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Pr130324BarbPark-ed.mp3

Welcome we as usual welcome everyone of whatever religious belief whatever gender sexual orientation color of your skin we are trying to be very welcoming heard was written by mary ashton rice a universalist woman and abolitionist a suffragist and a social reformer who lectures and roads for religious and reform periodicals and served as president of the american woman suffrage association the association for the advancement of women and the massachusetts women woman's christian temperance union she was renowned. A couple of years ago i gave a program in the first century plus of universalism you may have missed it general assembly and charlotte north carolina which covered the second 100 years when i was working through this i've left out a lot of hymns and i've changed a lot of readings in order to both shorted and personalize it and peter. John murray the light of the years of thomas potter when he preached on the new jersey shore in 1770. And heated potter's the man who share the universalist gospel that god is love. Eternal punishment hellfire and bitter sectarianism are the real heresies. So that should also in between. Convinced of god's love from searching the scriptures. Universalists preached published and debated successfully. With popular purveyors of doom. They applied their universality to all human issues as early as 1790 judith sargent murray wrote an essay proclaiming the rights of women india brown and the host of her sisters were officially ordained to a loving god. The way was not easy universalism was denounced as an anathema and universalist as heathens. The right of free assembly the right to support one's own chosen church. The right to ordain one's own clergy had to be won by legal battles. Early preachers and their congregations were often far-flung and lonely. So they began to meet together and held their first regular sembly in september 1793 the day that we celebrate as the formation of the universalist denomination. Text we're going to light our chalice and rick wrecking is going to help me by doing that and the chalice is a you use symbol is relatively recent before the chalice was used in universalist circles a small group of universalist ministers who are gathering regularly from 1946 to 1950 for adopted as their symbol the off-centered cross and close by a circle the circle represented the all-embracing nature universalism and the austin turd cross recognized universalism christian roots while implying that christianity with no longer central to the face you'll occasionally still see the symbol at you you gathering. And now we'll have a minute of silent meditation. Okay our first him is a handout that you have along with your order of service and i think what drew me to universalism as a child but it's unfailing at optimistic view of life are first-hand expresses the actors optimism that universal has had for the future in the mid-nineteenth century when i did a program on universalism early years a couple years ago we ended with this him the words were written in 1852 by universe was francis de engage who was a champion of the cause of abolition women's rights and temperance she wrote children's books to remove two words of power and privilege from the state constitution the words were white and and mail so when we sing. That wasn't the last millennium of which they were speaking either. However merger moved along two parallel conventions were held in syracuse new york in 1959 and after much heated wrangling over language and structure the merger was passed paul karns who later became president of the u.s.a. remarked that at that assembly quote something happened to the universalist they met the unitarians and found that unitarians are more or less just like universalist. And they make more noise so merger was finalized in 1961 okay that you can see if you were paying attention that i grew up in a church minister by the champion of the christian wing i adored my minister was one of the reasons that i kept going to church when i was about 4 and then when they moved away i said mother i'm not stopping going to church so she had to go and she said. She came in and discovered that that was the trip she had been looking for so coarse when we voted i voted again it. And i an ent doctor eamon was was one of those that was worried that we would that universe would be simply swallowed up by the more populous unitarian i was worried that we would lose some of the this character this kind of world religion character that that was really developing but probably it was a good thing that we went through. 318 you can see how that would. There are some churches of i think the one in peoria that is a universalist unitarian church universalist. Who are closing words these were the words spoken by 2,000 delegates. At the joint 1961 assembly to pledge their allegiance to their newly-formed denomination we unitarian and universalist children of the judeo-christian heritage inheritors of the wisdom of the universal profits eager to experience the insights of the great face of the world open to all sources of inspiration ancient and modern determined to explore the boundless ocean of truth which lies about on every hand and on before and welcoming into fellowship all men. Of whatever background of face. Here together on this night of consolidation conscious of the presence of the past and of our urgent tasks dedicating ourselves anew to app the free and universal fellowship of all mankind that is the church to be going to greet your neighbors and stay for coffee.

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Pr130929StevePaulson-ed.mp3

So welcome to a unitarian universalist society my name is peter anderson. Perry aspires to be both and open-hearted. And open-minded congregation we welcome people. Of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color. Sexual orientation gender. Or family structure we welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities are going to billy's heck i even understand. We have a committee to see if we can open our hearts to tea partiers. Andrew and we just fundamentals. Later the service will have will invite visitors guessing between friends to deduce themselves. So we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. Represented either by a prairie member. A member of the wider community like today. Or by reverend sandy ingham today will be presenting. A wonderful. We'll talk by steve paulson. On the wonders of the cultivating the wonder. In the age of. Of science. We'll have the chalice lighting now and russo light the chalice. And stable over the opening words. The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious it is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true science he who knows it not and can no longer wonder no longer feel amazement is as good as dead we all have this priceless talent when we were young but as time goes by many of us lose it the true scientist never loses the faculty of amazement it is the essence of his being on cellular. I can think of no more incredible way to make a life for oneself but to be paid to talk to some of the most inquisitive and curious and exciting people in this century please put your hands together to welcome. Up to the best of our knowledge. Staples. Thank you it is a great pleasure to be here and we have some technology here which i hope will work i want to start by reading a couple of quotes which actually harkens to the earlier quotes from albert einstein. The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious it is the source of all true art and science the second point is from rachel carson a child's world is fresh and new and beautiful full of wonder and excitement it is our misfortune that for most of us that clear-eyed vision that true instinct for what is beautiful and on firing is dimmed and even lost before we reach adulthood. Typically they're designed to evoke a sense of wonder so here's the question that intrigues me if religion is not part of your life where do you find wonder. There's this odd room it's round with a. Hemispherical. Feeling in this. Creature. Looking piece of hardware in the middle of the room in the lights dim. You don't know what that thing is going to do guy. Appears above your head and i was born in the bronx new york where i'm pretty much. Thought i'd seen all the stars visible is about 11 stars at night and hear 1000. I would later recognized that a course that was the real sky. And i was. Rock. Starstruck. And i would say that my path to become an astrophysicist. Wasn't even my choice i was called by the universe and that was my first to encounter with whatever cold wonder how old were you. That's that's astonishing i mean you now run the hayden planetarium. What do you think happened during that bad experience when you were night was it just how overwhelming at all was how how surprising. Exactly and i've later done some research on this. As director of the planetarium in what we found in order for an exhibit to make a completely indelible mark. It's got to be bigger than you are. You have to turn your head up and down left and right. To see what's going on in their sounds and smells and and you're transported. What we don't appreciate as adults regarding kids. Is that they are persistently and parentally curious. And it's really forces of of society that kind of squash that curiosity how do you think we can inspire that sense of wonder in kids specifically. Adults run everything. The kids will already curious about the natural world. And left to themselves they will explore it. .. So the real task to get out of their way. So what happens in school then because so many kids are turned off of science. In elementary school that they might have just simply had a bad teacher. The good student in class is the one who obeys the teacher. Who is not disruptive. And that is like the opposite of curiosity and wonder. Curiosity wonder is i have this energy it's gurgling within me i've got to express it somehow. I think this. Sit down shut up. Learning take exam is incommensurate. With cosmic discovery. The neurologist oliver sacks is famous for his remarkable and truly wondrous stories of people with brain disorders from parkinson's disease to autism his books include awakenings and the man who mistook his wife for a hat. Why is oliver sacks how wonderful years into his wife. Wanda lesbian. Very sinful in my life i think wonder comeback. Vines. Many feelings. Curiosity. In the sense of beauty. Sense of depth. And for me. The natural world. And the world of human creations. Give me all the wonder i want. And i i don't feel any impulse 212 about a supernatural realm. But i think that's without one. and it's. Complement of doubt. Nothing you would ever be down. You think wonder is ultimately and it'll actual experience or is it something more at the emotional level. And it sounds like you're saying that that experience can come to you in different ways maybe through the experience of nature through music. Two drugs that but but that was a long time ago. And falling in love. And sweetest being alive whatever sometimes seeing animals at play. I happened to see it kept on television last night of friendship between different species. Between a bird and i'll talk to some between a goat and a horse. And an andes filled me with wonder and i think one today also have an element of the comic in it. These things were wonderful and fun day. By the way that reference to drugs is a fascinating footnote it turns on oliver sacks had a very colorful history with some powerful hallucinogens back in the six. Today we eat we tend to think about wonder as almost childlike seeing the world with fresh eyes but it isn't it hasn't always been this way in fact wonder has its own history play-doh said wonder is beginning of philosophy in the medieval world wonders were often considered monstrous there were the oddities of nature two-headed snakes twins conjoined at birth newborn baby. Descartes case he thought he could explain what was an old medieval marvel namely the allegation that a victim of a murder would bleed again the corpse would bleed again in the presence of the murderer or the murder weapon. The car thought he could actually explain this with his mechanical philosophy lightness sent in to the journal of the pirate academy royal of sciences a report of a dog that could talk it could bark out 6 words in french including. Everybody was trafficking in marvel's in the 17th century. This fascination with wonders also caught the public's fancy especially the wunderkammer that so-called cabinets of curiosity which would probably be better translated as chambers of wonder. These were extravagant collections of all kinds of strange and exotic object everything from paper money from china that no one in europe at the time that ever seen paper money. I-25 pointed toe slippers from turkey to crocodiles armadillos and birds-of-paradise you might say these were the very first museum. It's worth pointing out a few things about this history at one time there was no clear distinction between man-made and natural marble they were all part of the same brew of wonders wonder could also be scary. As floor and ashton says there's a kind of bermuda triangle of terror horror and wonder which have deep subterranean connections with each other frankenstein's monster is the quintessential example. Today we've largely domesticated wonder but it used to be something that would grab you and shake you that's what difference between wonder and awe. All is an experience so overwhelming that it's both frightening and thrilling think about hanging over the edge of the grand canyon that would probably give you some censored bought historically the experienced brushed up against the awesomeness of god. Describing something that happened when she was about 20 years old during college she was shaken by a kind of existential panic after taking a physics class just how good enough describes the experience which hit her during a camping trip when she looked up at the stars. I suddenly realized that i was no longer thinking of this cute little round planet with a sky over it that the whole thing was huge and immense and that the sun was going to go out and i got very very. Upset and disoriented and fearful. Terrified actually. And. That stayed with me for a long time until i was able to work through in. So how did you work through it. Well i realized that the real problem was that i was trying to. Find some point in it and. What i could do instead was to just realize that why there is anything at all why the universe is here while i'm here. Is a mystery. And mysteries. Are not terrifying they're just things that you don't understand. Once. I did that i could just. Take the whole story and take quarks and electrons and galaxies and everything into say okay this is the way it is don't know why but. Wow that's pretty amazing. And lucky me to be a part of it. So you're saying this kind of scientific understanding that mean the more that you really get into the way life evolve where the earth came from all of that that really. Evokes for you profound feelings of all in wonder. Yvette. I can't think of anything that even comes close. Ursula goodenough went on to write a terrific book called the sacred depths of nature. She doesn't believe in god but she does call herself religious because she is intensely interested in ultimate question. That she calls herself a religious naturalist. Which is a label that i'm willing to bet we will hear more about in the coming years. Richard dawkins would not call himself a religious naturalist despises everything about religion. Dawkins of courses the world's most famous atheist as well as a prominent evolutionary theorists. He's also a wonder junkie. Though his take is little different from that of course we're good enough for neil degrasse tyson. I just interviewed doctors actually just a few days ago here is a short excerpt from menifee. Reality is. Very beautiful and the fact that we can understand it is beautiful. And that is poetry and understanding where we come from why we exist. That's poetry in. Understanding the stars exhaust distances between them. The laws that govern the structure of the universe. Does poetry in the vast expanse of geological time. Yes i mean i guess that's the aspect of it that's particularly relevant styles yes. Your book is called an appetite for wonder where do you go looking for wonder. The real world and it's hard work on the standing of the railroad property that's been science is hard. But i mean you also get it by just imbibing it i just looking up at the milky way. By looking at fossils by looking at the grand canyon. All these things engender wonder the crickets to. Immunize yourself against what i call the anaesthetic of familiarity was so familiar. With. The world in which we live for me become inured to its 1. that's a great shame wake up. But here i am. Surrounded by my cousins. Please cousin liliana's cousin dogs. Or the produced by the same extraordinary remarkable process of evolution by natural selection. Get rid of the anaesthetic of familiarity and imbibe the extraordinary fact of your existence. If you experience wonder you need to see the worlds in an unfamiliar way i'm wondering if. If you still find wonder i mean you're thoroughly well-versed in understanding the science of all the things around us. How do you cultivate wondering to learn there's still plenty for all of us. To imagine yourself into. I'd imagine well what you're experiencing for the first time. Play imagine that you never heard of a forest before imagine you just being plump down arrive from mars and you're walking through a forest. Capture. That feeling. I talked with various scientists about what they mean by wonder and it's kind of fast and the different kinds of responses i guess there's some people who say it's really. More of an intellectual understanding of how things work how how the world is put together whether through evolution or cosmology or whatever their other scientists who say that wander is. Is really an emotional experience. Where do you come down on that. But i do think it's both but i think that i would be reluctant to let the emotion take over i think anybody who lets the one that be all that they care about him and not really care. For understanding or even worse say that understanding spoils the wonder which has been suggested. That's even more pernicious i think that. Understanding is part of it. There's a deep question we're asking here can science itself produced the experience of wonder the answer i think depends on how you define science play a clip from a place but as a story. Here's how i think of wonder we wonder at the stars. Humans have wondered at the majesty and. In mystery there and then by pursuing that wonder. We say we've been on the planet for 150,000 years. It took us 150,000 years but by pursuing that wonder. We came to realize. That we are composed of the elements constructed by the stars. That's an amazing discovery then you taking a step further. You look it up in the night sky and you realize. We are those stars reflecting on themselves. Credible. How did we come to this discovery. Cuz. Wonder. Then there's an idea worth thinking about. Maybe it's possible that among other things the universe wants. To reflect upon itself. It doesn't just want to complexify. It doesn't just want to bring forth life. It also wants to marvel over itself. And so it brought forth uhlans. Who by pursuing wonder can become that space. With the universe becomes amazed at its own nature. To brian you are a cosmology. The seems to be a little different than what most cut-off just do this kind of thinking about the universe how did you get interested in these more spiritual ask. Of the scientific story. Well i had this amazing experience when i was a young professor they asked me to address the incoming students. Not alone i was going to panel. The woman who went before me was an english professor and she was talking about her working in mythology and she was describing a few of these greek myths. That was my turn i said i'm just amazed and studying. The way in which we can now detect. The light from the beginning of time. But what i noticed in the room was. I don't know who's like a stillness there's or something took place that i really noticed among that the young students it just dawned on me that moment this is years ago. That what i was saying to them. Had a kind of power. The greek myths used to have. It just hit me that. What i was saying was was introducing. These young minds to the ultimate nature of things. And later my class is doing see what what about the meaning of life and that's exactly. My life is as been reflecting on this question. Okay we've got this amazing science. What's the meaning what's the meaning. Let's cosmologists brian swim. So how do you cultivate wonder. I think there are various ways be open to new experiences. Seek out novelty but don't take everyday experiences for granted revel in the glory and vastness of nature allow music and art to transport you let the experience wash over you and don't get caught up in your own ego let go of your sense of self if you can. My last clip is from the primatologist brutta galdikas she was one of three pioneering women chosen by louis leakey to study the graves the others being jane goodall with chimpanzees and diane fossey with mountain gorillas. Got the cost went on went to it and extremely remote part of borneo to do the first long-term field study of orangutans. It was grueling work but intensely rewarding says that some of her encounters with wild orangutans have at times felt otherworldly especially when she stared into their eyes and they look back at her. It's almost like finding god it's a powerful moment of transcendence it's it's suddenly you realize that you're not alone in the universe and those moments were very very powerful and of course but they came from the fact that there was total absolutely total isolation and they came out of the fact that there was total acceptance of the part of the orangutans i'm possibly on my part as well as the situation and those moments had the intensity of a religious experience. Does reflect you know the kind of setting that we have and gothic cathedrals are mosques there's sort of these beams of light you know that shoot from the sky and there's a sort of a hush and apply it and i think that what what church is try to do so i try to duplicate you know the ancient force from which we can and so like when you go into the forests it's like going into a church but not into a church created by humans into the original charge into the original you know garden of eden which was our home which is where we became human these kinds of experiences help explain why people frequently become almost tempted to help. There's a sade room it's round. I can't let you go without mentioning another great naturalist rachel carson she is best known for her classic book silent spring which warned us about the dangers of ddt and other toxic chemicals which was also fascinated by wonder infatuated great magazine essay back in the 50s. She writes about walking along the seashore in into the woods with her two-year-old grand nephew they would touch moss in a forest after a rainfall or watch a bird migration in the moonlight. So unlock the 17th century fascination with the oddities of nature. Rachel carson was looking for wonder in the ordinary and everyday experiences. Interrupt this remarkable passage which i want a quote if i had the influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children i should ask that her gift to each child in the world via sense of wonder so indestructible it would last throughout life. As an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later years the sterile preoccupation with things that are artificial the alienation from the sources of our strength that can't imagine saying any better thank you. Anyone have any questions. Oh yeah the question was what has instilled a sense of wonder in me and my answer is is complicated on that's a part of this world of science and religion the relationship between them 40 probably seven or eight years now and i seem to be obsessed. And there are just a talk about atheist for a moment there's a whole different hands of scientists who are religious. Display evolution stories it's not just to do you read the bible literally it's if humans were an accident and evolutionary accident us. Smush parker. Robot that can walk across the room without tripping then to be a chess genius den. It's a really interesting quest. The role of artificial intelligence was absolutely is part of this question of consciousness so there's a branch of. Computer people who got the most famous one would be ray kurzweil who believes that we are approaching what he called the singularity. That somewhere down the road i think he might say it's in 24th. Brains work like computers and that you can essentially download the brain into a computer get all of that and. I think he's one of the reasons why they're very idea that. It's just strictly information that is sort of like the computer and a lot of people would say that consciousness intelligent have to be embodied in there so it is it's the way our bodies respond to the world as well mention another response to this interview. Maybe early 1980s or so creek of course of crick and watson fame broke the double helix code and so cricket. Caulk. He has the argument that. Consciousness is ultimately about complexity if you put and he says what people say about the human brain is that it is. The most complex object ever discovered the universe there are something like they're close to a hundred billion neurons in the average human brain there trillions of synapses i mean it is phenomenally complex and i mean. And costs are costs argument is that. It's just about. You need to have enough complexity and if you have enough complexity there then ultimately you could get consciousness of others you don't need no matter what the neurons are made of wire together. And i did with him was that. Anyway i'm just saying that's so. I'm actually encounter much of it but i think it's because of the rarefied publix radio circles that i move in so. Actually like talking to the people who have a sort of religious orientation i tend not to talk to the die-hard creationists and i'm not sure if there's much to say there. Interesting history on creationism as well because this kind of biblical reading is actually fairly new and i mean yes there was the scopes trial but for a long time people could the most religious people to not read the bible literally. Scientist to bash religion because then those the creationist will just get more defensible say i mean i mean the dawkins argument has been you can't accept religion if you accept the story of evolution probably wrong about that. The closing words. The scientific theory i like best. Is it the rings of saturn. Are composed entirely of lost airline luggage. thank you for coming. Right over here. Please extend your hand of friendship to those around you and then join us for coffee and employer for conversation thank you again.

uuprairie_org

Pr160703Haydock-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm rick wrecking a member of the program committee. Prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation we welcome people of every color. And ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation. Gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities or inability. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. A member of the wider community or by our reverend sandy sandra ingham. Today ken haydock will be speaking about the right of conscience and the democratic process opening words. We hold these truths to be self-evident. That's all men are created equal. The chalice lighting today will be done by joanna catch and evans street and family. Flame of spotfire spark of the universe. That warmed our ancestral hearth. Agents of life and death. Symbol of truth and freedom. We strive to understand ourselves and our earthly home. The program committee this year has endeavored to bring a series of programs on the purposes and principles. We haven't done them in a particular order but tried to organize them according to the season the spirit of the season. And this one is the right of conscience in the democratic process for obvious reasons we're doing it around july 4th can haydock is a longtime friend of prairie he's presented programs in the past on a religious nature on buddhism as i recall and always have been well-received. Can a welcome and. Canada. Let me hear start with a few preparatory march before going into the substance. The first is that. My object here is to kind of put a another egg beaters they the handheld ones that you needed to crank. It's to put a little egg beater in everybody's mind that this is a written it would be considered a thing. Shipley's accepted net in that vein. All second of got a couple of. All apologies. Humanist. Some of the text. Has references to god. Feminist. When thomas jefferson and robert burns were alive in the 1700s. In context. The terms man and men. Could refer to all. Human beings. Not just those of us. All with y chromosomes. And i apologize for any confusion there. Tomorrow. Is july 4th. The day that the united states observes. Its independence. Today isn't. And so let's instead of having a july 4th oration. With something a little bit more analytical. Introspective. The topic is the fifth. Principal. We're seven principles that were set down by the. American. Universalist association. Congregations in america and i think the 1960s with maybe a few tweaks since then. And the fifth. Reminds me a little bit. The 1st amendment to the constitution. First amended the constitution isn't on one topic. Legend freedom speech freedom of assembly freedom of press 04. Nor is this i don't think it addresses one. Issue. Itachi back conscience. I talks about. Democracy. And i see these as. Compatible with separate. Topix. The first i'd like to talk a little bit about. All conscience. And then move on to the subjective. Democracy. Now. These are personal reflections. I think conscience starts with accepting. Some set of standards or principles their ethical lamar. For a lot of people once you do that. Indie game. You're there. Private conscience actually exist the quest more of a continuum. Are people who've accepted certain principles. Moving up the chain their people who have accepted them don't live up to them and feel guilty. That's a step forward. The people probably most of us who try to live up to what we consider standards of right and wrong and when you should act. Should not. Don't always make it. Also people. Who make an attempt. To center their moral precepts. In the middle of their life. And. I'll work from there. You might think in terms of. Members of the holy orders and christian traditions of buddhist monks and nuns. All in any even the more committed members of the religious society of friends. It said friends that they did not abolish. The clergy they abolished laity. Everyone's response. Okay. And probably the clearest example of this is there are in our society today and the. Off fifth principle which is right there on the. Wall off to your right and blue plaque towards that. It does a talk about. Introducing. Concept of democracy into. Society in general. The. Question of. Hunching standards. It's related to consciousness its consciousness of guilt or consciousness of right and wrong. And. In the context of our society. There are folks. Waikiki evengelical protestants. In america. In the last century. Who believed that what's important in terms of right and wrong. Is your hughes. With respect to jesus of nazareth. . what you have that. Urraca salvation. The other end of the continuum. All is an odd. Collection of glue. Roman catholics. Unitarian universalist. Quakers many buddhists. Who. All of them lights. The book of james new testament. Faith without works is dead. Show me your faith without works and i'll show you my faith by my works. Very different approach. And so. All. Conscience isn't a commodity. You can go to east towne mall west towne mall. Orange and ports. And my boxes a thing. Corn flakes. Kitchen utensils at certain thing. You can't buy. A box of conscience it's it's it's an abstract. And i will leave you to. Ponder on that surgery. More interesting. Science major. Democracy. Now what does it mean what democracy like so many words. Varies depending on who's using it. Like the word giant me. The. Military dictatorship. And the repressive police state. Known as east germany. Was considered. Bye. Soviet union. All to be democratic its very name was the german democratic republic. That's not my definition is democracy. I think the simplest definition is democracy is the application of the principle of equality. In. Political or administrative setting. And mark is very proud of how. Democratic wheelwright. One-person-one-vote. Not so fast. You probably already already talked about the fact that. They're about five and a half million americans who live in the seven states. Smallest population. Today. There are about 60 million people live in our first and. Now fourth largest state in terms of population new york florida past my home state. Recently. And in the group c or the american citizens. Who live in the district of columbia the commonwealth of puerto rico in the american territories. All. American samoa us virgin islands bomb. And the wally. Always forget about the northern marianas. I define. Quickly. Group a. Find hit million people. Represent in the us senate by 14 senators. Poopy butt 11 times as many people represented by four senators. And the last group equal in size to the first. Or not now and never have been represented in the senate at all. That's not. Equality. Book. Every favor bringing democracy into. Not just. The engineering universalism. But. Society at large. What are we doing about that. Troponin. The term. Equality can also be applied. Ina. Economic setting. In american public life. Between 1968 and norman thomas died and a year ago when bernie sanders suddenly became public figure nationally. Very little was it about. Democracy. Applied. Equality played in the field of. Economics. How excited. Are americans at large about. That concert then again. The soviet union had very different. Definition of the term socialist. Are we different highly from that of the mayor's about 100 years ago. In. Gary's townsend. Wisconsin. Something to. Consider. Equality in society. The 1950s 1960s. It just wasn't done that suggested america. Had social classes. I know we all knew it. You could study it in a sociology class. If you no more talk about that. Play conversation that miranda get on the street just wasn't on. What america has been. This late. All the. Class structure obviously doesn't look like. India under years ago. But their folks. Lower lower class who. Success. Literally lived in. Boxes that maytag washers and dryers. Whatever reason. Alcohol is. Chronic mental illness. And you're not no matter how much money you have you're not in the upper upper class unless you're from. An old name family. You need not just money and power and social status. You need to have been part of society for long time. Roosevelt's. Even andrew carnegie who got there. Originated this kind of a poor boy in scotland. Championship table. Address again shortly. But let's look at the democracy mean democracy is. I'm democrat little d democrat first and foremost. A favorite. Is it always best buy. One-person-one-vote. But what. Number of people voting. Get us to decision. Simple majority. I use that here. 60%. For reasons known only to them that's what you need to get anything past these days in the us senate. Go to robert's rules of order sometimes you need 3/4 or 2/3 majority to do things. And if you are a hip site quaker. You need unanimity. Unanimity. It's a long time for. Decisions that are going to be acted on. To be reached. One person who doesn't like it. Decision does not get formally made by the meeting meaning conjugation. Where. You draw the line that's it's not. Clear it's not obvious. It's not. Specify. And. How useful is democracy in sunset. How'd you like to have. Your country. Defended. B committees. Will vote on who gets to hold rank in the military today. What are taxes going to be. Wonder music. How do i get the two most. Successful. Organizations in history western civilization. Have been. The roman army. These job considering the technology available to. And the roman church. Would you survive without. Kubo. Bring up my wires. Thank you sorry. So when we. Speak in. The context of. Unitarian universalist congregation. About. Democracy. Equality in other words. In. Operator. And change it we want more of it. Society. It's not. Necessarily quite. That straightforward. Off-the-shelf metanet. It's a lot to think about. I mean you might want to. Take a day off in and think about that. And that's what happens congress is obliged us. With a national holiday tomorrow. So this would provide an opportunity. I'd like to. And the next. The last. Thing. Musically related to. Screen. And just as i like. The thought. All of the first him. Written by sir arthur sullivan. May be familiar with some of his other works iolanthe the mikado. Play musician but he keeps the same one. It includes. A reference. And in the words of it benefit them except for his noon. Poets. Song it's boring. And i can think of no better illustration if the former has to do with individual conscience. And in that tradition. I can think of no better song. To illustrate. Principle of democracy. Why not. Wanting to have to try to translate all of your to joy. Autonation garden boulder resort. Decent. Then just poem that was written. By robert burns. Amanza man try that again man mankind. Humankind. Broad that basically means. In the final analysis. View all. Spoiler alert the last verse after having. In any part of the reason i'm doing this is because it's written and sung in scotts. Which is a strong dialects would you like. Watching a shakespearean play and not realizing what's going on his result. Are you talked about rank among people is being relatively worthless. That honesty is more important than whether you're rich or poor. They having an independent-minded laugh at people to think. Otherwise in the final of. Versus. Then let us pray that come it may. Come it will try that. It's sense and worth oral all the earth. A degree in other. Rezac returnship. Tumi win the prize win the day. We're all that not that it's coming yet for all that that man-to-man the world war. Show brothers be fraud that. Well that's. Home. What you will see is. A very gifted woman singer. Scene song. Two group of people who received it. It is the scottish parliament on the david it open. To wash. Independence day. Is a remembrance of something that occurred. Two and a half centuries ago. In scotland in 1999. They were regaining. Control complete control button. Major control over their own affairs for the first time. In over 290 years. And it's not by accident that on the last verse. The members of the assembly. Joined the chorus. Thor. So you need that. Background not everybody. Is up one. The scottish history. But here. How many 1776. I thought you should put money on it 1999 we're all alive. So this is. A real independence day really feel. And maybe we can think in terms of orange. In light of their. Being dumb not just across europe but in our own countries included well aware. I'll vote with a friend of mine sydney australia. Australian flag. Call angie. Upper left-hand corner of the flag. Seriously union gap. Answered your plan to just pull open your jacket over there all of them and words we're with the stupid. I pointed out that a critical variable in respect rogers is. Who's others. When did women get the right to vote in this country. When did former slaves get the right to vote. This wasn't written in. 1783 1787 is evolve over time. Equality respect for others yet very important. But. I don't. Necessarily. More of it. Status. Manatt. I'd rather. Have my life dictated somewhat. By the federal government. Then by monsanto. That's me just saying. Discussions that i've had on discussing the other person is yelling. With libertarians. Have tended to breakdown. Sorry. But yeah i know i think it is possible to have respect for others. In the context of. Ina non-democratic. That's that's. That's true i'd i'd argue that he will one. Abby. The abbot. We try to see that all the monks were treated equally but even though. In theory. Ironwood. Indoor. Chicana. The. Problem. I certainly have no problem. What you said yes sometimes liberty and equality are competing. Lamps in in. The thought behind the principal would beach person has to decide. How. He or she fits in. That. Diana. I'll bet there's a bigger problem with some people are not interested in you just. They're interested in a just me. A few of them. I've been on the front patriots. Part of the problem there is. Here is. Michoacana. Ranking. Republican senator. And here is. Elizabeth warren. Junior senator from. Massachusetts. One of them things.. Healthcare is right in the other doesn't. The problem you start the problem. Has started by defining what is a right and what is not. People seem to think that if the law says you have a right to something. Then it's morally yours. And that's not always. Mckay's. If you've got more food than you need them people around you starving. Legally. You've got more food. But is it the end of the. That that's it. Go in peace.

uuprairie_org

Pr111023Jaeger-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm mary mullen a member of the program committee prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation and we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color your sexual orientation or gender or your family structure. And we welcome you also no matter what your age whether you're very very young or very very old or in the middle no matter what your abilities or even more important inability. Later in the service will invite visitors yes and returning friends to introduce yourself. So we can get to know you better. On sunday morning we provide a wide variety of services. They're presented either by a prairie member or remember the wider community. We're still recruiting for a minister. A part-time minister. But we don't have one yet so it's just us. And we're used to that because we were a leyland congregation from the beginning and didn't have ministerial help for most of our history. Today a jim jagger. Sitting right here will be presenting a food aside for mom. And it's about the end-of-life directive. Jim has kindly agreed for tuesday for a talkback session from 11:30 until noon for more in-depth questions and discussion for those who can stay and that'll happen right up front here. 15 minutes after the service and we have to give you time to visit a little bit. This sunday the services by jim jagger about the end-of-life director as i mentioned before and again remember that he'll be here for a talkback session meaning you can all talk with him at 11:30 because we probably won't have as much time to talk to him during the discussion. jim is a student in the modified residency program of meadville lombard theological school which is the universal unitarian universalist seminarian chicago hospital and he volunteers as a part-time chaplain at a grace. Jim jaggers over in la crosse gundersen is a nationwide leader in what's called advanced care planning which is the whole process of making sure that when the time comes individuals wishes with respect to their care particular their end-of-life care isn't that carried out and so what we're going to do. It was a morning like this. Maybe. 5. 10 years ago. I'm i was in my office. I got a phone call. Was told that client of mine had just been admitted to the hospital. Now given the nature of my practice that's not an unusual event. Have a lot of clients in and out of the hospital. But in this particular case it was a little different because i had agreed. To be the health care power-of-attorney the health care agent. For this particular individual. And what i found out was. That she had been found in her apartment. Unconscious and have been taken to the emergency room. She was in her mid-sixties. Are generally healthy except for the fact that she had recurrent lung cancer. And she apparently it had a stroke. So i went down to the emergency room at university hospital. I went in and saw her in the room she's been intubated she was on the breathing tube. And was stabilized. But was not conscious. And so i said wild come back in the evening. And so about 5 that afternoon i went back over to the emergency room. At that point had a chance to talk to the position. I said what are you what's the plans here. He said well. We think we ought to remove the breathing too. I said okay so if you do that. What's going to happen. I said well so probably.. Well. Prior to shortly prior to the time. That. The this incident occurred she was getting ready to move. From her excuse me independent living apartment into a more supportive environment and so she was really focused on that. I tried to get her to have the conversation to talk about what you want and we'll do that later. Unfortunately. Later was now. And i told them i can't make that decision. I really can't i don't know what she would want. I went home that evening. I had some telephone numbers of people that i was instructed to call in the event of her death. Friends of her she was somewhat alienated from her family. It's why i called them talk to two or three of them. And came away from the conversation. I thinking that no she would not want to go on like this indefinitely. Until after rather sleepless night i got up the next morning. And i went down to. University hospital. Having steeled myself be prepared to. Have them remove the breathing too. And there she was up in the icu. Wide awake. With the breathing tube. And so they removed it. She was fine she could talk to me. Then we had the conversation telling you. And in fact she ended up going into nursing home was there for several months in and died of natural causes. That experience. Made much more real to me. This so-called process of advance care planning. As was indicated in the video. We don't want to have somebody else have to guess what it is that we want to do. We want to make these decisions. For ourselves. And so that's what i want to talk about this morning a process that we call. Advance care planning. I'm about 13 years has served on the ethics committee at oakwood nursing home. And. They're over the course of that time i met a woman by the name of linda briggs linda is a registered nurse. But her longtime work has been in the field of advanced care planning. At gundersen lutheran hospital. And i was. In my practice was well into the notion of doing powers of attorney for health care if you come to see me. Have an estate plan done and you don't have a power of attorney for health care i will do my best to make sure that when you walk out of my office you will have one. It's always really focused on the document and getting the documents executed. And what happened was in the course of working with linda. At. The heist at the oakwood. She began to hammer into me. The notion of. This is more than just signing pieces of paper. This is a process this is something that you have to think about. The legal background to this is fairly interesting. It started back in the 1970s with karen ann quinlan case ms quinlan was a young individual in her 20s. Cool for some reason not known to this day. Collapsed during a. Party she was at. Taken to the hospital put on the respirator. I was in what doctors referred to as a persistent vegetative state. Which is the state where there really is no activity above the brainstem. Limbic system of the nervous system continues to function. It was thought that if the breathing tube removed. She would not continue to live in at some point along the line her parents made the determination she would not want to go on like that. Petitioned the courts for. Authority to remove the breathing tube the respirator. In fact got that authority from the courts remove it. But they did something has been brother could become rather common which is they wean her from the ventilator. Weaning meaning they would take her off for short for short periods of time and lowan behold when they took it off she didn't die. And she lived for another seventeen years still in a persistent vegetative state on a feeding tube. Let's major case was nancy cruzan nancy was another young woman. Who is a severe brain injury in a. An automobile accident donna missouri. And at some point along the line during the initial treatment they inserted a feeding tube. Thinking she was going to get better what we call a bridge to getting better and what happened in that case was in fact. She would did not get better and so there came a point when her parents decided she would not want to go along like this and so they petition to remove the feeding tube. Now we've always looked at feeding tubes differently. Then we look at. Other kinds of medical intervention if something about taking away. Food quote on quote. That gets a different nerve. And so the matter went to the missouri if they were successful in the trial court they go to the missouri supreme court. The missouri supreme court says no. The only way that you can remove a feeding tube is if there is clear and convincing evidence of what nancy would want and they didn't have such evidence in that case. Case closed the united states supreme court. How does supreme court says you do have a right. To refuse unwanted medical treatment. And that right can be expressed. Buy a surrogate decision-maker a guardian a power of attorney or whatever. But the state and is with with its interest in preserving wife. Has the right to set what level of proof they will require. And basically they said in this case the state of missouri properly required clear and convincing evidence which to us lawyers is. Something more than a preponderance of the evidence but something less than proof beyond a reasonable doubt. As it happened what it what went on is out this case got a lot of notoriety. And. Went went back to the trial court the family got a call from some people say you don't know us. But we do nancy. And we had conversations about this and here's what nancy told us. Based on that they were able to go back to the court get an order authorizing the removal the feeding tube. In wisconsin with a little different situation we enter case called edna amf edna was an 89 year old woman who suffered from advanced alzheimer's disease. It was another situation long-term feeding tube they wanted to remove it. And ultimately what the wisconsin supreme court said. Is that if you're in a persistent vegetative state. Then an agent under power of attorney. Or eight more importantly a court-appointed guardian. Can remove the feeding tube but if you're not in persistent vegetative state they can only do so if there is for clear evidence of what your wishes are. Do i happen to think that the distinction they were making didn't make a lot of sense. I wrote a wall review article. That maybe three people have read and nobody is follow. But them. It sets a precedent in wisconsin. That is really problematic if you have not done it vance care planning so what is advance care planning what do i mean. By that phrase. I see it as having a three-step process. The first step of that process is going on right here. Within your own hat. It's a process where you have to think about. And consider. What it is. That you would want. Portage medical decisions not just end of life but will focus on today. But any kind of medical decision. We're faced with some interesting and troubling statistics. Cowboys. When we went from the 19th to the 20th century. The average life expectancy was about 43 to 45 years. When we went from the 20th to the 21st century. The average life expectancy is about 79 years. What's the impact of that well. The impact of that. Is that as you get older it is more likely that you're going to be diagnosed with dementia. Or have some other condition that's going to render it so that you're unable to make your own decisions. The largest growing segment of our population. Is over age 85. At age 85. Half of you. Will have be diagnosed with some form of dementia. Right now. We have about five million people with dementia. Primarily alzheimer's disease in the united states. If we don't do something about it if we can't find a way to cure it or to slow it down. By 2050 we're going to have 15 million people. With alzheimer's. So the likelihood is the good news is you're going to live longer the bad news is that at some point you may no longer be able. To make your own decisions. And so you have to plan for that. Intro the first step in the process. Is you have to think about these issues. I don't think any of us. Want to think about the fact that we may die. And certainly we don't want to think about the fact that we may face of an extended. of time when we're unable to make our own decisions for ourselves. But then who's going to decide for mom. So the first step in the process isn't step in your own hit. It is thinking about these issues how do you do that. Well there's lots of material out there there's material on the internet. There are what are called the gold wish cards. If any of you have had a power of attorney for health care. Done at any of the local hospitals there's a booklet called a gift your family. That they often use when they're doing the power of attorney for health care and in that book there is a couple of things with ideas to talk about your health care issues. The behavior remember. In the last election we had this argument over death panels the roving bands of government bureaucrats who's going to kill off grandma was. What's a proposal. The doctors actually be able to bill medicare. To talk with their client about their wishes at the end of life. That's what these death panels were. And that's a big issue. Because what we find is when people are given the opportunity to learn about what they're faced with and what the decisions are in many cases they're going to do what your friend here did today and said. I've lived a good life. Time for me to. Booba. And so. That's a process we need to go through you need to spend time with your doctor. With your. Other medical people with your minister with anybody who can help you work your way through these decisions. Let's step number one. Step number two. Is to execute. The proper legal documents. To help carry out. These decisions. Because we don't have in wisconsin. What is sometimes called a family consent law. Family consent law is one which says that if an individual is unable to make decisions for themselves. And they haven't done any advanced planning. Then what we will do is a certain people in certain orders of priority will get to make the decisions so if you're the spouse. You don't have the right to make. Legal right to make the decision. As a practical matter what we call it the law school law in action. What really happens. At the bedside is anybody who's been in the hospital knows our works in the hospital knows if everybody's on the same page are probably going to end there aren't that the advance directives are probably going to let people make the decision. But shouldn't count on me and we don't have the legal stuff to do it and so what we have developed because of cases like cruzan and quinlan and edna math. We have developed a series of documents that we call advance medical directive or amd. And these are the documents that are in place. So that people have the ability to care have the legal authority to make these decisions the oldest of these so-called amd's. Is what we call in wisconsin the declaration to physicians. Most other states would refer to this as a living will. A declaration to physicians if you think about it is here you hears you. Here's the medical provider the medical providers. And in the declaration positions you're saying something directly to them you're talkin from here to here. And what you are saying is. That if i am ever in a persistent vegetative state. Or in a quote terminal condition on quote which is divine means. That death is imminent if no action is taken. Then you don't want certain things done. You don't want extraordinary measures to keep you alive. And perhaps you don't want. Tube feeding. There's a couple of problems with that document. First of all studies have shown that. With just of the declaration of decision or living will take documents. Very often it's just not honor. People you know if there's any controversy at all people don't honor it's unlikely. That you are going to have your wishes. Carried out with that kind of a document. Secondly it is fits a very limited scope of decisions. It only fits the end-of-life decisions that affect the plot. But. With alzheimer's disease with other dimensions with the after effects of a traumatic brain injury or stroke may go on for many many years. And there's going to be other decisions that need to be made. Feed the consenting the surgery the aspirin or the band-aid. All sorts of things were the doctrine of informed consent requires somebody make giving permission. And the the declaration of additions just doesn't do it. And the declaration of positions is only an effect when you're in a persistent vegetative state or terminal condition. And while life is probably a terminal condition if you wanted to find a broadly as practical matter. It's a really late in the process before you ever hit that. So it's a document that's there i've used it in some cases where i will use it typically as if i have an elderly couple. With no close friends or family nearby. So that. I do power of attorney for health care so they can make decisions for each other but then i have that kind of his urbackup. But not as the sole document. The second document that we have in wisconsin or the second. Directive. Is what we call the dnr bracelet. Dnr means do not resuscitate. And typically you're going to run into that in a hospital or nursing home setting or somebody will be what we called noco. So that if they go into respiratory or cardiac arrest. Holly want be relaxed. But what about the person living in the community with terminal cancer. With advanced age. I'll wear there's that they're not going to. Be able to get any better. And they just decide that if in fact something happens if i go into cardiac arrest batory arrest and the emts, i don't want them. 2. Revive me. Well what you can do in that situation is you can go to your doctor. Out of the warrior can't do with the hospital can't do it you have to go to your position the position has to make the finding that you are in fact in that. Particular situation and prescribe this bracelet what you wear so hopefully when the emts find you collapse. They'll look at it say oh yeah this is a dnr. That's the newest of our advance directives. The best medical directors that i believe should be the one that we use is what's called the power of attorney for health care. That works differently. You have the movie called you you're the principal you're the person signing it you're here. You got the doctor or the nurse or the hospital or whatever over here but in between you got this agent. This person to make health care decisions for you. And the idea behind that document. Is that you're going to tell the agent what you want. And then the agents going to know this or have some idea of it so that when something comes up and you can't make your decisions anymore. Bat in that situation. You will then they will then be able. To make the decisions for you. Are power of attorney for health care. Is what we lawyers call a springing document. What that means is it is not the agent does not get authority at the point when you actually sign the document. All you're doing is creating the beginnings of a process. The document. The document actually doesn't take effect is not in in in effect. For making purposes until 2 doctors. Or a doctor and a psychologist. Have you trimming that you lack the capacity to make your own healthcare decisions. What is incapacity well it is defined in the statute. Does the inability to receive evaluate or communicate information so you can effectively manage your healthcare. And so what do doctors make that certification then and only then. Does the agent take over. Now what kinds of decisions can the agent make at that point anytime. Anything is i tell my clients from as simple as. I'm in consenting to an aspirin or a band-aid. To the other end of the spectrum consenting the surgery turning off the machines it is the whole spectrum of decision. Authorized by this document. Now it was sconsin. We have some. Additional things that are built into our documents that you don't have another states and that's why. If you are let's say you live both part 2 yd in texas or arizona or florida whatever another part of the year up here i recommend that you have documents in both places because the ones in these other states may not work in wisconsin is couple of areas where this comes up. First area has to do with admission to either a nursing home or what we call a community-based residential facility or cvrf. In wisconsin if you are unable to admit yourself because of mental capacity to one of these kinds of facilities your. Got power of attorney or guardian can't admit you unless either you got a part of attorney for health care that specifically authorizes the admission. Or the guardian you go to wakulla guardianship and protective placement in the problem is another stage in particular illinois their document doesn't have that language in the fact that short-form document they have in illinois doesn't mention facilities at all it's a list can create some real problems. If somebody's moving up here so that's one of the first things that unique about the wisconsin document the other thing about the wisconsin document. Is there's a provision in there where you have to determine whether or not your agent specifically has the authority to withhold or withdraw a feeding tube. Do feeding tubes were a lot of the controversy has taken place in the issue with the feeding tube. Is. Weather summer weather is it a bridge to recovery. For example you've had a stroke. How often when you have a stroke you lose the ability to swallow but that can often be brought back. Through various kinds of therapy. But in the meantime you need to be able to be fed or simply recovering from surgery you may not have the ability. To make the to be able to eat on your own. And so again with the hope is that you're going to get better. And the purpose of the feeding tube is to provide that bridge to recovery wallnau situations many people would say yeah i want a feeding tube. Cuz i'm going to be able to get back i may not reach. Receive all of my function. But certainly i will receive y'all get some of it back. And so for that reason. People may want on the other hand if you're the nancy cruzan situation or. Terri schiavo. Where the feeding tube is simply going to keep your physical body going. Indefinitely or almost indefinitely but there's no chance of you getting better you may say you know what. I don't want to go through that more important i don't want my family to go to it. So in the power of attorney for health care you have to make. Those decisions there's one other very important decision that has to be made. This is particularly for those of you who are. 85 year old women and that is the question of healthcare decisions if you are pregnant. We have added to our document the category of not applicable can i get some of the strangest looks. Okay. So who should be your agent well. I have three criteria that i suggest. One somebody who shares or sympathizes with your views and values relating to healthcare. Or if they don't share them they respect you and i love you enough that they will carry out what you want not what the agent wants. Secondly that they're strong enough to make tough decisions cuz you're asking somebody to decide whether someone lives or dies and if any of you been in that position. You know how that can be. And then finally you need somebody who is aggressive and strong enough to be your advocate in the healthcare system because anybody that's been in a hospital or nursing home knows. That in order to get really good care. Either you or somebody else has got to be an advocate on your behalf. That being said y'all the question was going to be the oldest child of the youngest child or whatever and while i think. That we older children oldest children should be given some degree of deference. In all reality. Y'all reality that's not the criteria criteria who you thinking make the decisions. The other issues will shouldn't it be the kid that's nearby. Any answer that is well all things being equal yeah. If you got two equally good ages and one is in madison and one is in alaska probably better have the first in madison. But if the person in alaska is clearly superior decision-maker i'd make them the agent. We are the kinds of communications we have these days. It is hard for somebody not to be able to communicate it with. So i don't know what the cell phone coverage is in alaska. So so basically i think you got to look at the kinds of decisions that are going to be made. Now when you sign this document it's not like a forever thing if you decide for some reason that you no longer want this particular asian or you want to change the nature of decisions as long as you have the mental capacity to do so. You can make that you can make those changes revoke the document. And in fact i think. That even if you've been determined to be incapacitated you can still revoked the document and certainly the wise clear that if they're doing something you don't want you can say stop don't do it. So they're there for healthcare and you really don't want to be there i don't want to go now they think you need to be there and you really can't make a decision they can go for guardianship. Okay so that's the second part get the document and placed third part just to kind of wrap things up and then we'll go to discussion. Communication. Obviously you need to have the communication with the agent. They need to know what it is you want. But there may be other key players in the family or friends structure. Who although they're not the agent needs to know what's going on. So they can understand it with the agent is doing is what you want. And so in that situation you need if you were pointed you know you got for children even pointed child one and child to is the agents. You could appoint all4paws long as it's in a certain order but that's often not done. You need to sit down and talk with everybody in the family. About what it is that you want and why. Because that's where a lot of the the conflict comes into play. So who's going to decide for mom. The hopefully mom will make that decision for herself and who she wants to make that decision. And that she'll talk with them that that agent will know what it is that they want. And that the agents and will carry out their wishes. So why don't we take i don't know how. Who's got the. Maybe take a few minutes for some discussion. Okay so question comments. It's a good question question because that really is the very often. The the dilemma is that people don't want to have these conversations. And all you can really do. Is porsche. As much as you can. Ward ward churches. Civic groups and all are beginning to talk about this. We want sad to say. Morbid to say but one of the best times that we had in this country in recent years for this conversation. Was during the terri schiavo case. More and more people wanted all of a sudden these issues came to the fore and they wanted to talk about it. Maybe you're not the maybe it's not you that is the one that will have to do it maybe their doctor. Needs to bring it outfit will certainly come up. Get there ever admitted to a hospital it's going to come up because they're going to be asked. Under the patient self-determination act whether or not they will have or want to execute an advance directive. But i can tell you that the hospitals in madison. Are pretty aggressive. About trying to get people to sign the documents i don't know how much they do with the other pieces of the planet really getting the people to talk about it and think about it but by gum they're going to have those documents sign. And so what's the document sign dickly if he signs the document their points you is the agent then you have every right to go to the same look dad. You want me to make these decisions i have no idea what you want. Would you want to have a feeding tube forever. Probably going to say no. But at least you need to try to force it if they aren't willing to have the conversation. You fry. And then at that point if you haven't been instructed in what to do. Then what the statute says that you try to make the decision it's in their best interest. That where the problem comes up. Is particularly as it relates to end-of-life decision-making because. Is the argument is you know is it. Is it not in somebody's best interest to be kept alive and being kept alive or dream of being kept alive biologically. Most of us i'm guessing to clean this room. Would probably say well that's really going to depend on the quality of my life. But then a lot of corners it's going to be you know it. If the choice is between physically living and physically dying physically living is better and so. That's where you get into this issue of what is in the best interest but. You don't at least broaching the subject it may not are his parents alive but the point is that what may bring him around. Is the day that he gets the call from the emergency room saying mr. so-and-so your mother is here and she all this is her condition what do you want us to do. And it goes oh my god i don't know. So that your very often frankly in my practice. That's what brings people around is when they have to do it for their. Elderly parents or relatives. I'm going to be here for like a half an hour or so afterwards we can get into this more so i will sit down.

uuprairie_org

Pr151206Tedesco-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society we strive to be a welcoming congregation we welcome you no matter your ethnicity no matter your family structure no matter your sexual orientation your gender the color your hair your. Physical a bill or your lack of hear your physical ability for your. Physical inability and we like to hope no matter your political persuasion that we don't get into that on sunday morning. If this is your first time here. Or one of your first times i encourage you to come more than once because our services are very different on different sunday morning sometimes i do. The service i am sandy ingham prairies minister. Sometimes people from within the congregation do the service which is the case today professor matt tedesco will do the service. Sometimes people from outside the car. You are services. Also if you are new or visiting and you'd like to introduce yourself. We don't force you to do that we just stare at you until you do it for a long time but there will be at time for that a little will be time for that later on in the service. Let's officially begin them. With these opening words. From deuteronomy. If there is among you anyone in need. A member of your community in any of your towns. Do not be hard-hearted. Or tight. Sister. Towards your needy neighbor. You should rather open. Your hand. Willingly lending enough. To meet. The need. Whatever it may be. Would you please like the chap. You are welcome here visit your friend. Or longtime member. You are welcome here. With your family or partner or lover or alone. We joyfully welcomed you here. You are welcome here as believer. Ward outer. As joyner. Or loner. You are welcome here. Feeling a part of us. Or not. Full of energy. Or plain tired. Taking a vision or arrest. You are welcome to join us. As you are. Written by. A minister i know ray drennan. As always it is a delight. Pleasure to introduce today's speakers sort of become a. Regular on our lecture circuit. Guy should speak slowly because i'm having technical difficulties. Matt tedesco who is a member of prairie. I was doing ice i've lost track of how many great services he's done. Your boyfriend you're becoming a regular. And he and i decided he doesn't need any answered anything you want to say. Whatever you want it's all you. Well so yeah i'll just say bruce lee where i suppose so. And so this will be my fourth service here and i will penny approached me a few months ago. Future nasty. That i want to talk about. So go back one now so. But what was what caught my eye my eye was the closing words from that from that service and so i kept the bulletin. With that conversation. And so my hope is that this will be in some ways interesting and a kind of in in in a way that represents that continuity also recognize. Someplace i could go over someone's water. Sorry i didn't write you may have come across this famous argument. But anyway i thought it'd be fun to talk about it before think of this instead of a refresher. So the quote is from is from peter singer the quick some show hands how many uniformly would that name. Okay so what you actually fewer than i thought but that's fine because in some ways thanks very much. So so this is the quote from from the end of that service. I'm just reading the failure of people in the rich nations to make any significant sacrifices in order to assist people who are dying from poverty-related causes is ethically indefensible. It is not simply the absence of charity. Let alone is moral saintliness. It is wrong. And one cannot claim to be a morally decent person. Unless one is doing far more than the typically comfortably off person does. And if it from something you said 2002. And so those are the closing words are you not as sometimes happens. And so it might be one that you agree with that you disagree with but it struck me that that day is that. You ought to see. If you don't ready and you met. That this is not merely a claim. It's a conclusion to an argument. I'm back at the conclusion to our relatively famous argument that he offered a long time before that. Fun you got to think. Lifeway. Osher. You're the problem is. Nfl. Yeah i think we would. 10 minutes. So i'm still open in a little bit better. So so what i thought i would do today is share with you that ours. That at the very least i think is challenging and provoking you compel. And go through exactly how it works and why singer thinks that claimed that very strong claim that concluded the service for weeks ago isn't just something we can sort of like or not what. But if we want to reject it. We have to do it by going into the argument and figuring out where it goes wrong. 1972 paper called famine affluence and morality. And so you go to the go to the next life you would. And actually. So anyway. Here's what he says in that in that articles making 72. Argue. Separate people in relatively affluent countries hours. React to a situation like that and then go cannot be justified indeed the whole way we look at moral issues. Our moral conceptual scheme. Need to be altered. And with it the way of life it has come to be taken for granted and a society. The first contact so this happened to be a time where that. Going back. 4840. Paper with a lofty goal. And so if it's argument is successful it's meant to shift our understanding of that moral situation. And so make that. The closing words from. Four weeks ago something that were forced to accept or not. But i can't be worth just saying. Brief snapshot. Logic but just words saying what when when i use the word argument today. I'm using it i'm not a kind of ordinary sense of like disagreement. Call the supporting sentences the promise he's the one that's being supported the conclusion. Right i mean you know there's a way which if you disagree with me was not adjusting to disagree with conclusion it showing how somewhere in my reasoning i've gone wrong. And so that's i guess what i want the only thing i really want to emphasize. Twisting about examples. You know i really. I don't know entirely which is an argument. These are limited number of ways is wrong. And this was a limited number of ways to attack any argument. Scattered. This this i want to i want to say something more about go back thank you. I think this is just a general way to think i mean. What way to think about morality is our dividing up the universe of actions. Between those that are morally permissible in those that are morally and. Course you can make distinctions in each of those category. I guess i'll just stay at least in a preliminary way. That you can think of every action. Every action has falling into one of those two categories you know so. You know i floss my teeth last month ago right is it. Morally permissible. Committing genocide my morally impermissible right and so. Those two being one of many. Choices. Now. Obviously within each of those categories. Well there's no further further categories. A challenge even if you find parts of it resonated with you or you feel sympathetic towards. Distinguish. Among some morally permissible actions. Between those that are morally required. And those there super iraq ettore or be on duty. Right so i think supererogatory. Donkey word but it's meant to pick out those actions that it would be permissible not to do. But if you were to do them. We think there's something extra good about that right we admire you for it or we think you've done too like a moral new server no moral goldstar something like that right so. For not doing wouldn't we wouldn't think that you've done something wrong. But when you do do we say on that was that was a good thing. Where do i take it that morally required actions are those that have to do. Write that morality demanded of me if i don't do it now done something immoral. Alright so. You know if. No back when my kids were little. Is morally impermissible. Blameworthy for not doing right. And so make this distinction. Upfront used to say that it's i think. I think these. The way to understand what singers trying to do. When he's helping us or trying to help us think about. What it is. Because there's a way we just framed around. Kind of question. That bubbles up. More or less. When we're paying. The world around us with. Where you looking you say how their people. Who are. In real need. Biscuit. Especially if this is something that. Hi aana. More than maybe you know many others. So so anyway. The idea is this is something we're aware of. But the question is. When. We are. One way or another. Rendering. And that could take the form of. Actually physically engaging with people who are in need physically going into community or reaching out with your skills talents energies abilities to help people. I think in many other forms. Involved. Providing financial support. Two organizations and people who are well-positioned to. Deliver aid assistance to to those who need it. Whether or not this is something mad. Other. It's still i think. Somewhat of a potentially shocking idea to think that. That's not in. 1b. That is. The helping of others is in something. That is above and beyond the call of duty. That is something that is morally required of us. Feeling to do it. Make something. And i know you know what i'm saying things that that are maybe a little bit too broad but. Actually makes me a bad person. Having done something wrong. Challenge build into that sort of a claim that that was all while ago that i want to unpack the argument for. And we've enough time for discussion one nice thing about this. So okay so. Pretty simple. I think. Appreciate. Suffering in death from lack of food shelter and medical care. Are bad. This paper i think it's a good feature of good writing anyway. Is that you are aware of. The places where you just simply saying i'm not going any further. You might want to say okay let's dig deeper is that really true why is it true what are the moral foundation this kind of acclaim and deputy potentially quite a lot to say there. But you don't understand point this claim. Which. Is one that he thinks most of us will fine. Unconscious. That is essentially the starting point. If you disagree with this you know. You don't. And so what i would what would i would suggest this. But you know this is one place where it's kind of hard. You have to have it. Orthodox moral view of the world to disagree with this so. Here's where things get excited. Much more of the classes are small and end. Conversation so anyway that's really important. Pikachu the wording on because it's doing doing the jessica torre working. The paper place we're buying into this right kind of going to get stuck. Potentially anyway. Buying a vision. And so he's offering. And the paper i want i want to just. Take a moment. Because. But i think they're really important reflecting on. How it is morally speaking we understand what we do and how we do it in hawaii. Let me go there. Let me just read it and in just a few things. Power to prevent something bad from happening. Without their by sacrificing anything. Comprable moral importance. We are. Morally. If you think about it. Read something bad when i sacrificing something as bad we should do it. Mount. When you start to think about how this might work though. I mean. Demanding. So i mean. Thought experiments ricky's out why. Let me offer one. Dessert. Imagine that there's someone on on a train track. And you see the train feeding toward them and you're like the world greatest physicist right so you can like do the calculations and you recognized running at full speed and diving to knock this person out of the way you'll be able to do it. But now the tree will like. Slip your foot in a way that will cost you your pinky toe. No one else train can't stop. Can she do it. Probably. A pinky toes not that bad cranking up you know the angle of your body. Below-the-knee or both your legs. What's a comprable more important. Potentially pretty hot. Recognize he calls this the modern version of principle. Pretty high up the high. Take that take that one. Biggest part of what this papers meant to do. And so he says i think this is true. I think. To get you. Change your fundamental moral views about assistants helping others i don't need that principle. Instead. I need the week version of. Halloween version. Only makes two tweets. All you got to do. Hello comprable more importance plug-in marley's. If it is in our power. Revenge something. Very bad. Without their by sacrificing anything. Morally significant. We are morally to do it. If you're looking at the train track. What's a morley signet mean this is essentially saying. When you can prevent something very bad what kind of things are very bad go back to the starting assumptions things like suffering and death from lack of food medical care cetera. If you could do that. Only sacrifice. From the moral point of view is trivial you know both legs below the knees. We're talking about something that essentially doesn't matter at all. Then. Shirley. Morality doesn't just admire you for. Acquired. Not doing it. Having done something wrong. As well. Go to the next one. Alright so. Alright. Bemis ac offers in this paper. And here's where he offers it. I get to call. An application of this principle that is the weak version of the principal prevented bad occurrences. If i'm walking past a shallow pond. And see it child drowning in it. I ought to wait in and pull the child out. This will mean getting my clothes muddy. But this is insignificant and presumably be a very bad thing. Take a piss. And you know if you happen to see a small child kind of very clearly in distress. Floating face down. Hopping about and maybe you're on your way you know. You know going in the pond you just got these new shoes and the water is going to make a note. 50 bucks. Hello sacrifices it's not literally nothing. Morally speaking. Seems pretty darn busy. And so. That's the trade-off is asking you to imagine in this case. Throughout the rest of the paper. Experiments in philosophy. And so-and-so look. Here's here's the clean. Hibbett. Which. Seems pretty uncontroversial. From easily preventable memes are bad things. Well. Saving the child. In the pond. It's not just supererogatory. Not just good to do. Morally permissible not. If i came when i said you was going to save the kid. Related stories lots of kids angry. Morally required. If if if. You were to abandon that situation. You would had. We may still say good job. Cipollini. You did something wrong. I walking by that child.. He's going to use it throughout the paper. What right the idea is. Preventing very bad things. I would only trivial sacrifice. Back again. Take from a slide earlier from. Piece of paper. The failure of rich people. In the ritz. People who are dying from populated causes ethically defensible. Why they're dying. Probably causes well we know those are addressable insofar as many of us have a surplus. We can send to people who. Not simply the opposite of charity let alone. It is wrong. And one can't claim to be morally decent purse. Unless you want to do it. Dog warden typically come playoff person does. That weaker principal the providing of the weaker version. Here's a question. Singers in fighting each of us. To ask. At what point. What is sacrifice become non-trivial. Presumably that's going to be very different for each person. Depending on your material circumstances and your income and whatnot. Alright so you know. At what point for it to do for one person. You know giving. $20 to us. Significant. For others. It wouldn't be. And today or what. Now you could do this game. Think about the things you spend money on. If you had not spend that money on that but it said sent it to provide mosquito nets to children who were in danger of life-threatening diseases in places where a mosquito nets to prevent them or sending them to place where you know they provide or rehydration. That dinner with friends that trip to the movies right that the things you spend money on. And i'll singer said is if you had foregone. Would you have to go out for gone something. More important. Not about not feeding your kids. At what point does a sacrifice become. Now having said all of that right i think. It's worth scanning. The universal. Possible jackson. I don't know but i think. Now. Bears. Range of possibilities how to say you're around the top. The one possibility is to reject the starting assumption. Mighty. You know. Watch people die inside. Now. Yeah. Possible but very few people to take that line. What's good. Another way to go is to try to reject the weak version of the principal. Do you want to say okay you know. I get the principal just to remind you again something very bad from happening. Without their by sacrificing. Anything morally signific. With trying to reject that principle wholesale the very least it seems like. I take it you would have been. Pretty harsh but i think you also probably one of the reasons that that principle seems to pick out that is. Terror. And you showing up things. Who cares. Wholesale possible. Open desert. But heart. Maybe maybe. Eddy's right about the principal. But there's something about. Pieces like. Well once he's trying to reach you right this go back if you remember the speaking about a famine in a place that most of us. I have a moral responsibility to contribute to those organizations that are directly and on-the-ground making a difference in saving people's lives and preventing very bad things. That's old. And so the question is. Is. Singers kind of move here saying that principle applies. It also applies to. Is it your region. Is there some relevant. Write you one up. The what is the one that i think most people are immediately. Assumption. Pretty try to show that. Supporting aid organization. In the way of describing right by providing them a support so they can continue doing the work they do. And by the way. Paper assume for for the sake of being charitable that were talking about. Discount bob's charity shack or whatever ride that were talking about you know we're talking about organizations whose accounting is you know public. And so we should protect those organizations. Somehow it's relevantly dis analogous from the case that singers trying to draw an analogy to hear. Mighty want you to find compelling. The analogy. I give you those organizations. It's in the relevant wait like. Okay so i'm going to sketch a few passwords.. When i'm walking by the pond by a kid is like you know i don't know. You know about. Things like you know. Refugee crisis. Charmander whatever typically typically. They're not quite as. Now. Being a sponsor. I think it's because it's. Instant communication and swift transportation of change the situation. Right before the internet right and so probably even even more now. This is. Visceral response. For why you no. Can't help. Instantly become trapped in this is this is so vivid. What's 4 from you. The story. That doesn't make a difference. Does different different kind of consideration. Full disclosure. John stuart mill philosopher century british philosopher and. The multiplication of happiness. Is the object of her. The occasions on which any person except. In other words to be a public benefit. Are but exception. And don't those occasions alone is he called on to consider public utility. And every other kid private. All we have to. This is joshua millwrighting in 1863. Are you pay attention to the circles that you mostly connected with and you know what that's all you have to do. The 1,000 possible to extend your reach and help people beyond those who your most immediately connect. But that really really rare and exceptional. And so you were. Potentially tomorrow point-of-view unlucky enough to be such a public benefactor right now morally speaking right. No worries 999 if you are not in that situation so we're cool right. Different from you know. Basically. Every generation going back yuno thousands of years prior to you know pick some point in the relatively recent past. And so i think you're saying is probably. In 1863. Chewing. Obvious when i jumped out to people i called the numbers of jexi. So you might know first off we were talking about things like salmon one kid pond. Number and it's not just us walking by. I think it's like. Well the whole world people walking by and. The challenge. Chat. Adjust the pain case now imagine. Vaccine. Desperately. Well you know. First off you might start yelling at the people hey. You know what you got something to do here. So probably that's the true 10. Fun. This is the last light. I think. This is a big attraction. The idea that what is offer years really demanding. That is what we take this seriously. Whitney moore require. And even if we're talking about that week version. Just giving up trivial stuff. To donate our resources towards. Towards people in great need.. They changed us. Computers answer. People doing fat. Judge. Has nothing to do with olivamine. Unless that principals reject. What the argument shown to dance app. Icc collision mustang however strange it appears. This conclusion is one which we may be reluctant to face. I cannot see though why it should be regarded. As a criticism of the position for which i have argued. Rather than a criticism of our ordinary standards of behavior. But yeah. But that's not a problem for what i barking. It's a proper how you understand. Anyway that's the argument underlying that. Closing time. Well the challenge there is we don't know i don't know if we need that kind of certain. I think with a pretty high probability you know if i go out to dinner with kim to a restaurant be like. I think it's reasonable to think that the 50 bucks we spent at the restaurant. Will not do as much good as sending the $50 of dr. borders. The match will be good enough to at least get some sacrifice off the ground. What singer says about this is that they're really good reason to simultaneously support helping the people currently exist and supporting the are organizations that are working towards helping people. Around family planning. Right so everybody birth control and things like that. So a comment organethic that was divorced from the outcomes of your actions that is he looked for a way to understand actions themselves as morally permissible impermissible and persinger the right the wrong with her actions is directly tied to the expected outcome of those actions. So they're very much on opposite opposite.

uuprairie_org

Pr200405DeeHall-ed.mp3

Our presenter today is dj hall. She's the managing editor of wisconsin watch a nonprofit investigative news outlet wisconsin-madison. Prior to founding wisconsin watch. With her husband andy hall. He was a reporter and editor for 24 years at the wisconsin state journal specialising in projects and investigations. Please walk md. Hi everybody really appreciate you having me here today to talk about something that it turns out as a lot more important even than when we first talked about having this particular session. We have been neck-deep and knee-deep in this disinformation problem for quite a long time now i'm going to share my screen i realize now that i need. My script so i might be flipping back and forth which is not ideal i think i should probably just. Perhaps print out my. Print out my scripts so what would i like to do i'll just talk for just a second while i go ahead and. Print it out. Because i realize you're not going to want to see my scripts that's rather boring. I can tell you a little bit about us we are a based at the uw-madison as you just heard we're at we're on the fifth floor of vilas hall. Which is. Which is in the journalism program. We work very closely with students and young journalist helping to train them to become investigative journalist my husband and i work at the wisconsin state journal for many years i have to take to tell you how long but. Andy hall my husband was there for 18 years and i was there for 24 years. I'd likely that if you get the state journal newspaper you read one of our story is over that long. of time. And then in 2015 i laughed the wisconsin state journal and i started working directly with the investigative center which we had started. Back in 2009 and so i have been there now since 2015 working as a managing editor we are growing which is wonderful i know a lot of news organizations are not growing we are shrinking or they are shrinking but we are growing. It is a really rough time for journalism is you'll see that's part of the presentation i'm about to give. Thanks a lot for giving me this opportunity to share the story of the wisconsin center for investigative journalism the state of journalism voter suppression. And disinformation. It's a story of challenges economic is as well as trust imperiling journalism and our democracy. The story of hope as nonprofit and for-profit news organizations and people in communities across wisconsin and america. Step forward with solutions. Make you guys really tiny on my screen okay. In the old days your trusty newspaper arrived at your doorstep you had little reason to question whether the information and it was accurate. Or where it came from. Technological and economic forces including the emergence of the internet have drastically reduced revenue to newspapers. Stores and businesses now can reach their customers directly. Many no longer needs a local newspaper to get their messages out. Many news consumers prefer to get their information on their phones tablets or laptops. And newsrooms are now half the size they were in 2008. Here you can see the drastic decline in the number of newsroom employees. Specifically newspapers. Over the past 15 years. In wisconsin 77 newspapers of closed circulation is down by 1 million many newspapers as you can see are just gone. What happens when you papers done here's what researchers have found there is less voter turnout. You are competitive races for office. Voters don't know who's running for congress. Government waste increases when reporters and the public aren't watching. Businesses feel free to pollute and regulators feel free to look the other way. And so in fact based news disappears resident start to get information from biosources instead of nonpartisan one which hardens their political position. The bottom line no news is bad news for democracy. Trust in media also has declined although it's a bit better than it was in 2016 at the height of the russian disinformation campaign. Media that report only one side of the story further erode that trust millions of americans get their news exclusively from fox news on the right or msnbc on the left. It's what makes me worth unaware of or hostile to perspectives different from the ones they see on tv. And what they see is often not reporting but commentary. Sharon wisconsin we have seen the emergence of news reports from outlets with ideological agendas and little or no disclosure of who funds the work. That can lead to confusion over what's fat and what's. Opinion. Trusted news sources are label is fake news and they're reporters as enemy of the people. Gallup sums it up this way quote americans trust in the media has been a rotating overtime but in the current highly polarized climate the views of political partisans have become increasingly diversion. President donald trump's description of the media as he quote enemy of the people is in doubtedly color the views of all american. This goes without saying but you can't trust everything you read on the internet. And most people in the us are getting their news from social media. Which as you know is a mishmash of legitimate news propaganda. An outright garbage. Do you remember pizzagate. That's the internet and social media become major sources of information leading to further media dressed as explosive. Ring run by hillary clinton at a washington d.c. the restaurant are contradicted or ignored by mainstream news outlets. This process prompts consumers of actual. To de-stress. Real. Factual news. This is how we joke became just information display comes from one of my colleagues over at the journalism program was a satirist in in cleveland who puts these mashups together just for fun. And so he he pasted a picture of a big crowd and so do a lot these are people going into a trump rally in phoenix anybody has been to phoenix of course you look at the green trees and go probably not. So. You ended up with. Mainstream news organizations saying that there. That that we need to take notice of these massive crowds that are showing up for trumpet we must you know take notice of his great sport. But then you got the washington post saying. Don't be fooled again that huge crowd photo is not a trump rally. The problem with this particular slide. Is that. It came from or this the meme came from something that look like the tennessee republican party. That led some media outlets like i supposed to say trump. Unlike the washington post that the photo she revealed at the photo was a hoax. And that leaves some people feeling like the republicans were dishonest when in fact the gop have nothing to do with them it was the russians. This is another example in late november rolling stone magazine reported that the author of this account i am tyrel jackson was the successor to the russians internet. Research agency with twitch trolled voters in 2016. According to this is a heartwarming tweet. In late november they found that the proposed according to the rolling stones that late november. Rather the tweet about work done was really a trojan horse to gain followers in a larger plan by a foreign adversary. In the case of i am tyrel jackson the ira has goal was to fold. Growing audience in part through heartwarming inspiring messages. And use that following to spread messages promoting division just trust and go. Disinformation campaign is often aimed at african americans according to the senate select committee on intelligence russian active measures campaigns and interference. Quotes by far race and related issues were the preferred target of the information warfare campaign designed to divide the country in 2016. It's an 66% of the internet research agencies paid facebook ads that in both race were quote principally aimed at african-americans in key metropolitan areas. So why target african-americans the senate committee concluded that the goal was to weaponize close race immigration second amendment rights. In an attempt stupid americans against one another and against their government. How much of our disinformation is homegrown in 2016 mpr found a purveyor of fake news in suburban la. The owner of disinfo media that he started the company to discredit the quote alright but ended up making money by passing on all kinds of fake stories that were shared and believed by millions of people. Mpr found just input media owner justin cohler employed as many as 25 people to write fake stories for clients. Most of them on the right side of the political spectrum. He's been fake stories from legitimate sounding website such as national report and the denver guardian. One story falsely reported that colorado marijuana with food stamps. Mpr representative in the house of colorado. In the house in colorado proposing actual legislation to prevent people from using their food stamps to buy marijuana based on something that had just never happened. Alex jones infowars wars at the major purveyor of misinformation in december former infowars writer josh owens road. You revealed some of the ways in which jones manipulates his radio listeners with bacon twisted news that seeks to inflame conservative than boost support for president donald trump. Jones convinced many in his audience that the 2012 sandy hook elementary school shooting in newtown connecticut in which 20 students and six school staff were killed was a hoax. The dead children and their parents were actors he claimed hired by the government to whip up anti-gun sentiment. A retired university of minnesota duluth professor was so taken by the story that he wrote an entire book on the cordon cokepokes. That man was found guilty of defamation and order by dane county judge pay $450,000 to the father of one of the children. Killed in the massacre. In another story about a peaceful muslim-dominated community in upstate new york on said jones ordered him and other reporters to paint the people there is terrorists and training despite what their own reporting had discovered. This type of messaging filters down and up. At one point during the 2016 campaign donald trump landed hillary clinton and barack obama actually founded the terrorist organization isis. We ignore certain facts fabricated others and took situations out of context to fit our narrative posting headlines like throwing investigates islamic training center sharia law zone confirmed in america infowars reporter stalked by terrorism task force. And obama terrorist cells in the united states. The rumors are true she'll realize here. Wisconsin dueling lawsuits are playing out in state and federal courts that could remove more than 234,000 voters from the rolls or 7% of all registered voters. Wisconsin institute for law and liberty. The league of women voters in the state of elections board argue that the program used to identify these voters often flags motors. You're not moved or who moved within wisconsin. Keep in mind. Keep in mind the 2016. Presidential election in wisconsin was decided by less than one percentage point. Another problem that we had in wisconsin is that people in power often do not want. Did they want to keep the public in the dark. Lafayette county officials considered a resolution that threatened to prosecute media outlets that did not publish news releases from the county word-for-word. National attention official abandon the idea of prosecuting journalists. 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uuprairie_org

Pr150524Tedesco-ed.mp3

Good morning everybody. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. I'm lynn curry member of prairie. And i want y'all to know that prairie aspires to be open-minded and open-hearted congregation we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure. Welcome you into matter your abilities or your inability. Later in the service we're going to give our guests a chance to say hello and introduce yourself so we can say hi to you after service. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. They're presented either by a prairie member as we have today a member of the wider community or by our minister sandy ingham. So now we're going to welcome kim sophia neva tedesco up for our chalice lighting. In honor of those we have known and loved in the past in recognition of the gifts and sacrifices they have made on our behalf and in our sincere hope that we may be worthy of their memory. I remained pleased to welcome for remember matt tedesco for our program today at 6 at the end of life. Aaa of sort of why i'm here. Introduction of the topic so i teach philosophy at beloit college i've been there since 2004. And. Also one topic but that i regularly cover in one of the classes i teach biomedical ethics. Is sort of. The set of. Choices or not. Depending on so the law that that are are not available at the end of life. And so i've been thinking and i mention this to penny little while ago that i thought it might be an interesting topic to bring to this group for a variety of reasons one because i think it's a really important topic. And then also the second frankly it's a purely selfish which is when i get to talk about this a lot you know what i'm teaching with a group that has median age cues a bit younger. Ultimately my hope is to get to some what i take to be really interesting and important moral questions and and what i want to say about it maybe as a way of spoiling the ending if you want to leave early is that. Distinctions that are captured in. Currently. Probably aren't defensible. In fact i'm pretty convinced of that convinced enough you know playing my cards on the table early on you know there's a range of issues that when i serve cover them in classes. Hardwood motivates me is that i really think there's a rich and meaningful and important debate to be had i think there's a good arguments on both sides. An hour to get to those with moral questions. I think it's. Important to just lay out some empirical stuff early on. That is to make some make some distinctions about what the law does allow and doesn't allow and a part of that is distinguishing a variety of. End-of-life practices that run together in a variety of ways i think. For people what i want to do to start. So can't go ahead hit the first slide. A fortuitous and obviously for unplanned that there were. Some stories this week in the news that directly bear on this talk and so i wanted a flag two of them back to both of them from npr's all things considered if you were listening or reading that website in the last 3 or 4 days these will be these will be familiar from a 24 days ago. The story about a woman named stephanie packer. There she is at 29 which is the same age is brittany maynard stephanie packer was diagnosed with a pretty nasty lung disease. Killer now i measure brittany maynard if you don't know her story it got kind of a lot of news about a year ago or so where she also she had a terminal disease i think it was a brain tumor i think and. And so that was quite a lot made out of her decision to one and her life and the obstacles in front of her doing so she had to go to oregon to do it a certain kind of way. Whereas the case of brittany maynard was one that was. Quite public for the way that it advocated for. Making permissible certain choices that right now the law forbids. This case in some ways is meant to go the opposite. Until i thought i did a few quotes from the story and so i want to come see them right now and then in some ways i want to come back to them later when we get to the sir the needy ethical stuff. The first off husband brian by the way she sewed. Maybe it's pretty obvious from the quotes so she's over the other side from from brittany manor she thinks that we ought not to have the kinds of choices that manor was advocating for in terms of and i'll distinguish these practices later. Assisted suicide active euthanasia. Sarah and silver husband says we're faith-based family god put us here on earth and only god can take us away. And he has a master plan for us and if suffering is part of that plan which it seems to be. Then so be it. Stephanie agrees she says death can be beautiful and peaceful. It's a natural process that should be allowed to happen on its own story online. Here's a here's a direct quote from the article they also believe that is the packers believe if california legislation called sp128 passes i this is. Can i buy current move in california to open up end-of-life choices that. Well brittany maynard case was prominent for showing that that people don't currently have. Especially in a world defined by. So one story in the news just this week about the end of life. The next day the next day three days ago yet another story this one about a gentleman named j.t. falk and his wife hope stomach cancer quite early on. And this was a story about once it was quite clear he was sort of trying. The he accepted that the end was coming no longer trying to start a fight the very aggressive cancers that rattling his body. Well i read the gammacore from the story. The day he was discharged from the hospital. To go into hospice care. Hope his wife was dropping off some paperwork in a medical office when she bumped into one of jd's doctors. He hugged me and asked me how i was holding up she. Ebony handed me a bottle of liquid morphine he said. You might need it. Hope said she handed the bottle back she told the doctor the hospice is going to drop off a machine that would administer jd's pain medication pain medication automatically. And he looked at me. She says he held my gaze for a second. And he put it back in my hand and he said. You might need it. No google next slide one more thinking that story and then i'll stop with the stories in the news this week and this wasn't the story. And so. If that is jd's wife had a stanford medical offices david magnus. He would have explained what assisted suicide is and what it isn't. It is legal for people to take or give large doses of narcotics to relieve pain. Even if a known side effect is that may hasten death. The difference really has to do with intent magnus's and that's a. Nothing. Because have to do with what's going on in the mind. Now we're getting some interesting philosophical stop so i will come back directly to this quote a little bit later. When we connection the next line to get into some subs. And this is the very excellent program that was given quite recently within the last month. Buy mary and millie the gift of years. Friends emily moffitt. You know it was an excellent program to be there were a number of things that came up in the program that i thought were really interesting in fact the title itself the gift of you. Concept2 mall over and i'm going to come back to that too but millie wizard of talking as they were offering the program about how to die gracefully. I think it's a really interesting concept that i hope. Will be on the radar as i should have moved through this talk today. I am mary i in the context of talking about the importance of developing a good relationship with a primary care physician she said. What is needed is a realistic discussion. Of the benefits and burdens of a possible intervention. Interesting i think that quote for for two reasons one is. Just thinking about. How we weigh benefits and burdens and how that weighing plays into what we think of the moral status of a range of possible practices. It also interesting because it raises the question what kind of interventions are possible and what times are not. And so. Anyhow one last connection that was and now to move into some substance slide just a little bit of stuff. Although i thought we get things going and this earth came out of a comment i made in response to mary milly's talk a few weeks ago. Which was. You know i hypothesize that one. One element of our lives that makes these kinds of questions about the end of life so challenging. Is the way in which. The way we die has really fundamentally change. I am the last century or so. And so i kind of get that going i should give you two storical cases either for a famous guy. Right so we could have told them others but here's to the first alexander the great write the great conqueror of antiquity and you know the philosophical connection. Student of student of aristotle actually. Alexander the great i spend about 15 years you know conquering our known world i really kind of push is quite far away for at least get the roughly to the outer borders of india and then comes back to babylon essentially with now near baghdad. 33 years old but you know he's he's a pretty full life at that point inner party with some friends. And this is. And. Goes downhill real quickly from their rights developed. I really never emerged from that dead 10 days late. Dead 10 days later. Probably typhoid fever i think is. Anyway but anyway. I want us to focus on the relative quickness. Right realtor quickness. And the same thing goes for george washington george washington i wasn't meaning to make any loose connections to memorial day but maybe you can make one here. Also george washington his death again quite quick right so he's out on his farm on kind of a cold rain even some hell doing some work all day i comes in apparently doesn't get changed right away stay. Clothes too long next morning wakes up with a sore throat. Gone three days later three days later dead. Now hot you are very different ages very different ages but i think the the thing that i just want you to think about is how those deaths. Are likely typical of a way of dying. Has really radically change. In the last century plus at least in developed countries like ours. So the next slide. Again just to kind of paint the empirical picture there you can see how much things have changed. That is just 110 years. Life expectancy at birth in this country has radically shifted radically shifted right from i'm just 48-47 years and change and 19th. 278.7 in. 2010. Where see the causes of death in 2010 peter runaways by the way if you look at the cdc statistics about this. The top two cause of death heart disease the cancers up above 20% and then it drops down to the single digits after that. Respiratory diseases and then i think the. 7% something like that. Anyway my picture of the way in which the way in which dying for us in the last century or so is really ad it raises questions that may not have been as much. As much a part of our lives. Surprise. Cenex lights. Start moving some conceptual stuff and this is really just clarifying practices that too easily run together as we talk about end-of-life. Decision-making and what we can or cannot do. I want to distinguish these because. Are there pretty important for the arguments their can follow so here they are. Conceptually just to make these clear passive euthanasia or withdrawing treatment passive euthanasia is. Commonly thought of as a pulling the plug right so when we talkin about withdrawing treatment or passive euthanasia were talking about cases where. Someone's being kept alive through some extraordinary intervention. And the decision is made. To remove the intervention and you know krampus care quotes around this is our let nature take its course. So that's what it 11 way dentalife s physician-assisted suicide ending their own life. With. Set of the expert assistance. About physician reitzer through the prescription of. Some lethal dose of a drug that allows that person then to administer the drug to themselves. And end their own life. Today's the second practice. Third active euthanasia part of the reason i put withdrawing treatment in parentheses is because it's easy just because they both often use the word euthanasia fees run together but the law makes it very sharp distinction between them. The delivery of a weasel dose of a drug to a person order to end their life. Right so we're going back to magnus's quote from earlier and i'll say more about this later right that's key write the intention is to and the. Person. End-of-life treatment. Palliative sedation or what is also call terminal sedation. Right so i terminal sedation. Is. The delivery of a dose of a drug. That will. We recognize. Very likely. Have the effect of ending the persons. So the suppression of respiration to the point of death. Breitbart. Right we're delivering this drug with this knowledge. Write in order to. Relieved that person. What's the difference between these two not a heck of a lot of. Send back in a very little right what difference goes back to magnus's quote is the intention of the person delivering the delivering the truck right is the intention to manage pain. Seeing that death will follow or the intention to. 2 and that person's life. So as i get into. Some more about legal. It's important to keep these four distinct. Oxxo next light. Alright so now what where are we you know so here's this is my expertise but anyhow i hear some just facts about the current state of play in our own country. Two practices of the four that i mention. Irr legal rights o terminal sedation this was in fact magnus's point in that story about jada farcry terminal sedation is legal and passive euthanasia withdrawing treatment is also illegal in both of these. Suicide in a much different sort of position. Illegal almost everywhere in fact we were talking about this. You know i'm not too long ago i would have basically everywhere but a few states would have caught up to oregon oregon was the first to legalize assisted suicide and now we've got four others who have joined them. I really in the last six or seven years you know. The story about brittany maynard has really raises debate in california and. It's a very active right now. And then lastly active euthanasia that's that's illegal. So that's something that can't be done right now. Hi in this country. If you go to the next slide there's a few there's a few more active euthanasia is legal. And so there they are i can visit there's a couple of others where the status is unclear legally but at least in these streets it's clearly legal by law. Are the netherlands belgium and luxembourg netherlands. A variety of reasons one of the more interesting cases you'll see why in a little bit first because they were the first two. Explicitly legalize. Activities in asia second because even prior to that. This was a practice that was widely seen as permissible in another one. People weren't prosecuted for it and a part of the reason the law. Just came to be was a recognition this. Happening anyway. I am sorry i won't say a lot about it but. The groningen protocol is a is a protocol that was enacted 2004. That. That essentially offers guidelines for absolving doctors from prosecution. If they actively euthanize an infant. Alright so we're talking about very rare cases. Infants who. I have very serious painful condition. Earliest years. Pittsburgh. The most serious cases for example of spina bifida. On a few others where death would be certain within a few years or even earlier that the child's life would be significantly painful and so there's a certain set of guidelines around. Set of doctors agreeing together with the parents one of the features of all these end-of-life choices emily talking about is going to be patient autonomy right to the patient making a decision about themselves. The groningen protocol has been controversial because by definition in hindi. Can't do that right a newborn baby can't make the. Decision incident rate that country has been out in the forefront of expanding options at the end of life and i won't say anything more about the groningen protocol but it's a really interesting kind of practice that's gotten a lot of attention. So you're going. So what's what's supposed to talk about moral arguments. Now that we should have napped the conceptual and legal terrains. Tulip. I don't say this up top. I should think about before practice. It's right before to the full suite of potential options at the end of. So withdrawn treatment position. Physician-assisted suicide paladins were terminal sedation and active euthanasia what would be conceptually the argument or set of arguments in favor of making all of them. Permissible right that is open up as options. For every /. At least on the face of it i don't think i'm saying it actually has very little i think i'm saying here that. Original are controversial about make me seem so in some places. Chooser straightforward arguments for thinking you know all of these ought to be option. And they are right in the first place mercy or humaneness right that is this these are choices. That are made available for people whose. Whose death is. She is coming very soon who's live between the moment of decision and death are going to be. Very low-quality right characterized by significant pain and suffering. And so your considerations of mercy or humaneness. Seemed to justify on the face of it right that's what are the full suite of options and i don't want him play up this. Analogy too much but it's one that gets offered a lot when we think about for example pets. Write this is at least right i take it why very commonly when our pets are suffering from those kinds of conditions right is that that is significant pain and suffering a certain and soon death right we very often make the choice to. Actively euthanize that might deliver a lethal dose of a drug that will end their lives right in that choices out of humane isn't that we think it's sort of. Inhumane to not do that. Are trees very common. The second consideration i take it that these two need to be working together to really feel the force of of these argument the second consideration is is patient autonomy. Right that is right we recognized in modern medical care that autonomy is a foundational consideration right with full information make choices that make. That mean the most to them that matter the most in them that make the most sense to them and that empowering people to be able to make those choices is at least on the face of it again a good thing. Hunting so you know how those two consideration is very straightforward. On the face of it anyway argue in favor of allowing all four options. I that is given episode of the general human impulse towards compassion and mercy and recognizing that significant pain and suffering is. At least on the face of it. A bad that people ought to be able to opt out of if they so freely choose. And we care about respecting people's free choices then we've got an argument for. Allowing all four of those practices. But but but. I keep saying on the face of it right these are private fascia arguments because. Because there's some argument you can offer against them. And there's a lot to say about. Several of these i want to kind of move quickly through them but i want assertive layout how would the objection goes. What it entails. And then also provisionally some reasons to think that they're bad. And so here's going to be my attempt to serve defend the full sweep from these objections. Oh you know this question of jackson's. So i want to go through each of these four of them. The first two. Conceptually pretty simple in fact we saw them offered in that first story by the packer family these two a little more philosophically. Subjection right this is you know people like the packer family why aren't we not to be permitted to make these kinds of choices and what answer is beyond us to make these kinds of choices. This is often framed in terms of playing god right that people ought not to be allowed to play god that choices of life and death the sort of volvo perspective that's way beyond us. And server for the packers right they say this almost explicitly right that if we're not we're not the arbiters of life. After we ought not to be. Again we can come back to any of these later on if you want to in discussion. Estates of it there's. Two two serious problems for this disorder. The first one is to my mind defeater. So here. Disappeared. There's a way in which the cat way out of the bag on this one already right. Yeah sure yeah so the first the first the first response has to do with modern medicine and our current life expectancy. Think back to i mean you know you know alexander probably wouldn't have died today of the same thing that killed him. Back then well why not because. As backslide about average life expectancy growing from. Or whatever it was 47 or 48 278 just another 110 years shows. Whew really good or we got really good at sorting def that is if we were seriously to sort of you know take that argument out of space right that we ought not to be intervening in life-and-death decisions then that's not an opt-out of choices like assisted suicide. But i take it on the face of it nobody wants to argue against modern medicine right so we shouldn't for example get rid of antibiotics and so i don't think this is a compelling argument. Like the ones that are currently illegal say where we are now. Assisted suicide pact of euthanasia just want to say. Anderson connected with this. Second objection is you know this will draw the line in the wrong place for a lot of. I think a lot of people who are making these arguments. Don't want to argue against withdrawing treat. I do want to argue against things like assisted suicide and active. But there's a way in which if you're really serious about. Playing god. It's going to raise problems for. That decision to withdraw treatment it's going to rain in to give treatment in the first place right so all these lines running problem seemed to at least to me pretty clearly suggests this argument isn't isn't very compelling one. Unable to get more compelling. Backslide. Slippery slope worries are really common here too. Right so again you saw the packers raise this one of those articles so great could you saw these two very common objections. Is raised right away in this in the span of unifor paragraphs. I'm here but the worry is an empirical one right answer the claim that if we were to legalize the kind of practices that aren't legal now this would lead to. I ordered the slippery slope is more about norms right that is going to lead us to be. Weaker in the kinds of norms that are really important for preserving. You know that. Life in our current societies or whatever. Now. I want to say that these are potentially powerful arguments that is. If if. Remember this is an empirical objection right if it were to turn out to be the case. That legalizing certain practices really did lead to for example the abusive the poor and the vulnerable. That would be a problem. It would be a problem. And so now here's the open question right you know. Do we have reason to think that the legalization of these practices. Does in fact lead to. These kind of slippery slope entailments that critics charge. They would lead to such that we ought to forbid the practice. And so here's where mr. leary here's where case like the netherlands are so useful. Right because we already do have places in the world where far more permissive practices about the end of life. Are in fact legal. In theirs. This is been studied you know not by philosophers cuz we deal with conceptual stuff not a ghost. but this has been studied fairly exhaustively and i can say that there is no evidence at all right worries. So within principal possible that in a different setting. United states for example. Baby slippery slope worries would come to pass. That's not conceptually off a table here. But. Empirical evidence doesn't suggest that it. And so in light of the powerful considerations right from mercy humaneness that are justifying these practices. Right. The hypothetical slippery slope worry. The hasn't been borne out in other places where these practices are legal. Seems too weak to justify a probation. I think anyway that's for. But we can talk about it more because i want to i want to make sure we get through the different objections before we're done. This is where things get a little more philosophically interest. Maybe not interesting you know her but. The first is. And i suggested for this before and the quote from magnus directly is about this. Themis distinction. Sometimes called the doctrine of double effect. Between intending an outcome and nearly foreseeing an outcome. So i kind of illustrate this i mentioned this year probably the most famous historical applique distinction by the way goes way back at least of the middle ages. But you're probably the most famous application of it isn't just war theory. Because so take the following to action. Justina insertive interwar. You know i i don't know i blow up a bridge. You know that you know any enemies service capital city. No. Reaction. Now imagine that action. With two different intention. Here's the first. Wright's the bridge has a normal strategic importance for moving you know enemy weaponry towards the front. Now i recognize this is a very crowded bridge with lots of innocent people on it. But my intention is to sort of you know cripple the enemy strategic capacity. I foresee it's going to kill some innocent civilians. Now compare that act. To the same exact action. With the intention. What. Right so i'm blowing up the bridge why cuz i'm looking to demoralize the enemy and kill as many innocent civilians as poss. I foresee the oh happy day the enemy happens to use as bridge to move troops and stuff but really what i'm trying to do is kill a bunch of innocent. Now. I'm not defending this right i think there's good arguments against all kinds of wartime behaviors that least traditionally and just war theory there's a very clear moral distinction. Wright's not about the act itself but about the intentions behind the app. I think that is one sort of intention is wrong and so the actor be permissible one sort of intention. At least potentially permissible. Now. On the face of it. That distinction is what driving right the distinction between terminal sedation and active euthanasia. Again the same practice. Delivering a lethal dose of the drug that with very good reason to believe will and that person's life through the suppression of the respiration. But. In terminal sedation. We're not trying to kill them i prefer seeing this is going to kill him. But we're trying to manage the pain whereas in active euthanasia. Our intention is to end the person's life. Now if that's a compelling moral distinction of operative here. Then. We have an argument. Against. You see it. Philosophically interesting i think there's two good reasons not to buy it. The first is i just think i just think it makes it makes it artificially bright line between attention and what's foreseen that really in practice. I'm doesn't hold up. Doesn't hold. That is and that's what david magnus was saying that the tricky thing to do i think there's all kinds of right i mean when doctors engage in terminal or palliative sedation. Very often. They and the family believe that death would be a good thing. For that person got together with the person himself right believes that. And so to say that. The death is merely for seeing and not part of the intention. Seems to really get people's minds wrong. That is you know this allegedly foreseen outcome is it good that all parties want and they're aware of it and they're aware that it's a part of the acting taken. And so. I have a hard time making that distinction and practice. It might make sense conceptually. The second objection what's wrong with just work haste with the intention to kill a bunch of innocent people. Well. Is it wrong to kill innocent people so bad is that the thing intended is obviously wrong. Now what's different about the active euthanasia case. Is that it. Obviously wrong. To kill someone who wants. Died and who by virtually any objective standard. Has a good reason to want to die this isn't the lovesick teenager. Right this is the person whose death is certain you know why is between now and death in the very near future will be one of very very very low-quality very very high amount of pain and suffer. And so. There's a way in which it begs the. To say that that intentions. His intention is only wrong. If he act that you're intending. Is wrong. And i just not obvious here i could say more i had this you know if we had another hour there's all kinds of literature on what well-being concerned there's different theories and all i want to see all line up here by any reasonable account of well-being. And so i think that at least on the face it makes it very compelling to thank. That's intended simply isn't in itself wrong next door item really wasn't the last conceptual distinction. Kind of famously there's also a distinction between soda. Doing. Are the active active bring about an outcome. And allowing an outcome. And this distinction this distinction has traditionally. I'm kind of under written the distinction between active euthanasia and passive euthanasia withdrawn. Right that is right with active euthanasia i'm actively delivering a lethal dose of the drug passive euthanasia. Letting letting something happen. And says the argument right there's a moral distinction between doing and allowing again here i could say a lot i don't know how many of you. Are familiar with trolley problem cited. Famous puzzles that that have now should have bled into the psychological literature in the last. In your cell, but i have emerged that a philosophy in the 60s you know you're you're standing at a track switch in as a runaway trolley and it's going to run over some of these passed out in the tracks but you can throw the switch and there's you know maybe there's three on one track and one person throw the switch. Sensibility next slide. Why do i find this again. My objections here are basically the same objections. Just transducer transcribed in a different case. The doctrine of double effect. That is. Again it says it's a sharp wine you have to imagine between doing and allowing. I hope that doesn't seem to be compelling on the ground. What many what many practitioners have said frankly in response to this kind of argument is. Isn't withdrawing treatment that kind of doing you're making a conscious choice. I did do something there when you're saying you know you're being kept alive through these interventions and we're not going to provide them any longer. And then again the same question begging problem. If you want to say hold on a minute you know we can't engage in activities in asia cuz it's a doing. But we can engage in passages in asia because it's in allowing. Well what kind of things is it wrong to do. Recognized the sleight-of-hand that's going on here. There's there's an assumption packed into it that there's something especially morally bad about the thing that's being done. But when talking about ending the life of someone. Whose life is going to end soon anyway. Who wanted to end now who by any reasonable set of a count of reasons it's just not obvious being done is wrong. And that distinction between doing and allowing really only as compelling were talking about doing something that's wrong. Price of killing versus letting die. Well. Killing is wrong. Wrong in every case. That's the assumption of being made here that i think. Isn't supported. And i think i can't remember i think it's probably the last slide. Yeah it is the flag here you know this organization compassion & choices maybe maybe you're familiar with it they're the group that really worked hard to publicize brittany maynard. Ordeal and their advocates for expanding choices at the end of life and i think it's. Compassion & choices and. And choices or get. org. I'll stop there cuz i know it's 11:05 and i hope we can have at least a few minutes for conversation. Yeah i mean it's a. I think it's kind of packaging. Question but i think conceptually it's right. Right that is. Some terms are loaded in ways that prohibit us from really. Thinking through exactly what they mean. Right and when you're talking about killing that often comes loaded in that way. Hello determines murder mosquito lands on your arm. Swatted i said i murdered the mosquito that would seem jedi killed them escape but none the less i agree with you talkin about. When we talk about people. Right that those terms get loaded in ways that maybe. Yeah me too part i think that's the really nice point apart of what so challenging. About the current. State. Other laws right is that not only not only is being kept alive sort of artificially and some cases. Not consistent with what somebody wants. But. The death of foes isn't always super awesome right i mean you remove someone from a feeding tube and. You know they're going to starve to death right and what we made the decision right life's going to end. W w y now for sure you did suffocate or starve to death right. Presumably there's a more humane choice that could be possible. I'm going to step in we're actually out of time so matt are you going to be able to stay around a little bit thank you so much. Closing where to do right by kk patriotism is supporting your country. All the time. And your government. Planet deserves it for coming today please extend the hand of friendship to those around you and join us for coffee and conversation.

