Mysterious Birthday Dick Alton I have been astonished by a series of events in my life that have made me wonder, had me catching my breath. Yesterday I had breakfast at Ruby’s Restaurant on the corner of Kadzie and Madison in 5th City. I was there to have breakfast with Rev. Michael Stinson who is a long time community organizer and lives near the 5th City pre-school. He says his favorite way to start his day is to go over to the pre-school and listen to the kids sing the Iron Man song.. really gets his day started right. During one of these song visits he heard that the teachers were going to the ICA to be trained in the Technology of Participation (ToP) and he asked if might also come. So my visit was to visit probably the first ever 5th City ToP pastor. Right before Michael arrived in Ruby’s I looked up and who should walk in but Verdell Trice.. the 5th City movie Trice who talks about he would never had done that shopping Mall if we had not had a team. One of my film heroes.. need a team. The Mystery is everwhere. The morning was like a scene out of the new Interstellar movie. Earth has been trashed and people are looking for a new planet to live on. Basically there seems to be a benevolent force that is helping. There is a 5th dimension to life almost like those who have gone before, a mysterious force that is leaving hints about the future. More than hints, like bread crumbs that you need to follow into the future. I mean like after I finished my visit with Rev. Stinson I went out to my car and the battery was dead. Something wanted me to stay. I went back into Ruby’s Restaurant and Michael was still there, and his son-in-law just drove up then and we jump started the car. It was a miracle I am into the mystery… and then there is the late Ed Schinn’s 3 minute video put out by Interior Mythos Journeys. Ed has an amazing sense of the religious. I watched that clip 5 times. He points out that the key to contemplation is encountering the mystery, but what we do is de-mystify every day existence by ordinary-izing our lives. Having the mystery is such a powerful dimension of our lives and two-thirds of the world knows that better than the West.. need a spirit encyclopedia to make the transition from this World to the Other. I have sitting on my desk a 1988 Kenya post card that Terry Bergdall sent out trying to capture our spirit lives. On the front of the post card it starts “I trust in the final mystery of all things” and ends with “and in the enduring sustenance of the Mystery in both life and death”. I do believe that the New Social Vehicle will ride the back of a new religious mode and I do experience we are seeing signs of this new religious mode not only in my congregation and my family but also in talking with neighbors. One just borrowed the Dark Night of the Soul … sees this as a helpful motif for the pain and suffering we are presently going through in preparation for new life. I love the Matrix movie and Leo’s struggles with will he take a blue or red pill..to stay drugged to a false world or to decide to live before the struggle of something new. Just to know one has the opportunity is awesome. As a sign of the mystery and the bread crumbs and deciding to take the pill below is my first published letter to the editor that came out today. Pulling the plug was penny-wise, climate foolish Opinion: Letters To The Editor Tuesday, December 9th, 2014 12:08 PM Why has the Oak Park Village Board "pulled the plug" on the sustainability manager position within village government? The accomplishments of the manager seemed to be working quite well. An example is the electric aggregation program, researched and initiated by the manager, which saved village residents $4 million over two years and helped boost demand for Illinois' clean energy industry. And the effort to bring a smart grid test to Oak Park through a South Korean company, though still unconsummated, is an important step toward adopting 21st-century technology. Installing solar panels on the village parking lot, along with boosting availability of electric-vehicle-charging stations are other examples of important modernization. It seems that the board, in order to save a few dollars in the 2015 budget, is giving up on an effective governmental model that is used by major cities all over the country to help mitigate the ever-more-threatening consequences of climate change. Richard Alton Euclid Ave. United Methodist Church Interfaith Green Network Richard H.T. Alton 166 N. Humphrey Ave, Apt, 1N Oak Park, IL 60302 T:1.773.344.7172 richard.alton@gmail.com Don't let the fear of striking out hold you back Babe Ruth