June Peace Sabbath, llvl

It doesn’t get more beautiful than June in Central Pennsylvania. The trees are green the rivers are full and the skies are blue, blue, blue. Yes, the pollen’s high, but… it’s gorgeous nonetheless.

And it’s a day of rest and relaxation. Two church services this morning, I’m preaching the home game and Sara’s leading the away one out in the woods at a park filled with waterfalls and a gorgeous lake. Then many of us are rallying for lunch, a swim or a hike or both. (don’t be ridiculous, ann doesn’t hike!)

I hope you have wonderful plans today. And I hope it’s as lovely where you are. We’re having a perfect moment here in the Valley. And I’m going to revel in it.

When we have these perfect days, may we all enjoy — and come Monday, Sabbath over, get back to work protecting this beautiful world.

No meaning, just Joy on this beautiful Sabbath Day. Peace be with you all.

Peace Has No Age Limits, llvl

A group of us gathered at church yesterday to pack toiletry kits for kids. That’s a whole story in and of itself. If you’re looking for places to help change kids’ lives, read this, and find something you want to do. Policy work is important, but the local work makes a difference and really makes community.

But there we were, this small band of volunteers. One woman had worked in a factory, she set up our line. There were 500 bags to be filled. One woman had brought her five year old. Now Cordelia makes me laugh out loud, on almost any occasion. She has enthusiasm.

One of the other other moms, whose daughter was in school, found a job for Cordelia. As we walked by filling our bags, she would hand us a toothbrush. After a while, she realized she was standing by the toothpaste, and she set out boxes of toothpaste, put a brush on the box and handed us both. More work for her, less for us. It was a great solve and it drove home that our kidlets can make a difference if we’ll just give them the option.

It was a delight for the line engineering improvement, a delight to have an empowered five year old and she laughed and giggled and made us all have a good time. She worked for the same 2 hours we all worked. Blessed are the Peacemakers and those who are willing to see the Peacemaking everyone can do.

Sometimes it’s easy to believe that we’re the only ones who can get a job done. uh… right… that’s wrong. So here’s to the 5 year olds and letting them take their place in the work that needs to be done. They might make improvements in the work flow, and they’ll definitely make you giggle. And you might just get a Peacemaker in training. Why not let them step up. Peacemakers who giggle? That’s priceless.

Connected Peace, llvl

When we think about Peace, we think about a global event. But that makes it too hard to approach. Peace, global Peace, is made up of a net work of local Peace. Peace spreads across the world bit by bit. We encourage world Peace by promoting local Peace.

I believe one of the important keys to local Peace is connection. We need to know who’s thinking and working on what issues. We need to be encouraging one another to live into and share our expertise. And then when that expertise is needed we need to step forward with our own or call on the person who knows about that topic… so we’re always using the best of us to move toward the sweetest Possibilities.

Let’s encourage the connections and grow the Peace. Let’s encourage each other. No one’s going to change the world all on her/his own. We need to keep reaching out to each other and moving the conversation forward.

Rage and Peace, llvl

Something about this last week has sent me scurrying to find a professor’s article, written sometimes in the 80s. It’s entitled “The Power of Anger in the Work of Love,” written by Beverly Wildung Harrison. It’s been a hard week. I’m grieving and deeply despairing. More children killed. Women targeted, again, again, again.

I’m trying to figure out how to channel my rage, which is powerful, for the good. How to stand fast. I’m also trying to figure out how to forgive myself for not being on this, at this. It’s not that I haven’t been doing good work in the meantime. But for the Love of All That’s Holy…

I don’t know who’s quote this is, so if you see it again, email me, but it talks about someone’s asking men their greatest fear about women: that they will laugh at me. When asked, women responded: that they will kill me. How can one-half the world’s population be in fear for their lives from the other half?

This is a failure, to teach, to train, to assert, to do the work. It’s time not only to say out loud (in case you hadn’t noticed!) that I’m a Feminist and to say to the women coming behind us that if they aren’t Feminists they are condemning their sisters to more of the same. It’s time to say to our husbands and brothers and sons: You must do something. The issues isn’t #notallmen, the issue is #YesAllWomen. Dammit. Now.

I know I’ll find equilibrium sooner or later, but I don’t mind that my anger will make people uncomfortable. that my RAGE will make people uncomfortable. Rage is the burning fire that burns through obstacles. Is it dangerous? Yes. Are we beleaguered? Yes. Can the world continue to support this. No. Listen. Take Counsel. and Speak.

Women will not be made free by putting them in smaller boxes. Equality brings freedom. Equality brings Peace. Peace now.

Mystery, Beauty, Peace, llvl

Our beautiful little village and our photographer who captures it. This is such a splendid picture of what’s happening all over at this moment in moist and lush central Pennsylvania. There are certainly other places as beautiful, but none more so, I think.

For some reason this catapults me back to childhood and playing make believe. Which I did for years. (who knew, all those years when they thought I wouldn’t ever grow up, I was just preparing to be a writer.)

It’s true that today’s Ann looks at this and thinks, oh, there’d be bugs under there (yes, I’ve gotten crochety/practical as I’ve seasoned.), but when I look through the eyes of the little girl I was I see Magic and Possibility everywhere. And where there’s Magic and Possibility, there’s Peace. There’s got to be Mystery, too, who knows what magical beings might choose to live in such beauty…

So, feast your eyes on this picture and enjoy the beauty. Consider who you used to be and consider how you might have played in this Faerie garden and who you might have met… Oh, such joy!