uuprairie_org

Pr110807panel-ed.mp3

Look into. and my name is peter anderson i'm a member of the. Select committee. Various many. Some of you may recall aspire to both and open-hearted and open-minded congregation we welcome people. Have every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender of family structure we welcome you. No matter what's your age. Or your abilities or inability today we'll have a joint presentation. Official longmont. Can i talk and bark park. Today's presentation. What does it mean to be raised as a unit unitarian universalist and we have. For presenters get rachel along with raised as a you you and we'll discuss why she stayed. And chose to raise our children in yu-gi-oh tradition. Matthew arnold rachel's daughter will share her religious education experience of the why she still hear you. Can he like this raises unitarian for me to leave. For new york. Unusual hill discusses recent journey back to univera unitarianism and bar park with disgust being raised as universalist andrew experience. When she had when universal unitarianism and universalism join to form the unitarian universalist russia we know today i'm going to do is. Bring the table up down here. And have them all present together. As they come up. The questions we've asked him to talk about. Far they're re-experience. Why they are still you you. Have they ever left or thought about it and why. What's the experience about raising a child as a you you and the positive and negatives about being raised in the new year tradition. And. They will apportion there. Order by themselves and trying to make their presentations to about 6 minutes we can all get questions in from others who have similar experiences to share afterwards. First off i'm going to start with. Hello things that have really stood out. In what growing up as you you has given me. The main thing is just a general moral compass. Teaching me that relations with other people and with the world are just as important as. How i think about myself and any sort of relationship with a god. That. This really outward focus of. How you deal with other people. And it's also giving me a safe space to talk about difficult questions i think. From observations of a lot of my friends and other religions it's hard for kids to do when they're doubting something or when they have these tough questions it's hard for them to feel comfortable asking. And here and i was definitely not only was a comfortable thing it was encouraged and the teachers are always more than happy to answer anyting. And we talked a lot about the gray areas it wasn't anything like this is what's right this is good this is bad there was always discussion of. Well there's many ways to think about this and it's a tough thing and you have to figure it out as you go. And i think. Another thing that's been really important to me is that i've been taught that my decisions do matter that. What you do is going to influence the world and. Whether that's true or not you know i don't know but that's as close as we get to space around here so i think one of the other main things that i've really been happy about with. Are you here is. An acceptance of diverse beliefs. And one of the main things that helped out with that is our world religions curriculum. And so at every three years where we'll talk about other religions and it's kind of it's an interesting thing cuz you. Can't think of any other places that will talk about other religions but that's one of the things that i. Think i think has been the most beneficial to me you just acknowledging that there's other religions and that there isn't anything necessarily inferior about them. And also along with the diversity just. Because unitarian-universalism is so welcoming and has the sort of umbrella beliefs that a lot of people can fit under. Just going to uu church means you're automatically going to be in contact with a diverse group of people. And. As much as sometimes it seemed like there was a very small dedicated force teaching me and ari and you know i'd like to say that i'm here that the more people are going to have. But i mean. I definitely got to have this experience of hearing lots of different people and. Coming from different background so that's been great. Summer things that have been talked about it one of the things rebecca brought up in our questions was that people have trouble with this lack of structure. And i think the closest thing that we get to a structure is the principals but to me it's never been that central. I couldn't even name them off word-for-word for you i will admit. And it seems like more of a framework of goals but there's not a specific way to get there. But has been tough. But i really like i said before has tommy that there's many different paths to get two goals but it it it's hard not having a specific things that out for you. And so i guess that's taught me that there's no easy way out and you always have to think and figure things out as you go. And like the story talk about this morning we have this ritual lighting the chalice but there aren't a lot of other things that we have. That keep your beliefs central. Like i think some other religions have with these repeated phrases and themes and rituals that they do every week. So that's something that i felt has been lacking this sort of spiritual ritual element. And that has actually been something that has made me question whether uuism is right for me at some point and if there is anything that has made me thought about leaving that's probably what it would be but i think part of it has been just coming to prairie because we are less spiritual than a lot of other places. So if i went to different uu church later on i might be different. So in terms of what i'm going to do in the future i'm not sure i think that i'll stay with you as i'm but i'm keeping my options open definitely. And i guess finally one thing that's been tough growing up is describing my religion to other people we are all familiar with this but you know it's hard as a kid because. You don't know exactly what it is and no one can tell you exactly what it is but something that's good that's come out of that is because it's such a small denomination yours gets introduced people when they ask you what the heck is unitarian universalism then you get to go into it and i brought a few of my friends here you guys remember pv testing and different people so it's nice to get to introduce people. But when i thought about the question what was my re-experience before stormy my you know elementary schools school experiences burrito 45 years ago and there were only a few bullet points that really stuck with me and it's interesting for me to think about why those things i remember in fourth grade our class of maybe ten or twelve fourth-graders going up before our whole congregation and singing deega dunkin's in fry and how exciting it was and scary to prepare for that and we went we were going to evanston illinois uu church which is a big church. We were in lincoln nebraska when i was in high school and attended lry which for those of you who are not initiate's that was the name of the unitarian universalist youth group at that time and it stood for liberal religious youth and lry was my lifeline it's where my friends were it's where my boyfriend's were it's where my best friends were and i didn't have any of the kids from my other wife who got my school even though my high school. What's big school. And we were just on the other side of town and i spent a lot of time in high school by myself i did a lot of reading lunchtime and. A lot of my friends were in other towns in a weed we go to conferences once or twice you know couple every month every other month so i had friends in kansas city and omaha and my best friend was in kansas city. And i think that just actually enhance this sense of aloneness that unitarian-universalism can give you anyway. And that has its pros and cons and you talked a little bit about that surly you have a sense of self-reliance and your ability to do this on your own and you're. Encouraged to have that sense that you can think for yourself certainly the idea that one of my first memories in churches do you get dunkin's in fry is not an accent that's that's part and i think you know rebecca had asked the question is. Is it a good thing to not know for sure. And i think that's a great thing i think it was wonderful a wonderful gift to be given to me early which is. Think you can think whatever you want you can you can think for yourself but i also felt the same kind of missing ritual. When i was an l r y. I remember singing chanting a lot of activities we did together like the feel wheel which is every conference they have a big wheel with different feelings and you put your little tag where you were at that minute. Very emotional and visceral. And that's the biggest thing that i missed coming to prairie. And if if i were to go to another church that would also be my reason and i feel kind of bad that i wasn't able to create. Ritual in my own family and in my own life the way i wish but it's actually a lot harder to create ritual in my mind than it is to figure out what you believe. Intellectual part in the waves easy part what what has been really valuable for me and my re-experience was what was that sense of connectedness and warmth as the congregation. I never really thought about leaving unitarian-universalism because what else would i be how can i be anything else i adhere to the core values of this base and i can't imagine adhering to the core values of any other faith the same way i sat in on a quaker meeting for a while. I can imagine going to other churches and have gone to other trips with other people and i love the building and i love the worship space. But the intellectual part would be so off-putting for me that i couldn't do it. In terms of raising kids you you of course my spouse got some saying this and luckily for me he was an early convert to uuism from his childhood christianity is so pretty easy sell. We raised you you and all of them still self-identify as you you although there's nary a one of them that has joined a uu congregation i think casey would if she wasn't an hour and a half away but you know. Presentation is going to be a little less philosophical than madeleine's was but i could experience is very much like mine and the religious education that i went through in the unitarian church is it is a boy is not at all dissimilar from the program that the rebecca overseas here. Think of a map of the united states. And consider that you could fit a tall rectangle around new england. And most of you may know that if you're inside new england inside that rectangle if you're universalist through unitarian you're considered part of the mainstream protestant church like the episcopalians the presbyterian. Most protestants new york we're probably in the african american community. And beyond that. The neighborhood middle class upper middle class in those days. Was for 25-percent unitarian there was a huge unitarian church in the in the middle of the neighborhood and later i've got a picture of it. And it was a church. It has spires gothic architecture stone in the outside carved wood on the inside and a couple of. And the grown-ups just rude and hard over those those two windows i'm a nine-year-old s*** what do i know about louis comfort tiffany. Except from the christmas carols and then i'm going to sunday school. About freedom rides sit-ins down-south haven't happened yet. You're in the jewish community. The last death camp. Can you are a closed less than a decade ago on the day that i started sunday school you're in the catholic community. Believe me when irish-catholic married an italian catholic that was a mixed marriage and the vatican council. And whatever. And. This point have been to. Multiple services in each about 20 different unitarian universalist review churches or societies in eight different states including south carolina and hawaii. Is that with increased distance. From the rectangle and with increased distance from my childhood. I discovered there's a very different brand of unitarian universalist and then certainly what i just described the hymnal i had been joined by and eventually supplanted by a red him and my eyes 20s or early 30s. It was filled with unfamiliar tune that were on single bowl to which people had said through the words of poems that didn't resonate with me better yet and the phrase that they a woman. It did not speak to my condition love that price and so i kind of laughed and discovered over time that many of my favorite colleagues before my friends were episcopalian. And this is having people who have very different takes on religion sit side-by-side on a sunday sunday service is commonplace and it's. The ritual looks catholic but the thinking necessarily stuff so i'm there and. And of course is filled with unitarianism. Trump filtering metaphor and allegory. And everywhere in the anglican communion but throughout north america and home country. As i would come into a new community i would see what the youview groups were doing what the episcopal churches were doing and maybe there was one that struck me as a good place for me to attend services. And if so i would. Otherwise i became. What. I booty call. A seventh-day adventist or in the wonderful adjectives of a of a friend of mine home church on. I found alive and well at first unitarian this brand of unitarian universalism that was alien to my experience as a bit as a boy. But i also found prairie. And i've been attending programs here regularly in the programs. Speak to my condition. Thank you very much. These are pictures of the. Quite a long time ago i had a conversation with my younger brother and he use the word indoctrination he felt it was very important to indoctrinate your children and that's not i don't hear you use talking about that much but i actually completely agree with him and i like to think of that indoctrination as like a vaccination against hatred and intolerance and i think at our best at you you education should do that it doesn't always because if you said plenty of intolerance you know runs around as well but at least if we follow our principles it doesn't. I don't i don't think that was as true as it was in high school i guess i think going to college especially going to carlton it doesn't seem like it's that big of a deal and there's plenty of you use there to although we don't really have that actively used you for anything but i didn't really send that very much but i think it was yes it was in high school that a lot of times i would talk about religion. Do you know when really know what i was talking about her wouldn't have one be on the same page as i was. Cuz i thought about this a lot actually i think it actually as you demonstrated in your discussion can you can bau you and be other things it's no problem someone someone said quaker quaker you you you can be an episcopalian you you it doesn't preclude you from from practicing in another faith rnic different church or whatever so if you do or no church but whether as a practice it will last over the long haul i don't know because the practice. Is temple full space. It's shrine the good part is creedle truth. It's ritual works of love. This profession of faith. Divine living. Thank you for coming everybody and the please extend your hand of friendship to those around you and then join us for coffee and conversation and watermelon.

uuprairie_org

Pr151122Ingham-ed.mp3

Which secret garden will you tan. Today. My question is. How do you tend your secret garden. Do you even have one. One of the ways in which. Itende mine is. To remember and to honor those who have gone before me. And shaped my life by how they live theirs. I often find myself. Paying special attention to this in november because. November's. Popular appropriate time to do this because of of the month bookends. All souls day at the beginning. Of the month and then thanksgiving at the end. I come from a long line of dead people. 7 line from libby roderick song. We all do we come from. Long lines. Objective. Most of the people who are in my secret garden our dad. Another way to refer to this long line of dead people is to call them our honey. Computer does not like that word. A phrase used by one of my favorite professors at starr king school for the ministry. Claire fisher. And what she meant by identifying our honey's was. People whose writings. Actions live. Influence stuff. The first example that comes to my mind when i think of that professor is one of her honey's was robert bella. But do you know that name. He was. Quite well-known sociologist. And he. He died not terribly long ago probably the end of the 19. You can look them up bellah will recognize a couple of the titles of his. And yet another way is to refer to those who came before us as. That great cloud of witnesses. I like that image. All those souls who have come before us forming this cloud and not that. Computer one. Farming is cloud looking down on earth witnessing to both their own lives and to how we live our life. I don't mean this literally surely you know me well enough by now to know that. But it's a working metaphor for me. As i have said before it can get really crowded up here. With all of these souls or at least the spirits. Of so many people who have preceded me down through the ages. Here they are all around us as in a cloud reminding us of their own lives. And asking us. To bear witness. To those lies. Many of my honeys. The people in my. Cow cloud of witnesses. In the secret garden i cultivate help me keep on keepin on. Remind me that i want to live daily in the garden of abundance a garden of gratitude. For the abundance of examples of lives well-lived. Many of these people are were. Prophets. I don't mean what may be popped into your mind. The stereotype of. A person who predicts the future i don't mean that. The best sense of the word prophet mean. Someone who tries. To foretell the future. Bye. Pointing out warning us about our destructive behavior. Not the same thing as predicting. Think rachel carts. And in this sense gayland smith. Was. Also. A prophet because he kept reminding us. That we need to take better care of the environment. I think individuals have profits within themselves you know like your interview do you have an inner profit there too. That angel on one shoulder and the devil on the other image comes to mike and maybe a guilty conscience is really our inner profit. Trying to get through door. In any case it is entirely up to us the living. To continue the work of those who've come before us. Or. I think you could make an argument that in some cases it's up to us to refute at i suppose if we're talking about questionable souls. And i'm thinking about hitler-stalin whole pot kangaskhan you know the bad guys. If history. It is our duty i think to try to carry on that search for truth and meaning the ongoing struggle to. Love one another. No matter of family structure no matter any of those things that we mentioned at the beginning of our services. To always be aware of others who have been engaged in that same struggle. And i passed the torch on to us. As i said to. The children. At the beginning of the story. For all ages. What we as freethinkers and religious liberals are working towards i hope. Is an adverb broadening an ever-expanding definition of family. Not just individual families but the human family. Which involves constantly being skeptical. About narrow definitions of what it means to be human and constant vigilance. To prevent less than human ways of thinking. Thinking particularly of laughs. Sunday service. In remembrance of transgender folks and honoring them. Those two brave people who got up and told us. Stories. I am inspired i moved energized by the many people from many different periods of history smith. Briefly about a few of them most are unitarians though you probably have not heard. Of these particular unitary. In preparing a sunday service a few weeks ago at one of those focusing on humanism i came across the story that i didn't use them. What was the story about unitarian minister john haynes holmes. Or heard of him not to be confused with oliver wendell. Home. John haynes holmes born in 1879 died in 1964 this is a thread together. But know his age. He lived a long life for that time. he died at age 85. John haynes home. Was minister of what we now call community church in new york city. Just one of the largest in our. Association. But when home speaking in his ministry there. In 1907 it was called the church of the messiah. And yes it was a unitarian church. He was there as the minister for 40. Two years story that intrigues me. He refused to support world war 1. And in so doing he had a confrontation with william howard taft. You might. Attack was at the time of this confrontation the moderator of the unitarian conference what we now call general assembly. Former president. Tap if you know he was a unitarian. There are five unitarian. President. Both adams isn't we claim jefferson. And. Tap and when we never talked about it. Yes the bathtub story. Anyway. Sotastick. Sponsored a resolution at this. Daryl's house. Asking the delegates for support of world war 1. This resolution passed. 236. 29. The aua the american unitarian association board then. Rizal. To withhold financial aid. To quote. Any church whose minister was not in support of the war effort. Well whole sad. Black taking his congregation with him. In essence the whole congregation was excommunicated or as close to that as we ever got. One has to wonder why he did that or i think obviously was pacifist but maybe the better more appropriate question is why would our denomination sport world war. Homes. Universalist minister david baumbaugh says. If nothing else this incident. Served as a reminder of how much a part of the national establishment unitarianism waze. And how vulnerable it was. To conventional thinking. Even. At the expense. Office ancient. Principles. That's a pretty sweeping statement. And bombard just wrote this recently in a in a new you history. I wonder if this statement still true. Are we still. A lot a part of the national establishment do our revolver bill to conventional thinking. How far wall are we if so. The american unitarian association did eventually apologized to homes and two. The church of the messiah which meantime during the war changed its name to community church. And they rejoined e american unitarian. John haynes holmes was an amazing man he endorse socialism you preached in favorite often. He supported margaret sanger's crusade for women's reproductive rights back planned parenthood. When it was just a fledgling. Institution. He was also one of the first americans to know who gandhi was. And he became an avid supporter of. Bondi and the use of non-violence to achieve social justice. These ideas that john haynes holmes embraced and preached about and put into practice. In his personal life pacifism non-violence women's rights socialism are very important to me and that's why he's definitely in my cloud of witnesses. But there's something else that homes that was just as important and holds his belief system. It was the purpose of religion he was very interested in what the purpose of religion was and what religion really means. I think that we cannot. This this is inseparable from the quest to understand what it means to be. Fully human. I just a gentle reminder i am usually defining religion as. That which ultimately concerns. Holmes believe that the basis of religion should not be concerned about god but rather concerned about humanity. And that the center of religious life is not the individual but the social group. The community and. Not just any old community. Or social gathering. A people. The community that works together. For social change. That was radical thinking at the beginning of the twentieth century even for unitarians. And i would argue that it is still radical thinking. Even for unitary. But it wasn't just home to was thinking this way it's never just one. Person. Do states or sustains starts or sustains a movement. There was mary white ovington. Ever hear of her. She was born in 1865 and live till 1951. She's definitely in my cloud she was a member of the community church in new york when holmes was the minister. Odenton worked initially as a director of a settlement house. Think dorothea dix. Discount on the houses haddon. Probably huge influence on people. Precinct. So i can work in brooklyn in the late 1800s and she somehow stumbled onto w.e.b. dubois has writing. At that point ovington. I looked around the settlement house. And realize that many people of color were not allowed. Into the settlement houses. Because of the color of their skin. She actually met your boss. In 1905 at a conference in atlanta. Which led her to do research on the social conditions of black people in new york city i mean. This is what she concluded this is her quote. That white racism. Lay at the very root of. Ssundee grow problem. This was in the early 1900s. Irvington map many black. Leaders male leaders. In her deliberate travels to the deep south. Now think about that. The early 1900s she said single white woman. This was dangerous work. She got fed up with the lynchings and the race riots. Even in places like springfield illinois. So she put together a committee of black-and-white leaders women and men to sponsor a conference in 1909 at cooper union in new york which became. The naacp. She was its first acting executive. And obviously one of the founders. Naacp. A contemporary of ovington's emily green ball shoe lived from 1867 to 1961. I really enjoy doing the math. Lucy's birth and death dates it's fascinating to me that's so many of these progressive freethinkers live. Long life. Tickets must be good for house. Remember that when you get weary. Working on social justice. Emily green ball screw up in the first church unit herrin of jamaica plain massachusetts a suburb of boston. He founded boston's first settlement house. Bringing social and educational services into a poor immigrant neighborhood. In 1905 she took a sabbatical from her teaching job at wellesley college. To study slavic immigrant communities in america. At the socio-economic conditions in the austro-hungarian empire now why in the world would she do that. Well because of the record number of immigrants coming to this country especially from that part of the world. It's not as if the immigrant problem and i use problem and quotes. Is new. In 1907 / 1.25 immigrants arrived in this country. And just like john haynes home. Emily boss was a pacifist a socialist. And an internationalist. A combination i greatly admire and would be happy to claim to describe myself. And you see why these people are in my. Cloud of witnesses and give me a reason to get out of bed in the morning. Wellesley fire. False when world war 1 broke out probably because of her anti-war views. This lad among other things to abolish and jane addams. Name you might know. Founding the women's international league for peace and freedom. Which i hope still exist i was afraid to look at. Because i was afraid it doesn't. Hey need some younger. If younger. False and adams were vocal critics of the versailles treaty. The one that ended world war i. And their criticism was right on their main concern about that treaty. That it would only lead to another major. Someone should have listened. Emily boss was awarded the nobel peace prize in 1946. Like home she temporarily left. Unitarianism because of the war issues became a quaker for a while. But she did. I'm back. One more contemporary from that. rodger baldwin. Know that name. Hear that. Alright. 1884 to 1981. Another contemporary he grew up in the unitarian society of. Wellesley hills massachusetts. Knowing for about the age of 10. That he wanted to be a social worker. His parents described themselves as agnostic unitarian. Which is the same way interesting lee that john haynes holmes perrin. Describe themselves. Baldwin says in his own words he attended church regularly he taught sunday school and i even listen to the preacher. He wrote. He was a social worker for awhile in st louis. We also taught at washington university. He went back to the east. And matt mary ovington. And emily. In 1917 he was jailed because of his leadership in something called the american union against militarism. And for his pacifism. Rodger baldwin's founded the american civil liberties union. In 1920. So many others that i don't have time to talk about today. Sofia lion pause for example you'll know that name i hope. At the age of 61. She became director of curriculum development. For the american unitarian association. Her birth and death dates. 1876. To 1970. 8. 102. William ellery channing had said in 1837 that the great and and religious instruction is not to stamp our minds upon the young but to stir up their own. Sofia lion claws. Put this into practice. Made it happen. You see the threat. You see this right here. The desire the impulse passion to do good not not because these folks were do-gooders. But because they believe that the struggle to recognize all beings as equal in love they believe that this struggle was the right thing to do but no question that they would live their lives accordingly. If i wanted to include a still very much alive honey of mine i would be rebecca parker who was president of. Starr king school for the ministry when i was there she is one of the most renowned theologians of this century and of the end of the twentieth century her work has been all about liberation she is radical revolutionary thinker however you have to wonder if. She is seeing a really revolutionary cuz he's our. New ideas at all. Here's a quote of hers. Parker from a book notes that the construction of identity. The construction of identity. As a white. Person. Is. To become more ignorant. Rather than seeing and understanding the world we actually live in. Are construction as white people angry with this. Is to become more ignorant. Rather than seeing and understanding the world we actually live in and then she goes on to say that knowledge allows us to disrupt. Injustice. To know. Is toothless. You see why i willingly write out that check. Student loan. Here's another idea that i find intriguing the connection between skepticism and action now and i want to explore this in some sunday later on. I had i hadn't ever thought about this and then the action would be to try to bend the arc of the universe a little more towards justice and mercy. I never quite understood. How. The humanists especially the freethinkers. Just keep getting going out there again and again and again remember when the humanist movement was at the beginning of the 1981 happened boom. World war 1 and then what happened. The great depression and then what happened. I want to have you keep going out there and out there and out there. I just recently read some some things by unitarian universalist theologians about. How skepticism is involved in that. You to be skeptical. We are rightly freethinkers. You have to be skeptical about what. What they are telling us. How do how do we how do we continue. How do we work for liberation and doesn't liberation lie at the heart of liberal religion. As current liberal theologian paul reiser suggest. Aren't we as freethinkers. Religious liberals after liberation. The word liberal. Comes from the latin word lieber which means free. Then it follows that liberals believe there is a fundamental faith committed. To liberate commitment to liberate themselves and by implication others. Who are denied some form of. Freedom and again isn't that what last sunday service was all about. Creating a safe environment. For transgender quotes. For people who are not. Free people who are marginalized in this country and his identity is. Given to them by somebody else that's crazy. So you should be proud of yourself for for a lot of things but. For last sunday service. And now what are we doing what are we doing in this country. We are officially. Officially. Wanting to. Like i don't. Syrian refugees. Connect the dots connect the dots there is one person who thinks that we should be letting as many syrian refugees as possible into this country it's not just me there are lots of us out there. Many of us view this current anti-refugee movement and hysteria as similar. To our failure in this country to let in jewish refugees. In the late 1930s. And then maybe in another forty or fifty years. History will say that. In 19. 39th st louis that ship. Set sail from hamburg. Germany. With more than 900 jewish refugees on board. Some of the refugees were admitted to into cuba. The ship docked there. But over 800 of them were denied entry. St louis was prohibited from docking in florida and canada. And those refugees went where. We're nearly half of them died in concentration. You're doing it again. And i'm not. I'm not equating the holocaust. But yeah i mean can't quite the holocaust capital h with anything else. But there are similarities. We come from a long line of dead people. Here's some other people in my. Cloud of witnesses. All those people who supported the sanctuary movement. In the 1980s. When archbishop weakland and milwaukee made that the first catholic. Archdiocese in the nation. To do so. And perry was also a sanctuary. Charlotte russe getting that. How are you know that putting it in our history. Come not everyone in my cloud is the unitarian weaklands up there. It's upset our state. This state and wisconsin apart. From the rest of the united states is a haven. For those seeking political and spiritual protection. What is hap. And in the comments. No passion. I'm getting close to bashing someone here. But in the end the discussion. Politics out of it. This is our lineage. This is our heritage. Does unitarian universalist. You should be very very proud. Of this. But we should also be very very humble. About this. Is daunting to think of what some of those spiritual ancestors of ours. I've done. And it can be overwhelming to think about living up to their standards. I have no doubt that we're capable of doing so we have no choice. That great cloud of witnesses pushing forward. Imploring us to be skeptics. And liberators. The closing words. Our words from adrienne rich. My heart is moved by all i cannot save. So much has been destroyed. I have to past my w. With those who age after age. Perversely. With no extraordinary power. Reconstitute the world. Go in peace but don't go too far.

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Pr130811GaryPeterson-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i mary mullen a member of the program committee prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation and we welcome people of all kinds we welcome you whatever your religious background was or is whatever your color your sexual orientation your family structure and we also welcome you no matter what your age is or what your abilities or inability czar. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services they're even presented by a prairie member as it's true today a member of the wider community or by our minister sandra ingram today gary peterson member of our congregation will be talking about international best practices. Kk anderson. Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Give a woman microcredit. She her husband and her extended family will eat for a lifetime and that's from bono. I'd like to introduce our speaker for today it's gary peterson gary is the international service chair for the evanston illinois i guess that is evanston lighthouse rotary club and they give out about $20,000 a year in international aid he's also participated in overseas projects and guatemala on two occasions and once in ecuador he has an undergraduate degree in business as well as an mba and he runs his own commercial real estate appraisal firm in chicago and what's he doing here in madison. Gary. Order it ahead of time. Return to the ayn rand and i acted like a man but the what i am saying is actually not for example to give the mosquito net what i'm saying is you can you can vaseline improve the economy that local area by doing more research and being more involved and finding this mosquito net manufacturer and have it you can do far more good with a lot of these things instead of example that kind of talking about painting. Focus on overseas that's where i know but it's leaning toward self-sufficiency but that's why we need to fundamentally in my view change how the 8th is given not that the 8th is giving it all but you don't run over there and do it you send some money over do you want to go teach english don't don't do what construction project. The other things that the united states or china is doing this in africa right now you know they do all this stuff for infrastructure building and but they said all they're chinese companies in or us companies to go in and do it and so now they build their whatever and then they leave wellhead you use locals to do it extensively you're building up an infrastructure and a knowledge base to do it and we just do projects and then our guys get the money and then there's dependency again there are there are. Sometimes when they say they want something sometimes you got to think about what they want what do you open it says i want diapers that doesn't mean you bringing diapers in united states it means you find a source and it may not be there, maybe a little bigger. Thanks so much. Are closing words are these charity creates a multitude of sins that was from oscar wilde charity creates.

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Pr140112MattTedesco-ed.mp3

Good morning society. Are opening worse this morning will be provided by evan we have found the definition of person namely the individual substance of a rational nature. Cartel will be provided by heidi james and rachel may this flame symbol of transformation since time began fire our curiosity strengthen our wills and sustain our courage as we seek what is good within and around us. I'll guess i'll just reply with a couple of mary comments today. The inherent dignity and worth a person using so that might make for an interesting conversation for a little while. I've been under the weather for the last few days and so i don't feel 100% shipshape but. A bit of a challenge to figure out how to pitch a talk like this right i mean i have a general sense of of of the audience but but not a deep one into what i don't know is how broad a background in philosophy. An audience where there's not a tremendous background and philosophies i got the apology is if there are some of you who have a significant background of philosophy some of this might seem like old news. But it's okay. That's it let's see if this works i love you too if i dive right in. And i guess so. Discipline but that's another conversation. And so there's a lot to build on there and we'll do a quick tour of some dead white guys as this kind of stumbles along today but we're not going to spend a lot of time. What they're doing is engaging in the evaluation of of arguments in the analysis of concepts to try to get a clear understanding of well whatever it is where were talking about. And so i thought that was really interesting you mention pulling them up and i saw that one on the free and responsible. I guess what i want to say right at the top of the others talk i don't mean to be at least directly challenging anyting about that principle and i don't really mean. The evaluation of arguments an analysis of concepts and soap. Are some really interesting concept. Right so you can talk about the notion of work i take it kind of. So let me make a distinction right off the top here that i guess for me has been a helpful one in thinking through our language around the category of human. And so there's not an important distinction at least on the face of it you might think between these two terms. But. I think when you push a little bit i think it's useful to separate them at least his marking off i think it's potentially marking off two different kinds of categories the first category. Whereas i take it the term person the term person is a moral term it's a term that picks out a moral category it signifies something as having. No. Meaning of think about this more of a corny slide but i put it up here. Just to kind of give you away to think about this right. Here's a here's a selection of some non-human persons. It's right so. Costco. Spock right from from star trek i think i put chewbacca on there there's et if you remember the 80's tv show alf maybe nobody does but me but there is gordon shumway. Even if they don't put a map onto our own experiences of the world and ask but what about those cases what should we say about that. Right now i take it out i'll just use a case of spot for an exam example because i take it probably from miliar with. Foxnext in character because. He's actually. Genetically a half human and half broken right and so i take it that's meaningful thing to say. But i take it but there's a sensible. A whole person. Right it's not as if he's you know for moral status. Just by virtue of being half-human. Right now right instead you know when live long and prosper or whatever. You walked up to him and just water him like a mosquito and killed him done something wrong. So soon. Galaxy. And why when our experience i think very ordinarily we think of humans in persons as coextensive recognized those categories. Right. Are there. Nonhumans your purse. Are there. Humans who. At least conceptually right at least conceptually the fact that these two categories come apart suggest that those are both. Just a quick tour of some dead white guy. No i don't believe the history of philosophy here. But i guess what i want what i want to just briefly suggest is that the notion of. Our faculty of reason as being tied in some deep way. To what it is that makes us the sort of special beings we are. I think i think it's deeply embedded in. The history of philosophy i didn't even put aristotle on this slide definition. In here. There and he was the opening comments that we read today. What was which is the one that i put up here and she's often cited as the first philosopher to attempt to define the term person and so i thought of being sincere put that up there. Definition. Man is a rational animal. It's the individual substance. And that focus on. On reason and our rational faculties is ubiquitous in the history of of western of western philosophy and so i put up on the slide also important figure in the history of western civilization. 1841. And. I put the card on here because he's sort of famous for fundamentally identifying what he is. And by extension. Thinking things. And maybe a lot to say about this that this comes in the second. He's really exploring a lot of. Questions. What am i. Yeah you know about the biological facts about me but that's not rational thinking. I mention this because effects are still widely referred to across the range of hearing you wouldn't get through sort of a business ethics class without encountering him i'm ever. At any rate that's just a kind of. Quick sketch of some historical flossers give you a sense that i think there's a really strong theme of connecting the notion of our kind of inherent nature than a particular are more rational faculties. And so truly write the famous paper on a called abortion and infanticide where he wants to explore what it means to be a person very quickly but i think i find compelling you reject a range of possible. Write a list of here right to this birth viability spontaneous movement of humor. I truly think that fundamentally person who is connected with. Self-consciousness where what he means by self-consciousness is something specific that is. You have a certain kind of concept you're capable of grasping the notion of. Something being. Continuing existing entity overtime and you see yourself. Anything that the has that kind of self-consciousness is a person. Her papers called on the moral and legal status report. 70s. And approaches the question of personhood. Slightly different angles. The rings characteristics that we identify person is having and she comes up with. 5 central characteristics that she elaborates and fence. There are her five central character is. Personally. Consciousness meaning specifically for hurt about a certain level of sentience or ability to experience pain. Reasoning which she identifies connected with problem solving at least in some basic or rudimentary way self-motivated activity movement that isn't purely instinctual. I'll communication across a range of topics in a varying in a variety of types and then also the friends of self concept. Tour of some historical and contemporary philosophy. Three interesting sets of beings where i think it's at least not entirely unreasonable to ask. Probably be. I'll start with the first my mind. There's actually been a lot in particular very recently in the news about the question of the extension of the category of personhood. There was a rather famous case in austria 2007 brought they're attempting to have a chimpanzee declares a person. And they all were attempting to. You're attempting to declare that ships ought to have a right of habeas corpus right so essentially to not be held right without hearing. Idid they were essentially being held as prisoners. Against their will and they ought to be given a fair hearing or fair trial. What was dismissed or at least two before a judge before they were dismissed in the group whole setup is a victory though. That's true. Well they're not. Adult you know you want to get right down to it that they're pretty darn close. You know look what is it that makes something a person i don't know go back to those lists that we saw it have a capacity for reason what about. No i'll jump to the most controversial case on next which is the case of newborns and correspondingly the question of the killing of newborns ordinarily. Imagine some people looking very strong responses here. But. Truly truly you know the kind of papers these papers out 40 years old but he hasn't wavered in his fans and in fact their other philosophers who agree with that. And so she worked hard in this postscript to to try to convince the reader that fanticide is morally wrong person. If you think about the history of the politics of abortion obviously going all the way back to roe v wade. In the last year if you've been sitting watching this issue there's actually been a kind of a new movement with respect to the moral status should say the the legal status of abortion that has. The idea being and this is an empirical question and it's an open question the idea being at least the claim being that that's the one. And this is just a few months ago by lindsey graham and. Well doesn't matter. If something is rational. More fundamentally isn't what matters whether or not they can suffer whether or not they can experience pain and pleasure. Explored in the last half-hour or so what's a person you know. I'll stop there so i want to make sure we have some. Yeah great so it's. Great range of comments so on the first one. So that's at the fair point the point masturbation sure so there's a probably. And so he she wrestled with that one too. On the first point actually initially had a had a couple of slides in this talk on potentiality because i agree that's an important point i dropped it because i didn't have time to talk about it. Spell. I think the idea that that you might think of moral status as a kind of continuum rather than either being a person or not as being upset with buying everything i think is an important point. Who has a tough time figuring out how to reckon with beings who aren't persons because they're not fully rational but are pretty close this is sometimes seen as an advantage of utilitarianism because it opens up that kind of spectrum rather than kind of binary. I guess i'm skeptical of putting what while. I'm not skeptical evolution of putting too much weight and morally speaking on evolutionary claims like that while i while i'm sure it's true that there may be some sort of evolution. I think that's the tricky thing to figure out right and so that's why i get worried about those kind. I often think that when we use terms like human in a mortal sins that we were doing it's really just employing a different category than the purely biological one right going back to school. Before i read the closing words i just wanted to say that there was out there were a lot of people who wanted to talk today and discuss the topics it was such so good and thank you so much will have a future opportunity because we'll be about here about the uu animal ministries working towards looking at our first principle and perhaps expanding it to include non-human animals in person and in the phrase person so we're going to have a program. And are closing words we extinguish we extinguish the flame but not the light of truth the warmth of community or the fire of commitment because we carry in our hearts until we are together again and please stay for a few minutes to greet one another and maybe have some more refreshment ikea.

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Pr160417Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. And welcome. Prairie unitarian universalist society. This is one of your first times here i encourage you to come more than one time because prairie sunday morning services are always different sometimes i do them i am sandy ingham i'm prairies minister. Sometimes people from within our congregation congregation do the service. And sometimes people from outside. Come in and do the service. Prairie aspires to be both open-minded and open-hearted. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation gender family structure no matter what your disabilities. Or. I should say your abilities in abilities are no matter your age we welcome you. The opening words. Written by universalist minister minister hosea ballou. More to say about hosea in a little bit. If we agree in love. There is no disagreement. That can do us any injury. But if we do not. No other agreement can do us any good. Let us endeavor to keep the unity of the spirit. In the bonds of peace. Hollywood you are fake you want like the eternals. May this light candle within us. The warmth of compassion the glow of love. The fire of commitment. Has a light of truth. Now i invite anyone who wants to come off for the story. This story combines two of my love. Baseball. And history true story i would almost bet money that no one in this room. As ever heard of this person. Lizzie murphy. Who was the first woman to play on both major league. All star. I was going to find majorly. Shortstop for the pipe. But i got a little. Off. My career path. In 1900 that was a very long time ago even i wasn't alive then baseball was his favorite game and everyone. Well i should say every boy. Oh i'd love a bath and a ball and a dream i dream that. Whidbey inn. Professional. Well our story takes place in a town called. Warren. Rhode island. There were a lot of keys in this town. Guys okay over there. Baseball score. Keller lot of teams in this. Hound and lizzy murphy's. Dad had played on one of them and now when the story takes place. Her brother is on a team. And even when lucy was 6 years old she could really catch-and-throw that mall. Because her brother practiced with her. Long long day. Her dad said. Lucy you are really good was he said i want to play first base like you did that. Who is her brother henry said don't hurry turn your mother said girls don't play baseball. Brown sugar dad she's really good. So when she was 8 years old. Henry's game. She asked the captain of a penance team his name was eddie if she could be on the team or what do you think he said. No taxi laugh batter. Girls don't play baseball but she didn't give up. No carry the bat. Okay. One day they play another team and neither team had brought a ball. But lizzy has a ball. Shut it eddie give it to me. Okay if i can play through space alright. A letter play. So there she is. She has her dad's love. And. Gets ready at first base or brothers playing shortstop. The french is pretty nervous. Imagine that. First batter up yet. Evolve to. Her brother. And her brother. First base no problems just like when they practice. In the backyard. Well lindsay went on to hit a single and triple and a double. In that game and then she struck out her last time i thought that was all right cuz the team was ahead tendon. Eddie said hooray for lizzie. Anna wintour. In the winter she when she was twelve she had to go to work. In the textile factory that some of you might know what that is but they made faucet. Hit water time to daydream but you daydreaming about playing baseball course. She practiced her violin during the winter months. She stated she was really good at ice hockey a really good swimmer. Justice.. When she was 15 years old. She was actually a regular on two teams. They were just amateur team which means i didn't get paid for playing. And one of them was called the silk hats and the other one was called the warren baseball. He played any position she played anywhere they needed her to play. Wow free years later when she was 18 her mother said. It's time for us to have a talk. What. He knew what was coming. Your grown-up lady now. You can't play baseball anymore longer. You can't get paid for it. You mean i should give it up. Well. Yes because a woman can support herself playing baseball menard we can. What she didn't want to do that. It's not about it's actually went to a couple of games where she did not play but you sat in the stands and everybody else but one time she almost ran down on the field when the third baseman dropped a really easy all. So she kept looking around and she found a professional team to hire her. The professional team. Hey honey big deal cuz the manager thought. Well. Having said that you can't do this will never get married. Kenji was playing. But other team was at first game she played the other team started. Macon smart-aleck remarks and saying. When you get there on her first game as a professional and has people there i mean there wasn't a seat anywhere. So what's going on the course the owner said. Well she did really what you was nervous she was really nervous again but she did so well her fielding was perfect. She got it. See i think she gets tricked out once but. She got a triple. That her team won 10 to 2. Well those days the manager came around right after the game was over and pay the players. Buddy walked right by lizzy. Didn't give her anything. She was angry. But she had a plan she worked really hard all week and when the next weekend came and they were supposed to get on a bus to go. Play a team in another city. She waited till everyone was on and then she just stood there and the manager said lizzie get on the bus we're going to be late. Then you have to pay me first. I'm not paying you'll just get married and leave the king. This is my jaw i am not getting on the bus. The manager said. Barbie. People are coming just to see you. The manager did paper. And her mother even. Decided maybe this wasn't too bad. A jersey with lizzie's name on the front and the back where. For the next 17 years play professional baseball. And she always made sure she got paid and her fans call her. But queen of bass. Are there you go. Farewell. 5 chester postscript. Because it's such a good story. She eventually had herself lizzie did listed in the telephone book as. Lucy murphy ball player. She want a contract with the boston all-stars. The manager said she's worth every cent. She made as much money as the man which wasn't very much but she brought in them sometimes $50 a game. She was the first woman to play in a major league fishing game and the first person to play on the national. And the american league's all-star teams in one exhibition game she face. Satchel paige. The great black. Picture. And he didn't let you know he didn't. He invested with everything he had. She hit a single. I was especially. Kind of almost giving goosebumps when i read the sources for this story. The first source listed is gay in them. Spell the way. Alright. This is a reading by barbara rohde who is. Not a u u minister. I did very talented ululate leader. But no wonderful. Book of essays. She titles this one the ideas that have moved us. We can catch glimpses of who we are. By looking at our historical past. As a denomination and as a fellowship. Do you know who we are. You must know where we came from. And which ideas moved us. The nature of unitarian universalism is constantly changing and we have no creed. Yet certain ideas have existed throughout our history. We have always believed that the source of religious authority. Does not reside in the pope. Or the minister. Or in a book. But within the center. Of our own personalities within our deepest selves. That idea. Has often been corrupted. To suggest. That all expressions of belief are equally. Valid. We have always believed in freedom of thought. And the expression of thought. That idea has been corrupted so that it often seems to be saying. Leave me alone. Rather than. Tell me what you see. We have always been advocates of religious tolerance. But that belief. Has changed from saying. I won't. Burn you at the stake. Who sang. I won't let you know i disagree with you. In the great religious division between those who would exclude in order to purify. And those who would embrace in order to redeem. We have always been with the embrasures. We have no creedle requirement for membership. Unless your last name is. Which is how it should be. But that does not mean. We should not be passionate. About our search for truth. Nor that membership. Has no meaning. Universal design as i understand it. And as i said in the current newsletter. A design response that fits for all not for most. Design responses that's it for all not. For most even though. They might have been designed. Just for a few people and i gave an example of curb. Cut out. For wheelchairs or scooters or things like that but we all use those we all use the curb. Cutouts. So i did a little play on words there and. Bought. It might be kind of the same way with that s. You. In our. Difficult to say name unitarian-universalist. You know we we are. Cantu leave out the universal this word all the time which drives me a little crazy. Designed or conceived of with a specific set of people in mind. Isn't oma universalism now. Those would have been the specific set of people who did not believe in eternal damnation in the. 1600 1700-1800. Bought. The word eventually came to be seen. Why it said here on sent others as a religion. That just might be a good fit for. All people. As in its name. Universalism. That opening him speaks to that belief. Down the ages we have tried many paths in search of god. And. Horse like that him. But all the different ways to believe in god to define. God. To search for god. Universalist design is dependent upon those ideas that have moved us. Aspen. Our spiritual ancestors in general and the universalist ones in particular. As i said on other sundays there were many people. Who are a part of that great cloud of witnesses that surrounds us. Many were unitarians. But today's service is made possible because of the lies of the universalist. Who have gone before us showing us a path. A way to bring more light into the world. And i'm very happy to see the two people here in my nose were raised universalist. Why do we tell their stories. Well because as i said in mid-january it is always a good thing to tell. Andre tell the stories of those who have gone before us. I'd have fought for peace and justice and equality and if try to live lives of integrity. Martin luther king jr said that one of the first where lectures at our general. Annual general assembly. You want to read it while silently while i read it at the top of your order of service. My friends. There are some things in our nation and in our world to which i'm proud to be maladjusted and i call upon you to be maladjusted. And all people of good will. To be maladjusted to these things until the good society is realized. And. Being maladjusted is something to be proud of. And knowing the stories about those from our tradition in our heritage were also maladjusted. Yes let's hope. We started at. The january service when i when i began this. Tortoise. With the man named george de benneville. You might remember those of you were here. He survived beheading. At the very last moment he had a reprieve from the. From the king because his family was connected to the royal. Family also i almost remember george 2. Envious because. He was the youngest of nine children some of you remember i said this. Before. His mother has four sets of twins. In four years then george was born. Dennis mother died. Not funny but it is. So. We call that's all i'm going to do. Don't call the benz veal the first. Creature. Universalism. In an america in this country. We call his contemporary john murray the father. Of universalism. In this country. In his book these lives tomorrow. Universalist minister. Clinton lee scott opens his chapter on john murray with this story. Murray was preaching one sunday morning. And he suddenly a rock was thrown through the church window. Barely missed his head. He picked it up and he said. This argument is solid. And weighty. But it is neither reasonable nor convincing. We put the rock aside and he said not all the stones in boston except they stopped my breath shall shut my mouth. Just because he was preaching universalism. Now she briefly mentioned here the ballou family. There were a lot of them and they were they produced a whole lot of ministers preachers and especially a lot of universalist ones. Hosea ballou i hope some of you have heard of hosea he's the most famous of that family. He's been called the single most important leader in universalist history. And even if you only have a passing knowledge of that history really have heard of him. He couldn't read until he was in his late teens he never went to school. His he came from a very. A poor farming family although. Probably not that all that different from several wheel from a lot of families them but had to work had to work on that farm he taught himself to read. And when he was 18 19 and 20. Botanics. There wasn't much to read the bible. In the bible contradicted. What his father was preaching. One day his father said what are you reading. Hosea said a universalist book. Wow. Father father was. We think a good father but very strict. About. Religion and the baptist faith. His father said well i can't allow that if it out of this house. Isaiah went out and the newest dad was watching him so he hit this whoop. In the woodpile. Because he knew his father we go find the book right. Well course it was the bible. Jose out valley was a minister. In boston. For 30 years. 1000 people. Kane. Not just for one service on sunday for all these 30 years. 43 services. On sunday. 1000 people at each of those service. A distant cousin of hosea's was aiden valu and when we get to the final him you'll see that he wrote the words aiden. For that him. Will aiden started out being. A disciple of christ and very very strict. Calvinist. Believe because he had been converted and a big revival after a huge storm went through. New hampshire. And destroyed a lot of things so then revival movement came out in the storm went through because the people were living in sin and all those things. So aiden became. A minister for the disciples of christ. But the more he try to refute his distant cousin hosea's beliefs the more he started believing them it was a little difficult to argue against them when you're actually beginning to believe them. Finally as john robinson says in in a book about unitarian universalist. Hosea army naden valu surrender to the irresistible appeal that universalism a to his rational mind i find that fascinating because we often make the sweeping generalization that unitarians are always the rational ones in their head. And universal is working. Information. Annabella is wish we could maybe try to remember him although if there's quisite will be open book. He he was a pacifist and. The very vocal pacifist be also was a socialist or communist small letter c because he was one of those people in the 1800's who believe that the ideal christian community was exactly that. Calming type. Arrangement our way of living and utopian community you may have heard of hopedale. He found aiden valleys. Found it. I in january i briefly mentioned how mysticism and spiritualism work. Intertwined with the universalist movement. Someday we'll have to do. Maybe i'll service on this because it's fascinating. The mysticism worked in here to me this is logical if you're talking about universal love. An enemy unit one universal church. Based on logging one big umbrella one. Under which everybody would be able to keep their. Whatever their own beliefs work gets into a mystical realm i think. Spiritualism and it's the picture here because. Well i don't know why. Van buren and you know that name i'm going to refer to john buren's in. A few minutes. Because i couldn't believe something he did not do an in a book of his that i was using as a reference. John didn't say this but some current unitarian universalist minister said that the challenge of spiritualism. Proved much more damaging. To the universalist. Then the transcendentalist uprising did. To the unitarians. If you know your history you know that the unitarians very successfully absorb unitarian transcendentalism. But. Spiritualism was. Thought it was odd. But there were many universalist in the early and mid-1800s who became spiritualists and a lot of the ministers did. Course it's not biblically thanks than the universalist. Were always more interested in having their ministers and their laypeople. Recite creed. And the ministers had to sign off on a creed. You didn't find any material. A universalist minister jon bovi dodds was asked to leave the ministry in this time.. Because he was. Into spiritualism which. Play khalid. Impart one i mentioned lydia anne moulton jenkins as we don't know much about the women in the spirit of time of course there weren't very many women. Who. Where ministers are certainly were. Number of universalist and unitarian ministers who were. Very active in the social justice movement in the settlement houses in. Trying to get the right to vote for women. An anti-slavery movement. I mentioned that lydia jenkins was really the first woman to be ordained. In 1860 by universalist congregation but it wasn't olympia brown she was the second one. Olivia brown. Apply to the unitarian theological college in meadville pennsylvania. Anytime we talk about that. Theological school catches my attention because i grew up about 18 miles from meadville pennsylvania. Olympia browns application was turned down by. The admissions people because quote they thought it too great an experiment. Next she apply to oberlin college. And they said she could go to overland. But only if all the time she was there. Studying. She refrained from speaking. Publicly. Eventually she applied to st-lawrence college in canton new york and she was admitted there with no cash. As to her eventually becoming a minister which was her goal. That was something that saint lawrence university believe was between you and the great head of the. This is the time. when the universal general reform association was founded in the 1840s in new england. And i mentioned it lasted time in january you had to pay $0.50. For the deuce. I hear but you could anybody could be long they had 40 goals in four categories. The categories included slavery. Women's rights anti-war non-resistance indian affairs. Social institutions inhabits. Prison reform. And rehabilitation and into the death penalty. Pretty ambitious for anytime. wouldn't you say. Stories make me hopeful. Kinda. On the other hand make me impatient. So i'm i'm i'm practice my learning more about patience when you read these stories. Already got us into the twentieth century now with mary ashton rice livermore think i said in january that the women of this time. generally had four names. Bubble just cormier. This is right now clara barton's in the same time. but you pregnant. Mary livermore wrote this when she was 85 oz 85 years old. False early. Conceptions darkened my childhood. And youth. The spacing in universalism during the years that i have believed it has grown up on me until it is essential thing in me i am not engaged to anything that is not as i see it the outcome of this face. Might later comprehension has given me a noble and abiding faith in human destiny and i am happy to say. I may still lend a hand to the weak and the struggling or strike a blow for the right. Against the wrong. I'd really appreciate that quote that she wrote when she was almost. You have to know a little something about her upbringing it was a very strict. Baptist upbringing. She spent a lot of her childhood fighting nightmares because she was sure she was not one of the sade. And she would wake her parents up and send you something. In the middle of the night and go back to sleep i think was their reaction. From this upbringing. Mary livermore went on to marry a universalist minister. And an ardent abolitionist. David livermore he's fully supported his wife and vice versa. Mary livermore. Despite being female became one of the most sought-after speakers in the united states. Even into her eighties. These women of course were also feminist supporters of equal rights for women. And they were especially passionate about. Getting the vote for women. Curious and interesting side note about horace greeley. It turns out was it. Always a nice person. His paper the new york tribune did cover the first women's rights convention held in seneca falls new york in 18. 48 though the paper did not cover it very enthusiastically. Greeley wrote the best women i know do not wish to vote. By reading the story and about aliens. John deere in john buren's. Former president of the unitarian universalist association. Still ruu minister in san francisco in pretty sure. Some errands running this piece and i'm enjoying it. Meow from our universalist history and not what. Did john baron's mansion. Horace greeley's wife. Name. This book was published. In 2011. Her name was mary young. Cheney. Yes spelled that way. Greeley. I don't know i didn't have time to go any further into her. History so i don't know she's. Anyway. Horace & mary greeley marriage was quite unhappy. He kept her constantly pregnant. Five of their children died young and at least some of them from neglect. I'm not sure what was going on. Mary was a spiritualist. Mary livermore livermore just for a moment was called the queen of the platform because she was such a popular lecture i'm just going to give you a couple of titles from her. Of her lectures. Concerning husbands and wives. Which was about being equal partners in marriage. Talking. 1850 60 70. The battle of life which was about working for a fair and just world. Rc put it the world that should be. Does the liquor traffic pay. And then what shall we do with our daughters. Which was about educating women for new roles in society. When mary livermore was 13 a teacher told her that she could not possibly have written the composition she gave him it was way too good. Workforce. She did right. Mary livermore proposed planned and managed the two great chicago bears. She took in almost a million but she didn't but the fair's cooking almost a million dollars. Which went to a pet project of hers the united states sanitary commission. Abraham lincoln was a friend of mary livermore. He gave her the original manuscript of the emancipation proclamation. But she promptly sold at auction promptly but she sold it at auction. For $300,000. She founded the association for the advancement of women. And she was president of the american. Woman suffrage association. Now it is sometimes difficult to live up to our values we all know that. And in this case to our universalist values. George pullman. George pullman was. A very influential. Universalist. He was on lay leader he did a lot in his congregation he had i believe two brothers were universalist. Ministers. Well you probably have heard of george pullman. Who was wealthy and establish that company town in pullman illinois. And the workers went on strike because of the financial panic of 1893 eugene debs of the american railway union said they were going to boycott. Any handling of pullman cars which the workers did. President grover cleveland called in 12,000 army troops. Both strikers were eventually killed there was a lot of. Property damage. According to john durin's by the time george died in 1897. He was so unpopular. With workers. Betty had to be buried in a lead-lined coffin in a reinforced steel concrete bowl. To prevent more violence against him. On the other side of death. Clarence russell skinner some of you may have heard of. Hey i want to kiss first positions was as assistant to the minister. Skinner didn't die until 1949 so we're getting into the mid. The middle part of the 1900s. He was an assistant to the minister universalist congregation in new york city will we now know that congregation as. 4th universalist. But then the name of it was church of the divine paternity which. Find weather. Cimino's for generic. Know that the divine paternity. In 1910 skinner went to grace universalist in lowell massachusetts. Massachusetts where he started something called the law for him. A series of lectures about social issues. His church doubled in size. He asked. How to transform this old earth into the kingdom of heaven. On. And he said he believed that fat was the main the primal question. Universalist. And should be of any. He went on universalism has not abolished the idea of hell it has humanized and socialized it. Skinner continued if universalism has established human misery. As a direct consequence of. Human action that a person must work out his or her own. Salvation. He or she must work out the salvation of the world. I think he's. Trying to say that. Hell is. Here on earth. For so many people. Extra. In 1917 notes update. Skinner drafted a declaration of social principles. Got to be adopted at what was the then called the universalist general convention which. Has become part of general assembly for. Here's his first point. An economic order which she'll give to every human being an equal share. In the common gifts. Of god. And in addition all. Bekesha learned by his own. Labor. Sounds like communism to me. At small letter c. I'm quite fond of clearances. The second point there should be a social order in which there shall be equal rights were all this 1917 special privileges for none. The help of the strong for the week. And the week. Until the week. Become strong. I'm impressed. No. But i think he was related to him. I'm unimpressed and humbled by this man in and again. Trying to learn patience in matters of social justice. Skinner was a pacifist in world war 1. Some of his colleagues universalist shunned him for this. Was he a pacifist or was he a real bolshevik was the quest. He spoke out publicly in defense of the iww the international workers of the world. And he did call the american legion. Anarchy. Skinner was a part-time minister near tuskegee university. When all a universalist congregation when all this was going on that church asked him to leave. The minister who succeeded skinner you definitely don't have to remember his name even though he was at universal. Wacom the ku klux klan. To an evening service. Well unfortunately the clan members came robed and. Hooded. Apparently during this time. the early 1900s this was not necessarily unusual. Have plans been sitting in your congregation so i suspect. Biro big footed part was unusual. Arcturian i want to briefly mention two more universalist to important in the second half of the 19th. Owen young. Doubt many of you i had not heard of. He was a lawyer and industrialists and a statesman he had a key role. In renegotiating at what germany owe the allies. After world war 1. Owen was on the board of general electric. He founded rca and md. Embassy. What amazes me about about young was. Not that he favored heavy. Taxes on inherited wealth what you did. But that he advocated for time when labor. Would hire. Capital. Not the other way around. And when workers would receive. All the prophets. About the fair cost. Of the capital. But they hire. He presented this idea once in a speech at the harvard business school. In 1927. Receive polite applause. Don't no one seemed to know what he was talking about. He was in favor of social security. Unemployment insurance disability insurance none of which the general electric board was thrilled about. And the last name and i'll mention is one that. Some of you might know kenneth patton. 90 look for 1911 to 1994 he was minister at first unit. Theran society here in madison. Before max gabler was a minister. Patton was at first from 1942. De 1948. He was too liberal and too radical for madison. Here's something about patton that i didn't know. He mentioned casually in a radio sermon that he would like to resign from the white race. And become a colored man. National magazine picked up on this. And on his on patents attempts to document how pervasive race prejudice was. Having spent time in chicago. Trying to integrate restaurants country clubs hotels real estate. Whitehead it well. Could have been way ahead of his time then but finally he was. He was extremely creative and artistic. When he eventually went to be minister at charles street meeting house in boston. Pat has 65 brass religious symbols from all over the world from. Spiritual and religious traditions. Install not everybody on the board at charles street meeting house in boston was happy about this. And after patton retired he was minister there from. 1949 until 1964. Those symbols were moved. To starr king school of ministry. Is my alma mater. As i said in january the unitarians in the universal submerged in 19. 61 and the major concern and the fear of the universalist. Was justified they were afraid they'd beat universalists were afraid they'd be swallowed up by the unitarian. One of the ongoing impediments to the merger was the different opinions on creed unity universalist were in favor of them generally. Insurance not. I'm going down with this quote that i used in january. From paul karns. Who was a minister in boston. And that's one of the few congress was at the time of merger in the early 1960. On the few congregations were both unitarian universalist affiliated with that buffalo. Church and said something happened. To the universalist. They met you to the unitarians. And they found that the unitarians are more or less. Japan to universalist. Except. That there are more of them. And they make more. The closing words repeating hosea bellows. If we agree in love there is no disagreement that can do us any injury. But if we do not. No other agreement can do us any good. Let us endeavor then to keep the unity of the spirit. In the bonds of peace. Feature neighbor pay for sue. And get outside.

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Pr140316Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to prairie unitarian universalist fellowship i don't know if we have any new folks this morning or people haven't been here too many times. Because sometimes i think if i do by the usual opening welcoming you've all heard it and you know you're doing your grocery list in your head and your planning the rest of the day but we are a welcoming congregation and you are more than welcome to be here no matter what your religious beliefs or. Sometimes i do the service reverend sandra ingham better known as sandy sometimes people from outside the congregation do the service and sometimes people within our congregation do the service. In keeping with today's theme of introducing you to a small band of liberal women ministers whose work took place in what was then the frontier of this country just right about here. The wild west i share with you these welcoming words of unitarian minister mary safford. Who use them in her humboldt iowa congregation from 1880 to 1885 when she was the minister there she said her church welcomed all people of goodwill. Regardless of religious connection andrew no sharp lines between sacred and secular. But would try to discover god the power that makes for righteousness. In whatever learning and truth its members could find. I think those are perfectly fine words for us as well 135 years later. Penny with you. For centuries. People have told stories. Celebrated life. And approach the ultimate well gathered around a fire. Today we light this chalice that the hearthfire of our hearts. Maybe rekindled. That our stories may be retold. That we might celebrate life anew. And that we might approach. What is a altima. Reading i would like to share with you this morning is titled the duck of enlightenment. Buy unitarian universalist minister. Kathleen mctigue. She writes. One spring afternoon i went home a little early. So i. Could claim an hour of study time. Before my children got home. As i open the door. I was greeted by both cats. Which was a little odd. Because they don't usually condescend. To notice our coming and going unless it's dinner time. One of them probably bolted out the open door. Well the other wrapped himself persistently around minds legs. As i stood puzzled puzzling over this behavior. At the edge of my vision. I caught a sudden motion. In the family room. Where there should be no emotion at all in the empty house. With the hair rising on the back of my neck. I slowly moved into the house. And rounded the corner of the room. And then i saw it. There was a duck. In the family room. A wild brown duck. He lies.. In the family room. My brain actually. Stopped completely for a couple of heartbeats. What. The brain do after all was so utterly unexpected a site. I stood there in the doorway and said out loud. There is a doc in the family room believe it. None of the windows were open the doors were properly close the duck. Huddled in the far corner of the room next to a clutter of books and dvds radiating the hope that if she kept perfectly. I wouldn't see her. Carefully i caught her up. A small wood. Female. Her heart laughing frantically against my hands. And carried her outside. I'd looked at her. Full of wonder for this. Little visitation. Then i open my hands. She left into the air and a great arts of liberation and beat her wings in a straight line of escape. All the way to the horizon. I went back inside to investigate the breach of household security. And within a few minutes the mystery was explained. A trail of ashes spilled from the fireplace and here and there on the wall and. The ceiling against the ceiling i saw sword. In little feather shaped impressions where the duck has thrown herself up toward the light. It all made sense then. Howard duck the time to be standing in the middle of my house. I felt lucky. That for the space of a few breaths. Might linear deductive mind. Had been shocked into silence. When something tumbles us into that. State of wonder. The unexpected quiet in our heads is like a window flung open on the world. Instead of the routine. Predictable. Waze. Predictable story we live each day. There is something new under the sun. And surprise out of our minds for a moment. We actually. See. Startled awake we received what's in front of us. Simple. Astonishing. On edited. Afterward basking in the dazzle meant of my visitor it occurred to me. Really shouldn't require dock in the family room. To awaken my wonder. Is that the same lovely little wood duck just as wondrous just as worthy of my aunt and my open and grateful heart. When she is out in the woods where she belongs. The real miracle is not that her frightened heartbeat against my hands for a moment but. Better heartbeat. At all. Better heartbeats. That my hands can hold. That my eyes. Can see. I chose that prince cinders story for all ages for several reasons. One was because as i said we only had the very younger children snoring over the older ones probably would have enjoyed it too. And the older ones are at hindu temple threat. We need two more off and i think bringing up with the re folks are doing and thank all those people who are doing it with the kids. Another reason for that story. Is that obviously we can change the narrative of our stories. Which is very important for women certainly very important than my. Growing up in the sixties and seventies and. Feminist movement being part of that. We need to remember that there are different ways to tell classic. Stories. That just might help us break out of our boxes. Change our assumptions. Breakdown. Uno's. And the reading about the duck. Well. It really shouldn't require a doc in the family room to awaken our wonder. I don't know whether or not. Some of my recent experiences quite fall into the same category as walking into your home to find a duck there. But i had some of the same reactions mctigue had to the duck. The more i delve into the stories of the liberal women ministers. Who may not put author cynthia grant tucker calls. The prophetic sisterhood. The book is titled the prophetic sisterhood. The prophetic sisterhood was also known as the iowa. Sisterhood. Whatever name we attached to this small but powerful group of women. Their stories. Miraculous. More than once this past couple of weeks i was awakened to wonder. By their courage. Determination perseverance. By their prophetic. Voices. I found myself so immersed in their stories that i kept losing track of the present time in which i actually reside. This led to strange. Unexplainable behavior on my part minor events but as. Odd to me it's finding a duck in the living room. Family room. I lost my library card one day now that makes you my nephew but that has never happened to me ever. Before i had library card since i was very very young. I think i still have most of them and i guard that part of my life. The day or two after that. At the end of the day i realized that i had been wearing mismatched. Fox. Two very different socks wear on my feet for the entire day and if you know me at all you know i love crazy thought i don't think i've worn this since i was three or four years old. I tell you these mundane things because i hope to impart some of my enthusiasm for the prophetic sisterhood to you. In the next few minutes. The first. We need to consider the word. Prophet. What is. A prophet. As you might suspect one of the dictionary definitions is. What is speaks for god capital g. Or the attorney. Another one that won't surprise you. Is. One who foretells future events the predictor. But these aren't the only definitions and they're certainly not the best ones. I like this definition. A prophet is one gifted with. More than ordinary. Spiritual and moral insight. This kind of prophet would make a declaration of something to come based on what is happening right now. Not based on. Any more because of divine inspiration or and certainly not speaking for any. God. Weather prediction of things to come. Based on being in the moment and paying attention. To what is actually really happening in the moment. So i'm describing a buddhist-inspired. Buddhist weaning process. Which leads to another good definition of what a profit might be or do. An effective. Or leaving spokesperson. For a cause doctrines or group. Most importantly. Prophet. Is someone who is ahead. Of her or his. Often. This quote from contemporary unitarian universalist minister mark valentini might help you better understand what i mean by the words prophet. And prophecy. Mark rights we are a liberal church community which has not only dare to preach freedom. But to live freedom as well which has not only prophesied. A more just. Day to come but has dare to live. Prophetically. Right now. So why do we call this small group of women the prophetic sisterhood. Cause they look at the world in which they lived. Really looked at. I mean really looked at. Do that. Don't try to. Take in and sword. Pain in the world. Difficult to do it and then what. Except would be what. These women. We're able to understand the world in which they live. Absorb just how broken it was. Remember the civil war had just ended. And then they predicted how that world could be improved how they could help with that what part they could play and healing the world they were. The eternal optimist. I could because they they form and get together right after the civil war and they. Fall apart. Right after world war 1. Would have done in any optimus. Baby swimming new. They predicted that the future will be very grim. For large numbers of people. Unless. People were part of communities. Communities of love and compassion. Well how are these women wild you might ask. Well they weren't exactly at least not in the sense that we often use. That word of fact i've been told a few google wild women of the west. You'll get some interesting things. But you won't find any liberal women preachers from the time. i'm sucking 1870s until about 1930s women weren't really wild except. Making them prophetic. Why are they important to us. Well remember i'm a history major so course they're important to us. In the most general sense because history is or should be important. What's that saying if we don't know where we've been how will we know where we are going. Most important thing about learning history studying history is. Story. Not dates. No it's fine. Eventually have know when things happen especially relations other things but the stories of those who came before us. Help us as nothing nothing else can understand our own stories and from that understand our place. In the world. What it means to be human. How to live in community. These women are also pinterest to us because they lived here. Where we live iowa-wisconsin minnesota michigan that was the wild west then. But most significantly. The stories of the perfect women of the prophetic sisterhood. End of the man who supported them. Should fill us free-thinking folks with. Gratitude. We might not be here in this space in the year 2014 had these people not come before us. Safeguarding our faith defending against unbelievable odds our right. Our innate right to search for truth to speak truth without dogma. Stockton. Without anyone telling us. What we should believe there's certainly very good chance that eyes a woman wouldn't be standing here had it not been for these liberal women minister. In the late 1800s and early 1900s. Try to imagine what it must have been like. To live then. Beginning in 1870 and. As i said up to. 1930. Especially there at the beginning. It's one thing to imagine living physically. Logistically maybe without cars. Without phones. A hairdryer toaster coffee maker all of which i used this morning. Using coal or wood. The heat no indoor plumbing. Generally. Life was hard. Very hard imagine living that no central heating especially through a winter like the one that we have just gone through. For me it's even more difficult to try to imagine living in those times. In terms of the the culture. The society the expectations of society the rigid rules. Of men and women. The box. I know we're still putting boxes but those boxes were. Even more rich and i think. People were put into an expected to stay there. I try not to have regrets about. Things. In my life that i should have done or. I should not have done but. But one of the regrets that i do have is something i did not do when i was a minister. In burlington iowa. Part of my job was. To go to keokuk iowa twice a month. And do a service there now. I dropped visual aids. In case anybody. If you're not familiar with the geography of southeastern iowa. It's. Just crossed the river from illinois. Missouri to. I would often go should really. I've had a a blow-up of this man i would go to keokuk via nauvoo. Illinois. Which some of you may know is a big mormon community with. A temple these temple but it's a replica. It's the middle of cornfield. So in order to get there that way to keokuk through nabu. I had to go through hamilton illinois. Which is also right on the river on mississippi river. Airsoft 2. Explorer. And to try to find city hall i don't know if there is a city hall this is village now must be someplace there that kept their keeps records from the 80s. Now why would i want. To explore hamilton illinois. Because two of the most important women from this little band of female unitarian universalist ministers. Who accepted positions in the west. We're born and raised on farms along the mississippi river. In hamilton illinois mary augusta safford and eleanor elizabeth borden. A third woman. Who is part of that's this group carrie julia bartlett some of you may know her as. Caroline bartlett crane. I'll get to that later. She wasn't born in hamilton but she grew up there. He probably won't remember these names. Nor the names of others that i'll mention. Bought. Just saying their names out loud and knowing that they are part of our heritage. Should be enough to fill you with wonder and gratitude. Especially after hearing a little bit about their lives. Mary safford. Born in 1850. Raised presbyterian. Luv2play preacher. On the farm with her best friend eleanor gordon was just nine months younger they used a tree stump for a pulpit. Mary's mother. Bought that cheap. Mary mary would outgrow this preaching game and eventually take her place in the presbyterian church working in the kitchen and praying from the pews. But as role models. Mary's parents said one thing and did another which is not uncommon behavior for parents farmer and a teacher and he kept having to explain himself to the church board because he was much much more of a free thinker than a rigid doctrinal presbyterian. He believed that the bible was fallible. He believed in evolution he believed in darwin's theory of evolution. In other words he was a heretic. That were just means to choose. Sadly mary's father died. When mary was only 9 years old. Her mother louisa was left with six. Children. To raise in a farm to run. Lisa turned out to be a better manager of the farm than her husband. And she was able to pay off the debt. And run a very successful van so she kept telling your kids especially her female children you have to do this you can't do this when you grow up you can be this you can't be that. But. That wasn't the. Why she was living her life and then there was eleanor's influence on mary eleanor's family was like a miniature parliament of world religions. They were radical unitarians orthodox unitarian a spiritualist. Baptist from all across the theological spectrum. And lots of debates about religion. Questioning was encouraged which made eleanor the bane of her presbyterian and baptist sunday school teachers. Eleanor gordon i might add was the minister in burlington iowa from 19. Until 1902. I was the minister in burlington iowa from 2002. Until 2005. Was still a child carry julia bartlett rebelled against her religious upbringing she didn't believe in this is her quote that a god worth caring about could inflict pain. As arbitrarily as the church said he did. Nor did she believe that unbaptized babies and so-called heathens in other countries were sent to hell will that resonated with me because that was the beginning of my own theological downfall i couldn't believe it either. Cary refuse to believe that jesus for whom she felt deep affection as a human being. Had been involved in anything as in this is her word impossible as the resurrection. Not very popular with her sunday school teachers either. Marion eleanor made a pledge in the mid-1870s. And this might be one of the reasons why i'm so drawn to their stories because i made a pledge with. With my best friends. in the 1870s. You're so later on a summer day in the 1870s when they were in their early twenties. Sitting in their usual place under an old apple tree. They made a pledge that they would spend their lives together serving the world as a team. For safford this would mean as a minister. For gordon this would mean as a teacher although she eventually became a unitary mr2. A my friend karen and i resolved to work together throughout our lives to end war on the planet. We're. Not finished. Has become a jehovah's witness so we don't talk. Mary stafford and eleanor gordon wanted to go to college but there was no money to do so so they studied on their own to get the equivalent of a college degree. They were greatly influenced by emerson who had been writing in the 40s. 30s 40s and 50 1830. Especially by these two beliefs of his. We should use book learning to make the world better. And we should find the divine within ourselves. Same divinity found in jesus is also in you emerson said we don't need intermediaries to find the truth. Gordon and stafford were becoming not only freethinkers. Humanist to sonic's camp. More than emerson. Eleanor and mary were especially fond of theodore parker. Because he took unpopular positions on social justice issues. Parker's one of the unitarian ministers back east in the boston area who had a gun on the pulpit just in case people were who were pro-slavery we're throwing rocks into the windows and this did happen. So eleanor and mary were quite taken with. Parker because parker believed that religious communities needed to spend less time in prayer. And more in ethical action. It was through their reading of parker that they discovered the philosopher kant who defined god as collective humanity. Definition i really like. Collective humanity. Well here these women are. The reading about unitarianism in universalism and they're reading. A transcendentalist. Unitarian universalist minister. Betty austin hurd oscar clute. Was the unitarian minister in keokuk iowa that time and he convinced marion eleanor to start their own. Church in hamilton so they did. They didn't even use the tree stump from the orchard. Baby cam planning services in the spring of 1879 enough time to go into so much of their stores. These women were able to. Raise money. To build. New buildings new churches and pay off the mortgage. Usually within four to five years and they didn't ask boston. That's another spy did ask boston boston didn't want the women doing what they were doing. That's a story then we telling you 3 weeks from now. And that was the end of the prophetic sisterhood so marion eleanor start this church. In 1879 in the spring by the end of the year. The sunday attendance in hamilton was over 150. With as many as 200 on some sunday and they had church sponsor. Church-sponsored. Lectures and plays. All week. In the evenings and they provided services for satellite group of folks eight miles out in the country which would have been. Very far away. Clute was not the only man who helped them start this church. Jenkin lloyd. John. Play depart now a big big party. Some of you may know that name because. Of his relationship to. Brian. Frank lloyd wright. Frank lloyd wright's uncle. But jenkin lloyd jones was a famous man in his own right then. In the late 1870s i mean you don't know much about him now. He was the american unitary association's western secretary. And i mean nice i kind of meant with the boss of the western district. Heck of a time finding any clergy. Developments in the west and there were just churches sprouting up everywhere. 4 number reasons the eastern trained young new male ministers did not want to go to. This is a quote the border of civilization but that's where they were most needed. The partnership that the prophetic sisterhood the iowa sisterhood formed with jenkin lloyd-jones to ride ministry on the western frontier of our country with last roughly 50 years. 1880 to 1930. It's important to remember that there were a lot of men who supported. The prophetic sisterhood mansion clue and jones and william cannon get it but there were others i suspect it had he been familiar with the term cloning lloyd-jones would have probably wish that he could clone these these women. That need administers. Actor hamilton iowa that congregation was firmly established checking lloyd-jones a stafford and gordon to go to humboldt iowa. Farther west. Where are unitarian grouper freethinkers was already building a church. So marion eleanor went to humble. They stayed for five years where they found quote like to be harder than anything they had ever known. Remember they grew up on farms. They lived in an upstairs apartment. No plumbing no central everything had to be carried in and out. Water and fuel in garbage and ashes out as my sister would say they needed a boy. And eventually they they did make enough money to hire someone to help them with that didn't make much money. There was poverty and illness to deal with and a harsh climate. They work 18-hour days but this work was not just a challenge physically. They're unitarian and universalist faith. Was constantly being challenged there were plenty of orthodox christians would also moved west. And regarded the free thinkers as. Heretics yes that word again. Free. Thinkers unitarian and universalist were persecuted harassed ostracize made fun of and mocked at revival. Presbyterian methodist baptist even calvinist congregationalists would boycott businesses owned by so-called heretics. Unitarian and universalist church is needed to be as mary safford put it. Outpost of rationality and human wants. Despite all of this safford's and gordon's unity church they named it unity. Became the town's fastest-growing attraction here are the words that were on the walls. Freedom fellowship. Character in religion. Truth. Port authority not authority for truth. Like i don't have time to give you and the what i wanted to give you maybe in three weeks i will a little. Blurb of one of stafford sermons. I'll just say that there wasn't much christ in her theology. Those shoes but she would have used jesus as a good example of how we should try to live. Her sermons would not have not have been similar to what most of the unitarian preachers in the east were preaching during this time.. Unitarian church was afraid of no subject. Most of all the humble church was so different. From the unitarian churches in the east because intellectualism was not the most important part. Of the humble church experience. The sisterhood believe with theodore parker that intellectualism was useless. Unless. And until it was integrated with current affairs and community service. Now there are recurring themes here and i'll get more into this in 3 weeks. These themes become connections. With our lives right now so can i. Between their lives in now and i call these. The f. Tnc factor. Some things never change. Here we are today almost halfway through the second decade of the 21st century and we are still debating whether or not. Community service and current affairs. Aka social justice. Is the primary purpose for forming communities of faith. Humboldt. Became a hub for the female ministers on the frontier especially in iowa. A place to reconnect. And strengthen. They're networking and by the west. You probably gathered this but i mean western pennsylvania. Out to. South dakota. I grew up in western pennsylvania. The people in the boston area move when they wanted to move west. To not be missionary. Went to meadville pennsylvania which is 18 miles from where i grew up. Okay once against african gordon were asked to move to a new pulpit start a new church once that humble church was formally established this time they went to sioux city iowa within 18 months of their arrival membership went from 26. To almost 200. During this period of time they took a sabbatical they went to that. Liberal mecca also known as boston. Were they were surprised and disappointed. It was to tame their theologically that is. After hearing harvard professor andrew peabody speech. Eleanor said that quotes she doubted that he had read anything written within the last century. She said the easterners needed speakers who knew how to talk to people. Not ask them. Nor over them. The women were constantly fighting isolation loneliness prejudice. Discrimination that may be difficult for us to grasp. And this time i'm referring to prejudice and discrimination based. On their gender not their religious beliefs. One of the women marie jenny how commented that she doubted that more than one in 100 women really like sewing as much as the typical typical clergyman seem to think. People were beginning to read freud's works during this time. you know freud. I don't have anything i say about 4. Troy do question how woman's life could be anything but inadequate and empty if they did not have husbands and children and most of these women made conscious decisions not to marry. And the ones who did married. Rarely had children. The prophetic sisterhood was always always trying to break out of the cultures to find roles for them. I'm fighting to be recognized as intelligent. Responsible capable human beings equal to men. And the sisterhood was always. Always at odds. But as i said more about that later one more short story about the women on the frontier this one takes place in sioux falls south dakota. A pulpit that have only had female ministers. From the very beginning. Eliza will. Flipping preaching in the backwoods of south dakota and iowa and. 4. Many many years with the blessings of both the unitarians and the universalist. She was asked by some 30 religious liberals in sioux falls to start a unitarian congregation. So she didn't but her interested wasn't starting up new congregation she didn't want to be the permanent minister of any of these. Chance boston to send candidates. For the sioux falls congregation but. Brooke said while they were likeable enough they were too academic and didn't seem to understand that in the west a minister had to speak plainly and be concrete. Will complain that a course at harvard is not sufficient antidote for a lifetime in orthodoxy you cannot plant eastern unitarian churches into soil. 7 norman sioux falls. Was to have a female minister. Hope it was female donate. But something didn't seem quite right when they're minister exchange pulpis with a male collie. One day there was a pulpit exchange this is from eliza wilson journals. Which brought emil minister to sioux falls. Wilkes has little girl queenie have been so thoroughly unprepared and scandalized. But she cried out in a whisper that everyone heard and many repeated for years. Hulk mama. There's a man up there in the hole and three weeks i will continue with the stories of these women and tell you about the end of the prophetic sisterhood. .. Association. When that happened. They expanded their ministry into the wider world. They knew firsthand that is reverend david lance rephrase in a meditation i've used her before. Life in community isn't always easy. But it's the only place we can practice being human. Liberal religion is not easy street but we have so much to offer those liberal women ministers on the frontier put these words into practice every day of their ministries. Unitarian raised they were ordained. Within their congregations because boston didn't recognize female ministers. If here you have found freedom take it with you into the world if you have found comfort go and share it with others if you have dreamed dreams help one another that they may come true and if you have known love give some back to a bruised and hurting world going piece. Your name.

uuprairie_org

Pr160131Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist. Society thank you choir. Sometime bar but we'll have to think about trying to remember to put the words in. I can understand the words wonderfully perfectly but the words were great. And i seem to not have appropriate. Prairie pride itself on many things including be. A very welcoming place no matter where you are on this journey of life and it was that line and what the choir just saying about mystery of life. Living in that. No matter what the color of your skin no matter your ethnicity your gender. Your sexual orientation your abilities are disabilities you are welcome here. We do hurt you if this is one of your first x to try this out more than once. Because our services are different every sunday sometimes i do the service i am. Sandy ingham the minister here sometimes people from within the congregation do the service and sometimes folks from outside. The opening words then are those of a cat. We come together to celebrate who we are. To share the insights that give meaning. And hope. Twilight. Learn from the wisdom of others. That their truth may contribute to our understanding. We light our flaming chalice to illuminate. The world we seek. In the search for truth may we be just. In the search for justice may we need loving. And in loving. May we find peace. This reading is from. Nicholas cars book. The glass cage. I am drawing heavily upon this morning. It's from a chapter titled your inner drone. Cartwright's. It's a cold misty. Friday night. In mid-december and you're driving home. From your office holiday party. Actually. You're being driven home. You recently bought your first. Autonomous. A google program. Mercedes build eastmark electric sedan. And the software is at the wheel. You can see from the glare of your self adjusting led. Headlights that the street is icy in spots. And you know thanks to the continuously updated dashboard display. That the car is adjusting its speed and traction settings accordingly. All's going smoothly. You relax and let. You're mine just back to the evening stilted festivities. But as you passed through a densely wooded stretch of road just a few hundred yards from your driveway and animal darts into the street and freezes. Directly in the path. The car. It's your neighbor's beagle. You realize. The one that's always getting loose. What. Does your robot driver. Duke. Does it slam on the brakes. In hopes of saving the dog. But at the risk of sending the car into an uncontrolled skid. Or. Does it keep a virtue it's virtual foot. The break. Sacrificing the beagle to ensure that you and your vehicle stay out of harm's way how does it sort through and weigh the variables and the probabilities to arrive. At a split-second. Decision. If it's algorithms calculate that hitting the brakes. Would give the dog a 53% chance of survival. But would entail an 18. Percent chance of damaging the car. And a 4% chance of causing injury. To you. Doesn't conclude that trying to save the animal. Would be the right thing to do. How does the software working on its own transfer. A set of numbers into a decision that has both practical and moral consequences. What is the animal in the road isn't your neighbor's dog. But you're on. What for that matter if it isn't a dog. But a time. Imagine you're on your morning commute. Scrolling through your overnight emails as your self driving car crosses a bridge. Is speed precisely sync to the 40 mph limit. A group of schoolchildren is also heading over the bridge on the pedestrian walkway that runs alongside your lane the kids watched by adults seem orderly and well-behaved. There's no sign of trouble. Your car slows slightly its computer preferring to err on the side of safety. Suddenly there's a tussle. I'm a little boys pushed into the road. Definitely tapping out a message on your smartphone you're oblivious to what's happening your car has to make the decision. Either it's swerved out of its lane and goes off the opposite side of the bridge possibly killing you. Or if it's a child. What does program what does the software instruct the steering wheel to do. What the program make a different choice if it knew that one of your own. Children. Was riding with you strapped into a sensor equipped car seat in the back what is there was an oncoming vehicle in the other lane and what is that vehicle is a school bus. Isaac asimov's first law. Of robot ethics. A robot may not injure a human being. Or. Through inaction allow a human being to come to harm. Sounds reasonable and reassuring. But. As soon as the world. Far simpler. Then our own. Turning on midvale on my way prairie a couple of weeks ago. I noticed that the car in front of me was behaving strangely. Car in the left-hand lane. Kept straying into the right-hand lane. Odd but i am too early in the day probably for a drunk driver situation. It was only 9 a.m.. I finally decided that the best thing for me to do was either drop way back. Or go around the car but since i'm always late i opted to zip by. On the right after honking my horn honk my horn once or twice at the light where it just sat there. But the driver had not look up look at me. The driver. A female in her i'd say. Maybe 20 or 30. Was. Texting. One of my pet peeves. Other screen related behaviors that annoy me. Seeing a table full of people in a restaurant where every single person is staring at a screen. Hiking in a beautiful out-of-the-way place and having that solitude interrupted. By someone talking on a cell phone. Customers. In stores and coffee shops. These are minor aggravation. And i don't notice them everyday nor do i dwell on them. Of much greater concern to me. When i observe so many people looking at their screens and being oblivious to what is going on around them my main concern is. Where are we we humans. Going. What will happen to our minds as we continue to use them. Less. Unless. What will happen to our ability to solve problem. Without the aid of apps. What will happen to our imagination. As computers do more and more what will happen to creativity and memory and joy. What will happen to the pursuit of gathering knowledge and learning skills and the pleasure and satisfaction in work. Well. If no one writes letters anymore. What will happen to the art of writing memoirs. Biographies. What will happen to originality if children mostly interactive screens and not with each other. Email messages have no breaths or with. And as for. Children well i saw an article in a newspaper remember them. Recently if i still renewed. With this headline. By h2 most kids can navigate touch screen. It was i thinkin objektiv balance article. Emphasizing the fact that it's too early to know what this means. Whether this is good or bad for child development. Remains to be seen the writer lisa rapaport said. One pediatrics researcher said that this will partly depend on how much the technology helps kids. Engage with the world around them. Eye doctor commented that screen time should not take away time away from. Play involving people. Two important points i think i'm out here in this article about computer you say cannot take the place of one engaging in the world and to interacting with people. 94 get any deeper into the subject i should tell you that my reflections this morning are not intended to be a rant against. Technology in general or condemnation of computers and electronic devices in particular i'm not advocating a return to living in a cave. We're giving up every modern convenience i like electricity. Port-a-cool. There is a time and a place for computers and satellite navigation systems and cell phones and all of that my concern. Is that we are increasingly lacks about asking the question. To watch. And. When new or new technology is concerned. He seemed oblivious to or. Maybe totally uncaring about what these two words me human being. As journalist nicholas carr says technology is always challenge people to think about what's important. In their life to ask themselves what human being means. But automation. Raises the stakes. To resist. Invention. It's not too. Reject. Invention. It's too humble invention car says to bring it down to. It's the source of our vitality is as emerson taught us. The active soul. Then our highest obligation is to resist anything. That wouldn't feeble. That soul. Automation. Sever's. In. From me. It me it makes getting what we want easier. But it distances us. From the work of knowing. The aim. Is joy. And although i have been accused of being a luddite. Some of you may not know it is. They were a group of early nineteenth-century english workman most mainly it's beginning in the textile industry. Engage in. The quote from addiction attempting to prevent the use of labor-saving machinery. By destroying it. By 9 i have been accused of being a lot and i sympathize with the letter i. But i'm not a true believer because i would not do way with all technology. Nor would i use a vial. I don't have a smartphone. Desire for one i like my little dumb phone. I don't even have a computer at home. I don't own an ipad or tablet i don't tweet or twitter or text or any of those teasing. I'm not on facebook and i have little interest in. I do know what apps are. And think that many of them are ridiculous. I do know what it's gps is. But for me it is much more challenging and fun to figure out my own on my own where i'm going more about that in a few minutes. I also know what friendship is. And what the true meaning of the word friend. If. I know the immense value of telling our stories. And of listening to other people's stories. One-on-one not through social media. I know that real deep. Connections are made that way face-to-face. And in places like this. Wearied screens all day. Not story. Mark leibowitz wrote in a recent. New york times magazine essay. So imagine my surprise my delight my relief even upon discovering that i'm not the only person. Who feels and thinks this way. There are entire books written on this subject. Their scientists and journalists. Psychologist philosophers social workers pediatrician. And so many many many people working on the long-term unforeseen effects of too much reliance on computers. Too much screen time. And i refer to nicholas car earlier. Is the author of the glass cage. Our computers are changing us. In this book which was published in 2014. He expresses many of the fears and concerns that i have about what will happen to humanity. Of computers perform an increasing number of our tasks. And our daily chores not to mention our jobs. It was a tale of three airplane incidents all of which occurred in 2009. On february 12th 2009. Continental connection from commuter flight from newark new jersey was on his way to buffalo. An hour-long trip. After takeoff during which the captain. Man the controls. He had beef with the plane on autopilot and the first officer then. Spent their time chatting about nothing. Little short flight maybe they were bored. As the plane approached the buffalo airport the control yoke started shuttering. And the autopilot disconnected. It's supposed to do. The captain took over your future. The captain took over the manual controls but he did exactly the opposite of what he should have done he was so startled at the autopilot have shut-off he couldn't get his bearings. Well the plane crash into house killing everyone on board and one person on the ground there were no mechanical problems there were no physical problems with the pilots they were. Healthy and well. But the two did not have time to adjust to the situation. Pilot error was the official cause of the accident. The crew seem startled confused and seem to lack. Situational awareness in this emergency. In other words the two crew members weren't. Pain. On may 31st 2009 about three-and-a-half months later. An air france airbus. Left rio de janeiro. Paris. An encounter to storm over the atlantic about 3 hours out of rio. Ice caused the airspeed indicators to give false information. And the autopilot disengage picture was supposed to do. Again the co-pilot did the opposite of what he should have done he seemed to be bewildered. Toward you send official report. Confused the airspeed indicators did start to work again. So the crew had after reading but the co-pilot kept doing the wrong thing. The plane crash killing everyone on board. French investigators said that the crew had a total loss of cognitive control. Of the situation. This sounds eerily similar to many of the texting-while-driving stories i have heard. The third airplane story happened in early 2009 a few weeks before the continental crash in buffalo this was a us airways flight leaving laguardia. A gaggle of geese. And lost all tension power you'll remember this story because it had a happy ending and because it has a wisconsin. Connect. Captain sullenberger and first officer skiles. Acted calmly and forget which one of them is from. Wisconsin. Styles. They acted calmly. Did the plane wasn't on autopilot. They acted calmly quickly and they landed that plane in the hudson river where as we know everyone was safe. Rescue. This crew was offering. Except the geese this crew was operating hands-on. Force close to hands-on is near playing fruit bats. They were paying. Many years ago i took the ground school part of learning how to fly. I kind of. Takeoff. I don't have to land. Singapore. I ran out of money. In the ground school park. Over and over and over and over and over the instructor drilled into us and a subsidy of redundancy you even if you're never going to going to be certified ifr. Plies instrumental. Flight rating. Victor vfr visual fight. How to know what i mean if you weren't intending to wannabe instrument-rated you had to do know what to do manually. If the instruments. The technology. Sam. Nichols car uses these airplane stories to illustrate the dangers of relying. Too much on computers on automation. He uses the term automation complacency. And automation. Bias. And he gives us examples of each. Automation complacency is when a computer walls us into a false sense of security is a minor. Not probably not terribly important example spell checkers. Make as much poor proofreaders. Illustration of what happens. With automation complacency you have a tendency to tune out and become completely unaware of what is going on around us will hear some not so minor example. Cruise ship called the royal majesty way back in 1995. I was cruising. Along and its state-of-the-art gps system failed. So it was sending out incorrect reasons for the ship was. Crew members for paying attention to the around them they ignored real physic real-time physical evidence with their location assuming that the gps. Happy graph. Will the ship was 20 miles off course. And it ended up running into a sandbar no one was hurt in this but millions never millions of dollars in. Damages investigator said that quote automation. Someplace. The unquote caused the accident and that the crew was overly reliant. On the automated system ignoring other navigation aids and lookout information. Automation bias is related to this. When people give undue weight to the information coming through their monitors. Even when the information is wrong. Or misleading. They believe. Automation bias often causes us to ignore or dismiss other sources of information including our own senses. Such as following a digital mapping instruction without question. Ignoring road signs and other clues that might not agree. With the gps. I have a personal example. I was once. It's so embarrassing. One hour late for a wedding. The wedding was out in the middle of nowhere. Somewhere new york. Ripper. And that area. The rehearsal had not been at the same place. It's never happened to me before i went to mapquest. They sent me the wrong. Way. That was fat. The couple didn't seem bothered. Father of the groom i think was. Ready to. But here's a more. Dangerous example a bus driver in seattle in 2008. Which happened to be for high school athletes. Into a bridge. Have 9 ft clearance. No one was killed but 21 students were injured will the driver said he was following the gps directions and quote did not see. What's the signs and flashing lights. Warning. Automation complacency and automation baez have this in common they get worse. As automated systems get more. And. They always interfere. With our ability. To payette. And most of you have heard me acting with me long enough to know that one of my recurring themes. Is. The importance of paying attention. Being aware being awake. Just plain being rebooted. Tap into your buddhist. This would seem to imply that we need to be actors in our lives. Not observers. Automation reverse. 45 years ago my sister and i volunteer to be designated drivers for my daughter and two of her friends who are hiking from the south rim of grand canyon. To the north rim. Now he's worked young women. They were probably in their mid-40s. Wonderful experience i mean my poor sister for me we got to spend. Free days at the north rim. We were delighted to be doing this favor. I don't know if any of you have ever made that trip. From jacob lake arizona jacob lake. About 40 miles outside of the entrance to the north rim. To cameron and then back into. Thumb grand canyon park. On the south side this time this journey takes you past the vermilion cliffs. Unbelieve. And through navajo territory too far from lake powell. Gorgeous unbelievable isolated. Funny. Landscape. Eibsee condors there. One of the three women and i've known her since she was paralyzed. Have this bantering time with her. She never looked up from her screen. At one point she asked how much further it was cameron. Well we just passed mile marker so i the driver was able to rapidly calculate. Appear how far it was but right after she asked a question she answered herself they all look it up. We arrived at the answer exactly the same moment. At which point i couldn't resist asking what she thought was going to happen to various mental skills. And her mental acuity if she relied completely on her electronic devices. Then i said. Something probably borderline sarcastic. About how she was missing white. Missing the incredibles country we were driving through. Which brings me to maps. I love matt. I love the feel of them i love studying them i love figuring out from the map. How and where all exploring new city. I still have my maps of paris and london and athens and san francisco and portland oregon and other places. Discovering a place with the help of a map and actual map. Challenges us in a way. Set a digital navigational aid could never. One way leads to knowledge. The other. Which only requires taking an information passively. Does exact. Opposite. American philosopher robert kelly says that. Doing this kind of thing requires getting your hands dirty with the world and letting the world. Kickback in a certain way. The world is a messy play. Within that messiness though. Are tremendous opportunities and auctions. You can't reduce everything. To a computer. We can't automate everything we can't solve all the world's problems neatly. And efficiently which seems to be what silicon valley wants us to do. The question is why would we want to do. Last june i had an entire day to explore toronto canada. Yes with my map. I walked for hours. I wondered into. But someone told me about this. Big commercial building in downtown toronto not a museum or anything. But there was a collection of sculpture there done by inuit people. Over the last 150 years ago. If you know anything about the inuit people you know the hunting has always been crucial. For 4,000 years they've left their homes on the island of an improving on saying this right. Off the coast of the melville peninsula in northeast canada. In the winter in the arctic sink ice and tundra. For most of these 4,000 years they didn't have a gps. Or any kind of navigational satellite. Now the younger ones especially. Almost all have gps. Bought. They. Completely skip the training by the elders. Which has led to injuries deaths and the lost sadly of what one inuit elder calls the wisdom and knowledge. Of the inuit. I suppose we could respond with her. Attitude. But i think. The inuit story is a warning. A proceed with caution sign. 4 humans. There's a big difference between learning a skill from the elders. Now that getting hands-on experience. And blindly following a voice. Coming out of an electronic device. Another way to phrase this there is a big difference between wayfaring and transport. The difference lies in which one lexus have the most interaction. With the world. Research is showing that reading maps strengthens our. Sense of place teaches us. How to sync spatially gives us deeper knowledge about a place in gps can and may. May help keep our memories shark. Nicholas carr says that who we are is tangled up in. Where are we. So there two ways to travel through life. In the wayfaring mode and in the transporting. Transport mode wayfaring saint going process in which we grow and develop and find ourselves renewed and refreshed transport is essentially destination oriented. Getting us from point a to point b. Wayfaring. Is messi. And not as efficient as transporting. And there are times when transport mode is exactly what we need. Something's lost if you believe what michael jones. An executive in google's mapping department says. About these two very different ways of travel john says. You can go anywhere in the planet. Confidence that we leaving google. Can give you directions. To get to where you want to go safely and easily no human ever has to feel lost again. I thought. I think mr. jones has no imagination. I like what nicholas cars response to this quote the more you think about it the more you realize that to never confront the possibility of getting lost. Is to live in the state of. Perpetual dislocation. If you never have to worry about not. Knowing where you are. You have never have to know. Where you are. You never have to. Worried about not knowing where you are then you never have to know where you are. Car wonders as to why it's at least a state of dependency. A ward of your phone. And it's apps. It's also puts us in danger i think i'm forgetting something very important about being. Human. The journey. Is more important. Then the destination. Draw we all have the same destiny. I want to be a wayfarer whenever plus. The journey through life is what matters is very human thing is understanding that the journey. Is that bad you've heard this before thing. Ministers have done. The dash between our birth and death dates. But truly defines who we are. And why we are. Why are we so willing. To outsource. Offload our skills. Our creativity or imagination our memory our interaction with the world. Computers. And automation. It will probably be at least a part 2 to these reflections we might consider search engines for example and their biases. Or facebook. And it's as nicholas carpets automated. Manny. Of many of the time-consuming aspects. Of personal relations. In an attempt to streamline the messy. Process of affiliation. And remove conscious effort. From socialize. And. Once you choose sunday we might want to explore the concept of robots. By asking questions like this who will program the robot conscious. The robots manufacturer. Its owner software coders politicians. Government regulators philosophers insurance companies. Enemies. Should be. Very afraid. I'm a world where computer used is seamless as it's so ubiquitous so everywhere that we don't even realize it's there. And we should be hyper-vigilant. Very worried. About automation. Just leaving with this fascinating example of automation from. Evgeny morozov book. To save everything click. Ben kamm how many of you heard of ben kamm. Well. It's a new project from researchers in britain and germany seeks to modernize how we deal with trash. By making our been smarter and you guessed it more social. Here's how it works. The bins inside lid is equipped with a tiny smartphone. That snaps a photo every time someone closes it. All of this of course in order to document what exactly you have just thrown away. A team of badly paid humans recruited through amazon's mechanical turk system. Then evaluate each photo. What is the total number of items in the picture. How many of them are recyclable. How many are food item. After this data is attached to the photo. It's uploaded. To the bin owners. Facebook account. Where can also be shared. What's the smart pins are installed in multiple household. Big cam creators hope. Facebook can be used to turn cycling into it. Game like exciting competition a weekly score is calculated for each man and as the amounts of food waste and recycling materials in the bins decrease. Households earn. Almost whoever wins the most bars and tree leaf wins. Mission accomplished planet saved. Nowhere in the academic paper that accompanies the ben cam presentation. Do the researchers erase any doubts about the ethics of their undoubtedly well-meaning project. Should we get one set of citizens to do the right thing by getting another set of citizens to. Spy on them. Should we introduce game incentives into a process that has previously worked through appeals to one's duties and obligations. Quit the goodness of one's environmental behavior be accurately classified with trelise and gold bars and stars. Should it be quantified in isolation from other everyday activities is it okay not to recycle. If one doesn't dry. Will greater public surveillance of one's trash bins lead to an increase in eco vigilantism. Will participant stop doing the right thing. If their facebook friends. Are no longer. Posing words are those of wayne arneson. Take courage friends. The way is often hard. The path is never clear. And the stakes are very high. Take courage for deep down there is another truth. You are not alone. Go in peace beat your neighbor. Bean coffee or whatever.

