Respect

Fall fearlessly into love.* That may sound like a very weak way to stand steady in our world today, but it is the only way that makes sense to me.

Our divisions are too deep and old for lashing out with hatred and disrespect. Something much bolder, more impossible, is required. For me, response starts with a roar from my heart as I seek to fall fearlessly into love.

For decades I’ve been waking up to the hidden and not so hidden destruction that lies within the heart of our beautiful nation. Too much of our unacknowledged history is in direct opposition to our nation’s bold assertion of freedom and justice for all:

…We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men [sic] are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

(Declaration of Independence)

…in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity…

(Constitution of the United States)

A great vision pulses through the founding documents of our nation. Unable to embody that vision, our legacy has included dangerous irregularities within the heart of our nation. We need to become, in Rev. William Barber words, “moral defibrillators of our time” and restart our nation’s heart back to the just and steady rhythm of her founding values.

Reflecting in Loving Your Enemies, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote “… within the best of us, there is some evil, and within the worst of us, there is some good … And when you come to the point that you look in the face of every [person] and see deep down within them what religion calls ‘the image of God,’ you begin to love [them] in spite of. … When you rise to the level of love, of its great beauty and power, you seek only to defeat evil systems.”

Fierce Love holds the possibility of systemic and individual transformation. Hatred, on the other hand, holds the seeds of destruction.

Fall fearlessly into love. That is the only way I know powerful enough to ensure that I land solidly on my feet, heart open and mind clear. From there I seek the courage to take seriously my partnership with Spirit, my global family and my nation and work for justice, general welfare and liberty for all.

Even when my knees shake or my heart wobbles.

*inspired by a story of Cynthia Bourgeault’s, found in “The Wisdom Way of Knowing,” pp. 70-71

To be hopeful means to be uncertain about the future, to be tender toward possibilities, to be dedicated to change all the way down to the bottom of your heart.

Rebecca Solnit

sue-last-photo-copy — Mary Sue Tipps Mathys

My mother died thirty years ago on the night of the winter solstice. Many of those years I’ve stayed awake ’round midnight because that’s when the veil between us feels thinnest.

Starting with the year she married Dad in 1952, Mom made an annual Christmas card that she mailed to 200+ friends and family. In 1971, she focused on Pandora’s Box and the hope that was left inside when all of the troubles escaped. In the card that year, Mom noted that I was to graduate from high school in May, and the only way she had the courage to let me leave home* (followed by my brother two years later) was that she had hope that “we would find our niche in the world” and that “some of the world’s problems concerning war and inequality and injustice will soon be solved.” The latter is far from happening, but I find it fascinating that my “niche in the world” has included working with others for spiritual and social transformation of “war and inequality and injustice.”

On one had, we live in dark times: midnight times. After this fall’s presidential election, many of my friends are still in grief, some crying most times we visit. It looks to many of us as if the troubles released from Pandora’s Box have won the day. And others around the country feel hopeful—underscoring the deep divides that cut through our nation today.

Silk Screened Pandora's Box by Sue — Silk Screened Pandora’s Box by Sue

I believe that Hope is a powerful force. Not a flighty Pollyanna kind of hope, longing for utopia, but a force in the darkness, facing the unknown, knowing that anything is possible in the next moment, and the next, always letting your heart take the lead.

I follow the One who reassures us that the light shines in the darkness, a light that no darkness can overcome—even when I can’t see the light. When walking in the dark, I must remember it is critical that I take each step with integrity and respect so I can add to the light and not the darkness.

I have found my niche in the world. Mom worried that I would be too timid, as that was strongly at play in my growing up years. But my passion for justice and equality danced with the flame of my spirit, and I’ve been on a revolutionary path all my life, no matter how timid it looked at any one point. The world calls for each one of us to step even more fully into leadership, into the work that is uniquely ours to do.

Mom was a force to behold. Opinionated. Headstrong. Steady. She was also open-hearted, creative and had sight far beyond her years. I couldn’t have asked for a better mother, a better role model for the life that is mine to live. And yet my work steps away from her path, off onto my own. Shortly before her death, she blessed me as I shared the ways I was stepping away from the path she traveled. That was what she was hoping for all along.

Are there hopes and dreams and visions that your mother or father, grandmother or grandfather or trusted elder friend have held for you to step into? What are you waiting for?

*I smile at these words she wrote because I know that Mom was also thrilled to have my brother and me move out of the house…

Tag: Respect

Fearless in a Time of Fear: Loving in a Time of Hate

Pandora, Mother and Hope