Dreaming the World

A bright, chilly day. Most of our snow is gone and we are forecast to pick up a few inches more tomorrow night before the snow turns to freezing rain, then rain. Sunday is forecast to be drenching.

Our days are noticeably longer now, the sun up before us for the first time since November. Evenings are longer, too, stretching luxuriously into the dinner hour.

Today is Valentine’s Day, a romantic holiday that once honoured Saint Valentine, a Christian clergyperson who was murdered on February 14th in the Third Century by the Romans. He was noted for his kindness and generosity, and for doing what he could to aid all people and resist the excesses of the Holy Roman Empire.

I imagine there are more similarities than differences among Western colonizing nations across time. For one, they all seem to create harm in the name of one god or another, seeing themselves as chosen people until they aren’t. For another, they tend to wreck social and environmental havoc on lands and peoples other than their own, until they turn on their own lands and people. And of course, they want to silence anyone who opposes them.

There is something profoundly pathological about colonizers who destroy people and places in order to increase their wealth and power. It was no accident that General Sherman burned southern fields on his way to torching Atlanta, leaving hungry, desperate people in his wake. Shortly after, Europeans were shooting hundreds of thousands of Bison from trains, leaving desperate, hungry Natives in their wake. Then there was oil and Vietnam, et al.

I guess we should not be surprised that our current administration and their allies are undoing many decades of civil rights and environmental law in order to further their hunger for power over others and to acquire ever more wealth. But it is not only here that we face an endangered species catastrophe. Our collective hunger for sugar, beef, tea, coffee and other specialty foods is destroying ecosystems, communities, and cultures around the world.

In the U.S., this madness is fuelled by three interwoven strands of fantasy. One strand is the idea that we can trash the Earth on our way to living on other, more pristine planets. Another is that we will soon be cyborgs and, thus, largely immune to the ill effects of spoiling our own nest. A third is the belief that if we destroy the planet Jesus will be forced to return and induce The Rapture. Of course Jesus stated clearly what he expected us to do and not do, and insisted that no one would know when he would return. He also said we would be surprised by who he chose to ascend with him.

Here then are three interlocking messianic notions that seem destined to turn our planet into a sort of Hell state. I find the moment, surreal, enraging, and heart breaking, and am hardly alone. I have heard and seen “heart breaking” used many times in communications with friends and students this week, along with a profound sense of helplessness.

Several years ago on a working trip to India I was gifted a thangka of Green Tara Buddha, a healing deity akin to Kwan Yin. She is also associated with Mother Earth. The tangka hangs on a wall near the altar in Jennie’s office, reminding us to breathe, soften into suffering, and take the long view. I deeply appreciate her calm, patient beauty.

Of course, we are human and at our best when profoundly aware of our kinship with all beings. When we forget those essential ties we become Windigo or hungry ghosts, and capable of great harm. If we take the long view we understand that life will go on long after we are all gone. Sill we watch the destruction of so much beauty, so much we hold dear, and ache anyway.

Deep dusk has fallen while I have been writing this post. The evening is beautiful.

I spent much of the morning working on a soundscape, which while unfinished, somehow captures the mood of the day for me

Winter Evening https://ramblesandpilgrimages.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2-14-25-wintyer-evening.wav