uuprairie_org

Pr120418Christian-PaganDialog1.mp3

Good evening. And as a member for a unitarian universalist society i'd like to welcome you. Prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic religious background. And whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure. We welcome you no matter your age or your abilities. Or inability. On sunday morning. We provide a wide variety of services. They're presented either by prairie member. Remember the wider community or by our minister as soon as we recruit one. And tonight in detroit edition. We have a program. Tonight we have co-sponsors. This is the first in a series of two christian pagan interfaith dialogues. And is co-sponsored by madison interface dialog group and the greater madison interface association. It is first edition. Destroyed our services for the reading and a lighting of the chalice. Followed by a moment of silence. Some of the wars and conflicts of the past and present were fought over land and resources. But many have been over religious differences. In the past century. A global interfaith movement has been growing. Helping to raise consciousness. About the need for tolerance and understanding. Between different cultures and religions. This movement has helped. Highlights. The common goal that most religions chairs. Such as the golden rule. Which is at the heart nearly all religious traditions. At the same time. Many throughout the world are discovering that. Spirituality. A deep connection to a greater purpose for humanity. Isn't an important driving force in their lies. Even if they aren't religious. Robert allen. Night session focuses on convergences. There will be a presentation by each of our to panelist followed by discussion with the audience. George anger is it catholic. Who's passed service has included teaching at holy cross cemetery in lacrosse wisconsin. Serving as director of the roncalli center at the university of wisconsin and lacrosse. And serving as a program director at holy wisdom monastery in there ecumenical and interfaith ministry. In 1987 george founded the madison interfaith dialogue group. And continues to serve as its if it's coordinator has been involved. Amana interface endeavors including the parliament of the world's religions. Selena fox is a senior minister at circle sanctuary and barneveld veld. Wisconsin-based pagan church which has been serving. Nature religion practitioners worldwide since 1974. She's been active an interfaith endeavors for many years including serving. As president of the greater madison and a religious association. Speaking at conferences including the parliament of world religions. And serving as a religious diversity. Accommodation adviser in hospitals prisons university state and federal government agencies and other institutions. Like to welcome them. And start off the stealing by asking george. If you could give us an overview of. Christianity. Let me know if you. But. I see a number of christians out there. And so. How many are christians in the group raise your hand. Okay. Christianity. Like any other religion. As external. Aspects and internal aspects. And some of the external as fix things such as. The word of god scripture. Certain commandments and regulations that follow from the word. And we all know are quite a ten commandments. Rituals of worship. And whatever you can see touch taste or smell is part of the external aspect. And they are they're largely to help us in our own personal. Journey through like. So these we generally talk about his. Religion. What religious tradition. And. Two of those one of those aspects are the sacraments. Sacraments are sacred science. Of what we believe in. And. The two primary sacraments are baptism. And eucharist. Baptism. Is really a sign of her inner commitment. 2r. Basic inner belief and primarily to the founder of christianity which is jesus. And it's done through the pouring of water and the eucharist or some protestant denominations. Call it. The table of the lord or holy communion. Consist of. Breaking bread and wine. Which end the catholic understanding. Means that the bread and wine are transformed into the body and blood of christ. And this. Presence. Christ in the bread and wine and the eating of it. I think signifies. That's price becomes part of our inner being. So. That's the religious aspect. And the internal aspect which i think we can designate. By the word spirituality. Which has to do with the internal. Personal response. Of the individuals. Are committed members of the of the. Christianity. To all these aspects that just talked about. And they can. Hopefully the two aspects would work harmoniously together. But very often they don't because the structures sometimes get in the way of the personal journey. And so rather than. Being harmonious they've become harmful. And so i think that it can. Looking at paganism and christianity. A lot of people leaving the catholic church or other protestant denominations. Found their way to pagan. Religion pagan rituals. And. Anyway. For the interior park. At least in the catholic world. We have a wonderful word called conscience. And we were taught from childhood that. Our behavior and our involvement religion. I must always be to be determined by our conscience. Rather than all the external stuff. As helpful as they may be. Church at one point define the conscience. As that. Voice of god that speaks to us. Very deeply in a personal way to our hearts. But what i would just a cell manga suckers. Talkin about. I want 100 or so denominations of christianity take a week or more to fix phone. But. For me there are three powerful worries. That's omotola. And those words are from the epistle the letter of john. And those words our god is love. God is well. And when you think of it that way that's so all-embracing. Does it does embrace all religions. And. And then the follow-up to that sheds. God is love. And we will bide in love. Abide in god and god in us. And. To be at that says pretty much everything. It's all about love and it's all about relationships. It's all about reaching out it's all about service. And it's all about. Later later centuries about. A spiritual dialogue and exchange. So i'll leave it there. Selena. Won't you give us an overview of paganism. Well paganism capital p paganism. I come from the latin word peggotty meme dweller in the country. And it's. Going through a lot of different definitions over the years. When it first got applied. Two people who were following indigenous nature religion traditions of old europe. It essentially meant. Hick. Those who are outside the big cities. Which had been christianize these were people that were not quite with it so it actually had somewhat of a derogatory word. Meaning at that time however piggins today or actually reclaiming that term. Not too much. All pagans are dwelling in the country but really looking at the nature connection. That is the connecting link between the paganism of old and the paganism of now. In christianity. I often talk about the major branches of christianity being. Catholic. Protestant eastern orthodox in one big catch-all category. For all the bratz. But within paganism i also i also talked about four big categories we have the wiccan category the druid and the heathen or asatru northern way and a big category that everyone else. So one thing that we have in common with christianity is the fact that there are major branches and there's diversity. We also have people. That are very rooted in particular structured practices. And we have other people that are much more spontaneous in their practices. Some commonalities that pagans have today include. Celebrating the cycles of the sun and seasons. Celebrating the cycles of the moon. I'm celebrating the cycles of life. Instead of being. Informed by a single sacred text. Our book is that of nature. And connecting with the spiritual dimensions of nature and a variety of different ways. There is great diversity within paganism. And just as there is in christianity i do not presume to speak. For every single person that calls himself taken now or may have been called pagan in the past but i have done quite a bit of. Intrafaith networking across the different pagan traditions and. Really sees some commonalities across the diversity. And one of those commonalities has to do with the interconnectedness of all life. Something that is not just. A central theme in many pagan traditions but it's something that's on the mind of many people in this earth week. Leading up to earth day. The idea of the divine as a great mystery. A1 sauce. Many people. For pagan value that. But what pagans are probably most known for is the multiplicity of expressions in connection with the divine. In particular. Many paths honor that divine is both a divine mother and the divine father. Add in some traditions. There is. Multiple forms of the divine a whole pantheon. Of different forms of the divine. There also is a system of affix how that stated varies from branch to branch of paganism. But there is no equivalent to the christian golden rule of do unto others as you have them do unto you. And there are number of world religions that have it positively stated as with the golden rule but there are also some forms of world religions that stated in a different way which is. Don't do to others what you don't want them to do to you which the wiccan rede for example is an it harm none do what you will. So the idea of paying attention. To being part of a much larger system not only a system of humans but a system of the web of life the circle of nature is really important across the different tradition. Many of our holidays. Actually have correlations with christian holidays for during. The middle ages as europe became more christianized. One of the ways that happened was that some of these old. Holidays overhead pagan names. Became. Christian holidays as well and i'll talk more about that later on. But our holidays are the solstices and equinoxes which start. Each season and the midpoint between. Some pagan traditions mate emphasize that was midpoint that are also known as the celtic fire festival. And some traditions emphasize the solstices and the equinoxes but most common. Is the celebration of the whole wheel of the year as it is known. The symbol of the circle is important there's no beginning there is no ending. It connects us all together. The idea of being and rhythm and in harmony with the rhythms of nature is important. The idea of using. Are powers of the intellectual discernment. But also our abilities of intuition. Are also key components that go across the tradition. Many people. Think of united states of america and its foundations within christian traditions. And i honor that. But i also see that is only part of the story. Because many of our images that are iconic in america actually have their roots in the classical pagan past. Because her and founding fathers and mothers had classical education if they went through a type of education whether it be in the school or with individual mentoring and part of that education had to do with philosophy that came out of pagan greece and pagan rome. So when you hear the word pagan my hope is that. Hugo beyond some of the more limited definitions which have range from anyone who is not jewish christian or muslim. Or. All definitions bad claim we have. No god actually we have many. And to really look more at. Pagan. Being equivalent to nature religion. Or those connected with what some people call earth base through to ality. Let's explore the convergence what we're here for. Are these faith traditions. And what way do these past converge. Well i think one way that they converge has to do with. The changeover. Of old paganism. And you're up to christianity. And as i mentioned before holidays. One of the ways that they converge. So at the end of october. We have what we call samhain. And some christian tradition celebrated as all hallows. Or. All saints day. And also stay. And that secular holiday of halloween actually is a grande. Inter-religious multicultural. Fun kids holiday that borrows not only from christianity but from celtic paganism and some roman paganism in depending where you in the world they are some other things thrown in as well. The winter solstice. I often call it you'll because that name for the holiday is something that christians as well as pagans. Use good you're yapping scandinavian ancestry oh what is you mean wheel. Reitman people say that that is about the wheel of the year. The celebration of jesus's birth. Was fixed. To coincide with winter solstice. Ancient roman saturnalia. The birthday of mithras who. Born in a cave according to the mythic legends and visited by shepherds wow that's a no way to disparage. The jesus birth story but they were actually some older pagan myth. That we're connected. With. That time of year. Beginning of february. Most people call back groundhog's day in the celtic tradition that's in bulk. Add. In roman catholicism. It's known is candlemas day. And some call it bridget's day or st. brigid's day. Beginning of spring ostara. Astara is actually. Variant of the name of austra. An ancient pagan goddess of spring. Who we know about because of a better beloved a monk. Who wrote about her month being april and. The name easter. A sacred christian holiday has the pagan name emmett. Beginning of may bell pain and from my tablet friends i've learned. How statues of mary have been crowned with flowers. And before that practice in pagan times. Statues of the divine feminine. Crowned with flowers. I'm some real parallels american society well that flower businesses part of mother's day. Then when you go into june you have that way the father's day and secular society in america but you have. The summer solstice. Or lisa is pagans call it. The longest day of the year. And. Among many christians this is st john's day. And in in europe today. People continue to celebrate st. john's day with bonfire is in grand procession. Happy st john is john the baptist. And then you move to beginning of august and you got lughnasadh or llamas as it was called in the middle ages loaf mask. The tradition of going into christian churches in bringing bread. Made from the first grain that's been harvested and certainly pagans today actually use the christian name sometimes mamas instead of a hard to pronounce lughnasadh but this is the time of the first of the harvest festivals and in secular society this is country fair time. Then we move around the wheel to fall equinox the pagan thanksgiving are mapping and in christian. Middle ages it was michaelmas time connected with saint michael. So those are some of the ways that christianity and paganism converge. We also converge at some sacred sites old pagan sites became christian sites. We also converge. I think of what george spoke about love. Because. When one gets deep within a spiritual tradition ultimately you connect with that which goes beyond words and that loving consciousness is something. That is part of pagan traditions today that's been part of the pagan past certainly part of christian traditions that i've had direct contact with and also part of other world religion traditions. Before ending this part of my presentation i want to call your attention to a book it's called christopaganism and it's written by some friends of mine joyce and river higginbotham. What is christopaganism but a convergence of christianity and paganism. Not everyone that i know. Bad convergys. Those two world religions as part of their tradition may call themselves crystal pagan was actually on an interfaith. Show this morning. And one of the people that called in. I said that there are things who i don't call myself a crystal pagan but i believe in jesus christ and i also call myself a pagan and so there's many variations of how these two. Traditions converge. Do you have a comment to give us on this multiple belonging thing this pluralism george. Okay first i want to mention that. Always at the middleton library. As looking through the new book section and that was the book. Crystal payne so i immediately checked it to the next interfaith meeting said sislena. Was a former nun. What time. But i liked it. Point out with it with these. Crossovers and different. As she said multiple belongings. I think up till the 19th century. Religions were pretty internalized them. Apart from each other and mostly probably quarreling or killing each other. So this is all the mention of. Coming together and crossing boundaries. I want to read. The short selection from. Wayne teasdale's. Mystic art. I'm waiting teasdale was at holy wisdom monastery at one time. And i also shared with him at every tree somewhere northern illinois shortly before he died. And doug. What he says in here in the. In the end reduction. Is. We are at the dawn of new consciousness. Erratically fresh approach to our life. Guess the human family and fragile world. Disparate into a new awareness. Into a new set of historical circumstances. Appears in a number of shifts. Inner understanding. And any list a number of ways in which our understanding a shifted. And one of them was a deep. Evolving experience of community. Between and among religions. To their individual members. In between. Whole bodies of. Different religious traditions. Any says each of these shifts represents dramatic change. Taken together they will define the thought and culture of the third millennium. And he said we could really name the age after any of these shifts and understanding. 200 compass them all. How to accomplish them all however. Perhaps the best name for this new segment of historical experience. Is the interspiritual age. And that's what. Pico and crystal pig and pork. Starts with. Wayne teasdale idea. Enter spirituality. And again. Spirituality referring to the internal personal journeys that we all go through. Panda. He also. Says in his book that enter spirituality is a term i have coined. To designate the increasingly familiar phenomenon. Across religious sharing. Of our internal resources. The spiritual treasures of each. Tradition. And. The mystic heart. It's his book. Attempt something new. To present a practical spirituality in a universal context. And in this new age of inter spirituality. All forms of spirituality are accessible to us. Allowing creative crossover. And borrowing a momentum among members of the world's religions. And just one more grief addition to that. Is a. This short statement he said. Enter spirituality is not a one-way street. Button. Interspiritual intersection. Where insights cross back and forth. Intermingle. And find new habitats. And. That's what he contributed in this book matthew fox. Who was the dominican priest at one time. And is a native of madison wisconsin. Hi his thinking got him a little bit behind but. His superiors and people so. And he was. At one time silence for a year and he advised by that. Doing the year was over he came back and then squares talk. He said. Well. As i was about to say as after i was so rudely interrupted. 1 river. Many will. And i'm just going to read this short section. He calls with william tc. Talks about his deep. Ecumenism. He says i begin with an observation from meister eckhart. Also i think was a dominican. And the teacher of thomas aquinas. Who says that divinity is an underground river that no one can stop. And no one can damn up. And then. Micah. Fox continuous. There is one underground river. But there are many wealthy into that river. An african well a dollar swell a buddhist well as jewish well. A muslim wella goddess well. And christian well and aboriginal well. Many wells. 1 river. To go down a well is to practice the tradition. But we would make a great mistake if we can confuse the well. With the. The well itself with the flooring litter waters. Of the underground river. Mannywellz. One river that is deep the human has. And then i want to. Since i'm an ardent student of thomas merton. How many did you know thomas martin. But he has a. He has a. What he calls genuine ecumenism. And when he uses the term ecumenism. At the time he used it. Most catholics distinguish between ecumenism as being. Ar. Getting together with her fellow protestants brothers and sisters. And the other part about world religions. It's called interfit dial. Martin includes them all under the one term ecumenism. And he says genuine ecumenism requires the communication and sharing not only of information. About doctrines which are totally and irrevocably divergent. But also of religious intuition. Intruz. That may turn out to have something in common beneath the company beneath the surface differences. Ecumenism seeks the inner. An ultimate spiritual ground. Which underlies all articulated differences. I genuinely fruitful dialogue. Cannot be content with the plight of a polite. Diplomatic interest in other ridgid. Religions and their beliefs. It's 6. A deeper level. On which religious traditions have always claimed. To bear witness to a higher and personal knowledge of god. Then that which is contained simply anixter exterior worship and formulated doctor. In all religions may encounter not only the claim to divine revelation some for another. But also the record of special experiences. In which the absolute and final validity of that revelation. Is in some way a tested. And furthermore in all religions it is more less generally recognized. That this profound. Wisdom experience. Call it knossos contemplation mysticism prophecy or what you will. All of this represents the deepest. And most authentic fruit of the religion itself. And then he's sums it up and he says to put it in the grossly oversimplified language. All relations aspire. To a union with god. In some way or another. And that that's one of my favorite tax for understanding where i am in the midst of all of this. But the. And he is he up to mendocino. And opening up. 20th century. Christianity the notion of. Necessity. Getting together across all boundaries. So that's. Well. I've run out of questions so i guess it's time for me to come. Alpha to the audiences and see what kind of questions you. This is being recorded so i ask that you wait till i get to you with the microphone into use the microphone. Or is a memorex does anyone have a question. I would love to hear what you both have to say about the significance of ritual. And. What it is supposed to accomplish. About ritual. Is something that. K'nex. The individual or the group. With the sacred when we use ritual in a spiritual sense. So i see it as a patterning. That. Opens. The deeper connection with the sacred. I see ritual in a group sense is also having a community building. Dimension. So what did dition to connecting with the divine according to the particular tradition where ritual is that. There is. A deep connection with that divinity. Within all of those who are taking part. In paganism we have ritual. For celebrating the seasons and i talked about some of them earlier. Many of us also celebrate the cycles of the moon going into the dark moon time now. And it will be new moon on saturday. We celebrate. The dark moon and the bright moon and some of us also celebrate the waxing in the waning moon. With rituals. Bat of the waxing moon. Growing. And light and brightness those of a full moon. Meditation inspiration the waiting moon at time for letting go. The darkmoon a transition. Release and rebirth. And there's a third type of ritual which i mentioned briefly which is life passage ritual. Rituals around birth. Coming-of-age into. Adulthood. Ritual of union. Marriage or handfasting tying the knot come from the pagan custom of actually joining hands together with a cord. We also have coming-of-age into elderhood. Ceremonies. For women they're called croning ritual most commonly for men staging. Or senior ring ritual. Which is my version of gender-neutral speak and then we have rituals at the end of life death passage rituals. And each of those types of ritual. Not only are opportunities for those involved to resonate with the divine. But to connect with community and in the sake of passage right it's helping the one or ones going through the passage right. To make that life transition in their personal identity and their community identity. And they're deep spiritual resonance with that larger circle were part of. Let me speak to that. Oh my favorite ritual. Which takes place on holy saturday evening. The holy saturday evening is the evening. Before. Feast of the resurrection of jesus. And during that ritual. In the beginning it was all night ritual of prayers and. Scripture readings and chanson. And that it has been greatly reduced in our time. To the saturday saturday evening. And in in the. The first part of the ritual is right lighting a huge fire. And that holy wisdom they do it magnificently by. Sky is over it up with the fire and then a small claim is taken from that put on the easter candle. Eminem darkness. The candle and processional comes into the church. Which is totally dark. And then. Wine sets in and the way in three times day. Sing the light of christ. And that's very sick. Test. Moving in in total darkness. And then in the chapel then people take the light from the easter can. And spread it to each person there is a little kim. It's so gradually the light fields building. And then proceeded to. Everything. And heaven and. Renew our vet pistol. Bowers death today water is blessed. And. So that's it. A very. And there's beautiful yum center. One helmet it's that the easter song it's called. Eczema. And usually by one or two people. As soloist. So putting all those things it's hard to. Communicate the solemnity with that just by talking about it. And i think that's the meaning of ritual is there. He expresses what we can. Really. Converse about. And i think that's the whole point of. The external has specks of every religion. Data. Is needed sometimes to bring out the internal. And vice versa you bring your internal. Sense of the divine. To that. Gathering. And ennis selena mention it brings people together in a comments.. I'm sure they're that sometimes. Wendy's rituals are. Her practice in kind of an automatic way. They lose their power. And in and i know if you going to different churches. That. I cannot feel very uplifted in one and then the other one nothing happens. He often talked about the cone of power and pagan ritual we get together in energy rises up is a cone and we also talked about flat ritual. There may be going through the motions but the connection with the divine we aren't plugged in as a group to the divine or with each other and that. I think one of the reasons. 4. Being very present with a ritual and finding subway's of tweaking or innovating. A ritual. There's something to be said about having. Patterns that you go over time. But there's also good to have some variation in it to keep it fresh and they. Have some spontaneity. Hemorrhage. Another question. What you both talked about the importance of connecting with the divine that that's a part of spirituality and you did a beautiful job of showing her which will enable us to do that. I would like to hear you say something about. Things like prayer contemplation or meditation that may not be surrounded by ritual just what are those. Thomas merton again. Says things very beautifully. End.. I don't know if i can spot that right off the bat. He talks about awakening. The contemplatively with them. And. I mean. He says contemplation is life itself. Totally awake. Fully active. Truly of where that is that it is alive. It is spiritual wonder. Is spontaneous are at the sacredness of life. It is gratitude for life for awareness and furby. I'm in and out. Another one he says. Contemplation knows god by seeming by seeming to touch him. Or rather it knows him as if it had been invisible e. Been touched by him. Touched by him who has no hands. But who is pure reality and the source of all that is written. Hints contemplation of the southern gift of awareness. An awakening to the real within all of his real. Vivid awareness of infinite being at the roots of our own limited being. An awareness of our contingent reality received as a present from god as a free gift of love. This is the existential contact of which we speak. When we use the metaphor of being. Touched by god. So it is said it's not so much being drawn outward into the external rituals. Ispy. Being directed back into our inner death. And they're experiencing as he talked about ecumenism. It's when we get beneath all these forms and. And surface things. That we come into a direct experience of god. And and that. The experience of god will be different i think for every person. Infrared for every tradition. I think the idea of the sacred. Being. Within everyday life. And all things. Part of our growth. What are spiritual path. Is that growth of awareness. And recognizing. Matter what we're doing there's that spiritual dimension to ourselves. And. From the time 1. Wake up in the morning and perhaps reflex from dreams. And not only seeing those dreams as a way of getting some insight in terms of what ones on consciousness is about. But recognizing that. Is part of the dimension of self. That. Fight for your dreams for example. Don't really have to make a ritual out of it. We can get messages. Through our dreams. Many of the dreams we have. It does have to do with daily residue. But dream sometimes are carriers of deep wisdom. They come from an even deeper place we talked about the wells of november coming from addy place with that river. The act of. Observing others of doing charity. Doesn't have to be ritualize a smile to someone you don't know who. May look down in the mouth. I'm having our presents be a tool for radiating that deeper p so what do you call it self-actualizing or moving towards enlightenment or cosmic consciousness or living out of the christ or a living out of. The spirit within theirs or the loving presence i see that that. Also as part of spiritual practice. For my own personal spiritual practice. I not only check out my dreams when i wake up but i make. A point of greeting the day. Each day ad. Yes i do a short ritual facing the sacred directions because. Many pagan traditions facing the compass points and their associated spiritual korelitz is not only a way of honoring the divine in that diverse way. Plugging oneself into that deeper connection and then coming back to center and honoring the divine that's within and around and seeing oneself is part of the. Greater circle. So i actually see spiritual practice in addition to specific. Types of practices prayer and meditation. Contemplation dreamwork. Service terrible service good works. That part of that is being. Evolving our way of being. Not only with ourselves and then ourselves but with others. And that all humans but that larger. Circle that were part of. And i'd like to add thomas merton always insisted. For contemplation to happen. You had to be engaged with the two sisters. Solitude and silence. And he is his active and is this his. Enter. Related to many many people throughout the world to correspondence. Very very busy but always had. The desire to go to the. To have a hermitage. Rincon. Just got everything off. And be at peace. And he was a very much a nature lover. It going to the woods and that's where. It's pretty fun guy. I really see that nature mystic. Practice is something. Bad not only you'll fine but them christianity but you'll find it within paganism and fact. See. Story of jesus going up into the mountains prior to doing the ministry. I've called it a shamanic vision quest experience when i've been speaking and it'll religious native circle to really talk about that story and how that's an ancient practice the sacred practice of. And what you're talkin about silence and solitude solitude from other humans. By being within that larger natural world. And having. Set and setting to live the still small voice within. Come forth. Take a moment question is complicated in my mind. You smoking so beautifully and elaborately about. The richness of ritual and the richness of. Contemplation. And enjoyed you talked a little bit in about solitude and silence but i'm i'm wondering do you traditions have. A discipline of affecting emptying. Who does not simply being in silence because our thoughts can chase us there and i thoughts can chase us into solitude but actually something comfortable to eat some of the eastern practices of a discipline of helping one to achieve a roof silence and not simply being in a place where there is annoys. I'm not quite sure right now i got the gist of your question. You talking about no mind effectually. Clearing thoughts out in being like the blank slate. So as in some traditions as into to find the richness as in. Patterning oneself and seeing all the richness of one's connection is to god. It is to find god in the emptiness to rather than the fullness of god. Is in emptying oneself to god. I'll jump in for a little bit and say within some pagan tradition there is value and looking. At. The void sometimes called the boy then for those pagans who have embraced a study. Of the kabbalah witch. True the middle ages has. Jewish dimension to it. A christian dimension to it. And in the late 1800s in the 19th century you had. An egyptian hermetic pagan dimension to it. Practice. When one. Crosses. To the top three spheres on the tree of life. There was something known as the abyss. And that abyss has been defined by different people who are practicing that particular form of discipline. But there clearly is avoid a stripping away of going in. In some cases the dark night of the soul. Where is boyd it's dark its emptiness. And it's by going into that. I'm state of consciousness. That the rebirth. Illumination and enlightenment can come for it. So why i guess answer your question about pagan traditions in the boys. There are some pagan this that do work with the boyd. The balance to that there are some pagan. Who find that connection with the divine. Buy intense stimulation. All night drumming and dancing around a bonfire with chanting and. Nature sounds human sounds where there's a cacophony of sounds that also. Contribute to a connection with the divine. For one has. Lots of stimulation. Instead of the boyd. My own personal experience. You know i keep. In our culture is hard to find silence. It's hard to find solitude. And when you find those it they're very precious. Because then you can empty your cell phone. And let yourself be just in the present moment without any. It's hard not to have any thoughts cuz my mind keeps going on whether you wanted to or not. But at least you can slow it down you can come through a deeper rhythm. And i noticed in some. Practices say don't do this while you're driving but but it is a letting go. And i know anna buddhist tradition part of their. Understanding suffering. Is that. When you desire something and you don't get it then you suffer. So you let go you have to let go of your desires. Amanda. Him and that's an m and emptying out process. Do you let life happen as it happens rather than trying to control it or trying to. Manipulated. Your advantage. Read some powerful stuff in buddhist tradition. America's field in that. Seeking. To empty. A lot of times i think certain tragedies that happened in life. I really blessings in disguise because it. Put you into a new dimension. Understanding. After you sent for so. In some ways suffering is almost essential to grow. Actually within some pagan traditions are you willing to suffer in order to learn baxley a proverb. I do think that. The stripping away of attachments. And. The stranglehold in the limitations up our ego-self. Not too much we eliminate our eco. But we take it off of center stage. To allow the deeper wisdom. That's available to be able to come come forth. So i think another way of looking at boyd and emptying and release what you're talkin about is. Becoming very aware of those restrictions in constructions in disengaging. Casting the mall. Shutting them. Has anyone questioned look. Good question deep questions. First of all thank you for having this discussion i was. Hoping to hear. Conversations like this a couple months ago and. They are ye. And i hope i can. Make my. Question clear. When it comes to sometimes the potential antagonisms between. Christianity and paganism i know scripture scripturally. There are words to the effect of. You know jesus is the only way. And i know. From experience that. Some people who are. Pagan are. Fairy. Open to. Some of the. Peaceful and loving aspects of christianity. So it's really. Interesting for me to hear about. Ecumenical work and i'm wondering about what some of the challenges are. And having this discussion. You know. I think for me i come from a place where. I was raised at. There that jesus is the only way and anyway other than that is wrong. And how do you have those conversations. When. There are you know. Conversations about one way and then also this conversations about god is love how did these things. React to each other. When i was born into the catholic faith. Until i please. That message.. We are the one true religion. And that. Nobody else comes. I know some people i don't remember being taught that if you weren't kathy he would go to hell i don't remember being talked that but definitely. Silver platter. Again. As i. Boulder and pinta. I was in the seminary and. And got more deeply trained. But primarily to what was called the second vatican council. Which was a gathering of the bishops from the whole world. And they did that from 1962. Until 1965 not continuously. But each year two or three months together. And they made some profound changes during that time. We went from curling iron. All travis suits were heretics. And we're the only two vacant den. And in previous times even to be killed if necessary. Youtube. Regards on those brothers and sisters in christ. And. I made i was already there but it was good to know now that this is what the church. So things change. American soul. And even in the same console. They had a. Face the question of the holocaust of the edges. Say something but that. Christian responsibility for that. And then. Other issue got out and said well how about the mushrooms in the hinges and yardage. All the rest of it so they did come out with. But i considered kind of weeks taken but at least acknowledging that whatever they had. In their understanding that they could gain his salvation that way. So if it was an opening up completely. And i i really attributive second vatican council. My car which is to be. Ecumenical and interfaith. Kinda. I was fortunate to be hired on the staff at saint benedict's center. Give him partly the responsibilities established in the community interfaith. Opportunities. And we should tell the book darling. That we should how did the two of us. Get together. Parliament of the world's religions 1993. And next week when we talked about. Christian pagan dialog collaboration will go into greater detail. But many people look at the 1893 parliament of the world's religions. How old in chicago. As part of the columbia exposition at the beginning of. Interfaith relations. In modern times. To celebrate that 100 years afterwards. Some of the descendants of people who were part of that first parliament. Came together and put on a parliament. Well the first parliament had. Some people from the east and some people from the west depending on your point of view though eastern religions and western religions well the 93 parliament 1993 parliament. Also included pagans and native american people from nature. Religious traditions. And there was a grand convergence at the palmer house and where it was one of the places where it was held and that's for george's i met. Waiting for the elephant. We were both waiting. Taken up it was just a really a wonderful meeting and connection and he had. The madison interfaith dialogue group that have been going a number of years and invited me to be part of the group then. I've been going to whatever sexy. Blue wonderful. You know with your question about well water some of the challenges and this is certainly one of the good possibilities that can happen. Have i spoke on an interface panel. That was sponsored by a student group at central michigan university a few weeks ago in mount pleasant michigan. Had. There was a muslim scholar. And. A christian minister and myself on the panel. And they asked that very question okay what are some of the barriers sienna religious. Communication and collaboration. Talk within each of your traditions and i said. Well among pagans. There are two main challenges. Unpleasant connections with a religion of origin different than paganism being part of some form of religion. In which. There is dissonance negative self-image. And in some cases worse. Add. I said the fact that some people in the name of their religion are continuing to attack pagans. So there is both a present reality of anti pagan rhetoric. And attitudes among some people calling themselves religious. And there's also been. Issues with pagans. Who. Started out in another tradition and just had a horrific experience. Iris raised fundamentalist southern baptist. I wouldn't say i had a horrific experience. But i certainly had what you might call cognitive dissonance in the 1960s as i was a senior in high school there is a tradition in our church. The howe. The. Senior high school. Student most likely to be. A pastor. To do a sermonette. On youth sunday. Outrank the two guys i quite a bit. Well it was for sixties after all 1967 they decided that they would have. A sandwich. They would have me with the two guys found either and both of those. Man went on to be christian ministers and i've continued to maintain connections in fact one not only was a christian minister but a professor of theology at a college out east. And it turned out we shared a student went and got independent study at circle sanctuary and when i found out who the professor was i said. Hey was in my sunday school class as to who. I. David very short sermon i thought about what i wanted to say and it was very much. What make you would call methods of social justice and i truly felt i was in touch with the holy spirit i meditated i contemplated i read the bible and i basically my message was well they're starving mexican catholics down the street. Why are you raising all this money. Going over to africa to convert people that don't really want to be converted when you've got people right in your own backyard that needs some help. I thought that this is something that jesus would encourage people to do. Total silence there was probably about 1,000 people in the church. And at that moment it was one of those defining moments. I don't think i'm in the right religious sector anymore. first of all. I've been called to do ministry and i'm the wrong gender. Second of all. I just. Spoken something and i bought set people. Third of all i've always liked. It's part of my personal spiritual practices and that was definitely frowned upon back then so i began a journey of seeking and exploring and it wasn't so much i rejected christianity but i just drew a bigger circle of expression. And understanding for myself which is why i've been a guest minister and christian churches uu churches. In the friday of interface settings and to me that does not. In any way contaminate or compromised my. Work. My personal work. Can paganism and nature religion although not all pagan that see me do this interfaith work. Get it. Or even approved and and so i think one of the challenges is being able. To have a bib such as this where we can. Discuss openly with respect and listening. And we may not agree on all things but finding ways to be in dialogue together and next week we'll be talking about collaboration and know some of the challenges for that. I really hope that together all of us can help envision and manifest the world. Where we can celebrate our diversity and find that common ground that pretty much transcends. The different religions to go to that deep. River that george. I'm spoke about earlier. I just want to mention i was a member madison urban ministry. And at that time there was it was a christian. Organization i was kind of pushing the director toward. Canby providence a little bit for other religions and so they invited to one of the meetings. A member of the buddhist. Temple in oregon and somebody from first. First unitarian church and they were to introduce themselves. And so the one from the unitarian church got up and said i am a witch. In your face. I just blew the crowd vinyl it set back that's enough. And i talked to selena about that later than she said. Do you can do that when you know what to sensitivity center. And then it hits per check pfeiffer as it's been half a year doing damage control. Where would that which word in that pagan word have been. Toxify demonized in the english language number of wave. Yes avery potter books i think of help the witch word and there are some wiccans who are clearly embracing that word to say we must reclaim this word it has a root word meaning wisdom that some people says it's the same root word as like willow and wicker basket whatever but regardless there are some loaded terms that have had baggage connected with. And one of the things when i teach people about inter-religious. Communication and dialogue is to encourage people to language. I'm whistling comment understanding. And to be aware that certain words. Can stop the communication instead of building the communication. There's a big debate among the pagans whether to use the which word or not the use to which were denied all pagans. Use that word or relate to the wiccan philosophy. Bad has its roots in in old europe band is kind of a modern emergence that's mold wisdom's combined with some newer formed. And you're right you know there are. Various things that one can say that can help and then some. Things are so loaded bad it can take a while. 2. Re-establish communication once that happens. And it doesn't help any when there are people. Using the words in the same way that they were used. Factoring what. Pagans commonly called the burning times because many people were. Natalie imprisoned and tortured hung but some were burned at the stake. And they were just people that might be. I'm carrying on old nature religion ways they were christians who were considered heretics that went to the stake as well as people who chew yishun and if other belief systems i'm really hoping here we are in the 21st century we can look. Back at. All of that. Religious violence in dissonance. And live. Disappear into the past. Not ignore it. But to basically move on from it. And not to get caught up in old battles. But unfortunately some pagans today when they hear anti pagan rhetoric in particular when it's being mouth by people running for high public office that does not. Help. With anna religious. Collaboration and convergence because it causes people. To want to hold back and the keep. Their spirituality more private because of a real fear. That there may be repercussions. And i'm on the frontline of pagan civil-rights battles everyday and. I want to give thanks to christian. That have collaborated with us and thanks to people of many faiths and different beliefs that have collaborated with us not only on pagan rights issues but on rights issues of separation of church and state and religious freedom. I really think that's a healthy way that we can conversion. And i work together and overcome the challenges. You're talking about. I just am in love with the mic. Okay. I'm sitting library science currently and. We were talking about with terms and the meanings behind them. I discovered last semester the library of congress. And where they categorize. Wicca. And it's under psychology. And there's several branches within psychology in this you know that the classification. And one of them has. You know. Satanism. Alien encounters. A bunch of other bizarre things necromancy and then witchcraft. And so. I was trying to write a report. And i went into this lake. Crave's you know. Got to change the world moments and my professor told me to calm down. But. I mean i was really frustrated because. I'm visiting hours at this isn't helping it's just perpetuating the problem. And it reminded me of my research on the scottish witch hunts with james the first and how he basically tied all these things together. To you know basically get people persecuted and to justify. You know some of the things that he was doing not just him but. That was happening in europe during that time and so i just was completely baffled at this was still happening in. I current construction that people are referencing and. You know uw-madison is cataloging things based off of this system. And i'm not condemning uw-madison but. It's an authority that most people respect and here it is just. Really i mean personally felt unacceptable but i also feel like it's helpful if people who know. That this is happening in form. You know institution such as library of congress that hey maybe this isn't really the best way. To represent this particular spiritual path. I just wanted to share that. I'm one of the emerging academic disciplines is called pagan studies. And back in 1995 i was part of a process to help. Birth. The nature religion scholars network which is now turned into the group on contemporary pagan studies that is an official part of the american academy of religion. So there is some really positive things that are happening in academia it how we organize information how we present information and there is an emerging field of pagan studies. To the point that there actually is an annual conference on pagan studies within. I bet in the us and at claremont graduate university and i was a keynote. Recently not this year things here before. Add. Not only was i there to share. Some of my own perspectives and i was able to sit in on the sessions of the other scholars. Interdisciplinary. And there was someone from library science. Who brought up that precise point affected an entire academic paper and presentation at that conference about it. And talkin about the need to make change. My understanding in one of the systems that she presented. There were some categories for traumatic studies and. Epic classical paganism but when it came to really looking at contemporary. Paganism too often. Those books were being routed in this other part. So prep after we conclude we can exchange emails that i can put you in touch. With. I'm the person who is actively working. To get other scholars. To make some positive change. And that regard one of my pet peeves is to capitalize pagan and it was capitalized at one point. And the word taken misused in a lot of different ways. Body for capitalizing christian and buddhist. In wiccan why don't capitalize pagan. Hello increasingly more people are doing that but these small things. Are indicators of the struggle to try to truly have liberty and justice for all on equal rights. That looking for special rights equal rights. Any further questions. This is probably the last one. More statement more statement than anything else just want to say thank you for coming and talking about the interfaith relationship and talking to each other and talking to us inviting us in a conversation. I really came tonight because i wanted to see. Completely divergent fates. Talking together. Current time in their current days. And you here i'll just say a politician saying thanking god at the end of every conversation. Yet there seems to be almost no peace. And no actual ethics. Coming into what they're doing i'm so glad to step into this room and hear the two of you. Doing what you're supposed to do with faith. She's actually communicating in a way that makes me. Feel proud to see it. That's all i wanted to say. I didn't think this concludes the question part at least the. The public question part i think george and selena will stay if you have some. Questions you want to present to them without the mic. And also they brought a lot of literature appear on the front table for you to peruse. Take time to do that then. Fellowship with some coffee and. Thank you very much for coming and i want to thank you all for coming and i want to thank prairie unitarian. Universalist. For hosting mets i want to thank. Rebecca and penny and everybody else connected with her uu that has made it possible. 4 off. To be here. And next week. We're going to have part 2. Justin pictures up at the elevator. Collaboration is well as some of the ways that george and i have worked together with people of many faiths right here and madison wisconsin. So in closing. Think we each were going to say a few closing words and my closing word is. A blessing. Peace be upon you peace be within you peace be all around you. Inner peace. Flaccid penis. Blessed be. So we'll be around for about a half hour or so yes look at the literature and kind of eat and greet and thank you all for coming.

uuprairie_org

Pr110320SusanElias-ed.mp3

So good morning. Welcome to prairie uu society my name is barber park and i'm the current president. Prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation. Gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter your age your abilities or inability. On sunday morning we provide a wide variety of services. Represented either by a prairie member. Member of the wider community. For a minister reverend chain estenson. Today. Susan. Goliath will be our presenter. And i'll. Introduce her more later. Now i'd like to introduce our speaker for today. Susan elias is a neighbor of ours because she teaches at the madison central montessori school which most of you if you come in. From. From frohna road will pass on the way here. Last summer she spent two weeks in palestine and israel as part of the interphase. Peacebuilders. She's originally from milwaukee. And. I graduated from uwm with a degree in speech pathology and audiology. And we welcome her and. Text it should be very interesting program. Thank you very much i am very happy to be here. As was mentioned i dunno the prairie here because we walk from our school and take the children over tomorrow bro park and they always admire the beautiful planting real of going by and seeing the prairie and then they'll look down the long walkway to the door and see the flowers hanging over and it's very nice for the neighborhood so thank you for inviting me today. About 20 years ago my church the evangelical lutheran church in america started initiatives to advocate for peace and justice in the middle east in response to requests from palestinian christians who are living under difficult conditions due to the occupation. I began supporting action by churches for middle east peace which is a washington dc group. Bubble witch the unitarian universalist our members. After 9/11 i began to try in earnest to understand the history in the politics behind. The israeli-palestinian conflict. Last summer i decided to see for myself the situation palestine by joining a delegation of 20 people. Through interfaith peacebuilders. We spend two weeks listening to many people representing groups of palestinian and israeli people working to end the occupation through peaceful popular resistance. We also listen to you and workers students from hebrew university in israel and breezy university in the westbank for representative from a settlement and one from a palestinian refugee camp. We stayed at home so christian and muslim palestinians and israeli jews. This delegation focused on youth and children. I compiled my pictures notes and literature and created the powerpoint you are about to see. My previous presentation is abbreviated. Today to meet your time schedule but i will hopefully give you information and pictures enough to ponder afterwards. How many people here have ever travel to israel or palestine. Did you take an israeli tour. Hahaha. Okay yeah you go through. Israel. And i have in his really bus tour to the holy site. And basically what that means is that that israelis are not allowed into the palestinian territories which is ridiculous to say since their settlements all over there but the occupied territories. Pagasa and then we went into many areas but we spent most of our time in the westbank. First time give you a brief introduction of the occupation and the problems involved then we'll look at the many people who work toward peaceful solutions in spite of the governments worldwide that perpetuate the cycle of violence and finally we will see those most at risk the children. Hot air balloon the wall of the reverse of palestine and israel through the years before the un made the plan in 47 only 2% of the land was owned by the jewish population. Which is shown. On the map on the left in the white areas little speculating around there and then after wwii when the holocaust. Reaction to the holocaust and from zionist jewish population in europe who wanted to settle in the holy land as it's. You know usually referred to. Who is the un agreed with you and was basically made up of the us france and great britain you and agreed to divide up the palestinian land into the areas that you see there is it points on the left along the mediterranean sea and mapped the second from the left is gaza strip and then the westbank is the large area. I'm toward the right and up toward the top is lebanon and the area of the golan heights. So then of course the palestinians. The christian and muslim. Palestinians who owned most of the land. Expelled and they had to go somewhere. So 800,000 palestinians were expelled from their homes and land. During that time. When the jewish people from europe and the us started moving in. Where did the 800,000 palestinians go they went to refugee camps. Set up by the un in lebanon the gaza strip in the area within the palestinian. A territory called westbank. Then of course the palestinians rejected that plan they didn't have anything to do with what was going on in europe at the time. Are the holocaust or anything like that so they started to fight back and that didn't sit very well they were overwhelmed of course by the strength that was provided to. The new jewish settlers show in 1949. T.i. is really our government decided to. Occupied i'm taken troll of all the palestinian territories and shrunk it down. As you can see the gaza strip got much smaller as did the westbank. And the north disappeared entirely. And then there were various uprisings intifadas and seeing his throat. 49-67. And then do the breakup of the westbank started early on with settlers. The government actually sponsoring. Housing within the palestinian territories even though the united nations had declared that that would not be available to them. As of 2010 you see what is left of the palestinian land not much. Of course the one of the major problems is the transfer and displacement of palestinians. This is a settlement for those of you who have never been to. The area if we don't really see pictures of settlements in the us and everyone has ideas that they're small they're not small they're huge. This is a real settlement. It has expanded down below in even bigger in size. The settlements are cities they have malls and schools and libraries pools parks and everything else. They have roads extensive road systems to go to and from the settlements now you have to remember these are always in the palestinian territories. The government feels some and then also people settlers. Will decide to claim a piece of land. And usually the government will go along with it then and developed that piece of land. Israel has been paying jewish citizens and businesses to move on to palestinian land offering tax breaks and financial packages. U.s. tax dollars of course help. As we continue to contribute 15 million a day to israel in foreign aid israel is the only recipient of us foreign aid. That is does not have to report. What it's going for. President obama recently just signed a 5.6 billion dollar. Package to israel which includes 3.1 billion in military aid. This is a settlement encroaching onto a palestinian town. This is another resettlement the palestinian town used to be. Down below you can see that there's nothing left of it when a settlement goes up. Our people are evicted from their homes and their demolished or they're just forced out and the housing is taken over. This is an old post you may hear that term sometimes that is a group of people who decide. Jewish people usually orthodox they have reasons for choosing the areas they choose. For the government it's usually aquifers water is very scarce it's a desert. I'm so the government may put up settlements over aquifers around aquifers so that they can then. Secure the water rights by fencing and roads usually the orthodox jewish people have different reasons. Furious holy places. According to the hebrew scriptures something or another happened in a spot and they'll want to build their. This is an urban settlement this is in the old city of jerusalem in the muslim section. And you can see a menorah up on the building in the back and that is now. A jewish settlements. This is in the christian section you can tell the israeli flag. Hanging out of the window so they're usually marked. Permanent there is a settlement it's never a benign occurrence. The sellers are moving into hostile territory they're not wanted. Deland have no rights to the land. All they will dispute that of course but do you win says they don't end. So there's they are armed they are often dangerous they will. Persecute and. Harm the palestinians until they leave sometimes the palestinians are offered huge financial packages from. Independent people to buy their housing and that does occur sometimes a lot of it is funded by. The jewish community in the states. This appears to be an old jewish temple from the past at some point it's in the city of hebron. And hebron was designated within the west bank territories know how broad is important to. Religious towers attacks jews because it was the old. City of david and so have ron had been fought over for many years there's lots of settlers there lots of military. And you can see the flags hanging outside of the window. This was a representative we spoke with at that settlements in hebron. This is a picture of a kibbutz dab what scenes were built in 48 and 49 when the large immigration occurred from the united states in europe of the jews who came in to settle the new land of israel. And they wanted to move together so it's a communist this is a beautiful place it sounded mediterranean it's only a very short distance from the gaza strip. But of course they had to displace the original people palestinians lived all along the mediterranean and the architecture in this building you can see by the arches that it was once a muslim. Arab. Family who lived there. Another kind of displacement this is in west jerusalem it's the oldest muslim cemetery in the city many of the graves have been dug up. So that the australian government will actually if the private organization funded by the weisman foundation in the us they are building a museum of tolerance ironically. Over the muslim graves. Here's another area this is in tel aviv and that was a thriving. Palestinian port city for a century. And that ended up in the land designated to be israel so the palestinians had to leave. And this was a mosque which is now called. Rather insensitively i think aladdin's restaurant. This isn't another you can see the flag this is an addition to a house in in the eastern russell neighborhood of shakes raw. 60in silwana often in the news because. Others extreme resistance to having their houses are palestinian houses demolished. There is a plan that the israeli government has for making a. Thoroughfare from west jerusalem all the way over to the jordan river which cuts right through east jerusalem which the un declared would be part of arab. That palestinian arab territories arab east jerusalem this family put on an addition without a permit you can't feel if your palestinian without a permit but palestinians don't get permits. So sometimes they build anyway their family had outgrown this. And i'm the idea for the israeli defense force one day came and evicted them saying they did not have permit they had to leave. And now that family is homeless. This is a picture of. I want to go back for a moment and just talk about home demolitions home demolitions is a huge security issue for the palestinians they don't give. Notice they don't get much notice like 24 hours. And so they live in constant fear they're actually terrorized by the fact of. Maybe ending up homeless and having nowhere to go. There have been over 18,000 homes demolished of palestinian ownership since 1967. So it is quite a frustrating very terrifying things. For the palestinians to be living under all the time. Where do they go when their homes get demolished if they can't find relatives to move in with they have to go to refugee camps. This is adelaar just refugee camp in the westbank it's called balata refugee camp outside in the town of nablus. And this is a member of our group walking through a street in the refugee camp. Burrata is a home to over 30,000 people and they live on 1/2 square mile. Which is about the size of lake wingra funeral probably nowhere lake wingra if you can figure. Thirty thousand people living there this was put up by the un in 1948. And in 1950 the people were still living there and they were intense yet. So the appeal to the un to build permanent structures so they're actually cement. On the footprint of these pants. And then they kept needing more spaces now they go up three stories and they can't go up any further. This is another street in bilotta. This is the clinic in balata serves 500 people a day. This is the playground. That's our group and i'm standing at the far end of it. There's a young man in the pink shirt on the left he came out to see what was going on. This is the. Used to be a bustling city have bron. And now it's like a ghost town because of all the settlements are these were all shops palestinian shopping along the bottom in and people lived on the top but they all had to leave. The lot of graffiti. Some of it is it's it's very captivating some of it is really nice like. This one. Bullet hole. Our guide showed us where he lives his apartment he was a student since they were under curfew and he had his light on to study so they shot. On the idea. Shot up in his window. Heparin used to be famous for soap it was all the people from the area would buy soap from hebron there were five factories. So when is really bummed out hebron they wiped out all of the silk factories so a lot of the infrastructure of the westbank is destroyed businesses water. This is the school in hebron. They have no money they have no building materials they cannot repair anyting. Okay so another huge problem is the barriers of palestinians are not allowed to leave the westbank you're orgasm course without permits they can't go from one area of the city to the other without permits and this keeps them from. Everything it keeps them from visiting their families get medical care go to their places of education work over there feels this is the big wall some people call it a security fence some people call it an apartheid wall snakes all through it was going to be built supposedly on the 1967 green line but it goes way in its snakes around to protect settlements and also to get aquifers and agricultural land. This is what it looks like in bethlehem. The most words would not take you probably down the street. Trashy and it's really tall and really big an awful bethlehem is encircled it's called from jerusalem which makes it very hard for people to get to their holy places and to get to jerusalem for celebration which of course the palestinians no matter what religion consider their capital. This is all over the country there you can see the road down on the risers. Razor wire barbed wire fences. And here's an example of the problem that it causes there's agricultural fields back there these two people have to take their animals with water jugs because they have been cut off from their water sources and. Have to go many miles to get water. This is a type of a roadblock this is a palestinian road there segregated roads there segregated license plate israeli license plates are one color palestinians are another so that people like the roadblocks can tell the difference the roads that israelis travelon are not open to palestinians this is a typical palestinian. This is a roadblock checkpoint going out of bethlehem and we waited for an hour for that day to go up you never know it's random there is no opening times. This is hebron you can see all this is a guard station and. Walls and fences and they keep. The people from accessing one neighborhood. To another all those wires up on top our surveillance. Camera setting. Here's a big concrete piece set. Was put in to keep people from going down that street. This is a checkpoint this soldier is looking in trunks of cars and checking permits. Our group had to get off the bus. And show our passports. This is the ultimate checkpoint welcome to a rez crossing now this is really ironic it's written in hebrew above and arabic below and then english now a reza's the. Entrance to the gaza strip. But it's not very welcoming since no one can get in or out of gaza. There it is. It's very eerie if there's no-one it's silence. That. Security officer was filming us and we were taking his picture but. Yeah back way back behind that. Big. Wall back there. Behind many layers of security fence. Is 1.5 million people who are virtually in an open-air prison 40% of them under the age of 18. They cannot get out. There are space is closed their fishing rights are. Now 1-mile they can't go out by sea land or air. So they are virtually in prison why. Because they voted for the wrong person during a democratic election. This is generations of family of people who were ejected from the house and shake it off. And because they put that little addition on they now live homeless out in front of the house under a tent and they hold signs up saying we won't leave we have a right to live here they work with the civic coalition for defending palestinian rights in jerusalem and the women say at first we were afraid and we're not afraid anymore and that would be of the police coming in and you know the middle of the night and evicting them and threatening them. The wall the fence all around belen because the farmers it's negra cultural area and the farmers cannot get to their land on this was one of the leaders of the peaceful resistance they always get teargas when the idf gets tired of doing crowd control during these protests. This was at this is a protest every friday afternoon a group an israeli group called women in black this is west jerusalem we joined their protest one friday and they stand on this very busy intersection and hold these signs up in israel in west jerusalem and there were some people from the synagogue across the street who came with an israeli flag. These are out for man from. Are actually legislators in jerusalem. But jerusalem according to the un is supposed to be a shared city so palestinian legislators do sit on the city council of jerusalem but these these people had their jerusalem residency revoked because they were not seen as being loyal to the aims of israel. Then they wouldn't leave they said we're not leaving our home so they were put in jail. And then when they got out they sought refuge at the red cross which is where they're staying until their trial is finished. And we met with them in the red cross that is another stan's they will not leave their home in jerusalem and they have to live in the red cross for now. This is a man who owns the place up on the hill. His family. nasir he is family has owned iris vineyard. Since 1913 and he's a great guy he gets children from down in the village every summer to a peace camp. And they make wonderful art and signs of peace and he said we're not leaving so he just goes underground you know i used to laugh when we heard about going into caves to live and everybody thought he was chased into the desert and living like. Kids are great i mean you can live in caves very well it's cool in the summer and he has them all painted because from are surveillance they will rip down his structures he is not allowed cuz he won't need to catch a permit. So he's not allowed to build anything and he has his farm settlers and uprooted and burn 200 of his olive trees. But now he keeps. He just keeps there he says i'm not leaving. I love the reading earlier from micah because this is a piece of art that the children at the kibbutzim that i showed you earlier it's actually run by peace advocate is really peace advocates and they had children make this these are spent rockets. The parts that are up on top because they live very close to gaza and hamas would have lobbed those handmade rockets over so the kids went and scotty spent rockets and then they put together this sculpture and it's based on that reading from the bible about turning the spears into pruning hooks. And it's beautiful. This is another israeli who helped us understand the road system and the segregation and how it divides up the land and takes away more and more land from the palestinian he's he works with the israeli group israelis against home demolition. That was our guide in hebron who had his house. Shut up and he gives tours seeing all these are you can always go there and there's a whole group called alternative tourism and you can get a real tour of palestine and israel. This is a man who works for the united nation he's not stray lien lawyer no i'm sorry he works for an ngo called defense for children international and he works on child detention cases. Palestinian children are considered adults to be tried in adult court at the age of 16 israeli children are considered adults at the age of 18. Also palestinians are tried in a military court israelis are tried in civil court. So there is currently 10,000 palestinian political prisoners 423 our children. He works with the family and tries to get the kids to get you know they still throw stones at the soldiers and get arrested and. Is it can be kept as long as soon as can be captain without charges in for as long as. Did necessary by the government. This is someone from our group but this was in the balata refugee camp in the man on the left works with children you can see that poster on the right refugee youth magazine. All this is omar bugatti on the right he leads a big bee dies campaign we met with him at the quakers the friends committee organization in ramallah. And dds is boycott divestment and sanctions and if anybody is interested in that that's something you can easily do here in the states with your investments if you're interested in anything like that you can go to who benefits.org it's a list of all the companies like caterpillar for example who has a contract with israel to use their machines for home demolitions they're all caterpillars or volvo's so you can ask your investment counselor. This is a wonderful woman namikaze on throat. Which is about a half a mile from the gaza strip and they were often the recipients of those handmade rockets and then the israeli government had that huge offensive in gaza december of 08 january of 09 were they killed something like 1,200 palestinians they just bombed all the infrastructure the water the sewer everything and she. Was sickened by it she had friends in gaza gaza strip is a metropolitan city is metropolitan there's five universities in gaza remember the palestinian society is not in a totally agricultural society to very well educated there big cities and she said they always went shopping. Called. Other voice and she knew that at in december of 08 that her country had broken all moral codes and her motto for her group and others is not in my name not for my security and she works over the internet to try to help people in gaza and also to get other israelis to understand that this has to stop. This was a video conference we had with all the people on the right they're just coming in it's a split-screen i'm on the left taking my own picture there and the woman on the right with entering with some other people from gaza and that was at in ramallah at the friends committee office and the partner with the friends of the quakers in ramallah and work on children's programming to help the children in gaza and they can't get out. Mama. And if they were being bullied and i'm taking over and made. Into more about clerical society and she said. Well she said you know my friends and i wear out one day and it was hot and we took off our scarves and someone came up to us and said you women should wear your scarves and she said we told them you can't tell us what to do when we are very strong in palestine and she said please everybody else so it was actually a very heartbreaking. Thing to have to listen to because you know they're in prison they're not one young man said he hadn't been able to leave god's in 4 years. I'm going to run i'll just quickly through this section its various pictures of israeli and palestinian youth of course the oldest people in the youngest people are those most at risk in any kind of situation where there is violence and war. This is the third generation but his little boy born in the balata refugee camp. Currently the palestinians are the largest refugee population in the world and the oldest it's sixty years of being refugees the right of return is a huge. Final outcome into in this conflict this is the other young lady from the family in shakespeare who is homeless and sits outside the house and she says it's really hard going to high school and having to do your homework and use other people's bathrooms then but she said we will never leave. These are students in the caboots the key. Where they had the wonderful sculpture that was made and sadly someone had asked them they were graduating you know when they must go into the service i'm girls serve two years and boys 3 mandatory military service and sadly they didn't know what the green line was someone asked them about their geography books and what how israel is portrayed and they did not understand the question they had to speak to in hebrew to the man there who is from the us and has lived on a kibbutz for many years but they are kept in ignorance about the palestinians. People children watching others in the balata summer program refugee camp. Little boy holding a spent tear gas canister. This was an interesting shot out the bus window this was in west jerusalem which is israel and there's a man on the left holding a rifle. Have some sort he is there a guard now if you have apparently israelis if there's 10 or more in a group you have to have an armed guard with you which is absurd if you're in israel really and nowadays and you can see that the government has to keep their people in fear otherwise the people would not support the military regime like they do they have to constantly keep this existential threat over their head. Little boys in hair braun kids r kids. Wonderful counselor at the block of camp. Pinky talking to us. How do you start salat with young people to try to get them as a way to express their fears and anxiety and the buena war-torn terror in which they live everyday. Desert kids doing a palestinian folk dance. Garbage is a huge problem this is a roadside stand in ramallah the palestinians have to pay municipal taxes but their garbage really is not picked up. They don't have a lot of water they don't have electricity there is. Blackouts and brown austin. No water and but they have to pay their taxes just like israelis do. Yeah the palestinians have the internet. These are. These are israeli soldiers. They are at risk there is a large amount of them whose commit suicide while they're in the service to society does not support resistance from going into the armed forces you can do it. But there is a big price to pay if you are a young person and you don't want to serve. This is israel israeli army where it mandatory service is required. I like this picture i found that probably i don't know maybe it's just the eastern culture but it's also the palestinian families are very close to net and here's just three things to ponder.

uuprairie_org

Pr110220Esbensen-ed.mp3

Welcome everyone who made it on this icy morning to prairie unitarian universalist society i wasn't sure we'd make it that we talked to dad. spires to be an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation and we welcome everyone no matter what your ethnic or religious background whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure whatever your age your abilities or your inabilities later in the service will invite guests or visitors or returning friends to introduce themselves and we hope you feel comfortable enough to tell us just a little bit about what brought you here and tells your name. On sunday morning we provide a wide variety of services they're presented either by prairie member or someone from the wider community or by our minister gina simpson will be presenting to us today. That we would invite any children's come forward and join us up front and jada simpson will be reading a children's story morning i'm so glad that today we're going to be talking about different religions and different ways that people think about religion and they think about god or even if they do think about that not everybody does and some people have different names for god and so i was going to read you a story that's called god has many names and this has no pictures to you i just want you to think about what i'm saying you can close your eyes would you can think better than lie down whatever you want to do. A girl and a boy played with each other and argued with each other and sometimes they argued about who could swing the highest and sometimes they argue about whose cookie was the biggest and one-time though they were arguing about god's real name. The girl said god's real name is mother of us all. Voices know it isn't. God's real name is father in heaven. No the girl said it's mother. It is not the boy said his father will i have an idea that the girl let's go find god and ask her what her real name is and then we'll know for sure and you'll see that i'm right okay. So the boy and the girl setup define. even though both of them admitted they were a bit afraid to go far from home and they might be a bit afraid to talk to god after they had gone some distance they met people carrying food home from the market and they said to the people we are looking for god so that we can find out what god's real name is. One of the people said. I think if you go straight ahead down that road you will find god. But i can tell you that god's real name is the giver of life. The children think the people that told me they still wanted to ask god themselves the people offered children some bread and fruit and they continued on. They came to a river where people were fishing from a boat. And i asked them where they could find god so they could find out god's real name. People told them that they would have to cross the river to find god. One of the people said. You don't have to go across because we know god's real name. It is. The hidden one. Do you still want to go on we will give you a ride to the other side of the river. Children thank them across the river continuing on. The boy and the girl were beginning to get tired as they approached another group of people in a grove of trees. We want to find out god's real name. Do you know where we can find god the girl and the boy asked. You may find god if you go a little deeper into the forest. One of the people replied. But it isn't really necessary. I can tell you god's name. It is protector. But we still want to find out for ourselves the children said. Well take these blankets for your journey the people reply in the children think the man traveled on deeper into the forest. Night came the girl and the boy ate the bread and fruit and they laid down in the blankets to sleep. And when morning came just as the sun was peeping through the trees they heard a kindly voice say. I understand that there are children here who want to know my real name. That's right we do credit the girl in the boy together. The boy. Goten. Sounds friendly. Well what do you think my real name is ask god. But i think it is mother-of-all said the girl. And so it is said god. See the girls that happened i was right. Well the boys are disappointed i thought it was father in heaven. And so it is god said again see said the boy happy i was right. Wait a minute the girl said thinking hard how can we both be right. And what about those people we met on our trip who said your name was giver of life and hidden one and the protector will what about them. Not there right to serve god. But how can you have more than one real name as the boy doesn't one of them have to be the real name the only right name. No the guy that i have many names. Some people say i have 99 names and some people say i have thousands of names. What are some of those 99 names the girl asked you well give her of life kitten one and protector are three of them god replied and some others are the truth. The creator and the loving one. And of course the 100th name is allah. What are some of the thousands of names as the boy. Mother of all father in heaven shiva the great spirit gaia. Any of these names is my real name if the person who calls me it does so with a loving heart. God replied. Well my heart feels loving when i call you mother of also the little girl. And my heart feels loving when i call you father in heaven for the boy. And mother of all is my real name for you god said to the girl. And father in heaven is my real name for you god said to the boy. And the girl in the boys thank god for helping them to understand. And as they went home they argued about who had been the bravest but they did not argue anymore about god's real name. Jane needs no introduction. I've been boycotted twice in my life and ironically both times were for joint religious thanksgiving services the first time was in river falls wisconsin where i was the consulting minister for the uu society there. I hadn't lived in river falls very long and since i was serving as a minister i thought that becoming a part of the local ministerial association would be a good thing for me to do. I wanted to bring a space to the presence of the uu society in that town. And i was also looking forward to becoming part of a group of other ministers. I wanted to join with them and see if what service i could be in the community. Becoming a part of a small community like river falls. I learned not long after we moved there. It was only really possible after you live there for three generations so i was hoping that being part of the ministerial association with jamie entree into the community some 149 years sooner in october 2nd month of meeting together with the other ministers the episcopal priest and i who is also new. We're asked to be the leaders in the upcoming thanksgiving ecumenical service. The service will be held at the catholic church. There was no discussion about who would give the sermon. That always went to the newest religious leader in town. And i was the newest by half a year. So the honor went to me. The two priests and i met briefly to talk about some logistics where the readings and the service would go at cetera. And then we didn't see each other again until our november ministerial association meeting which was one week before the upcoming ecumenical thanksgiving service. Our ministerial association meadows usual sharing the rotation on who gave the prayer. Sharing the lunch we all contributed to. I discussing the needs of the community. I was still contempt. I loved being a part of this nice group of people. Doing work that i felt with important alongside of them. Although i was a bit troubled by the fact that no one from the jewish temple was ever acid at these ministerial meetings i was hoping one day soon to go myself. And meet the rabbi and encourage him to attend. I had dreams i had plans i had two goals. As we noshed on our turkey sandwiches chips and pickles there was a brief mention at the upcoming of the upcoming service. That was mentioned on the former meeting the monthly meetings of the minutes. But nothing more was said. I took this as a positive sign. I was impressed by how truly giving and accepting these men were for they were all men of both me and the new episcopal priest. Gosh so much for the cautionary notes i've been given when i've been told that it took three generations to become part of the community. I don't even part of the ministerial association association for 2 months and there were no problems at all. Yes thank you i would like another helping of that three bean salad how kind you are. Coffee was served chocolate chip cookies were passed around. And it's the last wiping of our malls were being made and we were gathering up our plates and cups. The chair of the ministerial association cleared his throat a few times and asked us to please sit down again. If we wouldn't mind. His serious tone cause this all the pause in midst and before we sat. In our chairs once again. I've been getting a lot of phone calls lately he began. By members of some other congregations in town. Telling me that they are going to be boycotting the upcoming ecumenical thanksgiving service. Silence. I was stunned. And looked around the table at the sea of bowed heads so none of them were in prayer i'm sure. It seems they were told by their pastors to boycott since jane is going to be giving the sermon for that service. Bill silence. My heart was pounding in my face was burning. Well there anything anyone would like to stay. The minister continued looking around the table. Nothing. Well then pastor john. Let's start with you. Pastor john the methodist minister looked up his usual calm demeanor not very visible at this moment. He stammered. Well all i said was that jane was going to take away our christianity my eyes widened as i looked around the table completely stunned i saw a number of the other ministers all solemnly not even agreement. Pastor bob. What do you have to say. He began faltering. Call james religion is a threat. I needed to warn my congregation. He ended weekly this baptist man. And then the very young very blond and blue-eyed very the very aryan looking pastor ralph. From the wisconsin synod lutheran church good up. His 6-foot presents back by the large cross on the wall behind him he composed himself and spoke as though before thousands. Our lord and saviour jesus christ his name his very being is going to be stripped and trodden upon by this woman when she speaks on thursday night. She's going to shake the very foundation of our face he bellowed out the last words. I began to speak will you don't even know what i'm going to talk about i'd be really glad to show you my sermon. I truly thought. That's showing them my sermon would clear things up just like that. That once i saw my calm rational unitarian universalist words that they would see no threat was there in the least and it will be done with this little misunderstanding and we will be done with the misplaced fear that these pads. These men had for me. I wasn't remember that i was in a town where took 300 years or so to have your voice count. I wasn't remembering that i had been thousands and thousands of years since the birth and the death of christ. And that still there was no peace on earth goodwill toward all. And i was definitely not remembering that i was the only woman in the room and the only female clergy in town. I was only thinking of the words ecumenical. And ministerial association. And thanksgiving day service. All words that to me meant a coming together. Administering to our hearts and souls. A day of thanks for the abundance we have. And the ability we have to give to those who have far far less than we. Clearly this group of men had a completely different interpretation of those very same words. Hazard rosa final time to leave the room i overheard the episcopal priest tell the chair of the ministerial committee that something had come up with a member in his congregation that he would very sadly not be able to be a part of the thanksgiving day service after all. The other ministers shuffled out. Highsky stats routed to my chair. Still not comprehending what it just happened. When father john the catholic priest came up to me put it on around me instead. Don't worry. This town has been boycotting catholics for centuries since they won't acknowledge that we're christian i am the diversity on the ministerial association committee he continued to say we catholics are the religious affiliation that makes it believe it's an ecumenical association but you my dear will never be allowed in. For your face. And any other faith that is not christian. Is merely tolerated until it becomes public. And then it must be destroyed. You are very welcome to my church however and i look forward to your sermon on thanksgiving now let's go get a beer. Religious diversity. Important concepts important goals but how do we get there when one's interpretation and stance is not the same as their neighbors. I chose the title of the sermon today for the love of god. As the shorter version of the theme for interfaith harmony week that was held a few weeks ago here in madison which was for the love of god for the love of good i look forward to being part of the interfaith dialogue here and thought it would make for an interesting sermon today since i have to give my sermon titles way in advance and by blurb i was pretty confident that there would be something to talk about. But nothing of note happened and that's then when the theme of my sermon today became what does any of this mean. And is it really interfaith dialogue that we're creating or just a politically correct stance. Prairie has been apart of these interfaith weeks. This church here. Both in our presence at the capitol in december where we had a table with brochures set up in the rotunda along with other religious groups. Barb and rebecca attended an interfaith dialogue one snowy evening wear eight people including barb and rebecca attended three were the host and his wife and daughter and the four others were friends of the speaker we're also friends of the host and his family. Barb and rebecca represented the diversity in the room that evening. I attended several hours of speeches made by other religious leaders to a group of about 10 and prairie recently had an interfaith breakfast here right in this room. Where we serve breakfast to 7 people. Two sisters from wisdoms well and me rebecca and her husband john and their two little boys the diversity was slim but the old cakes were really delicious. Every gathering was a handful of people. And the discussions will interesting in that each time it was about what people explain about people explaining their belief structures we're not forward-moving. The window gatherings for working alongside of one another on a joint project. We didn't wrestle with typical issues together speaking from our own religious and ethical stances and seeing where we could come to a consensus in order to put some important initiatives in place. I'm sure that this does happen. But it wasn't happening where i was involved in this specific week. At every gathering we listened we ate we played music we chatted in a friendly fashion with respect and caution. But we didn't become close or merge and anyway. I'm not sure if that was just this year's experience or if that has been the way of it. Since madison and 1999 became a city supporting the religious and human rights have all as cited in a public proclamation signed by the mayor and celebrated when we figure in an intentional fashion. But i felt less than ecumenically linked with my religious neighbors. I felt as though we were just polite people of society. Nothing greater than that. But nothing of significance was actually going on between us. How can real change come about if the central issues issues between religious people are not honestly named. And looked at some each person perspectives. Getting to the core of what each religion says it exists for. And then i came upon the recent un resolution. From this past october. And i found these words by tony blair and i began to feel more hopeful about what is possible upon the world stage. And he wrote this. All over the world there is a struggle taking place within and about religion. Sometimes it results merely and harsh or prejudicial words and too often it erupt in violence and acts of shocking extremism. The essence of the struggle is this. Are people of religious faith prepared to regard those of a different faith with respect and dignity and yes even love. Or do they rather regard them as enemies. Are they open. To the other or closed. Do they want to live in harmony with these difference with those who are different from themselves. Or just say that they do. In each of the main religion such a struggle is being waged everywhere. Because of the enormous importance of religion in the modern world the outcome of such a struggle has immense implications for all of us those from the major face and those of none. Some people naturally want to say the answer to this lies in the realm of politics. And of course politics has a crucial role to play. But it's clear that since the dimensions of the struggle are inevitably affected by religion itself. People of faith have to step forward and take responsibility. What is more because those who are passionate about their faith do not want to act in contradiction to it. The argument in favor of the open approach has to go wider and deeper than simply asking people to behave nicely to one another. It has to address full on the spiritual theological and scriptural basis for mutual respect for those who follow a different religious or spiritual path. On the 20th of october 2010 largely unnoticed by the world. The un general assembly unanimously passed a resolution declaring the first full week of each february the world interfaith harmony week. The resolution first proposed by king abdullah the second of jordan this past september is unique in the annals of the un because of its explicit mention of god. Albeit in a way that does not exclude those who don't ascribe to a religion. And because it promotes harmonious interfaith relations in a way that specifically draws attention to the scriptural and theological basis for such relations. Obviously resolution no matter how well-meaning do not by themselves alter the world. But this resolution does encourage people who believe in inter-religious harmony and mutual acceptance to challenge. Those whose narrow and often arrogant view of other religions leads to discord and dissension. It acknowledges that religious discourse on social behavior is central to the way the 21st century develops. Dimension of love of god and love of one's neighbor is also important because without it. Devout christians muslims and jews are not likely to sincerely get behind the resolution. Equally. A mention of the love of good. And love of one's neighbor is important. Because while the good is god for believers. Love the good and the neighbor is the very essence of goodwill for all people. The first week in february set aside as interfaith harmony week dust has an unprecedented potential to globally turn the tide against religious tensions by uniting the efforts of all the interface groups doing positive work within one focused theme. Thereby increasing their collective momentum. Harnessing the collective might of the world's second-largest infrastructure. That are places of worship. Specifically. 4 piece. And harmony. And permanently and regularly. Encouraging the silent majority the preachers to publicly declare themselves for peace and harmony and providing a ready-made vehicle for them to do so. The real work of love of neighbor starts with a neighbor precisely and therefore in local communities. A good deed for interfaith harmony even if the world moves in the opposite direction is not like a vote for candidate who loses. It still counts. Accounts first for the soul that didn't. And is that much the better for it. And it counts by creating a ripple effect of goodness. It has the unforeseen positive consequences in the future and an ever-widening circle of goodness. By launching world interfaith harmony week does little-noticed resolution aims to give those working for understanding and dialogue a stronger voice. It's a modest first step. And we don't we won't know until next february and the following february and the following february's for many years to come. How much of an effect it will have. But at a time when the forces of religious intolerance are on the rise. As many headlines in our news services show. We can't forget. The many voices preaching. The opposite message. Enclosing harrison words by the dalai lama. Unless we know the value of other religious traditions. It is difficult to develop respect for them. Mutual respect is the foundation of genuine harmony. We should strive for a spirit of harmony. Not for political or economic reasons. But rather simply because we realized the value of other traditions. Thank you. So now it's a time and i serviced if we'd like to have a discussion. He said mm. Don't worry this town has been boycotting catholics for centuries since they don't acknowledge that were christian. We are the diversity that the ministerial association allows we catholics. We are the religious affiliation that makes it believe it's an ecumenical associate our organization but you my dear. Will never be allowed in for your face and any other faith is not christian is merely tolerated until it becomes public. And then it must be destroyed. But we all know that we all know that people think like this right i mean. We know this. And so what when we don't proselytize we barely even speak about what we believe or where we are or what we're doing are we very carefully and gently invite someone to come like to but don't you know worrying and being free to speak about what we believe in and what's important to us as the core. And that's where the interfaith dialogues are so extraordinary really important and vital and i was very disappointed not to have been able to have more time in the wisdoms well nuns were lovely people and we talked about if i could become a benedictine nun. And they things me because they had been told not to come. But then this other ministers called and said. Y'all need to be there this is ridiculous so they bravely came that way but i've been very scared and they come up and told me that it was a beautiful service and they were really struck by how everything i said they could relate to even though the word god was missing they didn't miss it. And that was very good was very good i was never allowed to speak at. I spoken to boca my my tacos about dietrich bonhoeffer and. The title of my talk was. No ground beneath our feet. And i spoke about that so i mean yeah anyway and of course the focus was on. Thanksgiving. Which is far as i knew was not a religious holiday but i needed to be boycotted from so it was it was quite extraordinary but i remember saying to one of the ministers later on when i met him on the street one day and he wants the other side of the street so i crossed over went over there to do things like that. Extraordinary that he believed himself. That he both gave and could take away. The faith of the people in the congregation because he was thinking about my speaking i could take away their face which meant that he's somehow believe that he also gave and could take away. So that was and i have to remind them about someone who is assertive in their past i kind of remember had them put up on the cross but we didn't get into that frame. The peace which passeth understanding the peace of god which the world can neither give nor take away the among us and abide in our heart. Please join us for soup afterwards.

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Pr110515Anderson-ed%20.mp3

Well good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm mary mullen a member of the program committee. Praise aspires to be both an open-minded and an open-hearted congregation and we do welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color your sexual orientation or gender or your family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age. No matter what your abilities or your inabilities. And later in the service will invite visitors guests and returning friends to introduce yourself. So that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. Representativa by a prime number. A member of a member of the wider community who are presently recruiting for a minister since our minister went off to sweden today will be hearing from a long-time member peter anderson. And he'll be presenting childhoods and doesn't sound like a very happy. The hughes family heidi rachel and james will be lighting our chalice. A prayer of sorrow. We have forgotten who we are we have alienate ourselves from the unfolding of the cosmos. We have become estranged from the movements of the earth. We have turned our backs on the cycles of life. We have sought only our own security we have exploited simply for our own ends. We have distorted our knowledge we have abused our power. Now the land is barren the waters are poisoned and the air is polluted. Now the forests are dying and the creatures are disappearing and the humans are despairing. We ask forgiveness. We ask for the gift of remembering. We ask for the strength to change. Well i'd like to introduce peter anderson who will be giving the presentation on childhood's end i've known peter for quite a while and. And you may know that he's the person that started dane county dances to try to get people of different ethnic groups together here in madison having a good time you may know that he's from new york from the bronx probably from his accent and he told me today i wondered how he came he came in 1970 for a political campaign. And i hissed also started environmental decade you probably in 1970 also. He's a longtime environmental activist now working mostly on climate change. His email says recycle world so we know that he's for recycling as well so i'd like to invite peter up to tell us about childhood and friends. I like lords the opening words. They opening words alex horses a twelve-year-old when he gave that speech. His whole life is now 17 and you can watch him if you go onto youtube isn't quite a quite experience. Alec lor lor lor z. And if i can get that too stupid. Powerpoint going. Thank you for having me i appreciate being back. The whole commerce between master and slave. Is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions. The most unremitting deficit. Despotism on the one for integrating submissions on the other our children see this. And learn to imitate it. The man is an imitative animal. Parent storms a childlike sign catches the limits of wrath. Puts on the same errors in the circle of smaller slaves. Gives a loose. To his worst of passions and russ nurse. Educated and daily exercise and tyranny. Cannot be standby it with this odious peculiarities. The man must be a prodigy who can retain his manners and morals. Honda prelude. By such circumstances i think. Many of us. 7 diluted internal contradictions of thomas jefferson the author of the declaration of independence. How could. Section 8 individual so noble in intent. And the reason is of course is that. When it came to mount vernon. Are all the creature comforts. Enjoyed in that in his interest in his home. He couldn't bear to give them up. And he would rather live with those internal contradictions. Then forego those benzos does joyce. And the reason i mention that is. I think that we have the same thing here. When the bp disaster. I used to have a corolla like this. And to be environmental and very much in the way of the green revolution. I got a hybrid prius. But the problem with zeke is a benefit from getting a hybrid prius. Is that i used to get driving bye-bye. Non-hybrid used to drive about 7,000 miles a year. And my prius i'm now driving about 13 14,000 miles a year so any benefit that i could claim about being greeting noble have been washed a tunnel where the heck i'm driving it's remember after after we saw. We had the sink what to do i'll get fluorescent compact fluorescent bulbs. Amazon. In the wall street wisconsin state journal highlighted. It was a home on ross street not too far from where i live. And they were very proud this couple because she was the first platinum lead house. In madison wisconsin. Legacy there there are solar collectors. Insulated rain rain gardens the whole nine yards. And when you compare with that house on division street i want to ask you a question. Which one has a smaller carbon footprint. Which one this one. I thought prior one. 2700 square feet. Two people living that i'm not trying to find 2:35. If you look at the stuff that we have to do. To go and get this. Kind of things going on. Before i get you that he'll issue has been put. About what we need to do to avoid the climate catastrophe that we all heard about it i think. There's no time to go into that as well except to note that all the things that you've heard about. If you have a business as usual and the temperatures will rise by the end of the century from 5 to 10 degrees fahrenheit. All those kinds of projections. Ignored. The worst-case possibility. And they ignored the positive feedback loop that we might be getting into. I want the worst ones you can think of is a tundra is getting warmer and esca released massive amounts of methane which has. 25 to 100 times more warming potential than carbon dioxide so everything you've heard about how bad. Climate change is and the risk it poses. To the civilization that we have known. Everything that comes out in these traditional day as more and more unknowns are resolved. It's worse it's going more and more to the worst end of the predictions. And not. Translate consequences that we are leaving for our children. The sophie's choice that we're making for our progeny. Is just terrible. Andy the whole thing has been going on. In the terms of what is the process to improve this. Has been looking at things like going beyond. The compact fluorescent bulbs took to carbon trading. And the bill that was considered for. About a year-and-a-half in the house before it got. Be buried in the senate would it provide a carbon trading bill. And the problem is that even if it had passed. Is this is the kind of analysis in the reason why we're using a. Feel like that. To try and address climate change when there was still a hope. This is before the november election. About something passing was because of us thought it would be too hard to go and directly address it's so weird provided ability for. Companies to trade their. Carmen demands on them by buying the rights to. Someone else would reduce it. Ever seen the kinds of things that this built upon they success. So2. Carbon trading back in 1990 which work well because that was electric utility companies. And it was measured emissions that were exact and not model. And because everything was actually recorded and bretman regulatory agencies. Everything was on paper there was no room for cheating when he gets a carbon trading. It's all loosey-goosey so 66%. Of the carbon trading that was going on on the clean mclean mechanism device last year. Was based upon a total scam. When we had the hfc refrigerants. Sara poisoning that they were destroying the ozone layer they went to a version other isotope 23. What has the the unfortunate act you better not to smell it that doesn't destroy the ozone layer. It has eleven thousand times. The warming potential. Carbon dioxide well there a factory in indy other bad 24 them they continue to pump out hfsc. 23. Up of refrigerants for the sole purpose of danny green not to pump them out and making his trades. And because it's 11,000 times. The multiplier on a weighted basis it dominates the whole process so. It's just so lends itself to scams and then if it's not being scammed. So much of the political process in terms of carbon trading which is the best it possibly could get. And we didn't get in congress. Is the hijacking you've heard of sure about the revelations about corn-based ethanol which instead of saving. Climate actually makes it twice as bad and you heard about. Hydraulic fracking hydraulic hydraulic fracking of natural gas. That makes it twice as worse because of the leakage. Another one i worked on a lot of landfill gas-to-energy that makes it about 4 times worse. All these things are they putting up there. In life to make things better i really things that have been bribed to the confessional process the administrative process. Which actually means when a people independent looking it makes things worse. This is a list of where the razor activists in climate changes a guy named joe rome he has a ewe. A blog called climate progress. He set out to say what we got to do to actually address the issue of climate change. And this was a list of things he came out with and you can look at fun and i got to do next couple years worldwide. All car 60 miles per gallon. 4000 gigawatts of wind turbines 5,000. Enormous task. I know what your forgot service think about though is. This is only if. We look upon the emissions today is baseline. We don't consider another factor when it hits a sprinkler will work. This about 10 years ago there was a wonderful book came out material worlds. And i asked people from around the world. To take everything in their house possession to put them in front of house in that picture taken this one's india that's america. Experience. Sli the first world's consumption per capita. Per capita is 32 * the third world. At what joe didn't put into the equation is china-india and the rest of the third world might not want to have a carbon reduction. Regimen section signs them to public rest of the life of we drive around and highly efficient bmw. That's not going to fly. Essentially if you wanted to bring all of the third world up to our consumption level. You would need 12 worlds of materials and energy. Sso people talk about well we could more efficient and more this more that much solar there's no way. And i might work on a us basis if that was our only horizon line with climate change. There's no way better get the efficiency gains or renewable it introductions which are going to provide 12 globes of world. Essentially what's going on here is we want the united states and in europe 12 have a regimen for a global treaty to replace kyoto. That would say let's have reductions based upon our total emissions. Animal control in missions today on such and such. Introducing by 10 or 20%. Well try to look at that travels as hell of that that means i'm going to be having or people as peasants terrestrial lives they say on a per-capita basis. You're 19 times what we are. And when i cleaned and we're going to sign any treaty that locks us into. Are people being in my poppers. So essentially. What's not being talked about any of these price and any of these discussions. Is looking past the borders of contents united states out to the rest of the world. And what are desire just like thomas jefferson's. To continue enjoying our ultra. Two cars. And whether we have to actually think for deeper than that. And go beyond. The kinds of discussion we've had in having. I think the problem is seems to me. Is that the human racine actors and you and him terms of human nature do not look at tomorrow. So i remember last year when we had the discussion about the bp disaster. And people were fulminating about bp's transgressions of i got up and said. Well that's very nice but who amongst us. Has given up their second car. I got people upset. But i slept all the way home and i talked about it having a 2nd am s car and let me see well who's going to carry jet here so this was. We've been bubbling back and forth the last year we still have my goddamn second cock. Play situation is arsene a are not here to act upon. What problems are tomorrow they're only act. If they get the west of water on the floor charlie up to rhinos it may not be have to actually have to be before i boil it before we are bridget we ready to act in terms of making systemic change which means something behind and a prius. Which is the second car. And i think essentially. People are unable to do that is my feeling. And what's the solution i've never die to this mope groaning and get caught the cave and go what was me i think i saw use. And i know being summoned from the 60s. I remember the revolution that occurred that could have occurred. And it's not that the people who are young don't have the same problems with a synapse limitations that we do. But you just don't have an enter the road you don't worry about your job yet they're also more reckless and went to take on that defaults to cliff. And i think also that the young can be. Brought into play. By using mechanisms like getting people mad. Using substrate anger for our inability to look for beyond tomorrow to tell the kids. Your parents witches us are grown. grown ups. I totally screwed up the world. Attalus you get on the stick like alex lawrence's doing. And basically going to the streets en masse. And overcome the entire structural social system. I was in lobbying in washington last reformation. Last month on the phone bill to repeal the clean air act. Provision that allows them to not only go after climate change. By stopping at tammy baldwin's office. Are they read me out because when the bill is passed in the house. For climate change a year ago. The the staffer in the government accountability office didn't put a impact analysis out on that field economic impact analysis out until after the bill was passed and they were appalled tammy therapist said to read that. The bill would have big impacts. Are they industries restarting energy-intensive in the united states in in wisconsin. Next time the bill comes up i got to have. Hey i hope mom is put on my steaks. Going to hold everyone who's going to be impacted by higher carbon prices harmas. I don't have any change. Lieutenant baldwin and now tammy baldwin is the radical fringe of congress imagine the rest of the congress. So we have to find ways and i think. From me. I think how am i going to find structures to send the message to the youth of today. That the that the grown-ups have screwed up and it's time for you to take over that i think i think back to is i think was a 1959 already. Pocket socks. Childhood's end which has a story about the. Advanced civilization. The only people they can salvage out of their physicals that everyone else's. Is it is basically. Only everything back and i think that's the situation we're in today. And so my hope. Is not in the political process of which i've been intimately involved with. Which i think is not going to do a damn thing. Only hope that i can see. Is it raining at the kids angry enough. At their. At the grown-ups iteration. To say you screwed us up and not going to screw up the road that we're going to live in because. We may be dead. When they. All the impacts come do. And we may take wyatt's solace in that secretly in the crevices of my mind. Well at least i won't be around to see it. But they will. Aerosol on their backs or something cuz i don't think we're capable. Ab doing anything when it comes to systemic change even though there's we have so much. Economic benefits. And future conference there's no reason why we couldn't have a very. Wonderful life with half of that it's not like it's anything it's impossible to do. Does changing the habits of the heart. And is nothing harder than that. Am i hope. Isn't childhood saying thank you very much. And i love that have one type of one question last time we'll have a lot of questions this time. The problem i have. Is that civilization in my experience at a very thin veneer. And it works when it look at. that's in germany and i think that. When you start shaking the edges of it and all the elevator things are people rely upon it doesn't just a ratchet down slowly. Civilization is very. But it's very subjects very fragile and subject to catastrophic collapse. And i think we have to be more aggressive. I don't think saying to weekend and then do the best bear the best but i think that's not an option goose. Civilization it look at what happens when a cat europe. It is just the kind of things that we're going to see. If we let this occur. Are so catastrophic in terms of civilizations collapse it wouldn't be feasible i think that. I don't think you would like to stop by think that's why i said the kids. I think the wealth is there. To have a feel what would you want to do is have the ability to not be afraid of not having food you want to drive up shelter of your head. You want to have a friend whatever wife would have kids. Does all the things that we haven't consumed so much like that that that leave platinum house. It's not necessary. There to enjoy a safe comfortable life i think it's that ratcheting down process. For i would aim it not saying. I'm going to try and make the best of it after it comes that's where i'm at. Dupree. Industrialization level of carbon and it was was 380 parts per million. Now it is 385 expected to go to 2450 pretty soon. And the scientist who are most concerned with this thing got to go back to 3:50. Attempt to stabilize things. Sonic go back to 350 and say. People not willing to give up their second car and their suv. What the hell do we have to throw at this. Bugger. To make all those things work out and that's what they threw it in. Especially the rebound problem because when you have wealth you save it by doing something more efficiently here. What you do with the rest of it to give it to the poor or did buy something else. And is that a specific problems is. But bye-bye. Even though i don't think communism. Can impose a suppose i was a list that would work. Anti-music apples i don't think communism is a solution to impose it because. Any government association legitimate government has to win the the tacit quiet support of his of his people by giving them goodies. So it's actually it requires a mine change. Not a system of one from an industrial. Industrial organizations whatever from industrialization. And i think. Although it sounds pie-in-the-sky generational changes can be enormous. Cancel descale about the capability of generational change within a generation once you develop habits of the heart. Which is what exactly have it sized don't advertise that people over 40 so they have become a habit and i can change. Fitness tomorrow. I've been lobbying for 40 years in the political process. And i can't and i and i'm always look for leavers i never say you can't do it. But i like i always figure out all the angles by can't figure out the angle to do that if i watch what's going on. The process was big one which would come out at the end of the pipe. Worsham instructed to so bad. A question a supreme court and route everything campaign-finance i do. I'd like to think is true i don't. Belatedly i don't follow. Very closely the arabic numbers if going to visit the same thing but in general a suburban lifestyle uses twice as much energy. As an urban lifestyle. So it's a big-ticket item intercourse looking at. Madison. 40 years ago. To what it is brought out today. Candice. Just try. It's in the sixties my experience was. That about two-thirds of the shock troops. Lauren really radical people. It was a cool thing to do. And i am looking for. Ways to exploit the way. Young people. Thick. To make tie-dye again. If it's very easy to get kids to be angry at grown-ups. And so i'm looking at mechanisms. We were criticizing a different beast. Different species. And i kind of think i've been thinking about us having some kind of integrated into really crowded rock concert word into it it has. Yak yak with the talk with the music in the background all ain't about how your parents are screwed up your world for you. Not snapping their fingers but doing the direct action is someone's face who likes electric. I don't pretend to have an answer for me but i just think. It's important least running a new direction. Last two years. The natural resources defense council the environmental defense counsel all those great group so we give money to. They spend 350 million dollars. All climate change in congress. Figured out terrible bill pass in the house they couldn't get a vote in the senate. Am i pointless to take i like to leave with you is. That is a dead-end proposals for this year it's a double down the same bed bet after november election i mean. Where are where is emphasis is it's not going to come from our environmental leadership. It has to come from below a rethinking of where we're headed. And i don't hear saying here's exactly as i'm saying here's the direction i think has the only sense of hope. To avoid terrible depression.

uuprairie_org

Pr110717GaryPeterson-ed.mp3

I'd like to introduce our speaker today or speaker is gary peterson. He's a member of prairie so most of you who are members know who he is he's president of peterson appraisal group and religious property valuations in a bad hardly anyone knew that his appraised commercial real estate for over 20 years primarily in the chicago metropolitan area. He has an maoi and i think you'll have to tell us what that is. Designation would have had the highest designation you can get in commercial real estate appraisal. He also has an undergraduate degree with majors in business administration and psychology from augustana college in illinois. And a master's degree in business administration from the university of nevada prior to starting his company appraising religious facilities he did a great deal of research. N2y churches fail. And factors that can help predict success or failure in a congregation please welcome gary peterson to talk about church life cycle. Good morning. When we stopped about a year ago we started a new appraisal service i got all these done gentle commercial appraisal in the chicago market. And we've been doing a ton of churches and somebody year ago we started a religious property valuations which appraises churches. And part of that process we're just doing a lot of research to see. You know what's going on in the church market. And as i was doing that research like you don't have to applying some of it into what's going on in prairie. And one thing we've noticed over the last few years and we don't have church it over the last 15 years is. You see more more churches in trouble than used to be. And there's a lot of reasons for that and so like when we used to do appraisals you just say if you're doing appraising at church. Find three church comps. And appraise the church. Now what we have to do is start going into what the census of the church what's their population how have they been doing over the years because we're seeing a lot more frequently where churches are getting in trouble and they're just closing down. And so sometimes go to church building where it's not going to be at church anymore because there aren't enough people to do it. What became apparent to me as we're doing all of these churches is that a lot of congregations pretty much stick their head in the sand and hope the problem goes away that's how i've been lucky so far but it doesn't. That's when the alarm bells go off and he says alright what are we going to do well that's called the death spiral in the churches and that's it's too late. At that point so you need to. Start being progressive. And thinking about this. While you're still stable or growing not after you start shrinking and and that little bit today about you know where the market is. And. Get more practical level. What can i insert name out of church guy i'm more of a numbers guy but what some of the research what they're saying you need to focus on to promote growth instead of slowly die. In. In the united states about 20.4% of the people on average attend church regularly in the united states. Some survey says hi 40% but people tend to. Overestimate jericho godly and because most people realize until you research and churches and what's going on is difficult is very spotty and you know it just takes hours of this and that but we were project. Churches between 1990 and 2006 and that was by far where we found the best data. But anyway in 1990 about 20.4% of people attended church regularly. Regularly attending church is defined as 3 out of 8. Okay which isn't all that regular but that's as good as it get in 2005 it went from 20.4% to 17.5% by 2020 and 7%. Regular catan. Now. In the south and the midwest is a few percent higher in the northeast at 2% lower in the west at 50% lower. But the general trend is. Going south. In. Roman catholic church resemble and again i don't have any specific unitarian because it's the relatively small but for. Prep for a few examples in 2,000 the roman catholic church in madison had 70 9177 members. In 2005 it was 60 7584. In milwaukee in 2000 with 230,000. It was on 296,000 in 2005. In rockford they did better in 2008 had 113000 and was about 109,000 in 2005. For more specific for prairie kaitlyn's not going to be a lot of the. Statistics over the last 20 or 30 years. In the 1980s we averaged 105. In the 1990s we averaged 213. In the year in the 2000s we averaged 95 and a half. I'm not sure the who the app is right at the moment r91. Part of the problem even though with any kind of membership is. How do you define membership. It's very difficult to say so at a small church like this or congregation it's probably easier to to to to do it. But you know. Statistically it's part of the problem with any analysis on congregations in churches is it's so great how many people come here every week. Who knows nobody count so right i found it a few times before this but in general okay and i didn't know mary, done that. And. One interesting thing is even though the church attendance has been dropping the united states relatively. Consistently only about 1.1% of churches close their doors every year. That's not very many i mean it could be a lot more than that but that isn't necessarily a good thing either because one of the things that when i'm reading these things at least a macro-level with like church life cycles. The fact that a church. Doesn't you know sometimes it would just be better for the church to die for certain churches because a lot of churches they may be well endowed they may have only a dozen members anymore they may not be doing anything they may just meet once a week in the building is closed the rest of the time but they can survive. I like support forever until the last person dies. There there so a lot of times the fact that there was such a low percent of actually going out of business so to speak doesn't necessarily mean it's a good thing. Churches or congregation supposed to serve a purpose and that isn't just to exist. It hopefully is doing some good in the community. The most important factors. Freak out. Or decline in a church at the macro-level is population. If you're living in an area with population growth. You're more likely to be going up in a population if your interest level population area or declining population area you're likely to be shrinking. That makes sense especially considering that it if the overall attendance is dropping a few percent every five years anyway. If your population isn't going up you got a smaller and smaller cool to pull from so by far the end because we still have a growth of population growth so that's that's. The number one factor bar none is as what's going on with population levels so we're somewhat fortunate madison because we're still a growing area. Appleton said the community the more affluent is more likely to do better than a less affluent community community education the more educated generally do better than the less educated communities. The age of the church and the constituents. Churches tend to grow or more likely to grow until they're about 40 years of age and then they gradually lose members and are in a state of decline 57 to 66% of churches depending on the congregation are in a state of decline after 40 years. The older the members of the church. The slower the slower the growth. Ihop in times because they don't. It says the age of the population of your congregation because you know older older they do not have any children and they may be slower to adapt to change. Also related to age the median age in the united states is 37. The average age for a presbyterian is 58. The average age for methodist 261. That the problem. Although i think i think most people realize it. As you age as you get older you're more likely to go to church so this is just a lot of stuff kind of crosses over against each other the core of many churches or many congregations are the seniors but it can be a two-edged sword because sometimes. That can also be they may be more resistant to change to or. Or whatever and it so it can be a blessing and a curse. The size of church is a factor if you have a very small church wonderful 50 people. Or the mega churches 1000 plus in general they tend to be doing better and then everybody in the middle tennessee to be doing worse there's obvious exceptions in all cases but that's just as a general rule. Gender makeup. 57 to 66% of churchgoers in the united states are women. Depending on the congregation. Younger and growing churches tend to be closer to 5050 it's rarely ever that way. That have a more balanced population. Get a tan in the five samples i did hear we were at 65% or within percent of that almost every time of women 35% men. Okay so that dad that would not be considered a positive. One of them this is a kind of just a side note that i thought was interesting one of the biggest predictors for children to continue to attend. Services or congregational church. And what are the father attended regularly. Identify the location of the church is another factor if you are in a rural or small-town it's you're more likely to be declining if you are in a city or a suburb you're more likely to be increasing. There's a lot of variables and lot of stuff mismatches all over the place. But i think the. The overriding thing is the demographics are the number one issue because you're fighting at a slowly declining attendance. You know overall. Now. Church life cycles. That you can have a huge variation i how long it hurts typically survive very few churches ever go more than like 80 or 90 years or a hundred years a few do but most have a whole purpose. That purpose is achieved and maybe the demographics change and the church died it isn't necessarily a bad thing. To disclose it down at a new church starts and that has lot more energy and achieves a lot more things so at least a macro-level church dying isn't always the end of the world but at 1. It's always a different story. Beretta typical old way the gurus of the church world define it the first stage is usually from 125 years where it's heavy growth. Popham 6015 is maturity. I've been from 15 to 50 years it tends to plateau. Yeah. this is a critical area because here the congregants is where we are right now he needs to either refocused towards new birth and growth. Or start to decline. And i'll talk a little bit about that. As a mage 6288 you start to get the decline and dropouts. If there's no real focus of the church. Cast difficult to stop declining membership once that occurs in at 80 is a death of a restart and restart me sometimes i get close the church give it to another congregation or so. There some polish churches in a very heavy catholic. Demographics are shifting some of these areas are now heavily hispanic while where you may have had a 300-person polish church now. If it's just something that happens i lifecycles are not always smooth and predictable sometimes you could attendants wings are normal you know we've had them you know lows and highs and stuff like that but you have consistently downward trend and you start losing a lot you know you can be in trouble. The most important. Point that i saw in the life cycles is once you're in the maturity phase. You need to either. You either need to keep positive momentum going. And edit what happens if people either side to protect what they've got. Or they decide to try to keep growing and keep reaching out. What tends to happen if people start. The institution starts. Inertia august broken door normal service that becomes more of a focus on protecting the church and just trying to maintain and less of a focus on reaching out to the community and growing and what. And it's a very subtle thing as you tonight a conscious choice. But once that happens. Eustolia starts decay. And that's what they seen with with with a studies that occurred so you make. At this point and it can take. 30 years to die. So it doesn't it it's not it's not something that has happened today or tomorrow but over time. You know. I'm 50. i was 40 you know about 2 weeks ago the factors for decline the biggest factors are 1 is demographics and population again is number one. We're doing a lot of appraisals on the south side of the city african americans tend to have a higher percentage of church attendance. But. A lot of americans are moving tonight or areas. The people aren't there. The economy is certainly not helping either. But you don't. When people move things happen so population loss and then next to mix whether it's polish to spanish or whatever. There's also something called a triple elder effect. If you have a older physical church if you have older members and you have an older pastor. These three factors combine to make it more difficult to increase our population and it makes it more likely for you to resist change. Part of the way you get younger members is obviously younger members need to join so if they're joining are they more or less likely to join if. Like the nfl they talked about this crippled eldorado. So. That's why it's important that you keep trying to bring in. New people and end in families and in all of all of this stuff. Another factor decline is the rapid pace of change internet computers etc. Especially at. Smaller churches you tend to have a handful of volunteers that do lion's share of the work. And. That can be. A good thing and a bad thing. God bless them because they need we need the people that are doing the volunteer work they can also do be maybe resistant to change or maybe they don't like the internet or maybe they don't whatever so. Ghetto and most of the volunteers that are doing most of the work will tell you they would love to have more people help. But the reality is its core group is making most of the decision. Because there's other people aren't stepping up to the plate and they may be resisting change or they may not you know maybe you need some new people coming in if they can get them. Tutu helper. Institutes of the institutional change and make it more flexible. Lawn service by the same volunteers can lead to decline this man is conflict resolution relational dysfunction i'm sure. I try to stay oblivious to most it but i know it's out there if you get two people in a room usually have some kind of conflict. Best buy in my company i managed by ignoring it and hoping it goes away. We are distant financial bliss eye primer. In terms of trying to turn right out what can you do to enhance growth. Did the 2-point or three points that i got about all of my research was and one thing that stood out and it's kind of obvious but that a hundred percent of new growth. Comes from visiting gas. 100% of course. So what when you ask what can i use an individual do. What when it went when you have a gas it isn't. What some of the people are very interesting i talked to lori today her dogs she wants to get a dog like i've got and i've got a blue eye and a brown eye. And her dog dana has a. Two colored eyes too interesting but it is critically important. Anita rose got a wonderful job. Of of greeting gas and making them feel comfortable. And it isn't just roses responsibilities every responsibility and if somebody comes in and like i love dogs i've got a picture of my dog right here when lori lori came in today the gas and i'm sorry for. Go say hello. I mean one of the most. Critical things a congregation can do. Relates to how we treat god. Most people according to what i've read decide within the first 10 minutes. Are showing up of whether they like the congregation or not they haven't even heard the person for it. Show family comes in with kids. Well maybe it'd be better if our to the kids we gotta run around upstairs being a nuisance instead of downstairs being a nuisance because at least if somebody walks in with a couple of kids they can start being a nuisance together but. It's the facilities how they look it's the kids at the demographics and it's the friendliness and it's it's it's. Your responsibility. It's the number one thing. What needs to be done or what could be done in a typical church. I know people get offended. The studies are based on christian churches. 6 to 10% of the membership. Will go away every year. And that's because people died people move people to come disinterested okay 6 to 10 % so that means you need to replace that 6 to 10% to stay where you were. Arch supports light growth. Of your visitors. 14 to 16%. Should join. Okay. To have rapid growth. 25% would join every year. So that. Not a small but you got to fight just to maintain. So these new visitors. One great additions latimer very interesting people and it is your responsibility to go and really outraged because a lot of these people are very interesting. Can't decline in membership typically get five to 8% or less of. Visiting people. 5/8 percent of the people that come every week. You are losing membership okay. And so then the next question becomes how do you get people to visit the church. It anymore today i know we've had some things where jane wrote an article are our former. I'm minister and some people came for whatever by the internet is pretty much the main the main way today. And i've done two or three months ago i mention this to nick i did a search and. For unitarian churches in madison madison unitarian churches. Google comes up with 10 on everything. We worked on page 143 well we didn't make the pac-10 and there's only three so for that matter. It in my company and i only know some of the stuff about the internet just because i've just been spending together we get done a few new websites and stuff with my company i have one website that i have searched. 500 800-1000 and i still can't find my company in it. Consistently or two of them that consistently ranked in the top 10 every time. The problem is if you have a website with no content and content is not a calling card saying hi i sell widgets and they're really good quality and here's my address. Divya bhaskar. Nobody that's not contest. Okay everybody can say that and you need to have it needs to be maybe we're engaged in these projects and you have to have more in-depth. Stop about what's going on about going to maybe service projects were involved in and stuff like that and as a side and i don't want too much into it. Internet you know website hits. If we if arts if we changed our website not prairie that stays the same but if we changed our website. 2. Madison unitarian. Dot-com. You would get. Five times more hits than you do right now you can click on that you would still be. Prayer you you i mean i got my company is commercial appraiser.com one of them because people search for commercial appraisers. Add website heads. Not because i'm brilliant but biscuit i got lucky with this name 15 years ago. But there's a few things that can be done that don't cost a lot of money. But website driving and i'm getting people to at least find our thing and then when people do come in. The other. Spider-man s1 e1 it spend more of the time with. Was talking about. Either you can have an outdoor focus or you can have an inward focus that just facetime preservation. And by an outward focus. It's. People are attracted to congregations that are more active in the community and they're more active in the world. Dan. If people are just coming here every week. Here service go home that may not have as much if you're doing things out in the community. For example. Stand-up radically parking lot of food food. Food kitchen that we do suck somewhere. 3 out of 8 so i'm a freaking summer. Pennies for peace. I know i put pennies in almost every time i come i have no clue what it is it's just i'm serious i even though i've invested at least $0.30 in this project i don't know what it is it might be worth having somebody come up and speak. You have. You will make. You have a far better life than 10 if you don't and i know of some projects where people skype that cost nothing you have to get up pretty early in the morning cuz of the time differences would like at 5 or 6 but may not be ready for some but. There are things in guatemala where kids have cleft lips and they're born with cleft lips and there's a service company down there that helps find these people butt and they have guatemala. But maybe that would be something that we can we can be doing there there things are the menominee indian somebody talked to kathryn yesterday about a project that he's interested in hearing wisconsin there's a lot of different programs that we could get involved with. Debt debt for community programs and i'm sure more most more people than me. That have some kind of outward focus. Toward the community and a lot of times for example if you're doing something let's play with. Kitchen india where you're learning to speak. English. Well maybe then that's something that's on the website and in a little more detail and say by the way we have to sentence of this if you have a page on it you maybe started with tracks. People from india to the congregation because that maybe there is nowhere. Get a different social things that could go. So. That is. The. For the two things are three things that i came out with my research was one. You need to. Having our focus instead of just self-preservation and outward focus means reaching out to the community and doing what you can it might mean we need to. Team up with. A rotary for somebody else. To do some of those projects because there's only you know there's only so many of us. and most people are already. You only have so much time and the other is the 100% importance rather obvious that all of our growth comes from visitors. Dad what when that person comes through the door. Would we really have responsibilities to make them welcome and then to. Try to funnel of be no internet. So that is the gist of my. Stop. I think it's important i think that's a good point and a lot of stuff can go on to a website i think it's important as a congregation though that we have at least a few focuses that we are pushing at a societal level i think it's a great idea to put stuff in there. A paragraph doesn't cut it with the search engine. And i think you also have to have a focus a little bit at least on here's to wear for projects that we are actively engaged in. And make sure that you don't go over well maybe it is teaming up with another organization. But at least it's something that we can be pushing and i'll draw people. What's been a bigger trend over over the last 15 or 20 years i think it was going to be somewhat interesting is to see what happens over the next five or ten years as the baby boomers are retiring and force. I know. The only other organization i'm involved it is his rotary in evanston and that has had a pretty stable population for years and last couple years it's all the sudden started bouncing up and i think it's because people that are just retiring are now starting to look. I don't know. But you're right with words clearly fighting declining demographics. In general. I think that's a good point i think it's a very good point and. Having never been to either of the other places in madison i have no clue what their identity is one is very big. So that they visit and see what they want. Choosing 44 things that are doable. And. I just got through that's where we've had some very old website where the technology for searches is changed and we just hired somebody they did very inexpensively any website for us but some of the things that they do now are completely different wear. You want to make sure it's being done with your website. That it is not stuff that cost money every month i don't really go in for that cuz i'm too cheap with my company but the you can do a lot of stuff but we are the only people that are looking at our website i think we're probably missing out because there is a sophistication out there that goes way beyond. What we can do. An actor.

