. To load coal into the boiler, it was necessary to load it into a wheelbarrow and push the wheelbarrow up a six- inch plank to reach the boiler. One night on breakfast prep, I broke 300 eggs to prepare scrambled eggs. I was instructed to break them two at a time – one in each hand; breakfast prep was just beginning. Showers and toilet facilities were barely adequate and tended to verge on collapse. Documents were printed at the print shop and then collated by laying out stacks of each page in order and the entire body of people passed by in a line assembling their document – usually while singing. I anticipated that Bill Hudson, who had left the Order and was a minister at Montview Church, would arrive for the second two weeks. He had gotten me into this, and maybe he could help me understand why it was important for me to be there. I was in a school gymnasium as part of a typing crew on Friday night when the phone rang. I heard the person who answered say that it was too bad that someone had died. I found out that Bill had had a heart attack and died the day before. He would not be coming to Chicago, to South House. Bill had left the Order; people did not leave the Order. No one knew at that point how the Order should deal with an ex-Order member who died, so his death was mostly ignored: he had left the Order; he had refused to live his life. I am not overly given to tears, but I think that summer I cried about every day. I still do not know why I did not go home. I expect a few people thought up a good reason why they were required to be someplace else. My prior (as in the head of a monastery), the leader of my working group was that same Charles Moore who rescued us from the back porch. It is hard to describe Charles. Like many other people in the Order, he was a preacher who decided that this was a far more interesting and significant thing to do with his life than working in the desert of the local parish. He lived in the depth of the spirit – close to the Dark Night of the Soul. And he could make you believe you belonged there too. I could not imagine telling him this work was not important and I would not be part of it. That’s what a prior is: they keep you pointed in the direction you choose for your life, willing one thing and being obedient. I had chosen to be there. When Summer ’71 ended, Paul Hamilton’s son Cap, and I drove home from Chicago to Denver. We talked all night, and by the time we drove in I-70 out of Limon into the Denver morning, I understood a lot more about what had happened to me. I could think about it and not just respond emotionally. I would not just go home, pick up my abandoned children, and return to life as usual. I understood that I had now assumed Care for the World – a burden that would never leave me. I did not join the Order, although I often thought about it. I had a husband with little interest and four children. And I am not sure I could have been sufficiently obedient, willing-one-thing, and detached from this world’s goods to have been a satisfactory member of the Order. Research and working in local communities was also changing the organization. At the 1972 Summer Research Assembly, they emerged from the dark night of the soul and waltzed. I couldn’t believe the reports of what a fine time people had. The decision was also made to make the Turn to the World. The assessment was made that major change in our time would not happen through the local church, but through secular society. Soon after, the Ecumenical Institute became the Institute of Cultural Affairs, because major change in the world would come from change in the cultural dimension of society. Human Development Projects were born and established on every continent in every time zone where local people learned skills to “develop” their community – human devopment. As ICA worked in communities with every religion, the intent was not to convert people but to find the [image: page5image3331086800] ICA Meeting, Chicago transparent life-giving word in their religion. I particularly appreciated the EI/ICA intention to create and define frameworks to use in thinking about things. My favorite is Knowing/Doing/Being. Although I wrote many history exams on the economic, political, and cultural backgrounds of an issue, how those interacted with each other were not as clear until I worked with the Social Process Triangles. The Global Grid gives a new way to imagine the world. And of course, there is Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience. Over the years, I volunteered in many activities, beckoned by the opportunity to work with unusually committed people who could see past the immediacy of the moment to the possibility of actually changing the world to one in which people – particularly the poorest of the poor--took hold of what they wanted for their future and worked to make that happen. The work opened my life to the world. John and I were part of a “cadre” at Montview Church, one of four churches in the Denver/Boulder area involved in the Local Church Experiment to renew our churches. We were instrumental in hiring Ken Barley who with Zoe had just left the Order, to replace Bill Hudson. He took the leadership role in changing Montview from a senior ministry model to a corporate ministry organization. In 1976, I assisted with town meetings in the nation-wide Town Meeting Project. It was a massive project--at least one was organized in every county across the country--as a way to raise the consciousness of residents to the possibility of new life in their community. In 1978, I visited development projects in India, Malaysia. and Indonesia while we were on sabbatical in Oxford, glimpsing first hand for the first time the enormity, richness, and need of the world. I helped organize local development projects in Colorado to attend the Global Exhibition of Development Projects in Bombay in 1984, and spent about four weeks there, helping to set up the conference, leading a group on a field trip to northern India, and traveling for a week after the conference ended. The Order: Ecumenical went out of existence in 1986 and the Institute of Cultural Affairs (ICA) became a professional non-profit organization working with organizations and communities in the US and abroad. They developed, taught, and used facilitation and planning methods called the Technology of Participation or TOPTM. I joined the ICA Board in 1995, became president in 1998, and coordinator of the 2000 ICA International Conference held in Denver at Denver University, attended by 650 people, one-third of whom came from outside the US. Forty years ago, the Kemper Insurance Company sold their office building to ICA for $1.00. An eight-story building at North Sheridan Road and Lawrence Avenue, it is