Peace Day is Every Day

Yesterday was International Peace Day. It is widely celebrated in much of the world, yet barely rates a mention here in the US.

Here’s The UN Call for Peace. The slogan for the year, this wildly warring year, is “Partnerships for Peace — Dignity for All.”

And of course the dances of peace and the celebrations are held on the 21st. But the question of questions is what are we doing today and all the rest of the days of the year to promote Peace. Here’s what a young high-school friend of mine, Reese, already a strong advocate for Peace wrote yesterday:

“On the 25th of September at the United Nations, 193 world leaders will adopt the Global Goals. They’re a series of 17 ambitious goals to end poverty, fight inequality and injustice, and tackle climate change for everyone by 2030. The campaign aims to make the goals famous and push for their full implementation. If the goals become famous, and if people really care about what has been promised by politicians, then it gives them a much greater chance of being put into action. So today, on International Day of Peace, along with the UN and many others, I would really like you all to help make the goals famous and ensure they become a reality. Out of the 17 goals, pick the one that means the most to you and share it with everyone! I chose 2: Zero Hunger. This is how I’m sharing, what are you doing? Here’s a link to the 17 goals!”

In my life, right now, I’m working on ending hunger, gender equality, and reduced inequalities… What are you working on? I’m working locally because I’ve found that’s where I’m most effective. I’m pairing with people and groups like ThinkPeace Workshop for Girls, which has inspired young Reese, because they’re working and thinking globally as well and with Undoing Racism because they’re doing right here on-the-ground difference making.

So I invite us to consider the goals and to choose one to hold in our hearts and to work on with all our being.

Peace is the gift we can give the world in celebration of its astonishing abundance. Why wouldn’t we do that?

Life Is Precious. Sabbath. Peace.

Oh, the weather is beautiful. Noisy in the neighborhood, however. Last night it was cackling with loads of college students; this morning the geese are running practice flights for their trip south.

It’s a wonderful time of year. At the beginning of every season, it seems, there’s a washing clean of the old… There’s a burst before the settling in. We’re having that right now. I always feel more alive during those passages. (I’ve always been a fan of the places in between!)

Today, I really want to hold on to that sense of being alive, to hold it up.

My friend, by no means a close friend, just a man I like, is alive. So easily things might have gone the other way. It’s always the little things that cause the accidents… says the woman who tripped over an acorn yesterday and went flying.

Life is precious. All life. My friend’s life. It’s too short, really to complain. But not too short to celebrate. Not too short to give thanks. Not too short to pack every single minute with joy and awareness of its abundance. We’re busy we think — we think until something makes us remember… right, show up, be present: now is the time.

My friends, about those Syrian refugees. They could use some support. Their lives are precious as well…

My last two decades have been shaped by deaths. This year, two years away from the last huge, significant death, I’m feeling a little steadier on my feet. I understand, all too well, that death happens. But it’s better when it doesn’t.

So look around your circle and celebrate. Life is here. That’s really what observing the Sabbath, keeping it holy, is all about — Life is right here. There is a wild and outrageous Peace in that. Celebrate fiercely. And let’s use that to fuel the work we have to do with others whose lives are not so lucky at the moment. Because we can.

Rights, Wages, Peace

I believe people need to earn a living wage for the work they do. I believe they should be safe at work and have sick time and vacation enough to ensure that when you return to work, you are rested and ready to go.

I’m grateful to all the people who have been in the fight so far. I’m grateful for all who are in the battle now.

We need to keep moving the world forward toward Peace. Peace for everyone. No exceptions.

Consolidating the Pieces for Peace

As the Fruit Moon wanes (alas, alack) I prepare for the beginning of my work year. It starts as it ended with a yard sale. Boy that required a lot of consolidations, but none of that mine, thankfully. I’ll just go down and hand out bags.

But I’m trying to make sense out of all the things I’ve read this summer, trying to find a place in my mind to lay out the puzzles of all those different pieces. What’s the picture? How do they all fit together. All summer I’ve been expanding and now I’ll have to pull it in to some sort of order.

In a week I face the congregation, and have to have something coherent to say… I don’t want them to miss how much I value the time they offered for this study. I don’t want them to miss the wonder I’ve felt at everything I’ve learned. I don’t want them to miss the importance of some of this simply because I haven’t done the appropriate sorting and placing. It’s been all about issues of Justice. Bob Marley said so simply, no Justice, no Peace. It’s easier for all of us to reach for Peace and ignore the hard work that justice-making demands.

That’s the work of the waning moon — to consolidate.

In the gardens and orchards, the fruits are being brought in and preserved for winter enjoyment. (Although my advice is also to eat them as quickly as you can now. Stand in your kitchen, over the sink and slurp up that ripe food as quickly as you can!) Give thanks for what we have now and for what lies ahead!

Here we are: consolidating the pieces of wonder for Peace. There are worse jobs!

Review. Finish. Celebrate.

It was so fun to be dancing around with my friend/colleague/co-conspirator yesterday after we finished the grant application.

I’m not sure that everyone appreciated it, but oh, well.

It wasn’t just the doing of the application… the plowing through, finishing it up. Although that was wonderful.

It’s not often you get to take a task from awareness to completion in less that 48 hours! Zoom.