uuprairie_org

Pr160424PAnderson-ed.mp3

Morning, kathy converse i serve as the treasurer and i'm also on the financing program committees here at prairie. Welcome to this morning this day and it's opportunity to be together. First unitarian universalist society it's a place where we come to learn more about being human. We're not here because we figured out why it's questions. Or because we think we've got it right. We come here to learn more about being in a relationship together how to listen how to forgive. How to be vulnerable. How to create trust and compassion in one another and how to live in a socially just. World. We do that well here so not perfectly in this society we strive not for perfection. But for authenticity and connection. Thank you for joining us we welcome people from all races ethnicity sexual orientation family structure and religious background. We have no creed to which members must agree. We rely on wake on our ethical principles to god. Whether it's your first time with us or your 100th time with it we hope he'll find questions that that that stretch you. People to be friends you and liberal religious values that challenge you to join us again. I'd like to welcome any guests we have today. And we will have a time thank you thank you for taking the chance in the time to walk to our doors and join us. Will give time later in the service. To tell us how you arrived here if you so choose. And we look forward to meeting you. Today's service is a continuation of a series and the study of the 7 principles. Set unitarian-universalism affirm and promote. Sedalia presenting principal 7. Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are apart. Ever mentioned again later that the offertory sharing today goes to the road home and the road home provides temporary shelter and meals for homeless families and children while helping families find long-term housing and that is a group that we volunteer with on a regular basis. There is a mysterious cycle in human events to some generations much is given. Another generations much is expected this generation of americans has a rendezvous with destiny. Franklin d roosevelt 1936. Do they ever mention the rendezvous with destiny but we're talking about the seventh principle. I don't think we could have anyone more qualified to talk to us about this i'm going to take a moment because. The wonderful thing about being layla society as we get to know more about people that was he. Every week think we might not know. A peter anderson here has a bachelor's degree in the labor economics from cornell university. And a master's in land resource economics from an industrial organization in the solid waste industry from the university of wisconsin-madison. Peter was the president of recyclables consulting. Executive director of the center for competitive waste industry and project director for the multi-state plastic redesign project. He's been a senior lecturer at the university of wisconsin department of applied economics on recycling systems. Chairperson of the national recycling coalition. Policy work group and its landfill subcommittee. Spinner landfill consultant for the grassroots recycling network. Phyllis from the keynote panel speaker of epa's national bioreactor conference remember this pure review committee and landfill responsibility for greenhouse gases and climate change. Peter's widely published she's also prepared major independent evaluations of landfill financial assurance for the california integrated waste management board and another run landfill gas is contribution to greenhouse gases for the epa. Peters also a frequent speaker at technical solid waste conferences. And most importantly. Peter is the person who started the dane dances. Daily cafe. Phyllis you make it irritating. Play david david david david david. I'm a big 12 physicality that is honor the spring the bugs that are merging. Listen to return of life to the midwest. With his temperatures in the winter is something that we all think but the emergence of the buds the reason i'm mentioning this used to be. In terms of the vernal equinox should be a month or six weeks later. And i looked around the room and we started. All the youngins. 456 years old. And when they reach the age of slitherio agust folks here with gray hair. The compression of our seasons is going to be suction spring. With the emergence of the buds. Will occur so much soon it will coincide with the equinox. We thought about. We always think about what we see around us not in the technical sense reread. In the science books but in what are our our senses tell us. And we've had the unfortunate fact. For action. The climate change has coming away. That is been focused so far in the winter. And not in the summer so people like us. In the temperate regions. School may not always. Love to have the wing length of the winter's that we have. Have looked upon the climate change that we see with our senses. Which is warm the winter. Substantially over in degree fahrenheit. But not very much in the summer is something benign and it affects the way we react to the challenges we have. Before easter. I want to just put some some things down as markers hood i don't. How much force is preachy vanilla matheson. And that is. If you remember after the bp tragedy. Who's winning the industry ruin some people are really furious during the during the comment.. About about this petroleum who was it. And i sold as true when i got up and i was like being a crunch berry and i said. That's fine i'm good to holler at bp but who amongst us. Has gotten rid of their second car. I thought about her for prius 2. Before i got the prius i used to drive about eight thousand miles a year. And after i got the prius. Just like fourteen thousand miles a year. Anyway. Mommy and i are going home in the car said not open my big mouth where we going to do about it. So we can show our principles. Well that was how we going to get a chance to see his girlfriend and how we going to do this how we going to that. You can't imagine a list of excuses we trimmed up. How much do ruminating through those excuses today 6. Years later. I'm someone who understands. Climate changes into midway i'm saying this. Emphasize that we're all. Culpable of being homo sapiens. Cuz homosapiens. We're wired. In a very poor way. For the challenge that we face. Just want again. And that was yes we see challenges that are immediate when the lion is jumping into. The village. But we don't see challenges when they're slowly coming down the road. And there and it's just waiver wire. If it was. Attack on pearl harbor. Delivery at. But we're just not reacting and it's nice to say it's the koch brothers urus exxon. But we all have. These limitations unless we confront the fact. We can't just point fingers. We have to get something going that reflects our own infirmities. In ourselves as well we're not going to make progress. Doesn't want to mention is. Well it's as funny as your racial a couple years ago to remember how many. But you better side comment. Add a stop at able to put it inside. And that was you were wondering why it is that the evangelical churches. Have so many more people going to the third world and helping. In the poor villages. Then we do claim this high moral. Frame. Ennis. Let me on a path i become more and more convinced i know it may appear in religious but i'm only a religious. Has to organized religion. I've nothing against spirituality. When we evolve it from ourselves and our community. And i'm becoming more and more of the view. That they have. To ourselves be willing to leave our comfort zones. And score like the thing about lucy was religious history of self-flagellation. We're never going to rise to that moral frame. It will tear that we all aim for. I want to mention is i don't. Speak here. With a. Define. Worldview to simply. Hand down from the mountain. Remember when i taught a class. If university. After i left the activist world in wisconsin's environmental decade. On how to be an activist. And the first year i taught the course at the university i taught the kids. Had a lobby and how to litigate. Tallest kind of normal mechanical things that go into becoming an activist. And the second-year i said i don't want to do the same thing again that would be boring. And i saw a. Article in time magazine that year. About 20-somethings was headhunted twenty-something quoted. I do apologize for my voice i'm very sick but i couldn't. Michelin go on. In a 20-something kids. Black parents screw the world up for my generation. And it's hurting me they said my parents was talking about me and my generation. I said who the heck i don't working 90 hours a week for twenty bucks. Who the heck does he have a right to say things like that enough. Milliliter to me. My generation said the same thing about. My parents generation. Which led me to ask how do you how do you turn the world how do you move mountains as opposed to this spadefish. And i wound up saying to the class let's try and figure this out. Books about historical jesus and about sigmund freud. Civilization is discontent. Google a suitable journey together. Without knowing where the destination way. And i think for the kids in that class it was far more interesting. And for more valuable. To have a journey of mutual exploration and that's why i want to do today. I wish now. The dave johnson was still here. But maybe rick should help. I once went to a oliver sex talk. And he took his coat off. He went like that. But i do think in terms of where we need to think about what really resonated with me in that religious context. Remember i think it was three years ago there was that bitter cold at overwhelmed funeral most shelters in madison we were asked to set up an ad-hoc shelter overnight. I think many of you as i was came in and got the pillows in the blankets and everything set up. We felt very good about ourselves doing that. All different forget is dorothy. I'm sorry sitting out here but dorothy. Took one of those bugs home with her. And i wasn't sure like i'm not trying to sugarcoat it. But there's something fundamentally different. In terms of our spirituality. When we just helped. Weather arms-length helping people who need help. Then we bring them home. And share our table with them. End. It's like a welfare system. It's always we we vote to have a bill passed on an appropriation may but we're not there with the people who need help. And i wonder whether. If we want to be spiritual i think that's one of the things that really resonated with so many of you. We have to search about. To do that truly achieve that it's not just enough to have. Principles. We have to go beyond the principles on our foundation but we have to go far beyond that. And it starts with leaving that comfort zone. All the issues. Interconnected with that web of life in the seventh principle. Other than the possible avoidance of nuclear annihilation. Wish for those of us of my age. Preoccupied society in the fifties with the. Bomb shelters. The issue of climate change and global warming. Is. The elephant in the room is the anger lb gorilla we. Of the public so we'd understand that we're being fed. By the scientific and political community. Problem. And we're being fed that. Because the powers-that-be. And the very sincere midas scientist believe. And if we were told what was the actual facts of the situation. People become so discouraged. But nothing could be done. And that's been the policy this been going on. Since the issues became paramount with the last major. El nino event in 1998. When temperature spiked. Intentionally got it directed to to climate change. But you have to say to yourself. Is that the approach this working. If we had acted. In a galvanized way in 1998. The things that need to have been done. Would have been feasible. I would have not required revolutionary change. Those twenty years we've wasted. Did the bush administration. Mr. obama's first term in office when he was too worried about re-election toadface. And was a republican tea party reaction to his spinal attempts to do so in the second term. Those twenty years have been disastrous waste. Ammonia produced by making people not get upset. Italian people. Soften the future. By suggesting that all we need to do to make the changes. Is live in. Lead. Rated a fancy efficiency rated mcmansions. I'm driving a nissan v. And that's what we need to do and otherwise live the same consumptive world we live in now. It's a very simple thing that's the story that people haven't also being tall. What is it produced. This is very much like the. Srs welding third man the cuckoo-clock. Who produced the paris treaty. In the paris treaty. Is good in the sense that at least the world governments tint. And in discord. I'm a fuse to talk to each other. But unfortunately. The word treaty. And although luciana's going to be extended to it. Have suggested that this progress. Well there's only progress because we turned the bombers moynihan we redefined tumnus. And what we have is a statement of 192 countries promises. All the fine in different terms. Apples and oranges. Most of the key ones which were repudiated. Upon the leaders return. To their country. Prime minister modi india. We can sue a. Tons of carbon. A year. In america. An india 1.5. 125. But when he got back. Start 2400. Do. Coal plant. Being. Built right now or inactive stages of planning. Which would release. 6 trillion tons of carbon dioxide a year when built. And modi and he has to remember to survive as a prime minister's is our business model for politics. In a democratic or or acrylic societies have to keep people. Belly's feeling happy. And he's promised to bring electricity to almost four villages that how much are they. And he's came back and later said we're not going to change one iota of those plans for coldplay. But even if you ignore all that. Ignore the fact that there's no enforcement mechanism. This is rita's pretended everything specified in that treaty we're done. In terms of the goal that's been said to not exceed and increasing our temperatures of 2 degrees fahrenheit in centigrade. And that's when the other killers things about this discussion. None of us know what the heck centigrade is. I wish they would keep it in fahrenheit if you're not going to convert an s 3.6 degrees. And the thought has been. That if we keep our temperature increase over. Pre-industrial times. To 3.6 degrees fahrenheit. The temperature will not run out of control. I weekend. Temperature control and we can stabilize things on a viable basis. But. The. Promises made in. In the paris treaty or let-go have to weigh. To that 2° limit. Headed back with producing increasing 4° that's good or 7.6. Degree increase fahrenheit. I never just a couple degrees is what turns changed it since the global temperatures on averages. Is what distinguishes us from what was the ice age before you. The small numbers are enormously significant. There's been enough for degrees with me. Which has not been seen on earth computer million years. Would be a sea level rise. Of 6.7 ft high. Persistent route over 40% of the surface. I have two species would go extinct. In point of fact. Most of the real science analysis show that 2-degree thing. As a goal was only put forward in 1992. Because it seem far enough out. Will it be when i am no longer in office. But have no scientific basis we are. How to exactly. We are that in terms of the jargon of climate change and turn to how much carbon dioxide. Is in the atmosphere. In pre-industrial times was about 280 parts per million. Spell reason to 400 parts per million four-in-one parts per million. And we have to go back. 23a 50 parts-per-million to get to a stable and a stable. Future for our kids. Got it turns your dying but in terms of a world being capable. Sustaining a civilization. So the idea that this. Sugarcoating is the way to get. The public response to overcomer sinopsis and act on a long-term. Child existential challenge. Clearly. It's not working. And if it's not working. Maybe the response it is appropriate to treat people as house. And talked. The folks. About exactly what is going on. What's going on in shrimp. Is that there's enormous inertia. In. Weather and climate. And what that means for us is the weather increased racine. Anderson. Ring, bye week or two earlier now. Is. For the increase in carbon dioxide. About 20 or 30 years ago. So we're seeing what was seeing what. They would love those levels. Produce. 2020 the amount of co2 in the atmosphere was 45 2/3 and 60 parts per million. You can imagine what's going to happen. When the increase happy happy early. Consistently. Syphilis was coming down the pipe and all the coal plants being built. The. I remember also and i was very much i hadn't been aware this until this study that came out. The strain. Yeah. I came out to this two days ago in nature climate mount magazine was point out that the increasing temperatures in the temperate regions of the north america. She mentioned earlier. Have been focused on warming in the winter and very little in this summer. And that disparity in terms of their way climate breaks out. Is it bad to reverse. And so we're going to see. Is not a benign side of climate change in the cold climate. But the very worst side of it. That's what's coming down the pike. The second thing to understand is that. Most of the way with what environmental and pollution issues in the passes if there's a problem. We don't get to it today will put the scrubber on the smokestack next year. We'll clean it up when we get there we got the process to work. There is no. Totowa. And it's alright. Solution to climate changes like. Taking the metal for a bathtub. With a stopper in it long as it's very very small leak. So is that bathtub fills up. It's not raining out. And the carbon dioxide that we're printout when we drove and i drove and all enjoyed drove here today. It's going to be in the tailpipe is going to be in the atmosphere. So probably something like a thousand years. So if we don't act. Exceptionally immediately. There is no going back through the problems with creating are irreversible. And in addition to that. And the best example of the snakes point. Is methane. We can set off change of reactions positive feedback loops. Pet become irreversible and keep on feeding. More warming gases into the atmosphere. And so in the shallow seas of the arctic. And in the permafrost is three times as much carbon. Is in the atmosphere. It was laid down in time in geological time to fix before. Hillary is been locked up right now in the permafrost in the ice. But one of the slaves that climate change has acted. Is it's been focused on samara just not even around the globe. And one of the feedback loops. Is in the arctic. As the ice melts or some ice melt you have more ocean exposed. Information e-surface have a dark surface. The absorbing more sunlight. And that creates a feedback loop and so far we've been seeing a degree difference. Herein are latitudes. Haven scene. 5 degrees. In the arctic. I love that means is the permafrost is melting. And that methane is coming out no reason why that is so frightening. Is methane is a is a greenhouse gas on steroids. And in the short term and has. 86 *. The warming impact. Of co2 per molecule. And. If we don't stop the warming that is not going to be able to stop screwing irreversible. Florida score.. Is. There is a lot that could be done in terms of efficiency gains here as long as we don't. Overcome them by buying bigger football tvs when you get something more efficient. Sorry about. Obtaining see we have. But we have to remember. Set. River indians 1.52. Tons of carbon released. Prepare for capita. We are 19. Europe is about 9. And the people in india. Just like you're saying today with the people in china. Are not willing to live. His presence any longer. Had a free say. To china. We want we want a global warming treaty. I wish we went to buy we're going to commit ourselves to buy these led. Rated mcmansion. We're going to switch from our cars to these. V. And you stay where you are. His presence. You think they're going to sign object you know. Without a global treaty. There's no way this to address climate change. The only way to globally address climate change. Is the recognized at the other right. Come up to the standards of living we have. And what that means in terms of the obligations on us. If we were in the next 20 years. To cut our emissions of carbon in half. Through efficiency gains and renewable energy. We might reduce after population gained our emissions by 3.3 billion metric tons of carbon per year. And that's if we ignore the fact that we often times had this rebound effect to get bigger football tv. And holographic screens. Better to take the 2.7 billion peasants in shining lifestyle. Even with that efficiency gains wrapped into it as an assumption. That would be 13 times greater. Increase that we would be saving. And what that means in simple english. Is that stuff you're being fed about all we got to do is get those. Alleviated hot mcmansions. Is not true. If we're going to accommodate. The rest of the world which is essential ingredients are global treaty. We have to live simple lives and our kids are going to be living. In apartments in urban areas without cars or maybe just have. Car services for occasional use. And maybe m once-a-week all those kind of things. But the key thing i want to point out when i try it and say to my colleagues were all wet it's good idea don't tell the truth. Sugarcoat it. And i'd point out the difference between whittier going to. Have a whitney winning. Message. By talking like george w bush after. 911 you said go shopping. Or when your head. Churchill safe i'm not going to promise you anything except blood. Sweat and tears. And remember for all the consumption that we do. Cuz i don't think this is a very. Scary message if we just get indignant. All of the. Consumption we've expended mms think about we have doubled. Our consumption since 1970 and we weren't like we were dying is living in cave in 1970. Our happiness is gone down consumption does not mean happiness. Ultimately. The thing that brings happiness. Is not living on a glass tip. And in the sucking down that can something. It's being adrian something for something bigger than ourselves and what is bigger than ourselves. Then our kids. What is. It's a story that can be told so that when i wanted to wrap up and leave some time for people to. React. Is. Coming back to that message that i keep on believing. How much your profile b is that we have to get. Willingness. To get out of our comfort zone. And leap into life and be willing to get the. To make the kite up extravagant efforts. To get the systemic change is essential. If our kids are going to have a livable world. And just to give it an example what i mean so it's not. Adjust rhetoric. Is. Maybe remember those golden 1. Walden tuition aloha restore. Maple rita walden three. 4 people go into communities and show that you can live a simpler life. Doing this for your kids and be perfectly happy. And maybe the capture of instead of having his. Always talking and having issues luxury. Escapes in in costa rica. Maybe he can come and visit to. But. Rabbit one kind of way of saying i'm going to leave my comfort zone. To provide a role model for what the world can do. I'm a member of 350. org and what we're doing there. Is opposing the physicality of of the climate assaults from the pipelines. To take the physicality and raise it up. We're putting our bodies on the line by being arrested. But whatever it is that you feel you want to do. I think we can start with our principles. But ultimately they have to leave our comfort zones. If we're going to be religious moral spiritual people. And nothing. Why climate changes every repelis. To do so before. We are. You think for a stable here but the earth is rotating now. Around this axis of 1070 miles an hour. The earth orbits the sun at 66th and uintah. Baby rider. The. The solar system hurdles to the milky way at 5 in the 60,000 miles an hour. In our galaxy relative to the galaxies near us. Cruise through space 26 minutes 71000 miles an hour and i went to school with carl sagan was at cornell there's a lot of talk about life being prolific around the universe. I don't know if it is. You think about how cold rusty or space is seems to me it's a very rare and special thing. And this little planet everest and the hampden. His unique. And we have to value. Pennsylvania we have to get out of our chairs. And figure out something to do and i know people here than i excite all of us and do stuff thank you so much. It's a trillion. Was curious song so if we reduce our emissions down to 1970s. Do we still have a problem with population yes but i think. If you compare the effective. Population growth. With consumption. With consumption morris celeste saying population isn't an issue. I'm saying it's the issue its subsidiaries or how much we consume and the problem i feel. Is that we have defined our success and our happiness. On the basis of how much we consume. How to spell problem. Coming young buster's this is a population issue. That's a buzzword. They catch. Datavisor global. Dialogue. Cuz you're saying. My. Problem area is not on the table for discussion it's just your problem. But i'm saying. The biggest one is consumption. And also. Took to do this. To make a response that would both be out of it for our country. To climate. In terms of decarbonizer economy. But also for the rest of the world that that would be. Is living in apartments. In urban air in urban areas. Using mass transit for most here. Trips. Cars for occasional. Using much less meat. Those are beautiful. Much less meat. M enormous faxes biggest transportation. Bear and son people. Kcr on this issue. I agree with the nuclear proponents. That the. Arguments used. Free climate change are not adequate to dismiss nuclear power it needs. Have a second look. But when i gave it a second look. It doesn't. Requital. Dishes are bigger than the us. Because unless you. You can transport electricity across the ocean. Got to build a plan. At the population centers you talking about massive numbers of power plants. In india. Cambodia. Nigeria. And. If you follow it all the way corruption is rampant. I'll take the bhopal tragedy. And how sensitive nuclear power is. I can't sit and operation. Once you recognize that. Being pro rico remains a global into the third world i can show you can make a case. For it. But i want to recognize something. The nuclear power people properly play now. Add soren winter intermittent. We can overcome when you go to and bring under the hood. We can overcome the intermittency from. Day and night because it is affordable number two favorite little things work. To have stories for night time. Public talk about a week. A prolonged. Cloudy weather. And indulge rooms. You're not going to be able to be like if you're not in the sahara going to have a city where has 100. Snow truck plow trucks. To build storage storages. A hundred times more expensive than that. Solar system. Choice fitness. To be fair to the luther people want to fly profi stability. If you go renew about your decarbonise without nuclear and of course without coal and gas. You're going to have to have times when you going to have. No. Central power. And i think to myself i was trying to get real by religious thing around me. We live in crestwood. Animal last plowed cuz it's dead ends. And so every other year we have a couple times what's the price of your words by three days were locked in. You're going to have to the biggest problem here is not. Einstein is just brilliance was recognized the speed of light with constant. Worcester say the number to figure out what to do about it. You said well maybe x not constant. Right now we have electricity is always on it doesn't have to be always on you can live with it. It won't be a high-energy. Girl. Ookala me but is that more important than having your world for kids. Well i do i get to for a field but the the. A process is used to use it up. So it's not so dangerous are very. Risky because they bringing the issue of nuclear proliferation. And so you're talkin about geological disposal. That processing took atomium is very dangerous internship liberation but. Look i think the talk about that more later so i can get other people to talk about this for sure. Let me suggest this nuclear power is not realistic the wager show. It's just a pundit issue. It's so expensive. Deployed in the third world where has to be to make any sense. So it's just. I would suggest we spend our limited time my feeling as my personal thing doug. Not. Entertainments just not giving it to credence that it deserves. That kind of attention. Because it's never going to rise to that level where's going to go do they call these wedges. Cr9 wedges are going to do to. Car decarbonized. Conveniently without changing our standard of living. And. Because it's so expensive. Even with the subsidies. And because it takes so long to complete. And it's not going to be it's just not as. I don't disagree do about the extra room as a real. Long-term threat. To getting things done on this week. Consumer. I respect the way i look at it from my perspective. I think we need to focus every ounce of energy we can. Interchanging people's heads. About what we just fine as successfully aim to pursue. And. The only sane advertise like i said 20 times the rich fact i'm just not trying to say you're wrong receive the risk factor that focused. Is you. About the civil rights movement. Keep your eyes on the prize. Little balls that are discussions and actions of stretching outside our comfort zone and start making positive changes. 4 hour and the next-generation destiny thank you again. Joy coffee.

uuprairie_org

Pr191208SteveCarpenter-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome. I'm 29 remember prairie unitarian universalist society my pronouns are she her and hers. Hurry is church done differently. We enjoy our discussions. We dress casual and our services are informal. During our services it's not unusual to see somebody knitting. Somebody taking notes or somebody nodding off. Or somebody correcting a lighter mistakes. Arkham gang nations religious pluralism runs the gamut. Including. Humanism atheist. As well as a religious in the spiritual. We strive to be welcoming to all ages all religious backgrounds. All abilities and inability and whatever your sexual or gender identity. Ruu principles boiled down for children are. Each person is important. Be kind and all you do. We're free to learn together and search for what is true. All people need a voice. Build-a-bear in peaceful world. We care for our slight bow. Are opening words this morning will be read by patty stockdale. And this holiday season may the darkness of winter vidas field in this festival of lights. And may the darkness of ignorance be dispelled in the strength of compassion reason and sharing. This morning chris porter will read our global chalice lighting. This is from reverend ariana hall from the unitarian christian church in indonesia. Call. The lord not only gave this earth to humankind for their workspace but also to take care of it. It is a pity that humanity forgets and ignores the caring of this world. Climate change makes earth language and the people suffer. It is not enough for us just to deepen our spirituality. It is not enough for us to serve good to humanity. We are also called to ignite hope for the future generations. But they will still have this earth. Is there a prosperous and future fruitful home. Not to language and fading away ground. We laid our tails today. Withhold. Prayer and commitment. That we will take part in keeping this a sig sustainability of this earth. We make this calling part of our spirituality. That we will take off our responsibility. And well. The other two also take responsibility. Care for this earth and save it from climate crisis. Harper's letter this morning is stephen carpenter and he is. An emeritus director. Yeah director. And steven alfred forms professor. Of the center for limnology at the university of wisconsin. Madison. His current research topics are control and dynamics of bloom of. Cyanobacteria blue-green algae. In our legs. Cause of collapsing recreational fisheries. And local trade-offs among energy food and water resources. Carpenters research has been recognized. By international awards including the stockholm. Water prize. Anna model. Prize. And the research awards are professional societies is a member. Other us national academy of sciences. And a former member of the royal swedish academy of science. Thank you penny and very happy to be here i'm coming to get the penny called for silent meditation my computer went into silent at. Okay. I'm i'm here to tell you about a project that a group of us shown and i'm not going to go through all the names you may know some of these people a group of us started this project in 2009 at uw-madison to begin to bring the public and scientists together. To think about the future of the lakes what do we want. For the legs and what do we want for the land around them. I'm going to give you a summary of where we are with that project. How many people know what a watershed is. Oh that's pretty good okay is the area of land that collect water for a river or lake and so our watershed. Is this area here around madison lakes this is a different image of the same thing this one it's an air photo this one shows land use land cover by different colors this is the mississippi watershed. Mississippi river watershed and where that little red blip right there so watersheds are in each other we're just a small part of the mississippi watershed and you can see we the pink harry is irvin and your buneary is concentrated among around these two headwater lakes mendota monona. And most of the rest of the land is agriculture which is yellow and there are few tiny little patches of native vegetation in the in the area one of them is uw arboretum. Right here. We don't have much. Any anymore. And really understand a body of water. Start with its watershed. Almost everything that goes on in that water can be explained by events in the watershed. And we got challenges in our watershed that you probably know from reading the newspaper we're losing agricultural land. Our population is increasing fairly quickly because dean county is very prosperous economically compared to other counties around us at most and rest of wisconsin. Should we have urban development pressure that's taking farmland away. There's increasing demand for biofuels 40% of our agricultural production now is used for industrial feedstocks it's not it doesn't feed anything. Used. For most of it to make fuel for automobiles. We've got lots of impact of climate change they are all around us i'll show you a few in the talk and we're seeing increasing flooded increasing numbers of floods the the rivers are going over there banks the lakes are going over there banks more often simply because when he's big. Cursive big storms and clustered storms that we're seeing more of in this is creating. Quite a bit quite a challenge for managing the lakes. Our water quality problems are most evident. Two people to walk around the legs and sneeze fix gums. Lg. And this is a picture i took right outside the center for allen ology where i work and they're pretty common these are. Composed of cyanobacteria the most ancient organism most ancient plants on earth and they're still around they make toxins called cyanotoxins which are very deadly. Are liver toxins or nerve toxins and you should stay away from. The water when there are men make sure your pet stay away. Humans are not too likely to drink that water but your pets might need to end and it can kill them. We had as far as i know we only have one human fatality. Trump drinking water in. A lot of pee. And. So these. These are these toxins blooms of these toxic. Floating plants are caused mainly by phosphorus phosphorus inputs to the lake. Are the principal cause. The science scientific term for that is low in phosphorus load is the amount of phosphorus it comes in. In a year. And this curve shows. About 20 years of inputs from two of our major streams the horror river in pheasant branch and there is no downward trend. Even though upwards of twenty-five million dollars have been spent to reduce phosphorus in wood. There's no trend. Not a reducing it and we continue to have the algae problems. There are two main reasons that phosphorus input is not. Decreasing one is the soils are now rich in phosphorus so the since we started using fertilizer heavily after wwii we've had several decades to build up really high concentrations in the soil and those are not decreased by probz very quickly. And we're getting bigger raised and the rains are coming in clusters and those big clusters. raines drive a lot of soil erosion. Have a lot of phosphorus movement into the legs. So the question we asked was. How could changes in the way we use land. Changes in the climate. And changes in human demand for land and food resources and so on impact. Future generations in our watershed ecosystem services is just a technical word for things you get free from nature. Like food. Drinkable water breathable air. And the project was started formally in 2010 we took a 60-year time horizon now to 2070 we pitch 60 years because we thought most people could relate to 60 years most people knew their grandparents. And and the difference in age between you and your grandparents is probably around 60 years and most people eater know their grandchildren or hope to know their grandchildren some. And that's. Also is 60 years fan so we felt 60 years with something people could deal with. Have some intuition. So we wanted to start even though this wasn't a science project we wanted to build it around things people wanted to know about the ro we. We started from the principle that we need to engage the public. School project needs to be a conversation with a public. We will let that conversation motivate the science that we do. So we wanted to start by gathering perspectives. From people about the future the watershed. And of course there are lots of respect is we could not talk individually with all 372 thousand people in the watershed we had to have a way. Sampling them. And so we. I'll wink wink. Creators of a random sample of people in the watershed people's names were chosen by lottery and we went into their offices or their kitchen tables and we interview them and we also have workshops about 15 or 20 people and the workshops were on campus we had coffee and snacks and we use the workshops and again these will randomly assembled groups of people. And we use the workshops to talk about center of the lakes kinds of questions that we ask for what are your hopes for the region. How do you hope it comes out. Buy 2070. How do you order your fears. What concerns him how do you. How might it turn out that would be bad. Like to avoid. What do you want to preserve what are the things about the region that you think are really good. It should be carried forward in the future. What would you like to change what are the things about the region you wish were different and how would you like to change him. What what about the region do you think is resilient. Either words. And what is unstable. Unstable things are changeable. And so we had all these conversations individual offices and kitchen tables and with small groups in in workshops and we gathered a lot of feedback. And. We sat down without information. And assholes what are are there clusters of beliefs about how to proceed. Are there really 372 thousand different viewpoints or are these are there clumps of people who. The same way it turned out there were. And what are the differences between the clusters so what makes the clusters similar and what makes him different. We went back and forth repeatedly with the data and we argue. About this quite a bit. Once we pick dark. Clusters. We constructed a plausible story about the logical consequences of the beliefs that went into each cluster. So is this cluster is really the way the world works in the way things are going to go. How will that play out by 2070 and we iterated many many times we hit we went back to the people we interviewed over and over again and asked are we doing this right are we getting. Are we moving in the right direction. So. In summary. We constructed a sample. People we didn't hear you all 370 2000. And. God. We we. Went through those questions about their believes hopes and fears about the future. The cluster the samples and we condensed it 24 stories about the future. Y4. I will. Some of you may be professors or teachers i spent my wife is a professor teacher and one of the rules of teaching is rule of hand. The rules hand is that if you have a group of undergraduates for 45 minutes you can get across at most five things. That's all you can say. 5. Deadmau5. It doesn't have to be. Sort of standard teaching 101. Another thing that we have found i've done these sorts of exercises all around the world and i did a global iran a global exercise or exercise for the whole planet nearly 2,000 so i have a lot of experience with these scenario exercises and one of the things i found. They don't want to think about the variability they want to know about. The one that's right in the middle. And if you pick an odd number. Then it becomes pretty obvious what the middle one is so it can't be an odd number. We can't have one. And it into is not enough so we picked for us it's as simple as that that's how we came up with so it's really impossible to tell. Which one we think is true or the most realistic the most accurate. It's just four different views of the world. And you have to embrace that diversity to understand. The message of the scenarios. So we are rated with stakeholders to make the stories better and better and through this phase where do it weird there's no masters no computer programs it's just stories so we're telling stories with people and we're developing aren't. Four different stories and we. Iterated with folks until we thought we had the stories just about right we gave him names i'll say a little bit more about what the names mean in a minute and. And eve story was was organized around a central question so a story called abandonment and renewal was motivated by the question what if we don't adapt to climate and social pressures on land and water what if we just don't do it don't do anything. Second one was what if we increase our investment in education green technology and better land and water mix management. And in fact green technology is a possible development angle. For this region. Are we all we have a great deal of science capacity and we have a lot of people interested in in natural resources we could develop a green technology industry right here to just imagine that and played it out. 3rd wind sports nutrition generational shift. Toward values that embrace environmental stewardship. And the fact there are indications that that is happening. There's a project called the global values project you can go to the website and read about they may take a random sample of values of peoples in a large number of countries and they do it every 10 years so you get a dick hayloft sample. Host of people's values and young people definitely have stronger environmental values than older people do you can see and is very that's very clear in the united states. Singapore tractor with sample there was a study published in the new york times this week showing the age distribution of support. Fraction on climate change and it's the younger people who want to do something about it for for the most part so there was just a really strong shift toward toward conservation values toward of stewardship of the planet. A fourth for ourselves and. And then the final once is what is governance changed at at federal and state levels so that clean freshwater was valued as a resource. So essentially clean fresh water becomes a crop. Farmers are rewarded for producing clean freshwater as a crop. We looked at the logical consequences of each of those four stories. Once the stories were developed we link them to computer models. And i'm not going to go through this in great detail but we spent a lot of time on this a couple of papers about it and basically the idea was connect the narratives to the models see what the models say and then asked if the narratives need to be changed so. And if the models say that we should change the stories because we do 50 physically impossible stories so we went back and forth. I'm simply showing you this to show you that there's a whole lot of styles i'm not going to go home. Panda. Show you some of the things they account for. So we came up with quantitative projections. For each of the four scenarios for 2010 to 2072 now we've got the stories we've got the card and now we actually say what what's going to happen. Weather land use transportation. Livestock. Farmland management. Scenarios. What's going to go on with food production. Carbon storage round water storage and groundwater quality. Surface surface water quality. Cyanobacteria blooms natural ecosystems. All of those things were put together for that 60 year. are you with misses. And neva we've now got quite a few products online and you're free to go to this website all this stuff is free there's no just download whatever you want. You can look at the stories with illustrations. We have a short video of each story about 5 minutes or so if you'd rather see a video then read his story and by the way each story is written about the length of an article in atlantic magazine and it was written by a real writer. We have a reader's guide for book clubs church groups and so on that that helps you decide how you might. Compare and contrast the stories of questions that you might. Ask each other as you read the stories we have blog posts and videos about the process and findings we. We're out of money now so we don't have a staff anymore but we had a blog that was a weekly. Blog that had a lot of interesting stories about the lakes in who's still exist. We had a writing contest you may have noticed that with madison magazine in wisconsin public radio and the three winning stories were read on wpr there were stories about the future of madison madison in 2017. And andy were published in madison magazine so those stories were still out there a wisconsin public tv did a tv show about our project. It's an hour-long special and if you missed it the the link to it is that are at our website so. Watch this. Story on your computer dozens of interviews and public presentations we presented model results to technical staffs of the relevant agencies the city the county. Lots of technical papers theses we graduated about a dozen students who. Diaspora this method and they've gone for. Greater glory and universities if you were four agencies and and as a result of his project. Sohhwhatchathink is there from the project you could you could look at it if you like now i'm going to give you some results really quickly these are the climate analogues for the scenarios in 2070 so each. Which scenario is it's as if madison moved further south right because of climate change. And there's a fairly modest one that just takes us south of chicago. Another one takes us to arkansas some someone mentioned are going on vacation to arkansas you can just wait. Indiana looking back on the project remember we started this in 2009. And we pick climate scenarios that were sort of middle-of-the-road for 2009 and they're too mild we should have the projections now are much worse than they were in 2009 and models are dead on so there is it's unlikely that those more severe projections or is it the result of a defect in the models is that emissions of greenhouse gases are worse than we thought they would be. 2009 so we would if we're doing this project now we would be going further south. Why wouldn't you be going north. Because we're not going to work. Our climate is. Climate that we live in now is going north well that's a good question the people are pretty much going to stay at home because they already bought their house and whatnot and their neighbors are here until the climate is moving over us that rather us chasing the client. And i apologize for my cuddle we always saying it. Is this making sense. All right talk a little bit about some of the results the. These are this slideshows annual maximum lake levels in lake monona that the dash line is what's typically considered a flooded and i'm not going to go through these in detail but you can see that there are. Lots of floods here. Here's an example of one of the floods this is a map of one of the flooded area is so quite a bit around lake wingra quite a bit around lake monona and a lot of the isthmus and up toward the airport. Is flooded those are low-lying areas. Show this map to the city engineer. He said. Can't show that in public. That occurred at the storm occurred on the 20th of august. 2018 so you may remember it very intense storm and it fell a lot of the rain with right over lake mendota. At lake mendota was high anyways so the center of the storm for a. of time when it was raining hard was right over lake mendota which is the worst possible situation for getting a flood. And so here is our prediction that i just showed you of the flooded area in the escapists and here's what actually happened and i just took this off the newspaper webpage actually it was constant state journal webpage the blue is flooded areas. It's not bad. Not bad and so even though we were told that we shouldn't show anybody this craft it happened a couple years after we ran the model creation. So. We we. And we have a lot of low-lying areas this area was historically very wet. And as precipitation goes up. And if we get more big storms and the storms are bunched up. What's cluster storm clusters often. Can this damage we can expect more flooded it's just going to be. The way it goes so i'm sorry if i offended anyone from the realty industry but if your realtor what you can do is say bye on higher ground. Okay and this i apologize for this because it has a statistic on it but i just want to show the wee-wee. Calculated the effects of different factors on phosphorus input to the lake so here is phosphorus input truth isn't branch after a big storm so i'm talking about this kind. Importance of phosphorus and ask what are the factors that control it. Print out and land-use actually. You know whether the land is a farm or a suburban area or native vegetation. Doesn't matter all that much land management matters a lot. The weather of farnaz nanage for grazing. Versus. Say heavy animal production in a concentrated animal feeding operation. That matters a lot. A big impact. The average climate doesn't really matter that much. So you know where we're going with the average is no he didn't matters the warmer average and wetter average matters but what really matters is the extremes and we're getting more big rainfall events and they're coming in packages so with the extremes not the average the really causing the increase in phosphorus to the lakes said okay yeah i wondered if i should show something label partial r squared. Superchick precipitation and extremes to this is the. Precipitation in millimeters per year so. 1970s which is about 40 in. So this is about 40 in. Apologize for using mm. Even though clients going to change we're not going to move all the way to europe. This graph shows the 10-year return level in millimeters per day so return level is the essentially the size of a 10-year storm. India of a store on a storm that would be the biggest storm in 10 years. That's the way you think it is. So the biggest storm in a decade. Statistically is going up. Pretty steadily and this is not trivial the difference from here to here is about an inch. So the biggest storm in a decade is getting bigger in an extra inch of rain. In an extreme storm matters a lot. This is another one i may regret showing and stop me if i should not show it. This is the precipitation return level in millimeters. Or the return time in years and this is the phosphorus in food return level in kilograms per day so same kind of analysis for phosphorus. So will take a return time is 10 years. That's about 100. Mm is switches for in and let's read up and see how much phosphorus that is here. Here read over here. That's about. 90000 kg of phosphorus. In one storm 90000 kg of phosphorus is. 25% of the typical annual load. So that's a huge storm. And we're going to get more of those. That that's that's all this means is that the trend toward more big storms is going to mean more pig father has inputs. Water quality. Here in in general well. Explain this via we measure water quality with the easiest way to measure this with something called a second disc and you can think of a dinner plate on a rope and you lower the dinner plate down into the lake and you measure the depth where you can't see it anymore and that's called the second death and the deeper it is the clear the water is with me okay. In the lakes. As you can see they're about the size of a football. Be a fairly clear water in the second dip disc disappears pretty deep in lake but we have very few of them actually happened with the disc out of the lake. So. What's going on with. Well if we could reduce agricultural runoff that would make the biggest difference i'm simply pointing out that this animal makes a difference as well. The best thing we could do. Control. And i can see if we're running short on time i can skip the animals.. We had very few daphnia we hadn't much poor water quality and at that time we had very few game fish in the leg in a lot of small fish so with few game fish a lot of small fish these small fish. To change fishing regulations and stock a bunch of game fish in lake mendota and greatly increase the number of large predatory fish in the lake simply by changing fishing regulations and stocking practices and as a result. We had a very quick response decrease in amount of the small fish and an increase in the amount of daphnia. Huge increasing on daphne they weren't really wearing bucky badger sweaters. and we got this decade had the best water quality. In lake mendota sense-data first started. 1875 huge improvement in the leg. And then we had an invader and it's an invader from the caspian sea region of europe and its called spiny water flea. This is a picture of one and. He also eats daphnia and fish do not displaying water flea. Spiny water fleas are fairly big are about this long so they're about two or three times bigger than. 84 times bigger than a daphnia but they have this long spine. Andy is not for the spine may be delicious to fish it would need you know those those canapes that have like a slice of sausage wrapped in bacon and then a toothpick in it there like that except you have to eat the tuesday. Current situation. But. I just i just wanted to bring this up as showing that even though phosphorus is really the heart of the problem. The way we manage the animals in the lake also has an effect. And right now we have due to the invasions we have some issues. They came in just in the last few years. How many of you seen a zebra mussel. Walk along the lake mendota shoreline. After about the 1st of august. You're probably going to see some on the rocks or please peers boat bottoms. And. As a result of the zebra mussels we get clearwater much at a time. So they eat a lot of algae but they don't. Poisonous ones so we are getting. When we get a toxic bloom it is really severe. So the lake is fairly is it's clear most of the time but when it blooms it's a big thick mat of severely toxic algae we're getting more growth of rooted plants which voters and swimmer is disliked we're getting more wade now barefoot because you're. And we're not quite sure how that's going to play out now. We will we're going to end up with a different fishery is result of this invasion is still playing out now so. This is another species from the caspian sea so. We really didn't need these. Stop doing that. They get here on shipping so the through the great lakes minnesota and wisconsin in upper michigan ship a lot of taconite or iron ore to the caspian sea region for making steel. And the boats come over with slow ballast water. So they don't. They don't bring a product back to the united states they come back empty but they have to have ballast water in them where they'll roll over in storms in the atlantic and then when they get to the great lakes they pump out the ballast water and is full of european and asian. Hop plants and animals is that legal know they are required to swap the water that they get. From the caspian sea the required to swap that for atlantic ocean water. In the middle of the atlantic and that will kill. But they don't do it. And and we don't have a horseman. Marines out there shooting death. Idiot aha reinforcement problem. Okay. So. Really. We need to be asked if we need to be asking ourselves since you know we have humans and people here have a lot of responsibility for the lakes in the land around it and what do we want. To get from this watershed. What should it provide what we wanted to provide. And what's bio physically. Possible course sometimes what you want you can't get. What you want what you can get by the physically can be two different things but we need to consider. What's socially acceptable and what changes are people willing to make and in what choices would build resilience for the future he's are really the questions that we face as a as a collective here and. Answers. From the publican in the reports and i'm going to stop here but i'm happy to take questions. You said our soil is rich in phosphorus. Free question. People at the university of that uw-extension have gotten the message out that farmers can dial way back on phosphate fertilizer and they they have especially after the 1044. In the city you can no longer buy phosphate fertilizer for your lawn and you can still buy it for farms but. After the inn in 2008 there were a series of global events that drove the price of phosphate rock up by about factory. And so that creative financial incentive to dial back. And so the farmers really are applying wayless. Phosphate fertilizer than they did in the past but the big problem is manure. And that's been going on for actually for. Really my whole professional life manure production inventory discharge. Have been going uphill pound of milk is about a pound of manure on the other end and and m den if you run a farm in newer is a waste product you have to get it out of the barn because if need a will shut you down if you're running a milk or meat production operation in a barn full of manure. You got to get the manure out of there and what people do is plowed into the ground. And and then to our land is way over fertilized. My understanding. My understanding is that. The yahara is not directly connected to the saint lawrence seaway. No we need directly connected to the mississippi river. They getting on boats so. Even here. No they get they get to lake michigan. And then from lake michigan do that i see that's a connection i missed good point. Turns out if you if you look at the dnr collects data of where people move boats from in the state lake mendota is the most popular place to bring your boat if you take your boat out of lake michigan and move into an inland lake in the late 50s like it likely to bring it to his way ben dodo so if you been fishing on the great lakes. And you feel your live well. With great lakes water. That has the juvenal stages of zebra mussels or or has spying water flea in it and you and then and you didn't exchange waterwood lake mendota when you go fishing in lake mendota you just inoculated. It sucks that we met the enemy and he is us. The question was could i explain the differences the overall differences in values or attitudes in the four groups. And. I will try to not show it but the. There was one group. And mostly i would say fairly environmentalist oriented. Just feel we should get. What's a realistic story that we get most of the people out of here. Let's. I have the talks have a water toxicity just get completely out of hand and stand which is not unrealistic signed it's perfectly plausible story and. And that way we can knock the population down to about 10% and explore the logical consequences for those people who have that interest to that was really. That that was how we handled that group. Actually a pretty sizable. Dane county of technological optimus and shoulder a lot of people with scientific and engineering training actually and in many ways i know i'm a technological optimus myself but i but i see that. I seen if you're doing and the end there's also the perception is hey we have great biotech. We have gray hi-tech. Why don't we develop greentech. And then we can just use our watershed as a practice area. So for example the world really needs better ways to get phosphorus out of waste streams why don't we be the place that invents that technology. Example. So that that was. That was so one scenario. Third scenario in this also sort of came out of the environmental community but i but i know it's true from from well from teaching young people and being around young people young people have different values and they're more likely to have environmental values. Values project at. Inspiring everybody. Right now. One of my former students is now a professor in ireland. Email exchange with her recently about something else and she said that you know what the brexit. One of the strata brexit is. People who are for brexit at 10 to the older and it's a more backward-looking view of the world and younger people see the bishop just be part of europe and you know they think they do not want breadsticks and she told me that every month. Net change of 6000. Brexit. And that's because voters dying young voters. People who are poster. Balance grille. Sorry for that long rambling answer. you can read it more coherent. Description. Hi i think those are excellent points i am not a sociologist and but you know a lot and i think a relevant quote is winston churchill said that a young man who is not a heart. I have been when i came here as a student in the 1970s i asked that very nice person i spent a year learning about the legs that i am. Why are all these rich people putting out for this. And the deer have been some leaders within the clubs for the different lakes who have taken strong positions from time to time if you know you're in power for a couple years i think it's. What's asking is what can you do and i think that. Eating eating needs those formed in an intensive way industrially produced need is one of the largest impacts that we have on the environment if you just look at the data consumption that is the big one that doesn't mean you have to be a vegetarian but you can think about where you're mean, if you go to the coop for example you'll see a lot of meat that is. Farm grass-fed. Nn grass-fed meat is much as much more expensive. But it's much less harmful. So that's one thing you can you can also think about milk and there and you can actually just read it on the bottle inn in most of the stores just buy grass-fed milk it will be more expensive and that represents the real. Cost of building in the environmental cost of milk into the milk and. Alright. Thank you for coming. Please extend a hand of friendship to your. Those around you and join us for coffee and conversation.

uuprairie_org

Pr131103Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society if this is one of your first times here i recommend highly that you come back of course i recommend that but our services are very different sometimes so they will be either by myself.. The opening words are these we gather this day we come in search of life's meaning all of us have moments of weakness and times of strength all sing songs of sorrow and love may our time here bring us strength along our way in the presence of the sacred maybe come to know our true selves finding a fresh impulse to love and do good. Now young boy wilfrid gordon mcdonald partridge remember. He ran errands were miss mitchell who walked with a wooden stick. Mr. drysdale who had a voice like a bite but. His favorite person of all with miss nancy allison delacourt cooper because she had four names. Just as he did he called her miss nancy and he told her all his secrets. What's a wilfred gordon hurt his mother and father talking about miss nancy why is she a poor old thing as wilfred gordon. She's lost her memory. Satisfy either it isn't surprising said his mother after all she is 96 what is a memory is wilfred borden he was always asking questions it's something you remember said his father but wilfrid gordon wanted to know more what's a memory something warm my child something warm and then. One of the most important documents in next step for unitarian-universalist after the transcendentalist. Although the humanist controversy is not over and has been the subject of some interesting revisionism recently the human is feeling up here to regardless of what their legacy ends up being especially when curtis reese in the chair when i was the minister of the burlington iowa unitarian universalist fellowship and then the 50th anniversary of purchasing they're building on paper. In his essay title guiding principles for a free face yes he answered history is a struggle between justice and injustice looking towards the ultimate victory in the promise and the fulfillment of grace sure we can do more than one sunday morning service on grace and what that means right here. Humbly we stand in the face of death confidently we stand with life our strength is the strength of many indeed it is the strength of all humanity throughout all time because we have one fate and a great compassion my understanding go with us and peace to that we may live together in charity compassion peace and joy in this spirit let us individually and together so forth to live and to love.

uuprairie_org

Pr120916BarbPark-ed.mp3

High-end barber park and the talk today is. Michael servetus unitarian murder. Based on the book out of the flames by lawrence and nancy goldstone. And as those of you who know me remember i was raised universalist. So my knowledge of unitarian. History is very limited. So this book was quite informative. Wikipedia describe servetus as a spanish theologian. Physician cartographer and renaissance humanists. Who was the first european to correctly describe pulmonary circulation. He was first in mathematics. Astronomy. Meteorology. Astrology. Anatomy jurisprudence. Languages poetry. And the study of the bible. He was born miguel cervantes. In the northeast corner of spain on september 29th. 1511. To a family of minor gentry. This is the time of charles the fifth. The last emperor of the holy roman empire. France was ruled by his rival francis the first. An england was ruled by henry the 8th. The story is also wrapped around the new interest in books. This was also the time of a new. High demand for books since gutenberg developed the printing press in 1455. There was an increase in literacy and the wealthy had started to collect. There was also a high demand for books written by the university. By 1500 a.d. worth in 300 printing presses. Had been set up across europe. Humanism is certainly something we're interested in as a group. There was a. A movement labeled humanism. That was the major intellectual and literary. In progress that the time. It was replacing scholasticism. In scholastic study all knowledge was divided. For strictly delineated areas. Theology. Philosophy. Jurisprudence. And madison. Students studied a very specific set of text. And would defend their interpretation. Thank you so much barb for black pepper. Are closing words today are from john brigham go your ways knowing not the answer to all things yet speaking always the answer to one more thing then you know thank you for coming today and please join us for us we have cookies and birthday cake.

uuprairie_org

Pr130203EricBanner-ed.mp3

Thank you mary that was lovely a homeostasis boil the mood welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society on penny eyler a member of the program committee. Prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded to congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age. Or your abilities er and abilities. Later in the service we will invite visitors and guests in returning friends to introduce themselves so we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we offer a variety of services they are presented either by a prime member remember the wider community or by our minister sandra ingham. Eric banner. A little bit about eric he was born and raised in manhattan kansas where he grew up in the unitarian universalist fellowship of manhattan he graduated from high school at the age of 16 and spent the next few years traveling the country in the world during that time he lived and worked in lawrence kansas. And natural resources in environmental science. He spent the next five years working in government including service. As a constituent affairs liaison. And as an environmental scientist for the kansas department of health and environment is work there focused on water quality including a wide range of data analysis mapmaking and program management field investigation and outreach with stakeholders leadership positions. Seminary and berkeley california this past may while they're he's through and student body government. And taught both the coming-of-age program and the middle school our whole lives curriculum at the unitarian universalist church in brooklyn. This time i would love to invite. Or is it the custom here to invite the children forward i'd love to him. I have a story i want to share about some friends of mine that you might you might have met. Are y'all coming over here. C'mon inn. I don't unplug anything. Someone tell you story this morning about. It's a love story actually only. Nobody ever thought they fall in love because you know ladybugs and penguins do not live near each other. Ladybugs live in gardens and they munch on things where it's green and warm and sunny and. Penguins live in the arctic in the antarctic i should say and it's cold and. Yes it's kind of like wisconsin it's cold and i see it. At least this time of year to each of them were living their lives with their friends and their family and it got to be that time of year when the seasons were changing and and ladybug and her friends and family noticed it was getting darker and colder at night and they decided they wanted to leave the guard then go south somewhere where it might be a little bit warmer i'm like. You know folks here in wisconsin right we don't just get to move south for the winter. So ladybug and her family got up their wings and started the flying at about the same time pengelly. Also. Got together with friends and decided it might be time to move somewhere for a little bit it was. Starting to get. Dark a lot and angry wanted to. Move somewhere where it would be easier to. Be in the daytime where there be more lightning. So ladybugs and her friends they all started flying across the ocean. Now they started flying across the ocean cuz that's what ladybugs do they have these really cool wings that are hidden underneath those red and black. Wings at and they fly across the ocean and pat and ladybug love to fly it was her favorite thing to do she would fly up and down and she'd go in circles and she would fly all over the place. She could have flown all day long. She had been allowed to. And penguin love to fly to now you know that penguins don't actually fly but. But penguin love to believe that he could fly he. He would. Swim through the water and he would go and he would get it as fast as he couldn't even jumper right. And just for a for a second. It felt like he was flying. Amazing it was beautiful and so that's how they met up they were there in the middle of the ocean and ladybug was. Flying over the surface of the water and angry was jumping out of the water and. When they saw each other they knew they had something special. They love to fly together it was. Amazing. And so they hung out and i played you know how it is you go to a playground you meet a new friend and it's like wow i could i could play with this person forever and that's what it felt like for them except. Eventually. They got tired and. And the sole. Try to figure out what to do and they couldn't really see any land from where they were they were kind of in the middle of the ocean and i thought about it and ladybugs believe i can fly up higher than you can maybe let me just fly up up up and i'll fly as high as i can and see if i can see somewhere where we could go and. And rest some sort of landon that's what she did she flew up and she's on island in the distance and said well we're going to go that way. So she so they swam over and flew over to the island they rested on the island. And they talked and they hung out and they played and arrested and they could tell that it was they were meant to be together another families were more than a little suspicious of this arrangement. Nobody had ever heard of a penguin in a ladybug falling in love but. But they knew it was real they knew it was the right thing to do and. So they would hang out and they would play together. All day and they would rest on the beach and. Then i kind of got tired of being on that island and when they got tired of being on that island it was time to go somewhere else then. Pink we looked at ladybug inside well. We need to go this way. And and ladybug said don't know that's the wrong direction we need to go the other way. And penguin ladybug started to argue and said never happened to them before they had never argue with each other was really hard and finally penguin just looked at ladybug and he said. I'm bigger we're doing it my way. And ladybug said. Well if that's the way it's going to be. I'm leaving. And ladybug flew off and she went back to the garden. We're her friends and her family were and. And penguin. Swam back down to the artic the antarctica should saying. And where was cold and icy and it was okay for a day or two while they were still angry with each other but. But after a while they started to get sort of. Only missed each other that they didn't quite as much as they did. Rate right maybe a bird but they didn't have any other bird friends and so so they they missed each other and they really wanted to be back together and and and penguin realize that. Maybe he had been a little rude and that maybe he shouldn't have said it that way and then you needed to apologizing and so he started swinging back the direction he thought ladybug wasn't in the middle of the ocean. And pink we apologize profusely my penguins i do know i'm so sorry it was so rude of me just because i'm bigger doesn't mean that i should. Being charged all the time we we should work this out i'm i love you and i miss you and i'm sorry. And ladybug said i'm sorry too i shouldn't have just blown off. I'm at will will do better. And so they may begin to play again right they love to play and fly and swim and they played influence women. And then they rested on the beach. They started the setup a home and again they're in their families had sort of hoped when they split up that maybe they would say that way and. They were more than a little suspicious that this was not going to work out they knew the ladybugs and penguins live very different kinds of wives and. They told them as much but they but penguin ladybug told him know we love each other we're going to stay together. It's what they start to set up house. Penguin took on responsibility for making sure they have breakfast. And if penguin did i'm sorry ladybug took on responsibility for breakfast. Ladybug did what she had always done what everyone did as far as she knew she put out a bowl of crunchy fresh aphids. Breakfast every morning. M and penguins. It was a little strange but he was trying to be polite he knew he'd kind of been rude before and he didn't want to offend ladybug and and so he ate those ladybugs but they're not the ladybugs eat aphids. Kind of hungry cuz. It was never quite enough for breakfast and then anyway he missed the shrimp but in the prawns that he used to eat in the ocean. And so. You know how it is when you're kind of hungry and maybe your. A little shorter and cranky and tired and. And you're not always the nicest person will. Will eventually. Penguin said. No. If it's okay but. Really when are we going to have something else for breakfast. And leave everybody. David's. Ain't that we all need aphids for breakfast yes we do need ladybugs ladybugs eat aphids. Thank you. It's so it's so. Rainbow didn't understand what's going wrong she has to all of her friends and what was wrong and they all everyone they knew ate athens for breakfast that was. Not the sort of thing than anybody ever heard of eating shrimp i didn't know what shrimp was ever seen one shrimp live in the ocean. Yeah they're related that's right now they're related to lobsters and crabs are crustaceans and they live in the ocean and i swimming. Mmm so angry. Swam off and said you know what. I'm not going to do this anymore i need to eat a solid breakfast everyday i'm leaving and he did. And ladybug with annoyed at this and whoever heard of eating shrimp for breakfast and she flew off to. It happened again after awhile they kind of missed each other and they got back together and then we got back together this time ladybug was the one who apologize you said you know i'm sorry. I never asked you what you wanted for. I never said. What would you like to eat. I think we said that's okay i should have told you earlier. Back before i was really hungry and tired and cranky and. And it'll be okay. A mighty bug and penguins decided from that day forth. But they loved each other and they would stay together. But if they were going to fly and play and swim over. And through the ocean and be together. But they would from evermore. Learn to tell each other what was going on when they were frustrated and angry. I'm not. Just what they did. It's not in me order of service but between the time i prepared and came here i found a reading from african american author and scholar bell hooks in the book she wrote a few years ago called all about love that i wanted to share with you this morning she writes when i was a child was clear to me that life was not worth living if we did not know love. I wish i could testify that i came to this awareness because i felt love in my life but it was loved absence but let me know how much love matter. I was my father's first daughter. At the moment of my birth i was looked upon with loving-kindness cherish and made to feel as wanted on this earth as in my very home to this day i cannot remember when the feeling left me those who had initially loved me had turned away. The absence of the recognition and regard pierced my heart. And left with me with a feeling of broken-hearted miss so profound. But i was spellbound. Grief and sadness overwhelmed. I did not know what i have done wrong like every wounded child i just wanted to turn back time and being that paradise again in that moment of remembered rapture where i felt loved where i felt a sense of belonging it is so good to be here with you this morning we appreciate your sharing of your space and if your time with us and the opportunity to gather together on sunday morning as penny said the congregation reminds me of the congregation that i grew up in a congregation founded some forty or fifty years ago where each sunday about 100 people still gather and chairs to listen to a good message to sing with our hearts and to love one another. Feel a lot like that home that i grew up in. The philosopher iris murdoch once said. That love is the extremely difficult realization that something or someone other than oneself is real. And if that's true and i think that it is if that's true then we would do well to find a place. Practice or work of being loving in the world. A being loved as well and we would do that so that we might find a way to live out our lives. Agents of love in this world. So to give away the answer to the question in your order of service early on the question what is the spirit. I say to you love is the spirit. But the spirit alone. Does too little. It can bind us together but it cannot change anything without action paired to it. It can join us together and it is important but it's not enough. What we need is much more than just words about love. What we need. Acting. With love. The congregation that i currently serve declares each week that love is the spirit of this church and service is its law this is our great covenant we say to dwell together in peace to seek the truth in love. And to help one another. It's an old covenant dating back to a time in the late 1800s when the congregation in evanston illinois was struggling to discern what held them together. They had a minister named reverend blake after whom this covenant is widely known. The blake covenant it's called and he knew that in our non credo tradition. That would help us together is not what we believe. But we covenant to do together. From the time of our earliest religious forbearers. Who landed on the shores of massachusetts our people have been held together. My agreements with each other about how we will be together. Not our agreements about how we believe. Reverend blake wrote those words and he offered them up as an idea about love as a centre of the life of the church. An idea we still a firm and idea so widespread that i have even heard. That the unitarian universalist who show up for gatherings for social justice wearing their bright yellow standing on the side of love shirts. Have become known as the love people. It is our brand. It's our team we stand proudly. On the side of love. But the truth is that love has gotten a bad name over the years and not in the way that bon jovi declared in the 1980s. You need only to bring up love in polite company to discover how quickly love has been dismissed as weak and ineffective. Maudlin and something for little girls to dream about. But hardly the stuff of a real life. Hardly the stuff. It would change the way. And yet behind those comments those dismissals of love i always suspect that there is something more of what bell hooks wrote about. In that reading. A yearning for love once had and lost. Or perhaps a yearning for something that seems. So far out of reach. Something. Feels like a longing in our hearts. But some of us push away the idea of love. Push it away because finding it seems far too difficult. And unlikely. Sometimes. Sometimes it's easier. To reject something entirely. Rather than to admit that you want them. And have no idea how to find it. Even still however in our churches we proclaim we proclaim this life-changing power of love the power of love to transform the world and in the process to transform us. The power of love to be with you when your times are the darkest when your parents. Verge of splitting up because they can no longer be together after 66 years of marriage. The times when you have lost someone you love. The times when you've lost your job and your spouse. Or when you're gay teen and you've been kicked out of the house and sent to the streets just for being who you are. These times are the times when life seems tenuous fragile when even life is good it is all too easy to realize and discover. We were called to do more than you would ever done before and that you need a spirit with you a spirit to sustain you and if love is indeed the spirit of our churches then it behooves us to learn something about why it works in the world and what it takes for love to happen and what i know what i have learned in my years is that all of the successes i have had as a parent all of the successes i have had as a leader in church and in my life have something that i first learned or perhaps. Bearing evitable intertwined in the true love the love that sustains the love that sustains families and it sustains churches it sustains communities is rooted in care and affection and recognition yes all of those things but also the love that sustains is rooted in commitment and frost. An honest and open communication as belt. So eloquently put it elsewhere in her book about love and all of this love must emerge in the ever-shifting matrix of human relationship as we ourselves grow and change perhaps i learned earlier on as a parent because of the way that i started out as a parent of a child already partially grown many people have the advantage you might say of being there right at the beginning they carry the seed of new life inside their body. And bring forth the daughter or son into the world or they tend and care to a partner while waiting for the day when a new baby arrives those relationships start at the very beginning with that new person and well every baby has a personality they also have a fairly limited ability to express themselves. Our love when we have an infant called us to learn to understand what they mean even when they cannot tell us with words. But i didn't start out my life is apparent that way instead i started my life as a parent by stepping into a relationship with a woman who had a daughter who was almost four when we started dating i started at least partially and who had her own personality and her own will and her own history and i had to work just as much to know who she was. If i had to learn to know who the woman i was falling in love with less as i walked into the life of this little girl i was faced with a difficult and often contradictory demands of being both a responsible adult for a child that i barely knew and also recognizing that i had to work to build this relationship not just with my wife emily but with olivia the girl who would be my daughter. Things were good or we wouldn't still be together as a family eight years later but there were challenges. To perhaps you've been apparent and notice. Times when i thought things should go one way and either olivia or emily or even both sometimes we're thinking another way was best there were times when i had to assert a level of power and authority as a responsible adult. Sometimes when i had to step back and let emily play that role because she and olivia had a relationship. That was deeper and richer than mine i had to learn that is where the power light and in so doing i had to learn how power worked in our family as we grew in love together so that when disagreements rose and disagreements always arrive. It is in those difficult times. That we would know that there was enough behind that family behind those difficulties enough of love. And spirit to sustain us until we could step through and of course it's not just me right. All of us have to learn to navigate new relationships. To say out loud what are hopes. Our expectations are. Just a present even when it is difficult to hear that there were expectations based on sound reasons that we were not aware of. And not living up to perhaps you had this experience in your own life married into a new family. And discovered they did things differently than you did. Or found yourself in a new job where everybody else seems to know the rules of the office and where to find the pens and why we buy this kind of paper and not that except for you. Maybe you found yourself in a new town or new church where you don't know who's in charge or of what or how things get done or even who to ask. Or maybe even you found yourself in a new relationship with someone you thought you already knew perhaps you retired and discovered that with all of this new time at home things were not quite the same as they had been before. Discovered your relationship had to be reborn. Morning new. Warming any kind of new relationship. Requires that we navigate these treacherous waters where love and spirit must guide us. But not. Love from a place of passivity. Instead love i'm an active place that knows that power and love our partners dancing across. Floor of life. One partner steps forward in the other partner steps back. Been the opposite. So that over time. You come to know that you can trust one another to be in control when the time is right and to let go when the time is right. In this month of love and african-american history it's worth remembering something the doctor martin luther king junior said back in 1967. He said something important about this challenge we face when love and power are not seen as partners but as adversaries and opponents it was 1967 and by this point he had spent most of his adult life working for civil rights he had seen much success the voting rights act passed the civil rights act passed school integration was an ongoing effort. But it was making progress poll taxes literacy tests were a thing of the past and yet he knew that his people had more work to do you know how important love was how important it is that we are called to love each other. Even when we don't want to even when we are sure they don't deserve it even when we would rather strike out in anger and indignation because each of those choices feeds on itself hate generates more hate and generates more love. But love alone live alone would never be enough it had to be paired with partnered with a level of trust and power and authority that would bring into being a world that finally recognize that every man and every woman regardless of the color of their skin were full partners in the work of this nation not boys and girls as they were so often called who were meant to be managed. Is black men and women have been for so many generation. So there was dr. king he was standing before the southern christian leadership conference. An organization he had helped co-found 10 years earlier. And he spoke that day on the question of where do we go from here. He carefully named the successes of the prior-year. And then he spoke of the ongoing need to beartooth on all of the problems both love and power love and power working hand-in-hand together. To step into the future he said power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose it's the strength required to bring about social political and economic change and then then he put it back on the people people i know that i can relate to people i think a lot of us can relate to. Who have been truant in their life to distrust power so many of us learned in our lives that power was a force for manipulation and coercion and deception it was a force that seems to always ask us to put ourselves a sign so that those with power could have more. And those of us without struggle to adapt to learn what. We needed to do. When are voice wasn't being hurt not all of us had this experience i want to be clear but many of us learned that power was a thing that was used to put down. The women people in ways that we're not loving we're not respectful we're not responsible or not protected. Too many of us learned that power was something that is wielded. Like a club to diminish and demean the doctor king knew the power alone was the manipulative and mean-spirited power the power alone without the modulating influence of love and relationship with the power to be distrusted power without open communication and trust and honesty he said and abusive and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its bessie said power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice. And justice at its best is love correcting everything that stands against bluff and this is precisely what we must be as we move on this collision of immoral power and powerless morality which constitutes the major crisis of our time. And i think that his message remains as relevant today as it did some 45 years ago when he first preached it. We face the ongoing crisis of change in our lives. Changing the world a world with changing governments each and everyday changing international power bases but much closer to home to. Change in our home more and more of our families look nothing like what they used to. And even. When is in my case they seem to be on the surface. A little scratch reveals that things are not. What you might assume. But i have one daughter by birth and one by adoption. And yet we still walk around and you might never know. So many hidden families and those families who cannot hide and assumptions of ordinariness. Families with stepchildren and step-siblings single-parent households whether due to divorce or adoption. There's more and more gay and lesbian households. Another configurations that i could not begin to list olive. And then every one of those new relationships. There's a requirement that the people work together to discern in love how they will be together. A power and love will live under the same roof. With each other. What they will eat for breakfast in the morning. Who will do the laundry and mow the lawn. And it's some level we have always known right that there is this tension this tension between love and power i was flying up here to wisconsin on friday and discovered that my flight had been delayed and that my connecting flight would leave the ground before i got there. The clerk looked in her computer system she scanned the american flight she scanned the other airlines that service the airport and then she just shook her head. She looked at me and she said. I got no love for you here. I can get you there by 10 tonight. The booking system had the power. But there was no luck. So what i mean to say this morning but we simply that's right that if love is the spirit of this church of love is the spirit of the space of hours then we are actually left with another question in the one i led with not what is the spirit. But what will we do with the spirit. Can we trust each other and not. To love and share power. Can we give and take on the dance floor. And recognize that it matters that we pay attention to which sets. We are called to. Knowing that sometimes we are called the weed and. Sometimes we are called to follow. I learned this particular lesson when i got married and i was supposed to dance with my mother who has a child. Had been in a dance class. Where there were not that many boys. She had been designated a leader. As a small girl. And even then however many decades later. Who would lead on that first dance. On the dance floor that night. And we need to know that we can agree that for our love to change the world. We need to know when the music is calling for a waltz and when it's calling for a polka. If you are dancing a contra dance. Velipoka is being played if you are spinning freely as though it is a rock concert. In a ballroom. You're likely to bump into each other. So we must shift. And dance with each other. Learning not to run into each other. Unnecessarily. This is what i learned as a parent. But i have much power i had far more power of course than my daughters did inform and. Because of that i had far more responsibility. Right. As parents we know this. But i also had to learn when it was my turn to teach. And guide. Which we do so much of his parents. And i have to learn. When it was my turn. Lafollette. It happened just a few days ago. You see my daughter had been at a school assembly and they were dancing to the latest pop music hits. And so she taught me the steps to dance gangnam style. And then my four-year-old saw all of this. And asked me to turn my attention to her. So she could teach me how to dance it. Princess style. Love and power navigated in every relationship and love is sacred. At least the love that gives and takes. It's worthy of our devotion and our care because love will transform us. And it will transform the world in the process. People come to our churches each and every week. Wanting more they want to be together with people who will hold them. When times are tough. To be with people who will grow with them as they shift and change and every day of their life. To be with people who sometimes even challenge them. Three different. And what they thought they were. What is no easy thing in spite of what the princess. Stories and fairy tales of old vitalis. The happily-ever-after always includes more work. And laundry to be done. Different work work that shifts work that changes and in there. It is i where i believe. But the holy emerges in loving and trusting relationships there is service and peace and truth and help is part of what everyone expects and everyone needs. And everyone knows. But sometimes we step back so that something new can you merge our churches. Canby training academies for life. Places where almost unlike anywhere else in the world we can bring her whole self our minds. And our hearts. Our bodies. And our brains. So is love truly is the spirit of our churches and services are long then because of that our members and friends will go back out into the world each week go back into the world carrying with them some of that spirit when they need him. And they will come back to renew that spirit each week to renew their own spirit and to carry that fire with them into the world in the spirits of those who walk through our doors each sunday carrying burdens unknown joys and sorrows they are not yet prepared to me will feel their spirits lifted and their burdens light love is powerful and power is best exercised in love. Maybe so. Seeing the time perhaps it might be better to move to the offering in the offertory and invite you each. To think of the stories of your life. And love and power that we might share them together over the communion of coffee and conversation. Following the service. Yes indeed i have strength like a mountain and love like an ocean may you go into this week greeting your neighbors reading your friends and those you do not know with love like a notion that love maybe not only the spirit of this church. And service its law. But that it may be true of all the lands and all the places we inhabit go into this week and be blessed. And be a blessing.

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Pr130616DanProud-ed.mp3

Good morning. And happy father's day i think we all had fathers so we're going to we're going to give them their due today we had a program for mothers a few weeks ago and now it's father's turn. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. We aspire to be. Open-hearted and open-minded is a congregation and we welcome people. Of every ethnic and religious background sexual orientation skin color gender or family structure and we welcome you no matter what your age. Or your abilities and then abilities and later on in the service if we have any visitors or guess we would love to for you to introduce yourself so we can greet you afterwards. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. Today is one of our lila sundays. Power off. Mister sandy sandringham also. Cavs. Leave the service and next week will be her turn. And today will be provided presenting this program on father's day called. Father's day remembrances. For opening words i'm going to read a poem by leave off at 8. Century chinese poem port. In the land of wu the mulberry leaves are green. And thrice the silkworms have gone to sleep. Denise liu where my father's family stay i wonder. Who is sewing. Those fields of hours. I cannot be back in time for the spring doings. Yet i can help nothing. Traveling on the river. The southwind wife's my homesick spirit. And carries it up to the front. Ivar familiar tavern. There i see a peach tree on the east side of the house. With thick leaves and branches waving in the blue mist. It is the tree i planted before my parting 3 years ago. The peach tree has grown now as tall as the tavern roof. While i have wondered about. Without returning. Ping yang my pretty daughter i see you stand by the peachtree and pluck a flowering branch. You pluck the flowers but i am that not there. How your tears flow like a stream of water. My little son poaching grown up to your sister shoulders. You come out with her under the peach tree. But who is there to pat you on the back. But i think of these things my senses fail and a sharp pain cuts my heart everyday. Now i tear off a piece of white silk to write this letter. And send it to you with my love a long way up the river. Now we'll have our chalice lighting with. Sort of a concocted the family phoenix and robin who often ride to church together. Intricate and untraceable weaving and interweaving dark strand with light design beyond all spiderlily contrivance to link not to entrap elation grief joy contrition and twine shaking changing forever forming transforming all praise all praise to the great web. Today we're going to have eight reading about some of the fathers of our prairie members. And. These remembrances as you might expect at prairie i show the varying experiences relationships that children have with their fathers. Those people who are sometimes lovable sometimes playful and sometimes stern. So i hope you enjoy the. The readings and will have chance afterwards for. Comments and questions. Well we'll have time. And we have a table on the side with. Awesome pictures and other things that you can look at that some of the readers will talk about. So we only have two chairs up here so it what i'm going to ask is that. Queen come up into twos. So we'll start off with robin proud and rosemarie lester. My father was a driving force behind my parents decision to move away from new york city and buy a small farm on the pennsylvania new york border i think he liked the idea of working for himself as much as getting out of the city he took what was basically a cabin and built onto it added plumbing and electricity. And it is true he was self-taught so something for a little odd but it basically worked and he also learned just from books and from talking to people what he needed to know to raise sheep. The farm never was self-supporting it was small so my father had other jobs in town and once we kids started school my mother became the main breadwinner i was not happy about this because of course on tv i learned that fathers were supposed to go to work and mothers were supposed to stay home and bake cookies. So when it became clear that the tiny local schools couldn't offer much we move to philadelphia where my brother and i were able to be in accelerated programs i my dad went back and forth to the farm for sometime in 1962 philadelphia was beginning a huge urban renewal project punctuated by streets that had small communities in ukrainian. Well my dad discovered an island of a few blocks where there was an old-time jewish neighborhood he surprised the shopkeepers by speaking tim in yiddish which have been his first language. And i think it was almost like a theme park for him that he found this little street that was a remembrance of the good part of his childhood which hennepin many he had some not so fun memories of childhood but he really enjoyed that so my mother advanced her career in social work so much that my father ended up not farming anymore they moved to several other cities based on her work my father had absolutely no problem with his wife making more money having a good job title he was very proud of her intelligence and accomplishments and he would get jobs in warehouses or other manual labor and get along with everyone. He was equally at home with immigrant co-workers in new york city and farmers and upstate with educated professionals in fact he often had a distrust of those who claim to be experts and he always enjoyed kids wherever he lives he got to know the kids and he has never forgotten what it was like to be a kid. You live life on his own terms according to his own values and he really enjoyed life when he died just shy of 86 years old he had just finished adding a room to his house and he had lots more plans growing up with a father like this i had really high expectations for my husband. And i remember those happy peaceful sunday noon when would be my mom and elsie our housekeeper we're preparing sunday dinner in the kitchen that was in the early times classical concert and yes being together with dad that was wonderful and i've never forgotten that feeling we just didn't need to talk to be content together. When it was indeed all over the marauding soviet soldiers were turned loose for 4 days and we lucked out there came an officer called my dad was a soldier with a big tommy gun horrible things there and the commandant ass in german. Okay. A great thank you next we'll have terry pruvo and carl wacker. Oh i'm sorry ruth ruth call dan and terry. Sorry. What is the very short poem of my own i think you'll find it a unitary unitarian i'll try again you hear me now okay i think you'll find it very unitarian poem dealing with a part of my religious development being talked to i2i i was pumpkin he was pie when i was eight he died and missing him so much i easily adopted christ the fantasy was comfort to me letting me reassemble papa letting me find again those same stronghand's to run to. College and felt lucky to have a job during the great depression as a prudential insurance salesman after meeting my mother he became a devout methodist and at either now that sounds very ordinary and conventional but in his leisure hours dad flourished and that's where he made his mark on me he played the trombone he sang in the choir. Enjoyed records of opera and you like new orleans jazz on saturday night he projected to new booty shorts using our refrigerator as a screen featuring charlie chaplin and buster keaton he taught me the constellations in the winter sky and two. Identify bloodroot and hepatic in the spring and there are often surprises when i came home. Crap brown weed from a local mill water from a spring mill caring for sunday breakfast and goat's milk for me to try after i read heidi we took johnson the countryside just the two of us to find hickory nuts or fresh cider in the fall one summer he dug a pit in our backyard to baked beans on hot rocks while my mother protested but neil the oven is so much easier and i was fascinated by his stories of his year in france during world war 1 servicing 14in naval guns that were mounted on railroad cars fastidious about cleanliness he had bought his own mess kit along in the us and cleaned it with coffee because water was scarce and sanitation deplorable in france i'm refusing to use is a regulation mess kit he was hauled before an officer who said keep your kit of blackjack and your head in the clouds he said summing-up aurelius inner living room was a bookcase holding my mother protested why would you want to be out there in the garage from my dad i learn to love literature. To lift one out-of-the-ordinary into the transcendental he would quote whittier we cut the solid whiteness through while shoveling are snowy blocks and savored whittier's description of snow etching a tree and the smallest twig on the elm tree rohrman too dear for an earl emerson's forbearance was another favorite has found name all the birds without a gun love the wood rolls and left it on the stock he loved william cullen bryant to follow and santa topsis about approaching death with trust they'll go not like a quarry slave but sustained and soothed by an unfaltering trust approach that grave in 1949 when george and i were newly married and living in a student fission c in ann arbor my folks arrived with a bushel of. For christmas fudge and old times sake said dad and around the rim he had painted in black words whittier snowbound and close at hand the basket stood with nuts from brown october's would waves of nostalgia swept over me but a bushel of nuts and are cramped apartment after weeks of colliding with a basket we put it outside for the michigan squirrels the squirrels had a heyday but i did not have every glance out the window at the empty and basket brought me a ripple of regret after all you know any squirrels who appreciate lines from whittier always who's dad's bring them a bushel of nuts in november afterlife of illnesses of noel nuses except for my dad died suddenly of angina at 62 and i flew home with a nursing baby but in marveled how an ordinary life can be so extraordinary. Great thank you. Carl wacker. Doug rink. Sure is. During these readings we recognize some of the traits of our own fathers. I'm going to talk about someone who is not historically a father to me but my father influence of course i'm going to talk about my father-in-law and his dad actually did not have the pleasure of growing up with him. From what i know about him he's a really easy guy to write about cuz he's just a wonderful man and every respect. Enough. Is everything one might expect from a daddy was a a great businessman is reliable and dependable true to his word and warm kind individual. You someone you could talk to if you need a good listener but he's very careful not to judge hastily. And he's always got some good advice and then words of comfort. Solo. It's easy to imagine if you know his daughter julie what a wonderful and terrible influence she had from him. Here's a father to all not just his immediate offspring he enjoyed mom were foster parents too many and an adopted one in value as their own not too long ago and i were volunteering at a community dinner at a homeless shelter in gainesville called saint francis house. We were there we saw this this young mother and her four-year-old daughter and in this unfortunate. Set of circumstances that led them to their and julie told joel about the situation and that evening joel. Couldn't it just didn't sit right with him and he had had to make some some changes in their life and within days or weeks would help help him find housing and transportation and unemployment this strictly through his network of friends and business people that he knew in town. Enough. And then when the the little girl did find herself in a very serious situation joel and his wife did take them into her house for safety and for nearly a year. And kind of. Informal network of hospital visitation screw into this most wonderful. Hospital ministry through his church it was really just visiting. Some friends from church you were in the hospital and he just saw annie that the people in the hospitals and all kinds of situations that didn't. That they hadn't a lot of little needs visitation program kind of grew into a ministry called it the special angel grouper angel fund and enjoys helped dozens of families who have mostly children waiting for a heart transplant and other life-threatening different things then he's arranged for housing meals. Are often have to travel back and forth in and they need help with meals there and special assistance programs where they don't have places to stay overnight but through this fund and in his own generosity last time she's helped with temporary housing and transportation and childcare and and a lot of other things but mostly it's it's it's caring and. And comfort and positive thoughts and prayer blankets in a lot of interesting things he's a real inspiration the encourager he actually has on facebook. And this is kind of what i see is god for bringing sunshine into the lives of those who are in their greatest moment of need and he's bonds with these families he he supports. He's there when the family gets the phone call that their two-year-old son is got the heart that's being donated by some tragedy and. He's also there at the funeral to some of these families when people haven't made it through and he's he's family's take him in so much that he's helped them through. He was recently featured on good morning america with a high school senior who cannot attend her graduation so he had the principal and the teachers come to the hospital and they were. My dad's 89 years old and still lives independently with my mom in mendota the small town where i grew up he was recently diagnosed with acute leukemia and probably has only months to live so i welcome this opportunity to tell you about him. My dad's a wonderful father in-person much of my better self iota him he is a quiet way of teaching by example. Honesty humility fairplay compassion and common sense hard work. In a playful sense of humor all characteristics that stand out. Allah says he reminds me a little of atticus finch in to kill a mockingbird life for my dad has never been about what he can get for himself but about what he can how we can help others. And thankful that he's always supported me if your views ever disappointed in my choices he never showed it. That was born in 1924 and grew up in the small town of lasalle on the illinois river. His childhood sounds like something out of the movie stand by me. With his friends he rode his bike all over town and roam the countryside with a fishing pole and a bb gun. Your horses milk cows and harvested corn by hand. Like to talk to childhood stories. And that was in his early teens he and some friends skipped school to go skinny-dipping in a farm creek. Chicken came along and one of them shot it with his bb gun. They didn't want to waste the chicken so still on clothes they tried to cook it over an open fire. But the farmer surprised them and took all their clothes back to the farmhouse. He came back out angry and with an axe handle and hand and demanded they pay a dollar for the chicken but they had no money. So finally you gave them their underwear so they can go in the house and make a phone call. They called the treasurer of their scope to. Lights out and paid the farmer in the crisis was over. About the same time. he and some friends were crossing the illinois river railroad bridge to fish on the other side. They got caught by a train. Barreling down on them whistleblowing there was nowhere to go in the drop to the river was over 60 ft. We scooted out on the ties as far as they dared anyway as flat as they could while the train thunder by just inches away. They all survived unscathed but he never told his mother about this close by. Life got serious for my dad when he was 17 years old. He was shot in a hunting accident nearly died he spent almost a year in the hospital in a full body cast he's walked with a cane ever since because the doctors couldn't fully repair the damage to his leg. If there's a silver lining to his injury i guess it's that it kept him out of the war although i'm sure he would have willingly served at his father did his time in the hospital convinced him to become a doctor. He graduated from the university of illinois medical school and set up a family practice with his brother in mendota just 12 miles from where he grew up. He married my mom my hometown girl and before long they had four children three girls. And the boy carl my dad had a sliding scale for his medical care i remember patients we couldn't pay cash coming by the house to deliver a dozen eggs or a basket of vegetables what you always accepted as full payment. For many years he was an old-time country doctor going on housecalls delivering babies completing minor surgeries counseling and providing basic care who was the on-call local doctor for the railroad and for the high school football team. You're tired often up in the middle of the night and routinely working 60-hour weeks. My dad was a very busy man but he always found time to spend with me and his family he took me to cubs games in chicago and remains an always hopeful cubs fan to this day. He loves the outdoors and spent many days with me fishing camping and canoeing for many years it took me on an annual week-long fishing adventure in canada we took a family vacation every summer usually camping in the trailer with a friend. I have wonderful memories of camping in florida colorado canada and many other places he continue this tradition well into his 80s working with my mother to plan family vacations that brought together is for children and 11 grandchildren. My dad has a strong sense of compassion in fairness. Years ago he received an inheritance but his brother and two sisters were not included so he split the inheritance so all would get a share. A longtime nurse retired circumstances left her without a place to live so we set up a living space in the basement of his medical office for. He asked for no rent only that she not feel the building with the odor of cooking chicken during office hours. Even today's thinking of others concerned of his medical care isn't taking scarce resources from those who might benefit more and wanting to be reassured that his children and grandchildren are all okay. Okay we're nearing the end here messi butler. And. I was going to read an anonymous piece but we won't have time so that you'll be the last. As long as you have the ability to tell your parents. You love them and appreciate them. Do it. This will not always be the case. Please greet your neighbor and. Greaser the new members.

uuprairie_org

Pr111113Galasinski-ed.mp3

Before i introduce our speaker i would like to introduce his cohort today brian michael wright music teacher teaches kindergarten in hartford wisconsin. He had his undergraduate work here at uw-madison and food here for an additional four years. Teaching creative music classes at madison school community recreation. And our presenter today james callison ski. Has a bachelors of fine arts & jazz studies from cardinal stritch he freelancers is a jazz bassist in the milwaukee area and has been a member of first unitarian society in milwaukee for the last 3 years. Enjoys traveling hiking and biking and is currently pursuing a master of divinity degree at meadville lombard theological school in chicago. Good morning everybody it's great to really great to be here and i really have the sense of community being here and. On behalf of rhino. It's always special being in madison to play a game. Magnus. We used to ryan probably play the gig there for 10 years and last three or four years on the plane was in there so it's always great to beer. Sold 15 of the titles of today's talk is john coltrane in the truly religious life and want to first start out with. I forgot a sheet of paper. Is too small readings i would like to reach you before i began and the first one is from a historical marker. In front of a house that john coltrane owned in philadelphia simply reads john w coltrane 1926 to 1967. A pioneering african-american jazz musician composer and saxophonist. Coltrane used african and indian elements to create a distinctive style. Which at first shocked audiences. But ultimately gained wide acceptance. He lived here 1952 to 1958. The next reading is a quote from a john coltrane interview they gave in 1966. My goal is to live the truly religious life. And express it in my music. If you live it. When you play there's no problem because the music is part of the whole thing. To be a musician is really something. It was a very very deep. My music. Is the spirit spiritual expression of what i am. My faith. My knowledge might being. When you begin to see the possibilities of music. You desired to do something really good for people. Help yumanity free itself from a tango. I think music. Can make the world better. If i'm qualified i want to do it. I'd like to point out to people the divine in musical language that transcends words. I want to speak to their souls. It was john coltrane's attention. To live the truly religious life. This is course means that coltrane thought there was a nun true or false religious life. The religious life of obedience following rules reciting creed's was not something coltrane had in mind when he spoke about the truly religious life. Coltrane thought that in its most authentic form. Religion should not polarize but instead help us to create unity. And to find something in our lives. Divine meaning in our lives. It should challenge us to take a journey of self-discovery. In many ways i think john coltrane was a uu life was characterized by constant spiritual and musical searching. Just let him to creatively transcend pain and tragedy. And in the course of his life he explored many cultures in his music. An end many religions as well. John william coltrane spiritual journey. Had a very humble beginning in a small north carolina town. Call hamlet. Shortly after his birth. His family moved to another world town north point. Both of john's grandfathers were christian ministers. He was raised a strict christian. His mother was said to be a very spiritual person who sang and played piano. His father was a tailor. An amateur musician. Coltrane father would close the door to his bedroom and practice his violin and ukulele almost every night. Within a few months. Each other in 1938. His maternal grandparents and an uncle and an aunt all died. And then in early 1939 his father died. Young and suddenly. All the sudden his family was broken up. In addition. Money began to become a problem. His mother eventually moved to philadelphia to find work. John stayed with a few remaining family members back in north point while you finish school. Around the same time of these deaths in the family coltrane began to play alto saxophone and clarinet. Coltrane responded to these desks. Biplane is clarinet incessantly. Closing the door. As his father did. Shutting them off to the world of pain and death that surrounded him. Music became coltrane's refuge. Music. Also became coltrane's father's substitute. Coltrane used music to transcend the surroundings that were around him. Music can be buried. Cathartic and it can really be a consistent friend emotionally acknowledging our problems can bring out small pockets of freedom. And this is the essence of the blues from which john coltrane and other jazz musician. Draw their inspiration. His much. Like a parasite. That irritates an oyster so much that the oyster build up a defense layer of calcium carbonate. But eventually become something beautiful. Coltrane practice habits. Have now become legendary. He was such a practice between sets on a gig. Practice off stage while other musicians were playing and he said to even practice at night while everyone else is sleeping fuel and his bed. And not blow in the saxophone just do fingerings. I also said the practice whenever is a family function or dinner party he was said to go off into a small room practice. Coltrane is universally regarded as being a technician of the saxophone. And two master any instrument takes hours and hours of practice. And at this point in his life he was putting in the time and hard work to become a master musician. After high school. He moved to philadelphia to be with his family. In the 1940s 1950s philadelphia had a lively jazz scene and a proud african-american community. At the time. Factions of islam or spreading and many of his friends converted to islam. His first wife naima. Only married in 1955 was a muslim. He began studied islam. And i imagine he must have wondered how there could be more than the one truth of christianity from which he was brought up. In this confusing. And transitional time is life coltrane also encountered heroin and alcohol. Heroin was the drug of choice in the jazz community at the time. Some people thought that even play jazz you had to do heroin. And i'll sure you know that's not true. It seems to me that practicing. Compulsively after the break-up up his family. May have not completely relieved his pain but and may have just pushed it off in a sentence. Despite the addiction. He was able to land a lot of work and blues and jazz bands. For example he played with one of jazz's all-time great groups the miles davis quintet he was later kicked out. Because of his heroin habit. Confused. Depressed out of work. He was probably at the lowest point of his entire life. Go to use the firing by miles davis as a wake-up call. He wanted to quit heroin and attempt an attempt to do it cold turkey. One can only speculate what exactly he went through but we know now that withdrawal symptoms of quitting heroin can be very severe and it's not recommended by doctors. Symptoms may include sleepless nights vomiting body aches cramps the list goes on and on. And it normally lasts about 14 days. During this time. He most likely would have been physically unable to play his saxophone his his refuge in his life. Instead. He must have relied on his family. Perhaps some of the structure and order an impressum destruction orders and found in islam. Out of all this pain. K manu coltrane. He was awakened from an ultimate low into a peak experience. He later wrote about this in the liner notes of his most famous album a love supreme. During the year. 1957. Experience. By the grace of god a spiritual awakening. Which was lead to lead me to a richer fuller more productive life. At that time. Ingratitude i humbly ask to be given the means and privileged to make others happy through music. He found that the hard work. He was putting into music. Would only pay off. If you would become a creative and healthy person who also worked and practice hard about being a human being. He not only took. At this point he not only attacked musical problems. Spiritual one as well. Sober and spiritual re-centered coltrane began the season music. As being bigger than himself. Any settled on one of the most creative periods in the history of jazz. He began recording his own compositions. I want it all came in is all done said he recorded up 250 of his own recording days after kicking heroin and alcohol. I think you can hear something different in his plane after this moment in 1957. 41 there's no cliches there's no witty or tried blues licks you here and extreme seriousness. End. In the 1950s he later rejoin miles davis. And some of the albums they made together like kind of blue of becoming just ultimate jazz classics. Begins experience with rapid chord changes in his music. And by the 19. 60s early 1960s he was told by most jazz magazines as being the most popular tenor saxophone player but the most popular soprano saxophone player. And he also had the most popular jazz group at the time. But. It if you would have stopped evolving right there and then in the early 1960s. He would have easily gone down as a great. Individual. With a break. Master a master improviser and a great composer. But he still search for more. He kept pursuing himself and the religious. In his music. Kept experimenting. And i think it is this pursuit. A complex subjectivity. That is the essence of religion. And he was able to communicate this. You reached the peak of popularity. With his most famous album a love supreme in 1964. And after that he really became the leader of the avant-garde movement in jazz. His music became free r-rated more instruments. And his classic quartet disbanded. He divorced and remarried again and second wife alice. Took over playing piano in his band. He mentored younger musicians. But. He died abruptly. Of liver cancer at the age of 40 1967. At the virtual top of his career. He left behind. Three sons. Wife alice. And his wife kept up his spiritual legacy in many ways not only through the music but she also started a center for eastern spiritual study. And she just recently passed away in the last couple years. In in talking about coltrane i think it would not do justice to speak. About coltrane and not talk a little bit about his conception of god. Not only did he speak about god all the time and interviews and liner notes. The titles of many of his compositions have religious connotations. A love supreme like i mentioned oma father son holy ghost. Spiritual like we just played meditations song of praise list goes on and on. It's not that he just. Tolerated all religions is obvious that. And he said that he believed all religions were innocence true peace study sufi mysticism the kabbalah. And he was a great example of the universal suffrage to religion. But not just that. He read textbook on religions and cultures of the world. As mentioned he was raised a christian. Married a muslim. His second wife became a hindu guru. Some of his best friends who you like wayne shorter word for buddhist. He lived multiple religions. The god that he believed in was not the christian god per se. I think what the god he believed in. Was what the illusion paul tillich called the god beyond god. Coltrane. Was a mystic. To experience a oneness with himself. The other others. And the universe. What coltrane men. By god. Was an interac sperian that transcended words. It was both. A unity. And a peace within him. His experience was something that he wanted to communicate to others and for him the only way to properly express that feeling was through music. Many people. Are said to have been changed after hearing. Hit music. Myself being one. During my undergraduate degree. I am jazz history course. One of the professors playdate. Performance by him in 1965 or something. And. I experienced explain but i experienced something that i didn't expect to experience that was outside of the normal realm but music and it made me. Think a lot deeper not only about my life. But. Where i was going musically. And i decided to pursue jazz further. I was transformed when it when i first heard coltrane. I felt reborn in a sentence. I felt. Awake. I feel as if all the event i felt as if all the events and happenings. Up to that point. We're moose compared to that experience. For coltrane. The contemplatively is not a moment of perfect peace and serenity. It's actually facing the reality of life. Innocent. Coltrane sound is freedom. And it's neither. Mysterious. Nor otherworldly. But rather it is the actual work of making freedom. Grounded in routine. And the everyday practice of doing and living. The quest for freedom. Is not something of the past for the future. Or just certain times. It is a continuous struggle. Coltrane was immersed in the tradition of jazz. The turbulent political movements of the time. But yet had the courage. To creatively pursue avenues outside of his own makeup. This sense of pursuit and striving. From moore is abundantly present in his music. Coltrane's influence. Is still felt today. His identity and in popular culture is constantly resurfacing. Today at church. In san francisco. Formerly called the saint john william coltrane african orthodox church actually venerates mezza saint. According to their website their main mission is to quote. Understand the divine nature of our patron saint in terms of his ascension as a high soul into oneness with god through some. We have come to understand the john coltrane in terms of his sound. And it sound as meditative union with god and quote. So if you are ever in san francisco services are from noon to 3 and you thought these services were lawn. But i think. Coltrane's legacy. Is in somehow it somehow related to me it's beyond the music that he created. The spirituality of john coltrane still speaks to us today more than ever. Coltrane viewed. The number one coltrane view the creative process as a sacred act. And our lives i think we need to find out. Find outlets for creativity in our own lives. And strive to become more and more creative people. Often. We become too complacent and stop speaking. Maybe we have nice job. Nice family a comfortable life in general. The coltrane's music urge is us and reminds us. There's always something more. Not more things. But more meaning in life to pursue. At the same time. Seeking. Should not be equated with never being content. Can we become peaceful. Ourselves. And become content. We should strive for more and more keys more and more content. Coltrane's life illustrates how pain. And destructive happenings can be overcome. By developing pockets of freedom. However. These pockets of freedom soon collapse. And new freedom must be pursued. The daunting task of creating ourselves. Is never over. Coltrane was always looking for the next thing. The next creative inspiration. Always trying to squeeze out the most. As much as i could from the music. That is what makes coltrane music so powerful. Likewise. We need to persistently try to squeeze out the most meaning in our lives. Coltrane did this. And his legacy. His music asked us. What pain. What's serious thing are we not facing that can get in the way of living the truly religious life. V a a word riot fest. The sound of a saxophone comes from the conical bore of the instrument how it's arranged doesn't matter you could straighten out the tenor. And it would sound the same. The sound comes from the holes. That that are opening and closing constantly not just about the only sound that comes out of the bell is when the whole instruments closed so if it does change the sound a little bit but it's still the main facts. clarinet at the two-cylinder the whole time and how the air goes through and vibrates. So it's kind of like the difference between a euphonium concert bass clef instrument or a baritone so those are like mini coopers. Reading and understanding and end his interviews he was a very mellow peaceful. Wouldn't hurt a fly type of person. He did have a alcohol problem some people said. He just had an addictive kind of personality. I read that after he quit. Alcohol and heroin. He still had to have candy all the time and it's. My guess is that the song obsession with practicing had to do with is addictive personality type of thing as well. That's a good question i guess i'm not someone that that thinks you know the vibrations. Here in his vibrations in the universe we have to get them all together i guess i don't think that way much about what i think is pretty. Really simple and that is. Music. Is. A collection of organizations that can express feeling. And if you're rooted and grounded. And know the language. You can express that. So. In the sermon i said coltrane's music. To me it's grounded in reality it's just. Turn off that explains when you improvise very rarely do you play something that you haven't practiced before in one way or another you can't play something from nothing so improvising is just organized thoughts and ideas links together spine spontaneous composition but there's certain levels of improvising where it's almost like meditative where i'm thinking more about sounds and contours and not so much how do i delete this particular note to the court change that james is playing and i i feel like that that's my form of prayer i feel very close to god just purely creating music other than sometimes blues or jazz tuna traditional to like autumn leaves or things like that but you can take any tune to that point so for me to be able to play tonight and i feel totally totally centered and grounded. There's two separate itself from other music. I think. That's another sermon maybe i'll come back and do the improvisation. That is the whole nature of the. The beast. In a census is turned on its head because. In classical music which ryan on his study i mean going for a specific sound of a specific way to do things. And you know we end. Kinjaz i think. Not only are you improvising but you're you're any phone individual sound. Classical music's that to amy rock musicians at 2. But it's really like the emphasis has you got to develop your own sound to your own voice. That's a big difference as far as a bass player. How how what was the question. Sure. My relationship. Is i mean i feel close to me sometimes when i lay next to my wife. A lot of times of course it's providing this like rhythmic ground and harmonic ground of what's going on. I'm so. Someone like ryan can improvise over the top of it. But i mean there's a lot of improvising going on and especially when ryan and i play to go to sleep for a while. We will get a kind of telepathic thing that we're going to go in this direction. And. We playing a quintet with a piano player drums and then my wife sings and plays saxophone as well and when i write tunes i know specifically what to expect from my musicians so someone coming into our bandy dozen or music would have trouble reading our music because i know what james kando on his face i write for that and i write chord changes that i know he will interpret away that i don't have to say play it this way i just know that that's what he's going to do so that's the relationship that i have with. Not that i know it like a hollywood dramatized movie charlie parker's life. Charlie parker's similar they both died young and they were both great saxophonist. So that may be what you're thinking of. On the frontline bleeding marches and things. But he did write a song called doctor king martin luther king. And you did right at that piece called alabama when she composed a night after. The birmingham of those 45 young black women got bombed and killed and. A lot of people didn't regard him as a sort of voice in that. I'll keep my voice in that movement. Two things that came to mind if one is. Mozart. Columbus people were improvisers. I mean like anton bruckner was a organism he would improvise all the time on the organ at all these things. Dumb because they never even have recording devices now jazz musicians record devices are recording devices i can go listen to john coltrane live at the village vanguard 1961 and learn from them. Audio listening about broke music that the similarity is is i think the counterpoint like basically two different melodies going at the same time. And that's really troubling inbox music and i think it's. Prevalent in jaswell. Did you. I've studied bach cello suites and when you're playing bach she'll be playing 111 melody hear that really lines up with the melody that's coming with the accompaniment well that's a bebop does charlie parker's music you're playing something here but it really doesn't belong yet until you get to this next cord maybe two or four three b's later and that voice leading has been around for hundreds of years so that's it if there's a wonderful book called forward motion all music is going somewhere in the same thing the same rules applied at that time now or still playing with thankfulness. I wish we could take.

