Time-out for Sabbath Peace, llvl

Things don’t always go smoothly as much as you’d like them too. Sometimes there are hiccups along the road to Peace.

So you take a spoonful of sugar and you exhale. Eventually the hiccups stop.

And perhaps you take a break. Get outside and breathe in Autumn. Celebrate creation however you do that. Sit around with friends and laugh. Sit around on your own and read a book. Catch up on your craft. Put yourself on time-out for a little (self) reflection and reconsideration. ahhh.

Take a break from the work. Take a break from your Peace partners. All that work will be there tomorrow. Today, go ahead and cherish the Sabbath. Make it yours. Fill up.

Peace. Give yourself a piece of it. Tomorrow’s another day…

Trusting Peace, llvl

A friend of mine was discouraged the other day by what are truly sad signs about people’s willingness to participate in their well-being. It’s not that I don’t get it. It’s not that I don’t go there myself some times. What IS wrong with folk?

But I know, because I know what she does, that she makes an incredible difference. And I know some of her friends. We make a difference too. We’re maybe not changing huge swaths of the world, but we’re changing what’s around us. We’re in the positions that we are, because that’s how we make the most change. Other people band together and make big sweeping changes, we’re little lights in the snow, homing beacons perhaps. Beacons of Love. Beacons of Peace. It’s hard, but good work.

June Jordan, once more: We do what we can…

So, remember, my friend, take heart. Your work matters and makes a difference. I believe mine does as well. Sometimes I can see it as clearly as I see your work, as clearly as I see our friends’ and our colleagues’ work. Gently I remind us all; stoutly I defend us all. The word stoutly surprised me… but it was the right one….

We do what we can, and that matters. Peace isn’t straightforward… it bobs and weaves and gets backslid… but we have to trust ourselves in its arms and trust our passion to bring it to fruition. Peace be with you. Peace be with us all. Peace may we be.

Just Peace, llvl

I had a conversation with a dear friend yesterday, who’s been writing about just war, detailing the horribly many years we’ve used this to just-ify war…

Then I went off to hear an expert on the Middle East talk about endless war. It was terrifying and so achingly sad.

When asked what might end this conflict, he said the only thing he could imagine was a trickle of civilians saying they had had enough. Those civilians would have to meet across the boundaries and turn their trickle into a flooding demand for Peace.

It sounds excruciatingly naive, doesn’t it? Particularly as you begin to understand how other governments and too many corporate entities profit from the people’s pain; how many fan the flames of hatred to increase their bottom line and then, here’s the word again with still no justice about it, just-ify their actions. My gut instinct is to curse the bastards… but that actually doesn’t bring Peace either.

And so I encourage us to become the trickle. To decide that Peace actually matters enough to us that we will turn our faces in that direction. To forgive our neighbors as ourselves to paraphrase the Golden Rule. To love them. And ourselves.

To become come trickle that becomes the flood for Peace. Because anything else isn’t acceptable in the heart of the Divine or in our hearts. Let us do what is just and become Peacemakers. Let us do it in the name of all who have died in the maw of war and in those who live.

Serving Peace, llvl

It’s not that I don’t know that Peace is desperately needed all over the world. It’s just that I know that I am best suited for working on Peace here where I live, here i my little vida local. I have a friend Kelly who works on Peace with girls all over the world, she works to give them tools to know who they are, what they care about and what they’re capable of. She gives them space to love each other and laugh together. She’s planting seeds of Peace. Some of them are for Peace plants that explode into being and flower immediately. Most of them become tiny shoots that the girls nurture together.

Never underestimate the bonding power of late night s’mores… There’s a future in that.

I’m always clapping for Kelly, I’m a huge cheerleader for her, and on a couple occasions, I’ve been able to do more. Makes me happy.

But that’s not where I’m best. I’m best right here, right now. Standing in the Park with my neighbors, trying to raise money for programs that other people start and staff… June Jordan, poet, wrote what may be the most important words of my life: “We do what we can, more than that what can anyone ask?” This is my sacred service. This is my work.

But that much we can ask. How do we serve Peace?

Because if we’re not working for Peace, Peace isn’t working. If we look at this world, there are an awful lot of places that Peace isn’t working. For a long time, that whole servant metaphor didn’t do it for me. But I simply hadn’t found my cause. So… what’s yours? What’s the Peace in your life that you can’t rest if you’re not making some Progress toward?

Peace, Love and understanding — and for me, food in the bellies of kids in this Valley. Who’s in?