located in Uptown, north of Chicago downtown, between the commuter rail and Lake Michigan. Uptown is a low-income area with very diverse population. The Kemper Building became ICA: USA headquarters and a center for Uptown community services. There are ICA offices on the sixth floor, a conference center on the 7th floor and a community and guest rooms on the 8th floor. The rest of the building is leased to community service organizations including a health clinic, Chicago Social Services and various immigrant and other support services. On [image: page6image3331648272] Sunday music from African congregation services fill the 2nd floor. Particularly during the years I was on the Board, I was there frequently, staying in a guest room with the bathroom down the hall, eating meals in the dining room on the 6th floor and listening to the traffic and sirens that filled the night. I would fly into O’Hare, take the train to Jefferson and catch the Lawrence Avenue bus that stopped right on the corner of Sheridan. It was about a half hour ride through neighborhood after neighborhood, each a different nationality with its own ethnic flavor. That eye-opening ride was preparation for entering that building and the work that goes on there. For many ICA people, it is a place to return to, to see colleagues, work on project, maintain the archives, and touch base. It was a home I shared with many others. Over the last few years it is being turned into a green building modeling energy conservation and sustainability. In 2012 ICA participated in and was an organizing leader in Chicago’s Accelerate 77, which stands for Accelerating Green Initiatives in Chicago's 77 Community Areas. The building also has a new name: GreenRise Building Uptown. At the ICA International Conference in Denver in 2000, called the Millennium Connection, there was concern about the threat of HIV/AIDS to development in Africa. African staff were overwhelmed by their experience of HIV. People were dying and AIDS was decimating communities. At that time, the HIV rate in Zimbabwe was 26% and 16.2% in Zambia. Every family had at least one person sick and dying. In 2001, I joined several colleagues to develop and implement the African HIV/AIDS Prevention Initiative. That work called on everything I had learned in public health and years of ICA and life experience. I had the opportunity to work with committed colleagues in the US, Canada, and the UK, but most importantly I worked in Africa with African staff and on the ground with rural villagers. I experienced the great pleasure of working with colleagues in a common and significant enterprise. What had often seemed like living my life in parallel universes finally came together. In the previous thirty years, I had many friends and colleagues in Denver who knew of and worked with ICA. Denver had had a Religious House with ICA staff and many in Montview Church were active or aware of ICA. But most people in my day-to-day life were not involved. I often felt ICA was too strange to be understood by my “normal” establishment friends and family. If you hadn’t been there, how would it make sense? ICA always claimed that it was not dis-establishment but trans-establishment – between the no longer and the not yet. I felt my experience was far outside that of most people, hard to explain, and hard for friends and family to grasp. The ICA African HIV/AIDS Prevention Initiative was something everyone could understand and support. Without funding of Denver friends, Montview Church, and the sponsorship of funds from several Denver and Boulder Rotary Clubs, we would have had a difficult time launching the Initiative in eight countries in Africa. Working in eight countries was possible only because [image: page7image3332124816] of the network of self-governing country ICA’s with local staff trained to lead Human Development Projects since the early 70’s. They were local community revolutionaries in their countries. Assisting those staff to address HIV prevention and management, as an integral part of their development work was our goal. This would become my work for the next decade and beyond. ICA as an organization is working as a professional non-profit organization in an establishment world and it is not easy. It has not yet learned to be a reliable beneficiary of funding organizations. The commitment of those from the next generation is needed to continue vigorous work as those involved since the ‘70’s retire and die. It is difficult to inspire young people to take up poverty, chastity and obedience – but I know from experience that that is what will be required to move to the New Social Vehicle, which seems less attainable and more essential with every newspaper report. 2012 was the 50th anniversary of this organization. Using the social process triangles, it is clear that the economic process is the tyrannizing force with the political as ally. The cultural dimension is collapsed, divided into sides, each unwilling to even talk about common values – those final meanings. The Occupy Movement had a glimpse of this, but did not know how to build that new social vehicle. It is the task for the next twenty years to figure out how to live in community that has changed radically at every level—local, national and global--since 1971, but still seeks the same human benefits. I am one of the people who want to make that happen. The blessings upon my life by my work, my colleagues, and association with this remarkable organization – this global home – have been beyond measure. Written as part of a memoir, Between Earth and Sky, self-published in 2015 ICA Global Citizen –1987 -- Richard H. T. Alton One Earth Film Fest ( OEFF) Green Community Connections Interfaith Green Network T: 773.344.7172 richard.alton(a)gmail.com **Save the Date! One Earth Film Festival 2021, March * http:www.oneearthfilmfestival.org Make Plain the Vision, Habakkuh 2:2 Won't you be my neighbor?

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Global Buzz for April
by ICA International 07 Apr '20

07 Apr '20

Enjoy catching up with what is happening in ICAs across the globe.... Global Buzz Report: April 2020 Click above or copy and paste this URL into your browser's address bar http://globalbuzz.icai-archives.org/7dayreport-20/2020-04-01.php And: read the latest ICAI Winds & Waves Magazine brought to you now on Medium.com See here: https://medium.com/winds-and-waves ICAI Communications

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Remember Tim Caswell?
by James Wiegel 05 Apr '20

05 Apr '20

https://youtu.be/q17rWut_cVw Jim Wiegel “We are all time travelers journeying into the future. But let us make that future a place we want to visit. “ — Stephen Hawkings

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