uuprairie_org

Pr110612TributeToBarbRames-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm mary mullen a member of the program committee pray aspires to be both an open my hearted and an open-minded congregation and we do welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color your sexual orientation or your family structure and we also welcome you no matter what your age are your abilities or maybe more important your inability later in the service will invite visitors and guests and returning friends to introduce yourself so that we might get to know you better and sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services there either presented by a prairie member or a mistake-free prairie members a member of the wider community and when we get a minister again i minister will be part of that mixes well today our service is called hale poetry a tribute to barbara trains of former member who has now passed on and it will be presented by three members kathy converse and prior and orange schrader well introduced a little bit later. I don't have any announcements here so if. None to read. But there are plenty on your order of service and on the back so be sure to read them and they're made so you can put them on your refrigerator at home if you like. Our opening words will be read by anne pryor. And in the spirit of honoring barbara raines i'm not going to read i'm going to recite and hopefully with that sense of conversational recitation that she did it was never a standoff and i'm going to tell you this poem that i've memorized which i'm hoping i don't do either so nature is what we see in this is written by emily dickinson. Nature is what we see the hill the afternoon. Squirrel eclipse the bumblebee. Nae. Nature is heaven nature is what we here. The bobolink the sea. Thunder. The bumblebee. Nay nature is harmony. Nature is what we know yet have no art to say. So incidents are wisdom is to her simplicity. Please welcome the converse rollins families up to light the chalice of the congress family is kathy randy and may leanne and the rollins family is tara who wants to the converse family as well and chris rollins this is on waking by john donahue. For the gift of eyes to see the world. The gift of mine to feel at home in my life. The way it's a possibility breaking on the shore of dawn. The harvest of the past. That awaits my hunger. And all the further rings this new day will bring. We'll have a minute or so of silent meditation started by. Started by the china ended by the shine. Now we invite children and parents to the front of the room. For a children's story within this case will be too poems. By randy converse so come and join him up here. Today i've got two poles last songs. Fat. I think bob would smile on cuz it i don't think i've ever heard of these. Story songs poems by gary smiling when she if she heard them. And i think they really highlights our seventh principle interconnected web which of course barb. Biolife. First one call eco terrestrial by ken lundquist. I followed his work. For many many years i've admired his courage and his creativity. He also i don't know anybody else out there but maybe the kids he wrote the song called fat 14th was he saying at the demonstration way back in january-february. You can call everything on this planet e.t.. From the birds in the trees to the. Fish in the sea. From the beast in the wild. And the forest in trees. Fragile they are fragile at for their fragile life-forms. As fragile can be. Just like you and me. Oh there's rats in there's bats and gazelles and canoes. Octopi platypi and kangaroo. Eagles in. Eagles and. Mosquitoes and elephants to. And there's a me and the you and me and the. Next song it's called song it's called someone's going to use it after you by tom chapin and john forrester. When you stand at the sink. Did you ever think. About the water going down the drain. How was first in the deep blue sea. And then it was rain. And then maybe if you came to know for an eskimo. After using a snowball fight. Danny came down south to be in your mouth to help you brush your teeth tonight. Like wheel. The earth is turning. And it will go on that way forever. I don't care. Barry sullivan. As the old becomes a new. Someone's going to use it when you're through. Like a water went in there things we got to share someone's going to use it after you. When you sneeze like thunder. Did you ever wonder. If the air you started motion. Help to form a tropical storm over the western ocean. Or. Was blown out of a blue whale spout. As a girlfriend need to see. Now that the air is in your care. So when you sneeze. And go on someone's going to use it to. Like the water went in there things were going to share. Someone's gonna use it after you. Thank you all. Well if we presenters this morning are all prairie members who loved and admired barbara rain. Kathy converses two daughters adopted barbara as their grandma and had wonderful times together. Barber gave in poetry books. And they had her favorite passages marked with comments. Orange has a longtime love of poetry. And greatly admired the natural way in which was apart of barbers life. And ann which wishes she had a tense of barbers vast memorization skills and i sure we're all in the same boat with her and if i invite them up i'm going to explain who was. Thank you. Making the announcement for the program at least on the prairie website there was a little a little bit of information on barbara don't see it in the words. Barbara was the farberware rhames was a former member of prairie. She had come here in the nineties and stay through 2001 she came to madison because she was caring for her brother who lived here so she came and lived with him. And. Well she was here during a years in madison she lovingly tended the prairie yard and flowers which is never quite the same since. And she is a mansion in rich star prairie community by many spontaneous heartfelt recitations of poetry. Seawood. React would have joys and sorrows and she was pop out of her chair and she was said. On the way this morning before she walked two miles to get here. I saw the most spectacular cardinal and it was singing and it made me think of it and she'd go and she was in or it was a cardinal or it was a daffodil or it was a bluebird there would be something that she had seen and she would just jump up in barbara was probably 9lb sopping wet and she was a tiny little ball of energy she made me think of a drop of water hitting a hot frying pan in minneapolis minnesota. And family were when she her brother died here in madison and then she went back. So we're trying to celebrate her life by focusing on inspiring and fun poetry and we do have a general theme of nature. So. Saw the pictures up here i think it's pretty amazing in the top right-hand corner if that doesn't look like barb i mean i never saw a child that looks so much like the adult version and then everything is pretty obvious. In 1941 with a bachelor's degree. And in twenty years later in 1972 she went back into graduate work and got a master's degree. Did you go to the next. This is mom and her three sons both younger and grown and then it just a couple pictures of barbies she was younger. And this is her picture this is a fairly a more recent picture and the three men are her three sons. River and richard and peter and the young woman on the on this side is her one of her granddaughters. So she worked is after she got her degree in social work she worked in. And not minneapolis in the public school system as a social worker. And then. At the midvale lincoln school and actually received an achievement award as a volunteer from emerson school. And you can go to the next turn. And this is this is chose bob with her. This is a more recent pictures of her with her. 3 granddaughter has a total of four granddaughters and then she also had adopted granddaughters. Will hear about later. In addition to volunteering in schools. She worked in league of women voters st. david's society. And plus. Volunteering and she works with camp unistar in other groups with young people throughout her life. I had read in one of the descriptions of her. In the league of women voters they described her as a quietly energetic stalwart registrar and she has to be at the farmers market on saturday mornings. For the league of women voters for a long time. And bob was loving the outdoors in. I love the backpack up here which is probably weighs more but she traveled all over the country and went to all these different wonderful parks in places and camped and knuth. I'ma show some of the places that. Pictures some of the pictures i've found two places at to win. Which were all pretty spectacular. And her family was. Wonderful and that she traveled always travels with her sons and their partners and granddaughter. And barb love music. And. She was always really ready to. Take off and travel at anytime it looks like even into her very last few years she may have been in a wheelchair but she sure looks ready to go there. And one of her biggest loves the scrabble anybody ever played scrabble with her there was really no chance and these pictures were taken in 2001 isn't that within 2010 so right through into her ninetieth year she still. Play scrabble. And i think this is the picture of the new of the barb that me know and remember most with her uu t-shirt on. Flats for barbies. Orange is going to come up next in poetry while the poetry is running we're going to have. A series of a stream of nature picture showing. All but two of the photographs of mine so i won't. Remembers to bring some homes today and either memorize them or read them and we're going to do this in two sections with him in between because it's a lot of words to absorb so the first half is going to be some prey members who had offered to read a poem and we asked that it have a nature themed as possible because that was very dear to barbara's hard but they may not all have a nature themed i thought i'd start by sharing probably the only that i have memorized we had the breakfast. And it is it goes something like this i'm so i don't know the poet's name. The hen contributes. But the pig gives his all when you're doing your palm if you would stand up rosemarie lester's going to start she has one memorize and she's going to read one. Mini delights. Eventually i memorized a very short one to make a prairie it takes a clover and one b. Went over and abby. And revelry. The river alone will do if bees are few. The hell it was. A narrow fellow in the grass occasionally rides you may have met him did you not. He noted its notice son is. The grass divides as with a comb a spotted shaft it scene. And then it closes at your feet and opens for the run. He likes a boggy acre a floor too cool for corn yet when a child and barefoot i'm more than once at morn 9:30 i thought. A whiplash unbraiding in the sun. When stopping to secured it wrinkled and was gone. Several of nature's people i know and they know me i feel for them a transport of cordiality. But never met this fellow attended or alone. Without a tighter breathing and zero at the bone. A new support for the. That was by emily dickinson thank you. I just discovered this poem by john updike. It was red on the garrison garrison keillor's program. And i've always loved chicory. Show me a piece of land that god forgot. A strip between an unused sidewalk say. Anna bulldoze lot rich and broken glass. And there july on will be chicory. Bit leggy hollow stems staggering skyborn. It's me is rough harry and uncirculated. Like pointed shoes too cheap for else to wear. It's button blooms attend rizmo blue how good it to risk the roadside fumes the oil soaked heat reflected from asphalt. A wretched earth's done colored like cement to packed for any other seed to probe. It sent a deep taproot delicious boiled. Is relish by all livestock lends its leaves to salads and cook greens. I will not thrive and cultivated soil it must be free. They know it's going to be our next home. Michie peachie. When when she send an email saying i want to do this, trickery can you tell your story of why you. When i was very small my folks were given an assurance that they would not lose a house if they built one in the depression. And so my father was clearing a field. Centerfield was entirely. Light blue for chicory chicory. And i remember that memory. But on top of that. As he was clearing the field he put everything he dug out into a wheelbarrow. Any friend of my brother and sister on that wheelbarrow and gave him a ride. And i am in time. With so little. And when he gave me a ride my mother was in the house i'm sure she wouldn't have agreed and i had to lean over in order to hold onto those sides of that wheelbarrow and it was this wonderful springfield and a wonderful color. And that was my earliest memory. Okay i'll i'll do the serious one first it's robert frost poem called nothing gold can stay and i just choose my torch fourth-graders this town would go through a kind of analyzes so they could understand what it was. But you're only going to get them. The poem nature's first green is gold her hardest to to hold. Hurley leaf a flower. But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So eden. Sancta grief. So dawn goes down today. Nothing gold. Can stay. And then the other than ogden nash poem they hold it. it does not clock. Instead of quack and when it sucks it bottoms up. Shamrock for them in some of the books of poetry that she that she gave him so these were ones that we know where dear to her. Kearns the first one i have is from a card that i got cents from barb. So she wrote herself. Says. Oh i'm sorry to be late to honor the speciality. When you million can celebrate your birthday but i want to stay your someone i appreciate. Creative smart compassionate i want to say i think you're great. My tardiness i won't be rate please choose a gift appropriate and infection reinstate barbara and then i chose another poem by shel silverstein. It's called the old camaros. An oak tree and a rosebush grow young and green together talking the talk of growing things wind and water and weather and while the rosebush sweetly blooms the oak tree grows too high. Fitnow it spoke of nursing eagles mom's mountain peaks in sky. I guess you think you're pretty great the rose was heard to cry. Screaming screaming as loud as i possibly could to the tea shop in the sky. And you have no time for flower talk now that you've grown so tall. It's not so much that i've grown so the tree it's just that you stayed so small. Every year we would be sent. Poems and. And books and things like that in. Do i pick one that i love from barb it says. 15 is a magical number. It almost it opens a promising year for tara my almost granddaughter a time of great changes is near. A jogger musician and dancer so upbeat so helpful so dear. New school with new faces new friendships new challenges soon will appear. Fake courage and love and good fortune attend you. That's my wish sincere barbara and the other one. Visual aid. This is not the other one was by a barber this is not but she made this for me and you'll see each of these there's a different flavor which corresponds with the poem of course for my 16th birthday 16 flavors 16 scrumptious flavors chocolate lime and cherry coffee pumpkin fudge banana caramel cream and boysenberry rocky road and toasted almond butterscotch vanilla dip butter brickle lemon custard coconut and mocha chip. How i love those ice cream choices each scoop lovely smooth and round tallest ice cream cone in town lying there on the ground. Kathy and i are now going to read some poems that we chose and i think that i'm going to start with a light one. This is by arthur scooter man is called routine. No matter what we are and who some duties everyone must do. A poet puts aside his reese to wash his face and brush his teeth. And even earl's must comb their curls and even kings have under things. Hey this is henry wadsworth longfellow the tide rises the tide falls. The tide rises the tide falls the twilight darkens the curlew calls. How long the season stamp and brown the traveller hastens toward the town and the tide rises the tide falls. Darkness settles on roofs and walls but the sea the sea in the darkness calls. The little waves with their soft white hands efface the footprints in the sand and the tide rises the tide falls. The morning breaks the steed in the stalls stamp and a at the hospital called. The day returns but never more returns the traveler to the shore. The tide rises the tide falls. Well i was going to read a different one but this is about blessing the boats so to follow on the tide by lucille clifton at st mary's. May the tide that is entering even now the lip of our understanding carry you out beyond the face of fear. May you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back. May you open your eyes to water. Water waving forever and may you in your innocence sail through this to that. Another woman poet jane kenyon let evening come. Let the light of late-afternoon shines through the chinks in the barn moving up the bales as the sun moves down. Let the crickets take up chafing as a woman takes up her needles in her yarn. Let evening come. But do collect on the whole abandoned in long grass. But the stars appear and the moon disclose her silverhorn. But the fox go back to its sandy den let the wind die down. Let the shed go back inside but evening come. To the bottle in the ditch to the scoop in the oats to the air in the lung let evening come. Let it come as it will and don't be afraid. God does not leave us comfortless so let evening come. Robert frost again. Because your nature poems robert frost a lot of nature poems. People that do in forest still reflect. The total sky almost without defect. And like the flowers beside them chill and shiver. Would like the flowers beside them soon be gone. And yet not out by any brooker river. But up my route to bring dark foliage on. The trees that have it in their pent-up buds to darken nature and be summerwoods. Let them think twice before they use their powers to blot out and drink up and sweep away. This flowery waters and his watery flowers from snow that melted only yesterday. And this next. Poem comes from one of my favorite books talking to the sun. It's an illustrated anthology of poems for young people so that's why pills to me and it smashed with paintings and other art works from the metropolitan museum of art. The poem acquainted read is match with this image by rousseau. The repast of the lion and it is what the title of the book comes from. It's one of the more narrative poems i've ever read so it's going to read more like a dialog then. A poem. A true account of talking to the sun at fire island and this is by frank o'hara who lives a short 40 years 1926 to 1966. The sun woke me this morning loud and clear saying hey i've been trying to wake you up for 15 minutes don't be so rude you are only the second poet i have ever chosen to speak to personally so why aren't you more attentive if i could burn you through the window i would to wake you up i can't hang around here all day. Sorry son i stayed up late last night talking to how. When i woke up mayakovsky he was a lot more prompt the sunset petulant lee most people are up already waiting to see if i'm going to put in an appearance i tried to apologize. I missed yesterday. That's better he said. I didn't know you'd come out. You may be wondering why i chose to come so close. Yes i said beginning to feel hot and wondering if maybe he wasn't burning me anyway. Frankly i wanted to tell you i like your poetry. I see a lot on my rounds and you're okay you may not be the greatest thing on earth but you're different now i've heard some say you're crazy they being excessively calm themselves to my mind another crazy poets think that you're a boring reactionary not me. Just keep on like i do and pay no attention. You'll find that people always will complain about the atmosphere either too hot or too cold too bright or too dark days too short or too long. If you don't appear at all one day they think you're lazy or dead just keep right on i like it. And don't worry about your lineage poetic or natural the sun shines on the jungle you know on the tundra the see the ghetto. Wherever you were i knew it and saw you moving i was waiting for you to get to work. And now that you are making your own days so to speak even if no one read you but me you won't be depressed. Not everyone can look up even at me. It hurts their eyes. Oh son i am so grateful to you. Thanks and remember i'm watching it's easier for me to speak to you out here i don't have to slide down between buildings to get your ear i know you love manhattan but you ought to look up more often and always embrace things people earthsky stars as i do freely and with the appropriate sense of space. That is your inclination. Known in the heavens and you should know and you could follow it to hell if necessary which i doubt. Maybe we'll speak again in africa of which i too and specially fond go back to sleep now frank and i may leave a tiny poem in that brain of yours as my farewell son don't go. I was awake at last no go i must they're calling me. Who are they. Rising he said someday you'll know. They're calling to you too. Darkly heroes and then i slept. Which we'll just do tomorrow. A short run called leisure by wh davies. What is this life is full of care we have no time to stand and stare. No time to stand beneath the boughs and stare as long as sheeps or cows. No time to see when woods we passed where squirrels hide their nuts in grass. Do time to see in broad daylight streams full of stars like skies at night. No time to turn it beauties glance and watch her feet how they can dance. No time to wait till her mouth can enrich that smile her eyes began. A poor life this if full of care we have no time to stand and stare. By raymond souster queen anne's lace. Magnificent. About half and entertaining places you can walk to. Queen anne's lace is a kind of flower that if you didn't know it. He passed you pass by the rest of your life. But once it's pointed out you will look for it always even in places for you know it can't possibly be. He will never tire of bending over to examine. Tomorrow at this shaya filigree of wonder born among the grasses. You will imagine poems is brief as fair so natural with themselves as she takes the breath away. Rose's exit to adhapona. The puffin is one of my favorite bird. There once was a puffin just the shape of a muffin and he lived on an island in a bright blue sea. He ate little fishes which were most delicious and he have them for supper and he had them forty. But this poor little puffin. He couldn't play nothing. Free haven't anybody to play with it all. When along came the fishes. And they said if you wishes. You could have us for playmates instead of 40 so they now play together and all sorts of weather. And the puffin eats pancakes like you and like me. Thank you very much everyone who brought up home today and i know barbara would be pleased. But we do have a chance for any comments that anyone would like to make. Or questions. For a memory of barbara. I remember we came start coming to prairie and 2000 so we knew her for a little over a year. But what i remember besides she was as wonderful greeter that one of her jobs was that she would interview new people. And she was particularly. Interested in andrew. And she every time we come to church. She sit down and continue this interview you know this is the day before prairie was into computers and she would write this out and then the next week she would check it all out. And she did. And i asked more questions and then she had this book i don't know what's happened to the block but. She would tell us about. All these wonderful people in prairie that you was going to add. Us to this book and then she would. Tell but other people did but it was just. A wonderful introduction to the church. Did you also then put this all on the prairie fire. So i had brought a long poem by mary oliver which i won't read but when i was going through the poetry section many years ago came up with these japanese death poems and i don't know if any of you are familiar with these i hadn't been but it's the custom. Starting many centuries ago on your deathbed to write a poem a very short like little haiku. Bury me when i die beneath a wine barrel in the tavern. With what. The cast. Will leak well i'm approaching barb stage and i thought i would write a brief little thing. The benefits of aging. Now old ice low my frantic pace. Add stop to smell the roses. With joy i've left the work time race. A necessary poses. But apparently last golden years and tried to keep my health. No longer front or worries or fears enjoying life by wealth. Remaining time i cannot see what's left i need to know for life has been so kind to me i'll leave it with a globe. Barbara was always making connections with people. And after she had come to pray for a few weeks. My mother from washington state was visiting. And so i introduced her as a visitor. And barbara came up afterward and she said now i know why i thought i knew you. She had been in graduate school at western reserve in school social work with my mother back in 1940 41 and so she when she came to pray she recognized me because i look enough like my mother would have loved then. That are reflected the time and. For the the whole kind of life that each of them had lived. From from the time they were younger through. Their older years. I'll call this suburb is the peaceful cop when you come out to prairie barb would be lying if i can picture her lying on the grass rooting out dandelions with their big hat and stuff and. I used to come up here a lot in those years during the week and i remember there were a gang of young toughs i would call him who are out here skateboarding and. Just generally you know keep me kind of anxious about them coming into the building or doing something untoward and so i figured i would enlist them and i said hey guys i got a job for you there's a spoiled lady that hangs out here and i want you to watch out for you know because she might need a medical thing or something like that. Hey one small memory also that maybe not everybody knew she made a point of parking a distance from the church so that other people who would be less able could get there easily. I apologize i can't remember the author of this. Inspiring poem. Spring is here. The grass is red as i wonder where the birdies is. Tripping on a banana eating dirty worms. Hahaha. Well i got a couple more memories to add things to say one is that when i don't remember which one of you read the poem that had something about be abandoned hole. But. I couldn't help but remember a line out of winter frost poem is about how i stepped on the toe of an unemployed whole milk comes up and hits you in the face i just thought that's what's going to happen to that abandoned. Sushi scott she was scotch. And. I save everything but she would wash every. Aluminum thing and save it i think that's what she did at the school to she took those trays and she washed them and then recycled them. But she was also worried about me because i went out i didn't i wasn't used to being told you no come back or tell somebody when i'm coming back i came back about 11 or 12 she was sitting up and waiting for me and worried about me and. How old was i 55 years old for me. Are closing words are by walt whitman and very appropriately for us are called a prairie sunset from 1888. Shot gold maroon and violet dazzling silver emerald van. The earth whole amplitude and nature's multiform power of consign for once two colors. The light the general are possessed by them. Colors till now unknown. No limit confine not the western sky alone the high meridian north-south all. Pure luminous color fighting the silent shadows. To the last.

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Pr130303Haydock-ed.mp3

Call dan glad. Tell your family structure and we welcome you also no matter what your age or your abilities or your inabilities later the service will invite visitors or guests are returning friends and haven't been here for a while to introduce yourself and the purpose is so that we can get to know you better on sunday mornings we offer a wide variety of programs they're presented either by a prayer remember remember the wider community or by a minister send sandra ingram who is in the back row on the left hand side over there. I'd like to read the opening words and peter will light the chalice 30 spokes share the hot wheels hub it is a center hole that makes it useful shape clay into a vessel it is a space within that makes it useful cut doors and windows for a room it is the holes that make it useful there for profit comes from what is their usefulness comes from what is there a lawsuit. Well i'd like to introduce our speaker can haydock who as i mentioned has been coming to pray for a quite a long time i don't know several years anyway he's a longtime friend of prayer and he describes himself as an amateur on this topic like so many people in this congregation he searches to find his own pathways that lead to spirituality and recently has been casting his net to the far east so today he's going to talk about the secular roots of taoism and a later service he'll talk about buddhism please welcome can. Yes i did i just start with the. Disclaimer that i'm an amateur not an academic in this area. But it's someone recently i've had occasion over the past. 40 years or so sporadically to read different. Translations of the two written works that were of the start of taoism and over the last maybe five or six years i started to do some reading about buddhism. And i discovered something that came as a surprise to me that i thought was interesting which is that. For the first couple of hundred years after it first surface taoism was really not. Yep associated with what you would identify as a religion. Its teachings were adopted eventually and turned into taoism the religion that exists to this day. Confusion arises because we use the term taoism both refer to the philosophy and to the religion cell. The same thing is true basically with buddhism although it took about four or five hundred years before buddhism produced its dominant form mahi honor buddhism which is clearly a religion in terms of ritual and many of its beliefs. But its roots also were largely in a secular philosophy ft up for buddhism you might consider. All that reincarnation involves the supernatural but even there it does if you assume that buddhists are talking about reincarnation literally not all do. That shed. When we get to buddhism which is part two of this mini-series. That's relatively easy talk to do. Because. The buddhist from the earliest times were creators of numbered lists of ideas and they spent a great deal of time defining what the items on those lists me trying to describe taoism by contrast. Is like trying to use words carefully and accurately describe the three dimensional shape of a cloud before we get to some food concepts which i want to talk about. And i hope to wrap up with talking briefly about the second most famous passage in the oldest book involving taoism. Before we get there though i think it's important to know that there's certain barriers room pediments the stand between us in the modern age in the west. And understanding what the first couple of dallas writers had to say and so i want assertive set that foundation again when we get to buddhism that won't be necessary so i'm going to do something akin to what a political analyst call a discussion of process rather than policy first. 2400 years ago. Give or take a century. In north central china. A couple of men contemporaries one older one younger sets and thoughts down in writing. And all the older of the two is a fellow whose name was lee early being his journey. Younger was named chuang sir. And in all cases by chinese pronunciation is approximate. Willie wrote a book. Of 81 chapters but most of these chapters are about two paragraphs long. And his audience was people in positions of power authority that's kind of who he was addressing. And his book has become known as the dowager chain a chain is a text that's highly restraining text that's highly respected. Another one you may have encountered is leaching looks like it's spelled i ching. What are you doing is the ancient important action the subject to change the nation. The dowager king is an ancient respected texts on the subject of how which is the central principle of taoism get into that in a bit. The word literally means the of the pathway and it's generally translated the way and. Which is either virtue or power. So the name of the book is the great treatise on the way and. Virtue or power or the way and its virtue empower. Depending on which translation you feel most comfortable with now that the other the book written by charles there is inventively referred to as the kwanzaa. And it it runs some 33 chapters and scholars tell us the first seven chapters the ones that. Mr. tuan personally wrote. The remaining chapters 8233 or also my body is philosophy we're not sure exactly how much of a handy had in writing. And his audience was folks in general. What the principles. Pretty much the same. And a complete translation into english of the daodejing can be very short this is a complete translation this little book here. Okay. In normal text it runs more like. 4045 pages. And while the kwanzaa pills at a certain normal size book in the chapters more normal size. The first seven chapters the ones that wong's are wrote referred to his inner chapters. They run about 50 pages so you think that of a rainy afternoon you can sit down with about 100 pages. Read through them reflect on them and come away with a clear understanding of what taoist philosophy is all about. And here's why you'd be wrong there are a number of impediments that we face. In understanding what the chinese characters that were set down 2,400 years ago give or take a century what what they mean now first off we dealing with the work of their works of that embody philosophy these aren't written the way philosophy books that we're used to sing or they're not expositions of the philosophy they're not tutorials in the philosophy of. Secondly we the most part here in the west don't ordinarily sit down and read something written in classical chinese. We have to rely on translations in the case of the chuang tzu and english there is one book one translation that seems to have very little competition on the bookshelves and that is this book it was a translation by felony burton watson was a professor at columbia. Howard's express alpharetta clearchoice very but the ideas are pretty much the same so there's not too much of a problem with respected translation for however. And i keep going and leadership anyone's confused that was a man's name. Loud sir. Was short of an affectionate and honor. Honorary nickname konrad adenauer. And of siddhartha gautama the buddha the enlightened one okay well. Louds that means the old philosopher. With the old stop the characters literally mean old boy which i think is very. But it is a title road rather than his his name. Leader. All or the translations of of of what he wrote are numerous you can probably find on the bookshelves right here in madison libraries bookstores used book stores two to three dozen different translations pause radiatore in my view. Easily half of them or worthless. They are not real translations they are complete reinterpretations. In what way can well for example. Some people want to advance the the thesis perfectly reasonable thesis that all religions. Basically teach the same thing. Why. But it was two or three centuries before this philosophy. Became part of a religion so if you're trying to prove something about religion you're on the wrong bookshelf. All other folks basically coin-cell translators bring an axe to grind and they want to impose their viewpoint on the text. Not the least of this is occasionally you'll see translations of the dowager jen with the term dao. Is translated as god. There's really nothing of the supernatural in or reference dinner important to. The doctor jing. Yep the back of oz book is this a lot of seemingly supernatural stuff because. The entire book consists of parables it's metaphor and allegory okay. All-inclusive the dodger drink not not so. But. I for one have difficulty with the concept that somebody 2,400 years ago in northern china. Was dealing with say this great semitic war god yahweh. I just don't think it influence the text and there's no reference in the text with one exception passing reference to maybe more than one there's only one that i recall to a.a. god of of the chinese folk religion but it's not advocacy just a reference. So you have to be careful. With the translations in by way of how to its usual and i know at least one person that your other than myself has had occasion to sit down with the desert chain and chapters are very short. And put in front of you three or four different translations by reputable academics don't have an axe to grind. You recognize the name the institution they're from and compare the translation. But they're you're even within that group you're going to see a wide variety of interpretations. It's possible to select 12 chapters random chapter 37 and see two different translations and. It's just impossible to believe that you sure the translators started with. The same chinese characters. This is not peculiar to the dowd reaching its peculiar to the language of classical chinese what are the translators up against. Well apparently classical chinese or so the scholars tell us wasn't just the written language it was also with style of writing. And it was a style that valued. Succinct nests. Brevity. Moisture issue could be in expression your idea the more elegant. Now where do we deal with that in our lives with poetry. And a significant unitarian universalist minister said recently. A good poem needs to be read several times for us to understand its complexity in meaning. Thank you said you said that right here if you weeks ago. I think that's a good. Analogy. I think that a brevity tends to bring along its kid sister ambiguity. And there is a certain amount of ambiguity in all of chinese specially classical chinese the way it was written. As if these weren't enough in the way of hurdles and barriers. There's also the fact that the dow jones has another copy. Is written. In poetry. There's a reason why these translations very. There are. All interpretations of a dredging that have taken place in china white chinese dollars over the last 2000 years. A couple of them in the first half of the first millennium, nera are considered the most important that's a guide to what the meaning is and is also some of this works like a riddle once you know the answer you can see how cleverly worded the the question was. And and this is how we develop any level of confidence and what it was that leader had to say so many years ago. Well what was it these folks were saying. What the central principle of daoism is down and it's hard to define but basically it seems to refer to. Are the rules by which the world around us in the universe operate. And you're also kind of incorporates the universe itself. What what kind of rules will like if i took this piece of wooden like hit the floor gravity. River stem the flow with force in a given direction. Things like that would. All his brain that is reliably flowens cause a certain direction. Well why is important to know any you well the idea is that once you pay attention to and know the way the universe operates around you with the world around you operate. It's possible to act in accordance with this. Here again a go a block of wood if you wanted to cut the wood against the grain with a hatchet would take a lot more effort than to cut it with the grain something as simple as that but they apply this principle to pretty much all aspects of life the object is to achieve which is literally no action button contacted the least amount of effort necessary to accomplish the job. Yin and yang and for the dallas it's not too different but complementary thinks it's two aspects of one thing what does that mean can well imagine if you will that everything is in pitch darkness all the time. Wouldn't be particularly useful because everything would be equally dark it doesn't differentiate. August 8th doesn't express a difference with distinction that's important and sexual. The turn light would have no meaning because. It doesn't exist. We live in a world where there is dark and light and the dallas they will they exist in relation to one another. Lots of things exist in relation to one another and help to define one another. I had a piece of wood has a. Top and a bottom. The is two principles. Are so intertwined that they are inseparable let's say we cut some. Pizza applewood threw it away. What will we have. We have a short a piece of wood. But it would still have a top. And a bottom. Good and evil are also related to one another fortunate and unfortunate are related to one another. And these principles run through dallas thinking. Let's. Consider a couple of dallas stories to put these things into some context. He's just your couple of. Favorite supply. A. Teacher and the student or walking. Taking a walk down the road. And a pastor hillside. And on that hillside is 1 long. Erasure. Free twisted tree. And the teacher continues on his way in the student walking respectful paces behind him notices the tree stopped thinks about it and starts to laugh. Teacher hears this. Friends around goes back to the student asks. What's so funny. Student says. Will you look at that tree. That is a pathetic tree it is short. It is twisted. Is ugly. Nowhere in that tree is there wood. That. From which you can make a board that is long straight and sturdy straight grain useful for making a house. Aura or furniture or both. I find that funny i'm laughing at that tree. Now at this point the teacher. Approaches the student. And administers the functional ancient chinese equivalent of the slap upside the head. What else. Do you see on that hillside. Well. The chantress the tree. Just a teacher. 40 years ago on this hillside was a woods. And almost all the trees grew tall and straight and big. And they all produce many boards. Straight and straight drains and suitable for making a houses. And furniture and boats. And because they had those traits. They are all gone. Because this tree had its traits. It's still alive it's still here show respect for that tree. Now in the opening words they were there was a passage from the daodejing and it mentions among other things window considered a window not these these have glass in them about old-fashioned windows. 2400 years ago. Give or take it's a hole-in-the-wall. Maybe it's octagonal or chinese round maybe it's rectangular. What is the window. Well it's nice wood framing around the edges. Hard tangible visible. And then there's the park inside the front. The dallas ask what makes. The window useful. And the answer isn't the yang the hard visible would the frames the window. Is the empty part. That's what let's. The smoke and stale air out of the room that's what lets the fresh air and the sunlight into the room that's what makes it useful. Yin and yang little pro-union biosphere. Here's here's another story. Developers are very keen observer just what goes on around him. We get to buddhism that's considered a really good thing for the real keen observer what's going on around. And he's in the marketplace. Any walks with marketplace any passes the corner where the butchers have their stalls. And they are the butcher's doing their thing they're hawking their wares chatting with customers are cutting up me. So and so forth and it's also something else that he notices that you're doing. The constantly sharpening their knives. All but one derby goes over the butcher and says hey everybody else here you know they're your same train they're always sharpening their knives i never see you sharpen your knife why is that. Witcher holds a knife with pride my knife never grows doll. Really does the observer how old can that be. It's really simple. I always cut. Alongside the bone to remove the meat and i'll cut through me occasionally cut through a joint. But i never use my knife to cut through bone and so it never gets doll. Do you see the flow business about the direction that the knife took. And do you see the yin and yang aspects. Of this we don't cut through the hard when we go through the. If you wanted to cross a river to get from right here to directly the other side. You wouldn't go downstream and try to pedal up against the current anything you go upstream and put in enough effort to get across the river and let the river carry you down to the point opposite again this is the sort of concept that the taoist constantly. Hawking them now. The. Dads are ching. Had begins in an interesting way. And the opening words are i think the second most famous passage in the most famous as an aside comes later and it uses the word lie but not as inlier the surname of of of the author. Lee was also a unit of measure unit of distance. And it says. And i'm taking this literal terms from from the scholars. A journey. All the thousand li starts. Under your feet we kind of know this is a journey of a thousand miles right with a single step this is where it came from. The. Second most famous passage or the opening words. The way the dower the way. That can be expressed is not the eternal way the name that can be named is not the eternal name. What the heck does that mean. You're a couple of. My own stabs are trying to explain what. Lee ermey have been trying to tell us. Imagine if you will. Two rooms you're in one room and in the next room. No expense to you someone is prepared your favorite meal my case it would be a coin flip between a really good thanksgiving dinner or boiled. This is your favorite meal and now you have a choice. You can. Enter the second room. And eat your favorite meal. Or. You can select a friend. And have your friend going to the room. And he or she can eat your favorite meal and come back and describe it to you. Here's another one. 100 years ago in belgium. There was a painter name or her name i greet. And if you're familiar with mcgree you're probably most familiar with an image that he used sometimes once and a painting sometimes multiple times. And it was always this guy who was dressed all in black and had a black overcoat and black shoes and black gloves and black bowler hat. And i'm right in front of his face and obscuring it was a large green apple. Back painter. Another one of his themes. Was this multiple times. He'd paint on the canvas or the wood. The image of a pipe. The kind that you put tobacco in light up smoke and underneath the image he would paint a sentence in french. Ceci nail polish. This is not a pipe. And the first time you see it you look at the image that's a pipe with the sentence this is not a pipe you look at the image not that's a pipe. Well. Academics in the field of art point out know actually agreed that it right. That's. Not a pipe that's an image of a b b two-dimensional you cannot pick it up. You cannot put the backhoe and god forbid you should try to light it smoke it. Sushi nick b repeat this this is not a pipe. I think this again is. In line with what loudster. We are destroying it. Hello. Dallas believe that in order to understand the rules of the universe and had the universe operates inductive can't be conveyed to you in words. The dowel that can be expressed in words is not the eternal doubt the name is not the eternal name. This is basically. All what i wanted to. Cher. And if they say when we get to buddhism. That's going to be a lot easier. What they're saying it's a lot of things that we that we ordinarily think of is being opposites and separate or actually related there was wonderful story which made its way from taoism into zen. Sacrifice a punchline. Taoism grew up in china roughly. The north of china and when buddhism reached china from india. The people who are the taoist heard booth buddhism that buddhism and they didn't see any particular conflict between the two. Any kind of adopted a new form to form of buddhism called chan buddhism which said it's not studying it's not chanting it's meditation. That's the core. And so 10 means meditate. Something along that chan buddhism. Chan buddhism eventually found its way to japan kind of died out in china only got two japanika new name. Zen buddhism. So some of these concepts and a little familiar. There's a good reason for it okay. What i said but i think what they're trying to do is get people to not think that it was it was a tale i started to say that in fact the sandy read to the kids a few weeks back. About the farmer who suddenly a horse showed up on his property in jose versao this is a great thing. And the the farmer said well maybe. And then the horse ran away all the time and effort you put in the horse you can be putting it to the farm that's awful in well maybe. Nothing is absolutely good or bad. Good and bad are. Inextricably interrelated which is not to say that some things are good but goodies list. In. Country inn in. Together with and in contrast to that. You can't have one without the other. As i understand. Well i think that we are all who was himself up if he existed and it ends up most scholars believe he did but not all agree. We are was actually a government official. And a lot of what he writes in din adapter jing is about how you will be more effective. If you do the lease. It's getting the people to do what is necessary for them don't worry about taking credit for it. That that's also wait if it's a form of active passivity is going to hard to describe. But it would be easier illustration. Think that you'll be a lot happier if you happen to be a butcher if you don't constantly try to cut through the bone. With with with your knife and interest the general principle of you need to cut wood think cut with the grain is going to be so much easier. Look look not to fight at cross-purposes with. The world. Or to take stewardship of it and dominate the world. Look at the world as it is and and try to act in accordance with. I'll be in again these weren't written as philosophical treatises what was written is a bunch of of poems. All directed to people in positions of authority and any other is once your fables intended to embody and convey the full. No no no no. Loud so what would leave her was saying yes is it is directed to l. But kwanzaa. Takes the same principles and seems to be speaking to all of us. And you know if you're a butcher if you're a woodsman. Helpful and just going to time doesn't permit all the possible. Examples that even they race. Let me tell you another story in the end i wish i wasn't sure whether we my own life. And it occurred many years before i ever knew that. There was a dowager jing jing when a friend of mine was reading it and i said why do you want to read that and he said okay then try it it's it's interesting that was about 40 years ago. I was about 13 or 14. And i was at the beach. And on that side of long island. And i was riding waves in if you can't if you catch the wave just writing you can sweep you into sure. And i've been doing that for a while and i had to pretty much finished and i decided to head back into shore. And as i was heading in i noticed that the the undertow was. Really fierce didn't think anything of it. We're looking out. Pass. Me. And i turned around and there was just wave i had ever seen is one of these things with lots of little waves going to come in and then occasionally all the waves come in at the same time and i'm looking at this thing and you know he felt like. And i know enough. That i didn't have. Enough strength and time to run against the undertow back to the beach. But i lost it wasn't close enough to the face of this way which is already you know almost vertical. To dive into the face of it the way you can and then just come through it let it go past you. And i had maybe. 2 seconds. Before it was going to hit i figure what the heck i just went in the direction of the wave. And i had barely a chance to take a deep breath. Not very good one. And so now i'm under the water and i'm being swirled around every witch way. And. Within maybe half a second i thought. I should swim for the surface. Wait. Which way is the surface. If there were a lot of very bad options if i decided to swim so i just relax. Was absolutely spontaneous i just relax. And at the point when the second of realization that if i'm not careful i'm just going to take a deep breath right now came about 8 i felt. Ash and scraping against the front of my body and i realized oh good i'm going to water maybe about inoue foot high now this is good. Got up. Had i struggled this program could have been very different. I happen not to until i was kind of primed for the philosophy of. Whatever the forces are work with them rather than against them it's probably going to work out better that way. Well let me begin with the. Borrowing from buddhism the words that all buddhist tales begin with. Is a show of. Humility thus have i heard. The dominant philosophy certainly among the people of leaders variety somebody. He had passed through the very very very rigorous exams become part of the state government. And i had something to do with the records department. And the dominant thinking in those days hadn't quite yet crystallized into confucianism confucius basically documented it and added to it. But was very formal very ritualistic very social stratification different roles for people at different levels of society men women so on and so forth. And he didn't like that. And show impart this is. A reaction to the formalism and you're part of this whole and you better do as we tell you in and perform these rituals and show respect to the right people. Society that he lived in. Confucianism also was basically a good so it's almost a political philosophy and and not. Are drawn on the supernatural and so that's. Out the context. The there are so many going to just looking at maps of china at various points in time. Are the boundaries were flowing every witch way and they were no of states amalgamated and separate and so forth i think he was living in a time of relative calm of the world. It it. It's not very difficult the concepts aren't that difficult there aren't laid out for you neatly. But it seemed to resonate with i guess initially the people who were educated could read. And many the tables are again this is just a bunch of parables and fables. Many of them are quite. A fascinating memorable. And in and i think it may have gone on for. For that reason i wasn't exactly a society where you were competing against. One dominant organization that they wanted you to believe it certainly didn't adjust the way society was organized. One of my favorite copies of the other jane is this one. Which. The addition thing remarkably familiar with seeing a concordance of the bible or to shakespeare. This takes the entire daodejing. Chinese character by chinese character in the order that it appears from ender. They're few variations depending on which manuscript you start with each character it lists all the possible meanings. And while. I certainly think that it's a it's a perfectly wonderful literary or poetic exercise. To read with different people had to say. And i. Share your joy. In the portion figuring out which translations i thought were. You know more in keeping with one another seems to be some consensus about. Oh i encountered some others that were just. Amazingly bad. What one of my favorites was a fellow who was the translator. And tells you up front. Why no no. Chinese. I have read. 5 translations. And now i'm going to tell you what the original author had to say. I mean i can get that bad but in terms of beauty or or provoking thought. Absolutely i don't contest that but from from assertive and academic. Standpoint. Even in classical chinese. Words have meaning. I'd like to read the closing words before creation of presents existed self-contained complete formless voiceless maitlis changeless which yet provided itself with unending motherhood do that can be no name for it i have called it the way of life perhaps i should have called it the fullness of life since fullness and plies widening into space and plaid stillwhite her further widening implies widening until the circle is whole so thank you all for coming up who's extended hand of friendship.

uuprairie_org

Pr091115-ed.mp3

Well all immigrant groups have gone through the same though not identical transition from them to us. Hello requiring public schools to teach all major subjects in english only was a major controversy in wisconsin. A little over 100 years ago and it decided any election for governor and the targeted ethnic group. Lowe's uncivilized germans. Wisconsin started out on a very tolerant note the convention that wrote the original constitution in 1848 specified that it was to be printed in three languages english german and norwegian. The original constitution also allowed non-citizens to vote in state elections as long as they had lived in wisconsin for at least 6 months and proclaim their intention to become citizens. And of course were males over the age of 21. But things went downhill from there were the germans and the yankees people whose families had migrated from new england and new york. The yankees were mostly protestants or puritanical background and we're leaders of the temperance movement and they deplored the germans because many of them were catholic. Even worse most of them drink beer. On sundays with their families in public parks this was intolerable. The first major confrontation came in 1872 with the passage of a law that would have put most taverns out of business by requiring them to put up a bond of $2,000 a huge sum of money in those days that law was repealed in 1870. The debate over english only came to a head in 1889 was there a law that required all major subjects in public schools to be taught in english only. This united the germans against the dominant republican party. The catholic germans had mostly voted democratic but the protestant germans along with the mostly protestant scandinavians usually voted republican. But they lutheran germans and scandinavians saw the law as the threat to their language and culture and their parochial schools. Now backers of the laws that they were only defending americanism and trying to help the poor immigrants. The milwaukee sentinel which was staunchly republican attack the opposition saying this unholy crusade against the common schools is carried on by a coalition of priests pettifogger politician and poltroon. People don't have artistic insults like that anymore anyway german your noblest treasure on earth mother tongue. The only time i've ever seen german referred to as melodious but i guess this is a matter of taste that law was repealed in 1890 after the republicans were thrown out of office by the combined voting of most germans and scandinavians and in fact the only time that democrats won between the civil war. We're in 1873 as a result of that tavern law and 1890 has a result of the english only law. World war 2 ended most attempts to preserve the german language and culture was underway long before then the milwaukee sentinel perhaps realizing that nearly half of its potential readers were germans extended an olive branch in 1904 saying of the germans. They have taught us so much needed lessons in the art of cheerful and pleasurable living. Stereotypes changeover decades the sentinel continued american life was comparatively a hard prosaic and sad-colored business before our settlers from the continent helped us to dispel the shadow of the two austere puritan standard of living. So far from the us having proven the grave of german characteristics it has really proven they fruitful seed field of some of the best and most gracious german characteristics. By the way the assimilation of earlier immigrant groups was not as fast as critics of current groups think the 1819 census which was the first recorded languages found that there were several areas of wisconsin in which more than 20% of the population. I'm about half of wisconsin residents today have german ancestry that's the largest percentage in the country. But i'm curious how many folks here have german ancestry. Me too in spite of my name i think that's about half. Now how many are 100% german. We have one two three four. Five thought half before now five well. That's assimilation. And if the past is prologue current and future immigrant groups will follow a similar pattern. As they make the transition from them to us. Lila. My name is lila pine and. I am a member of james reid congregation here and my husband craig macomb and i spend our winters each year. In tucson arizona which is only 60 miles from the mexico border. What you have heard about immigration so far applies to many immigrants. Regardless of color or nationality. But i've been working at the u.s. mexico border for the past 5 years. As well as with many latino immigrants here in madison and all over the midwest. I've been confronted daily with the awful reality of what happens. To these brown-skinned latino immigrants from mexico guatemala honduras. El salvador and colombia. This is the key difference between immigrants from latin america and immigrants from europe. Over the past five years as a volunteer with the humanitarian aid organization no more deaths. Which is the primary social justice ministry of our uu church of tucson i've witnessed the systemic persecution. Of these hard-working good-hearted but poor people and my attention has been focused on their suffering and humiliation the fear and constant anxiety of raids and physical attack. Of losing their us citizenship eldrin and suffering years of family separations across the border due to u.s. immigration policies. Of living in the shadows in a country here that has destroyed the economies of their homelands. Lesson without any jobs and for two decades has repeatedly denied them the documents to work here legally. Many people of faith including uua president peter morales and the uu. You you a social justice staff are also focused on these issues. Of the persecution and death of more than 5,000 men women and children. At our border. Through the homeland security policy of deterrence we call it deterrence by death. And the deliberate murders of hundreds of others by vigilantes and white supremacist. We are rising up against the injustice and human rights violations we have witnessed. Not only at the border but in towns and cities all across america including here in madison. Injustice has by unscrupulous employers who hire them then have them deported before they pay them for their work we have a word for that it's slavery. Buy white supremacist who murdered the first latino vasey on the street. By vigilantes like those who just this summer broke into an immigrant families home in arivaca arizona and murdered the 29 year-old father and his nine-year-old little girl. The mother just barely escaped. By hiding under the bed. By heavily armed border patrol. And ice agent ice stands for immigration and customs enforcement what used to be the ins. By border patrol and ice agents at workplace raids and midnight break-ins into their homes violating both us and international human rights laws and terrorizing their families and hundreds of private for-profit secret. Immigration detention facilities that have sprung up all over our nation just in the past 5 years. Historically many immigrants from many different countries have been treated very unfairly it's true. But this is something relatively new here. We are arresting and incarcerating people for long periods of time without even bringing charges against them sometimes up to five years of incarceration just for not having the right papers. We are criminalizing the poor and people of color with our u.s. immigration policies our government has been deliberately funneling migrant families through the most treacherous part of the border. By building walls at all the safe entries. And this has led to thousands of unnecessary deaths. And people of faith are rising up against this demanding justice. That's why immigration was such a big focus at this year's uua general assembly in salt lake city that's why so many uu congregations across the country are standing up for human rights. For immigrants and demanding that ice and border patrol stopped prosecuting humanitarian aid workers including those from no more death. Persecuting immigrants and demanding. And we are demanding comprehensive immigration reform to fix our broken and unjust immigration policies. Justice summer the father of the sanctuary movement of the 1980s but now retired reverend john fife. Of the southside presbyterian church in tucson. At a press conference attended by 50 you different humanitarian aid groups. Enter chiz including the uu church of tucson. Said quote in seeking the cooperation of government officials and the department of the interior the 50 organizations represented here today will affirm their commitment to work to end the humanitarian environmental and human-rights prices on the border. Is our firm belief that safe good sense. Civic responsibility and the law require us. To do so. The error of border enforcement that uses death as a deliberate deterrent must come to an end. We can no longer ignore the reality of more than 5,000 deaths at the border and the horrendous conditions in human rights abuses at immigration detention facilities all over the country including here in wisconsin. We must educate ourselves through faith body civic and community organizations in the midst of a media blackout that hides the truth and that panders to fear and hate. These issues are complex. And the myths about so-called illegal aliens that's in quotes. A hideous term fed attempts to criminalize and dehumanized people whose only crime has been to try to provide food and shelter and a decent life for their children. Must be exposed to daylight. The uu church of tucson where craig and i spend 5 months each winter will be submitting a social action issue or sai proposal on comprehensive mini. Immigration reform at general assembly next june which will be in minneapolis and we will be asking for your support. Are tucson you get a church has also partnered with a non-profit humanitarian aid group called no more death. One of about 10 at the border. Which each year saved hundreds. A human live. That could who could otherwise die in the desert near the arizona-mexico border. No more deaths. Again is the primary social justice ministry at the uu church of tucson. And save hundreds of human lives at the border. We have also been documenting human rights abuses against immigrants by the border patrol and negotiating with the department of homeland security in washington dc on new regulations and enforcement of humane custody standards in federal and private immigration detention. Centers at the border. We also published a report last year called crossing the line human rights of migrants in short-term custody on the arizona-mexico border. Where we documented human rights abuses against 345 immigrants. Could we interviewed personally. And we presented our findings at a congressional hearing. We're in the midst of negotiating again with homeland security and others in the obama administration for humane treatment of immigrants. In these facilities. As well as comprehensive immigration reform but the no more just ministry depends heavily on the faith community and individuals like you for funding its humanitarian aid at the border to pay for repairs and maintenance of for its search and rescue vehicles and to buy food water bottles medicine and. First aid supplies diapers and formula blankets and clothing for migrants who might not otherwise survive the five-day long 75-mile trip on foot through the most treacherous part. Of the desert at the border. I will we will be collecting donations later after your regular offertory and for those of you who may have brought your check. Checkbook's we'd be very grateful for checks and or cash whatever you can give. For this humanitarian aid cause. The check should go to the union. Ct. And write the words no more deaths on the memo line. Cash donations will also be gratefully accepted. Until we stop the government policy of deterrence by death. There are also yellow handouts. Outside in the lobby and. For those who wish to learn more about this issue. The the handouts include resources like videos and websites and. And books. Near the immigrant trails out near arivaca there is an altar with a poem. Written for the families of the thousands of people who have died trying to find work food and a way to provide for their starving families back home. For the right to live in peace. And to those who have died in the desert. In memory of those who went to look for a better life. Get only encountered death. In memory of those who risked everything and lost everything. Of those who went with hope in their eyes and challenging their souls. The sun burns them and the desert devoured them. And the dusty race their names and faces. In memory of those who never returned we offer these flowers and say what the deepest respect. Your thirst is our thirst. Your hunger is our hunger. Your pain is our pain your anguish bitterness and agony are also hours. We are cry for justice that no one would ever have to leave their land their beliefs their dead their children. Their parents. Their family their roots their culture. Their very identity. From out of the silence comes a voice that speaks so that no one will ever have to look for their dream in other lands so that no one would ever have to go to the desert and be consumed by loneliness. A voice in the desert cries out. Education for all. Opportunity for all. Jobs for all. Bread for all. Freedom for all. Justice for all. We are a voice that will not be lost on the desert. That insist that the nation give equal opportunity. To a dignified and fruitful life. To all its children. I am an immigrant. You can't tell it by looking at me. But as soon as i say a few words it comes very apparent i am from elsewhere. The first question i'm often asked is where you from. After the 40 years that question is getting a bit old and if the circumstances are right i oncet atlantis. You see in england i'm sort by those who don't know me to be from elsewhere to. Then i guessing game begins. And often any english-speaking country is up for grabs. When the first unitarian society lakewood committee decided to offer this respect reflection. In response to the uua. Standing on the side of love campaign. On the weekend of general assembly. I was the obvious candidate to pull it together. But had no idea where to start. The subject is extraordinary complex convoluted and emotionally-charged. Everyone who comes to this country has a different story. And the data and opinions abound. Then this spring. I spent 10 days. In vernon county. On my 40 acres of land pulling garlic mustard. Garlic mustard with pulled over by german immigrants. In europe it's used as a pothead. He was a different sort of immigrant under my very own nose. Many of you undoubtedly have experiences moving from one place to another. But immigration exacerbates the feeling of vulnerability. To enter this country i had to announce that invasive personal questions. Have a military-style physical. Buy us governmental authorities. And submit to blood tests and required immunizations. I was fortunate i spoke the language. And did not have to make major transitions over that marriage asplundh. Mostly in pronunciation and phraseology. After i got here for instance i was corrected by an 18 year-old from cambridge wisconsin who has never been further for me home the medicine. When i send tomatoes which i still say. And schedule. Which i changed. A nappy. Which i was working in a pediatrician's office. And they were fine wood stuff. There are also some embarrassing no-nos here which i won't go into about which i was fortunately forewarned. To my chagrin mike simply right but fine for that professional credentials would discounted. Midwives were understood only at that time with little old ladies with dirty fingernails. That was in the sixties. The rules of other surprises. Food mice things like flour. Sugar and rice amil differently another country. Differently in familia recipes. Shopping was a challenge for a while but at least i could read the packages unlike some. So you'll understand why it's very common to send for familia foodstuffs and seeds from home and then you can eat something normal. So back to the garlic mustard. This is a very useful plants that has no enemies here. It's hottie one of the first plants to show up in the spring. I'm great for natalie salad. When everything else. Is scarce and you've lived on dried beans. And eat that wizened root vegetable through a longer winter than is usual in your. However now it's taking over the native would see it and it's considered to be an invasive species. It's achilles heel. Is the tits a biannual and so if you can find it catch it in time and pull it. It can be controlled if not eradicated within a few years. The metaphor was not lost on me. I sent pulling these plans for our think about this immigrant species taking over the world. They provided the best meditation i could ever have wished for. I recommended. But people and not plants. They can move adjust and acclimatize quickly to changing circumstances. Which is after all why are species is now messing up this planet from the top of the food chain. Moving from place to place to improve second stances. Is a long-standing human activity. That is not really about individuals. Suspicion of each other it's triggered by much more how much more basic animal instinct. It's stranger or other. Upset accustomed stability and comfort inn. is change. In mythology the stranger functions as a messenger who embodies and mirrors the extraordinary. And brings life to the shadow. Every country has a shadow. An america is now being forced with the rest of the world looking on the face the violence and racism that is part of its history. And has 22 long being swept under the rug. Over the few centuries this country has existed. Poor or not speaking english group. Who have come here and number have consistently being scapegoated. But it also happens in every other country of the world. It's the feminist edition. Now it just happens to be the tune of our southern neighbors. Most of whom a filling the jobs most american workers will not consider. Almost every immigrant out argument used today. Clipping hood before a strong story and illustrates. 250 years ago. Benjamin franklin complained about bilingual signposts. And swarms of unassimilable germans migrating into pennsylvania. Later people like samuel morse. Inventor of the telegraph. Became the founder and generous contributor. To the anti-immigrant and anti-catholic catholic know-nothing movement. And he railed against the irish immigrants. Who was subverting the values of anglo america. He advised keeping them out of the country. By the latter part of the nineteenth century yellow peril was the war cry. Caused by increased migration from asia. A contemporary cartoon depicts lady liberty as a chinese coolie holding an opium pipe. With the eminent emanating rays of light labeled immorality. Self. Disease. Ruined to white labor. And henry george political economist. Denounced what he called the mongolian isolation of america. Today. The same long list of similar instances. Has been exacerbated by the twin tower attack of 9/11. Contesting spice with religion. Then is aimed at those of muslim origin and border-crossers. Sofia is further intensified by sia mungus. And the media and governmental are a tree. It's better now than it was. The war on terror has resulted in a punitive and limiting immigration policies that restrict visas for those those who it's a positive benefit is this land. I often wonder. If einstein a family will get a visa today. It has also increased paranoia. Those who feed these fears veneration ancient monster. It's a real is it a real entity. Or just a figment of sceptile imaginations and paranoid rhetoric. The only difference now. It's the largest group of people is crossing the political border instead of coming by boat. This imaginary line which like the equator and greenwich was created for convenience. Whispering relatively recently in world history. By political conquest. In fact this political stranger it's completely fictional. History. Statistics and rational thought reveal it to be so. Recent report painting entirely different picture. Most immigrants pay taxes and social security. They all pay sales tax and property taxes. I certainly put more into the government for kalfus and they take out. And because lois field workers from abroad usually feel less desirable jobs. American workers tend to be more upwardly mobile. Although it is indeed true many sent home money to families abroad. This makes it possible for these others to have a better standard of living in their countries of origin rather than joining the migration trail. The workers also spend money here. Talk the role they have to take care of themselves to. Do you have any idea how difficult a language languages to learn. Especially if your own language uses a different alphabet and grandma. Most non-english speakers struggle mightily to make themselves understood. They have two for practical reasons. Most full so eventually apply for citizenship. Even in the face of difficult requirements. And huge backlogs that can delay the process fee is. I became a citizen. When frustrated. During the reagan administration. I want to devote. Until then like most immigrants my husband david and i experienced taxation without representation. With much less likely to commit. Crimes than i need to phone count plants can spot deportation if arrested. And 2/3 office are in fact here lawfully. David like many came to study under an expert in his field. And originally entered on a student visa. Contrary to rumor. Possible undocumented immigrants initially and to the united states legally on some sort of visit. Most of the 9/11 hijackers were here legitimately. The popular belief that increased border security and board offenses curb the flow of immigrants is totally untrue. Instead they'd only succeeded in pushing border crosses into more dangerous and less patrol research regions as light as presentation into case. I never actually serve to increase the undocumented population by creating an incentive to quietly stay put and out of trouble on this side of the border. Final secure it finally security experts agree. Set the best deterrent to terrorism. Is excellent intelligence. Go to target immigrants to self-defeating. Frenulum emigrant to reach out to us rt even if you were in trouble or being exploited can be risky. After all you never know what might happen. Some agency my trying to round you up and support you. Better to lie play low and keep quiet. I am not the same woman who crossed the atlantic 43 years ago. I'm no longer a stranger in this land. But through circumstances i could not have foreseen when i came have made it my home. My children will go on here. As well as with many of your ancestors. A my friend children will be born here. That contributions can be seen clearly all around including the pot hubs. Every group who comes brings with them something of their own culture. Their own new ideas and long experience will history from that country of origin. Experience this country does not have. Most cultures have stories in which stranger brings pressure to the community. Some examples of introduce falcusan philemon. Shakespeare shylock nfl among others. Jesus says to welcome the samaritan and the disenfranchised. Native american stories have a white day or buffalo maiden depending on the tribe carrying a peace pipe. And african legends bring people god's if they're in characteristics into. Being there also. Asian stories 2. The stranger represents the door to a fearless life the process threshold some boundaries. A step nearer to integration and wholeness. History is destined to repeat itself unless the past is brought into consciousness and integrated. This is the gift of the stranger. Valuable human resources are entering this land. And in the process. Creating a magnificent mosaic. It takes the risk to open oneself to such influences. And it might mean feeling insecure for a time. But i encourage you to reach out to the strangers who cross your path. And then like me. You might find yourself in another place. Maybe it too will be cold atlantis. And now i'd like to take just a moment. To imagine the person next to you is a stranger. Speaks another language. And it's from a different cultural traditions. In the following short silence. Discover your own you unique way of reaching out to such a person. It might be as simple as a smile or something more active. And the next time you do it you meet the stranger do that too.

uuprairie_org

Pr150125KristinRucinski-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society where. We make every endeavour to welcome you no matter where you are on your spiritual journey no matter your beliefs no matter your ethnicity no matter your gender no matter your sexual preference you are welcome here. If this is one of your first times here. And you would like to introduce yourself we trying to force you to do that but there will be a time later on in the service for that right now encourage you to come more than once because our services are different every week. Sometimes i do the service i am the minister here sandy am sometimes people from within our congregation do the service. Sometimes we are very fortunate in having people from outside the immediate congregation do the services such as the case this morning. Beastman are the opening words. From evie white. You have been my friend. That in itself is a tremendous thing. I wove my webs for you because i liked you. After all what's a life anyway. We're born we live a little while we die. A spider's life can't help being something of a mess. With all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you. Perhaps i was trying to lift up my life. A trifle. Heaven knows anyone's life. Can stand a little. Now it is my pleasure to. Introduced today speaker for you that i would like to say that this program the road home today. Is kind of erin bashas baby in way up aaron for those of you who might not know is a member year. And aaron does a lot i believe with your program kristen. Aaron is with wolves were thinking of her today because erin is in denver i think you. I'm awaiting an actual but he has been born well. We needed another candle for that right. The road home. Just finished celebrating its 15th anniversary. They began in 1999 as a small shelled right that did not know that. And have expanded their services to now include intensive case management services. And housing solutions for homeless families. Our speaker this morning kristen rosinski. Has been the executive director at the road home for three years and has been involved with the agency for over 9 years in different roles. She has been passionate she says about social justice issues for as long as she can remember. I truly believe every person. Especially every child. Deserves a place to call home. Welcome krista. Thank you so much for having me. I'm going to try to sort of set the stage about. Family homelessness right here in dane county and then mix in a little bit of what the road home does. Start a combat that. And you'll hear a lot about how everything that we do is a real community response to homelessness. So for instance the shelter network which. Most people most familiar with. Is a huge partnership with over 50 different congregations this is one of many. Play ashley quickly see a show of hands of who has volunteered in this. Perfect thank you. From the bottom of my heart and from all the families do don't always have to say thank you. Real quick before desiccant. Set the stage for like a long-term success that we're going to talk about. Volunteers unfortunately you're always seeing the families at the worst spot in their lives the lowest point in their lives. They're not always exhibiting. Behaviors that are the most ideal door so stressed out. Learn survival mode their living minute-to-minute hour to hour day today. And if we can all celebrate when they move into housing but then the volunteers and shelter just get another family and shelter to replace them and you guys never really get to see the families. Once there in housing. The staff were so fortunate to be able to. See the girls that they succeed and. This what the end up contributing as solid citizens once they have some stability and some support. I always wished there is a way for the volunteers to hear more of those stories. Unfortunately you kind of always see the the sad side of things but. Many many many good things happen. Families including the children once there and housing. So i'm not even try really hard not to disagree this presentation. Boring in my mind except for the very first slide. Permission statement. So the road home then county provides opportunities for homeless children and their families to achieve self-determined goals and affordable stable housing. So like was mentioned earlier we started as just as a shelter back in 1999 but we kind of quickly realize that. As much as shelter is needed it's only a 90-day. Family feud only have 90 days in shelter. It sort of a band-aid fix. Where is affordable housing is really the long-term solution to housing. So that's why i'm a lot of our expansion efforts have been in the housing side of things. So our name actually started as interfaith hospitality network. In 2008 we change that overall name for the road home. To encompass more of everything else that we are doing including those housing. Section. So that interfaith hospitality network was the perfect name for the shelter because it was this interface. Hospitality network. And so the dad is so-called that so you'll still here ihn for the shelter but the overall agency name. Change the road home. Some people don't think you realize that we're the same agency so i like to. Give a little history. So we're actually the only agency then. That works exclusively with families with children and dane county. We partner very well with the salvation army the ywca many other agencies were the only one that works exclusively with families with children. So we really try to emphasize a lot of the. That cycle of poverty the cycle of homelessness and try to focus a lot of our efforts. I got younger population. So we do that through the three things up their shelter case management housing and we'll go through those a little bit more. For the end. So again children children children those beautiful to see how these kids up here this morning. I think when most people think of somebody who's experiencing homelessness. They usually think of a single person on state street. Maybe around the capitol. Maybe forties fifties single man usually i'm stereotyping here but this is usually what people think of. People don't usually think of the five-year-olds the six-year-olds. The 7-year olds. 40% of the children research last year or under the age of five. Talking about little little kids. Who. Spongebob edited. Learning i need to explore and discover the world and. You're almost to see that sometimes the trajectory of their life is a bad path if they can't have those. Basic needs met of shelter and food. Instability so many many more children and families are homeless and i think most people realize. So just a little picture. Again maybe when you see your little one-year-old in your office taking their first step for the first time cuz they finally have some continuity and stability in their lives. It's annie's are like the small successes that we get to see him. I'm sure some volunteers between some of those as well. Causes of homelessness again the number one cause is just a lack of affordable housing. Does anybody want to guess what the average 2-bedroom apartment cost. Madison right now. Yeah right around around 1000. Obviously a lot more sometimes and. I'm low and can get maybe like 8. Most of our parents work. But usually those entry level jobs making $79 an hour. So on the high-end are bringing in maybe $1,200 a month. Sophia of 1,000 for rent and then at least 100 for your utility bills. Transportation cost. Diapers and wipes and little kids. It's simply not affordable. So that's what we say for housing we leave me maybe families only have to pay for $500 a month for rent. Because that's. Affordable to them. But like before the hawkins huge it's also right now and very very low vacancy rate. Hey madison. So it's hovering right around 2% so there just aren't a lot of vacant apartments.. And then if they are vacant. They're not affordable. There's also been some recent tenant-landlord changes to our state law. That makes things much more. Pro landlord the pro tenant. Usually. I was waiting for that. Another common cause of domestic violence we see that a lot. We typically in our shelter in case you have volunteered or wondering about volunteering. We know that we're actually not the safest place for somebody who's feeling a domestic violence situation. We're not in one locked facility 24 hours a day. We're very volunteer-based so it wouldn't be safe for the volunteers or the. The victim so we actually. We are always running to screen families in rather than screen people out but. Safety is number one so we're not the best fit for some experiencing domestic violence. What is. It's amazing how many people we do see who. Experience at some point in their lives. Maybe years ago maybe last year maybe currently but it's. It's huge. Definite issue. Nytimes it's just a lot of different things coming together. Some people are sharing experiences about. Family members of themselves in the hospital recently. If you don't have medical insurance i m just one thing after another piles up and soon enough people are left without without homes. So talked about this already but. I guess it's just lays out the numbers little bit better if you want to take a minute to look at that. The families in extreme poverty when they're. When they're in the situation when they come to us. So we can talk about just those children and for that the effects of homelessness. You guys could read these and. I think the next slide also has some more. But. It affects children so much whether it's. Interpersonally the mobility issues are a lot of kids that we see by the time they're in 8th grade and maybe already been in six or seven schools. Just bouncing around living for with family here friends here. Maybe a hotel here and then in the car for a while and then they could finally get into shelter. There's constantly bouncing around. And i read a lot of. Research on this. Every time a child switches schools they say it sets them back six months. And that's not just academically. It's also like socially behaviorally emotionally they have to meet new friends get to know the teachers. It's a whole the whole system that. Just keep. Almost exponentially getting worse every time they have to move. The socks about. More likely to get sick. More likely to have learning disabilities. Fall behind in school and so. Our community right now is ever since the race equity report was released. Talked a lot about reading levels. Employment incarceration rate. I'm glad to see that you guys aren't all that moses. And so again when you don't have. Those basic needs met. When you can see there are there already falling behind in school. Which means are probably not reading at grade level which means they're probably not. As likely to graduate high school which means they're probably not as likely to get. Decent paying job more likely end up. Traction system. You can almost see the past sometimes like i said earlier. We really want to try to get kids. As long as we can. These numbers are staggering and i usually like to try to ask this question so i. I told you to jump ahead too early but i usually ask how many students do you think we're done if i'd is homeless. In the madison schools. And nobody has ever guest over everybody always guesses like 300-400. Last year was over 1,300 students. Yep. About 5%. I kept getting ssi finally. Obviously you can see the entries last couple years. Some of that is due to better reporting and catching the kids better. Some of it might be due to an increase. But either way to think of. That many students who don't know where they're going to sleep at night. Don't know where they're going to get their next meal out possibly be. Ready to be learning and i'll be at their biggest potential. Very very difficult. 94 k through high school so. Not even counting the three-year-olds two-year-old one-year-olds. And like i said in the beginning 40% of the children we work as last year under the age of five. So that number is louis anyting. I need update that now that we have 2014 numbers but basically reserve about 150 families a year. But every single day we still have to turn away a family. Who calls a mom or dad or grandma or grandpa who says you know here you have an emergency shelter we need to come in tonight. And when you have to tell them. Yeah i'm sorry but we have to put you on a waiting list. I still get goosebumps trying to describe what that feeling is like it's terrible. And accounting and country as wealthy as ours there's no need for. Forget smooth living in cars or in bus shelters. Last month we knew a family living in the storage. Facility storage unit. At least you know it's a damn they had a roof over their head and somewhere to go with you every night. But enough is happening right here in denton county and madison. So then you got time to get back to that we'll talk a little bit about what those three is like the three things that we do to try to help this. Like it would mention you guys partnered with midvale lutheran. If you're not familiar with the way that our shelterworks family say two different hosts congregation for a week at a time. That's a huge commitment because everything is volunteer-based. So every host congregation gets paired up with a couple buddy congregations so you're a buddy congregation to midvale lutheran do it together everything three meals a day evening activities to volunteers sleep overnight everything from 5 p.m.. Overnight to 7 a.m. the next morning is run by the community volunteers. Like you we could we literally would not have a shelter without your support. So i can't can't thank you enough with that. About 30 families a year so most of the families that we serve a dinner. Through our housing programs. Just because it's affordable housing is the answer or trying not to expand shelter so much is there housing program. So again this is just all about partnership so there to the faith community or. The school district other agencies the volunteers. Businesses foundations we're just really trying to encompass the whole community and what and what we're doing. Case management is the second thing that we do and i truly think that this is what makes our families as successful as they do. Kids music minnesota turner gets thrown out there quite a bit so i like to break it down and see like three or four sections. The first is that it's a very professional relationship. So we have a case managers are all masters they all of their nsw's master in social work. It's. You know they're canceling getting new training. Learning the most evidence-based practices so that we really know kind of. How to work with the population. So it's very professional the second thing is that is very holistic. So housing is always the main goal either to get family's housing or to help them maintain that housing but so many other things go along. The hope that so whether it's health. Mental health education. Employment i mean you name it whatever that family's goals are the case managers are there to help them work on that cuz that. Ultimately all ties back into their housing stability. It's also very flexible. Because like i said earlier lot of their families work if they're working nine-to-five or case managers can't work nine-to-five because they will never have a chance to meet together. So a lot of early mornings late evenings sometimes weekends just a very. Flexible job. And finally a very client-centered. So we truly believe that. The family of the expert in their lives were there to provide support maybe some advice and help them with what their goals are but they have to be the ones leading this partnership they're the ones who know what they've been through and where they want to go so everything we do is very very client-focused client-centered. This is just a statistic that again i think is. Tired to argue. If a family is homeless and then moves into housing without case management this is nationally there only 37% likely to maintain that housing. You can't take a family who clearly has some barriers and just say here's your house. See you later they need that follow-up support. Sonar programs and i'll do come with that case management were actually over at 90% now a families reach housing for one year than usually much longer. Ansonia look at 37. Against 90%. It shows the value of having that support system. We have six different programs i won't go through each one that would bore you to death. But they each sword have. We have programs along a continuum so summer 1 year long. Summer two years long and summer was considered a permanent housing. We try really hard to match the family with the right level of service if somebody you know only needs a little bit of security deposit assistance. And we'll probably never touched the system again. They're not going to put them in a permanent housing solution so we really try to figure out what the family strengths are what their needs are and then match them to the appropriate level of service. If anybody wants to know any. Do you know anything about those i'm happy to answer those questions after the fact. Possibility is a program. Again families with children with the adult has to have some disability whether it's physical mental any sort of. Disability. It's a permanent housing one so very low turnover we have 24 slots. But because by nature to go with the disability who probably aren't increasing their income much. It's very very low turnover so those spots are precious so that would be on the higher end of the continuum. I usually high like this one and i'm talking to congregations cuz this is just another way that the faith community has been really supportive to us. This program is is probably actually my favorite. It's a two-year program for families. A sponsor in essence pays the rent for 2 years. So it sponsors could be a congregation or a couple of congregations together businesses. Individuals. It's not necessarily a free ride though for the families. The families then pay 30% of their income for rent because that's naturally what's affordable. But since the sponsor actually pays the rent. That money that the family pays everyone's goes to repair their credit and pay back past landlords that they might owe or past utility bills. So at the end of those two years they now had a salad to your house in history that actually repair their credit. They're much more how isabel it's it's a huge impact on that family it's a big investment. About $10,000 a year to pay for that rents or $20,000 commitment for the sponsor. But then that impacted fm that it has on that family is tremendous so i'd like to highlight that one. And then quickly by our baby. Housing hope. So we wanted to be a little proactive as an agency because we knew that there is a lack of affordable housing in madison. Sobe undermines our capital campaign few years ago and raised 4 1/2 million dollars so that we could actually own our own housing. Which has been tremendous. Especially for someone smell agency like us. So we we raised 4/2 million. Half of the money went to purchase and rehab 30 apartments. And then the other half is sending madison community foundation endowment fund and so the money that generates from that every year is what sort of making this rent affordable for families so then they only have to pay 30% of their income. And it's it's the saint of also these 30 units will be. Here is long you know after all of us including me. Argon so it's. It's a huge thing but a small dent in what we actually need but it's been very successful. So the ones on the left are the first 15. And they're on the north side and then the ones on the right are on the southwest side. Negotiable xander trying to find the locations we knew it had to be on a bus line most families don't have their own vehicles we wanted to be close to schools just to try to increase the likelihood that the kids would have higher tendons. Ideally close to a grocery store so they didn't have to go on two or three buses just to get a couple bags of groceries. Ideally again by a library or community center those types of things. So we really got we got the good locations for what we were what we're looking for. And then we have some children can draw their dream home. I like the end with these you can see how bright and cheery it is and i think this is just sort of a. Accounts reminder that the kids the children they do have hopes and dreams and goals and. It's kind of up to us to try not to let them down and try to give them what we can do. There are a couple more of these that we can just go through quickly. If you do want a little more information. This was kind of like the very one-on-one volunteer training. They're both what's better website. They're usually tuesdays or wednesdays at 5:30 or 6:30 i also brought some brochures and newsletters and stuff that i put out by the coats out front. So yeah if you can get involved we have a wishlist. Going to top 10 things that we can never have enough of diapers wipes. Laundry detergent cleaning supplies anything that you can't physically eat. You can't use your food stamps with. So when families are in housing some of them are still having to pay 80 or 90% of their income for rent if they're not in one of our programs. So with the little money they do have we want them to pay the rent first so anything like that that we can get donated we can get it right back out to the families toilet paper paper towels. Anything like that. That's coming out of their pocket. So we have that worthless item volunteer with us or another agency i don't care who it is just volunteer. Ebenezer. Is there more pictures you can go quickly i just want to point out one of them's coming up i think it's hilarious but. Look at the detail on this. Not only does it say garden but it'll say like greens peas watermelon probably can't see you in the back. Three car garage. A climbing wall in the backyard. I mean if the pool is even says like how deep it is. It's actually incredible so. Maybe a couple more that's about it so hopefully you kind of got it a little bit of a scope about the need the good things that are happening and how your support can really make a difference so thank you very much. We're 25% united way funded or a very big united wage nc. They have a direct strategic plan to end family homelessness so since that's what we do we work very closely and then 50% of private fundraising. Do that again community comes from congregations from businesses. Foundations grants individuals. But yeah 50% of it we're raising and it's a 1.2 million operating budget year so we have to basically raised $600,000 a year. The campaign was pretty much the same. Yeah before it happening again. Come from the community. We had a lot more like sort of the you know those bigger grants for a couple hundred thousand that we could. Apply for. And the city of madison actually gave 600,000. So that that was a big chunk of it. And then your third question of if low-income housing is the capacity going to increase. The. There's sort of a new which i wish we could talk 20 more minutes about. A new a new here philosophy called housing first. Remind me to read that. Sorry the new york years ago we're finally kind of catching on board here. And even some infared exposure lot of programs that are operating right now things are housing first or more housing first. The realize you housing prices that you take people straight off the streets. And housing with no preconditions and you don't have to say you have to get sober first or you don't have to have any like he is like nothing it's freaking to put them in the housing with the idea that once they have stability there going to be more likely to. Overcome any barrier that they have. Obama program that we have here now still are saying though you have to do something like you either have to be a dane county resident for two years or. You have to complete this class first or. Listen that but the idea is catching on i'm really excited about that the mayor's caught on. Right now the real focus is on ending veteran homelessness. Looks huge which is great. Don't forget that all once. If when we can get that done will trickle down and spend more resources on family homelessness but right now it's on singles and veteran. It's amazing how many it's not always women being the victim but how many women they don't want the police involved they feel it then they fear retaliation they think it'll go from just getting beat up to maybe getting killed. Many women do choose between. Having a roof over their kids heads knowing they're going to get. Beat up. Or being homeless i mean this is something that's. Wisconsin. I don't have the right answer for you but we're not going to go call the police if they're not asking us to do that cuz we don't want to make anything worse. Cities are size i would almost say where. Removal of the pack for say. But when you look at bigger cities like minneapolis new york portland. Seattle homeless services. Photos courtesy a city. Employee give a presentation about a week or two ago and i. I won't do it justice and figure everything else out but. So and madison we only have so much land right and we have a lot of restrictions some things can't be so tall some things are. Preserve land like there's only so much space we could do but historically madison always has the lowest unemployment rate in our state. It's always going to attack 10 city to live in. All these things drive people in and so. We're constantly i wish i could remember the numbers. It's something like and don't quote me on this. It's only like we rebuild thinking that like 5,000 households a year will come in and the last couple years has been like 13,000 households are coming in and i'm sure that was a aren't right but it's something where it's like three times. More are coming in and that's why the vacancy rate then gets lower. I mean they're not going to see rents going down anytime soon they might start to stabilize. The city thinks that the vacancy rate will be at three or four percent and make another year or two. But landlords can still charge i mean it's still such a tight market that the prices will not get driven down but we might have a little more capacity. If that answers that question. And then there's things all the time like subtle racism still exist. It exists nationally but. I think. I think we're more aware now than ever you know you're not going to see your for rent no black sign but it's amazing. How many stories people come back with and they're convinced that. That they weren't given that apartment or even showing that apartment because. Love the color of the skin. Yes so this is one area where madison definitely der the madison school district has i guess i don't know what you would call it. I don't know what department in the school called tough transition education program. So they have. Like 45 staff social workers that are. Dedicated to all of the students who are homeless. So making sure that you know they're maybe not getting bullied if they are they. Connect them with that school social worker just they have a lot more support whether it's just making sure that they have the right supplies. So they're starting out school on day one. Somewhat on the level playing field as their peers. Whether it's supplies at emotional support they need transportation is huge there's a federal law called mckinney-vento which guarantees. Transportation 23rd and who's homeless. So whether they're in a shelter or saying. With family or friends they can they can get a ride to school so that type program is really a leader. For all of the services for students. So the 5% is of students in the madison school district. And that that comes from the 1364 that right gentefied last year. So they track you throughout the year and at the end of the 2013 2014 school year the total was 1364. And then just because of this week it might be in the paper there's something called the point in time count that happens naturally twice a year and it's this coming wednesday night. So all of the service providers will be you literally out on the streets from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. this wednesday to try to get the most accurate count that we could see if people who are unsheltered living outside. So the first question given our nonprofit status we have to be careful about lobbying per se but we definitely advocate a lot. A lot a lot i'm very into policy. And. There's a soda city i should have mentioned it earlier with your question but. I don't know people been calling the rescue development at the avenue so in 20. 16. There'll be about 55 units for singles sros family solution but for singles. That's, that's really right down the road and then the year to after that they're actually planning to do 40 more for families. So. Something's working whether it's our advocacy or just the idea that this is. Kind of coming up more and more across the country. But i do feel positive about what's happening in madison now and those are both be following more the housing first philosophy. And then your second question of what happens. The families after 90 days about 80% of our families. Do under shelter leave successfully. Phenomenal. And that includes 13 sometimes they literally do just up and leave or. Maybe even leave town maybe just don't want to be in shelter where there's some. Structure. So we have to count those. Failures i don't like that word but. Novato virus a52 10% or them and then another five to 10%. I will work with another shelter if they haven't been there yet so if they get in with us first. And. No progress is leaving maple try to get them into salvation army or the y so they don't have to. Go back anywhere else. Honestly i've been here for nine years and i think maybe like five families total have just. We just couldn't find a solution so. I'm pretty proud of that i wish that i could say that no families did that but it's. It's pretty is very successful. Habitat. Our dream is for a family to go from like shelter into one of our housing programs and then going home through habitat. Estimating our development director. Extra work to habitat for 7 years and then went somewhere else and i was with us and. So she can say a bass but just how. The continuum is so long. And our families. So many families live in poverty and don't become homeless first of all. Most. So when they are to the point where our services. They have. Like so many barriers. It's unfathomable sometimes to us. So it's going to take a really long time for them to even get to the point where maybe they could. Through habitat on a home i mean i can send him is just so long. But we're definitely always i mean habitat valeria haven't and i talked to probably once a month trying to figure out how we can partner butter and we could do so exactly happening i don't have a success story to share though yet. Shut up good thank you i'm sure that was not it about time wise that was there will you stay around for a few moments. Representation. B u now to get. This out. Because we need to continue to have programs like this. We want to continue that program. Where are the closing words. If you wait until you can do everything for everybody. Instead of something for somebody. You and up not doing anything. Or anybody. Preacher neighbor have coffee if you want it then come back now.

uuprairie_org

Pr150628RoseStephenson-ed.mp3

Oh good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society my name is barbara park and i'm a member of the congregation prairie aspires to be both open-hearted and an open-minded congregation we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age your abilities or inability on sunday morning we provide a wide variety of services presented by either prairie member member the wider community as we have today with olympia brown or andy ingram who is our. The opening words today are going to be. Responsive reading which is 5. 69 in your book. Standby this face. From olympia brown. And i'll read the. The regular texting you read the italics stuff. Dance by this face workforit and sacrifice for it. I do. Which is comforted us in our sorrow. Strengthen to us. Four noble duty and made the worlds beautiful. Idiot results. That you were strong enough to work for the great true principal without counting the cost. Applications and equation. Kid this morning we're going to have the lulu family do the chalice lighting at skate catherine and erin at this hour in small towns and big cities in single rooms and ornate sanctuaries many of our sister unitarian universalist congregation are also lighting flaming chalice as we light our chalice today let us remember that we are part of a great community of faith made us dancing flame inspire us to fill our lives with the unitarian universalist ideals of love justice and truth judith qualls so this morning i'm happy to introduce as olympia brown society and a member and avid supporter of the league of women voters we have many unitarian and universalist in our ranks who have not only. Good morning ladies and gentlemen and thank you for coming to hear me speak today. For those of you who don't know me i am the reverend olympia brown. I was born on january 5th 1835 in a log cabin outside schoolcraft michigan. I attended mount holyoke female seminary antioch college lawrence university where i was ordained in 1863. I was the first woman in our country. To be ordained as a minister and to be recognized. Buy a denomination. I also talked long and hard for women suffrage. I worked hand-in-hand with. Susan b anthony. Pictured here. Elizabeth cady stanton. And the mini mini other individuals who made woman's right to vote a reality. I helped establish the wisconsin woman suffrage association. And i served as its president for 28 years. Do you need me little curious about my background. My parents lafayette is a brown. Married in 1834. And shortly thereafter moved from the green mountains of vermont. To the frontier of michigan. Which was then still a territory. The trip was 800 miles in a covered wagon. To reach the area near kalamazoo. Andrew jackson was president then. My father bought a farm north of the town of schoolcraft what the tiny one room cabin on it in which i was born. As a child. I helped my mother with a household cast. Puppyworld water by hand and carrying it to the cabin in buckets doing the laundry by hand i never learned to milk cows make butter and cheese. Spin flax and roll mackenzie bread and salt down wheat for the winter. I was the firstborn of for children take care of the smaller ones. I'm her even as a child. But there is satisfaction. In hard work and accomplishment. That lesson has stayed with me all my life. No i'm not like millie. People of that time. My mother believed fervently in equality of the sexes. And she is still that principle in me and in my sisters and brother when we were still very small before school was established in the area. She made poetry to us. Some of the basic universalist believe. That. Salvation. Is extended to all human beings. But god is kind and loving not angry and vengeful. That there is no such place as hell. My parents. Especially my mother. Spell education was essential. I'm so my father built the school house. When i was 14 years old my sister and i had outgrown that local school and we convinced father to allow us to attend the cedar park cemetery in town. Although it was quite some distance. We walked it every day when the weather was good and in the winter we stayed with relatives in town during the week. I went back to teach for one term in the little schoolhouse in my father's farm when i was 15 years old. That experience helped me decide that although teaching is a noble and worthy profession. I wanted to do something else with my life. I began to make plans for furthering my education but i was frustrated that no university or college to which i applied. Not my mother bread-and-butter school near mount holyoke south hadley massachusetts that admitted only women mount holyoke female seminary founded in 1836. The difficulty. And my mother had no money of her own. In those days when a woman married. All the prepositions became her husband's property by law. My father did not value education as highly as my mother did it ali for women he was merely reflecting the general attitude. It was just accepted that only man he needed higher education and teaching. Well with the education that we had that all my sister and i could ever hope to do would be to teaching a country school somewhere. And i had already decided against that i took it upon myself to convince my father that my sister and i. After all the other one of us had plans to marry soon. Iphone. The rules and regulations at mount holyoke. Dice lingo. As a diversion we organized a literary society where we could debate give readings and practice public speaking but at the end of the term. We were ordered to disband it or we would not be allowed to continue to attend the seminary. It was not considered proper. Flora woman to speak publicly. Practicing to do it. We were also forbidden for looking out of the windows wifey that woman women shouldn't be rival and lazy. At the end of the year or ella and i returned to michigan steeply disappointed. I couldn't bear to return to mount holyoke. I was determined to get the education needed to state my future live and work. My father. Seeing my determination. High school. By agreeing to send me to any. School choice. If i could find one that would admit me as a student i didn't go there. Well i wrote to college after college after college asking for admission. And i was finally admitted. 4 accepted by 6. I narrowed the choices down to oberlin and antioch. Both co-educational ohio now lucy stone antoinette brown had graduated from overland and i'll show you. Antoinette brown. And lucy stone. Right there. Had both been accepted by overland. And had gone there. Excuse me. But. Neither one of them had been allowed to take part in any speaking exercises as students. Or to read their essays at the graduation ceremony as all the men did. Simply because they were women. For that reason i decided against overland i wrote to antioch toward mission. The curriculum impressed me as did the unitarian president and famous educator horace mann. In spite of the liberal spirit there i still encounter discrimination sometimes subtle sometimes. I heard speakers. Such as horace greeley. Wendell phillips. Edward everett hale. Ralph waldo emerson and others. I began to wonder why women were not invited to speak. So i asked the chairman of the organising committee. I was told. There are no women comfortable to the men that we have selected. But there are i said. There's susan b anthony. Elizabeth cady stanton. Lucy stone antoinette brown. They're all well-educated and well-known. Some has spoken at oberlin college. The committee members were resolute weekend except female speaker. Well i decided that if i wanted to hear a woman speak i would have to find one and bring her to the campus myself. The other women students eagerly agreed to help and together we raised the money the speaker we selected was antoinette brown a heroine of mine and i wrote her the invitation myself. She had completed the theology course at oberlin college but the officials had refused to ordain her at graduation antoinette brown. And i was deeply moved by that experience. Women. Speak. As well as men. I graduated from antioch in 1860. During my years of study there i had given much thought. What i wanted to do with my life. I decided. To become a minister. I finally convinced my father for support and i began looking for theology school so that i could request admission. The theology schools were generous in their rejection. I got used to reading. We do not believe that ladies are called to the ministry. In march i received a letter from say flores so universalist theological school in canton new york. Expecting yet another rejection i was apprehensive as i opened the envelope and i read the words of the president ebenezer fisher. You will be admitted. Into the school. I've had all the opportunities that the school of fords. In the letters he warned me of the problems that i would encounter at an all-male theological school pointing out that they're never before had ever been any female students there. It is unlikely hero that there will ever be any others. I do not think that women are called to the ministry but i leave that between you and the great head of the church. That is exactly where i thought it should be less. The civil war. Had begun in april of 1861. I arrived st-lawrence in the fall of 1860. Although the male students were friendly two of them were anything but. They taunted me openly. Who would ever go hero woman preach what kind of church. Would hire a woman teacher. And at 9. They would get below my window and mimic my voice which was soft and high pitch. This was painful for me. Since i had no idea of how to improve it. And a good preacher had to be heard at the back of the church. Over the christmas holidays at church nearby agreed to highway to preach the congregations like my sermons and asked me to stay on two more weeks. Good report follow me back to camp and then the second term what much better. My second year at saint lawrence was pleasant and passed quickly and early in 1863 i began to take steps towards ordination. I knew it would cost strong opposition among the faculty including dr. fisher. So i decided to go before the northern universalist association meeting. To plead my case before the ordaining council. I asked only that the board members be fair and impartial. Unjudge me on my merits and not on my sets. The council members knew that they would be setting a precedent. But my arguments were convincing. And i was ordained on june 25th. 1860. Dr. fisher. Took part in the ceremony. Bikers paris was in vermont. But the congregation was aloof and unresponsive in. Seem to be having a hard time adjusting to a woman minister. When my brother arthur became is i resigned my pastured in order to go and help my mother care for him. While i was in ann arbor michigan i also attended lectures at the university and one that i attended had quite an impact on me. Dr. lewis in boston. Aleve. In physical education for women. Use which were new and quite radical. Adapter that lecture i went off and i asked him. If there was a way to improve my voice. Of course. We have exercises that would develop your chest and lungs. We can teach you how to breathe so that you can lower your voice and learn to protect it. I went to boston as soon as arthur was well. Broward the city attended lectures. And improve my voice. The voice can be improved as well as any other part of the body i said. All it takes is instruction and practice. I practiced every day. I developed a voice but gained mean national renown as an auditor. Why didn't boston i visited with the head of the universalist association there to find a church that needed to minister he was uncooperative at first. But i persisted. And eventually he told me of a church in weymouth landing a little town south of boston. After i preach the sermon their the congregation voted overwhelmingly to hire me and offered a salary of $500 a year. I had my old church. The installation was july 8th 1864. Newspapers across the country carried the story of my installation. Since they were still no other ordained women ministers in the united states. I stayed weymouth landing 5 years. It was a happy time. During the years of the civil war. Women that put aside equal rights activities and we put our energies into war work instead. We had hoped to begin the ballot funky spain but. Congress continue to ignore our demands and a new women's movement began. I attended several women's rights conventions and i found myself drawn into the cause. Susan bf. Pat asked me to accompany of small group of performers on a six-week campaign tour for equal rights. New york state. We were still pouring new york state when the letter arrived asking for a speaker from the east. To help kansas workers gain support for a suffrage amendment. Going before voters there in the fall. I have no idea at the time that i would be that speaker. I travel by train to leavenworth kansas and arrived on july one 1876. They had expected the speaker of greater renowned. But everyone else and had commitments. I was what they got and i began to make a name for myself. I traveled from town to town and spoke seven days a week i never missed a meeting i have been promised for traveling companion and a convenience to get to all these meetings but when i arrived i discovered that the money for these things was locking. I was on my own. And i had to find a way to get from one town to the next. Often this was in an open wagon with no sprint. I stayed with whatever family would put me up off and on the floor of a sod house with a blanket over me to give you a picture of what this is like this is what joel moody. With her talent and education. She has great physical power of endurance. Lately speaking two or three times each day in the hottest weather. Traveling from 20 to 50 miles each day with only an average of about 4 hours of sleep and her speeches from 12 hours in length. Without apparently the least 14 and weighing only 91 lb. Eloquent helpful engrave with religion is the basis of all her actions and piety her leading trade. She is the best cleaner for women. That we have yet seen you before the public. I had hoped that this campaign. Would be the beginning of women acquiring the whole. I was terribly. I learned that the republican party had been openly opposing the ballot for women. What's more liquor interest. tissue with newspaper advertisement posters and speakers. They warned that the women wanted prohibition. If we got the vote we close the saloon. Woman suffrage was defeated 19850 72 9070 more than 221. I was crushed. I returned to weymouth landing to my congregation happy to be preaching and doing parish work again. Tumors after the kansas campaign i received several letters from susan b anthony imploring me to give up the ministry answer the woman suffrage movement. She offered me. Thousand dollars per year above expenses. To work. Woman's. Thousand dollars. I was making only 800 it's a minister. The ministry gave me an opportunity for self development and fulfillment and i turned her down. I would continue working for women suffragists time permit. Still. I went before the board of trustees of my church with that letter in my hand and my salary was increased to $1,000 a year. The 14th amendment to the constitution was ratified on july 23rd 1868. Gave the ballot for the negro male. Pacifically. Fluted women. I've been at weymouth landing 5 years i was beginning to feel restless it was 1869. Heard of an opening at the bridgeport connecticut church and it was accepted as their minister at $1,500 a year. It was painful for me to leave weymouth landing hypomania close friends there including. John henry willis with served on the board of trustees. And what's the church secretary. In the fall of 1872. Susan b anthony decided that she was going to vote. On election day and a number of women walk to the polling place and cast their ballots they were accepted. Thanksgiving day however susan b anthony. And her friends were arrested it made headlines i read the story in the newspaper and i wrote her immediately. We all anxiously awaited the progress of the child. The judge however ruled that miss anthony was guilty of boating without having the lawful right to do so and find her $100. Miss anthony refused to pay the fine. On the homefront i was having trouble in my church. There was a faction of members who had openly opposed to having a woman minister and this caused discordant enmity. I had an offer from a pittsburgh trip at a higher salary. Get i chose to stay in. I had my reasons. John henry willis. Had moved from the weymouth landing church to bridgeport a year after i moved there and had become an active member of my new church. Although i was busy circulating petitions attending meetings campaigning attending to my ministerial duties. He was patient. And paid me visits when time allowed. He was committed to equal rights and suffrage. And i gradually saw. But he was also committed to me. We married in april of 1873 38 years old. My husband was a source of joy to me. As i later wrote. I could not have married a better man he shared in all my undertakings and always stood for the right. Even so. I kept my own name after marriage. And i've been known as the reverend olympia brown the rest of my life. I was 39 when our son henry parker willis was born. My mother came from michigan to help take care of the house and baby she lived with us the rest of her life which allowed me to spend more time on ministerial and some fries work. In march of 1876. The dissenting might retreats the head. I lost my password and the board of trustees faithful to me. Resigned in protest. I now have more time to put into suffrage work. In november of 1876 i had a second child gwendolyn brown willis and devoted myself to my family for the following year. 1878 though i was ready to serve at church again and i was excited when i read that are universalist church in racine wisconsin with without a minister at once the reply i received. The racine churches in a run-down and unfortunate condition he wrote. It is addressed in debt hopeless. And doubtful where. Any pastor can arouse them. I am 62 just such churches i wrote. Let me see let me come and see what i can do. I was invited. In spite of a terrible rain the entire time i was there. I managed to visit every family in the church. And on sunday the peoples were filled. The church of the good shepherd. Voted to call me as its minute. Mr. willis. Brought a beautiful house overlooking lake michigan and invested in the newspaper. I organized the sunday school young people's group ladies afternoon social club and evening social meetings. The public was invited to the evening lectures and musical programs and the church grew and prospered. Elizabeth cady stanton. Susan b anthony julia ward howe pb hannaford and many other friends from the east. Came to my church to lecture. In 1882 i got involved with a wisconsin woman suffrage association and later became as president. I organized committees and held suffrage meetings around the state and annual conventions members of the association went before the state's legislature and urged it to pass a woman suffrage amendment. 1885 a limited woman suffrage bill. Allowing women to vote on school matters this past the state legislature and was ratified in 1886 then wisconsin. There was a great effort to encourage women to vote in the next election i asked susan b anthony to come and help organize and statewide canvas. She came but she let me know that wisconsin women needed a strong leader one who could probably campaign and organized. He thought that. I should be the one to take on that job. 52 years old. I think my church nine years. It was time to start a new career i resigned my ministry at the church of the good shepherd against the wishes of the board and the congregation but i promised them i would always stay with the church and then i began a campaign tour across wisconsin in the worst month. January february and march and in april i returned home to vote. Several co-workers and i went to the bulls together. But the inspector did not allow us to vote. He maintained. That we could only vote. For school officials. And then. We must use separate ballots and separate ballot boxes and these were not furnished. They were forced to return home. I wrote to susan b anthony for advice and partly because of her own bad experience in the court she advised strongly against a lawsuit. But bowing to pressure from the executive committee i did file suit against the inspectors. Although the initial ruling was in our favor. When it was appealed to the wisconsin state supreme court. Brown versus the state of wisconsin. The decision was that women could vote on school matters only. Everybody fletcher did not provide separate ballots and separate ballot boxes for that. For another 15 years. Between 1887 and 1893 i traveled and lectured more than at any other time in my life i canvassed ohio illinois new york minnesota wisconsin to south dakota. I went to conventions and lectured in boston and washington dc. January. 1893 it was my 50th birthday. And i was truly surprised by a large party to celebrate it was a delightful event. And yet within two short months my mother died. And then my husband john suffered a stroke. And shortly thereafter died. I was overcome by grief. I had to learn how to manage his publishing on printing business on my own. I'm just took much of my time. During this time. I also preached in mukwonago. Nina and columbus. In 1909 towards the end of theodore roosevelt's presidency i sense the new interest in women's suffrage. In england emmeline pankhurst. I'm lame you might know. With staging militant activities with the suffragettes as they were called there. I prefer the name suffragists for both men and women. In england they conducted protest marches sit-ins and hunger strikes. Now these tactics were not looked upon favorably by the younger members of the national american or the wisconsin woman suffrage association. But the old guard was slowly fading away elizabeth cady stanton died in 1902 susan b anthony. In 1906. I had continued my work woman suffrage but there was growing dissent among the leadership of the wisconsin woman suffrage association. I ended up resigning as president commenting. Hi i'm 77 years old. Old to waste time on political insider. In 1913 i joined a new party with alice paul and lucy burns that pictured in these pictures here take a look later on. Alice paul and lucy burns. Call the congressional union later non known as the woman's party. Our sole purpose would be to get the susan b anthony amendment through congress. It stated simply. The right of citizens of the united states to vote. Shall not be denied or abridged by the united states or by any state on the counter set. I spoke again before the congressional committee hearings on women's suffrage we finally got the amendment presented before congress. The bill had lain dormant in committee for 27 years. The first vote on women's suffrage in the house of representatives with 174 and favor. 204 again. After president wilson's re-election we organized a protest march in washington dc. We began picketing on january 10th and bitter women it whether hundreds of women march day in day out. I had just celebrated my 82nd birthday and i marched with everyone. Finally wilson decided that this was an embarrassment not to be tolerated any longer and he had us arrested and put in jail. Some suffered abuse in jail and minnie staged hunger strikes and were force-fed. Newspapers picked up the story and women across the country were horrified of pewter arose. The women's party organize medicine demonstrations with thousands of women participating. And then on november 11th 1918. World war 1. Came to an end. Later on large contingents of women began attending congress every time the anthony anthony amendment was on the agenda. Finally. Wilson came to his senses. And in 1919 the bill was passed 304 289. Two weeks later the senate passed the amendment. 60-45. I reminded everyone that it's still had to be ratified. And it wasn't until august 26th 1920. The tennessee the 36th and final stage. Ratify the 19th amendment and it became law wisconsin had been the first state to ratify it in february. I forgot to mention they change their name to the league of women voters. Inspired past disagreements i was their guest of honor at that convention and i was asked to give a speech. Newspapers reported. Her excellent voice was not equal by any of the younger women i was 85 on november 2nd 1920. 72 years. After that first women's right convention in seneca falls new york. So many women and men. Had worked so long and hard to see this dream come true. And i'm proud. Antoinette brown blackwell. The woman who had inspired me to become a minister. And i. The reverend olympia brown. Both live. Cast our ballots olympia brown. Her son became a politician graduate degrees. And advanced degrees and fruit for a while your son attitude. The newspapers are washington post i believe and she went there to live with him for a while and later on he became a politician and was active in politics in colorado and so forth and her daughter. Racing down on her mother as well and and she was a devoted mother and. But that was that was often a charge thrown against her. The right to vote is so interesting so in the eastern states that were founded early there it was hard for me to get property rights and so forth and so on there was a battle there but remember as the pioneer. Where women could vote in presidential elections before 1920 so in some states there was open acceptance of that but in other states that was a it was a battle the old argument that was that women could influence their husbands so they already had influence on the boat and so forth because that was the old arguments and. Way back when i've been doing this for a little while and i remember in the early days i gave presentations at the historical society in lodi and there was a woman who was over 100 there and she said that she had voted in the first election and she was in nebraska at the time and her she was a teacher and her principal had made sure that all the women teachers could vote and it would help them. The roses going to read are closing words. And let me comment that olympia brown loved hymns and love to sing this is the great lesson it's from the opening doors a sermon that olympia brown gave and racine. And i believe in 1926 and i should say see she lived on and was one of the founding members of the american civil liberties union. We can never. Make the world safe by fighting. Every nation. Must learn that the people of all nations are children of god. Share the wealth of the world. May say that this is impracticable far away. Can ever be accomplished. But it is the worst. We are appointed to do. Sometime. Somehow. Somewhere. We must ever. This great lesson. It's been a real privilege and pleasure to have roseanne trevor stevenson with us today and now it's time to greet your neighbors and join us for coffee.