Lingering Peace, llvl

The season has changed, there’s no denying. Everything is slowly hunkering down for the winter. Most of us are fairly resigned, some of us are even excited that winter’s icy goodness is knocking.

But some pieces of Nature are not quite ready to give up their Autumnal beauty. Insistently they pinkly take their good ol’ time relinquishing their reign.

They’re a good reminder. There is in every season, a little bit of another. So the embers may glow but the flowers still reign in their little fading kingdom. There’s beauty everywhere… it’s worth taking the time to notice. You live here. Appreciate that. Allow Peace to linger in you as it lingers in all the quiet corners…

Voting Peace, llvl

Vote. There’s really not much more to say.

Oh, well, unless you’re a person of color and/or a woman. Then, really, vote. Cause people died so that we could. Or poor. Because many of the people who do vote are not voting in your/our best interest. But if you vote, that makes a difference.

Are you a patriot? Vote. Proud of your country? Vote. Think things should change? Vote. Care about what happens in your little community, in your vida local? yep, Vote.

Turn out. because while we’re walking around thinking we’re proud to be Americans, the rest of the world just thinks we’re ignorant and apathetic. Because we have freedoms and the only one we seem proud of is to own guns. Voting. It’s a thing. It’s a doing good thing.

Hope it’s yours. Get out there and vote for Peace.

Shadowy Peace, llvl

Few of us spend any time looking in a mirror — and when we do, often we don’t look beyond our hair. We’re discouraged from our childhood fascination and exploration in a mirror. During puberty, we learn to see only flaws in the mirror. Young adulthood only asks that we be trendy and from the first grey hair it’s all down hill.

But, stop!

There’s a lot to be seen in a mirror if we really look. Who we are is right there for us to examine. If we give ourselves a chance, our beauty is right there.

Also, It’s said that in a darkened room the shadows of our ancestors can be seen as well. All their hopes and dreams for us are there. Whatever they made of their lives, and I believe most people do the best they can, our forebears’ wish for us is that we will make the most of our lives, that we will be people of change.

Do we want that? Do we want to be people who do what we’re passionate about? What we’re interested in? Do we want to be beautiful because we’re filled with zest for life, because we’re hopeful?

Maybe starting with the shadows we can see not only our ancestors but also all the Possibilities for Peace that lies in our hearts. Wouldn’t that be a lovely sight?

You’re beautiful! And in the soft shadows we can’t see our imperfections — simply our beauty. Peace be with you. Peace be you. Peace of the shadows. Peace of your heart.

Saintly Sabbath Peace, llvl

Ooh, lots of ssssss. I couldn’t help myself!

In a little coincidence yesterday I spent a couple hours watching a vid on UU history and the background music was “For All the Saints” (which for a memorial hymn is pretty march, march, march, but lovely). Amazing to hear about the men and women who shaped this church. (Sad to hear how much burning at stakes everyone did in those days.) I took a long time to get to this church, but it’s certainly home. Sometimes the journey felt arduous. Yesterday certainly put THAT in perspective. But I’m grateful for the work they’ve done.

Grateful too for the saints among us now… or the recently departed. Not just the Pete Seegers and Nelson Mandelas. But those folks we know and love putting their lives on the line for the things they believe in. People we know…

I giggle a bit when I remember on my tour through the hospital in chaplain training. I’m a very low church kinda priestess as I’ve said before, so the notion of intermediaries between me and the Divine are just not part of my understanding of death. But it certainly is for some churches. A guy on the hall, who’d been quite an unpleasant patient, died. The priest came and prayed, and said at the end, Well, now when you pray, you can pray to Harry. I swear the nurse and the wife rolled their eyes at each other. So hopefully, he’d be a better saint in death than it seemed he’d been in life… But that’s the thing about the communion of saints, particularly if you’re a Unitarian Universalist — everyone gets on teh go-to-heaven bus.

I do believe that if we allow them, people will linger with us as they can and as we will let them. When my beloved die, I work hard to carry on their best work. I look to find their point of view in situations where I used to look for their counsel — or their giggle. I hadn’t really planned the service to take advantage of this, but All Saint’s Day happens to be the day of Deb’s memorial. Deb wasn’t a saintly kinda woman, but she was divine! And I relied on her guidance, support and counsel my whole life. While her loss is devastating for me, she whispers her Deb-view in my heart quite frequently. Here’s to the saints!