Peace, Both Simple and Complex, llvl

I find life fairly complicated. Or, perhaps, I make life fairly complicated. I sometimes wonder if I love Swedish Modern design because I’m Rococo enough on my own. I describe my thinking style as associative — which is perhaps only another name for the bright, shiny object style of thinking. Look a thought, I can tie it to this thought.

And yet some things in life are fairly straightforward. This hunger thing we’re working on. Straightforward. The causes for poverty and hunger are complex and confusing. But children who are hungry on the weekend? Straightforward solution. Feed them. Someone, and not me, needs to figure out the root causes and find ways to make change. In the meantime, I’ll gather money because children are hungry. I’ll ask you for money because children are hungry. See. Simple.

My faith journey looks like one of those cartoons of a kid walking everywhere to get from here to the corner. It has been both a struggle and a delight. But if I had to put a FB description on it, I’d have the heart and then: It’s complicated.

So it’s wonderful from time to time to encounter folks whose journey is simpler. They have a tradition that works for them, and mostly, they go about doing good. It’s what is required of us…

Faith can be all those things, complex and straightforward. Elemental even. Peace is all those things as well. What’s important is that we consider what’s important and reflect about how those things shape and transform us.

Popes for Peace, llvl

Well, it’s not my local vida, but it’s the vida local at the heart of three important religious traditions. There where there should be Peace, there is only conflict.

I can’t tell you that Francis’ gesture toward Palestine and Israel will go anywhere, neither can he. But his open-hearted invitation and their acceptance gives Hope. This is the work Popes are supposed to do, since no one else is making any progress. On the sixth of June, when they pray together, may we all pray for Peace between Palestine and Israel. And as our prayers hang in the air, like incense, let us wage Peace.

If Peace doesn’t start with one of us, it doesn’t start. All our high-minded posts on social media about revering the soldiers don’t matter today, they matter tomorrow and the days after that. If we revere them we do everything we can to keep them safe. We do that by addressing the Need and the Possibilities for Peace that don’t demand their ultimate sacrifice.

Memorial Sabbath Peace, llvl

An odd juxtaposition. On the one hand its my favorite day of the year. The pool opens for the summer.

On the other, it’s a memorial for all the soldiers from all the wars. Young men and women who because they believed in a cause volunteered and sacrificed. It was hard enough when the enemies were clear cut and the danger real. And now, governments decide and people are risked and no one at home, except the families, pays the price. Perhaps war has always taken people to ugly places, but now we’re seeing it all on tv.

And then, of course, war. And Peace. We’ve never found a good way to getting to Peace. One that cares for the victims. One that engages everyone.

For two weeks, since the Pete Seeger concert, I’ve had this song by Ed McCurdy on my heart:

“Last Night I Had The Strangest Dream”

Last night I had the strangest dream
I ever dreamed before
I dreamed the world had all agreed
To put an end to war
I dreamed I saw a mighty room
The room was filled with men
And the paper they were signing said
They’d never fight again

And when the papers all were signed
And a million copies made
They all joined hands end bowed their heeds
And grateful prayers were prayed
And the people in the streets below
Were dancing round and round
And guns and swords and uniforms
Were scattered on the ground

Last night I had the strangest dream
I ever dreamed before
I dreamed the world had all agreed
To put an end to war

May we dream of Peace and not War. But let us never forget those who are lost to us, those who sacrificed. It’s the Sabbath. Let us take some quiet time in the day and remember. Let us take some quiet time and rededicate ourselves to Peace.

Realigning Peace, llvl

Every once in a while, you get a day that is all about wide open space. Exhale.

Sometimes, you want to take those days off and just relax. And I say, do that!

But other days you realize there’s all this empty space for thinking, considering and pondering. Days when you can re-imagine your Life or maybe your Work. Days when there’s an itch to poke at.

That is not a day to fritter away. That’s a day to seize. That’s a day to take yourself seriously. Try this, try that. Let Peace, with all its bold Possibilities push at the constrictions you’ve placed on your life, even your soul…

Why are you still here? Go be present to yourself! Dream very large dreams!

Surprising Peace, llvl

Sometimes you surprise Peace. Sometimes Peace surprises you.

Tuesday’s ruling was a surprise. Even though I’d been seeing rumors, I hadn’t really been able to allow myself to hope. Could it really happen? Could such a thing be true?

For years, I’d thought what I’d heard, this will only happen when the Federal Government acts against all state bans. The work, in this state, was against the thousands of small villages and townships and cities and their codes that specifically allowed discrimination in housing and workplace. Enough small changes were made that SB & HB 300 are finally in the legislature and look like they have a fair chance of passing. Even our antediluvian governor seemed predisposed to sign this.

But then, boom. And there was dancing in the streets. It’s only now, a day or two later that the wonder sneaks in. If you have witnessed the pain of elder lesbians and gays, years of solid relationship under their belts weeping at young couples’ blithely assuming the right of hallowing their relationships, laws be damned, it doesn’t seem real or possible that, just like that, life is different.

The surprise isn’t lessened when you’ve tried to make your life a Prayer and a Witness for the change. It’s only compounded, I think. So many people for so long have lived in fear or at the very least been forced to accept their position as less than.

Here in a state where the assumption was that Life and Possibility could not stretch that far. and yet they have. Grace. Peace. and overwhelming Joy. Thanks be, to the All that Is!

Sacred Village

Building a World of Peace, Village by Sacred Village.

The Priestess Is In