uuprairie_org

Pr130526Erisman-ed.mp3

Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist. Society. I'm penny i'll remember. Are the program committee. Prairie aspires to be an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities or inabilities. Later in the service we will invite visitors and guests and returning friends 200s ourselves. So that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services they are presented either by a prairie member. A member of the wider community or by our minister sandy ingham today of ryanair sermon from the farmers veterans coalition will be doing our presentation. We're opening words of i-75 at 3 tomorrow they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks nation shall not lift up sword against nation neither shall they learn war any more isaiah 24. Please welcome. Like the chalice this morning. In honor of those we have known and loved in the past and recognition of the gifts and sacrifices they have made on our behalf and in our sincere hope that we may be worthy of their memory we light our candles we give our things and we offer our prayers amen charles f play. Today ryan ehresman will be presenting ryan drew up. On an organic grain and livestock farm in parma illinois he graduated from uw-madison in 1997 and was convinced commissioned as a marine corps second lieutenant and infantry officer by training ryan served in various billets. Culminated with two tours in iraq. The second as the commander of 170 man rifle parent company. Ryan love.. Active duty after promotion to major and 2007 his forthcoming book no better friend details his rifle companies experience with elm barf awakening for marines partnered with the rocky tribes and pacified a region together ryan with his wife sarah and their twin two-year-olds hazel and carson are looking to establish their own farm outside of madison. Thank you first of all for the honor of speaking to you today. Because it's memorial day weekend i feel compelled to acknowledge the occasion. As a time to mourn. I grew up attending saint mary's catholic church. And the tiny farming community of assumption illinois. And as a kid i remember marveling at how many men in the congregation. War vfw uniforms on memorial day. When they read the roster of the town's war dead at the cemetery service. I recognize some of the last names. But they weren't people i know. Memorial day means different things to different people and certainly for veterans. For me after two tours in iraq remembrance is no longer a dutifully honored moment of silence on a specific day. Remembrance comes as randomly is rain. It is a roster. Of colleagues friends and brothers in arms. Is ambushes and firefights is medical evacuations. Is kick in the gut messages flatly delivered died of wounds. It's condolence letters and phone calls to next of kin. A memorial services. For the tiny tank think of dog tags being hung on the inverted rifle. Fill the room with a hammering finality. Good morning is only part of the day. At noon on memorial day we raise the flag from half mast. To his full height. As a symbol of resolve. Is it time to heal. There are numerous ways for veterans to heal and resume their lives after serving in the military. And many continue to serve. In new ways. In 2008 michael o'gorman an organic vegetable farmer in california founded the farmer veteran coalition. In order to mobilize veterans to help feed america. The farmer veteran coalition arrived at a time when we stand at the crossroads of two converging trends in america. Two people the average american farmer is 58 years old and two people retire from farming for everyone who enters leaving our agricultural communities in critical need at the same time while unemployment remains high is consistently higher for a nation's 2.4 million post 9/11 veterans but there's a green lining to all this some of those who once answered the nation's called to serve on the battlefield. Are discovering the calling to serve in the farm fields. After the crucible of combat and lights and desk decision-making. Few and ever satisfy the need. For intellectual and physical challenges and a sense of purpose as raising food to feed one's family and community. Veteran successfully transition to farming because they know how to deal with adversity. The understand problem solving. And perhaps knowing firsthand the fragility of life vambrace the responsibility of nurturing. Crops and animals with great passion. Many promising seeds of our communities agricultural future lies in our current crop of veterans. It's time to plant. The farmer veteran coalition helps recent veterans transition into farming through educational retreats and workshops in wisconsin that's included growing power in milwaukee the michael fields institute in burlington. And the moses organic conference in lacrosse. Farmer veteran coalition also helps veterans through fellowship grants that allow veterans to purchase needed equipment for their farm. Through mentoring programs that partner veterans with experienced farmers and through the agrability program that helps disabled veterans modify their buildings and equipment to meet their accessibility needs. Our farmer veterans come from diverse backgrounds and own and operate a variety of farms. The farmer veteran coalition does not endorse one type of farming over another we honor the veterans choice to farm as he or she chooses. So what's all this have to do with you. It is a time to build and it takes real people to build a community facebook and linkedin can help us assemble enormous virtual networks with a cannot trump the bond of real human interaction the connection and trust conveyed through eye contact and honest word is mount. Take our message. Back to your community. Many of those retiring or transitioning farmers are right here in wisconsin and so are many recent veterans. Do your friends or the friends of your friends and family members we may find the next veteran interested in farming. Or the next farmer landowner interested in partnering with a veteran. When we help people make these connections. We help build stronger communities together. Communities that will feed themselves. Endust feed america. Thank you. I actually have cards and brochures if anybody's so interested. So the question is it hard to find a farm. It's hard to find a farm that's affordable and one of the problems that you can say really within the last 30 years. Is as we have moved away from being an agricultural nation and fewer people farm. Your people are connected to land as what it means to produce for us. And as we've urbanized. There's nothing wrong with that. The value of land has increased disconnected from its ability to produce because we value it more for a place to retrieve. From the urban life. And so what you end up with is. Land being priced out of realistic production value and especially in the greenbelt that wants that our cities those keep moving farther and farther away from the cities and really the more interesting or fun as cities to live in. Like madison like portland like seattle some other places that have live. The more difficult it is to find farmland near there are there farms available yes are they necessarily affordable that becomes more challenging and that's not fart that's all beginning farmers that's the challenge of getting into farming for everybody. We work with we're essentially a networking organization and we work with a variety of other organizations whether it's financial institutions in wisconsin we're actually we do have a relationship with badgerland financial because they understand the issue farm service agency so all the same organizations that are out there that would help a beginning farmer we can also show a veteran this is the way this is how you would go about purchasing land the biggest connection becomes finding landed again available and what we found in other places we haven't done it yet in wisconsin is that there are people who would be interested in transitioning or renting their farm out but a lot of them are holding on because they don't have another generation in their own family to take it over and they don't want somebody to come in there and knocked down all the buildings take out the trees and farm it from edge to edge as if we're still stuck in the 1970s with robux so round and living in the second house on the same property and they found in afghanistan.. And those are some of the connections we hope to be able to make across generations with that common bond of background and interest in the future. There's my personal thank you. In my own personal background i grew up on a farm i grew up around livestock and very comfortable that now it's a very awkward situation or not awkward but just the unique background people think organic farm they like oh small vegetable operation of your parents were hippies that's huge we were one of the big ones now our neighbors are nine thousand ten thousand four thousand six thousand. So with the farmer veteran coalition in general when i say all types of farming all types of farms. Those who come from a background where they're going to return to the family farm and it's a large conventional operation that's fine and that worked out very well if you're not inheriting her walking into a turnkey operation then most people that start in farmington veterans are not the only way you can start it with small acreage cuz it's the only thing you can afford to do and when we talk about sustainable business models and systems and affordability regarding the prices of land then you have to be able to get on very little with what you have in anchorage me personally my wife and i leased a farm for 18 months outside of watertown before she came to work in madison and on 7 acres with some catalogs chickens in her own cropped until if there's no tractor i did everything with a walk behind machine so. We have had interest from the white house specifically we have partnerships with the usda and the farm bureau at the national level my titleist ambassador to the midwest region awkward but aboard decided on that and so it shall be but we didn't have other than our veterans that are actually out there farming we didn't have people in the communities spreading the word and just because you have national leadership saying this is what we should do doesn't mean that we're actually doing anything about it and so two weeks ago i was actually in the fssa office in madison and talking to the chief of loans and he's like yeah we know about you guys but. But it takes us to make it happen. So again it national-level the usda understands the importance of all those programs and i guess the sad thing in this is me speaking personally is that we have to have a lot of these programs in place because otherwise it's very difficult to make a living at farming and so we to some extent subsidize our own environmentalism so we can afford to be out there on the land taken care of it and not drained of every single resource they can give us for that. of time so. We're very much in favor of that but i think long-term. Real sustainability. This long-term means that we don't need to subsidize our environmentalism and we should be able to build systems that also pay for themselves that's the challenge now but i can tell you that my parents farm has paid for itself unsubsidized know gramps no government programs through the farm crisis of the 1980s and the only reason my dad waited until 1992 convert to organic was that was when he was finally out of debt because nobody was going to give him an operating loan to go organic at 2,000 acres in one shot so once you got out of it and so it's. And make a living doing it now that's not a pc that's me but that's where i want to go with it we have an excellent relationship with growing power in milwaukee and if you want to talk about urban farming i think at the individual level the model of urban farming is robert frost not the poet but the guy who's still living in johnson creek and about to move to minneapolis if you don't know who that is one straub is the website and it is i opening i think the future is the opportunities are there for everybody to produce more of your own food to make a system that works for all of us and growing power is probably the largest organizational system that i know of that's doing that in doing it very well and we actually have a handful of veterans that work through we made a partnership with growing power and the veterans were already a lot in helping the whole person and to that in much of it as education with sponsoring 11 or 12 this year that's a lot of what the farmer veteran coalition does is setting up the education networking with other incubator farms in organizations there are several veteran run incubator farms popping up throughout the country we do not see them as competition we see them as allies in one large mission that we need to accomplish so a lot of what we do is education training and again part of his debt trying to find those partnerships with mentors so that we can pair an interested veteran up with somebody who has that experience and say this is what i recommend this is what i would do or you know don't try that i've been there and failed. We see them run by veterans which addresses your whole thing is the whole veteran and what do we do for that we find that the farmer veteran coalition ends up being an unofficial network of just getting together with other people who have some commonality of background in addition to their current interest in farming makes a difference and just knowing that there are other people out there that you can use the terminology where were you, experience so far. Most of our veterans are post 9/11 so serve somewhere after september 11th 2001 we do have older veterans that are part of the organization as long as they're essentially beginning farmers. We called them you turner's the people who have another business retire and then later in life have the capital to buy a farm and going to farming i'm working there's a guy up in ashland right now toby griggs who has the griggs cattle company he's a retired pilot who started flying us or a force in vietnam finally retired and bought his farm 130 acres in 2010 so he's a beginning farmers. Everybody fights their own war in my book project i can tell you it's amazing that you can have three guys that were right next to each other in the same gunfight and get three completely different stories and our entire wiring our whole process of how we were raised what we what we expected comes to bear when you experience a traumatic event and how you process that so everybody processes those things differently i know from some friends i can until you personally i had no intention of going back to farming when i left the marine corps i was going to coach cross-country teach history and be quite happy with that. of nothing else seemed satisfied and literally of all things on my knees underneath a combine so this isn't you know nice escarole taking care of the calves and stuff. This is bloody fingers being stubble cuz your organic and have lot of green stuff that goes through in something you slugged a large machine digging. Grass and roots and green stuff out of a combine with your arms over head for half an hour and i got to work my dad came over he was like hey you missing the marine corps now. And had you know what. No and even is a miserable mindless tasks like that i felt this is the important thing i need to be doing and this is where i belong and i think a lot of veterans reach that point that or in something else but you find that thing that says this is me and this is what i should be doing and farming sort of came back to me in that way that okay maybe not where i grew up but this is where i need to be. There are a lot of organizations that would love to hire vets and that's across the board and that's general electric that's home depot that's in a locally badgerland financial i mean it's and it's out there i'd there's seems to be two versions is one that all recent veterans are suffering from ptsd and untrainable and the other version is that everyone's a hero and ready to go into the job force with these unbelievable leadership and skill sets it is both and it is neither and i can tell you from my own guys i have several marines that are now out of the marine corps use their gi bill went to school and one of my top squad leaders who was only twenty at the time finished his degree at temple university in december and went for a lincoln financial intern program. To loaded questions here we go a minute to spare. Fairly personal story my brother and i went to boarding school and that was because the educational system to my dad standards in central illinois did not measure up to what he wanted my dad going to a boarding school in prairie du shein camping that's been industrial park. So i accepted that as normal but i think part of that was. And my brother and i left the farm fairly early and looked to the greater world as and we would settle someplace else so yeah leaving for the most part at 14 then after going to boarding school in st louis i didn't want to go to college in illinois closer than i've gone to high school so i came to wisconsin and then after that serve 10 years so probably in the same respect that the greek philosopher steps in the same river twice because he's not the same man my culture my style fits better here and i have that needs to go build my own thing that presents some significant multi-generational because it is. Most people understand that the iraq turnaround happened in 2007 with what they call the alambar awakening which was the rising of the tribes. A lot still equate success or at least the turnaround in the war to this sudden surge of 30,000 troops and that some of it but that wasn't the answer where i served between collusion remind because we didn't get those fruits and that was the most violent province in al-anbar and that also saw the greatest security gains in that time. and so it wasn't about numbers it was about. Quality trumping quantity and a few good men and women going out there figuring out real counterinsurgency understanding or trying to understand the iraqi culture and identifying with the people specifically and really not decisions made from on high but those young corporals like mat near who i mention becoming what we once called strategic oracle's realizing that the decisions they made could end up on the 6 news if they were wrong and understanding the larger picture with respect to us and the iraq he's building relationships reacting to violent situations with the least amount of violence that they could when they could and mostly focusing on that partnership and realizing that it was only through working with them together that we were going to achieve success and so much of the book no better friend with his fellows epitaph no better friend no worse enemy became the marine corps in the invasion of iraq and general mattis said make sure everybody understands that in the united states marines they will see no better friend coming down from a large-scale understood out there patrolling took my basic as well they have a different moral code than we do. Thank you so much love you had lots of time for questions they had some good one. Closing words from maya angelou. How important it is for us to recognize and celebrate our heroes and sheroes so it's almost time to raise the flag to the full staff and go out there and enjoy the. Freedoms and liberties that holly's veterans have enabled us to enjoy a wonderful day thank you.

uuprairie_org

Pr151213HerdaPenebacker-ed.mp3

Good morning everyone. And welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i am linda colletti and i am a prairie member. Prairie aspires to be both in open-hearted in open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities or in abilities. Later in the service we will invite visitors guests and returning friends to introduce yourself. So that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services they are presented either by a prairie member. A member of the wider community. Rbii minister sandy ingram. This morning's presentation is by members of moms demand action for gun sense in america. Eric is going to read the opening words. I'm riding by howard zinn. To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only cruelty. But also compassion. Sacrifice courage and kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst. It destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places and there are so many. Where people have acted magnificently. This gives us the energy to act. And at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do at. And however a small way. We don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents. And to live now as we think human beings should live. In defiance of all that is bad around us. Is itself a marvelous victory. I'm al and eileen nettleton are going to light our chalice this morning. On this anniversary of our grievous loss in this time of asking why. We are. We'd like a flame of sharing. We light a flame of commitment. In this time of why. We like this flame. Sign of our searching sign of our sharing. Sign that together. We remember. Together we ask why. Together in sadness and joy. We share light. Together we celebrate. What we are. Together. Now i have the distinct honor of introducing our speakers for today. These are people i have come into contact with the last few years and. Their dedication and their. Inspiration and determination have been. They've they've changed my life in many ways. I'm sorry i'm going to introduce kelly and then she is going to. Traduce. So kelly herta. Is the chapter lead for moms demand action. Of wisconsin and her responsibilities include. Point person for all internal communications and relationship with organized organizational manager. She manages and communicate regularly with all the volunteers and access the spokesperson for the chapter to the public and media. Kelly is the co-founder and senior partner at prawn. And and associates consulting firm that provides advocacy training. Legislative strategy grassroots organizing public relations and crisis management for nonprofits. And corporate. And corporate clients so. I further do i welcome. I just love her. A little bit more about me i should tell. Why i'm involved with moms demand action i'm the mother of three daughters and i fear for their safety every time they leave my home. The gun violence milwaukee's terrifying and only minutes from our neighborhood. But it wasn't until after sandy hook. That i decided i couldn't sit at home and allow this to continue. I wanted to be proactive in this fight. I didn't want to wait until my loved ones became victims of gun violence. I wanted to be involved now. So a little over two years ago i joined moms demand action went to a coffee chat it up with the ladies. Couple days later they asked if i'd be their legislative lead for the state of wisconsin. Okay what's the best move i ever made. So that's how i got involved that's my action item that's. That's how i fight gun violence is working for moms as a volunteer. But don't want to talk about why we're all here today. Over 100 events are going on like this across the country and yesterday they marched in anchorage alaska in orange. So we are marking the third anniversary of sandy hook. Aunt remember all victims of gun violence we wear the orange. As a symbol as hunters would wear orange as a symbol when they're hunting not to be shot at. So this is a gun violence prevention color for all of us. The gun lobby would like to the world to think that were part of a small group. But we're not. We represent the majority of americans who believe america can do better. Not only win the majority but we show up and today we need to make sure your semen counted. I know you want to take action to put a stop to the gun violence. And your first action item is right now. So i'm going to ask you to stand up and be counted. I need you to pull out your cell phone if you have a cell phone. I will going to text the word orange. To the number 64433. And i'll say that again for you so you can get ready. Stand up and do it for down and do it however you want to do it but stand up and be counted what's going to happen is when we send out this text. You'll be prompted to put your zip code in. And your name. By entering that not only are you being counted as being at this event. But we know who your legislators are based on your name and depakote. And that helps us show them just how many people in their own district. Ready. 64433 and text the word orange. You should be prompted then to enter they'll come back and ask you i believe for your name and your zip code okay but once we do that. And again this also tells your legislators by having your zip code we know who your representatives are. And we count those numbers of people volunteers with moms demand action. Who want common-sense gun laws and we can show these numbers to them and numbers are important. 64433. And. You should be prompted to enter your zip code and name is anyone having trouble getting through on that number. Hurry are you able to do it. Okay that's okay that's okay we have sign-in sheets outside the door. So if you don't have a cell phone and you want to be counted as a person who'd like to see common sense gun laws passed. Like universal background check then you should sign that. Okay. Are we doing everybody ready to move on. Okay. That's okay i can speak while you text. I want i want i want think you're being rude. So three years ago so we lit the candle our country was shocked and heartbroken when gun violence route through the halls of sandy hook elementary school taking the lives of 20 precious children and six brave educators. Since that day. Everyday. 88 americans have been killed by gun violence and hundreds more have been injured. Less than 2 weeks ago in san bernardino our country suffered the deadliest mass shootings since sandy hook. And the daily toll of gun violence tragedies that don't make the headlines. Continues unabated. With the seemingly endless stream of tragedy it's tempting to become disheartened in hopeless. But by being here today. You're showing that we will fight to take back our country. We are in the majority who believe. We can do better. And know that together we can end gun violence. Congressman have failed to act in the months following sandy hook. But mom's haven't. In fact we've made significant progress account across the country in the years that followed. You're just a few of the things i'm not going to go through all of our amazing accomplishments but i'm going to give you some of the things that have happened in just the past 3 years. We got the movement of over three million members with chapters in every state including hawaiian alaska we are everywhere we've blocked the nra's guns on campus pill in 15 states. 12 states including wisconsin. Have enacted laws to keep the guns out of hands of domestic abusers. Most of these mass shootings. Are actually domestic violence case. In some of the. Other than mass shootings it started out as a domestic violence and killing in the home and then they left the home and went out and killed more innocent bystanders. So domestic violence association. And this year alone we defeated the dangerous permitless. Cherrybelle meaning you don't need a permit just carry the going to go everyone. We defeated that 15th state. Mom's convinced 11 major businesses including starbucks target facebook chili's imac to go on. It's adopt consent policies meaning. No guns in our stores are our restaurants. Six states have passed laws to close the dangerous background check loopholes that exist. Bringing the total number of states that require universal background checks for all gun sales 2018. I want background checks were on the ballot in the 2014 election in washington state. More than 1.2 million voters. Came out and voted in support of background checks. I did that one legislator stone act. Voters will. So what can you do. What can you do right now to help end gun violence. First and foremost your vote at your most powerful tool out there. The majority of our legislators their first priority is to ensure that they get reelected. K rino this. But they need money and they need votes. Sure the gun lobby has a lot of money so do we weave hair bloomberg we're good right. But we also have the majority of the vote. Okay and as long as you vote. In all election. Your community like local elections or state your federal. Get out there and vote and make sure you're voting for legislators who support common sense gun laws across the board. We all do this. We can end gun violence. Because we'll have common sense. Legislature. In there for us. Your perseverance. Is also needed. Understand the passing legislation is the longest game in town. And you need to be in this fight for the long haul. Shannon watts the founder of moms demand action always says this is a marathon not a sprint. It took the nra decades to set up the sweet deal that they have in the congress and in our state legislators didn't happen overnight. It didn't happen overnight and we're not going to fix it overnight. But we are going to fix it. And we can again. End gun violence will keep reiterating. Another action your time and your talent. Is needed in this fight. Please sign up. Please take a leadership role. At help us build a grassroots movement in your community i need one here in madison desperately. The tower numbers and we need to make certain that those who want common-sense gun laws common sense gun laws are standing up and being counted. We are all volunteers. Hurry and i am linda we all work we have families. But we find the time for this. It's that important. And we need your help. So please please. Join us. Now that's the end of my speech. I get the distinct honor of interviewing and one of my favorite people. So curry paper wears many hats. Here in our organization. He is the communication please. The social media. He's the twitter god. About the dads ambassadors because guess what moms aren't just moms their dads grandma's grandpa's. Daughters. Comes with me my daughter carly comes with me almost everywhere she's toured the country with me she's marched with mom she's called for mom. But you just turned 18. Thank you carly and she's here today to actually photograph for us as well. But. That's life. Curry is my better half. I could not do what i do without him. But you also need to know about this incredible person if he's a gun violence survivor. He's an outreach coordinator for our steak and also around the country. He's everywhere. So please give my friend. And the bravest man i know. A warm welcome. She got me crying already. So before i start. I want to read the names. The victim's west. So if you wouldn't mind closing your eyes as i ever save you. Rachel. Divino forever 29. Dawn hochsprung. Forever. 47. Anne-marie murphy. Forever52. Lauren rousseau. Forever. 30. Mary sherlock. Forever. 56. Vicki lee soto. Forever. 27. Charlotte bacon. Forever 6. Daniel barden. Forever. 7. Olivia engel. Forever. 6. Josephine gay. Forever. 7. Dylan hockley. Forever. 6. Madeline sue. Forever 6. Catherine hubbard. Forever. 6. Chase kowalski. Forever 7. Jesse lewis. Forever. 6. Ana marquez-greene. Forever. 6. James matthew lee. Forever. 6. Grace mcdonnell. Forever. 7. Emily parker. Forever 6. Jack pinto. Forever 6. Noah pozner. Forever. 6. Caroline previdi. Forever 6. Jessica rekos. Forever. 6. I'll be over richmond. Forever 6. Benjamin wheeler. Forever 6. And alison wyatt. Forever. 6. Forever 6. My name is curry kenny baker. And i have a gun violence survivor. I have been a gun violence survivor. My entire life. September 8th. 1979. A mother decided to take a drive but she did a number of times throughout her adult life disassembly clear head. Except this time. I'm off the floor. She upset at the kitchen table with some of her closest friends. And literally told them. It's you wanted to die. She told him i want to kill myself. But at no point. At that night. Or the month after that did anyone think. We need to make sure we get her gun from her. So that morning. September 8th. 1979. My mother. Kill the both of us. She pulled on the side of the road. And put the revolver to her head. An end of her life. I would not wish. My life. On anyone. Not my worst enemy. You can't imagine. The things i've had to go through just to get here today. I've been racked with grief. With only answering questions that no one. Give me a solid answer to a woman that's actually worth having a conversation about i've had to constantly ask the question. Why me. What did i do wrong. I didn't ask for this. I didn't ask to be born. I surely didn't ask my mother put a gun to her head. And shoot herself with it. What could possibly be wrong with me. That my own mother. Doesn't want to be here anymore. Pocket puppies a case. But it wasn't a case of and then in just about every phase. My mother actually just wanted to die. She just didn't want to be in pain anymore. I wrote an op-ed for the journal sentinel on world suicide prevention day. And the the editor was kind enough to send a response back right away to our initial email today i know the pain the curry is feeling. Here's an article one him to read. And it was about the. The terrorist attack on 9/11. We're all the salt of people jumping out of the building. But people weren't jumping out of the building. Because they wanted to die. They jumped out of those buildings because they didn't want to be on fire anymore. My mother shot herself. Because she don't want her brain to be on fire in my that was simply a. She need help. But it's easy access to a gun. That's something i have to live with every single day. After survival. Every single day. And i didn't ask for. But i have no choice. There's nothing going to say there's no marching going to go through there's no phone call going to make this kind of pull the bullet. Out of her head that exploded all over that car. There's nothing. But what i can do. Just make sure i talk to as many people as possible. So they don't make the same mistake my mother did that so you can make sure that you can make a difference so that the 88 people that died everyday have a chance. It is up to us. The people. It's not your money. It's you. It's your fault your voice your feet your fingers everything. You can honestly make a difference. So that those 88 people that die every single day don't die in vain but we can take it down to 80 into 72620. Because we. Can end. Dunbar. Are any of you. Survivors of gun violence or know someone that's been affected by gun violence. I've been to some of these were the entire room raises their hand. Witches heartbreak. But those voices mater. In fact a few years ago there was a woman who was involved in a domestic violence dispute involving a gun. It took her 7 years to help pass a bill that is now the law here in wisconsin that governor walker sign the 2014 that helps keep the. Keep guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them. Survivor stories matter. The heartbreaking. They make you cry. They're hard to hear. But these are the stories that we need to listen to. Because when you talk about gun violence people usually talk in the abstract we'll talk about satistics. I'll tell you about how there's 88 people that died everyday that's one of her 16 minutes. There's a gun suicide almost every 25 minutes. With every single day. What is our stories in our voices that help make change come about. Because we know. We don't have a choice. Our loved one isn't going to come back but maybe if we fight hard enough we can prevent the next tragedy from happening. There's a man that we work with his name is richard martinez. His son was shot and killed in isla vista mass shooting 2014. 10 things that he'll say you just about every time he gets a chance to speak. Is that after the sandy hook massacre ready he didn't do anything. Until it was his kid. Don't let that be you. Don't be complacent. And don't let tomorrow just be another day where you just just watch tv and the day ends and you do nothing. Make sure they hear your voice. Make sure you get counted. Because you can make a difference. Do any of you feel. That. This is a hopeless and fruitless fight. Breaker and it's okay to be honest. And i can appreciate that and i'm not going to lie i felt that way myself. Amongst the other feelings that i have to deal with. I do feel sometimes that this is hopeless horses help us. And tell remind myself. Then i have to get my mother voice. Any chance i get to speak for her i have to take it. Any politician i get to talk to you to tell her or him about my mom i have to take it. So maybe when it's their turn to vote for common sense gun reform they think about joyce pennybaker. I think about the. 236 christmases. Chimas. They think about. The three kids of mine shall never get to meet. Don't think about all my failures and all my successes. But she never get to help me with. Don't think about the 36 birthdays. The 36 christmas. The 36 thanksgiving. But she missed. All of that. Maybe they'll think about it. But if i don't say anything. They don't care. They're not just going to do it just because. There. Decent people. They don't work that way. Some of them. Summer bought-and-paid-for unfortunately. But i'm here to tell you we can take our country back. To make sure we have politicians who will vote for common sense gun reform that can honestly save people's lives. In the states that have universal background checks the 18th at have it. They're 48% fewer guns suicide. They're 46% fewer shootings of of women by either current or former husband's a boyfriend. They're 48% fewer cops that are shot and killed. Nastasya have waiting periods. There are. At least 50% fewer gun suicides in those things. And it's even better in the states that have longer waiting for you. Wisconsin have one for 40 years and unfortunately. That law was repealed this past this past summer. But we are making sure we move we make every effort to bring that law back cuz that law honesty saves people's lives as well. This is something we can honestly do. I wouldn't be standing here. Just to hear myself talk although i do like that. But i believe in this. With every ounce of my being. I believe. The we can end gun violence. And i hope. The all of you. Find some way. Whether it's with your vote. Whether you march. Play chopin wear orange. But they get on twitter. And tweet about how you think we can end gun violence but you do something. Cuz it's on all of us. Can't leave until the next person. Because the longer you wait. The more people will die. Every single day. Since sandy hook has been 90,000 people. I've been shot and killed. 90000. 90. Thousand. And thousands of others who were shot and survived. This is not the america we want to live in. We do not have to live this way and i refuse to accept this as being normal i don't get complacent i'm just feel numb when i hear another one of these stories i cry just about every single time. I mean survivors all the time and i have to hug mothers who had to bury children. That's heartbreaking. I don't want to do it. It's unbearable sometimes i have to go home and and cried and talk to my wife and without being with explain how i feel because it's that bad. But i fight because i know. I know. We can make a difference. We have to. So what i'd like you to do if you are able to stand. Anyone ableton. If you're able to stay and. I like to do some. Chance william so they're going to be a series of chance you're going to repeat after me and what you going to repeat. Is the word as the phrase. We stand today. And then at the last one we have a pretty. For all the victims of gun violence. We stand. For all the survivors of gun violence. We stand today. For the communities ravaged. By gun violence. We stand today. In defiance of the gun lobby. We stand today. The put our elected officials on notice. We stand today. With hope. For our country. We stand today. The end gun violence. This is a special one so just repeat after me. We must. We can. We will. End gun violence. We will end gun violence. I've heard curry speak many times and he moves me every time. His passion is contagious. Thank you. There are groups that do protest in front of the nra headquarters in virginia. Just about every day. But the important thing is the nra is only. One part of a tissue. They happened to represent. About five million members across the country. Hurry up there's a gun for every man woman and child. In our country right now very small minority of gun owners in the majority of gun owners are responsible. And i support what we believe in. Over 70% of all gun owners support universal background checks so that tells you the message that the nra ascending isn't actually working. Except when it comes to our legislators so. That's where we need to process. I'm free and i might want to make a comment towards what you were saying about the gun sales. Jerry bonneville she's the founder and president of wave the wisconsin anti-violence effort and linda works with the wave as well she's like moms and wave and everything she's really amazing. But jerry pointed out to me the other night that the studies after these mass shootings in those. Cuba rising gun sales. Those aren't new gun owners going out and buying the guns these are the same people time and time again who going by guns they are not recruiting more people. Just done hoarders going in 40 more and more ammunition out of fear to certain mindset that does that kind of purchasing. But these aren't like are wisconsin hunters are people who have. Common sense when it comes to guns running out in 40 more. It's it's pretty specific group. So an accident interview with the fox 6 milwaukee on tuesday. Where she asked me about. What are response was after black friday when we have record gun sales including here in the compound believe there were almost 2,000 done sold on black friday. One of the things that i told her. Was that your story is is is rather unfortunate or your lead for stories unfortunate. Because the other part of that equation so on one hand you have record gun sales. How many gun safes were sold. How many trigger locks for someone that's the most part about this conversation we're not anti-gun we're anti-gun violence. And we want to promote safe safe gun using safe gun store so if people are just buying more guns. With the idea of that's going to make him say for that's not necessarily true you actually have a 2022 % or i'm sorry 22 times more likely to shoot someone in your house or yourself and you do a sailor. Define morgan's only propagates the problem it doesn't actually make our country safer in the fact that we have people actually pushing that narrative is unfortunate because it leads to more death. We we do have a program moms isn't just legislation we are education. And i put pamphlets out there the program called be smart. And three and i have hosted house parties for be smart we've talked with work will kris hooked up at the police department to. Esmart is actually an acronym on on how to promote gun safety in the home and keeping guns out of the hands of. Young children and. Teenagers and so we we do address that. You'll probably want to follow up with more on that because the team suicide is also there. But be sure to grab that brochure on the way out and if you ever want to hold beesmart house party or have a be smart. Church event we can do that. And it's basically giving you your talking points and giving you an empowering you. When you go out and you have your children going for a playdate to ask. Do you have a gun in your home. And is it stored safely before your children go there it's. Curry and i always use the same analogy if your child had a severe peanut allergy what you ask. If they were peanuts in the home or an allergy to animals you would have to ask that guns are pretty. as dangerous as a peanut going to. So feeling comfortable and making that ask is important. Part of the thing. For me when i came on to mom's it never occurred to me to ask that question. And now that i'm with mom. It's on my mind and i have family in the south and they all own guns. And that's okay. But when my aunt moved in with my cousin. And she packed her gun and her box with all the other things and moved in. The bedroom with the three-year-old. I thought his were eating at the dinner table. Hollywood you do with your gun so it's in storage at the at the warehouse is not here. And i looked at genesis house website can you go check the box. Just 44 my cycle check those boxes sure enough sitting right on the top of the box was a loaded gun next to amelia's bed. Of course they were devastated to find that that has happened that you unloaded it and did the proper storage but if it wasn't for moms in this education piece. Never would have occurred to me to ask that question. So just having this conversation is giving you. The empowered part of being able to protect someone. So the other thing. Is that. Every 36 hours there's an unintentional child shooting. And there was about two million. Children that live in houses where you ham. Unsafe to store firearms. You just asking for for trouble. And again if you want to go and let this completely okay as long as you can pass the background check but then when you bring that got home you need to make sure it's stored safely. So that a young person. Or a distressed teenager can have access to it. I wrote an article about a young boy's name is eric gutierrez he's a love info. He was 11 years old. Do you want fourteen-year-olds friend's house. Fourteen-year-olds dad. Had over 20 loaded and unsecured firearms stored throughout the house including. In the 14 year olds bedroom. The two boys went out behind the the garage or playing a believe it was cops and robbers. Happened to be with a loaded gun. The fourteen-year-old ends up shooting. Eleven-year-old in the head killing. Guess how much time left. Not a minute. So when you hear stuff like in a there's there's record gun sales or there is a you know there's. Tens of thousands of rounds of ammunition for every individual. How safe are we. There's 80 people that i ever that died every single day. Buying more guns. Has not made us safer yet. Again it's okay to own one. What is the responsible people. I need to join us to make a difference. Cuz there's that vocal minority that's going to always be rabbit there can always call and be nasty show up. Armed and ready.. Kill it will important. They showed up yesterday. But they are a vocal minority. We. Are the munchery. We're the ones. With enough sense. The stand up and say we don't have to live like this. An eleven-year-old boy should not be playing with a gun or should a 14 year old boy. That is not okay. Just the other day i believe it was actually just last night a deputy. Left his. Loaded. An unsecured. 9 mm on the bed stand. Is 3 year old shot and killed. Did that cop gun make that three-year-old safer. That was just one gun not 300-plus million. Just one gun. A bullet. Has no rhyme or reason why it's going to hit some. It doesn't care it doesn't care if you're black or white younger old richer for republican or democrat. It is about as apolitical as you can get. It literally does not care its job is to destroy. Which. Makes you realize. Responsible people. Have to help make this chain. Responsible. I can speak to that a little bit i joined wave which is the wisconsin anti-violence effort. And then we just started a madison group we meet once a month. And we focus on what right here in wisconsin we can do. And in with your program i put a list of some of the bills that were looking at and that we are. Tirelessly lobbying for and i find it i like working with moms which has a very you know they're looking at a broader picture a national picture which is great i also like working locally i want to be down there i want to make the calls and want to be working for my community to so if you're interested with wave look up on their website and see when and where we're having our next meeting we would love. To have you join that and also mom because linda didn't just do wave and she does moms and wait because the federal law supersedes the state we work at the federal level we work at the state we're all volunteers just like you and i didn't know what to do i joined and they gave me actions but i had to take a leadership role. And i had to be able to do the work. Of that we need a leader here addison to help us build a group. Well i answer your question specifically. So a day after the san bernardino mass shooting that happened almost two weeks ago the very next day. Our esteemed us senate. I voted down closing the background i'm sorry closing to terry gap which allows people who are on the no-fly list still buy gum lot of people don't even know that exist. And they also voted down expanding universal background check. So the way you can actually make specific change and actually play a part in making a different is calling. Both at the federal level and at the local level so between the efforts between moms and and wave we can accomplish that so here wisconsin there are five common sense gun reforms that are that are that have been filed one deals with restoring the 48-hour cooling-off period law that was repealed in june another is the families know first law which is essentially a gun violence restraining order law that allows a family member to petition to have guns temple again temporarily removed from the house of someone who maybe. Averse to risk temporarily there's a number of other ones that better. Possible. The important thing is many of these common-sense gun reforms here wisconsin may not actually get out of committee because we haven't all republican legislation again i'm not talkin politics necessarily but because they have a republican legislature laws have not been really brought to the floor in fact some of these laws or some of these bills actually may not actually come for a public testimony. But the way we change that. Is why you getting on the phone and calling. Because i had to record who called for or an opposition for particular bill in the more calls we get to go into those those legislators. Better or for supporting some of these bills the better chance we have of getting them out of committee and having a public testimonies of people like me and others can come on speak people like you who want to come on speak for me not be a survivor and say i just want to make a difference to end gun violence. So there are currently 18 states that have universal background checks but the efficacy of those laws in those states are only as good as the surrounding states around it so if you have states that have good common-sense gun laws but i have surrounded by states and a bad one. Essentially in a way nullifies how old how good some of those walls maybe so people always throw up when you talk about gun reform bill say what about chicago illinois have some of the strictest gun laws around illinois surrounded by states that have very lacks come on it's within chicago for example of indiana buy a gun. Badger guns and ammo would oftentimes sell guns that ended up in in chicago fact in 2005. Badger guns and ammo which is located in west allis wisconsin. What's the number one dealer for crime guns in the in the country. So again. If you have a state that is smart enough to pass common sense gun reform these surrounding states can can impede their success by reducing their common sense gun reform so if you look at the federal level. If we have universal background checks that would apply to the entire country. So that way you couldn't have a state like indiana. Expand gun rights and reduce gun laws that will keep guns out of the hands of people should have them. To conversation to conversation and knowing your fact and knowing to how to have these conversations without calling somebody an idiot. Or demeaning them in some way which just like sapphire and ends the debate right there. Everytown.org. If you go to that on your computer there to learn button if you click that. Wonderful information talking points a lot of the numbers and percentages that. Curry has been skating here are listed there on that site to help you have these common-sense discussion. With people who are basically spewing nra propaganda and not really getting the picture. Do you think i turned around my family in in kentucky. You better believe i did. They're no longer nra members and they're locking their guns up. But. You have to be able to one have the conversation do it with your family your friends your neighbors and let it spread that way. And that's probably why your family member change their tune after seeing some of the facts that are actually out there. Mom doesn't lie. We really do the research everything we say is based on solid data. So that you have something to use when you're having these discussions around gun violence. And no we don't preach to the choir doing. But the thing is you have to find a place where you can have common ground. And for example the most comprehensive way of reducing gun violence is universal background checks. 70% or more than 70% of gun owners and actually nra members support universal background checks. So you can find something that that they find is is is going to be acceptable in some ways we also make sure we use the right verbage so we hardly ever say gun control. Will say either, cuz gun reform or i or gum sense or something like that because the word gun-control has such a negative connotation out because the opposition has done a good job and they're messaging there's some words that just make people retreat to their corn. But if you talk to people in an honest and decent way and have us a regular conversation no different than what we're having right now week announced a chained heart change hearts in mine. But part of that starts with your legislator yet that's who we need to start convincing because the population already does in the majority sense. It's but instead politicians i need to make sure that they hear and and. Their heart in mind doesn't matter. They have to go public. There was one story that i found where the family followed the young boy who is now an adult who fired that weapon. The fallout of the family mom and dad splitting. Child. Going through life with that horrible guilt and feeling that the father could never face him or loving again. And they talked about that it's a devastating story so yes they do live with it it destroys not just that young life it just throws a whole family and the young child that fires that gun. If you think that they don't have to live with that this this man that told the story was in his thirties and he still living with it. Public out there and he is working with survivors and people and getting those stories out there for everyone so i'm sure he could share more but yes those stars are there. We think. Lisa's heading up campaign on campus to prevent guns on campus in our classroom. Thank you all for coming please extend a hand of friendship to those around you. Please stay and enjoy some coffee talk to our guests and we want a picture if anybody can stay come up here we want you to hold up some signs this is a national event that you're part of today so. We'd appreciate that and there are also handouts and other. Pins and things out on the front table there too so please help yourself. Thank you.

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Pr160807SandyIngham-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. I am as most of you know. Sandy ingham prairie minister. Prairie. Tries to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation. We want them people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure we welcome you. No matter your age or your inabilities or your abilities. Color of your hair tell your eyes we welcome you later in the service we will have an opportunity to or you will have an opportunity to introduce yourself if this is your first time or one of your first time. And i always encourage people to come more than once to see what we're all about because sometimes i do the service sometimes. People from within the congregation do the service and sometimes. Those from we have a guest speaker from outside. I bring you greetings. From your transylvanian. Unitarian. Brothers and sisters. You will hear much more about this. In the coming months. This morning's collection will go to the literacy network. Of madison and that is described in your order service what they do is describe. The opening words are these. What has come into a calm clear place. Where we can relinquish our clutter. And relax from busyness. Into being. Let us settle into that calm clear place. Where the earth supports our bodies. And the community list our spirits. Where we can breathe in peace. And center ourselves in love. Let us welcome our calm clear place. Where our hearts can open and our slots can expand beyond the cobwebs of convention. Into the creative flow. Of infinity. We like. The flame of knowledge. May understanding be with us. We like the flame of love. Make caring be among us. We light the flame of holiness. May the unifying spirit. Be within us. The reading this morning is. Taken from. Speech. That. Unitarian universalist minister. And then president of starr king school for the ministry rebecca parker gave right after katrina. Rebecca writes. What we need is a revolution in our values. A revolution that turns our attention. More. Reverently. And. Responsibly. To the interdependent. Relational character of life. What we need is a spiritual. And practical revolution. Spiritual and practical. That involves love for neighbor. And for the world through sustaining structures of care. And responsibilities. 5 days after the hurricane. President bush. Toward some of the devastation in louisiana alabama and mississippi. And sad. This was a time for people. To love their neighbors as themselves. His comments suggest. A view of love as a gesture of kindly. Help. When the situation has become. Horrendously. Dyer. Such a view of love is not sufficient. Loving our neighbor implicates us. In loving. The whole network of life. This interconnectedness of all things calls for. Wisdom and. Reverence. Maybe in the end parker says. Love will save us all. But it has a lot better chance. At the beginning. We need to love from the star. Not as an emergency strategy when everything has gone wrong. We must learn again to live with reverence. Reverence is a form of love. It is a response to life. That falls on its knees before the rising sun. And bowels down before the mountain. It puts its palms together. In the presence of the night sky. And the myriad galaxies and recognizes as poet langston hughes tells us. Beautiful are the stars. Beautiful to are the faces of my people. Reverence. Grease all humanity as sacred. Reverence for life. Have to be. Learned. It is not just a feeling. It's a way of life. That is manifested in more than an isolated moment. Of appreciation for nature or all before its destructive or creative power. Reverence involve. Full fledged devotion. Enacted in deeds of care and responsibilities it involves knowledge study. And attention. Our society is currently guided by a worldview that is insufficiently grounded in reverence rights parker. Reverence. Religiously it is a worldview that regards the earth itself as. Trash. Economically the dominant worldview regards human beings as self-interested individuals motivated only by their personal desire to consume. And scientifically it sees existence as devoid of value atomistic. Disconnected. Mechanistic. Such inadequate views are tearing our world to tatters. By lack of regard for the communal character of life. A few years ago parker says. When i visited my congregations partner church in oakland pennsylvania. Reverent levante. Catwoman took me into the sanctuary. To see the ceiling of the 400-year old unitarian church. In his village. Genocide these churches don't look like this. They look like first unitarian either. They look like a traditional big cathedral. With the steeple bells the horse. So here's rebecca in this room. She writes in. Typical transylvanian style the church has a wooden ceiling. Criss-cross with beans creating a lattice. Of deep squares which are painted with. Folk art. Depicting flowers and plants beautiful. Bright. Near the center of the sanctuary the ceiling harbors a surprising image. A golden sun. Surrounded by circling planets. In a star-spangled indigo sky. It is a diagram of the copernican solar system. At a time. When religion was opposing science. Our ancestors. In the remote mountains and valleys of transylvania. Build sanctuaries that affirmed. They did so even when the dominant religious culture. Advocated ideologies that allowed no new revelation. And insisted that the old theories of how the world came to be had to be taught. In the public schools. Our task now is to do what we can. To advance reverence for life. And deepen the promise. Of love. Let us make love. The first. Not the laugh. Presort. I too saw. Wooden ceilings in some of those old transylvania. Unitarian churches. Just a week ago today i was in one. In the village of nashotah. For the sunday morning service. The village has about three or four hundred people. All of these villages have unitarian. Churches. In transylvania most of the villages are 50% catholic and 50% unitarian. The unitarian church in majorca is over 500 years old. The experience was overwhelming. To think that a small group of freethinkers. Could have so much influence. On the world not only in the 1500 but still now today. What they did and how they fought influences us. Greatly. To think that many of these people were willing to go to prison for their beliefs. Willing. To lose everything when they stated publicly. Such beliefs as these. Well they believe that the bible was a book full of great wisdom. They did not believe it was meant to be taken literally. When the mid-1500s here. And this one. The bible was not the only religious book of wisdom in the world. Our transylvanian ancestors arrived as you might think they would and similar to the way that most of us arrived and important conclusions. They determined. They're see illogical beliefs. And conclusions through the use of reason. And rational thinking. But there was one more element in their processing. In their bag of tricks so the speak. These early unitarians had a profound reverence. 4life. Irreverence that was passionate. They were passionate about their right to freedom of font. Passionate about examining new ways of thinking. Using the vin new methods of science and. Reason. Passionate about the divine spark that they believed was to be found within each. Person. And which enables each of us to find. Truth. And meaning. Without dictates from the established church. Three weeks ago here. I talked about ethics. Where they come from. Particularly. Where we get our personal code of ethics. Whether or not this personal. Code changes over the years. I talked about ethical dilemmas and how we sort these out how we arrive. At decisions that are complex. If you were here on that mid-july sunday. You may remember that i mentioned a famous study called heinz's dilemma. Lawrence kohlberg is the one. Who did the heinz dilemma study. Heinz field medicine from a drugstore because he can't afford to buy the medicine but his wife will die. She doesn't get the medicine. The ethical dilemmas between. Feelings and the sanctity of life. Philosopher in feminist carol gilligan a name some of you might recognize. She wrote in a different voice she was a research associate for kohlberg and she was also one of his harshest critics. Gilligan said that kohlberg's approach to this dilemma was wrong. Because i'm on other things he only used males. In his study. In his research. Gilligan argued that men and women have different value orientation. She was interested only in coburg was interested only in freedom of choice. And what rights the individual has. But gilligan argue. That what matters in heinz this dilemma is relationships and that choices have to be made based on. Karen. And then she went on and gave. I'll preteen girls. This is still emma and preteen boys and came out with totally different answers. Most of the boys sad. It was okay to steal the money. Because the wife would die otherwise and you could get more money but you couldn't get another wife. That's good reasoning but the girls didn't even think about that they said no he shouldn't steal the money. Because. She probably need more medicine and then what and what it's about, he got put in jail what would happen to the marriage. If if he stole the money. What's another way to get money for this drug and shouldn't hines and his wife be trying to figure that out. So is scientist dilemma about right. Or about our responsibility. Two others. I was hoping on that july sunday to leave you with more questions than answers. And i am aiming for that again today. As i said in those earlier reflections. Having grown up in the presbyterian traditions. I was pretty steeped in the concept of predestination. Which i never quite believed. And once i was old enough to begin thinking rationally and maybe reasonably i'd say around 10 11 12 years of age. I just. Ignored predestination. As i said to you before if gone is already decided. Who's going to heaven. And he's going to that other place. Well why bother to be good. I've never received a satisfactory answer to this question. And i've asked many presbyterian ministers this. I think the question. Is more intriguing and meaningful than the one that all of us probably have gotten. If you you atheist agnostics humanist unitarian universalist in general if you don't believe in god with some higher authority then why bother. What is it. That underpins our ethics and our morals if we don't believe that we humans answer to a higher authority. Well i'm trying to understand my own code of ethics and how i arrived at it i think that i went through three stages. First. Using reason as a basis for what i believe was morally acceptable. That go on to the second stage. Which was trying to be rational in every situation. And finally i have entered i hope i have entered a third stage. Reverence. Have not discarded reason. Nor rationality. I'm trying to integrate the three elements. Reason rationalism in. Reverence. In july i asked you these questions. Nobody chose to try to. Answer any of them. But he later. Is western civilization becoming more and more secular. Despite all the religious fanaticism and extremism or perhaps because of it. As nations and societies become more secular doesn't necessarily follow that values ethics and moral get lost. By the wayside. As fewer and fewer people go to church and i'm talking about. Moderates for main street. Church not not the arena. Certainly not the right side of the spectrum. Does it necessarily follow that van. As fewer and fewer people go to church. Does it follow. That more and more people are only out for themselves. That money and the acquisition of things become more and more important. Does it follow that the importance of money and material possessions. Increase. As the number of people attending mainstream churches. Decrease. I don't know. It often seems that way to me i am not saying that secularization is a good or a bad thing. However i believe that it has created a vacuum. And that. Concerns me. What rushes into fill. The vacuum. Within this vacuum where and how do ethics. Fit. Rebecca parker talks about pudding. Love first. She doesn't mean self-love. She needs love of the whole of creation love for the interdependent web of which we are apart. She needs love and. Reverence. I love that in. Being part of the worldview our worldview i love that would prevent. Possibly. I should probably say could prefit. Many of the kinds of tragedies. That we've been experiencing. From 9:11 to the present. As unitarian universalist minister richard gilbert says. The traditional western view of ethics stresses obedience. A rules. Or adherence to principles. Some consider this view. 2. Narrow. I think that the real focus of morality is the bonding quality of relationships. I told you may remember that he added this to that statement. In general men view morality in terms of rights. And women. View morality in terms of. Relationship. I often refer to this as being in right relationship. Passionately connected in july i said that an extreme example of not being in right relationship would be the relationship. Between the nazi ss soldier and a prisoner in a concentration camp. And i mentioned the word you have to help me again. Mislead. A mighty. Leid. Metlife. Which the philosopher schopenhauer defines as. Compassion and maybe more specifically suffering with. I think it may be compassion is easy to have. If you just won the us open or something. Tennis. But. Suffering with. I said this in july to me that word. Which let many words in other languages may be hard to translate into english completely. But i think this concept of suffering with. Means a lot more and goes deeper than. The one i grew up with as presbyterian not one word though the phrase. Walking in someone else's. Mislead. Fly. Mitla. Suffering with is the compassion that lucia kb hall says forms the foundation of ethics. And i didn't have time left. Three with three weeks ago to. Do anymore then. Tell you about simon wiesenthal. Being asked to go see. Ss soldier who was dying. They were all in a concentration camp at the the soldier was had been on. Yeah he wasn't in the part where he's being tortured. And as far as i can determine decent saw was was chosen at random. He was relatively healthy. In this camp he was one of the few who got to go outside the camp to work. And they could often find some food that way. So he reluctantly went to into this room and the soldier told him a horrible story. About something he had done. And he want he was dying as i said and he wanted these installs. Forgiveness. And isn't all. Wrestled with this for the few minutes he was in the room and he could not do it he could not give that soldier. Seasoned salt. The next day ran into a nurse who said that the man the soldier had died. During the night and she has a very small packet of the soldiers. Belongings. And he refused but he did. Note the address of the soldier's mother. And after the war. Maybe as much as a couple years after the war season saul went to stuttgart. And. Reluctantly again he wasn't sure what was drawing and but he went to the mother's house and he met her. And this area stuttgart was bombed out and the woman had lost her husband. As well as her only son in the war his name the only son's name was carl. But it turned out the carl's father was a social democrat. He was opposed to the nazi. Did not want his son to join. The hitler youth. He's very disappointed in his son. The woman kept telling jason saul what a wonderful son he was a car all had been what time boy what a wonderful boy. And this is all on the spot made up a story about how he knew. Carl. Soldier. He could not bring himself. To tell the mother. The truth about what her son had done. Digital ask. At the end of relating all of this. What. Link was there. Between me. Who might have. Been a mom her son's victims. And her. A lonely woman grieving. For the son of her family. Living in the ruins of her people. Decent small answers his question this way. Perhaps. Blank is grief and sorrow. Midline. Suffering with. Lucia hall wrote this in a humanist magazine. Ethics cannot be derived from religious authority. For some reason. Bought. Is biologically-based in. Piolin amphitheater biologically-based in empathy. Ethics. And something fell into place for me because there it is. That third note in my search for a basis. Of ethical moral harmony that is not derived from a higher outside. Authority. Biologically-based. In. Empathy. Reverence. Paul goes on to say this ability to feel as another person feel. To be able to put yourself. In their emotional situation even to wince. Involuntarily when someone bangs are funny bone. This is the link that binds the human race together. That makes us care about how we act. Toward others. And a quote. This ability is rooted in reverence. I believe that a personal code of ethics must involve transcending boundaries. Shortly before i i left on the trip to transylvania. Read an amazing book because. I've had it on hold and there was you know the library called. This book was for adults. Because i saw it advertised in new yorker. Had to be for adults right. I haven't gotten very far into it when i realized that it was a book for younger readers. Everyone should read this. It is all about transcending boundaries making connections and being in right relationship and itsfunneh. And i'm always looking for laughs. But it will bring tears to your eyes as well. Raymie nightingale is the title of the book. By kate. Dicamillo some of you may know that name she writes. Children's books in young adult books. There's a great deal of wrestling with ethical behavior in this book. The wrestling is done by 310 year old girls. What that age children are generally logical thinkers. They don't do much nuanced thinking. Morals and ethics are black and white. Great doesn't interest them. Yeah or factor into their thought processes. Bought 10 year olds also have an abundance of reverence. 4life. All three of the protagonist's are dealing with crises in their lives. Adult generated crises. Ethical dilemmas abound and confront them everyday. One of the girls rainy. Spends a lot of time trying to figure out exactly what a good deed is. And then trying to actually successfully. Perform one. At one point in elderly woman tells raimi's trying to read to her i am not interested in people doing good deeds. What dates are pointless. Nothing changes nothing matters. There was much more to my presbyterian upbringing than the predestination part. There was a strong connection to jesus. As a compassionate. Connector. As a human being. Who understood that compassionate connections are what will save humanity. That are epics have to ultimately be about relationship. Not about rights and principles. I agree with rebecca parker who said that our society is currently guided by a worldview that is insufficiently grounded in reverence. She is not saying that our society needs to be more religious. She is saying we need to be more reverent. Those two are not the same thing. Reverence. Is profile respect. Mingled with love and all. There's no use of word god in there. From the dictionary. I would add profound respect of life. Mingled with love and awe. What we need. Parker maintains is a revolution in. Values. Reference is a form of love. What particularly struck me. And parker statements just one. Reverence for life. Hastobe. Pan reverence for life. Be learned. Doesn't that imply that we can change human nature. I hate the phrase. Oh that's just human nature. I really hate that phrase. Because to me it's a cop-out. It says well we can't we humans you know we try but week we really can't make the world a better place. We haven't ended war or poverty a tenor tenor etcetera because they're just human nature. Can we switch our western code of ethics. From one based on rights and property and rules and regulations. 21 based mainly on relationships. And caring. To be in right relationship you have to be aware of the world and aware of your place in it. People learn this kind of awareness. This level of awareness. Not long ago i came across what for me is a timely quote from the russian novel brothers karamazov. By teodoro pustejovsky. I may have used this in july but it's. Worth repeating. Not all are guilty. All are. Responsible. This quote has helped me grapple with some of the tragedy of the past few months orlando saint paul dallas just a name with you because if we can grasp that concept not all are guilty but all are responsible. Perhaps. We can move past those things. That prevent us from acting not only guilt but also frustration over the immensity of the problems we humans face. Perhaps we can learn to be more reverent. And more passion. Reverence is waking up each morning. Profoundly grateful. Full of a profound respect mangled with love and all you know some of you don't like morning so you can postpone them. Pass the time when the sun rises if you need to. Over there east. This is not easy. Or automatic for me not yet i'm working on it it takes effort and awareness. But as some of you know i memorial day weekend a close friend of mine died suddenly in her sleep. At age 64. Reverence is waking up each morning. Profoundly grateful. Full of a profound respect. Mingle with love and all. As byrd baylor reminds us in that story i used the way to start a day a morning needs to be sung to a new day needs to be honored. People have always known that. Since the beginning of time people have known that and the fact that we know or we. We know so much more in the 21st century than our cave. Brothers and sisters. The fat. Back fat. Doesn't change anything. When it comes to celebrating a new day. And raising your arms to the sun. Giving thanks for the sun rises not a rebuke of or a contradiction to science to reason to rationality but rather another aspect of being human. Reverence is being astounded by the passion of others. Those who go over and over and over again to the social action. Social justice meeting such as moses. Reverence is being patient in the face of foolishness. And distractions in an election year. Of that profound respect for life. Mingled with awe. And love reverence. Is a profound respect for others when encountering another person in a totally different culture and a totally different setting and really really truly. Keeping your mouth shut and listening to them. And not being worried about being rational or reasonable. And definitely not being concerned about the need to be right as in correct. Reverence is grieving for all of the needless tragic deaths of black men by the police in this country reverence is also grieving when the police are ambushed. And tragically killed for no reason. Reverence is found in the faces of the transylvanian people in the village of joyce waving and waving to us americans and the three indians were with us as we left their village. After having traveled so long and so far to me. These brothers and sisters of ours reverence is empathy. And. Mittleider. Suffering with. Beware of politicians who do not have empathy. Can we be rational. And reasonable. And reverend all at once. Can we listen to our hearts. As well as. Our job is to embody all three elements all three notes recent rationality reverence and to continue. To carry on the tradition of free thought and love of life. Handed down to us by so many people including those long-ago transylvanian. Our job in the words of rebecca parker is to make love the first. Not the last resort. This is on audacious task she says. For a small movement of progressive people of faith. But to paraphrase thomas starr king. We may be small. But when we are mad we weigh a ton. Weight of our passionate carrying can help turn the world around. We are an ethical moral people whether or not we believe in a higher authority or believe that our moral character derives from within us. Kaiser is a spark of the divine within each of us. Wherever is for all of us atheist agnostic christians muslim. Buddhist juice hindus pagans wiccans pantheist are transylvania unitarian cousin. All of us. Put reverence with reason and rationality and you get a very special blend of compassion. A unique lens through which to view the world. You got. 3 park. Harmony. Housing words are by unitarian universalist minister kenneth collier. I sit in my garden and contemplates a depth and profundity of the universe. And all the while the wind blows gently. From the hills. And cheeses. Leaves and flowers and brushes my hair. A hummingbird visits the bright red sage and that hover. In the warm air. What need is there of profundity. Everything i need is here. Go in peace. Beat your neighbor. Drink iced coffee.

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Pr130317Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. What about you but it takes me a week or two to adjust the time. I don't care which way we're going almost. If this is your first time here or one of your first times here will be a chance later on in the program to tell us who you are if you want to do that we don't force anybody to get up. But i do encourage you to come to more than one serviced because our service is very greatly sometimes they are led by me the minister sometimes by people in the congregation. Sometimes fight people and larger community come more than once. These van are the opening words. Written by. Bell shoals and name some of you will recognize he was our. President of the unitarian universalist association. A few years ago. This is the mission of our faith. To teach the fragile art of hospitality. To revere both the critical mind and the generous heart. To prove that diversity need not mean divisiveness. And to witness to all. That we must hold the whole world. In our hands. We like the chalice this morning and celebration of. The returning light. End of the spring equinox that will. Occur this week. In the words of diane lima me. Again did the earth shift. Again did the nights grow short. And the days long. And the people of the earth were glad and celebrated each. In their own ways. Perhaps the most we can hope for and i use the word hope. Very intentionally. In the struggle to live in a world with evil in it is to learn how to keep it at bay. And we do this in many ways we do it with words with patience. Is hope love humor. It was stories. Am i taking very good care of our children. And our young people so that they. Will grow up to be strong. Caring adults. With a strong sense of good and evil. So i give you now a story. Story about hope in the midst of evil and as always invite. The children are anyone at whatever age to come up and hear the story. I see some of us have our green on huh. Whether we're irish or not. William. A little bit. The story about. 210 year old girls. Who. Who lost their homes. So it's a sad story in some ways but it's a happy hopeful story and other ways. And they lost their homes because they lived in a part of the world where there were wars going on and lots of lots of fighting. And they just couldn't live in their home so they had to go to something called. A refugee camp. You know what a refugee is. Did you want me to give you my shorts. See if you agree with it. A refugee is someone who has lost their home and not because. They wanted to. But usually because other people were doing not nice things. This summer i don't know if any of you would know this story it's really new book. 4 feet 2 sandals. It's a story of. They said two little girls one of them's name lena. There is not in the camp and usually people in refugee camps. Live intense but it's not like fun camping. Cuz people are very very crowded in the pants off and leak and sometimes it's really hot where they are. And sometimes it's cold but people from all over the world send. Clothing. And shoes and things like that to people who are in refugee camps i'll bet their people in this. Room right now who have done that. And. So when the trucks come with the things that people do people leave their homes. To go into these camps and they don't. They don't have anything with some usually accept what they are wearing and they're usually like during heroin in bare feet. You know they might have a little suitcase or paper bag. So when the trucks come with lots of stuff and everybody rushes up to find something will lena's cancer she's not real tall. I'm a little older than 10 i'm not real tall either but. She didn't have much of a chance to get up there the beginning so everybody rushed up to get things and she sound. One sandal. One brand new clean sandal. Pashto sports she looked around to find the other one. But she didn't find it on the ground. The other sandal was on the foot of the other 10 year old girl. They don't know each other. And the other little girls named we don't know yet and leonid though says awesome i'll come to her. My apologies anybody might speaker. Peace be with you. Next day lena goes down to wash some clothes i don't have washing machines they have to use the river if there is a river or whatever water they can find. And she's been very careful not to get her sans and brand-new wonderful sandal. Wet so she's walking around one sandal on. Find out what they do. And there comes the other girl down to the same river down to the same spot. With her sandal on. And she finally says. She introduces herself finally she says i'm for rosa. And so. Derosa. Hands her sandal to lena because for the roses grandmother said it is really silly to wear just one sandal. What's your favorite lena the sandal and she started to leaving and leah said wait we can share and cirrhosis it how can we share will take turns tomorrow will be your turn. For longtime every other day you had the sandal. About samples. Well. They got to be very very good friends they got to be such good friends that they would. Sit around and talk a lot cuz that's what good friends do when they told their very sad stories. Wenis. Father and. Her two sisters were killed in the war. That was just it was just her mother and her two brothers left and so rosa had no one left except her grandmother. They really wanted to go to school what was hard to have schools i know this might sound funny to some of. Really wanted to go to. It was when you don't have something that's when you really want it. But the first of all there often aren't schools in the camps. Secondly in this part of the world. The schools were. Only four. Sofa rosa and lena. Listen dennis the window and their lessons outside in the sand and it night they talked about wanting to go to america to canada or to someplace and they were all on the list. To go to places so eventually hopefully they would be able to go somewhere else in and find a new house and get new clothes. Everything well. One morning when leaning frozen were down at the stream at the river. Lena off roses grandmother waved at them instead lena lena come, your mother says your names have gotten to the top of the list. Which means. They got to leave camp and they were going to america butts larosa's name and her grandma's names weren't on the list of course it was very very sad. Now what to do about. Sandals. Frozen sad. You have to take the sandals to america you can't go to america without anything on your feet. But. Lena's mother had managed to save up enough money to buy lina a pair of shoes. The first arose against the sandals to lena to wear to america and then leaned against them back for rosa. Because. Mother had bought her shoes. Well king time to get on the bus. Start the journey to america. And frozen lena were sad because it's always sad to say. By your good friends. Rosa came running up to lina as she was getting on the bus and said wait wait you have to keep one sandal. And lena said walker this one sandal. Infant rosa said it is good to remember. 4 ft. 2sand. And lina got on the bus. Nailhead tears in there. A rozerin alongside the boss for as long as she could and lena. Leaned out the window and said. We will see each other again in a marriage. I guess we could write the next part of. Story. And see if they matted we can make write a story about the meeting and. Anime. And what they did then the other people. See you next time i see you. Farewell. Good friend farewell address. We meet again till we meet again or well. Factory jeweler. Q words that them. Kathleen norris wrote some of you may be familiar with kathleen norris. She's obviously a writer. Primarily a poet. Has russell. Four years with the language of christianity. So she would still call herself a christian i'm sure and i know that many of you in this room. Russell with that we've had interesting email exchanges about the word worship. Lately. Fixing morning will just do all service on. Ebony will be worship. Norris rights. In her section. Call good and evil from her book amazing grace. Most of the time. People will not come out and say that they are good people. In contrast to those who are not. But that is often what they mean. And this strikes me as a dangerous proposition. History demonstrates repeatedly. That if enough people begin to define themselves as good. In contrast to others who are in quotes bad. Those others come to be seen as less than human. Genocide is justified in the eyes of those who perpetrated. On the grounds that it is not real people who are being killed. Rather something evil is being eliminated from the world by those who are good. I prefer the perspective of the roman poet parents rights norris. Who wrote. I am human. I do not think of any human being of any human thing as foreign. To me. North says i feel that it is my business when i read the news account. Of some horrible crime. Not to regard my good self as completely separate from the bad people. Depicted in the story but to search my own heart. For a connection i tried to see if i can understand how it is these people have done. What they have done. But some crimes. Are so evil that they defy belief. Think of timothy mcveigh scouting the federal building in oklahoma city and then. Taking care to place the bomb. Near the daycare center. Pick up jeffrey dahmer cannibalizing the men he has murdered and storing their hearts in his refrigerator. Crimes in which basic human trust. Has been so heinously abused. Provoke a panicky response in us we retreat back to the safety of friends-and-family those whom we know like a child pulling the covers up keypad bay the monsters under the bed. We hide behind the mask of a self and say. I'm a good person. North says i don't believe that i could hate anyone or anything enough to blow up a building. Without the slightest regard of having. To be inside. To who happened to be inside only ideal all ideology can hate that syrup. Frustration at bureaucrats i can understand. He says but not the killing. When it comes to the crimes of jeffrey dahmer however i can understand them. All too well she. I am not quite sure why his story caught my attention. It may have been because a policeman said that that donner has seemed so enormously relieved. You have been caught. The photographs in the news did not depict someone who was belligerent. Or boastful as serial murderers often are he seemed bewildered. Exhausted alost. Soul. She then goes on to write about. Meeting a little boy. Blythe danner. A terrible. Homelife setting. And then. norris of courses afraid someday she'll be reading about him on the news. At the end of that anecdote she says. I believe jeffrey dahmer shows us. What the fear of abandonment can do to the human spirit. To judge by 1 survivors accounts a man who matt dahmer in a bar in a gone to his apartment it was when i decided to leave after only one drink that dahmer seem to panic. This man thought out. Others were not so fortunate. Apparently it was the font. Of being alone again of having the person leave his life that prompted dahmer to go over the edge. And begin drugging the drinks so that these men would stay forever. What seems saddest to me says north about the loss of human lives. Is that it might have been prevented. Dahmer had known for some time that something was wrong and he had sought help. Several times he had turned to a church. And that seemed to la the madness for a time. But it did not hold. Nora says it is my firm conviction that some people may more readily be reached change and even healed through. The word she uses courses religious means. Sensory psychiatry. She says i am one of them. However she says in the end she doesn't know what to do except. Maybe pray. She puts it i don't know much about how to deal with my own evil and she goes into that in the spec. But i have learned enough. To recognize that sometimes all i can do is pray. Is a humanist i don't do much if any praying. At least not in the traditional sense. But i found myself relating to norris sentence. About having learned enough to recognize that sometimes. When considering evil. All i can do. Is prey. The more i delve into the subject of evil the more ignorant i fell. About it. The more overwhelmed. In a loss to make. Any sense of it. I do believe that each of us is born. With the capacity for good and. The capacity for evil. But i'm not even sure what i mean by that anymore. I'm also pretty sure that. We won't probably be able to take care of the entire problem of evil this morning. So there may be a part to somewhere down the road. What exactly is. Evil. Do you know anyone who is evil i mean personally do you know anyone i'm not talking about political figures here. Current or historical. But in your life now. Or in the past. Do you actually know anyone whom you would label or describe. As evil. Evil takes different. Forms. In different generations. And in different cultures. My dad would have acknowledged the presence of evil in the world. I think. He fought and was wounded twice in world war ii. He believed he was fighting a good. So maybe a necessary evil. A fight to rid the world. Of the evil hitler personify. Writer and professor lance morrow. In his excellent. Elegant book. Evil. And investigation. Says that people's views of evil tend to be generational. Form b particulars of personal and historical experience. The sixties rebellion. Against authority. Says morrow introduced the idea of satan as rockstar. I am inclined morrow says to refer in a more conventional way to auschwitz. Fascinated me. I consider myself to be a child of the sixties. And yet i always end up at ocean ritz. What i'm contemplating evil. After reading lance morrow's book i am inclined to agree with him though on this one thing it is ultimately not possible. To understand evil. That doesn't mean it isn't real that doesn't mean we should stop having a conversation with it. What does. Unitarian universalist have often been accused of ignoring. Or downplaying evil. I'm having a sesame street. Conception of evil. I don't think we're the only ones who are guilty of this. The very culture we live in doesn't acknowledge evil. At least we didn't before september 11th. We kind of gloss over it. Morrow says that america never accepted evil as part of its deeper. Theological. The nation was founded under divine sponsorship. And whatever evils attended the american unfolding for example slavery. Extermination of indians. Did not permanently stain that essential virtue the american idea is to leave the damage behind and not look back. Every evil will be transcended as the nation goes on reinventing itself in better and more prosperous way. Evils are disposal. I think there are many reasons why we in this country tend to ignore or avoid the subject of evil. For one thing we are most of us. Really comfortable. Who wants to dwell upon. The whores. What happened in newtown connecticut in december. The think much about this evil the aids epidemic in africa. Who wants to. Pay attention to the huge number of refugees like lena. And for rosa. Pouring out of syria. Well i don't know. The many many other refuge. In the world. We have way too many examples of evil. In our newspapers and on tv and in our sources of information that may sound a little bit the opposite of what i just said but. I think because of all this evil that's always supposedly in the papers we have become oblivious and are desensitized and or. Indifference. Too much evil. Mark twain write. About the evil of slave catchers. And the cruelty of overseers. But far worse twain writes about. The vast. Smog. Unknowingness. The evil. Obliviousness. Of seemingly innocent. People. This is something that has always puzzled me about the holocaust. Why did good people. Step aside. They didn't step aside. Rosemarie i know you're going to want to say something through this. Is a butt but i you know it happens everywhere. That we step aside let me see. Evil 4 number reason to remember in huckleberry finn when tom gets off the steamboat downriver and reports that there was an accident on the boat. A boiler exploded. A woman asks anyone hurt. Tommy answers. No ma'am a couple diggers killed. A woman replies. Okay cabins. Because you know sometimes people do get hurt. This is an evil pint of innocence. The ignorant innocence of the powerful. And we're powerful people in this room. Morrow maintains and i agree that the steam runs through the american story. Evil to me. Is found anytime someone is diminished somehow prevented. From fulfilling their human potential. This diminishment can take many forms. Verbal abuse. Discrimination rape murder. Name a few and noticed how violence seems to be an underlying theme here. Perhaps violence provides the underpinning. The support structure for evil. Another way to say this is that for me evil occurs. Anytime our first principle is violated anytime that a person's. Inherent worth and dignity is trampled upon or ignored. And evil. From my perspective occurs anytime. There is a violation of our 7th. Principal. Respect for the interdependent web of all existence. Of which we are apart. 900 dolphins were slaughtered a few weeks ago in. The solomon islands. Because of a dispute between. Villagers and. Of all things and environmental. That's evil. Hello water evil. And we're all busy doing it. Doing evil by my definition and description of what i think evil is. So that's my take on evil. Need to be resigned. Am i going down a slippery slope. Casting such a broad net for evil doing. Necessary evil. Morrow says that maybe we need the word evil in our vocabulary because it is necessary to human community it indicates what we collectively will not tolerate. Back to my dad and a story that lance moore hotels in his book. I never asked my dad. If he killed anyone when he was a soldier in. France and then germany in world war ii. I would like to know how that. I would like to know if he thought the killing he must have done was evil. Lance morrow tells a story about a rifleman in wwii someone like my father. This particular rifleman was. A rifleman towards the end of wwii and his squad was moving out in advance of the american lines into no-man's-land exactly what my dad squad was doing. They came to a small river and they captured eight germans there. These germans were little more than kids. 16 or 17 years old. What to do with them. The americans were far from their lines they couldn't take them prisoner. The country was too dangerous and they had their assignment. And they could not let them go. What do you think the americans did with those. Young german. And killed them. It struck me when reading this story that is not too far-fetched to imagine that if the americans had let these particular germans go. They might have gone on to kill my dad. Who is in the same vicinity. Separated from his unit. Was this evil killing the german soldiers. Were these evil deeds that rifleman. Who did the killing. Became an extremely productive member of society. Inherited lots of money and during his lifetime he gave away considerable amounts of money to education. Into the arts. He had wonderful product. Children. And then presumably wonderful productive grandchildren this man. This rifleman. Was a professor who taught thousands of students and influence thousands of lives. Necessary evils. Here's a true story about a hermit. A story that lance morrow says is maybe a story of micro evil or maybe not even that. What a near-miss. An either-or this hermit lived in a deer hunters windowless cinder block cabin in the woods in upstate new york. Half a mile from lance morrow and his family across from an old gravel pit important. The gravel pit. No one ever spoke to this man and he never spoke to anyone ever. A neighbor had lived there for fifty years and didn't even know the man's name. Where it came from what he did for a living. The hermit drove by the morrow's house every morning at exactly the same time he always drove 40 mph. You never look to the right or the left. Amorous dog fred. Was often would often shy on the road past the hermit's house. People weren't so much afraid of the hermit though as. Curious. One winter day lance morrow and his wife saw the hermit making snow angels. The snow. And one falled aaa tow truck came and took the two junky cars in front of the hermit's house and then. A day shortly after that. Another truck came along and they're ringing. Old butt. Why wash in good condition plymouth. And all day that day. Drove that new car back in. Back and forth. And then you died at the wheel of that plymouth. Soon after he had washed and even waxed it. Hermit died by rigging a hose from the exhaust pipe to the front vent window when going through his belongings the police found cancer medication. Eventually someone bought the hermit's cabin and began gutting it. When the new owner tore up the floorboards you made. A discovery. Arranged in secret compartments. Beneath the boards he found dozens of little girl. Dolls. A very styles and vintages. Collected over many years. The dress. On the dolls were torn. Below the waist. The genital areas for mutilated. Couch. Purses. There. Was no record. There were no crimes on record involving this hermit. Apparently the hermit had just been engaging in weirdness. It was nothing in the gravel. But what a possibility. Was this evil. Or is this a story of evil resist. With great. Great struggle. Over a. of years. As far as can be determined that hermit did not touch little girls. Was he evil. Compare this to the exposure of sexually abusive priests. Metaphorically speaking some floorboards of the church were taken up. Anime secret compartments revealed there were secrets more evil than those of the hermit in his hunters. What is eva. Is there a global standard of evil. Well i personally think there should be. If for no other reason than the weapons we now have. Have both a global range and the capability to destroy all human life. As albert einstein said and i'm so fond of quoting everything has changed except our way of thinking. And here's an equally moving beautiful quote from morris book about evil. But global development of our technology and weapons. Exceeds the speed. Of our moral development. As a planet. The plant the result is planetary regression. And that to my mind is evil big. Moral rights that the real struggle in the world may not be between good and evil. Abetweene. Help. And evil. Hope seems work. And creative than the somewhat wishy-washy nebulous word good. Maybe the opposite of evil is not good then but. Poop. Evil is energetic. And needs to be countered or oppose with something more vigorous than. Good is much less interesting than lucifer. Or state. Good is blandly undramatic. A sort of in lance moral says this in his book a sort of unitarians with nella. Hope so. Is goodness in a tight spot. Ambitious to improve things. One more story about evil it concerns a woman named puma. Bobotoh. Madison ziegler. And again i apologize if there's anyone here who speaks south african languages fluently. A black south african psychologist who served on the truth and reconciliation committee commission that was formed in south africa after the end of fishel end of apartheid. 1994. The trc. In the mid-1990s she interviewed eugene dakota. The commander of the state-sanctioned apartheid death squad. Eventually he asked to see the widows of several black. Policeman he had exit. At 8 we had them. At a place called motherwell which some of you will remember that name. The coke wanted to apologize. Two widows met with him he was remorseful. He wept. Miss gabutto magazine found that she was troubled by many questions that came up for her during this meeting was to coke deserving of the forgiveness. Challenging by the widows. Was he too evil to be forgiven. A question by. Post by ts eliot kept recurring in her sauce. After such knowledge. What's forgiveness. Because in my mind to with the whole catholic cover-up. One-day boat o matic azalea was so moved by the coats pain and remorse that she reached out and touched his shaking hand. Surprising herself she said. Both parties were startled by this test. A black woman in a sortie touched a white man in chains. A black. Resume to comfort. The former white master. What role reversal. Good put its hand. On evil santa. Komodo matic azalea was appalled this mean she had bestowed a sort of blessing. On that evil hand on that evil man. It's even have the right to do that. Did this make her somehow complicit. In his evil deeds. Just struggling with that whole issue of identifying with the evil person. And she saw. Does that matter. Because he this evil person was obviously struggling with what he had done in the past. And that is what the photo. Meditasiya decided mattered the most. How do we resist. Evil. How do we confront evil as of march 6th over 1 million syrian refugees. And half of them are children. How do we give them hope. I give. $10 a month. Whopping amount. 10 lousy dollars a month. To the united nations high refugees commission. Does it give anyone ho. I don't know. I do know that 3600 so-called lost boys of the sudan. Resettled in united states cities with the help of the unhrc. In 2001 and that one of them when they jacob asked him. Recently returned to the south sudan and open the clinic. In his home village there. Rely on hope. Rely on love. Relion patients. Relying on the words and the stories of people like kamala. About tow mater cazila. And the people like that american rifleman. Rely on the knowledge that good can overcome evil. Remember the story of the hermit. Andre lyon. Compassion. As you go out into the world and encounter evil. Because you will encounter. Horoscope 4th into the world through a door of hope. Hope for the future remembering these words by martin luther. Not martin luther. Even if i knew that tomorrow. The world would go to pieces. I would still plant my apple. Go in peace.

uuprairie_org

Pr110626Maples-ed.mp3

Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm rachel mono prairie member and head of long range planning committee this year. Curry aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter your age your abilities or your inabilities. Later in this service we will invite visitors guests and returning friends to introduce yourself so that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. Presented either by a prayer remember a member of the wider community. Or by our minister which right now we're in between but when we have over our next minister. Today sherry. Meatballs and that if you write will because i will be presenting to us today and i'm really looking forward to the service i'll be introducing her a little bit later. Our opening words will be provided by kate liu. When we come into contact with the other person. Our thoughts and actions should express our mind of compassion even if that person says and does things that are not easy to accept. We practicing this way until we see clearly that our love is not contingent upon the other person being lovable her story for all ages today will be run by married front and i would encourage any young people or young at heart who would like to come to the front of welcome to do so. Have you ever felt that you were in such a storm inside that you couldn't think straight or smile this book is about how you can help yourself more happy it's called each breath of smile do your little ones let us sit very quietly. Listen to the wind listen to the birds we listen to the crickets and the frogs. Listen very quietly to your own breathing. I close my eyes and stay with my breathing in. I close my eyes and stay with my breathing out. It is so wonderful to feel my breath coming in it is so wonderful to see my breath feel my breasts coming out breathing in i called my whole body. Breathing out. My whole body is called body cam. Breathing in i am blooming like a flower. Freezing out i feel fresh. Breathing in i see myself as a mountain. Breathing out i feel solid mountain solid. Breathing in i see myself as space. Freezing out i feel free space free. Breathing in i come back to myself. Breathing out i smile. Breathing in the world is so beautiful. Breathing out i smile. The blade of grass is so green the skies so blue. I see that mommy is lovely. I see that daddy is wonderful maybe he's lovely to maybe mommy's wonderful to yes i see that my sister is so kind and i see that my brother is so playful. And i see that my grandpa and grandpa are sweet and gentle. I see that even my classmates and my teachers make me so happy. We listen. Nbc. That all life is breathing with us. Electric freeze like that then you feel call me back. K. Then i have the opportunity to present our speaker today cheri maples will be speaking on mindfulness and social justice in our daily lives let me give you a little bit about her biography she was ordained a dharma teacher by zen master and peace activist tick not han in 2008. She's co-founder of the center for mindfulness and justice. A keynote speaker consultant and trainer. Sherry worked in the criminal justice profession for 25 years as a madison police officer. She was the head of probation and parole and she has worked as assistant attorney general in wisconsin. She has extensive experience as a community organizer and social justice act advocate incorporated all of these experiences into her teaching and practice of engaged buddhism and this combination seems so special that i'm just very eager to hear your talk today please welcome. Morning everybody likes to be here with you in 25 minutes which is which is impossible of course but i will highlight some things that from my own journey that i think are important and maybe what i don't cover you can ask me questions about after i'm done but. But since i was very young and i've had a passion for justice and. As rachel said i wouldn't say community organizer and social worker before i began my 25-year journey in the criminal justice system and actually i was a police officer for 20 years and then i was i served a short stint as the head of probation and parole and then i was an assistant attorney general under peg lawton flogger and then when the new guy got indicted for a while but he got rid of me. And probably the biggest price that i can describe to you is that just a few years into my 20-year police career i was already an angry alcoholic pretty cynical cop with the armor of a closed heart and i got to my first meditation and mindfulness retreat with thit nuong han over 20 years ago now and it was by accident. The beginning of my path how past it really was about understanding more about my inner world and learning how to work for peace and social justice from a place of equanimity and equilibrium and peace rather than from a place of anger with a chip on my shoulder. Which is how i came to it and it was really. Learning about meditation and learning how to work with the patterns of my own habitual mind that provided some refuge from that tornado of habit energy that used to violently tossed me. Around some people. Want to know what mindfulness is and it's. It's hard to describe it that could be a whole other 45-minute talk but one thing i do want to say is that i think a meditation practice. Is the foundation for mindfulness not the other way around sometimes i think we reverse those things many people tell me that they have a. A mindfulness practice but that they don't have a daily meditation practice and having done interviews at various meditation retreats that i lead all over the country what i noticed is that many of those people are still suffering and tormented by the habitual patterns of their mind is so i think it's really important understand that a meditation practice is the foundation of mindfulness and probably the most effective way to work with the habitual patterns of her mind. Eventually but that being said let me just try to give you an understanding of mindfulness but i thought the children's book which is so based on the teachings of teton hun was a perfect example of mindfulness it means paying attention on purpose to whatever is happening in the present moment and we live so much of our lives on automatic pilot with these whispering. To the interaction we had with a co-worker in our problems at work and our mind is off and running and we miss whatever's in front of us because our mine. Is taking us somewhere else constantly so mindful this is really about reawakening the capacity that each of us has to live more fully within our own experiences and we learn that we don't control a lot of our world and we get the into develop a very deep acceptance of that and we understand that most of our disease and most of our dissatisfaction the events in our lives that the mind and heart respond to those events. So it doesn't mean mindfulness doesn't mean that were in a place with no noise or no trouble or hard work or anxiety but it means that we have the ability to be in the midst of those things. With some calm with some equanimity with some patience and wisdom compassion. For ourselves and what mindfulness really opens up is the ability just to be okay with life's ups and down with the ability to understand that it is just this rich tapestry of experiences they create endless opportunities to learn and. That we're all is my teacher would say part of the ocean. We mistake ourselves for the waves. And we really both we can learn how to surf these ways we can learn how to go up and down. And we can learn how to relate to all of life's chaotic events all of these challenging both pleasant and unpleasant experiences that we have with a greater sense of understanding and compassion both for ourselves and in others. And it's my own mindfulness practice progressed over the years i begin to understand that working for peace and justice is really a. A process is a journey of gentle honesty and is the process of learning how to be more present to myself and other people and since i don't have time to tell the. Entire story that in itself would be a 45-minute talk but i'll share with you some of the. Most important lessons that i have gleaned with respect to the role of mindfulness and social justice in my own life and it's important to understand that i've separated them for the purpose of talking about them but they're very like everything else interdependent in that it's hard to talk about one without talking about all of them. The first thing that i've learned is that in order to realize the fruit. Of a meditation for mindfulness practice one has to practice you can't read about it you can't talk about it you can't listen to it those things are nice but you have to practice and it can be as simple as what it was. Breathing in. I know i'm breathing it. Breathing out i know i'm breathing out. It can be as simple as washing the carrots in the sink and really feeling the water and noticing. The texture of the carrots and when your mind wanders from whatever it is that you're doing as it inevitably will. He gently notice it. And you just come back over and over and over to their what's happening in the present moment. Dennis i said inner peace and equanimity require working with the habitual patterns of the mind and mindfulness is something that teaches us very important lessons about how to stop doing. Which this culture encourages us to to never stop it encourages us to live our lives and fast forward with it and never-ending series of to-do list. Mindfulness is the exact opposite of that it encourages us and starts to develop the muscle of how to just be. So my teacher rather than say don't just sit there do something he says don't do something just sit there and if you're at a retreat you'll hear him say that the other thing that my teacher has that i really have taken too hard for my teacher. That really quick for me is. Whether we like it or not. This is it. This is it. And that means that there's no more peace there's no more compassion there's no more justice there's no more opportunity for healing relationships no more opportunity for personal transformation or enlightenment in the future than there is in this very moment. In other words now. Is the time to wake up. And to commit to waking up. Because if not now then when. And if not you then who. One way to bring the practice of mindfulness into your life consistently as well as to slow down is to commit to establishing moments of mindfulness each day and the place that i always started these i would pick one activity. Each day and allow myself just a little extra time for this activity so that i could start developing this feeling of spaciousness which then leads to patient so i would eat a meal in silence and just really cute and savor and enjoy. Every bite. I call that the mindfulness diet by the way you know as a cop i was so used to getting something to eat which was nice and invitation for red light and siren call that i would inhale my food it took me years to learn how to taste it but you can also do things like fold the laundry and just pay attention to the feeling of the clothes and the texture of the clothes. You can read a bedtime story to your children and just take more time and put more space around doing that you can cook a meal in mindfulness just paying exquisite attention to the chopping and the mixing of the ingredients you can sit down and have a cup of coffee or tea. I just really really enjoy it and if you're really brave you can commit to creating enough time between activities to actually go the speed limit. In all the practice requires of mindfulness his constancy. Not goal-oriented you don't have to approach it as one more thing you're not good enough at one more self-improvement project all it takes is constantly just the commitment to doing it the second thing that i've learned is. But the truth is many-sided. And that i don't have a patent on it that the truth doesn't need me to defend it and that it can be approached from multiple perspectives and that there are no simple solutions and its importance when you're doing this work to develop a deep sense of of openness and understand it when we start categorizing things regardless of whether it is. White non-white. Gay straight. Are republican and democrat. We those categories are immediately going to divide us you can't have democrat without the category of republican and so often our enemies or the other side when it simply isn't necessary. So the kind of openness i'm talking about requires a commitment to finding the middle way by being willing to hang out in those very ambiguous gray areas the areas between fear and faith. Between self-acceptance and self-indulgence. Between doing the right thing and righteousness. Between acceptance and resignation. Between equanimity and compassion. And between attention to ourselves. And attention to others. The third thing that i've learned with my mindfulness practice is that it is important. Critically important just set my life up in a way and make conscious choices so that the things that matter the most are never at the mercy of the things that matter the least and of course. We cannot know when we're off course unless we deeply know. The values that were committed to. Unless we know where that guiding northern star is and likewise we have to get rid of a type of laziness that makes us take on thousands of less important activities than our own personal transformation. So often people tell me they don't have time to meditate for 5 10 15 or 20 minutes and. I start asking them to really make a diary of what their day is about and they realized with. Just a little bit of time passing. That the things are probably the most important art at the mercy. Of the things that are least important. And that they can't really tell me what it is that they stand for. What it is they want to say to their children their grandchildren their great-grandchildren. At the end of their lives. The four thing is it is very important to water the seeds of july i see so many practitioners who are so serious about it so in addition to slowing down and establishing moments of mindfulness and approaching this chaotic crazy human existence with the sense of humor we can carve out time for those things that we enjoy deeply. If we really enjoy walking and nature more than anything else we can do that if it's a sport music gardening cooking a hobby anything that we enter into fully. Anything we do wholeheartedly in this way is a way of awakening. And sustaining the contemplatively experience in the present moment enjoy and he's come with the concentration. Of the absorption of the mind in a single pointed way into just this one activity so major way to water the seasons choice just to be faithful to the things that give you joy that's why my teacher teaches meditation is such a simple way. Follow your breathing. Because guess what. If you're more committed to your breathing then to your to-do list. The past the future your resentments your fantasies and all those other things. They all fall it. With just the simple commitment. To your breathing. If this thing is to learn the skill of pausing and refraining. To me this is d probably the most important ingredient of a mindfulness and meditation practice. Because it gives us the ability to begin to experience the healing power of non-aggression. It requires slowing down to create space so that there's distance between you and your emotional reactions and this is the ingredients that provides us with the ability to bring some awareness and some choice to our speech our actions are responses to others and that is where i have found the beginning of freedom to be in the space of that choice and without putting space between our thoughts and our words or our thoughts and our actions. What we do when we feel attacked hurt trey or confused and that space creates the pause required to refrain from acting out old patterns of dysfunctional behaviors that create problems for ourselves and others and this space. Is so important because every time we create a pause that enables us to choose to refrain from harmful behaviors we affirm our inner integrity and we awaken our divine nature. And we bring her true nature moral i each and every time we do that and pausing and refraining that i'm talking about isn't simply behavior modification in this practice it creates. The space that makes room for personal transformation because we use that space is a vehicle to consciously enter into those tender places in our hearts that have been fenced off and touch those wounds with some compassion in this is the stuff that ultimately enables us to reconnect with the basic wholeness of our true nature. The six thing that i have learned even as a police officer who carried a gun on a nightly basis is that it's impossible to end violence with violence therefore working for peace and justice requires an unwavering personal commitment. To nonviolence in our own lives and in their relationships environments and systems were part of and the first and most important way to eliminate violence is by skillfully not contributing to it in any way. What we offer everyday in our thoughts and in our speech in our actions is going to be our only continuation. In this life as we know it every thought every word every action produces a ripple effect that there's. Fairlife signature. This is our life signature so we have to ask yourself is how we are living our lives producing the life signature for the ripple effect that we want and the place to start practicing non-violence is the place that we always start with ourselves. Paying attention to our self-talk then after we have learned. And had some success with paying attention to how hard we are on ourselves to what judgments we put out there to the messages we give ourselves we can set the intention to bring her full prisons to her speech and interactions with others what i found is that it's so. Easy to be philosophically committed to nonviolence and still go to war. With others on a daily basis with our words and our need to be right so what i found is that. Even though i'm involved in a lot of social action work that how i talk to and relate to others is the most important piece work that i can engage him. 7th i've learned that it is important to. Appreciate the humanity of myself and others the litmus test of spirituality for me is relationship for me to seneca and nurturing relationships with other people requires first and foremost making friends with our own human frailties to denying perfection is to just own yourself and when we can face ourselves squarely and give off the desire to look good we learn a confidence in the tenderness that comes with the willingness to expose our vulnerabilities how to approach our own imperfections from a place of acceptance. We developed compassion for ourselves which is the root of compassion for others in his compassion for ourselves and others challenges our tendency to move away from life's too tender parts when we accept their own imperfections we can stop fighting them in others and what i'm learning in my own journey with the people that i love is that as i acknowledge my own pain i'm much less squeamish about getting closer to theirs so is our practice develops we can notice all the little ways that we begin to perpetuate violence on ourselves and begin to let go. Rather than a belief or non believe in something. Can be very challenging it requires a willingness to live with a ambiguity to live inside the questions and paradoxes and to lizzie to leave behind the comfort of answers so with a mindfulness practice what i found is that it's not about mitigating the negative we don't try to get rid of or run from our fear from our anger from our depression or other strong emotions instead we learn how to turn toward them and embrace them with gentleness. Of fear not the overcoming of anger not the overcoming of depression but rather becoming intimate. With the nature of fear with the nature of hangar in with the nature of depression. My own path is taught me how important it is to be present to my own life. And to trust myself and to allow my heart to be torn open in love rather than protected in fear and in order to do this one needs to cultivate and awareness the fosters some sense of inner stillness and what inspired in me was the strong belief that even something like carrying a gun for a living can be an act of love if one is also armed with mindfulness. Bennett compassionate intention. And what i've learned is just to keep asking myself if what i'm doing is making kinder more understanding more loving. And i continue to try to practice to be open. To the viewpoints of others and to be and to find ways to be with those who are suffering without being overwhelmed by it. And some days i do better than others but i keep trying to affirm i focus on mindfulness piece connection. And creating community everyday so i wish each of you the best in your own spiritual journeys and i thank you for the opportunity to share my reflections with you. Can we have some time for questions and comments. That's an example of how the absorption in one activity can just create the sense of resting in the fastest of whatever is. Wonderful example. By the way that if you expand sob into two more things it's a great tool for being mindful throughout the day so we teach this to people who are recovering from addiction the acronym sober. Stop. Observe. So just stop. I'd rather then if you just stop and focus on what's going on internally. And focus on these sensations let's say i'm i'm very angry with somebody if i just stop and focus on what's going on in my body. With the sensations where i feel at pressure bernie whatever then i'm focused. In the hearing now. Anna what's going on. With me. With awareness rather than you rather than out there so. Stop. Observe breathe that creates the ability to pause and refrain. The e stands for. Expand. So so often we get when were agitated weekend. Tuned into one little. Way to solve our problems because of doing mine wants to get us out of this uncomfortable thing so we breathe so that we can expand. And then we were spawned creatively sober. Stop observe bring it expand respond. Thank you. That's a great question. What i found is that. What's most important. In terms of my response to anything is the intention. So if i walk into that situation agitated and angry my response is likely to be to up the ante. Right in the police officer i'm not going to play fair i'm going to call people on my radio and if people are going to be violent i'm going to go one step above them. Okay we're just going to have them going to go one step above me and the other. that's often how things work but what i found is that i couldn't figure it out when i got back from my first retreat i was working nights right and i could not figure out what everybody including the people that i was arresting were more kind or what it happened in my absence. And what kind of effect that hat but having said that let me say that there is a time you know that compassion can be fierce as well as gentle. So an action can be very gentle but if it's done for manipulative purposes in my mind that's a violent action likewise it can be very fierce. But if it's done to protect. Myself you or somebody else. From engaging. In a behavior that will hurt. Them. Or somebody else both emotionally and psychically. Best fears compassion and sometimes fears compassion requires. The ability to set wi-fi laundry. And not just with people that you're dealing with on the streets. But with people in our lives but that we love for being abusive to us in some way so to me those kinds of high-quality boundaries are boundaries that are set. From a place of non reactivity. When were calm rather than in the heat of the moment. Try setting a boundary with a teenager that you're really angry with wanting done something it's going to be like after else and then you feel guilty or bad right that you said that boundary and reactors face so then you're off and running here in this dynamic that can't be broken. What boundaries do i need to protect my love for this child. To protect the solidity of the relationship. If i set the boundaries from that place but i'm not going to bennett's going to preserve the integrity of the foundry. Because i didn't have the courage to maintain the boundary because i believe in it. As well as i won't be watering the unconscious behavior. Of that person so when i walk into a violent situation i'm determined that. I am not going to. Allow this person to be violent as a sign of my love for them. The only an unconscious person i think can be violent. And manipulative and only an unconscious person can be manipulated by it. Which things do move very very fast but if i can keep myself calm that doesn't mean my mind can't work fast in an analytical way and in a chronological way but if i walk in with the intention that i'm talking about so here's the difference. Lock your house. So that your things don't get stolen. Or lock your house so that you protect other people. From the effects of engaging in that kind of behavior you see the difference. So is a police officer i can choose one approach or the other. It took me a long time to learn that. Well one of those big things that it's really interesting. I was the captain of personnel and training for my last 5 years in the police department i retired from the police department in 2005 and what i discovered about training police officers is that we focus a lot on their physical safety how did to the tools required for them to keep themselves and others physically safeware. The problem is really with their emotional safety. And the tools required to. Deal with some of the effects of the job that aren't noticed overtime so. That became a very big priority for me. Who i hired became a very big priority for me i figured that i could teach not everybody but most people how to be police officers but i couldn't change their value. But looking for a person with a certain set of values not a certain degree in this or that but a certain set of values. And the other thing is is that i learned how to bring. What i saw and this is something that you can do in any workplace in that is critical to changing any workplace. I learn how to bring. The unconscious and unwritten agreement that people have with each other that are never talked about that aren't written down anymore that people are socialized to and know very well into the conscious arena. For examination. And that's how you change behavior that's how you change agreements and that's how you improve and and work on changing. The integrity and ethical climate of anyplace example okay professional courtesy i'm not going to tell you you can't take a free cup of coffee i want you to tell me why we socialized to this what does it mean. Is it okay or isn't it okay i don't know or when you make this stop can you tell me why you made that's not what was going through your mind. Who are you more likely to stop what color is their skin is why why not. So when you start to ask questions rather than tell people things and bring that kind of dialogue out you be surprised but what happens the agreement start to change and very powerful what. Well i think that. When one does this kind of work it's really really important to. Develop. Equanimity because compassion is a quivering of the heart in response to suffering right where is equanimity is a sense of spaciousness around that suffering and one has to know one's limits so is if you are. Becoming traumatized increasingly by what you do if you're becoming agitated irritated angry i pay very very close attention to my limits where i can put myself where i can sometimes i'll take. When i realize that i am approaching burnout. That's my time to step back into create some space around things so i didn't go to the demonstrations every single day. But. I certainly did go on some days i loved. Being the difference between the demonstrations that occurred here and when i was a police officer my first experiences as a police officer the first very first demonstration that i had the police. Could have been a clan demonstration and i would have had to protect their rights to so i'm walking around introducing myself to people in the crowd and this. You know you want to get me you know you want to hit me and i was like yeah i do people on the left are no different than some fundamentalist they couldn't see beyond the uniform couldn't see beyond the uniform couldn't see and allies because of their own perception so. How people viewed me as a police officer options they made about me who i was what i thought what my politics were is been a tremendous lesson to me in the things that you're talking about. And we really have to be careful about the categories we create. And. How we convert eyes people is one thing two. We witness violence and exploitation everyday. And how we witness that becomes really important that we become part of the problem or do are we able to compassionately. Call attention to it. And do something about it. I went to you know with this haircut i figured i didn't need to be spending that $40 in a beauty parlor so i found a barber shop in my area where i could get a $12 haircut i wanted to support a local business and the guy immediately hears that i was a police officer and wants to start talking to me about how evil people of color are right so i have to make a decision to do with him. Or do i continue to come in there so that he has an alternative viewpoint that he probably never exposes himself to. And every time i went in there. I felt. Like i've been to war right but you know the last time i went in there. It was finally different after about the 13th haircut but i hung in there but. There was a lot of space between some of those haircut. Are closing words today. Are by his holiness the dalai lama. I believe that to meet the challenges of our times. Human beings will have to develop a greater sense of universal responsibility. Each of us must learn to work not just for oneself. One's own family or one's nation. But for the benefit of all humankind. Universal responsibility is the key to human survival. It is the best foundation for world peace. I think everyone who contributed to our servicemen especially our musicians and please greet your neighbor and join us for coffee and community thank you.