And while we had a long sleep last night, (I certainly took advantage of the extra hour) it’s going to feel like a short day because the change in times will bring that sun crashing to the horizon at 5 pm. So, many of us have leaves to rake, but enjoy that indoor stuff because it’s a grey and cloudy sabbath. Might as well read the Sunday papers cover to cover! Peace be with you and the saints of your heart.

Peace of All Souls, llvl

Today we learned that a fourth child is dead of gunshot wounds in the last we know of high school shooting. The only way to make Peace with that is to change laws about guns and our ho-hum relationship to violence. Are you voting on Tuesday for someone who will listen to your wishes around safety? Are you learning what you need to know about this issue? Are you engaging people in discussions? You might want to.

And I don’t know what we do for children like Jaylen, who somehow find themselves so alienated that this looks like an option. Because that poor broken child is lost as well. His family is as devastated as the families of the other children.

And today, we remember our beloved Dead. I learned so much about Day of the Dead about commemorating the dead when I lived in the Bay Area. All over the world, people have celebrated this time as a time to remember. And yet so much of American culture is around forgetting the pain. Any of us who have ever tried that know it doesn’t work…

And why would I forget? Why would I forget people who brought joy and beauty into my life? Why would you? Re-membering, calling them back into your heart once a year is a reminder that your life has been enriched. It is a way to proudly acknowledge that your life has been blessed by these wonderful people. It is a prayer of thanksgiving. It is another way of making family and creating community. So today, on this day of all souls, I will spend time with your memories and I will give rejoice and give thanks and sigh for those things we will never do again. And it will be a worthy use of my time. It will be a splendid exercise in Peace because you are among those who taught me the beauty of relationship.

Boo! Spooky Peace, llvl

For me Halloween is a holiday, but a holiday of Mother Earth, not the party store. It’s half-way between the Autumn Equinox and the Winter Solstice. Otherwise known as the beginning of Winter. Winter deepens as it nears the solstice and then it starts lessening its grip — never mind that the cold is still fierce. As the hymn says: “Light is returning, even tho’ this is the darkest hour, No one can hold back the sun.”

This is the time for looking within, for remembering our ancestors and our heritage and our lineage. This is a time of releasing the grudges — anything that hold us back from a good night’s sleep and the Sacred Dreaming that is to come. The only goblins I believe in are the hobgoblins of our thoughts that haunt us and hold us back. Let go!

I get a little whiny about commercialized, over sexed halloween… I dislike that it’s another opportunity for greed and materialism. I guess I’m a humbug. So today you get not one, but two (count ’em, two) poems about being a Witch on Halloween. (the first one’s in paragraph form, because Word press is not a fan of poems, keeps leaving a space between the lines… Funny all this time i’ve been writing on Word Press, I’ve never known this…) I’ll spend some time in this six week season thinking about the possibilities of letting go… But in the meantime, here I am, in all my glory, Grumpy Witch!

It’s not easy to be a witch on Halloween — Where’s your hat, everyone asks me? And then they laugh. Like they’re the first person that ever thought to say that. Ha!

I’m a witch. This is what a witch looks like. I look like this every day.

Of course I wear black, I’m an edgy, New York kinda witch.

But my spiritual practice is not about wearing a pointy hat and riding a broom. My spiritual practice is about honoring creation and all who dwell within.

I don’t even like cats and as for snakes, no thanks! I must confess, the whole thing makes me grumpy.

Yes, there are witches, real witches, who wear their silly hats and carry a broom around. But then at Christmastime, you can find Christians in some pretty scary outfits, with flashing pins that have very little to do with any baby born in a manger, destined to claim the world for peace. And Easter Bonnets do not make much more sense.

While people run around this Halloween, dressed like goblins and harlots, the world is slowly dying. On this sacred day, when it is believed by some that the veil between this world and the next is the thinnest, that our ancestors can whisper their wisdom in our ears, the din of battle over-rides the still small voice.

Divine Spirit can shape and change us and all we want to know is, “What do you have for candy?” and “What are you wearing on Halloween.”

So yes, I am a witch. And no, I don’t wear a hat. and if the Gods had wanted me to ride a broom, vacuum cleaners would never have been invented!

So, color me a little bit grumpy and a whole lot grateful. No hat, it ruins my hair. Yesterday I had a ride through Autumn’s dying colors and I rejoiced. Boo! There, witchy obligations handled, I wish you Peace and a spooktacular, sugar laden evening if that’s what turns you on! Consume responsibly.

Sacred Village

Building a World of Peace, Village by Sacred Village.

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