It was the recognizing what we’d done and what we’d set up to continue doing that was grand. And then we received a letter that confirmed that what we thought we were doing, people who were using the money we raised ALSO thought we were doing. That was a great joy.

And a great encouragement to keep going. So. would you like to help feed hungry kids? Go to Love Flows and donate. $10 a month feeds two kids. Amazing, eh? You can change two kids lives for $10 a month. Right here in River City. Want to start your own program doing something anything to help? It will make a difference.

It will build Peace. And that’s what we’re here to do. Make a difference. Build Peace. And Celebrate when something works! Yahoo!

Great People Making Great Peace

Ah, Jimmy Carter. Wishing you an easy passing. May Death be as kind to you as you have been to Life. May your wife find comfort in all the amazing things you have shared and the love so many have for you.

President Carter is a spectacular man who has done great things for this world. I suspect, watching his announcements, that in addition to whatever he is able to do for women as he has pledged, he will lead us in a gracious acceptance of his dying. He is, as we hate to remember, 90. If it hadn’t been this, it would have been something. May it be easy.

I’m always a bit of two minds when someone who has done great things. I’m filled with admiration and gratitude. But I’m also aware there is greatness in many of us if we only put our hearts and minds to it. There is so much we can do. There is so much difference we can make. The hard work is ours to assume.

Thank you, President Jimmy Carter, for all the work you have done. Thank you, Mrs. Carter, and I’m so very sorry. So many years together and now you are called to practice open hands, open hearts… Peace, Comfort and Blessings to you all. Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family… and with the country who claims you as theirs…

And now in your names, let us make a difference together. Let us Peace.

Abundance. Peace.

This is the time of year when it’s easy to comprehend Abundance. Look at any garden. Count your blessings in numbers and varieties. Although, you may also, if you’re the gardener, be a little overwhelmed by the chaos, which is the flip side of abundance. We need, I believe, good glasses to find the abundance in chaos — and a lot of deep breathing.

But yes. it is our responsibility to eat tomatoes and tomatoes and tomatoes. They’re here. They’re wonderful. Sure. Put them up as well… but taste them! yummmmmmmm.

And Peaches. And Peppers. And whatever else is tickling your fancy.

Although, it must be said, i don’t feel any responsibility to eat the 45 foot long zucchini!

But enjoy. Give thanks. Don’t take this bounty for granted for one moment. And share.

There’s enough for everyone. Let’s share. Let’s Peace, for goodness’ sake.

No Peace Without Respect for Women

Astonishingly it was Mao ZeDong who first said “Women hold up half the sky.” I found that out when I went googling to find the exact title of Nick Kristoff and Cheryl WuDunn’s book Half the Sky.

But you wouldn’t know it from their treatment in the world. We all like to point fingers at other parts of the world, and forget about the unfairness here. Forget about the lost wages, the underpaid jobs and the sex slavery. Forget about the mistreatment of undocumented workers. Forget about the lost opportunities.

And then there is so much of the world where they are chattel.

I’m grateful for the Elders who are working on this. Grateful that Jimmy Carter in his cancer diagnosis has said this is the work that he will devote the rest of his life to.

And I don’t yet know where to pull the first thread… but dammit. It’s awful.

I said last night I don’t believe in a condemning God nor a hell to which people should be consigned. I know that it is my feeling powerless that makes me long for it in this case.

Just the words “Theology of Rape and Sexual Slavery” combined with “enshrined.” I must get past the rage to work effectively. But right now? I’m sitting with the rage.

And that’s no way to Peace. And Peace is damned hard work. I’ll get there. But maybe not today. And still it is a goal. Peace.

Ripe Peach Peace

I totally missed one of my favorite holidays this year because I was traveling. Lammas, the first of August, is always my eat a ripe, juicy peach holiday.

I think there’s nothing more delicious. Nothing more sensual. Nothing more joyful and celebratory of life.

And here we are, with a whole month devoted to such deliciousness! Viva the Fruit Moon!

I think when the fruit is ripe and full, it’s almost a rite of holy obligation to enjoy it if we have the means. And thinking about it, the other part of that obligation is to find a way for others to enjoy as well. Fruit. We should eat it!

Being in our bodies, completely absorbed in appreciating the beauty and abundance of our Mother Earth is a prayer of Peace. Peacing! Praying! Giving thanks!

Reading Peace

All through the summer, when I was a girl, from about junior high on, I would walk to the library at least once a week and check out about 10 books. Two summers I undertook to just read through the fiction and so I was reading epic Russian sagas at the same time I was reading British spy mysteries. It was fun. Although I have to admit that at the speed I was gulping books I may have missed some of the finer points! But nothing gave me more joy. Swim. Read. Swim. Read. All Summer long.

During the work year, while I may get one or two substantive books read, I pretty much stick to fluffier reading. I read mostly to stop thinking rather than to think. ahhhhh. a chance to unwind.

But now during the summer, one of the requirements/privileges of my job is to prepare for the coming year.

This is made so much sweeter by the fact that this year, no one is sick, no one is dying and I’m not recovering from a death in the family. I am so grateful.

So this year, I get to stuff and stuff and stuff and stuff.

And it’s grand. I have no idea how things will all come together or even if they should, but I’m grateful for the opportunity.

Books have always offered me Peace, even as they’ve stirred and excited me.

Hurrah!

Sacred Village

Building a World of Peace, Village by Sacred Village.

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