uuprairie_org

Pr150315Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. As you know we aspire to be an open-hearted and open-minded congregation welcoming people. Of every ethnic and religious background. No matter your color your sexual orientation or gender your family structure your abilities or disabilities. No matter where you are in this journey of life we welcome you. Do later in the service if you are on new or this is one of your first time since you'd like to introduce yourself. We will have our moments when you can do that we don't force you to do that. We may alternate look at you. You really don't have to do. On sunday mornings we have a variety of services sometimes i do the service i am sandy ingham the minister here. Awesome times people from outside the congregation do the service and sometimes people from within the congregation do it. But they are almost always different self this is one of your first time. We hope that you will return. Bfan are the opening words of the words of. Unitarian universalist minister william murray. These are the days that have been given to us. Let us rejoice and be glad in them. These are the days of our lives. Let us live them well in love and service. These are the days of mystery and wonder let us cherish and celebrate them ingratitude. Together. These are the days. I have been given to us. Let us make up them. Stories worth. Telling. To those who come after us. We like this chalice as a symbol of our thankfulness. The chalice reminds us of the sun. The giver of life. The flame rises up like the power of growth and renewal in the springtime. We give thanks. For the sun. Which lights and warms the earth. For the gross and renewal of nature. Arising from the earth. And for the earth. Itself. The reading is actually in the back of the hymnal a few. Comprehend better following along its number 659. 659 last time i spoke about the transcendentalist. I believe we did this as a responsive reading. But today i'm going to read the whole thing. This walt whitman. The psalm of all known reverence. I add up in you. Whoever you are. Those who govern. Are there. For you. It's not you. Who are there. For that. All architecture. It's what you do to it. When you look at it. Look up on it. All music. Is what awakes from you. When you are reminded by the instruments. The sun and stars that float in the open-air the apple shaped earth and we are bond. The endless pride and out stretching of. People. Unspeakable joy. And sorrows. Wonder everyone sees and everyone else they see. And the wonders that fill each minute of time forever. It is for you. Whoever you are. It is no farther from you than your hearing and sight are from you. It is hinted by nearest. Commonest. Radius. We consider bibles and religions devine. I do not say they are not divine. I say. They have all grown out of you. And may grow out of you still. It is not they who give the life. It is you. Who give the life. Will you seek afar off. You surely come back at last. And things best known to you. Finding the best. Or is buddhist the best. Happiness knowledge. Not in another place. But this place. Not for another hour. But this out. Whitman. Singing the praises of the individual telling us everything we need. We can find within ourselves. Urging. Each. One of us to be the ones who interpret. What is divine and what isn't. What deserves reverence from us. And what doesn't. You surely come back at last he writes. And thanks best down to you. Finding a fast. Or as good as the best. Happiness knowledge on another place. Display. Not for another hour. But this. When i first encountered whitman. My freshman year in college. I was smitten. Cassius yes. I remember was my response. To his writing. I am fat wonderful that's strong that confident i don't need anyone else telling me what to believe. Or what is worthy of respect or telling me from my good telling a structuring background. But jesus knew about miracles whitman called wonders. Wonders are everywhere. The wonder everyone sees it everyone else they see. It is not. They who give the life it is you who give for life. Oh and then there was song of myself. Just what an adolescent. Wants to hear. Which has something. This is part two of my reflections about transcendentalism. If you were here three weeks ago when i did the first part. You may have been confused. Or at least not completely clear. About what exactly transcendentalism is. That's okay so was i. I'm going to start now with a brief recap of what i was trying to do in part 1. I told you then that even the transcendentalist were confused. About who they were. And i'm always using a capital t here. The word transcendental list and the word transcendental. When they the transcendentalist had. Trouble as much trouble as we do. Trying to define the word. When emerson try to define transcendentalism in. An essay and then lecture form. I mean i'm spoken for. He only made 6 worse. Is at say on the subject was too abstract to obtuse. What is the best attempts at a very short definition of transcendentalism that i have found is simply this. Transcendentalism transcends goes beyond all other ways of knowing things. Transcendental issue into it. Things you don't depend on your senses you don't depend on science you don't depend on. Experience all those things are important. But you into it you know in your gut certain things. So what i help you. Took away from that. First part or take away today. Is at least some of the following. Transcendentalism. If. A very important part of unitarian universalist history. It was one of our biggest controversy. It was controversial not just within the unitarian congregations and mostly is i said 3 weeks ago i'm talking about the unitarian. Not so much the universalists although they. Became transcendentalist eventually. It was controversial among society-at-large people were frightened. By transcendentalist idea. Because eminem. Transcendentalist such as ralph waldo emerson and theodore parker. Intero. Although he didn't have this big. Of an audience at first. They all attacked the established religions of the day. Including unitarianism. Transcendentalism was first and foremost a religious revolution. Spiritual revolution a new way of thinking about what it means to be human. What god is or is not. It was a new way of considering such questions as what is the ground of all being what matters most what is divine on spy ring. How and what should we worship and i know that many of you struggle with that work but in this context i mean. What is worthy of our attention that's what i mean by worship. Who interprets the divine. Each individual. Porto's. Or some bishop minister. Transcendentalist ideas were not new. They were presented in a different way but they were what we might call universal truth. That resurface. Periodically in human history until. They get distorted or squash. Or brutally squelched. Over and over again think isis. These ideas these universal truths demand. Peace as a way of being not war. They include. Figuring out how to bring an end to human suffering or at least the pain and suffering that we humans inflict upon each other. The transcendentalist movement. Stated. The so-called old ideas. In new ways or they tried to state them differently. For some reason or reasons that i have never understood humans need to be reminded periodically about these things. About the highest ideals that humanity aspires to. Here's one thing that was new. Probably but the transcendentalist gave us. In the words of david robinson in his book the unitarians and the universalist. Transcendentalism stands at the turning point. In american life. When moral question. Moral question. Began to resolve themselves into. Political 1. Think about that. When moral questions began to resolve themselves into political. Once. This continues to be an issue. In the politics of our country. Is it good. Is it bad. To have moral questions part of politics. Well i don't think you can separate. The transcendentalist bequeathed to us to believe that we unitarian-universalist now take for granted. Exactly probably roll our eyes to think that we would believe he sent one. Every single person has a spark of the divine within them every person. We are all jesus. Differ. Die. We are all bonding. Maybe we are all hitler. I don't know about. The second thing is each one of us. Intuitively knows. What truth is and i'm using truth with a capital t here. We just know certain things in our gut we aren't necessarily aware of the fact that we have. This knowledge. Within us and more often than not we seem completely unaware of the implications. Of this knowledge. We unitarian-universalist today in the 21st century really think about these two. Beliefs or truths we take them for granted. Shuffle leave me these are still very controversial statement. So what are the implications. If i have. The divine spark and i believe that you also have it will even better i know without a doubt. Because i just know it. Intuitive but you also have divinity within you. What are the implications. How should i treat you. I guess you could say that the transcendentalist gave us another way of looking at the golden rule. The challenge that the transcendentalist faced in the 1800. Was how to put this intuition into practice which brings me to the tensions within transcendentalism. Here's a quote to illustrate what i'm trying to explain i'm indebted to one of you you know who you are for sending me this article. On the internet. But i don't. But i'm always a little weary of using things from the internet loans this one doesn't seem to be attributed to anybody. Except the title is transcendentalism historical. Contacts. Here's the quote. Some transcendentalist. Were led by their belief in the divinity of humankind. To espouse. And under. Compromising. Individualism. Uncompromising individualism. Well they were very stearns to describe this individualism and not all of them were flattering elizabeth peabody called ego-c ism. Like to tell emerson he was guilty of ego theism. Some nicer ways to describe it where self-culture. Self-reliance. Which of course emerson champion the row was a disciple or any appearance of this uncompromising individualism after all he didn't pay his taxes. And then of course it was civil disobedience his. Is wonderful. Essay written in 18-49. And you want to pay that poll tax because he didn't want the money use for the mexican war. That's bringing texas into the union. More slave states. Into the union. So that's one side of this. But i'll call a balance beam or maybe a teeter totter. Of the tensions among transcendentalist. Here's the other. Some transcendentalist emphasize the unity. Of humankind and stressed. Cooperation. Rather than individualism. As a key. To social improvement. That you might not recognize this many of the transcendentalist suit came down firmly on this side of the equation as you would horse recognize emerson's name. Interos. What about. Margaret fuller i think most of you know who margaret fuller is. Close friend of emerson's and actually some say that person stole all of his ideas from her. Margaret seems. To be able to do both balance the self-improvement with a going out into society and trying to. To improve the world. I mentioned orestes brownson 3 weeks ago. Just because. Arrests. First name bronson. He began his professional career as a unitarian minister. But he ended up as a catholic. And he was raised as a presbyterian calvinist. But. When he was still a young man adolescent he became universalist. He's important to us today. Because his. Assistant. Advocacy for the working class. He accuses robinson quote again browns and argued that political reform political reform. Has to proceed. Self-culture. That in fact the possibility of self culture was dependent. This is a brown since quote. Dependent on a general reform of. Property distribution. So we couldn't have the. I agree with this you can you couldn't have the leisure. Time to self improve. Until. Think we're equal in a socio-economic. Why. By brownson thoughts actually then that the complete opposite of what emerson was saying. And bronson was a socialist a communist. Swansea. In the early 1830s and 40s 1840s. Wait. Speaking of communism with a small fee george ripley's name might be familiar. To some of you. Because of the brook farm community that he started the utopian community. Louisa may alcott's father amos bronson started i love the name of this one fruitlands. Another experimental. Communists would be utopian community now you could say that while all of these communities sale. Eventually they did. The mere fact that they existed for a while and that humans could even conceive of such experiments. The success of sorts i think. It is important to remember though that all every single one of the transcendentalist no matter which end of the scale they most-favored improving oneself or improving society every single one of them. Was opposed to slavery. War. And what they termed the evils of capitalism. Here's an interesting aside. When i was typing in king in the hymn number 44. I didn't realize it but i had the cap law. Fun. Do you know what the 4s. The dollar sign. So i had number dollar sign dollar sign. Consider number 44 was pretty proprietary given what the transcendentalist thought about the materialism in this country. The transcendentalist did not like the direction which united states was going. Is a sound familiar. Coming out from them. They were contending with the same things we're contending with wars prisons in need of so much reform and its treatment of native americans the fear of immigrants and on and on. In the 1800's though they believed. That this would end surely soon. That there would be an end of slavery well they were right on that one. The end of poverty. There would be a place where everyone this would be this country. Would be a place where everyone. Would receive free education. And that's right reach their full human potential a world on which a few are special and holy and divine. Which we all are. It doesn't matter if you are mentally ill or what color your skin is or how much money you make. Really sounds familiar. Those ideas aren't old-fashioned at all. By the middle of the 1800s. So within two or three decades transcendentalist ideas were becoming more and more accepted not exactly mainstream yet except perhaps among unitarians. So much of their energy went of course into the anti-slavery fight. Everything else they were working on sort of got put a spy. Until the civil war was over and after the civil war. The pendulum swung to emerson sign. As philip morris says in his book american transcendentalism. Does uneasy balance. Between. The parties have self in a society. In the direction of the former that. The proponents of self culture. Whose philosophy supported individual rights and market capitalism rather than humanitarian socialism. Which i think was a. Really sad thing for this country. In other words emerson's self-reliance became paramount in our national consciousness. And i think you can argue that still the case and i don't think it's help this country at all think. Nra. That's where rugged individualism has. I do want to say though. That emerson. I tie-dye shanalotte. Then i know i have said many times that is emphasis on self-reliance aren't his harm this country because it led to rugged individualism. Entwine but i don't know if emerson would approve for lack of a better word of where rugged individualism has taken us there. All his followers and descendants. Spiritual descendants dead and i need to admit that i am indebted. Deeply. 2 emerson. In one very important respect. I agree with him about nature. And how it provides. A direct experience of the divine that's that's my defense. Nature. Give you just a couple of examples of what happened with the transcendentalist in the after the civil war. And remember the emerson. Born in 1803 lived until. 1882. So he was the spokesperson for transcendentalism through. Most of the 19th century and he was certainly an influence on the second that second generation. A transcendentalist. Consider the story though of someone you've probably never heard of william. Batchelder green. Born in 1819 died in 1878 he's a wonderful example of transcendentalism beginning being the taking off point for changing society. This man greenwood yet another orthodox calvinist you couldn't live with k version of humanity. The green became like bronson a champion of the working class. Green believe that equal amounts of labor should receive equal pay. Very radical for the mid-to-late 1800s. Maybe still is. He also believe that mutual love this is his quote was the only response to what the industrial revolution had created. And that as soon as one made. His. The sexist language. Own private. Enjoyment the main end of his life. Both the harmony of the universe and the unity of the human race shattered. Interests many fragments is our individual men. And these fragments repelled each other. For each was intensely selfish. And each cared for his own and not for the common good. He was onto something. Something meaningful and something. Important. Dorothea dix. You will have heard of. Born in 1802 live till 1887. Did you know that she ran away from home at age 12. She started the school at age 14. She was influenced by william ellery channing who many call the father of american unitarianism. Channing suggested that dorothea dix started class. In her school for poor children. She did which letter is actually to teaching a class in her prison which led her to realizing that there were a lot of mentally ill people in prison and they shouldn't be there and well you know the rest of the story probably. She found her life's work. Then there was caroline healy doll. I never heard of her huh. 1822 to 1912. At age 19. She was a full participant in those conversations that margaret fuller had i mean you had to be really bright the following most people fell asleep apparently and they were for women only. Which was very unusual but carolyn healey doll never fell asleep. There was an 1841 conversation about mythology and caroline said. That she never had enjoyed anything as much. Her husband disappeared on her in 1855 and went to calcutta to be a missionary and he denver really return so there was caroline left with the children. But she became out of successful writer and lecturer she was way ahead of her time. She wrote a book about the complex connections. Among systems of education labor and law that kept women subordinate. She was way too radical for susan b anthony. And elizabeth cady stanton so she never managed to penetrate that inner circle. Some of you may know that margaret fuller. As i said she seemed to be able to balance improving herself trying to improve society of you may know that she spent some time in new york city. And she visited prisons there the women prisoners at sing sing women did not go into prisons to visit. About she manage to do this. Margaret was very concerned about the homeless. People living in on the streets in new york city. Talkin 1840 here. On internet what they been called homes houses. And margaret fuller believe. That the economic social conditions were as much of a problem. As skin color and or gender. It's not more so. She was onto something too i don't think we grasp that yet. Most of these transcendentalist live through the civil war. Margaret fuller unfortunately did not. But they continued despite living through something as horrendous as the civil war they continue to believe that people could change. That the world could become a better fare. Play. Now surely if they could. Feel that way and keep their hopes up and their dreams and aspirations through that. of time. We can too. Through this one. Did the transcendental transcendentalism fail. Will phillip guru in that. Somewhere in this building. About american transcendentalism. Includes. This wonderful book sang. Sort of saying they did feel i don't agree at. I think that's an unfair judgment. No matter how utopian and idealistic they were much of what they struggle to achieve is now a reality. And i don't mean just the theological part. That we unitarian universalist embrace. But. In other faith traditions and bring some of that i mean the end of slavery in this country. And in other parts of the world i know there still slavery in the world but they did a cheese that not. Doc the transcendentalist but that was part of what they were trying to achieve. Yes they lost some battles but did they lose the war. Wars to create fully equal society is in brotherhood as they put it. I don't think so you still have the civil rights movement i would argue that we are no we're done with the civil rights struggle and that we've now entered a new phase. With all of these inexplicable horrible shootings that keep happening. But still there then just sit down so when i can try to do this anymore. You say the same thing about the battle for the immigrants rights or women's rights. Air rights. It's gender rights. Not done. We have any raticate addresses and by any means but we're still working on it. Still working towards that and we get that from all of it. Call the cloud of witnesses sometimes but all these people have come before us who've worked on this. Especially the transcendentalist i find this encouraging energizing and uplifting looking back at what our spiritual ancestors faced. And how they dealt with the problems of their times. Unfinished except. What about the hymns. And the next reading. I already said that in that opening him i find the words difficult to decipher. I don't know that's my 20th 21st century mine but the one that sounds good. And remind me of why i like emerson. Now we're going to do a responsive reading. Another whitman poem. But he's not talking about the individual being alone in this he's talking about companions. Who are on the road together. Whoever you are come travel with me he's going to telus. And then the closing hymn which was written by. No not emerson. Do you know this person jane laurie borthwick. She wrote the words to the. Closing can i i don't know her either but the dates of her life which you'll see on the page where the hymn is. 1813 to 1897 so she most likely knew about transcendentalism she probably was at ranson. Dental is so when we get to that closing him you those words will tell us all we need to know. About how i how i deal with. The transcendentalist were. We hardly need the closing words after that but here they are. Reminder that we are part and participants of the universe. Let us go forth from the quiet of this hour. Encouraged. To strive towards faithfulness to the best. In ourselves. And others. And in all of creation. Go in peace. But your neighbors.

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Pr130210Peters-ed.mp3

Welcome to being an orange trader up to cheryl channel sledding from phillip barragan according to a university of south carolina study violence in america rose 42% during the vietnam war this is hardly surprising our leaders are lawless so why not we'd if the government threatens other countries with the bomb why not threatened one another with handgun if our leaders are raping the planet why not our neighbors are leaders create a climate of fear and violence why do they appear shocked when americans killed robin name one another. Okay well i'd like to introduce our speaker today as i mentioned our guest is sean francis peters and sean is a an internationally recognized expert on religious liberty issues he's been featured by cnn pbs court tv time magazine the new york times and the wall street journal. I have my stopwatch experience i probably ever had in my life. Tv talking head and she embodies the worst. Attributes. Of those two professions and i publish this book on faith healing and it happened that that kind of stuff. To do a few of these things on tv and so she asked me to appear on the show and she started out by saying this is sean peters he's from uw-madison his book is called when prayer fails and i'd like to begin by saying mr. peters i think that the title of your book is completely and utterly wrong of american religious experience those are the folks who sort of wind-up interacting with state power and state authority. Yeah and it's you know there's the one of the interesting things about writing about catholicism is the the hierarchy and the catholic church. I think in the integrated liberal studies program and ios is a multidisciplinary interdisciplinary humanities program i actually teach. In in catonsville and is its environs there are lots of people denying told me this and i heard that people would come up to them and say thank you so much you burn my draft record and that meant i didn't go okay. You know they didn't just coincidentally choose to burn the records they thought about symbolically there been an earlier action with this pill barragan in participating with a cord blood on some records in downtown baltimore people serve didn't get the symbolism so they used as well so. Well and that was another reason why some people question what they did some people said truths truths civil disobedience teens submitting state authority and it was a matter of controversy among their supporters as well i think those things have changed between may of 1968 in the spring of 1970 and witness outside of in a way that will be mean what i really need to do is not be bound by the the norms of civil disobedience. The closing words today are from robert heinlein a society that gets rid of all the troublemakers goes downhill.

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Pr200216PennyAndrews-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome my name is robin proud i'm a member of the program committee here at prairie. Prairie aspires to be an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation family structure age abilities. And later in the service will invite visitors guests and returning friends to introduce yourself. So we can get to know you better. On sunday we provide a wide variety of services. They're presented sometimes by a remember a member of the wider community at this time we don't have a minister but we are honored sometimes to have a visiting minister just such as today. The opening words. Have a little weird missing their it's from real case go to the limits of your longing. I'll introduce penny was going to the child's biting. Penny andrews has worn the number of hats. Teacher social worker tv station director. She was one of the founding members of james reid. And it's through that experience she went on to become an ordained interfaith minister. Receive a doctor of ministry and become a board-certified chaplain. Retired now for work at uw hospital central wisconsin center at a local hospice as a chaplain. Profoundly shaped her life today. Permaculturist grandmother. Spiritual companion and lover of life. Her ministry now focuses. Exploring how we can live lives of meaning and purpose. As we enter this uncharted future. Kenny will be the chalice fighting. We like this chalice for the brothers and sisters who suffer from storms and droughts and fires. For the species that suffer. For the world leaders dedicated. To make decisions for life. We like this chalice for the web of life that it may be mended through courageous actions. We like this chalice that love and wisdom might inspire our own actions and the actions of our communities. So that we may look into the eyes of our brothers and sisters and all beings. That we may truthfully say. We are doing our part. Care for them. In the future of all earth's children. We begin with a meditation from joanna macy. Is you close your eyes and. Relax into your breath. Let your level of awareness drop. Deep within you like a stone. Sinking below the level of words. Can express. To the deep web of relationship that underlies all experience. Out of this vest net. You cannot fall. No stupidity or failure or cowardice. Can ever sever you from that living web. For that. Is what you are. And when you feel complete. Bring your energy back into this room. Well there's a couple of. I want to begin this talk with. The first one is what i'm calling now. The parable of the coastal birds choice. And. It's a story about. Eggs. Please indulge me. That are. Made to look identical. One is the actual egg of the coastal bird. This one. The other is a ginormous. Egg. That looks just like. The coastal birds egg. This was research done some years back. What happened. It to the coastal birds parents. Were. That the coastal bird chose to nurture. And steve. This large egg. That could know. Couldn't produce life it was made out of wood. Painted to look just like the coastal birds egg. And so. In that go around anyway. A wooden egg with nurture. And life was lost. Second premise. We have a problem right now we have a big problem. Some have called it buca. A time of vulnerability. Uncertainty complexity. And anxiety. It's called an aurora. Avoca. And you might know what i'm talking about. So that's our premise. We have a big disconnect. With how we are responding to our problems. And i might say. In parts. It's because we've been nurturing the wrong egg. It's road quincy. The real price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it. And we are so far. From that truth. So joanna macy. Has for her entire life. Recently but not this week heading pastor ninetieth year. And still going quite strong. She. Her work life involved working in fair housing in washington dc. She was a speechwriter for the urban league. She worked for the movement for new society all this many decades ago. She worked in anti-nuclear. And. That took her to three mile island and chernobyl. To attempt healing work. And she also worked with sarvodaya and sri lanka. She's known to be a scholar of systems. Buddhism and deep ecology. So that is what she brings to. Today's. Talk. I know many of you have. This if you don't have this and would like one of these. Please come up and get them i got lots of them right now. But what i'm most concerned is that you have a visual. For what she has called. The spiral. And it is a way that she. Did she has conceptualized how our life. Antar lights small life and our life large life. Has evolve. And. Evolves in our lives daily. They've done studies and one of the results of the studies. Are the people who integrate this model. Have felt. Significant. Improvement. And how they've been able to cope. So i offered this today as the. The construct for our talk. But also as something to consider. As a model for life. It's one that i have been working with for. 20 years now and. It has served me well. Especially as we. Walking to increasingly challenging times. The first rung of the spiral. Begins with gratitude. And she says. Because that is what quiets are frantic. Mine. And brings us back to source. Stimulating our empathy in confidence. It helps us to be more fully present in open psychic space. For acknowledging the pain we carry for a world. There is science now to construct the story of the journey we have made on this earth. The story that connects us with all beings. Right now we need to remember that story to harvest it and taste it. For we are in a hard time. And it is knowledge of the bigger story. That will carry us through. Put another way. We are being called. The ground are activism. In what is called. Post activism. And another branch is calling it mystical activism. These are the words of matthew fox more than ever we need to stop. And sit and be present. To allow our love for the world. And the world's love for us to be deeply felt. This can carry us beyond nationhood and ethnic or racial or religious smallness into the much bigger world of creation itself. Love will be the source of the energy and our imaginations that will render us effective agents for deeper change. Not superficial change but a change that begins and ends with the reverence and gratitude we all carry in our hearts. Ford the universe that has birthed us. Week is without a doubt the cannabis capital of the world in that because of the enormous almost unbelievable interest in the marijuana boom and believe me that room is coming to the tune of about 80 billion dollars but here's the real twist for investing in amsterdam that you want to be looking instead we're looking right back in north america. Well apparently they enjoy somewhere in the ethers. To be alive in this beautiful self-organizing universe. To participate in the dance of life with our senses to perceive it. Are lungs that breathe it. Are organs that draw nourishment from it. It is a wonder beyond. Words. Gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions. The hallmark of the mystic the source of all true art. Furthermore it is a privilege to be alive in this time. When we can be. We can choose to be part of the self-healing of our world. And the phrase i've come to really like and appreciate a lot because it seems to take the pressure out. We are being called to love our world back to life. Surely there is joy in the world. But we don't get joy. Without losing. Everything. Over the course of our lives. So what is that that pain. And what has penes. Be calm in our culture. It has become something to avoid at all costs. And it has cost us at cost. In owning and honoring our pain and daring to experience it. We learn the true meaning of compassion. To suffer with. We begin to know the immensity of our heart mind. What is isolated us in private anguish. Now opens outward and delivers us into the wider reaches of our internet existing fence. So. When we experience play pain. And it's unblocked. It goes to action. When we experience pain and we are. Loving ourselves. All that energy that could be released towards action is actually going. Sports blocking. And what causes this. Are fear of pain. Austere of despair. Our spiritual traps. Our fear of not fitting in. Distrusting our intelligence. Fearing our guilt. Fear of distressing loved ones. Seeing yourself as separate. Hijacking our attention. Fear of powerlessness. Are mass media. Jobs and pressures that are related. And social violence. What does this cost us this blocking or numbing and not actually going to the heart of our pain. A conscious cognitive functioning. It cost us an access to our unconscious. It cost us our natural instinct for self-preservation preservation. It impedes our empathy. It impedes our imagination. And it impedes our openness to feedback. Don't be afraid of the dark. Questions joanna macy. This is a dark time filled with suffering and uncertainty. Look like living cells in a larger body it is natural that we feel the trauma of our world. So don't be afraid of the anguish you feel. Or the anger or this year. For these responses arise from the death of your caring. And the truth of your interconnectedness to all beings. It's tougher with. Is the literal meaning of compassion. Surely there is pain. The crisis. Threatens our planet scene from its military ecological and social aspects. Derived from a dysfunctional and pathological notion of self. It derives from a mistaken. Idea about our place in the order of. 1. Grounding that joanna macy. Courage is very much. Comes through the words of john seen who wrote think like a mountain with her. I try to remember that it's not me. John seed. Trying to protect the rainforest. Rather i am part of the rainforest protecting itself. I am part of the rainforest. Recently emerged as human thinking. Steve considers this a spiritual shift. That shift. Of our sense of profound interconnectedness with all life. So then the next stage. Is seeing with new eyes. If we're not stuck in our pain. If we were. Honoring it listening to it. Acting from it. It takes us to seeing with new eyes. Whatever the expression of our creativity. It is our prayer and praise. Experiencing the reality of our entering distance houses. To see with new eyes. We can sense how intimately and in extract finnick strictly we are related to all that is. We can taste our own power to change and feel the texture of our living connections with the past. In future generations. Brother sister species. Another. Discover. Conscripted has been understanding our place in time. Are the three stories. The first one is. And it's all three are going on right now. The first one is business as usual. You know most of us are living our lives. Without change profound things. Maybe were little more against at the headlines but. And some of us have lived in those water. Water-soaked. Outer areas in man in the madison dane county area. But we are not experiencing it to the extent. That. Miami. Annapolis. You name it. They're out there in their severe europe cyclone bomb. Thom hartmann was saying. I don't ever remember hearing the word cyclone bomb. So that's. That's what we're not experiencing. We're experiencing our days today's. Pretty much. Gazed. But there's something called the. The great unraveling going on. And that is in those places. That are overwhelmed. Whether it's australia. Whether it's and maybe you can name one that's dear to your heart. Anybody got one.. Bashar. Puerto rico california. New orleans. Alaska. Those those areas that have been. Grown-up in the most vulnerable places. So that is the unraveling and we are. Watching it vicariously. For the time being. But she also offers a third idea and that is the great turning. And the great turning is where we are seeing. Changes made. That are linking people's arms together. That are bringing voices that you know would that they have been together years ago. They are there now. And these are the environmental groups that are all fighting for the same protections. Can you anybody thinking of any that are coming to mind that you know of. Sunrise movement great yeah. Groups of any kind that are making. Really positive profound social change right now nature conservancy. Restorative justice. Moms demand action. Yeah we're coming together. Places like sealegacy. In radical draper is this an organization. Radical joy for hard times. World wildlife fund. Southern poverty law center. I know some of these. Are a mix of things that have been going on for decades because. This news is not. This news is not brand new. A shocking piece of truth to me around climate change is. So these have been around we have known about the effect of carbon in our environment for 150 years presidents have been told warned about it for 50 years. So. So it is this. Swelling. Of. Woman in in a positive direction. That is beginning to show the next path. That is joanna caused the great turning. Out of this darkness a new world can arise. Not to be constructed by our minds. So much as to emerge from our dreams. Even though we cannot see clearly now it's going to turn out. We are still called to let the future into our imagination. We will not ever be able to build. What we have not. First cherished in our hearts. So then the last. Of these. Is the going forth. The seeds. Briefly. Many people don't get involved in the great turning because there are so many different issues which seem to compete with each other. Shall i save the whales or help better children. The truth is that all aspects of the current prices reflect the same mistake mistake. Setting ourselves apart. And using others for our game. So to heal one aspect helps the others to heal as well. Just find what you love. And working on it. And take joy in that. Never try to do it alone. Link up with others. You'll spark each other's ideas. And sustain each other's energy. Active hope. Is not wishful thinking. Active hope is not waiting to be rescued by some savior. Active hope is waking up to the beauty of life. On whose behalf we can act. We belong to this world. The web of life is calling us for that this time. We've come a long way and we are here to play our part. With active hope we realize that there are aventures in-store. Drinks to discover and comrades to link arms with. Active hope is a readiness to discover. The strengths in ourselves and others. A readiness to discover the reasons for hope and the occasions for love. A readiness to discover the size and strength of our hearts. Our quickness of mind are steadiness of purpose. Our own authority. Our love for life. The liveliness of our curiosity. The suspected deep well of patience and diligence. The keenness of our senses and our capacity to leave. None of these can be discovered. In an armchair or without risk. It is important to remember. That whatever actions we take. Whatever actions i take whatever actions. You take. That is the great turning. Our attorney. Is the great turning. Thank you and i look forward to it. Which conversation. One of the things that i'm aware of is julian of norwich has said. All will be well or will be well all manner of things will be well. She said that during the black plague. When she looked out her window and carts were going by with body. So you are tapping into. We have a. Inherent resilient spirit. And this is clearly a time. To engage. For the life of me i don't understand why we're not in the streets regularly. For whatever caused that is dear to our hearts. So i applaud those young people and i think. Perhaps my hope is they are the beginning. And what i know is jane fonda now is. In washington now in la and she's bringing others and linking arms. With the students. And there's a group out there called the elder climate activists who are doing tremendous work. And so. There there. Turning is the great turning. And a very important message. Very essential message of joanna macy's is. It's not about results it's about motivation. Critical. Because you lose. A lot more than you win. But if you stay motivated. For one thing you'll be facing your pain directly. And moving through it acting on it. But for another. We ignite the beauty and ourselves to ignite the beauty and others so there's that. Possibility of the hundredth monkey in all of a sudden. Quantum results happen. And that is the power of synergy. And it can't happen if those students aren't doing what they're doing. If we stand for our values. And we converse with others from our values point of view. Not through. Brightness wrongness. Even though you're a hater. But true. You don't know you're talking about something that really matters to me. And i'll tell you why. You know. And then you. Hugo from that place. That seems to be. The closest way we know. To get through. To someone who holds a vastly different opinion. No i recently heard this may or may not be true but the fox is 42 60% false facts. So it's significant. And so. You can only imagine how much you have to get through. To get to a person's heart if that's what their exposure is. And i just want to. Share that sunshine is the person whose. Going to be offering this introduction to going a little deeper with joanna macy's work in the spring. Thank you so much and i want to see. And finally. Words of joanna macy on uncertainty. I know that we're not sure how this story will end. I want so much to feel sure. I want to be able to tell people. Don't worry. It's going to be okay. And you know what. I realize that would not be doing anyone a favor. First of all we can't know. But secondly if somehow we could be given a pill to be convinced don't worry it's going to turn out okay. Would that enlisted from us our greatest creativity and courage. No. It's that knife-edge of uncertainty. Where we come alive to our truest power. So we do ourselves the favor. We honor ourselves to live with sufficient realism and dignity to know. We're right. Went that nice. Knife-edge of uncertainty. And we don't know how it's going to come out. There's no guarantees. Then we realize. But wait there's no guarantees anyway. There never has been a guarantee for human life. And it's in that uncertainty. That is the nature of life. All the wise ones tell us that. That's where we come alive. Surely there is hope. In this place. Go in peace thank you.

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Pr211017IleneHaykus-ed.mp3

A presentation today is evoking spiritual experience in our lives by. Eileen hegyes. Which it relates rathered principal. Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregation. Eileen haigis received her master's degree in psychology from antioch university. She worked as a psychotherapist in private practice for over 25 years. Specializing in the field of hypnotherapy. Before retiring and moving to wisconsin. She was owner of the alchemy institute in colorado where she taught. State approved certification training in hypnotherapy to hundreds of practitioners. In the healing arts. Welcome island. Barb. I'm in the spirit of challenging the norm i'd like to. Share my pronouns are not on the screen. But i'll share them now because it's in a somewhat unconventional manner. When it comes to my physical gender i am she her. When it comes to my. Psychological in my mental gender identity. I'm absolutely male-female and masculine and feminine. And when it comes to my spiritual. Self. There's no gender at all. So if i fail to put my little she her when i when we meet together and on my nametag understand that that's because. For my own personal self i find it somewhat limiting way to define myself. So if you have any questions or concerns about that please feel free to share them with me i'm happy to. Talk more about it. And that being said i absolutely honor the needs of the lbgtq community in that regard. And have supported as a. Straight ally that community for. Many many years. From the moment we are born we grow. The most obvious way we grow is physically. Each of us has witnessed the physical transformation that occurs. As human beings change from newborns to toddlers. In two young children adolescent and adults. Our intellectual development is pretty obvious to. When we're born we absorb and process information. True everything we see hear and feel. Speech and communication develop. And soon we had reading writing and performing mathematical equations to our repertoire. In the preaching years a major shift occurs. And the human animal develops the capacity to reason. And to make cognitive judgments about the world around us. All these skills are necessary if we are to live safe. And productive lives. We can also observe the maturation of our emotions. Pioneers in the field of human emotional development. Such as erik erikson. Have outlined distinct stages of emotional grow. During which we learn to trust. Become autonomous. Take initiative. Develop intimate relationship. And reflect upon our lives. When we use language rather than violence to resolve a dispute. Express laughter and tears at appropriate times. We show signs of emotional growth and maturity. It is easy to observe the human processes. A physical intellectual and emotional development. Scientists can measure these things. However there is another dimension of our existence. That throughout history human beings have explorer. Listen to mention which is harder to measure or quantify. Do some contemporary physicists claim into becoming quo. And that is the realm of the spirit. Or the soul. What is this spirit or soul which so many feel ojans philosophers and poets. Attempted to define. As unitarian universalist should we be talking about it. I'd like to talk about spiritual experience and spiritual growth. Not only because it is a topic i believe to be an interest. Because it is a phrase used in our third unitarian universalist principles. Which states that we covenant to affirm and promote. Acceptance of one another. And encouragement. Spiritual growth. In our congregations. What is meant by spiritual growth. Of the seven principles which guide our fade. This one may be the most difficult to interpret and define. While it may be difficult to observe or quantify spiritual experience. I'm spiritual growth. In the way we might observe or quantify weight gain in a healthy child. Or the ability of a team to discuss abstract concepts. It seems to hold great meaning for many of us. And is therefore worthy of our attention. The dictionary defines spirit. As the vital force that characterizes a human being as ally. The complex of human attributes. Ben manifest. As consciousness. Thought. Feeling and will. Regarded as distinct from the physical body. His soul is defined as the animating principle in humans. Often conceived of as an immaterial entity. What is the solar spirit is immaterial. How can we claim it exists. One answer is through personal experience. Just as the love we feel for a spouse. Partner or child. Cannot be measured with scientific tools. And yet is as real to us as the earth beneath our feet. Spirit or soul may reveal itself. To a profound personal encounter with its mystery. I'd like to share some examples of spiritual experience from my online. And the lives of others. To begin to illuminate the reference to this important element of our faith. Afterwards i hope some of you will share your experiences as well. My first spiritual experience was when i was 12 years old. It was my first summer away from home. And i was attending a camp in new york state. It had been a challenging summer. As i observed two girls in our small bunk. Ganging up on a third. Making her life miserable. When afternoon when it was her turn to clean the cabin floor. They smeared ripe fruit pulp. Into the wooden planks. Their victim burst into cheers. And i not having the courage to stand up to them on her behalf. Retreated to the outdoors. I felt overwhelmed by the realization. The human beings are so profoundly capable. Of hurting one another. Then without fanfare. I had an experience that i can only describe as waking up. It was as though i had been asleep. Then suddenly. My eyes opened. In that moment. I was fully present to the scent of the surrounding prime farm. The feel of the mountain breeze on my arms. And the warmth of the sun on my face. I noticed the solid form of the boulder beneath me. And was acutely aware of the sounds around. Including the drama continuing to unfold in the bunkhouse. But something had changed. I witnessed the events consciously. But without judgment. Discerning the suffering of bullies. And victim. Alike. I didn't realize it then. But this would be the first time i felt simultaneously compassionate. And attach. A sense of equilibrium in the presence of challenging events. Later in life during my career as a psychotherapist. This quality would be crucial. In allowing me to be of service to others. Without becoming despondent. In the presence of suffering. Like my experience at camp. The awakening of a self or consciousness. Beyond the body mind and emotions. Austin seems to occur when least expected. At times it happens on the heels of deep despair. A friend spoke to me of one such time in his life. His wife of many years had serious physical problem. Which had developed into psychological ones. She had been admitted to a psychiatric facility. And her condition was deteriorating. The financial difficulties and stress. With parenting his son under such conditions. Let him into a severe depression. In the midst of his dark night of the soul. He found himself giving up to a higher power. The control he had always maintained over his life. He said quote. I sent up a white flag in my mind. No i didn't even believe there was a set of ears listening i said. If you want it it's yours. I surrender. With that he experienced a profound emotional release. Gut-wrenching sobs shook his body. Is he allowed the totality of his pent-up feelings to be expressed. Afterwards he said he felt more open than he'd ever felt in his life. Looking up. He saw in the room what appeared as around glowing object. In his words. It radiated pure love. Well he's always been an atheist he called this vision god. Having heard many people define god as. Pure love. He told me that this series of events changed his life. It created a state of trust in him saudi. But he was able to find peace. Despite difficult circumstances. Some of the greatest figures in history report similar experiences. In his book the strength to love. The reverend dr. martin luther king jr. right. In montgomery. After weeks of receiving threatening calls and letters in our home. I felt myself faltering. And growing in fear. After a particularly strenuous day. I settled in bed at a late hour. I was about to doze off. When the telephone rang. Angry voice said. Listen we've taken all we want from you. Before next week. You'll be sorry you ever came to montgomery. I hung up but i could not sleep. It seemed that all my fears had just come down on me at 1. In this state of exhaustion. When my courage had almost gone. I prayed aloud. I am here taking a stand for what i believe is right. But now i am afraid. The people are looking to me for leadership. And if i stand before them without strength and courage. They too will falter. I'm at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I have come to the point. Or i can't face it. Alone. At that moment i experienced the presence of the divine. Is that had never before experienced it. I could hear the quiet shortness of an inner voice saying. Stand up for righteousness. Stand up for truth. God will be on your side. Forever. Almost at once my fears began to pass from me. My uncertainty disappeared. I was ready to face anyting. The oder situation remains the same. But god had given the inner calm. New strain. And trust. I knew now that god was able to give us. The interior resources. Two-face was storms. And problems of life. Experiences of this kind are so profound. But many not content to leave their occurrence 2chan. I sought them out. In the sixties this quest often involved mind-altering substance them. One such substance lsd lysergic acid diethylamide. Was first synthesized by swiss chemist albert huffman in 1943. He said that his accidental ingestion of this new compound. Created in him an altered state of consciousness. Which he immediately recognized to be the same as a mystical experience. He had as a child. But a forest path above baden switzerland. This experience he said. Casey mcglynn. Of a miraculous. Powerful. Unfathomable reality. On the occasion of celebrating the fifth anniversary of his discovery he said. Millions will testify. Did we got valuable help. On the way to what aldous huxley said. Is the end an ultimate purpose of human line. Enlightenment. Beatific vision. Love. Current research points to the therapeutic benefit of such visions as well. Clinical trials in the use of hallucinogens. Have you demonstrated the compounds ability. To help veterans recover from post-traumatic stress disorder. Addicts to overcome addiction. And to alleviate anxiety. Among terminally ill cancer patient. Confronted dad. However random use of hallucinogens can be physically exhausting. Or even dangerous way of expanding consciousness. An early pioneer such as. Former harvard university professor dr. richard alpert. Reported being discouraged by the impossibility of maintaining spiritual consciousness. Once the drug wore off. Is search for another way to achieve and maintain the clarity he'd experienced through drugs. Let him to india. Where he met a guru live in a full-time state of bland. Dr. albert became a devotee. And was given the new name rhonda. In the presence of his guru ram das reported and awareness. The consciousness beyond his ego. And the existence of a world. Beyond duality. When he returns to the west. He wrote a book about his journey. Call be here now. Fortunately one does not need to fall into despair ingest drugs or surrender to a guru. To cultivate spiritual experience. Less drastic pass can also have profound results. Some years ago while living in sedona arizona i took a class in shamanism. My teacher spoke about shamanic drumming. And gave us the opportunity to become familiar with both the physiological and transcendence aspects of the practice. Repetitive drum beat produced a monotonous pattern of two distinct tone. The quiet in the mine. The first. Stimulated the brain into an alpha waves day. Leading to deep relaxation. The 2nd. Generated theta brain waves. Switching his words. Open our spiritual heart. Allowing our spirit to rise for unimpeded. To access a world. Hidden from us. In the busyness of our everyday lives. Other techniques and circumstances can provoke something similar. Last month my husband and i visited patti and mary's house for a circle supper. After eating our group took a walk tomorrow boro park. To see the community garden founded by mary decades ago. Our dinner conversation had included and exchange on the meaning of spirituality. Which was extremely meaningful. Visiting the park. Took me even deeper. Walking along paths lined with dahlias zinnias and gigantic sunflowers. Peppers and squash. Hearing the laughter of family and friends as they filled baskets. With home-grown produce. Transported me to replace. Beyond concepts and ideas. My senses came alive. And i entered the eternal now. My feet planted firmly on the ground. But i felt as though i was flying. As the indian mystic osho one said. Knowledge is interesting. But experience. Changes your life. The recently developed science of epigenetics reveals. The changes in our inner worlds do more than create a state of bliss. They can have a profound an observable impact. I'm healing physical. Illness. And disease. Meditation yoga. Listening to music being in love and even tasty chocolate cake. I've also put me in touch with the transcendence quality of being. Since i consider myself an ordinary person i must conclude that the capacity for experian. Experiencing a transcendent state of being. Is available to anyone. An awareness of the metaphysical is important. Because when all else fails. Which everything must. In the corporeal world. It's deeper level of being. Can bring us acceptance. And inner peace. If hazard third principle suggests. We are to encourage spiritual growth. Within our congregation. What steps can we take. Hypnotherapy student of mine once remarked. I think spiritual experience can be found anywhere where people are willing to share in the moment. From the heart. So when we break out into small groups after the service this morning. I invite you to speak with each other about your own acquaintance. With spirituality. In honor of our third principal. And with deep respect for the diversity of our lives. Namaste. And blessed be. Thank you eileen. We have time now for some discussion. Yeah unfortunately i do not have a drum of the quality that by. Shaman in teacher used in his in his course and there was something about there is something about. The particular. Construction of a shamanic drum that that productive produce those two tone simultaneously that i spoke of. So in order to experience that particular thing. It might be interesting to look around and see if there's someone in our own community that would have access to such a thing. I'm such a case. that would be. Wonderful. My husband had a one-on-one experience with around us he was invited to ground us invited him via a phone call to meet with him in the hotel room when he was visiting chicago. And so peter wins and it would be really fun at some time for him to be able to share that story with you all as well. Thank you so much aileen. Or around. So that wonderful talk. So much for inviting me i appreciate. Are we really enjoyed it.

uuprairie_org

Pr920315Zakem-ed.mp3

Good morning everybody. The program on beyond lion aren't culture passing prison. Vivity continuing in from last week maybe tonight. What's up with this morning with a song i feel that culture and a lot of things takes a little bit of understanding bit biped piece-by-piece little bit at the time so. Not start out today i have a sound on my assistance with me some famous mayan models for all around the world it's so we're going to have some of the children come up or if anyone else is. Adorn themselves. Tell me your name tell the group your name i'll tell you where their things are from here. This is eric and erica swearing. Appeal or sure hear from sunil. And there's a volunteer peace corps volunteer in zunil i just stroll around derek's of human kind of see what you're doing. Here's another one from aguascalientes. The hot waters. He has your name is okay lucas one from aguascalientes and he has a thing here a sash that the priest of the sacerdotisa. Used to wear and some the modern priest wear these things to so he's dressed up kind like a sacerdoti. And his thing is from aguascalientes the hot water just kind of scroll around and let people see you too. Yeah they're little areas but they're tolentino. Eric has a bag here and show me bag. Here's another what's your name. Judy has a piece on here from. San lucas coleman very bright blue color very famous if you ever see this and the little things on it she's from san lucas still not going to walk around that people trying to take a look at you okay. Here's another one here what's your name. Josh josh has a band on here that's a christmas decoration. And another one that's real popular this is chris christmas decorations from japan japan. So josh want you walk around that people see your thing from tonic apartment. Here's another one from who are you as a stylish hat here and this one has cats on it and this is also from a pan. So what you show people your things from total liquor pop another one. Heather heather is from santiago athlete plan this is where they had a massacre a year-and-a-half ago the people there had beautiful work and usually they have a lot of birds and things on there with heels. But she has one with all my endangered mayan things on this excellent. This one this one i was attracted to cuz this one reminded me when i was in iran has peacocks on it. Peacocks are really popular in this area two and this one is from comalapa. Comalapa music until they have this kind of decoration like diamonds on it. Luzanne and there would be able to have this cover read to sochi some comalapa with her peacocks on there. And who are you. Katrina katrina has on a piece here from san juan soccer practice which is near. This one was first in the country this is like the inch by inch i did not like the style at all and in my last happy or it just really grew on me and so i have something sometime on s a s so she's from sidelines. They use german diets now and so they don't run and bleed like you buy things in some parts of the world their tourist things and you take it home and it's red and blue and green and yellow and you wash it and it's orange everything. This is famous in guatemala. This is a common souvenir of people in the country by for themselves guatemalans by these things so i said i got to go to the peace conference couple years ago. 51st poulos. Anna bought myself only says i had a few extra bottles to it neither one. So this is a traditional-style hangout. Had some things in the back or sanchez like this. The colors look kind of nice but not real bright this is all silk. There's another one back there that doesn't look real bright it kind of subdued but it's all still fixes all they would still. And the women i've got some pictures and i'll show that the women wrap this one around their head and then have these two little jobs going to hang out in front. Fantasy women walking around. Alta verapaz when the upper uropods was posted up italian when it was a lot of a lot of troubles until recently. And now the people are safe again and they're going back to making arts and crafts and things like this so. We had a couple volunteers up there working with them. It's someplace if they do but most of their silk is too important. But they are starting to think they want to start. These two. These are natural dyes these are about 50 years old. These are all natural dyes. These are made with walnuts skins whenever you can get these are all natural dyes. So this is this is a nice green natural a termites got into 1/8 of a fulton at my house. They don't respect the old things are some people might displace. This one they make a cotton that's natural brown and solo allow this is closer to have a whoopie on the back that's a natural brown cotton the only grew in the new world. Some department avenue world the video spanish and other people thought this was better than the continent had in europe so out of his cotton that's the best option was from the new world and there's a brown cotton there. This appeal also is. It's quite nice lot of turmoil. San marcos. And this one has some of the traditional things up reindeer. Peacocks in things like this new style. Hotel restaurant san marcos. So they are just a lot more back there but i just leave a couple i just wanted to mention. They were little bit unusual. And then they say we've been. So it's tied and dyed all this they called yahtzee and then they weave it and they're a couple areas that only do that that's more popular popular. So they have tyondai those banana wiva can you see lot of shirts shirt i was worth all the time to go. And the pattern that has the truck and auto. Okay let's see. Yeah we need some transition economics instead of a filling the hard stuff answer. Okay fine if you want to wear those there in your re-tying you can wear those if you want to. Keep mine if you don't even put them on the table back there but you. Thanks for being my models that i can sit in the backyard if. On art and culture. Show me the. The area's the language that are. Just in guatemala alone a lot of varieties language up in mexico but most of the areas of the brightest language in but mama are from. The mayan dial until try then there were many mayan i'm here but the word a big goofing up shorty and so there's tortilla hear a big famous areas happy kelly. Dj is also famous when i came back united states by lived in iran for 4 years. I didn't know the difference between pka and ph. I came back i never seen the word teach before he on for years these things catch on. Aguas calientes in sound. This is around. Guatemala city antigua this whole area. saiki k. Then get up at 2. Menards in independence catchy. So that pj catchy not a lot of people up here but in belize which is over here. A lot of people quote. I moved eric speak more time maya. Add ketchup to a lot of people move into belize in the last hundred years with problems in guatemala so please are the big top of the population. The yucatecan my people came out in the yucatan and i was in belize. They about 11:00. They started breaking off that's when the language is really fast but not until they have a common. Rut. And you can work things out. Spanish and portuguese sign language. I accidentally another one. There's a. What is down here. There's one is in there called the popol vuh museum i'll save some few things from there but they don't big and sensors big incense technically this big around this high. It is late is full of them and i was just told that they had in that area and then to kind of richly destroy these things it's like a lot of people believe you make an art piece has life. Answer this function and then. It's it's soul has to go somewhere so the art part of is gone and then throw it somewhere or do something. It was over nigeria there's really believe. Volcanoes. Call rana. Read about rental here. Broadway espanyol. What about city antigua is in this area here that's tried to kill area and then take the bus and go to. Pieology. A lot of them are when you get into the cauchy kill the mom. And the kitchen over in the with the call the occidente the western part of the country. A lot of them don't only speak their own language speak spanish and then learn the local language to to work have interpreter for a while eventually. Experience using new language to learn another language. This is probably about 1500 3500 with an opp before present. Are the archaeologists got away from before christ bc. Before the present. Dad just respond up in guatemala to mexico but when i was in belize id was in a state with a family that only lift half a mile from pollo. Boil is the oldest mayan site now that they feel. How much is one of the oldest. Beginning to civilization again this this hemisphere even older than you know anything about the olmecs we almost always the old people the ancient now the maya they feel had a similar beginning at the time the olmecs probably about 2,500. 4584. It didn't come up there to come up there but it wasn't the big big production thing yet. What is guarded giuliano. I mean like a weak type thing to a little tiny top thing then under domestication if you can we have today so far. This is autumn one of the. Dakota state is there only three codices left in the world the ancient books of the maya. We thank. Bishop. Londa. Who came up with the yucatan youtube saving the three. He destroyed 453 450 were lost they are that time so this is the mayan calendar on this codex that gave the people and idea what time is all about nehemiah world which. We take a long time explained. Plastic part of their life. It was off of a new fancy card. Is alum gold. Here's an idea of some of the mayan motifs in guatemala. The quetzal bird flying up there he needs to cut solitude mean bird is coco. Does big pot live at coco's big yellow pods. From the pottery beneath that. The old mortar and pestle down the volume rendezvous chili's and things. Poinsettias. Autobuyer common household. Planets. Growing area panty i outside. Colton. Some of the early foods that the people in mexico guatemalan edith were natural diet types of things like worms and that's so you're reacting to guava guava worms getting ready to put in the old box. And. Tortillas de rana frog tortillas do you talk like your tortillas with your beef or chicken or whatever while they also used to eat frogs. And these people crabs and things into but this is a frog tortilla. And what is becoming popular in the united states now and is amaranth cameron is a. Floral typos but it is a grain also there are signs of times it would rain to spanish for bad the people to use this grain. Because it would take the grain and make little bread things. And put blood in it. And make it like those sacrifice things to dedicate for the spanish didn't like that because they wanted to control the eucharist types of ceremonies and i would say look at that. In india is popular is kind of a serial of some sort but now they look at amaranth is much more protein in wheat gluten so you need to use weed or something with gluten but has more protein so they said they could give people some protein. Another one called. This is florida so take it's very popular guatemala people mix it up and put in eggs when it's filthy season is in. People go nuts over this marketplace flowers. Big big lilies of the valley when you see them. And. Up here that you sell isode wood. Inputting hospital plants in like the things that wrap around these poles that you might buy the next episode they would and they use it for that because it's just had some property against. It will work well with flowers you can put flowers into it and rolling important flowers. Coco coco and. the bottom is vanilla vanilla also came from his private world actually most of vanilla veracruz mexico when was traded into these other areas too. In cocoa as most people know used to be money. They didn't have money that use cocoa a bag of coco the value of a bag of coca savali got five chickens erlensee that's the value of this little bag of hopewell here until coco azure standard. That they use for money. And in the new world and mexico central america and even the united states. You're only. Two animals that were domesticated the people put 81 was the turkey. And so this is one that people could could keep. Coronavirus in water and heat it work for the others this is a really popular tacos or tamales. They were made with turkey not a chicken and turkey like in guatemala when you're gonna have a big day it's going to call them and next day and. And so if you're going to have a big day today over going to turkey and one of the other. Well they want domesticated l domesticated. Could have a little chicken yard. That's called the. August 5th you're not in english. Mckinley and the spanish give nothing english and it's a rodent type thing and but it tastes wonderful. And the queen came to england king queen came from england for independence in belize 1981. They're going to server this dish and it hit the english tabloid so you might know they get into stuff they said hi. Autopark chili's. What we know around the world. They look at the most of the major voyages and the earlier time exploration where for spices and pepper was one of the big spices. When they found chili's which were only grown here and took them back india korea all the areas know where the chili's came from that they use now they only had never before when they saw the power of these chili everyone switch. This is a. Not really if this is real famous at palenque getting id to just tell them i am. Style thing this is the temple of inscriptions in palenque this is when the rulers and a sitting here. Ready to die and ready to go and has a big burn. I think i'm here on your sheets on the mayan chief zahava a graphic a visit to a better but it's big bird up there that's the big bird of life overlook anything so this is life up here and this is the underworld so. And there are very things around here will tell you later to up. Would be a disaster position when mercury is in a certain position for saturn assistant position. This good luck and so he's got all the right signs up so this is a big slab to phone if it's temple the instructions in palenque in mexico. This is a lion motif the otherworld the above world. And safety. Creatures like the rattlesnake. The rattlesnake go under the ground and come back going to the underworld and come back the ego the ego could fly up into the heavens. Where we could go and come back the jaguar the jaguar could go into the night into the dark which everyone's afraid of and come back. The turtle turtle go into the water and come back to all these special good luck signs for the ancient maya. This is a jade matt jacobs really popular down there a james veitch mustang area. Blanket apart call the ruler there. This one i'm not sure if this was all j another one here. This is a famous jade matthew guatemala in the archaeological museum there. There was a lot of speculation on what day does all about only the ear spools only the little round things at the bottom of the years our actual jade. The other things are like jay. But in the real purasense they're not jade only little ears school don't need a little round things are jade. The other guard. Varieties of things that they call jade but they're not now really big but. Also in. In pokemon in honduras which is one of the really famous mayan centers. It took a long time to figure out these things why was this center so popular why was it so famous. And now they found an old temple underneath like three layers down three temples down from their temple that they have today that they've been working out for so long and this is what they called eccentric flint. These are flint's the people card chipping away to make it separate figures out of this is one of them that they found on there they found a whole beautiful collection of eccentric flint. So just make these stylizing can you see the mayan forehead there the spiky forehead and nose big lips. They like cross eyes to their hanging. A little thing in front of baby's noses so they bought their eyes where can i get the other way around. A ago and this wasn't discovered and now it's a stubborn soda. Easton stalker. also the figures they found it for pain. Really artistically done the mind some people say all they just look like bunch of whatever but. The maya really did have some individual styles about them in so much and now they can tell where individual people. And they bought the phone now that the works were sighing. Before they thought it was like the medieval times with justin onimus artist a lot of these works were sighing here's a quick look at various mayan faces while they aren't just all the same they do shows people in various stages of things from the. Grotesque the godlike contortion to whatever to human touches into. I knew this wasn't that. Do not look at in the real-life this is another common type of thing happens again. This is a woman she's like queen mother and she's preparing for her son to ascend to the throne and she has to purify herself. And the blood of kings the royalty. We're the ones first of all the early maya who had to do blood sacrifices. The women. Spider-man vulture put a little cord with spines on for my stingrays and stuff. The whole entire town. Or pierce your ear lobes or ears the man has a sore penis. Had to get blood out later as the more of everyone doing it. But cheese. Purify yourself here she's got a little bowl down here with paper in it would put the blood on this paper and then burn it. This is a vision serpent coming to her she's getting a vision it's like we talked about people that are joggers or something give me a runner's high with you lose a lot of blood you can get a high from this too and so she's lost enough blood that she's had this vision. At least the serpent when he comes down here sometimes i'll have little circles underneath the show the east of vision vision resurfaced from thought but these marks here this is blood type thing. So he's a video she's gone is gone lost and reverence is awesome with love. It's ashish purify herself to have her son become the king that's the vision she's a vision a dream it's a vision quest type of thing. People had to carry things on their backs around their heads or drago there weren't horses to work cows to work animal took a little puppy dogs and turkeys they were domesticated. Even the andes belong wasn't think they're very fragile even use those. Salerno wheels. On vehicles and tires. It's all deposits were made with the gold pinch pots. The biggest coil to play pitch them together like she's doing there and then just make these beautiful things will paddles and things to smooth them out. So there were no wheels or no potter wheels and even today a lot of the potter's even if they have these benefits of modern potter's wheel won't use them. They prefer this person away in central america. Until they're going on about 250 left. I'm doing rainforest is also going to. What is the last vestige of another world. Monument building, people truly never reach the mine in the building stage but they don't have neither domesticated text thing store was so they're more like the hunters and gatherers thank you. For 500 years of resistance. And big meeting of the americas off representative america's game for this for the 500th anniversary to celebrate the black indian and black. This is teco newman this is a hero and guatemala he is the last one he was he was the last one to fight against the spanish. And once he died that was it he was the last remaining group of powerful people powerful tribes and once they were cheated guatemala was under spanish control. He was the national holiday of symbol that use for once and i'd like the phoenix and wanting to go to heaven. The national holiday for school holiday. Sobriety of peoples in guatemala. That's on the coastal areas they have the garifuna people that came from africa 167 years ago various other people. And if you go to belize to go get the zoo it says do not feed the animals in english spanish and chinese so chinese people are becoming so predominant in somebody's country especially beliefs and parked what amount of it your friends in chinese. Greeting cards for business. Mary mary and joseph and jesus also mary joseph and jesus are. Rhombus a real windy times a year. Reply this big big bites. So many things i like 30 feet across. Open this area where i said they're clocking from that i wasn't real thrilled with that person. Sandman s packets now is where they fight as big tights and you go down there on the weather big holy days. Yeah and it's big mob center waikiki flies kites take like 5 or 6 7 p.m. so big. This is the woman from the bar. When the bags i had here is a real kind of stylized design like this from the box. When a man is kind of traditional. Where was hella felt. Over piece there. Even though it's cold mountains. It gets warm enough air today why i could never wear that stuff you know i had a hard enough time or t-shirt sometimes with people got used to wearing his warm types of things. You can't part of life. Another woman stomach kind of a wrap a root big band raptor on how she doesn't have the little bottles on your but she's from up in the area in the north to. Another area that is just opening up now level 2. Don't have the front seat. We can go into this is alton i was probably a. Nearest very popular i'll send them to you and you can go out there and spend a week spent two weeks and work with someone and we're not to leave out there with the family. This is. There was something it went on that i really began where i wanted years ago it was what they called this country in 1920 scientists ortiz a mayan revival. And a lot of mayan architecture around this is a shot from a theater in los angeles that i'll show you a picture later looks a lot like. New temple that they found in kopana revival. The back frank lloyd wright's brilliance earliest influence was mayan architecture and these are some of the early building if he did california. That were frank lloyd wright the high-voltage kind of style was early frank lloyd wright but it was mayim influence that the that he did these also look a lot like someone is mexico and guatemala. Even when he went to japan we did fine architect in japan to pick up some of these japanese influence. This is the. The kind of drawing of the new temple they found a coupon just recently and so he had the big temple. Steps there this is where they always have been studying these what they call the steps of the inscription. 125 steps is so longest kind of like conscription. Thing is they have it's here it's not we've instructed yet but here they show underneath when they were digging around this kind of put the steps back together he found this other temple. And this was the real. Sacred temple that was the sergeant halloran copon. They never dream is that the new something was in that area that's important so now they found it. This is the kind of inside the. The place is still intact. Up on the border of nevada. Danny the colorful amazing thing as a color that the people that he was a natural dyes the real redd's real yellows greens turquoise blues just am really vibrant colors and the temple that we see today that look just like white on the outside door all color and painted out. I just salvage archaeology in belize i could say things if they're filed open to whatever this isn't where i work but this has a lot of where i live these things are all over he called his royal burial mound to be like here or not real big. But the looters love them cuz they could just dig a trench right straight into that mouth and get the goodies out from inside and then everything was lost for anyone studying to know what the people are done in that area but we're everywhere. Ripped open tractor something and people said. And their popular in various parts of mexico guatemala but this is a ritual still goes on today. Native restaurant in mexico they have the man on top gets up a little drama in a little fight kind of thing and place almost like drumming fight music from scotland or somewhere. And he's up there playing this and the men are swinging and they have this role. Is dr. naked going and going and going and gradually they reached the ground swinging around some people die like this. Black family members. Ultimate custom yesterday. Amateurs who decided there. Traditional villages. It's up like a wheel on top there so this was later i mean this is something i did but once the wheel came and they get out of things or just wrapped around and answer thing. Unwind the lords of down spinning around but time to get down to bottom. I seen a couple times. Yeah they can't but if you can stabilize himself that's they they go slow enough things have stabilized until temple doing there. I got going too fast and they couldn't stop at noon. Smack on the ground. Here's a teacher at one time there was a brother working on a little tiny parrots and things that they make guatemalan i'm kind of tourist trade so that. Bhutan super modern area now. This is some people who have the virgin there they're doing at worship service for the virgin but she has a. Repeal clock on that is copied from the ancient mayan glyphs. So they used some of the same decorations to some of the patterns they have someone. i have here. They're offered a traditional things so they looked at those and kept up at 2 to the old-style here's one of them and this is a motif is supposed to be looking at the sunrise and the sunset and they. Solid gold things go when the sun is coming up and then you see more in the middle when it's the middle of the day and then see fewer when the sun is going down. So if it has a flow to it has a sense to it that's from their traditional. Mayan artisan head. Coffee $40 in chiapas but i bought it from a cooperative that i knew who they were getting the money. And what mata bus 40 hits out if it's about $8. Because of the difference in the economy is from people i know i'm going to get that money i didn't feel so bad about spending your work of art real. Put into this. I'll give you the foot little. Jewel still alive today. What they have they acted like teenagers when they need to have their teeth. False teeth put in in the front because he blocked her he's already. he's puttin faulty with stars gold stars in them. So you see some people so it's still part of that nature. From the bag from the very serious i'm still alive. tummala san lucas. Do a backbend backyard one of them to style. The man even though some of the most men don't wear. Critical neymar jerseys bags these bags are like they that's one thing is still hanging out with y'all.. And this is some of the new stuff today. This is a look into the extra-terrestrial mya's and all the planets.. Thanks. Life outside of the earth away from the earth. The powers of jesus and all these other people came from all the scientific explanations of order power came from. And like after that. Until they have every year the city's posters around lots of mama and mexico about this group to get together and those are so weird. Contact amaya's contact with earth. Current. Amaya mathur has fought two up to 2 ft high but some carver's up in the area business since it's beautiful but to me it was not so much my anita's got the fat nose that lips and eyes not really crossed but to me it reminded me more. Probably hung around. This is a somebody probably seen some of these things. When i broke my leg. 3/2 years ago i've been in belize for you and i've been doing archaeology work there just in the community. What about that i said i just want to put some. Drawings of my house in simple drawings this was the first one to put on my house by samantha the wall over which is 6. I just got into this outline black and white and then i had some paint. My neighbor came over. Play some cracker paint orange. I'm not artist going to do this. I work with him makes a bright color painting face and then the rest is history as they say so i did. Volleyball. I just got into it. Death. Amazing you could live in the united states where you can learn how to do all this stuff. That's the goddess of the moon and it's interesting because they right now they don't know where this came from schedule chicken rabbit in her arms. For rapping. Warframe moon they don't know what is the current song that word for rabbit sounds like it work from home but we're kind of stuffies to together is evolutionary. The sounds kind of went along with some whatsapp whatsapp there will that be home this whole week. There's four things that you really can see depending on though the shadows. Another notable over there. Is it snowing crazy. Here's the vision to talk about the vision serpent there's a vision that was the one i really wanted to do and i put the blood scrolls on it this is from yaad kalon. We're not what the actual on this is a multi from yoncalla. And the vision service errors in green got the triangles on it to show blood. Add the scroll the golden the red is showing the blood that sacrifice. The guy planting corn there is an old mayan priests dressed up with a jaguar skin planting corn for good luck. The woman i think the next one.. This is a woman this is the goddess of. Help. The guys of sewing of painting. All different kinds of things rolled into one a lot of guys with multi-purpose gods and goddesses. Up above her had are four signs for four planets. And this was also some good luck signs. Rattlesnake on her head that is actually the way it was the rattlesnake on her head that's the way it was. And saw that was another good lunch time. This is when the the mayan the popo who believe that. Various stages of humanity one stage that they want to humans were made out of wood and they just weren't very friendly emotional or whatever and so it was time for the gods and goddesses to wash them away. Play watch them away and then you see the shell and another little mayan person coming out of a shelter that's the birth of real humans we got really know wouldn't eyes wasn't a little more emotion. I was also asked by a village next to mine 2 design they had this big monument they're like 80 high for 30 years in concord no one ever did anything with design it. That it's going to be kept up so i said. This will not be mine. This will be yours i wanted the village council they voted on that they said they would do it they pay me $20 for the penny. Cuz i said. On the front that big head there that said jay had that i showed earlier christmas. Representation. I drew that on. Just with. Dark red marker to see if anything would happen to us. I came back the next day. An old man there who used to practice the mayan ceremonies with hasn't done it for 30 years at byrne and offering in front of it he said this is sacred and that camisa this is worth everything right. So i put on there open ash this is the greeting in maya for this area you can take amaya crystal rae the name is crystal rae and your chin to little areas together and welcome in english. You want spanish i thought spanish. Would break the continuity of integrity. But one thing i said without if i do this for you i want to have a woman's head onto so this is a woman's head off my house and put hers on to i haven't jaguar and snake on one side and on the back of the jaguar but i wanted to give equal recognition for women to. This is for my own bill i just sign a paper mail villages what's the name for the other guy like you said hey we'd like us on your to-do list. Can i put more of a woman's face on it which i took from an egyptian mask. Dialect maya. Which they thought was more like. Hey really i just well you're really welcome. This is a woman at work with us first air. She told me that she had study mi she's amaya. She had studied meiyappan yucatan to learn how to do different crafts and things but then do it anymore cuz those interested in it. I didn't just want to buy one because she made me a hammer you made this hammer traditional lion style everything every not so you made yourself. I still have. It's a work of art itself. Her sister was doing was interested my things but things weren't really going today with the mayan stuff there and so she got his cake decorating. And really a very. Hrithik fat person talented. By julio barstow. It's slimy decipher from the picture of that case that she was decorated to get i took a photograph of it and then painted it and i know how this is. Thanks and some cross-stitch patterns and needlepoint things i asked him if it would do this for me. But they just never had add this contact to my own kind of things before and then as we got working one more together they start rose springing up. This is the symbol for the popol vuh museum the ancient. Kind of like the bible. Written down after the spanish came but it was written down. By someone still eye contact with her. Ancient rites and ceremonies. Gettysburg well this is my door and kamala and i put the popol vuh bird up on the top and the consol down to bottom too. This is a guatemalan i move there i didn't do much paint 100 things. What model is also now is concerned about the environment. And so they said the guatemala tambien disney tiara it's my land to the jaguar duration symbol. Belize again going back to arts and crafts and things. And i made some play-doh. Reschedule first latest. From their parents. Making her mother making tortillas and things. And would you like to tell they're when they're making tortillas cuz it's time for tortilla to hear this slacker hands making tortillas here at all-round ability but these kids took a little while. I didn't work out paper mache and pinatas. This is the girl who made this pinata that to make it pop paper sculptures i call it rather pinatas. What do with different ways to heather pinata and so she has it on this tuesday. I'm so she was kind of getting into. Some women in another bill i swear i made the big monument they asked me to come and work with them and pinatas the mayor's wife that we want to make pinata so one day i showed up i think anyone's going to come get 40 women with children on one arm on their dip with would make a pinata with her other hand and it was just amazing. Listen to mayor's wife. Do the women act was when we went for the first session and each one of them has finally made at least one thing of some sort someone that made three. The daughter just wasn't interested in education. And 111 person or ask me. Do all gringos know how to make me laugh. Is that was it that's the kind of making a reed contact with the older mayan world in it so they say it was a great experience but also the sea alive. And i'll have to wear to go look at some imperial baker lol. Thank you very much david i think david is a good example of not only piece for work or taking their children to other countries but to their own fuel bring anything back. Company print david to tell sometime a little bit about four-and-a-half years in huron.

uuprairie_org

Pr160731LetsBlowOurHorn-ed.mp3

Good morning everybody. unitarian universalist society blinker am a member here at prairie and it's been a few weeks since i've been here so. every ethnic and religious background. We welcome your no matter what your age we are bilities or your inability. Later in the service hang on in there i know you're all if you're new here or haven't visited hurt for a while i'm sure you're anxious to introduce yourself hold on to that thought will have a chance later on and the service for you to do that. Just to let you know if it if you are new to prairie i'll give us a few times every sunday is a little bit different sometimes we do something special like this where we offered the variety of voices from throughout the congregation. Awesome times a member of the congregation presents sometimes it's our ministers and being a sometimes with someone from the community comes and presents on a topic of interest. Play me something. All right i'll try to read in a high voice i guess sorry there are always meaningful songs for somebody. People are doing their courting. People are finding their wives. People are making babies. People are watching their dishes. People are getting through the day with songs that we may finding significant. But their significance is affirm by others. There's always someone affirming the significance of the song by taking a loved one into their arms or getting through the night. That's what dignified the song. Songs don't dignify human activity. Human activity signifies the song leonard cohen. You're welcome up now polypterus one of our prairie members who has a treat in store for us with the help of a lot of members i think we're all listed yet in the program so you'll have a chance to learn a little bit about each of them as we go along. Thank you again. So good morning. She's probably one of the easiest programs i've ever put together because i not. I'm not planning on providing which content. I'll talk a little bit about songwriting in the creative process. For the most part i plan to let the musicians in the music. The almost immediately after i agreed to coordinate this program i realized i had a severely neuroscience focus so that i can have a manageable number of performances. So i first i ruled out. New original words to familiar melody by parodies like in rigging granny's and a lot of us have written.. So i decided no original melodies and words original melodies only. Then i rule out coral work because it wasn't feasible to. And they weren't good enough according to those. That were submitted. And then. I had to regretfully rule out any music by the multi-talented prolific. Death of few years ago head is all hard. I think it's best if we do someone does program. Devoted solely to her. Impact on. But still there are eight composers during the work today including me. Several more including prairie children and adults. Either didn't quite have a piece of ready to perform or they weren't able to be here. Whether you're too shy. So we've already enjoyed two original works this morning. Amber played one of her compositions wasn't incredible. And another treat is in store for the offer.. And actually. It's it is to every time she play the piano i just told you. So in elizabeth alexander who attended prairie briefly during the 90s i think. She composed being who we are for school children in school in waunakee. And visit her website if you haven't if you like music at all she's a brilliant composer. Inspiring themes. She has an international reputation. And she's supposed to know cross-border she's best known for her choral composition. And her website is listed on the lyrics sheet. And as far as a prairie choir has sons one of hers and i'm looking forward to seeing another one of her. Why do we write songs. And why do we feel a need to express an idea or an emotion in music particular. I and the other musicians will speak about what brought us to reiter individual song. But. Well i think we all have in common is that even though songwriting is a solitary at. It's an attempt to connect with others. And to reach out to. Whomever. Might be the one that listens to it the songwriters very own personal song. It feels that it speaks to their experience awful. And very often at the end of the creative process of writing the song. The songwriter realizes it. Here she is just a conduit. For some universal consciousness or or humanity. Or we're honest but maybe that's just me. So i'm happy. Tuba. Havasu. Water cuz my mouth is really drying up. And i'm going to see what i'm going to do my song first. I wrote the lyrics and melody and carl actually made the music for and i said he arranged if he'd actually. Completed the music. I wrote this for. It was a play a short musical and there were four women in it each woman. Had her own song. And this character dell. As happens so often. Has an emotion has a love for somebody that is doesn't quite fit in with anal societal norms for somebody who already is committed in another relationship. And so i wanted to speak to the difficulty of your. You're having those feelings but knowing that you print. Did you read. So my chris. It's next to share his music and i know he i hope he'll speak a little bit about what brought him to write it. He'll need a microphone. But i just wanted to say. Mike has more musical ability and knowledge in his little finger than i have my whole body or most of us and he's like oh. I consider moving treasure so i'm looking forward to hearing. Okay what what you have this morning to talk about both of them. Examples of dance music. I have been. Working with dancers for better than 40 years. He's just going into my head. I use. I don't write them down. For a long time i used to in my writing is. All raggedy ann. Hard to read music notation. 20 years ago a quiet composition program golden noteworthy. Thoroughly recommend. It is not one of your x hundred-dollar programs. Crosby just 4990. Design impoverished church musicians. But it worked. Dances to the first one is a waltz. And it's called karen. Both ways are going to be on there on cd by the way. And i lifted them off my noteworthy program. I don't think this. Any piano instrumental asian in either one of them. Karen repair. Dancer singer. And this was written for a. Big fat round numbers birthday of yours back in 2013. I want tell you which one it was. And the second one coming later in the program is called trip. Banner. Has nothing to do with falling in and has nothing to do with flags. Trip is the husband of my friend susan conan. Susan feldman played the flute in a band. I was in with her and david mullen who plays violin. And we called ourselves or the border. Which is a reference to scotland. When you want to get the hell out of scotland you go or the border. Done with england. Susan lived in st-charles illinois dave and i live here in the madison area. So anytime we had a gig at least one of us had to cross our border. And it is a hornpipe. I called a trip down up because i. But it was appropriate for somebody with his energy. Hope you like them. Thank you. Black women. I'm hoping we can play them both back-to-back. Back to back. Thank you michael for lovely. Our next musician. Dependable. Offertory. I should have gotten a thesaurus out because i'm running out of superlatives but anyway i think most of those know dan and isn't known as creativity and generosity with this music so i'm looking forward to it. Well. This is the guitar. But i had to handle how many trace it was 40 years ago when i wrote the song. I love the travel i've been gone almost all summer because i've been traveling all over the country and for various. Things. But the back in the 70s i didn't have a car so i hitchhike. Yeah those were the days when hitchhiking was pretty common i knew people who hitch-hike to work. And i hitchhike to get. Good places around the midwest i remember writing. Are we. For me songwriting is pretty much writing about my experiences and. I was hitching somewhere north of. Minneapolis probably anoka and the sun was it was toward the end of the day the sun was going down starting to get cold and i needed a ride. So that was the contact sport all usually i just write the the lyrics down in that i. Later so. Who's going to fingerpick this but i think you'll be better if i just. Radioshack going to rain tomorrow. How many of you have ever hitchhike. Wow they kind of connection. Yes. Place to go. Johnson. Several people lined up there with their thumbs up. Trafficmaster fast. Another comment. If you don't know i think dan. Is probably one of the most prolific composers and prairie he has dozens of sunk everyone's beliefs that good. One of his i like so much that with his permission i put it up on my website. Call it's all over babe. Maybe it's not special. Really love that song. You should check that song. So i was so happy to be able to bring jim and lisa glick back into this building. Jimmy doolittle setting up and lisa if you could come up and maybe introduce the song. We just heard a song from dan who was called. Perry's most prolific musician. And this song i somehow by a miracle grow. And i'm the least olympic nieces quite clear. So i was just meditating and each morning another verse would come out. And it would have a little melody so i'd walk around singing it and then. Record it and finally when it was done i brought it to my. Musician. Husband. And he said. Well i'll arrange that for you i really like the melody in this song. So he started working on it. And it got more and more beautiful. And i soon realized that my attempt to sing it was interfering with the song it's got so i wisely stepped back and let his music secret self the song is about i just briefly about a butterfly in africa and the protagonist. Invisible protagonist. He's the butterfly and the butterfly is so beautiful that she wants to own it. Put it in her jar. And so of course the butterfly. And so it's kind of the song is kind of an analogy oh. Is she gets a second chance and lets the butterfly. Free. And it's an analogy to the human. Desire to own things and. Capture them. And it's like putting a butterfly in. What happens. I'm not going to say. Composition is canada just told me that was inspired by lisa's melody words and kind of took on a life of its own kind of somewhere between iraq and irish tune irish drone probably. Thank you. So carl asked me not to put them after gym but i didn't but it's not the guitar and some of you have heard this song already but i think it's worth sharing again. And that hasn't been done to recently by the way several musicians almost everyone here submitted several pieces and then what they helped a violin and carl i was able to select no one from each of those though it wasn't completely my judgment. Yeah i submitted a couple and i really wanted to do one this about hitchhiking kind of. But. I mean i can i wrote this song when i was on it. 4 years ago for guitar. When i was on a guy's only week. Sitting on the porch. Fussing around with my guitar and it's like usual it's like. The melody and the rhythm. Words for the chorus to kind of. Came up all at once. I wrote it down so i wouldn't forget it real quick and then i came home and chill. It was written for guitar until the first part of it. Piano man. But the intro to it isn't what you'd expect from the rest of the song but it's based on the guitar a guitar in c. They're not crazy. I also liked his website he put a slideshow to that music that always brings tears my eyes. So our last musician is a john wunderlin. And we kind of ran long on announcements on joys and concerns this morning. But i would like to give john at least a good five minutes during the warm-up because this is a a real tree. And this is a different kind of a musicianship composing because it's improvisational. And talk about the creative juices flowing through you. Everybody. This is a didgeridoo. The didgeridoo is one of the oldest instruments dating back many thousands of years. It is been used by the aboriginal tribes of northern australia and rituals and dance. The name didgeridoo is actually a western european invention. Which was likely in an amana poetic word. But the first explorers created which mimics the sound the instrument makes. The actual name of the instrument varies among the many indigenous tribes of australia including more than 40 different words. Such as morlo marco. Nikki nikki. And your docking. Luckily for westerners. The aboriginals of enthusiastic we adopted the name didgeridoo in addition to their native names. See you'll never offend any aboriginals by calling it by its western. I wanted to briefly share creation story from the aboriginals about the didgeridoo. Beverage store rich history of storytelling. Their spiritual stories are called dreamtime. One of their dreamtime stories involves three gods. Griffin bird for. The dab bird plays the didgeridoo. The butcher bird plays clap sticks. Dancing. And the peewee bird dances. As this band play dance and sing they name and by naming create. Everything in the world. When they finish naming and creating everything. They pass on the didgeridoo clap sticks songs and dances to the tribes of northern australia. Continue to use them from generation to generation. The didgeridoo is basically a one-note instrument. Players created drone sound by circular breathing. That is blowing out through the instrument while simultaneously breathing in through the nose. It's actually as hard as it sounds. On top of the drone sound players create many special effects which are used to mimic animal noises. And make a wide variety of other sounds which transport the listener to the outback and beyond. Listen for sounds of the dingo. Kookaburra mo-poke and the hopping kangaroo. Fabulous. Battle thank you all the performers. And will welcome robin proud up here for our closing woods should become a regular tradition music. I look upon myself and other songwriters. As links in a long chain. All of us. We are links in a chain. And if we do our job right. There will be many many links to come. I don't know about you but i think the other notes today they're going to be residing for me throughout the day in the week so i hope that is true for you as well thanks so much for coming please be sure to extend the hand of friendship to those around you say hi to somebody you haven't said hi to for a while and catch up and then join us for coffee and conversation thanks a bunch.

uuprairie_org

Pr110501KalenFristad-ed.mp3

Good morning everyone happy made may day and welcome to pray unitarian universalist society on mary mullen remember the program committee. Pray aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation we welcome people of every ethnic. And religious background. Whatever your color your sexual orientation. Your gender or your family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age. Your abilities. For your inabilities. Later in the service will invite visitors guests and returning friends. The introduced yourselves south louis might get to know you better. On sunday morning. We provide a wide variety of services. Represented either by a prairie member. A member of the wider community. But we don't have our minister regina still so i can tell you that we're searching for a new minister. Today we have a member of the wider community. And it's reverent the reverend kaylin free stuff. Think i pronounce today right who will be presenting universalism past present and powerful and his wife is here as well. Reverend priesthood has copies of his book destined for salvation on sale on the lobby along with cd copies of today's sermon and others he's given. You probably noticed that on your way in please feel free to peruse available selection after. Our opening words will be read by toby wacker. Go out into the highways and byways give the people something of your nuvision you may possess a small light but uncover it let it shine use it in order to bring more light and understanding to the hearts and minds of men and women give them not help but hope and courage speech the kindness and everlasting love of god. Thank you toby. So now we invite kids and parents up to the front of the room for the children's story which will be shared today by. Both. I see some more kids owal i'll try to speak loudly. Now. This story is about. The first universalist minister in this country. And in this story. There's a talk about a place called hell. Does anybody has anybody ever heard about that word before raise your hand if you have. Well it's a place where bad people go after they die but you know we don't believe in hell so don't worry okay this is a story about a man called john murray. Over 200 years ago when the united states of america was still the 13 colonies there lived a man named john murray. John murray and his wife. Eliza lives in the country of england. They were very religious people. Every sunday they got up early. God's wrath. Ate their breakfast and went to church. Sometimes sometimes john murray would preach a sermon and talk to the people about god. Now their church was not a place to be happy no one smiled. No one smiled knowingly laughed knowing sang because the followers of that religion called calvinism believed that almost all the people were going to hell. No matter what people did even if they were really really nice and try really really hard to be good they still couldn't go to heaven. No matter what. And so the religion in that church was a very serious business and the people were expected to be serious too. But one day. John and eliza mary. Heard of a man named mister riley. Mr. riley was of a different religion. A religion that said people didn't have to go to hell. A religion where people could be happy. Finally after talking about it for weeks. John and eliza decided to listen to what mr riley had to say. The next sunday they got up early. Gatra. Ate their breakfast. And they went to mr. riley's church instead of their own. At that church people smiled. Someone actually laugh. When it came time for the sermon mr riley got up to preeti said. God loves all his children. God doesn't have favorites. Everyone. Everyone in the universe has the chance to go to be to go to heaven. And be safe from the fires of hell. Salvation is universal. Mr. reilly was he universalist. And after hearing his sermon john and eliza decided they were universalist to. But the people at their old church weren't universalist. List of marie they said very stern. Have you and your wife been going to hear that heretic mister riley. Yes sir we have answered john murray. And do you believe such nonsense. That all people have a chance to be saved. Yes sir sui do. Mr. murray they said at all. You mustn't say such things. Yes sir john murray we must. And they said oh no you won't. And he said oh yes i will and they said well. You can't stay there you can't say them here. You and your wife both have to leave. Poor john and eliza marie. None of their old friends would talk to them and they were lonely and sad. Then eliza had. Had a baby which made them happy for a while. But then the baby got sick. And eliza got sick. And john had to borrow money to pay for the doctors. He borrow more and more money. And went to more and more doctors. But they couldn't help. His wife and his baby died. And then he was arrested. Because he couldn't pay that the money he owed. So they're john maurice at all alone in his cell. With no job no money no family and no friends. He decided he had failed god and fails his family and failed himself. He decided he was never going to be part of the church again. He decided he was never going to preach again. Ever. After few days. Eliza's brother paid the money that john owed. And so john was set free. But john wasn't happy in england anymore. He wanted a new life in a new land. He bought a ticket on the sailing ship. Hand in hand. This ship had great white sale that were filled by the wind. And the wind blew and blue. The wind blew john murray all the way across the atlantic ocean. Far away from england into a new land. But the wind. Blue john murray to a place he hadn't planned to go. He ended up in new jersey instead of new york the hand-in-hand became stranded on a sandbar off the coat. And the sailors couldn't move the ship because the wind kept blowing them in fisher. Because there wasn't much food on a ship john murray climbed out and waited ashore through a marsh. Near barnegat bay he met a farmer named thomas part of potter. Who invited him into his house and gave him supper. Mel thomas potter. Also believe in a loving god. And he believed in universal salvation. People legion it's so much. The ten years before john murray had showed up on his doorstep blown in by the wind. Thomas potter had built a little church all by himself. He had been waiting for 10 years. And waiting for the right preacher to come. And now the preacher was here. But john murray didn't want to preach. Not at all. Thomas potter argue with him and talk to him and prayed over him. And still john murray didn't want to preach. I swore i would never preach again john murray said ever. But thomas potter said. I believe. Set the wind that brought you here to my door was the breath of god. I believe god sent you here to preach in the church i built. I believe that the wind will never change. Until you have preached a message from god. Tell me sir if that when does not change by sunday morning. Would you take that as a sign from god himself that you should preach again. John marry thought and thought about that and finally. He said. I will. The wind blew. The wind blew and blue for days and it kept the boat from leaving the shore. The wind didn't change. So. On sunday morning on the 30th of september. In the year 1770. Well that when was still blowing. John murray got up early. Got dressed ate his breakfast and went to church and he preached in the church thomas potter had built. And a priest of a loving and caring god. Kate priest of universal salvation. The idea that all people everywhere in the universe. Could go to heaven and be saved. He said. You possess only a small light. But uncover it let it shine. And afterward. When the people came to him and thank him for his sermon john murray changed. He changed his mind about joining a church again. And he changed his mind about being a preacher. In 1779 in the town of gloucester massachusetts. John murray became the minister. Of the very first organized. Universalist church in america. He traveled and preached in many places. In the united states. And became known as one of the founders. Of american universalism. The church the thomas potter doesn't build. Doesn't exist anymore. It was torn down years ago. But universalists are still there. Unitarian universalist now. If you go to a new jersey. They're on the shores of barnegat bay. You can stay at a special unitarian universalist retreat center. Named marie grill. In honor of john murray. The man who decided to preach again. And to let his light shine. God like to introduce our speaker today reverend kaelyn friestedt is an ordained united methodist minister and i didn't mention to you that my father was as well. After serving churches in iowa for 27 years he embarked upon an independent ministry he conducted this ministry full-time from 2003 until 2006. It consisted of traveling around the country with his wife darlene accepting invitations to speak at churches. And other groups. How to get a teaching that many people will suffer eternity in hell instead for claiming the hopeful message of universalism. Darling could you raise your hand so we know where you are there she is. He went back to the perry's ministry in july 2006 and then since as of january 2008. But continuing to serve some churches and iowa part-time can use them just traveling ministry. Spending halftime on the road speaking on the subject of universalism. And i think the way he does this is he spends a few months at 1 shirt that has churches in iowa and then he. He travels like maybe he goes to. Florida or maybe he goes to someplace like here so. It's a great privilege and a pleasure to be with you today i love you you churches and i've spoken at. Somewhere around 90 uu churches around the country. And i don't know what the record is for the most uu churches for anyone has spoken but i'm working on it. Panda it is his great and i celebrate that with you. What i served the united methodist church in dallas center iowa. I became acquainted with auu minister in des moines. And when she realized that i believed in universalism she invited me to attend a special service that they're going to be having. There's going to be a small town of mitchellville which is just east of des moines. And it was to be in a church building that was originally a universalist church. Without a congregation there at this time. But they have the tradition of having a service there one sunday each summer as a way of celebrating their universalist heritage. And so i was happy to accept the invitation to join them for that service. And i always remember as i walked up the walk in front of that church over-the-door read universalist church. And i thought i have arrived at home. Universalism has been really important to me for a long time and as a result i wrote a book on the subject and. Spent three years traveling full time speaking and now halftime we're in our fourth year of half-time speaking around the country. We we had. The opportunity to spend two months in florida speaking during his last winter so that was kind of talked to take i know but while you all were suffering up here maybe some of you were in florida as well i don't know but. Today i'd like to speak on the subject on on the history and the significance of the teaching of universalism. It is sometimes referred to as universal salvation sidelock like to offer a definition of salvation that's probably different from what you've heard from other sources. You're probably aware that at least among conservative christians. The definition of salvation would be to accept jesus as your personal savior so you can go to heaven when you die. Well i believe that's not a very adequate understanding of salvation and so i definition that works for me is salvation is to learn and grow either without with or without divine influence. So as to experience the fullness of life. In this life and beyond. And if you don't believe in the divine or if you don't believe in life after death. You can just leave those parts off the definition. That i think it to me that's the most basic understanding of salvation. And.so in contrast to what many people believe i reject the idea that a lot of people will spend eternity suffering in hell. Instead i believe that everyone will eventually experience salvation or fullness of life. And whether that takes place in this life or sometime after this life. I don't know but i am confident everyone will eventually experience salvation or fullness of life. During the time of the early church it was commonly taught in the religions of the day that most people would spend eternity suffering in hell. That there was at least one exception and they were the zoroastrians they were universalist and that's a wonderful thing a lot of people would spend eternity in hell. Instead it's clear from many passages in the bible that jesus taught that everyone would eventually experience fullest of life. In the environment though where it was commonly believed that the majority of people probably the vast majority would spend eternity suffering in hell. It was hard to convince a lot of people otherwise. It's over there where many people are at least a good number of people who were converted to christianity. But they weren't fully converted. They continue to hang onto their belief of endless suffering of many people beyond death. But there were a lot of people who are fully converted. And it may have been the majority or maybe even the vast majority of the early christians where it where universal has. There was a clementon origin of alexander. And they they. Did i say that right. Alexandria. I serve at church in alexander iowa is alexandria in egypt anyway. They were strong leaders and theologians during the time of the early church. And there were others including gregory of nyssa ambrose bishop of milan and jerome who translated the bible into latin which is known as the vulgate. Never women strong women that leaders in the universalist movement among the early christians. Others macrina the younger and macrina the elder. I guess they weren't very imaginative with their names but they are considered. Top participants in terms of spreading the message of universalism and they are considered saints in the roman catholic church today is that cool. As i said though there were some people who weren't fully converted. Tertullian was one example of that. He became a christian at age 40 and he continued to believe that there was that many people would suffer forever in hell. Fact he shall relish the idea of people suffering in hell that he said he believed that one of the best things about heaven would be the superb view of the damned frying in hell. Consult relish the idea of so many people suffering excruciating torment forever. Theologian augustine was another person who wasn't fully converted. He became a christian at age 32 and he held onto his belief of endless suffering of many people beyond death but augustine lived in the latter part of the 4th century and into the 5th century. But he was a pretty decent theologian in many respects and so it's not surprising that is his theology started to become dominant in the church at that time will by the 6th century. That because his said that the ology becoming increasingly more prevalent and dominant in the church. That generator division and controversy over the issue of universal like something. Well in order to resolve this controversy the roman emperor justinian called a church council. It was a fifth acumenical council in the year 553. Now does it seem a little strange to you that a roman emperor would call a church meeting well it makes perfect sense when you think about the fact that emperor's like to control people right that's a given a like to control people and the people had back then had learned that threatening people with eternal damnation is a foolproof means of controlling them that sounds familiar. But the problem is the emperor and the hellraisers of the day they advocates of an ending suffering of many people in hell. They were having trouble controlling those free-spirited universalist. They can threaten them with unending hell all they wanted they didn't take it seriously be a allied himself with the advocates of the teaching of on ending hell. And together they push through a resolution which abolished the teaching of universalism. What's that surprising that with the power of the church as well as the state against the teaching the teaching of universalism pretty well died out after that. And went underground or dormant it continued for about 1,000 years. You can't suppress the truth indefinitely right eventually it'll start bubbling up some place. And that's what happened about three hundred years ago it really started before 300 years ago but about 300 years ago it started to become a strong movement again. John wesley who is the primary of founder of the methodist or movement leader of the methodist movement back in 18th century. He had a close association with a group of christians called the moravians feather moravian for universalist. But wesley used to argue with them he thought they were really wrong. But he continued his his lifelong association with the mehrabian's and it seems that they eventually wore him down. Cuz he too came to bleed and universal is coming. I love to tell united methodist that wesley came to believe in universalism late in his life. And that is because in the united methodist church. The the most conservative people in the church are the ones who are the most likely to reject the teaching of universal arizona at the same time they could often be heard to say let's go back and re-establish the teachings of john wesley. The american colonies proved to be a particularly fertile ground for the spread of the teaching of universalism. George de bonneville came over from france in 1741 and and he spread the teaching it through a good part of pennsylvania. Although i don't think he's necessarily starting any churches or anything like that but he didn't need to spread the message of universalism. But then john murray come came over in 1770 and we had the wonderful message the story of his arrival. And i had the privilege of couple three years ago of preaching at the church that he found it in in gloucester massachusetts. That's wonderful and it's very very pretty and the church is magnificent you ought to go sometime chance. Jean-marie worked closely with the quakers and the baptist in spreading the teaching of universalism throughout the american colonies. That might seem a little strange that he worked closely with the baptists you could understand that he would work closely with the quakers because a lot of quakers yet today or quite receptive to the teaching of universalism. But unfortunately the baptist's are a little different situation at least among the southern baptist but the american baptist. And there's a growing number of southern baptists are starting to see the light. That's because they've been taught all their lives. That god is love. And they're starting to think it does that really square with the idea of god sending people to hell forever or if people end up there of their own free will just abandoning them forever that doesn't make sense. And so there's still a small percent. But it's a significant group of people who are starting to becoming universalist from among fundamentalist churches. Anyway mary work closely with the quakers in the baptist. Spreading the teaching of universalism men and it was under his leadership that the universalist church in america was organized. As in the early church there were women involved in the movement strong leaders including hanna whitehall smith. Olympia brown. Who was the first woman to be ordained in any major denomination which is in in. In 1863. And i'm scheduled to speak at the church this name that where she served him in racine. I'm going to be speaking there later this summer. And that the church is named after her and and she served it for 10 years or more i think. Anyway so it's a wonderful thing. Jose blue was the most prominent leader in the universalist church during his life and ministry. And when he died in 1850 to the universalist church had about 800,000 members. So it was a strong movement to be sure. The date hasn't been promoted only by universalists or unitarians for that matter. But i've been promoted by leaders and theologians from other denominations as well. For example back in the nineteenth century there was a german theologian named friedrich schleiermacher i wonder how many. But he was a fine theologian a strong advocate of universalism besides that i just like to say his name. Dietrich bonhoeffer leslie weatherhead and others. So the teaching of universalism has a long rich history. For more than five hundred years following the time of jesus and then especially again in the last 300 years. Unfortunately that's really not our doctor in terraria official beliefs in the church said to believe in universalism. But i find a lot of united methodist who do believe it there's a lot of closet universalist church. But they don't often openly admit it because they're afraid other people will criticize them or not like them or something. This is very important to me because it seems to me that the teaching of a god of eternal damnation has prevailed for far too long in most churches and in our society at large. And with devastating consequences. What are the consequences in one of the reasons this is so important to me is the teaching of a god of eternal damnation turns many people away from god. People know that they would never ever punish their own children without end. And so they just can't relate to a guy do people say does that very same thing. So the teaching of a god of eternal damnation turns many people away from god. Sometimes they become atheist. I need to acknowledge that i've learned a lot about atheism from you use and ungrateful when we went on the road i thought i knew something about atheist course i did know a little but not very much. I met a lot of wonderful atheist and do your chores around of concrete is just been a great joy of my life quite frankly. I met a lot of people at wonderful people of the variety of states in uu churches of course. Start learning from the atheist. Thetford for many of them they find it to be a thoughtful responsible but your way to approach life and it works for them. It's over people for whom atheism works i don't have any difficulty at all with that. But in other denominations it's not always such a positive thing when a person becomes an atheist. That's because they still having the back of the mind the possibility of spending eternity in hell and if there's no god to rescue them from that plight than they conclude that they are doomed and that leads to despair and meaninglessness. A lot of churches people go to church only at christmas and easter that wouldn't happen in a church for the reasons i'm going to mention it. Another fraps half the population that doesn't go to church at all not even at christmas and easter. And i've spoken to a lot of fun church people in and they so often bring up the idea of spending eternity in hell that it obviously it's an issue that weighs heavily upon them. And it seems that that somebody will have will agree with him to tell him that it ain't so. Punish them forever because they were naughty. Oregon is not too weak and stupid and powerless god we just allows people to go floundering around through life and somehow of their own free will end up in hell and then just abandon them there. What kind of a god is that who in their right mind would want to serve a monster guy who throws people into hell the torture them because they were naughty. Or couldn't you couldn't care less if people end up in hell of their own free will and just abandon them there we have what loving parent would do that with with her own children. So many people are not aware that there are are progressive and open-minded that united methodist and presbyterian and lutheran episcopal and united church of christ that's everything as well as your you at churches. They're not aware that there are churches that teach love instead of judgment that teacher hope instead of damnation. Until they drop out of church altogether. Well want to make the world a better place. But it seems to me that we're not going to have much success in doing this as long as the teaching of a god of eternal damnation continues to prevail in most churches and in our society at large. And that is because people's perception of god is a powerful and direct influence on how they live their lives. If people believe that god is judgmental and condemning and cruel it's very easy to justify living that same way themselves. It's like the old song one tin soldier goes. Go ahead and hate your neighbor go ahead and cheat a friend. Do it in the name of heaven. You can justify it in the end. Sadly i see people in our own country and around the world every day. Sticking to justify evil behavior in the name of heaven in the name of god and it's much easier to do that that we believe that god is judgmental and condemning and cruel. On the other hand if we believe that god is loving and kind and merciful and gracious and patient and until i'm. They're much more likely to reflect that in our lives as well. During the civil war abraham lincoln was was sometimes criticized because he loved his enemies too much. He was told you should love your enemies you should seek to destroy them. To which you replied do i not destroy my enemies when i make them my friends. Does that powerful do i not destroy my enemies when i make them my friends. Abraham lincoln was a universalist. ejected the teaching of a god of eternal damnation he believed in the power of love and the preciousness of each individual and the end and the everyone would eventually experience fullness of life. And so as a result he could love even his enemies. And what a difference that made and how he lived his life. I believe we who are universalists who believe in the preciousness of each individual and the power of love. We have. I believe we are called to live the same way that abraham lincoln did. And as a result we can rise above being judgemental and cruel and transform the world to love. Sowega believe in universalism who believe in the preciousness of each individual. I do believe in the power of love. Have a wonderful message to share with the world and it's powerfully important that we do so. There's a man named robert short who wrote a book called something to believe in a wonderful book on universalism. And he says there's too much at stake for us to allow ourselves to be intimidated by the wrathful self-righteousness of the hell-raising gloomy do me. Fundamentals can be intimidating can't pay. They go around quoting the bible and asking people whether or not they're saved they can be intimidating. But i say let's not be intimidated by then. After all we are the ones with a good news to share with the world. Then contrast for the message that is divisive and leads to cruel and inhuman behavior and justifies abuse. What the perception of the fundamentalist it really isn't that big of a deal to go to war to kill people of other faiths or people who don't have a particular faith because they believe. I think without feeling guilty it's as if they were christians. Also. What that what the perception of the fundamentalist. Santa is really no big deal to torture people whether that's at guantanamo bay or wherever after all they contend that god fashioned hell specifically for the purpose of torturing naughty people forever. Ab okay for god to torture people that surely must be okay for us to do it. Besides that the torture that we might inflict upon people whether that's waterboarding or whatever is nothing compared to the torture that they say that that god is going to inflict upon people forever in a lake of fire no less. So will you believe and universal is coming who believe in the preciousness of each individual to believe in the power of love. Have a wonderful message to share with the world. So it's important that we not be intimidated by the hellraisers. The teaching of a god of eternal damnation leads to wars and and racism and oppression and abuse. While the spread of the teaching of universalism leads to equality respect. Love and dignity for all. So i say let's not be intimidated by the hellraisers. Instead let us freely and boldly proclaim to the world the wonderful message of universalism. And the world will be infinitely better off because of it. Well you know we have discussion so we have about 5 minutes or so and. What are the things i've learned about you user from you used is that they tend to not be very pushy when it comes to spreading. Good news. other people and part of it is in reaction to so-called evangelicals who are fundamentalist who can be really pushy in in regard to sharing the faith. I encourage you to somehow get beyond that but you can. To realize that you truly have good news. To share with the world. And and your neighbors. And enters no reason for you to be intimidated. And there will be opportunities. They know you're a member of the uu church and i think you're all going to hell cuz you're misleading miss so misguided the right i mean is not a common understanding. At least i know some people believe that. And. Because you don't believe as they do in insulting. It's typical for the subject to come up among neighbors among co-workers and sometimes and family. I know you have to be diplomatic in your you don't want to run all your friends off.. To realize that you really do have good news to share. The message of love the power of love. Of course if you were loving people and you'll try to share that gently and kindly but i think it's really important to do that. That's good point cuz labels tend to divide. Unfortunately. I think i'm labels can instruct help assorted get give us some identity or whatever but i guess. Yes i spoke at it at a church in riverside california. Where that where. The minister said they really don't talk about heaven or hell or or universalism. They just sort of assumed everybody believes it the minister believes it and she assumed that everybody else did. And in bed. She splits has it at first even invite me taking what we don't even need to hear what you have to say caswell believing universalism. Why preached it. Banda pouring of gratitude they said no one's ever said anything like that in the church before i never heard of such a thing before and so while the minister of universalism. Spreading the good news. Mini concepts terms gahanna. That is an example. Myself. There are some words that are translated to hell in some translations but not others so it is not a clear thing. Do i really aren't a lot of references quite frankly to hell and and then ones. The ones that there are in many cases there's no indication that it's it's without in. And now they temporary house are like the catholic purgatory concept you know where you go there for a while and you showed it straightened out and then year. Thanks so much for coming please extend the hand of friendship to those around you and join us for coffee and conversation with you.

uuprairie_org

Pr150111RobinProud-ed.mp3

Well good morning welcome everyone great to see so many smiling faces out there. My name is stan phone i'm the provider today i'm not the minister or minister will be. Speaking of next week next week. Reverend sandy ingham anyway i'll prairie aspires to be an open-minded and open-hearted community. Are we walking people of every ethnic and religious background regardless of sexual orientation color. Our gender or family structure and no matter what your age or abilities or inability so welcome. Maybe be reminded here of our highest aspirations. And inspired to bring our gifts of love and service to the altar of humanity. May we know once again that we are not isolated being. But connected. In mystery and miracle to the universe. To this community and to each other. Well we have a member of our congregation is no stranger to the podium and i happens to my wife. I don't know what i have to say let's see maybe something about her that you don't know. Passionate about his reading and so i think she has something to say about that. And please welcome robin pro. Good morning. But everything i was doing i didn't put on my name tag but. Here prairie we have items that are name tags that indicate something about us. My husband's got music i see marilyn there with the dogs. We've got people that have canoes and gardens at all kinds of things in my house books. Took a whole different for me to be up here usually i'm bringing you some of my series on the famous women we've never heard of. But this time. There's something else that i really wanted to share and this will be interactive that you'll get a chance to share something at the end. I don't remember learning how to read. Apparently my brother who was two years older came home from school and he shared with me the immortal pros. Look jane see spot run and i somehow picked that up i was about 4. We lived on a farm in a remote area of pennsylvania in the nearest library was in a town about 15 miles away and wasn't very big and there was no such thing at that time is interlibrary loan. So i think that the children's section was just a few bookshelves sort of of the size of the one back there which i have read through many times we didn't have a lot of money for books and it wasn't as easy to. There weren't a lot of places around to purchase books. I had something that belonged to my mother. And even her father which was wonderful. And i read some of those over and over but then i realized that a lot of times for children even if they have many books at their disposal they do enjoy reading the same ones again so that was not a differentiation. However when i was 10. We move to the city of philadelphia that's a whole other story but they're the main public library is a huge stone building. And the children's room alone was about six times as big as that whole. Small town library had been i thought it was in heaven. I've always loved reading. Sometimes i've had to adapt. When i had two small children a magazine article was about as long as i can get through without interruption. So what my kids got into school and i started working full-time in a business office. I thought it was terrific that i got to have a 15-minute break where i could just go and sit and read. I almost lost my love of reading once and that was because i went to graduate school studying literature it's soon like this theory that if you catch your child smoking you should force him to spokeo. But then we had to take them apart and. According to the prevailing trends which. What things like freudianism marxism structuralism. But i even bounced back from that eventually. Over the years. As i've been reading i've also regularly heard the opinion that people who eat a lot of redheads anti-social loner to cope with the real world or trying to escape. But that wasn't my experience. I felt like i got more connected to the world through reading. Prince and some years ago i read a novel by marge piercy called the longings of women now i don't think it's one of her best books but. I still remember that there was one character who was a middle-class woman named mary and through a series of. Events. She loses her husband and her home. The description of what she has to do to get through the day in the boston area where she lives when she's not allowed to sit down lie down or wash in any public place. Really stuck with me. And give me a visceral experience of homelessness that i wouldn't have gotten from articles with statistics. In the same way i think i paid more attention to the war in afghanistan after i read the kite runner. Now this might seem shallow but it makes sense to me. Justice you might care more about looking at the news from a certain place if you have a friend or cousin living there. Well i had that says like oh i know someone from there. I think that journalists actually. Our understanding that power and that's why what we seeing long-form journalism is more of a narrative with continuing characters and. Story development. What many other people report similar experiences. I want a woman shared about. What you said was it book saved her from racism. She grew up in a white family in the south end for family was very short of how. Racial inequality was supposed to be. But she read to kill a mockingbird and then later she read james baldwin toni morrison other riders and she saw that there were other views. But all this of course is just personal anecdotal evidence by a few people. So i was delighted to start seeing articles. In the last couple of years. About studies linking reading and empathy. In 2006. Keith whitley and raymond mar from the university of toronto. Published a study on this topic. It what they did the assessed volunteers according to how much do rad and if they read fiction or nonfiction. And they tested the participants ani-motion perception and social cognition. So how do you do that. They had a couple of tests one of them they showed photos with just the eyes and they asked a participant. What emotion is this person feeling. Is this the person. Frightened. Or joyful or angry. They also showed video clips and they asked about interactions of the people. In the scenes. Olean marr found that the more fiction people read the better they were at perceiving emotions and interpreting social cues. But they just prove a causal link it certainly makes sense that people who are already interested in emotions and relationships would read a lot of fiction because that's often what it's about. So detest that in 2009 the same two researchers took a new group of 252 adults. They measured the participants ahead of time for traits such as extraversion agreeableness and conscientiousness. And they stuffed their social networks to see how connected they were to other people. They found a significant relation between the amount of fiction people read and their empathetic abilities. Also they found that people who read mostly fiction. Far from being loners or escapists. We're actually less socially isolated then nonfiction readers. There. Position was at reading fiction affects what is called theory of mind. The ability to recognize. And take on the perspective of other people. Recent brain research has enabled researchers to see that there's an effective reading when someone reads he threw the ball. Regions associated with our movements. Are activated in the brain when the sentences he kick the ball. Regions associated with leg movements. Light up in the same way. So and also reading about experiences or emotions of characters triggers those emotions in the brain. So. If the does make sense certainly people who like to read romance feel that they get to fall in love again and people don't like to read thrillers get the. Adrenaline rush. Without having to be in danger. In 2013 to other researchers. From the new school for social research in new york city. Recruited subjects for their experiment to amazon.com. Participants ranged from 18 to 75 years old. They were paid a small amount to $3 to read. For short. it was under 30 minutes. Summer and excerpts from literary fiction. For example one of them was the roundhouse by louise erdrich which is perfect book by the way. Others might popular fiction such as romance or science fiction. And some red nonfiction articles and they specifically chose them without. Human characters are friends until the potato change the world. After reading they took the emotion perception test which was i reading test. The researchers found that those who read the literary fiction scored better than those who read popular fiction or nonfiction or nothing at all. And this happened even when people said they didn't particularly enjoy reading the literary fiction. In popular fiction. The emphasis on the plot usually so the motors and desires of the characters are tolls in the reader by the author. In literary fiction the researchers said the incompleteness of the characters. Change your mind to trying to understand the minds of others. These results imply that people can be prime for social skills and when it came out it was written in the new york times it said well if you're going on a date or to an interview perhaps you should sit down and read some. Jane austen or the wizard. Some other writer. But there's so many questions. How long does that affect last. And isn't analysis of faces and videos which are visual even a good way to test overall empathy. This is work for children. Well for the last question there was a study done. Dr. moore from the original study in toronto that a team that studied preschool children. They found that the more fictional stories preschoolers heard. And the more fictional movies they saw the better they did on tests of children's theory of mind now the way they did that test is. They have a puppet and say all this puppet really loves broccoli it like broccoli better than cookies then as they're playing to ask which snack the puppet should have. And the fact that the child could understand that the puppet might like something different from what the child would pick. Shows that they were able to understand theory of mind. Well the children who watch tv did not have the same results possibly because tv shows tend to be simpler. And prevent fewer opportunities to take on another point of view. Dr. oakley has written. Fiction is the original virtual reality. Fiction is about possible selves. Impossible worlds. It's a bit ironic that we're discovering the importance of fiction for children at a time when education reforms. Are exciting nonfiction. I am understanding is that some places classes words to be practical materials like user manual. Now what we need to know those things what could really be more practical than learning to understand and care about other people. Sweetwater press in the last few years about this whole endeavor. An article from the boston globe from april 2012 states. Research shows that fiction does mold us. The more deeply we are cast under a story spell. The more potent it's insolence. In fact fiction seems to be more effective at changing beliefs. The nonfiction. Which is designed to persuade two argument evidence. Studies show that we read nonfiction. Weary with our shields up. But when we are absorbed into story we drop our intellectual guard. We are moved emotionally. And that seems to make us rubbery and easy to shave. Gyptian enhances our ability to understand other people. It promotes a deep morality that cuts across religious and political creed. So that was the writer for the boston globe. This isn't a totally new concept play-doh wanted to ban novels from his republic because he thought they had too much influence over citizens. Jane austen 300 years ago has a character say in northanger abbey which is largely about books. Only a novel. Only some working with. The greatest powers of the mind are displayed. In which the most thorough knowledge of human nature. Happiest delineation of its varieties. The liveliest effusions of wit and humour. Are conveyed to the world in the best chosen language. Stories can change our views. Studies show that when we watch a tv show or read a book that treats the gay families positively our own views are likely to move in that direction. Uncle tom's cabin famously stirred up anti-slavery sentiment. However it could work both ways when we talked about becoming rubbery. Gone with the wind contains a justification for the ku klux klan and. Many people claim their philosophy comes from the novels of ayn rand now that's what author i have not read but my impression is that empathy is not one of her values. And why does empathy matter so much so. And what am i talking about this at all i have heard from some people who feel that when we have our book sharing sundays at that's not really an appropriate topic for a sunday morning because it's really not spiritual. Now. But what i want to specifically talk about is why this connects to what i believe. Then we had a little panel here about what i believe. I called myself a humanist. And as such i feel the highest value is empathy. The first uu principle the words and dignity of every individual certainly stems from that. But i think that. This underground all of our principles. When we talk about. Encouraging each other in spiritual growth about compassion about the rights of the individual. All of those exist within empathy. Give me the seventh principle about the interdependent web of which we are a part is a larger field of empathy. And in my opinion just about every evil stems from a lack of empathy. If we have empathy we don't bully people. We don't blame them for their misfortunes. And we certainly don't torture them. I personally think that tortures about the greatest failure of empathy there is even more than killing. It's incest such as one of the few things that i just can't read about infection i have to serve skip over sometimes. Some people have things where they can't read about an animal being hurt for instance or children in pearland i just. Have a lot of trouble with deliberately gilbert cruelty. Other places. Last night some of us went to see the movie selma. V. Differentiation between races can only happen when you make that person other than you and needs are not able to put yourself in their place. As i was preparing this talk i continue to see relevant information on new york times article on december 11th show that. Gateway medical canvassers who had respectful face-to-face discussions with voters. Shifted the views of voters on gay marriage by about 20% in a lasting way and also often affected other people in that household. This didn't happen when the canvassers were straight people. Or when temperatures were talking about non personal issues like recycling. Although if peter would say that's a spiritual issue as well but what moves people was really someone telling his or her own story that's why this was so effective was that people were able to come around and say this is our story and this is who we are and that's what got people to ship their opinions. And it just a couple sundays ago the times had an essay called how reading transforms us it was co-authored by dr. keith only was one of the leaders of the original study that i decided. And its focus was on how reading not only gets us to think about it understand other people better but also to think about and understand ourselves. That's what other area. Don't you have some caveat. These studies were done with relatively small sample. And even though the researchers controlled for personality traits. If the subjects were taken from university students which is often the case. Or even shoppers on amazon they may not have totally reflected the general population. And i also want to tom leavitt who i don't think it's here today because i was with dad biography. Can certainly serve the same purpose biography is. Telling us a person story with all its complications. For history well-written princes by doris kearns goodwin. Can also give us a chance to get into the world of another person another time and place we might have a simple view of lincoln that we learned in school and let me read her biography there's so much more and it's not all. Consistent just like the rest of us. So it is not that only reading fiction is is what causes this. But he has to do with away that's written and none of this is to disparage or discourage the reading of quality non-fiction we definitely need quality information we need opinions and science. And after all that's what i'm presenting today. Is probably world of nonfiction. So i'll close the section. With another anecdote of a reader's experience that was sheridan online book room. I'm quite addicted to the site goodreads. I used to recommend it wholeheartedly it has been acquired by amazon a few years ago so i'm not sure i recommend it quite as wholeheartedly but i do i do enjoy lot of things on there i belong to one group where we are reading all the books of dickens in the order they were written and we're reading them kind of the way they came out 40 or 50 pages at a time so that it doesn't take over your whole life however this is it. And different many years. But the wonderful thing about this group is that we have people around the world doing this we have a retired professor of english in england will post something with a picture of the area that's in the book and we have young people who have never read this before and. People who. Comforter background so it's really been delightful and i'll be giving a presentation on dickens as a result of that sometime this year. And then. In some other book groups online i've just heard some wonderful stories in this one. Wasn't he in a long career in engineering in both military and civilian life was very accomplished highly intelligent he read a lot of science technology and other nonfiction works. But he couldn't understand how anyone could waste your time reading silly made-up stories. Then one day he was in a summer cottage with nothing to read. His college-age daughter had left behind a copy of emma by jane austen so he started to read it. At first it was challenging for him to get used to this different type of writing. But has he got into it. He was amazed at how absorbing it was and how much. Here. About the characters and what happened to them. He had no idea that reading put engage the emotions. And he himself posted this what he said when he got to the end he was laughing crying and jumping around the room he discovered he was a romantic at heart he went on to meet everything by jane austen and anyone like her. And i kind of envy him this discovery it's a bit like the wizard of oz where she goes into black and white it all this color is there and only discovered by jane austen today and i read it. I would love that but i would have some idea how was going to turn out he really had no idea how this is going to turn out so this is so exciting. Noticed changes life in other ways. He didn't say that but i have to think that being in touch with his emotions in this way. Do novels had to rub off on his ability to express himself with his family and friends. And just the fact that he shared the story online with rick dukto and he's a probably a regular reviewer now of historical romances. So now i can get you a very fun part of the program i'd like to invite you to share with us a book that changed your life it doesn't have to be fiction. Although from what we've seen i think that's more likely but i'll give you a couple of brief examples. The summer before i went to college i read war and peace. I totally changed my course schedule in order to study russian because i was so fascinated by this book. Now this would be a better story if i travel to russia or married a russian or something like that but none of that happened. Maybe another example little roundabout is i read the mists of avalon around 1990 and that's a story about king arthur told from the point-of-view of all the women in the book. It's i thought it was terrific. But it was me even more with there's an afterword where she mentioned that modern groups had reintroduced. Some of these pagan goddess traditions. That was totally new to me i was intrigued and researching that further actually led me to one of the first talks i gave at the unitarian church that i belong to it that time so. You may have something else. Even more striking about how a book. Engaged you. A wonderful book that i have dimension is a book of quotations by women that my husband gave me many years ago and i use all the time when i do my shocks hear this from virginia woolf. What's the day of judgement john's in the great conquerors and lawyers and statesman come to receive their awards their crowns their morals their names carved indelibly upon imperishable marble. The old lady will turn to peter and we'll say. Not without a certain envy. What he sees us coming with our books under our arms. These need no reward. We have nothing to give them here. They have loved reading please greet your neighbor and stay after afterwards for coffee and i believe we have some baked goods to buy thank you for coming.

uuprairie_org

Pr141207Haydock-ed.mp3

Welcome prairie unitarian universalist society i'm mary mullen a member of the program committee. Aprea supposed to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded. Congregation and we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color your sexual orientation. Your gender of family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age. Your inability or your abilities. Later in the service will invite our visitors guests and returning friends. To introduce yourself so that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services and other presented by a prairie member as true today. A member of the wider community or our minister sandra ingham. Today can haydock will be presenting. A service and quakers. Please welcome pam and gary gates toledo chalice. We like this chalice to find inner peace. Love for each other and faith in ourselves. Also to be welcoming to whomever we meet and kind to all living creatures. So gather around this light of hope as we share this time together. It's from the oberlin uu fellowship middle school face development class. Next part 2 come on. And that will be the presentation by ken hey. i was not given a. Description of ken to read you but i know that ken has been. Coming to prairie for several years now i know he's going to turn on. Have you spoken to us several times and everyone. Always likes to hear him speak because he's well-organized he's always knows he always has a lot to say. And i think i think this is true that he. That something about quakers down in. Pacifica high school class. And he wanted to share what he learned. With us and so i think we have a lot to look forward to so i can head back and i like those. Camp is the microphone working. Okay. I carefully chose as the title of his quakers is not everything you could possibly know about. It's not possible in the in the time. Allotted to do justice to other over 350 year history. All of the religious society of friends. Open parenthesis. Quakers. Close parenthesis. Part of a couple of talks today. Right now i want to talk briefly about some parallels between unitarian universalist. Hand. Most breakers in north america today. And then i'm going to launch into a brief run. Through the first three hundred years of history. But as reflected in the lives of some specific waker some of them famous some of them really obscure. All but what i'd like you to consider when we get into that. Is what these people what concerned these people and what experience are they having. And i think that will reflect a lot more quicker history than i'm no specific lee. Me after this service. And a potluck lunch in this room. There will be a meeting of the eunice union of madison. And they're going to talk about something which i discovered in the choices of preparing for this.. Which is how in recent history. The religious society of friends came to function. As5. Distinct and different denominations. All all of the religious society of friends and i used the word denominations are there. That's an interesting history as well. I'll blood. Unitarian universalist all quakers. Do not impose a creed. As a condition of membership. Moose. Unitarian universalist in. All north america today i think you can fairly say. Are very similar in terms of demographics. Education politics socio-economics that is that sir. Unitarian universalist association of congregations has set out. Seven principles. That. Inform unitarian universalist belief and practice. They are posted. Around this room. Personal excite i'd like to think of them when they are posted this way. As the stations of the chalice that's just me. Most quakers in north america. Embrace a shortlist. All examples of quaker witness or for quaker values. And they are. Simplicity. Peace. Tegrity. Community. Equality. Is very little there nothing that i can think of the conflicts. With the seven. Principles. The principles. 6 values. Are the value of integrity which i should honor here. Which is me. Part of the reason of there will be only one him today is i i wanted to buy more time. It's not a simplicity of all tied together. Now also. Among the groups within the religious society friends north america again. Aldara couple that all are known as liberal quakers capital l capital q. And all of these are mainly focused who remembers of monthly meetings. Bob. West of the rockies the green independent. And a monthly meetings that are found across america affiliated with the friends general conference just so you know. Details. After lunch. These groups have in recent decades. Beginning to accept. As full members. How much is monitoring universalist have in in recent years. Folks who are not. Traditional protestant theist. And just as it is possible as the unitarian universalist year will know to be a jewish going to turn universalist or buddhist unitarian universalist. It is now accepted. All that someone can be a buddhist. Orion non-theist. Wake. Didn't know that when i started. This is would be another similarity. There are number of these parallels. But i think that. I apologize mad reyes at the main interaction between. The religious society friends in the unitarian universalist. Kempsville sharing of religious education materials that's that's been going on for generations. But i thought it would be interesting to talk about. Awesome aspects of of. Of the quakers. Unique to them. And i talked about some quaker. I'd like to start in the year 1650. Relax we're not going to cover every year. Buy 1650. Several of the people on mansion have already been born. 1611 mary barrett. N64 george fox. In 16. For he a fellow with whom i happen to share a uniquely lancashire surname filling a john he.. 3 years later the first of his younger brothers rodger. And in the next year 1644. To an admiral of the royal navy. Who was very rich she had financial dealings with. And to the others wife was born. William penn. Now by your 1650. George vaught should pretty much formulated. His understanding of the relationship between man and god. And i would argue that there two principles. From which all the other aspects of quaker beliefs and practices emily. The first is that. Every. Person. Has within him or her. That was divine. Something that he referred to as the inward light. Today more commonly the inner light. The second was that. God. And speak directly to the hearts of men and women. If they would like to ship. Quietly and wait. Upon the still small voice. Everything else radiates from that. If we are all in possession of an inward light. We are all equal. If god can speak to us. Directly. What need is there for intermediaries. The clergy. For ritual. Or any. All sacraments other than the sacrament of life itself. And speak to us. Directly in the present day. In the bible all the revelation. It's not the most immediate or the most recent revelation. You can see what that does to the importance of the bible. Entice today none of this seems all that radical or threatening. But we're in 1650. The country has been for decades. I suggested to open warfare 2 warranties roaming around the country. Up until this time. One representing the loyalists the other representing the parliament. And that will be open combat from time time. Part of the concern is how the country will be governed but also part of it is religious. If you're living in this era. If you do not accept. Be. Authenticity of the head of state. And his policies will that. Treason especially in time war. This effectively is time of war. And if you do not embrace the beliefs and practices of the established church. Why that's heresy. And i both care about treason and heresy we equally not just as bothersome. What is threats to the existence of england. To the point that last year 1649 they decapitated the king. Cromwell has now won the stage of history. In what year 1650. George fox for the first time. All is going to prison for expressing his beliefs. One of the problems with these dates is when you go to different sources summer you still using the julian calendar summer on the gregorian calendar just bear with me. Little attitude. It is also the year. That. In a court in darby. The judge nopin court. Applies it time that it that was you. General use. The report to little dissident groups. Big catholic was not with no piece of cake in this year within recent memory people were put to death. If they were priest and found to be celebrating mass. It was a certain amount of safety in numbers for the presbyterians groups. Are there were the animals in the ranchers in the monarchy men and yes the followers. George fox. And. The judge in open court. Labels. Watch and his followers with this. Quakers. And it suck more to the children of light were friends. Then any other group and it took. Centuries to become basically. Just a familiar nickname. It was also the year that mary barrett who is now married and she's now married dyer. Is in england had. Immigrated. Back in. 16372 england. With rights with her husband. But for whatever reason she is back in england at this point. And she hears george. Fox. Preach. And she becomes. Convert terminology convince. And her condition is not leader just to become a practicing quaker. A bleacher in the terminology of the day to become a quaker minister. This isn't somebody who delivers a sermon and leads. Worship service. Was not part of quaker practice. Sure you're aware. Rather it's someone who passed away. Speaks out on behalf. Of the faith. I will catch up with her and the decade. But right now let's move ahead two years and it's the year 16. 50 tooth. And george watch is in lancashire. Near the town of clitoral where there is a geographical feature called pendle hill. And he's moved to ascend. The top of pendle hill. And that day he has a vision. All the notion of men and women. All dressed in white. And he takes this to be a sign that one day there will be thousands and thousands of people. His george boxes understanding. Of god's will. So when he descends from temple hill. He does not desus and preaching he persist in preacher. When you think of pendle hill. Do not think about that. Pendle hill is 1827 feet high and if we're north america we call it a mountain. It's now 1660 and where and wash them. And here is mary dyer. What's happened to mary dyer since we left earth decade ago. Well she returned to. New england. Massachusetts. The massachusetts bay colony with her husband who is not never becomes a quaker. Entry express is her religious views. The powers-that-be. Did not like this. Who were the powers-that-be. Why the puritans. The original mayflower descendants and their friends. What would they up to well they were known to. Shoe. Native americans are seldom into slavery to burn books they didn't approve of. To label people they didn't like warlocks and witches and sit by them. And they had a particular distaste for quakers. Puritans considered themselves to be the correct. Church of england. And these people were. If you were a ship's captain in this year and you brought. A quaker reading quickly literature into port you would be fine very heavily. Pretty much anywhere in the wing. So when they find mary annabelle. Speaking out on behalf of her beliefs. They applied to her the lesser the two penalties associated with parrots. Spanish. And where did the puritans and a tiara. Send. The apostates in the heretics they found in their midst. Why no no not yet. They sent them to that. Filthy quagmire and poison splash of all the illogical abominations. Rhode island. New shifter to rhode island so she and her family they have children at this point is given to be nice and supportive of her friends neighbors. And one point of friend of hers his serious business to attend to in boston and mary user. It's a small world and marry you spotted in the streets of boston and taken into custody. And she is a squirted to the edge of town along with to quaker men who we've been out and about. Proselytizing. And they would like to a tree snowing over. A branch of the tree and induced was placed around the neck of the first man and he was hanged for being a quaker. And the nurse price round the neck of the second man and he was hanged for being a quaker. Has placed around mary dyers neck. And then removed. The powers be allowed as how. Folkston interceded on your behalf and they were prepared to have her simply return to exile. In rhode island. It wasn't good public relations to hang. Quaker women. Unnecessarily. In 1660 mary dyer returns to boston. And she is again found on the streets and this time the authorities are prepared. To carry out the heavier of the two penalties. In the beauty of their saw was they offer her an opportunity to repent. May i came to keep blood-guiltiness from you desiring to repeal the unrighteous and unjust law made against the innocent servants of the lord. Name an i am not now to repent. I'm slightly your bridge those are married to irish words. Virgin mary dyer's last words. I choose hang for being. 18 + 1661. The quakers from around new england sent delegates together and they formed a group called the new england yearly meeting. Existing functions to this day. Is austin to hear that. Charles s arbor, was that. The stage of history the restoration has occurred. In the form of charles s coming to the throne. He wasn't all that big on discrimination. Actually catholic. And he sends note to plymouth over the massachusetts bay colony. You are not to hang or. Put to death any quakers. You can bring charges send them to england. We will will do it from here. In 1666 we find william penn. Who's recently been kicked out of. Christ church oxford. He didn't fit in. He's traveling family business in ireland. And he falls in with some quakers. And on his return to england. The publicly known. But he is becoming convinced quaker. In the year. 1667. Johnny doc up in lancashire. Posing with waitressing. He becomes convinced. That was parents were anglicans. Although. His mother. Was known. The harbor. Strong presbyterian sentiments. Once she has a. Nonconformist protestant. You should take a better view having a croissant. She did not. She turned to her second oldest son rodger and asked him to talk some sense into his older brother. And at this past ask. Rodger. Fails miserably. And now there are not just two. Quakers. In the family ministers john will go on. Two possible ties throughout england and scotland and at one point he takes a trip that your xbox himself to take a decade earlier. He travels from england to barbados. Eastern seaboard of north america. Proselytizing and meeting with quakers who have already settled there. To get from. England to barbados in that day involve. Being in a small wooden sailing vessel on the high seas. For seven weeks. This was not a trip that. People to flight levi traveling just around europe in the late 1600s. Take a toll on people medically and physically. Credit one. Rodger. Justine new year's. 1880 and 16 + 81 is and traveling around ireland. Holland. Germany. Scotland. Is this unusual. Raising. Interest in. Their religion. 1681 east newport new year in history. All. Not only is it the years i think philadelphia yearly meeting was founded. Is the year the charles the second. Settle the debt he owed to admiral pain. Grants to william penn a vast tract of land. In the new world. Which the wounds embarrassment and the king's great amusement they can personally names pennsylvania. Now you know that william penn travels to pennsylvania he yelps to. Sound of philadelphia he personally conducts the first of a series of. Treaty of negotiations with the native americans vs lenni-lenape people. And. You probably think that she stays there in lunch the colony. Wrong after 3 years. He spends the rest of his life except for one other trip about three years in england. Vi. In the year 1696. We by william pan in england. And he is at all a. Meeting for worship. Are in bristol. Seaport. Southwestern quadrant. And he's standing there standing opposite him. Is a woman named mary callowhill. Why are they standing facing each other in the middle of a meeting for worship. They're marrying one another in the absence of clergy. Quakers would marry one another and made to this day. Who's. Hannah calendar will she is convinced quaker shoes from very wealthy family. And it was easy to have marriages approved it has to be approved by the meeting before before it occurs. And after the meeting was a table they said a piece of parchment. And people sign a document indicating that they were witnesses to this marriage. What's the legal proof of it. It was a big deal 66 people sign the document. And one of them was your friend. Depends. Watcher. What you think that would make. That year a better year. And you be wanting to me he died. This very greatly upsets his older brother who gathers together some of roger's writings. Theological tracks. Pamphlets. And adds to it little biography. Brother. And has this published new year 1700 that's. How we know what we know about rodger. In. The year 1718 we find a william penn. Anyone. Bob in of. Embed. Horizontal. Why he's on his deathbed. Over the preceding eight years she had a series of increasingly debilitating strokes. And during this 8-year. hannah haldol pain. Increasingly which after the family business in the affairs of the pennsylvania colony. Pain and his first wife. Who had died of. I had four children who survived infancy. And william and hannah had a child. We survived infancy mainly boys. Willing dies. It's not one of his sons who takes over as. Looking after the affairs of pennsylvania. It's me it's hannah callowhill penn. If you persist in this role of being effectively the governor of the pennsylvania colony. For the next 11 years. Until she dies ironically also stroke. Sean lowe. Only day. William married hannah. He was 52. She was 25. The following year after william penn's death is 17 19th and we find john haydock in lancaster castle. No it's not a royal palace. It's the largest prison in lancashire. Is it unusual for a quaker to be in this racino. Spent years there on two occasions. Why is john in prison. He has refused to pay the tithe. What's the time well it's a tax the proceeds would go to support the clergy of the established. Anglican church. Quakers didn't like this. They want stir didn't like it because. This is so 21st century. The monies that were collected in poor areas. Tended to wind up being spent. In the richer areas. And they were opposed to it. One moral grounds is a general matter. What is significant about john. Being in lancaster castle protesting time. Print out. He was the last man in england to die in prison protesting the time. These people die in prison. It would be 100 years. Exactly a century later. That elizabeth fry quaker woman. Always visiting lancaster castle to observe the above the construction of women's prison. Lancaster castle surges to prison from around 12:00 until five years ago. Now museum. All and. There are reflected in george boxes writings. Descriptions of his being imprisoned in a cell. With a barred window. Open to the elements. Maginet winter. Sanitary facilities non-existent. When elizabeth roy has a century later. Cost together friends of horizon many quakers rally to our cause. She doesn't manage to improve prison conditions. She manages to improve prison conditions throughout the entire english-speaking world. In the year 1743. One of them rogers sons immigration. To philadelphia. In the year 1748. I thought was born named elias hicks. I have some pictures of text this is him when he's in the 70s. If you just passing rasser good gift it gets gets a look at and they've been out all exactly the same. Although we're going to be coming to him into course but. Want to make sure everybody gets a chance to. Take a look at the gentleman. I got more. Tradition around. Will get back to him in a in a minute. But we going to rest for a while in the year. 1796 and 1797. Is another dog named john haydock and he is. A descendent of rogers through the fella who emigrated. And he is equator and he is now at the rahway new jersey monthly meeting. And someone comes to the rahway new jersey monthly meeting. 1850a myers. And she leaves a petition there. In a meeting for worship. Should marketing meeting business park. Besides that they're going to refer this petition to a committed. And john happens to head the committee of twelve men who consider it significant. We probably should take this the quarterly meeting. Which is representative serve monthly meetings in the immediate area. And that group decides. Let's take this to the philadelphia yearly meeting. And it's your daughter the philadelphia girly meeting basically comes back to rahway new jersey. And says. You tell us the champion wires his petition view for. Membership. And that she tells you that she has. Accepted. Quaker beliefs. And you tell us that. Youth believe she is sincere in her condition. Well. The chapters remember. And they do. The late 1700s cynthia myers becomes a quaker even though she is. Mulatto. And the color line. Start to fall. Among the quakers in north america. It will be 150 years before it falls in american baseball. This gets us. Didier 1827. Here's what the historians tell us was going on. Minion england. The persecution of the quakers and other nonconformist groups. All had died away. All laws that have been on the bus when tony for storeroom. And quakers. Increasingly involved in business activities. And they became highly valued members. Of the business community. They're known for. Scrupulous honesty. Fair dealing. A liability. They became prosperous. And we began to think. Would really like to be better received among. Our socio-economic pierce. Week she received this. Equals. Presbyterians and anglicans and congregationalists to methodist. We don't we introduce into our worship elements they have in there. Why don't we introduce. Readings. From the bible. Why don't we have formally trained. Ministers in the morning. When we sing some hymns. Did the england and america and cities. This seemed to be a jolly good idea. To the rural quakers. And elias hicks was born to a farming family in jericho. Long island nassau county new york city. This was. Horrendous is horrifying. To introduce these changes would be to abandon the very precepts and under leg. The religion of george bought. No one was more articulate. An outspoken on this subject. Then elias hicks the fellow who's. Picture. He travels throughout. New england middle atlantic states are quakers. Indiana. And he is willig you practice a great orator. And what happens in. 1827. Is as follows. In north myrtle beach. In an urban areas are shopkeepers and artisans laborers. They didn't they didn't cotton to these changes. Restarting 1827 in monthly meeting after monthly meeting starting the philadelphia area. Either the people who wanted these changes. Would call themselves orthodox. Or the people who oppose these changes. Who became known as hicksite. Left. Their monthly meeting. And this split between the orthodox and hit sites. Persisted is staying who's the first of several to occur. Between that time. And the early 1900s. For that. Humanist union this afternoon get into details. Just because you were hit everything but elias hicks. Cared about. Elias hicks was morally opposed. Did the building of the erie canal. If god felt that man needed an inter. Continental waterway he would have provided a river. Okay. What is also true. Then wonder why is hicks death bed. He repeatedly expressed his single greatest concern. Which was that when he died his shroud. Not. Be made. Coffee. Because cotton was a product of slavery. 1830. Emily jump ahead. Paramount. Like to i'd like i should not want one thing before we get to the year 1947. By 1690. 6091 george fox died. One out of every 100 residents of england. Was a quaker. High-water. In 1947. The norwegian nobel peace prize committee. Announced. It's. Award of. The peace prize for that. The following year it was accepted. Play the american representatives of american friends service committee. And its british counterpart. But the work the quakers should done. In world war 1. And recently ended wwii. Handling the needs of refugees. On both sides of the battle lines. But if you go back. Look. At the statement that was issued by the norwegian committee. In 1947 you will find. That the. Peace prize that you're rewarded. The religious society of friends. Open threats. Quakers. Close prince. And folks who were the pariahs. It won the respect and admiration. Efficient whitesboro. Number to close with a piece. Of a poem. Very lengthy poem. It's written by john greenleaf whittier who was in american quaker abolitionist poet. By consensus. In any of them. He wrote this poem in 1862. Imploring the english. The support the cause of abolitionism. In north america. And i've long felt that these words work. Equally well. To illustrate. What winston churchill called. The special relationship between the united states and united kingdom. But i think that they also work well. In describing the relationship in. Contemporary north america. Between the unitarian universalist. And. Vast majority quakers. Whittier route. Joint heirs and kim's pho. Leagues waves nor length of yours can part us. Your right is ours. Shrine in grave. The common free whole of the brave. The gift. Absence. And mortars. What my scope here was was confined to north america purposefully. Mom. About if you if you'll get the anglican communal but if you look at the anglican communion live in africa and similarly about half of all self-described quakers in the world are residents of kenya and in both cases only to missionary work that has been done in england when america was experiencing the site separation. All the english quakers were almost entirely what we would call orthodox. And gradually over a century. They have become in line with the folks in north america dayquil liberal quaker. And in terms of their practice. Acceptance. Brothers. When that note of the fact that. Unitarian universalist are constantly trying to explain their religious affiliation to folks unfamiliar with it well unitarian-universalist don't have a creep. It looked like the quakers the quakers. The. Being a unitarian universalist like like to refer to the quakers as unitarian universalist. Who can't sing. And quakers like to refer to a unitarian universalist. With attention deficit disorder. I think that's probably better illustrated in the cases of the united kingdom. Alden of in united states. I'll get the other the in england unity of practice. Always make the importance of smaller countries as well. All put here rather than the. Coming together that produced unitarian-universalism the quakers and these various groups. Have animosity towards one another. You want the docks and in and the liberals in particular perfectly. If you think you'll be seeing him know you'll be seeing him the shaker split from the quakers and we're very different and they danced in circles. Alright thank god for coming and please extend a hand of friendship to your neighbors and join us for coffee and conversation.

uuprairie_org

Pr150419TickTockIngham-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. We welcome you no matter where you are on the spiritual religious the sacred. The life journey. No matter your color of your skin no matter your gender no matter your sexual identity you are welcome here. If this is one of your first time here or you first time you are invited in a little bit later in the service to introduce yourselves if you want to. We also encourage you to come more than 12 more than one or more than two so you can get a better flavor of what we do here and what we're all about. Some sunday mornings i do the service i am sandy ingham the consulting minister here. Some sunday mornings other people from within the community do the service. And on many sunday mornings people from outside the community. Do this. Welcome and. Come back over this is by the way since sunday. If this is your first soup sunday here we really hope you will stay and. You don't have to pay. The first one. Please join us after the. I have an announcement from our young people. Building the museum. Is an activity for young people at our spring retreat. And our spring retreat is may. 1st to the 3rd. If your parents are sending you to spring retreat or fee. Bringing you taking you there with them we will spend some time creating. The history of a new museum. Sounds really. We will become museum archivist. Managers of our museum holdings. Because the retreat site has limited historical objects available. 4 hour x. Playstation. For exploration. We will need to bring some materials to assemble into our important exhibit. Holly calendar who is our director of religious education will give you instructions about the kinds of important materials we need she's not here right now but you can check our facebook page or. Talk to me or. What are you involved in this or talk to rick if if you have questions it's all he's not. Here today. Be part of the world's great museum. The opening words today. We're written by unitarian universalist minister. Barbara. For the beauty of the earth. This. Spinning blue green ball. Daya. Mother of everything. We walk. Gently. Across your back. To come together again in this place. To remember how we can live. To remember who we are. To create. How we will. Be. Daya. Our home. The laugh in which we live. Wow,. Somebody please. Flame of fire. Bark of the universe. That warmed our ancestral hearth. Agent of life. And jeff. Symbol. Of truth and freedom. We strive to understand ourselves. And our earthly home. Reading that i would like to share with you today is written by unitarian universalist minister. Kathleen. Titled thinking like a stone. She writes. My aunt mary. Has lived alone much of her life. In a little prospector's cabin. Far inside the boundaries of yellowstone park. As a park biologist. She's a bit eccentric. And also remarkably wise. To the ways of the earth. For as long as i can remember. She has said. That. She thinks like a stone. She doesn't mean. That she sits around listening to rocks. Sa wax eloquent. In subtle gravelly voices. Simi. That she has learned to anchor herself. In geologic time. She observes the seasons keenly. As they come and go. But she is tuned into rhythms. That are unfathomably long. Sweeps of time that the stones no. That's how i feel at the bottom of the grand canyon. She goes on. This gives my aunt mary and unshakable equanimity. Right alongside her passion for the environment. She works. Tirelessly against the earth's segregation but she thinks like a stone. And in geologic. Time. India logic time trees are a recent invention. The dinosaurs came and went. Just last week. And the whole span of human life. Has happened in the blank. Avast oniai. With her consciousness anchored in this long and rocky view. My aunt says that the planet will survive us. No matter what we do. And we'll live well past our extinction. That's what gives rise to her serenity. I find it very hard to think like a stone rights make pig. I think like a human being. Like a mother who wants to believe that her great-grandchildren will have a green earth to walk on. We are to breathe the chance to see an osprey fishing in a lake and to hear peepers trail out there awakening to the spring. However this is where my aunt's wisdom might nevertheless wear off on me. If we can learn to think like a stone then we might learn to think as though. We are truly. Apart. Oh. A planet. Instead of merely living on it. We might learn to see with a sort of double vision that allows us our laws and loyalty to our own kin but. Stretches. Beyond. Them. With that dual vision we can start to live as though it is not human life that should be the measure of all things it is the planets life. We might learn not only to think like a stone but to also think like an american chestnut. Wornall to think like a peeper a sacada. Red fox. Vulture a coral reef. Or an amazon butterfly. We might come to believe that their lives on earth actually matter as much as our own. Making like a stone with begin to know the truth. At a bone-deep level that we are not living on the earth. We are. The earth. As everything else is the earth rising into life and wild extravagant variety. In april and all made of the same handful of minerals chemicals and salty water into which we will dissolve when we die. We are the earth made. Conscious are unique and marvelous way in which the earth itself. Can see reflect contemplate. And shoes. The store is stones of our planet have been around for a long long time. And they will be here as long as our bright little jewel of an earth keeps spinning around the sun. If we want life to continue. Blossoming among those stones. We've got to take on their longview and then use our marvelous large brains. To benefit. The bright planet. The gave rise to them. In the first place. I don't think that i had ever heard the word gaea. Until the mid. 1990s. When i was going to seminary. I living in berkeley california. Not surprising that the word would have entered my consciousness and either of those instances. Yet. Somewhere deep within me i knew. About gaia. Kathleen rice. That sinking like a stone. We begin to know the truth at a bone-deep level. That we are not living on the earth. We are the earth we are the earth. Do grass pad can you grasp that we are the earth made conscious. A unique and marvelous way in which the earth itself. Can see reflect contemplate. And shoes. I didn't have to go to seminary to learn this. This is something that i have always known. I have intuited it for as long as i can remember. It probably didn't hurt that i grew up roaming the hills in the woods of pennsylvania. But i have always known this. This past week the one that ended yesterday turned into old home week for me with many reunions. I met a lot of old friends during the week literally. And figuratively. This morning i want to introduce you to a few of them and some of them you already know. Many years ago before i even thought about ministry i was a member of some of you know of the big. First unitarian society right here in madison some of you notice the frank lloyd wright search. Eventually i even worked there as a secretary or office administrator whatever title someone felt like giving me that day. It was then as a member of the staff that i began going to general assembly capital g capital a. Every year. Ga as it is usually referred to is the annual meeting of our unitarian universalist association and it's something different. Parts of the united states and then canada not anymore we don't have handed it in anymore but then it was all over this country and canada. Change venue every year we conduct the business of our association at general assembly we connect with friends you would not believe how many workshops seminars on there are to choose from as well as many services and musical events. We almost always have outstanding off and well-known if not famous speakers martin luther king jr spoke there many years ago. Speakers such as david corton. Know that name. Anybody know that name really. That's okay more about him in a few minutes. At one of these general assembly. One of those famous speakers whose name i can't recall. What's an environmentalist but before most people had any idea what that was. And what it might mean. I remember being stunned when he said. That if youmans were to disappear tomorrow. Fall off the face of the earth. None of the rest of creation would mind in fact they probably wouldn't even notice our absence. And in some cases many species would even flourish without us around. And then the speaker asked us to imagine it the other way around. If the rest of creation disappear tomorrow. What would happen to us humans. Batman have been the defining moment for me. On the road to be an activist for the environment well one of the defining moment. Another was stumbling into a class at starting school for the ministry talk by johanna macy. Now i know you've heard of her because i've talked about johan here several times the title of the class was. World as lover world as. Self. Also the title of the required book for the class. Macy buddhist scholar expert in general systems theory teacher mentor. Anti-nuclear activist she sleds how many workshops around the world who became a mentor to countless numbers of people she was one of the first westerners to go to chernobyl after the nuclear reactor disaster there to help the survivors work through their grief. And sorrow. Well that's lover world as self. The class and the book. Show us how to apply ancient philosophy to modern day life. By teaching us to view the world and all the creatures in that world as extensions of ourselves. I have no problem with this because i believe that we are apart of earth that we are indistinguishable. From all the rest of creation. In terms of value. Importance. And meaning. I try though. remember that this is still. A pretty strange belief for a whole lot of people. Possibly even many of you in this room. And not just the concept. That we are part of the earth. What much less beginning to understand the implications of that. In part two of these reflections which will happen at the end of may. I'll give you macy's theory of four different ways of viewing the world and which of those four she would like us to choose. I said that i stumbled into macy's class i certainly have no idea what i was getting myself into if i had not been active and beyond war and i talked about beyond or before but some of you weren't here when i did that grassroots organization that still exist. That well was obviously in war. On the planet if i hadn't been in that because macy was very active in that organization. She was active in california i was active here. Wisconsin. If i haven't gotten into the class if i haven't had that little. Part to say you had to audition to get into the class. Hydro dishin on green index. The dreaded green card. Somewhere during the same time. the mid-to-late 90s. I also met. Wendell berry. And bill mckibben. Literally in mckibben's case i met him a couple of times because our paths crossed when i was the minister in plattsburgh new york. Any peaches in. At middlebury college in vermont. Some of you probably read mckibben. Maybe even are familiar with his. The organization he started 350.org and be prepared to go to jail. Not for looking at office for doing what he wants us to do. Barry as many of you probably know wendell berry. Brights mostly poetry and essays. And he does have a whole new collection of essays out title. Our only world read it. Two other names associated with peace justice environmental activism with mending this broken world. Two other people to whom i was introduced during the 80s and 90s. David corden and sister miriam michelis. How many of you know sister miriam. You're about to meet her. Remind you you might never. I literally met her in the early 1912 and late 1980s maybe as part of my work and beyond war she lives in new jersey but she was invited here to the midwest by our beyond war organization to tell us about genesis farm and that's why we're working on the environment. Genesis farm which she and other dominican sisters. Had just found it and caldwell new jersey. Alive and well for over 25 years it started in 1988 and is one of the oldest. Csas in. The country community. Thank you supported community supported agriculture. It was formed to focus on connections between the health of the earth. And a few men communities. Within. Particular bioregions if you go to their website you will see it says among other things. Humans must alter their most basic perceptions about themselves in the earth. The survival of the human species must be considered. Within the broader context. Appel nature. I survived. I was mesmerized by sister miriam. And her enthusiasm about eating locally and buy a regions in this connection between the health of the earth and health of humanity i remember thinking bouquet. Maybe in new jersey you could eat locally all year-round at ultratan parts in new jersey to. Button wisconsin. In the middle of the winter for all going to starve to death. Well now my attempts to eat locally as much as possible are continually forwarded by. Avocados. Sister miriam was a friend and student of. Thomas berry. Not to be confused with wendell berry and also no relation. Thomas bury some of you may have heard of. Jesuit priest author teacher. One of those amazing persons. Like macy. Who is so far ahead of their time is scary. Thomas ferry road. Dream of the earth. Some of you maybe have red. A well-known booking environmental environmental world and also among liberal religious folks. Thomas berry taught sister miriam that there is no such thing as a human community in any manner separate from the earth community. And then she went through a tremendous struggle around this. Because. She's a catholic not. Beast. It seemed that what the catholic priest thomas perry was teaching her about the cosmos. Was. Ultimately in her words incompatible with the biblical teachings. That creation is. Finished. Get many of you in this room know those teachings could you grew up with this. Once that we've spent a lot of our adult years refuting and rebelling against. As mcgillis put it those teachings tell us app. Creation is finished humans were made history began there was the fall and history will end with the apocalypse. I guess just couldn't live with that she decided that. We have made god in our image. And stewardship as has been have been presented to her as. Growing up catholic and becoming this nun. These are her words again. It hasn't worked real well. She said it's it's to human-centered. It's the opposite earth is taking care of us. Earth takes care of us. To which i would add forces trying to take care of. So out of this came. Genesis farm money. That also out of this came agonizing by the pope's over what to do with her. Some of you know this happened with joan chittister. And they couldn't excommunicate her really not that's on the strip. So we have all these wonderful thinking and experimenting on. Call jackson everything imaginable going on swirling all around out there. During the 80s in the 90s. It's important stuff going on into the 2000s. We're all sorts of people are coming up with initiatives that the way beyond what we're doing to save the planet you just go right on recycling that's good that's fine but it's not really hurt bad. But i don't think we have to change the system obviously this is not original thinking on my part. I think we lost track of the environmental issue because of 911 911. And then of course we have to remember that none of this is really new. None of this thinking of how you know that we are apart of the earth isn't new. This is been around. As long as there been people around think of ancient people think of the native americans here think of ancient traditions thanks 7th generation teaching. Turn down 550 in the back of your hymnal and look at the reading beer box that's attributed to chief noah south. About you've all heard it this we know the earth does not belong to us. We belong to the earth we fuse that here. All things are connected like the blood which unites one family. All things are connected whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. We did not weave the web of life. We are merely a strand in it. Whatever we do to the web we do to ourselves. I think most of us. In this room probably. Believe that native americans understood the importance of taking care of the earth in a way that we. The teen has seem foreign to us i mean we called them savages. At least we don't do that anymore. And we're getting more and more interested in. How native americans lived in harmony with the earth. There was a period of time when unitarian-universalist i think were overly concerned about co-opting other traditions. I think we can learn from native indigenous cultures without disrespecting them. Or feeling to attribute what we've learned to the people who came before us. That was before i walked into the laundry room yesterday and. Did a double-take when i saw the box of detergent that was named seventh generation. I believe i've used some seventh generation products. But that's maybe co-opting. How will we avoid environmental disaster. How do i avoid sending you out of here on a downer. How do we avoid destroying mother earth. Is it already too late. The clock is ticking. My clock is ticking loudly. Are we listening. What we have done thus far to heal this planet is too little i think. Question is is it also too late. I am very very frightened for my grandchildren's future. I think even if i didn't have grandchildren i would be frightened. For the future. For future generations. We have an obligation to leave this world in better shape than we found it. But despite all these noble sentiments of mine most of the time over the past decade since i initially. Meadows friends i've been telling you about this morning most of the time. I try not to think about what a mess. We're in what a mess we've made of the environment i try not to think about the fact that earth day may be pointless. I try not to think about the fact that my recycling my bicycling my walking my whatever i do. I don't make much of a difference. We humans are like those frogs we used to talk about and beyond war. Presentations that we are talking about the plural formation of nuclear weapons. Then but we could just as easily have been talking about the lack of interest in paying attention to global warning you know that story where. Displaces frogs in a pot of water and then you turn the water on. Simmering. And they don't notice. But it's getting hotter and hotter and hotter until. Do you like to jump out of the boiling water. Not many years ago i took three or four years ago i was asked to be on a panel at edgewood college. 2. With graduate students. To present the. Religious perspective of earth day. Right around this time of year and then saving the environment. And i was young people's course and i was astounded when the young man beside me. It during a break said to me. What people my age. When i go out in nature. Never go outside. Not interested in going outside. Not interested in nature. I hit him over that.. Tell us about that offset a lot for me when i when i take those hikes in and out of grand canyon. Which i will be doing next week. I meet lots of young people. Obviously they respect nature and wouldn't be as long as i can and i hope i didn't. Call maybe a month ago i went into a coffee shop. It had been really cold it was that february. Really cold stuff but that was ending it was only. And if i walk through the parking lot there was a pickup truck running. Until i went in and said. Was anybody in the truck. Was it was obvious that the two young women working there knew who owned the truck. This is young man standing right there he's kind of. Shifting around. And they said they sent him go turn off your truck and he said no i was cold then we also. I got on my soapbox. And he looked uncomfortable and he looked puzzled and. And. He said well that's not my problem. You are not my problem i was wrong button to push for me. And i said yes it is i said yes it is it's your fault it's my fault. Now i hope that's i hope that's not indicative of left. Darley twenty-year-old. And then maybe sometimes there is cause for hope some of you may have read about the kirtland's warbler. Warbler hard word to say long. Something that you don't know this bird it's a beautiful birds on the endangered. Federal and state. 40 years ago there were three hundred of them in wisconsin. Last year there were about 25 only 13. When was just found a banded one. Not abandoned a banded one. In the bahamas. Which is where it's supposed to be for three months of the winter. I ask you who's smarter. But if it had made that trip and open sound down there i can't. Have them it's making that trip when your 5 in long from here to the bahamas. But perhaps what has given me the most hope in years. And this is. Most of what will be part 2. Has been reconnecting with those old friends of mine from 20 to 25 years ago. All of them except johanna macy are featured in this current issue of yes magazine something else i. Really recommend you read comes out quarterly. And it will keep you from. Wallowing around in too much to spam. Yes magazine spring 2015 issue. And there was david corden. There was an interview with him. I meant horton not actually i didn't actually mean to but i heard him speak. At a general assembly in the mid-1990s it just written the book title. When corporations rule the world. In which among other things he made the case. That humans are on a path to self extinction. 1990s that's what 20 years ago. He presented the swell and i agreed with him he's a new book just published its only in paperback so it is not prohibitively expensive and it's not hard to carry around your favorite coffee shop so you can berate people when they're leaving their car. But his new book is. Change the story change the future a living economy for a living earth. Like sister miriam macgillis court and has been heavily influenced by thomas berry. And his book dream of the earth. Barry maintained that humans need a different story. A different narrative about life on earth. A storyline that court and says gives us a powerful reason to live a story that answers the basic question why. And that's what portland's new book is about. Changing the story his title. For the old outdated outmoded story is sacred money and marcus. Is title for the new story that he hopes humanity is moving towards is. Sacred life. And living earth. These stories are two completely different ways of looking at the world and also of planning how to organize human society. I'll let corton's word summit up you either see life as a means to make money. Or you see money is simply a number useful. For keeping accounts. In service to life but have no value in itself. Buy into the sacred money and market story that money is wealth and. The key to happiness. Los us into indentured. Servitude to corporate role. Locks us into indentured. Servitude to corporate. Rule. In other words in my words if we continue to play some monetary value on everything. Commodify all aspects of life we are doomed. Humanity will not survive. Just stop caveat here for certain people. This does not mean. That we won't we will cease to have material goods. This does not mean that we have to go back and live in caves and be hunter-gatherers. People keep on but will buy local. We won't be slaves anymore to corporations will have more sustainable viable farms model on existing farms like genesis. Be smarter. We will change the story. I recently read an article that the price of beef is supposedly rising. I just tripled. In-glass six or eight months. Why. Because of demand. I thought there's a simple solution here. Which would have so many ramifications for the environment. Don't eat beef. Or if i'm talking to my son-in-law. I say don't eat so much. The system isn't broken. Is way beyond broken. It is self destruct. And it is supported by a lie. Buy a false. Story. The only legitimate purpose of any economic system should be. To serve. Life. To serve us as living beings. Making our living in co productive partnership with. Living earth. You will have to wait until the end of may to find out what the true human story is over quit in should be. Part two of these reflections will concentrate on the new but not really new. Story titled sacred life and living earth. To get to that story will need to more closely examine what we mean when we say we believe in science and reason. And if you were here last week for that wonderful service. Which are eights to 11th graders presented the results of. The survey and what we believed here at prairie then you learned that we apparently have a lot of faith. In science and reason. You might even say we worship it. You might even say that we never questioned what the role of science and reason is. In today's world. But these old friends. Want to show us that there is another way. But there are other options. Closing words are actually in the back of a hymnal number 545. Written by langston hughes. In time of silver rain. In time of silver rain the earth puts forth new life again. Green grasses grow and flowers lift their heads. And overall the plane the wonder. Spreads. Of life. Of life. Of life. In time of silver rain the butterflies live silken wings. The capture rainbow cry. The trees put forth. New leads to sing. Enjoy beneath the sky. When spring. And life. Our new. Go in peace but your neighbor eat your soup and enjoy spring.

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Pr100509Reilly-ed.mp3

That obviously was not the choir. That was the sonata in a major by marianne. Martinez martinez the first movement. There will be. Cyberpower pakistan the choir director and that lovely piece. Therapy light in this hole was written by elizabeth alexander who used to be a member of this. Congregation. Unfortunately she left us and she's now in the. Minneapolis-saint paul. Area but still. Delights us with her music. He is a choir i think they did a. Tacular job today. I threw them at the last minute we're doing that acapella and. Oh my god. Anyway good morning to prairie universalist society we welcome off people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color. Sexual orientation or family structure we welcome you no matter what your age. Your abilities or inability. And towards the end of this service we will invite visitors and guests. I'm returning friend introduce yourself. And let us know how you got here so that. Hella slow about yourself so that we get to know you. On sunday morning we provide a wide variety of services. Either by prairie members members of the wider community. Administer route to sandusky. And today. Jim riley will be presenting our our program and he has been here before. Comes down from minneapolis. And that dizzy. The new musical on friday at first society and then. It's willing to stay on and and do a program for us. I want to just to say that this morning. Program is a music and reading. Bi women who mainly by women composers the dog i had to really stretch to find reading. About music or about mothers which we also included since this is mother's day happy mother's day to all the mothers out there. For some reason that was just i thought i can just google this. And i had a hard time. But anyway off of youzik and most of the reading are by women so next we're going to have. Colony tire. Start our music will not start the continuum music portion is down-hearted blues. So am i. Remind me brush him i wanted to share a little bit about the two women i don't want to take too long. I'll still a few facts about their lives and then i'll pass around their bios. I love you austin. What is a pianist composer and bandleader. She was born in. She's burton chattanooga tennessee in 1887 she wrote many of the classic songs of the early blues era and she was recorded by major singers like bessie smith. Alberta hunter. Ida cox. She toured and recorded with her group. The blues serenaders and she worked for 20 years as a music director. Chicago's monogram theater. She was cited by mary lou williams as a key influence on her. She attended rodger williams college and when it closed ackley different studies at knoxville college. And which wasn't unusual education for black women of her generation. And what's that she could have gone into more genteel profession. But she chose the more. A lucrative and exciting world of live entertainment. I'm playing piano. End up performing in in the black vaudeville circuit. Alberta hunter. It was so interesting when i get to sing and researching these composers and singers it's their life was so fascinating. She was born in memphis and she ran away. Call the age of eight she had a very poor childhood and difficult childhood. She started singing as a girl and a brothel nearby but. She but she was protected and watched over and befriended by the prostitute. And she always said. The best people in the world and it she graduate graduate went up to more upscale. Bistros in upscale nightclub. She was briefly married but her marriage was never consummated and perhaps is about that time she realized she was a lesbian. Shortly after she met. Lottie. She met woman with whom she lived many years of her life. Bloody taylor what's her name. She had a very successful career she became a full-fledged star. She was billed as a sweetheart of dreamland. Ashi travel she was in production she sang and showboat with paul robeson. World war she went on the uso tour throughout the. Europe. When she returned she been taking care of her mother all this time to paint her mother's care. In her when her mother died in nineteen fifty-six alberta hunter. Decided to quit music. Took training as a nurse and became a nurse. At this time she was 59 years old. And i cheat years. And she retired. The pasta where she work force her. Retired 1977 believing that she was at the mandatory retirement age of 70 in the fact she was 82. And she just had an incredible career. So i'll pass around on fire. The name is phones downhearted blues by levy austin and alberta hunter. Now it's my absolute present pleasure to introduce jim riley. Jim has been. A friend of mine since we were kids in the universalist church in syracuse new york so that is going away. I watched it learn to play the piano and then two and then learn to play the organ. From yellow like. The sidelines and cheering and we were in the youth choir together. So we definitely go back away in the meantime he's going to work in a number of churches as as music director and. Accompanies and teaches. Teachers music in and has developed his wonderful tenor voice which he shared with us this morning in the choir for wikileaks. Cuz that was a difficult piece. Bender kuiken which is a a norwegian norwegian church in minneapolis for which approach he had to learn norwegian to follow the norwegian service. Gotten wonderful repertoire of scandinavian music since he went to church which is very impressive. So we are delighted to welcome him this morning. Thank you barbara and thank you for having me back today. Last year we had. A wooden composers program in which. Now in retrospect for calling women composers one because this is. Women composers to. And we began with a piece this morning on the piano by maryann martinez. From the 18th century. She was a friend of. All she was trained recently as a singer. At that point in history. It was still somewhat rare to have. Composer. The great explosion of women composers in numbers game. In the 19th century. With the expansion of the piano. To everyone living room or at least everyone in the middle class. And with the great expansion. Upper-middle-class. Piano playing. Came to be an ornament. For women it made them more marriageable on it was not exactly meant yet to be profession. But you know when someone learns to play the piano and discovers they have a great talent for it. Discovers that they can also. Compose. It's not always easy despite the pressures of society to keep them in their place so there was you'll find if you do research and women composers that all of a sudden thirst. Small photographs is the total number of women and then all of a sudden. It goes like that. The opposite of the way the stock market. And we heard last year how fanny mendelssohn from a very wealthy and accomplished family with a brother who became of course felix mendelssohn famous composer. How she was encouraged to develop her talents fully accept that she was not supposed to use them. Professionally. Because that would not be feminine. And we heard how clara schumann. The great pianist. A great pianist of the night. Battery and the wife of. Robert schumann. Became discouraged about her own composing. Despite the fact that you wrote some wonderful music. And came to believe that women couldn't decomposers. That they never had being in that they never would be. She was ignorant of. App history cuz they're already had been with. So the next three piano solos are are more or less from that explosion of. Women composers that came through the piano. We have a piece by fanny mendelssohn one of the few reheat. Composers that we have from. Last year. And. You know this piece has a title loan skylander union auto starter. Oh dream of you oh golden star. And you really don't know. What significance this title have. For fanny mendelssohn. It seems that it was a dream of youth that perhaps. Was i realized. And then we follow that with. Piano piece that's. Far more ambitious because cecile chaminade. Wrote music that was intended both for salon performance center concert. Performance. She was. Married early in her life to a much older man who died she never remarried never had children. And as soon as her husband died she commenced during hasn't had its she was. Famous all over the world because it has a. Kubota. The fact that she had some success. Was. Despite. The fact that she was a woman and she and she received praise such as from the composer of let's go. He said. She is not a woman who composes but a composer who happens to be a woman. Because that was still rare. And then finally we have a piece by perhaps someone you've never heard of. I got the backup running dog. Who was a contemporary of greek or dates are wrong with the programming that's my fault. If they're 1847 to 1907. She was born in the same year as week and she was afraid of grief. This is her only piano piece of all the ones i have seen that has some reference to norwegian. Folklore sodus. The holders. And it's really unfortunate that i should have to talk about the holders on mother's day. All the others are sort of. Daughters of trolls. They're they're extremely attractive women. When you meet them. They seduce you. And then they show their true colors are quite insatiable they wear out there man there are two ways you can tell that a beautiful woman you meet is a holder and not just a beautiful woman. One way is that she has a tail. Is considered extremely impolite to point this out and the other way is if you manage to get behind her. She's actually halo and looks like a a hollowed-out tree trunk runtime film. Some union is if already hasn't had a field day with the holders with the holders. Is the dance of the holders. For interspersing the piano pieces with. And this one is by mary oliver who. Forgot to here. Some of us at the general assembly a few years ago. And this is called the whistler. All of a sudden she began to whistle. But all of a sudden i mean that for more than 30 years. She had not whistle. Really. At first i wondered. Who is in the house. Stranger. I was upstairs reading and she was downstairs. As from the throat of a wild. And cheerful bird. Not caught but visiting. The sound world and slid and double-back is barked and sword. Find me a. Is that you. Is that you whistling. Yes she said. Used to whistle long time ago now i see i can still whistle. And katie's after cages. She strolled through the house. Whistling. I know her so well i think. I thought. Elbow and ankle mood and desire. Anguish and frolic anger to. And the devotion. A all that. Do we ever begin to know each other. Who is this i been living with for 30 years. This clearly. Dark. Lovely whistler. This happened to her door by mary l and it was written for her daughter sarah marie. There was a time your door was never closed her music box play for these complaints. Her crib nouveau i drew her sleeping there. Blue drawing sit beside my chair he station ornaments for hands with rings. She's 17 her door is why not. There was a time ideally brushed your hair by window light i bathe her in the sink. In sunny water in the kitchen there. I bought her several thousand things to wear and now this boy buys her silver thinks he goes inside her room and shuts the door. Those days to rocker was a form of prayer she gave it me and blank. And i would sing of bees and horses in the pasture there. The drawing system still is naptime are. The curled up ham that precious mind her cheek. Next year her door will stand against our. But she herself. Pupil by donald justice. Picture me the shy people at the door. One small tight fist clutching the dreads pictures mean. Becton timer still comedy not mommy. And i could spend a whole week practicing for that moment on the threshold. Then acreage. And enter. Pass among the mysterious sense. And sit quite straight and look up frail confidence assault the keyboard with a childish flourish. Only to lose my place or forget 16 and almost doubt the very metronome outside the traffic the labors going home it's still across chopin or braum's stupid and wild with loved equally for the storms of c-sharp minor for the count of c. Now we're going to have our offertory and had the pleasure of hearing jim again. I'm golden. Now we're going to have you stay seated for a prosciutto last week by jim our piano has never had such a workout since. Home with music in your hearts and. Dance step in. But in the meantime join us for. This piece is for all those people who work on this building. Break down the door. Break out the national.

uuprairie_org

Pr160207LuciChickowero-ed.mp3

Good morning everybody welcome. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist. Autumn lynn curry a member of prairie and want to just make sure you all know the prairie aspires to be an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age your abilities or inabilities today will hear from lucy. Chico guero. Hopefully yeah okay well introduced in the service. I will be sharing the opening words this morning. The great aim of education is not knowledge. Footaction. By herbert spencer. I'd like to welcome up mary mullen and hattie stockdale for the chalice lighting this morning. As one small flame fills a whole room with light. Show me we radiate. Hope. Courage and good cheer. And an all the corners. Ivara mighty world. Reverend cecilia midgley. Well i'm honored. To introduce today or speaker lucy chica guero. She comes from zimbabwe and works with the rosario memorial trust. Which is a community-based non-governmental organization in rural zimbabwe. She is currently working as the girls club coordinator in north america. Lucy connects the girls in the rules and bob way with those were here creating penpals mentors and peer groups with the scope of widening the horizon of the underprivileged. Srmt girls they seek to provide safe spaces for discussing issues of growing up in a non-judgmental environment that's nurturing. Provides growth and open lines of communication between young marginalized girls and global leadership. Last year lucy's daughter in the back maca. Who is a member can you raise your hands. Who's a member and a child ambassador of the trust in north america was invited to the united nations as the youngest delegates the commission on the status of women. She was again invited by the un women. Women's executive director to help address thousands of people participating at the international women's day march. Finally she was among the girls invited to launch every woman every child healthcare initiative by the secretary general of united stations bunky moon. Outside lucy's volunteer work she's a student pursuing family sociology a mother and a wife. So work with young women and girls including those affected and infected by hiv and aids make sure an active global citizen. But seeks to close the gap between men and women and actively campaign on ending early marriages affecting most african countries. I want to know it before i invite lucy up here that she has a bunch of cards that are available on the table outside the one next to the coffee so feel free to grab one of those thank you very much. Good morning. Thank you again for the. Beautiful introduction and thank you so much for. Allowing me to be here to speak with you about rosario memorial trust. This off of. I would like to introduce to you. Auto to tell you about the bed. It all started with a gehl. Who was 15 years old. Azaria. Brasilia was it school. When he auntie came to her and told you that. Rosaria. You're going to be mad at. She was pulled out of school. And take it to her husband-to-be. With her. Keto. This rapper. She was tired on yourself. World revolving household chores. Is angel bright. She started having babies. To accept the ripper and carry the baby on her back. And still go to the field. To try and get food. Like all child marriages. Poverty's return on your face from day one. Rosario went so hard. You raised her children. Some of the days. She did not have phone. Cute.. Take a can you take a children. Give them water new dog and pray. Until deter that. Tomorrow. The sun shall rise. And we shall rise with the sun. And we shall rise with dignity. She went so hard in educating her own children she was so did your mind that i am not going to let my children miriam. I am not going to let my community. Stuff like the same way i suffered. Today. We are purchasing has kids. Musically. Ywca secretary-general. Wiki. To help women. Miguel's. I try tuesday advance to help alleviate poverty. In-a-gadda-da-vida. So have you been to rosaria. Your children. This is this growing up. They got sick. Qtickets. Then cover them. What's on that you can feel. The motherly love. Tilted children died. He's 22. And shoot. Comedy and vide children goodbye. To hear this ripper was a sign of love. It was a sign of divinity. It was a sign of resilience. Ethos of interpreting worship. She was left with offers. Interested. If your children. Raising them. Children's community care. Deal with the phone. Hey pilla. In rosario. In january of 2006. Rosaria.. The community. Note the head loss. But was that a student said mommy are gone. But your legacy telephone. That was the best of rosario. Rosetta memorial trust. It became. This became our pillars. As we started this with distrust. We wanted ghost to have the self-esteem. To building, to build confidence in these girls. We wanted that social security in the community that you are going to be able to grow up and be who you are. In your dreams. We wanted those six pieces for girls where they can talk. Winn-dixie. Tell each other you know the growing up issues. When we have mentas. With the derosa remember artist. That we are sending out if you in the school currency. Helping. We have a membership of guelzo flag 1000. Galaxy 5 sport. Cairo elementary school to get to high school. Some of these girls are affected by hiv infected by hiv. They offer as they do not judgemental in their own homes. Some of them are breadwinners coming to school and they'll go after school they'll go into work. So that they can find food to feed their siblings because their pet is an hour late. With some they are taken in by relatives they become. A members of an extended family. But. Given a choice. Between sending that go to school. And feeding the family. These girls are being sacrificed. That education their future is sacrifice. Because. Stars and bible right now is going through a fight. Betty connor make a recession. And with this situation. Payday. No. If y'all need solitary where. In that family oregon used to go to school. Don't have to weigh the options whether to send this girl to school order to get that $1 and get a bucket of cornmeal from. From their stories to go to the miller to grind the corn. So that they can feed everybody. Definitely the ghost of stupid. A priori. From that moment. We are in this schools. Teaching this girl's life skills. We totally understand that not everyone missed is academically gifted. But you have something that you can do. As a person helped you discover.. Thousands. You always to take care of yourself. You're going to take care of your children you are going to give your children a decent future. Wheaton college. Young women and goes. Do valencia in their own communities. Is this. They. Is this not to live in sound goes we're saying you know what this something that you can also do. If you are given this opportunity. To know your rights if you're given the opportunity. To know that you can get help somewhere. And you heal someone. When is that he'll. Divinity you can try and help what i can say is i didn't them to where they can get the hell. So we have time for me. This young girls become leaders on themselves we are trying to connect them to global leadership to national leadership. To advance the ghosts of the rosary. Amigo used to build that self-esteem right. El amigo is too and eleni child marriages. Our main goal is to give the girls a chance. To empower them to support them. Is what we going through this. Did the schools thank you find out how best we can help it goes. Uses of senator to wake him up. Indigo. We can't even go to school when it's our time. It's x. It is damaging to my self-esteem because everyone will know that this was my time and the next time i go to school. I want feel comfortable about it. End. The other issue is. Well i'm out of school because i do not have proper equipment. To take care of myself. Some people with supernanny and we are falling behind. It's now that's an crazy. The achievement gap. So we have to find ways over the telly. These girls. So that it is so that this gap this cannot be an issue that can stop them from going to school. It is. Actually doable it is actually we can solve this issue and at least help. Race they are. Self-esteem. So kind as to we have. So many activities. That are going on. We said it seemed that. Who wants to retain these kids in school what are the body is. Some of them it's medication. 2ds acrylic. Would see how best we can get. Hiv. Would see how we can help even with the school. Some of the school building to go to school in southwest school blog. So beautiful. That's still with rooted but it still needs to sing finishing up and at least put some tests. Intensity. So we are waking with that andrea still. We also trying to figure out how. We can connect our girls. To global leadership i am happy.. With our fight for any child marriages. The supreme court the constitutional court of zimbabwe into two weeks ago. Darude.. It is against the law to middle of a guild that is below 18. So it is one of those biggest achievements that we had but the issue lies on implementation. Is it going to his way to follow you through. We are going to be those police people looking seeing. Is this is going to be. I followed through and through its edition. But we have to fight hard as we have always been. And also because african countries. We are fighting. In any child marriages is not just an epidemic. Elizabeth. If for myself. I have your friends. Actually did my mother died when i was five years old. Then i went to stay in the village with my grandmother. I was in kindergarten then. Can i go instead. Eyemed friends. One of my friends. We were so close. Tagelus orientalism. Would compete for first place i know i want to be tested. But what else would you have everything at the end of every semester. Who did sit for exams. So when is it. She would come to this outcome s. The next to save-a-lot. With her she had dreams. By the time i was i was going into fourth grade my dad remarried. End. I moved back to the city with my dad. I left my friend's place in the village. But during the holidays with guava. And would go out go to her house. What made the fire so we can cook. And take me to go today to call get & fitch firewood. If i'm drinking something we're always together. One holiday when she was in 7th grade. I went back to the village as usual. I couldn't find my friend. Hibbett middle. If your parents went to this. Chase. That's that allowed. Polygamy. In the middle of young girls. I was hot. I was. So i couldn't get it i couldn't understand it. My friend is now married and now we don't have anything to talk about. The federal hold the husband. But tracy hedrick died them. She became a mother. Decided lazy orange. Medicine older guy. Huda beauty. You know.. Changed my life. That's. Also give me the desire to find out what is wrong with the family stretch it what is wrong with this family tradition. And how is it that we can end it. That is how my own. A drive-in family sociology came to be. With all with women studies came to be. I want to make a change i wanted to make a change. And also this. The objectives of of the garage. Give me the platform. To be the change that i want to be. Who the whole young women around the world. You find that like here. And we started having beautiful. Vocational skills training for our young girls. Because as i said before we know that. Some of them. Wikipedia teaching them to have some skills and they can make those presley. You have better job or anything when you're done with school getting going through the. The school process andreas really grown up. You can see you can make those things and sell them. Remembers. When we all did they sit down. You know it's easy when you go. Like a. When you want to talk about. You can talk with your friends and that is if environment. Because if you don't talk about them. Little joe lou come and see you know what you don't really love me. If you didn't love me you have to we have to do this. And if you're sharing those little issues with your friends. You know that that is not love. We can wait. You be able to stand up for yourself so these are some of the skills that would be passing montague elementary. What unit. Talk to this young girls so that they know that. Inno unit to blow up your body needs to my shoes so that you'll be able to handle life issues. And we are also talking about issues of hiv and aids. So we have followed that by talking about them the hiv prevalence rate is going down. So these are the girls in the. That doing that. Admitting their heads. Inside my dreams tired eyes. So that they can. Listen to say linda selling them in making their own income. Some also find the way of. Just. Engaging themselves making use of that extra time with that they don't have anything to do engaging themselves. So with the sanitary with. Currently we have a campaign.. To get away for this weekend hands chances. The time it's cool. So these are some of the solitary place that we've managed to buy. We have what we have been. So we are doing what we can do. Si se da. There's no global community without the local community. Rosario members. Geto boys. Today. African union. 2. Try and talk about their issues affecting young women and girls. You that one community. Is rosetta memorial. Introduction. Which site is open up the doors between. Gals themselves and the leadership. So that they'll communicate directly without filters. It's issue concerning them so one girl stupid out for kids. Because they know how to solve some of these issues. So is this in this life we have this is what this is. The ywca. She's without miguel's in the african union whether it was an african union. Yo chow today. They're still pushing that agenda of an ending lle childhood. Marriages. And we have metal also speaking at the. It will decide later that samsung music. About those issues that are really affecting us and how we can help out girls grow up and be who they want to be in their community. So is i was talking about. They are. Discussions.. The sith space. Without being judged they'll be talking about their own issues. If samantha's is well who are you trying to say you know what those we have been at your edge before. So this is how things going do you understand depression. But weekend. Go on and be somewhere. That little girl was sitting. This lady is the. Un. Women women executive director. So there were photos taken his two girls. Who is the united nations. Last year. Educational status of women. So they don't know what you needed to meet with her and she's. The one who she sits down inside you know. We have under sweetheart getting it we are really getting. You'll come save. My car had to give. They. She's the one who held it. The resolution. The 20th century solutions. For women. That these are the issues that we want address in terms of technology in terms of poverty. Intensive domestic violence in terms of gender equality. These are the issues. That. You wanted that one introduced. Mechanical. She can tell you about what she did. Hi my name is marcus sugar guero and i'm 11 years old i go to hamilton middle school. I'm club member of the missouri memorial trust girls club. I've been a member since last year. When i went to the united nations and i was the youngest delegate there. At the dime. I got to meet my auntie moon. From what i learned at the united nations is that girls and boys do not have the same opportunities. My wish is that all girls all over the world. Have the same opportunities as people do here. Dutchess win club joe's. Get to meet with the. Un secretary-general. So it is. It is our drive. This year we live in fight we have invited. Some girls from zimbabwe and two more girls here because we are setting up jones clubs if in here clubs. To go to the united nations again for the csw security. Widow health to go and meet with other global leaders younger. So that they understand. To open up. Dell ryzen life is beyond the next village. Life is beyond that little boy marry me marry this little boy i can be someone i can do something i can change. My whole family i can change my community i can change the whole country and i can change the world. So is this for the outcomes of head without initiating. We have four managed to reduce teen pregnancies. Full it some point one secondary school. Do the quiddity decline of like 30 cows. Getting pregnant in 2014. To like nine girls. So. That is a remarkable improvement and we are still trying to get to that is zero point mark. We hope we have also improved its menstrual hygiene for this young girls. Is it salty the future is that we are buying them sanitary with every also give you them when they leave the house in the morning confidence. That they are going to fix the world is so it is no longer so that it becomes. He stops being a hindrance to stop being something that stops them from achieving what they want to achieve. We have money institute. Did these goals. And they become. Adidas. 1040 young girls two years before. Winston identity united nations institute. The african union au in african continent african countries. With a disguise the way you just come in to discuss the issues. In the gills wonderful jose became a keynote speaker at the episode in the united nations and also. So we are also embedded the er the sense of volunteerism. Which is something that people don't normally do. Was it want to see a how does it help me where do i stay in this. So we are trying to encourage that in so that they can help. The young young women and girls. We have monday. Is i smoke by smoke up on these girls touching to young joni. Dental setting to defend themselves. I know those precious. Even fighting for what they believe in family member. I know that i have a right to education. They are sealing up with their own right now. We are finding more and more leadership skills in our galaxy. With the rosary argos club. We have. The gallows coming together they have to have their own leader. Dotty's on victorian rotational basis. So that they can advance the issues. Then we'll talk about that you shoes. Devil den. Play the wake forest and also why we encourage them to it to rotate the leadership so that everyone feels comfortable in being ended. So we have also increased the participation in schools. Dropping off dropping out that much and we have so many girls. Also state education in zimbabwe. You have to pay in excel. Tuition. To stay in school so. Help as much as possible. To get. Galaxy score. Isn't that the official limbs. Because they won't be married anyway. You know so we stopped at. Is it community. We had siding. To provide. That's security. Even. Is this we talked we women's you say we are dealing with girls. When it comes with issue of metamorphic gill. It has the end up going to talk to the parents. So that that issue has to stop so we are also very involved. You know all this. Issues of change and elsa ellie child marriages trying to uphold the girls. Dewdrop holding education. So is this is the. Future. Want to strengthen. And be more effective and sustainable important. We also. We had siding also to have some exchange programs. With a guilt that i hear we noticed that some girls that are here. Growing up in the bible they don't know. Today it was a weeknight once its employees to bring them. The girls that are so that they can. See that there is. Life outside. These. Small my small community. And it's like looking up what you need is for them. Also wants. To expose them to global and national leadership is like. Thank you so much loot.. Qna. Wait for microphone. Change is not easy. Between. We are fortunate that if it was in there. Within our community. People in the communities. Would have seen that children suffer. And some of them. If that's some young fathers young man wasn't no this is not it we have to figure out a way of. A different way of doing things we shouldn't demanding his younger brothers were saying no this is not it but also. Like recently over christmas. They were talking. And they is a girl who can bake later. From a date with the boy. I guess. If it in the brother was. So maddy chest. The go away from home to go back to where you are and she was. In the deposit was not happy. Subway engaged in some. Kind of mediation. Understand. Brothers and sisters. Buttom. So salty family. They are saying we went to send it to school so we are hoping is going to be like that but still. Which is why i spoke of implementation. Currently zimbabwe's going through a very tough economic situation. Such that even failing to pay their simplisafe. To seek help from the government. Kind of. So we are actually asking people to help us in. Like we have an initiative. So all those issues. Will you be able to stay around a little while after the service was wonderful thank you. Closing words today will be read by gary gates. Gender equality. Is a core development director in its own right. It also smart economics. Greater gender equality can i enhance productivity and prove development outcomes for the next generation. You make us to choose more representative. From the world development report. 2012 on gender. Equity in development. Well thank you everybody for coming today please extend a hand of friendship to someone and those around you as we excuse ourselves. Grab some coffee and enjoy some conversation have a wonderful day.

uuprairie_org

Pr090719Beck_Kelley-Jones-ed.mp3

Mary mullen will be introducing our speakers today. Well it's my joy to introduce two people one who i've known for many years and one who i just met this morning so when i've known for many years and sophia kelly jones who lives just up here and crawford drive about a couple hundred feet from here she moved her about 10 years ago and i think i don't know if that's when i made her acquaintance but i know her parents long before that. Sunshine and joanne. Soul is now a graduate of college hampshire college in amherst maine and she spent her growing-up years at the james reeb unitarian universalist congregation and she's been engaged in social justice activism as she says. Since the womb because her mother is very much of a social activist and i think that's her life. But soul has been an activist and an artist in performing arts and so youngest years. And we had prague theater come here once or twice and she's the founder of that high school group that is still i don't know maybe seven or eight years later still very much alive and kicking. She has also continued with her social activism social justice activism as a college student. Oh she's been to palestine she's into the border areas of mexico and the united states into threatening play how many have seen that play over at broome street theater sometime back. Not too many of you while you missed a good one. So. That play was called the birds that are your hands how to start a fire under siege and it was about. Does similar plight of people in palestine and people mexicans on the border of our country coming coming over tire country. The other person who's going to be speaking to us is nathan back and i found out that solon nathan met in palestine. He was born and raised in eastern africa on the coast of kenya. He's worked as a volunteer in human rights all around the world. Texas to tanzania tanzania palestine to madison and he's working in the boys & girls club right now in the youth summer programming it and i know i'm going to ask how that compares to being in some of these other places he's a recent college graduate from college in texas so with no further ado. Hi william i'm nathan and i threw it all start with y. Why palestine satellite i was asked that while i was in palestine. Buy a lot of other people at work but they said you know there's. All these other places in the world that are suffering in justices. Why would you choose. To go from the us all the way to palestine. Ender multiple reasons i think the main one to me. Was that the occupation of palestine is one of those i think the clearest examples. Of. The right and wrong and i gross misuse of power. I think there's a side that has no power no side that has power. Their other side other places in the world that don't have these clear distinction i don't think. That's one of the reasons why i thought it was important to get off another reason is because. Just as us citizen. And the enormous amount of military aid that we send israel we are. Are we should bear responsibility for that. We should work with everything that we have. To go to these places and write these. Tragedy. And then. Other things just just the work of witnessing i think it's so important especially being a us citizen i'm going to place and being able to witness. Being able to see what people are not allowed to see. To be able to. See it with your own eyes and to be for the palestinians to be seen. I got. To show that there is. Compassion with your cost in in the us i know there are statistics and. Military figures that say the opposite but there are individuals like solon i. So that are willing out and many dozens and dozens others that we met while out there that are willing to really. Really work towards. People ingest hoffman. Some of that work that i did there was teaching english it's one of the skills that i think i have that i'm able to give anywhere it's not something that you to really refine and spend thousands of years working on i hope to have a skillet 10 years from now that is. Amazing and great but right now i'm happy with having that skill and i think it's important to go to give these people a way to communicate. With. U.s. citizens with people from the us that speak english from with with most of the world even. I think that was important i worked in. University settings in community centers in refugee camps. I worked english and all these different settings and. I was able to meet all these different people in that way. It's over similar. Stop in palestine. And for a long time involved in all different social justice. Nfl. Is that time and i think things are changing out which is very exciting that we never talked about and wanted. I think you're talking about was israel and palestine and was kind of a complexity of that difficult to you know there's a lot of we won't go there. That makes it. I really been in theater and social justice and looking at the different way isn't. As a form of intervention in trauma looking at anti-oppression work. Switch on a grassroots level people are imagining theater to be resistance is that makes sense i'm so different in organizations for example that are putting theater at the forefront of their work both for cultural resistance and also for imagining. For me as a us citizen we give 7 million dollars in aid to israel every single day i subsidize the bomb i pay for the wall i pay for the concrete. I am part of a system that dean's the arab other as terrorists as unworthy as father and so for me to be able to be as nathan was saying the position of witnessing but also position of standing with the courageous palestinian-israeli and international activists. Who are seeking. Radical forms of solidarity and undoing of the system but also other bringing back stories doing things like this sharing the information that we don't see on our television that we don't see any other places and then says that and i worked in that velous. Which is actually this city right here is very beautiful as you can see one of the oldest continually inhabited places in the entire. Planet's entire earth in bethlehem area and engineering which is to the north and then throughout time. the work throughout palestine on throughout the westbank in different solidarity work so without further ado but i'm going to start the photos and we're not going to talk about them individually right now but if you see one. And we have a few selections for you and some of them are very beautiful like this and some of them are of really horrifying things that we want to show you some of the breath i think of palestine has also very beautiful place with extraordinary. Humanity even within it and the title we have today we hope to return to but it really is a. I would say if people who are continuing to resist and incredibly creative ways and for whom breathing and even living with something rather extraordinary. I am. It's often and i think integral. To this conversation is what is occupation. We hear a lot in lots of different contacts but. So i think we're going to share a lot of experiences that we had. Witnessing occupation. Start with the very first day that i entered the city leaves on the first picture. I entered i'd just flown in. A couple is like two days before. And i spent some time in jerusalem and then i was going to novice to the westbank. To the largest industrial city. And all palestine. And i was going. To work for human rights organization. So getting there is difficult if you go through checkpoints you get on taxis different taxes go through another checkpoint going another taxi go to the next checkpoint get out go through get on another taxi but finally made it through all of this. And i went i went through a wire which is the largest checkpoint right. In the entrance to palace.. And went through. Hellotech mike and i got in and they were it was a slow day there didn't seem to be hardly any people and i had no idea why but i finally found a taxi would take me to in the center of the city. And so. So i get in and i thought he was really jovial man he we laughed he joked about george w bush it was a good conversation we had fun while we're driving though i was noticing out the sides during all this laughter burning tires on the ground. I know trouble all of the street. And there is not a single car. On any three other. Then the bi. I was kind of note i was noticing this dramatically and starting to panic and he was laughing i was like okay it's fine this is normal. And we get towards. The city center. And all the sudden he stopped pretty abruptly mid-sentence probably mid laughter and he stopped abruptly it says i can't go any further they will shoot me. Eminem any pauses and he's like. But you you he's like you because of your skin and he's just retarded safety he gestures to my skin. He says you'll be fine no problem. I thought i was abrupt stop abrupt shift. You know what to do about i got up. Any point he's like that's where you're supposed to be going right down there. And i look around and i'm in the middle of the city center city besides madison. I'm downtown capitol pretty-much. Oh and there's not a soul out. There's not a car out. It was it was afternoon it was. Yeah probably if i remember was probably 12:00 between 12 and 2. Not a single soul not a single car. And so. I'm a little worried about any points for that and then he drives often and i look towards where he was pointing in in the distance and i don't know why i hadn't really realize this i think it was. Shocking quick quickly pace that i didn't really. Think about it but very pointed there were military jeeps. And there was machine guns and explosions that i could hear. I'm in at this point i did something stupid. I decided to trust my us passport. And the amount the privileged that my wife gives me. To get me out of any trouble that i could get into an i didn't know what else i could do so i walk towards it. As i approached this military operation. I i saw the first sign of life but don't keep in mind. The still fighting the distance jeeps there are. Machine gun fire but the first sign of life i say i'm entering the. A new road from every corner every crevice from every alleyway. A horde of kids. Probably all between the ages of 8 and 14. I'm just all emerge from out of the shadows and competent kind of surround me. And they all have these curious smiles plaster on their face on this is a couple hundred yards away from a military operation. Are there these just curious miles are looking confused like white what is this guy doing here. That's why i didn't know how to speak any arabic at that point, i still don't know very very little but i communicated the way they knew how i smiled i laughed with them they laughed with and probably at me but. It was just this genuine human connection i felt already 200 yards from a military operation i felt so full of the human spirit. A couple minutes of shine fm. I decided i needed to find out where it's supposed to be if i'm the organization i'm and i thought the only way i could do it was to go where he appointed. And so i point to the high point to the tank or the military jeeps and the operation in the distance. And these kids and i shrug and i start walking towards it. And i want for all the kids who started to applaud. Until i turn around and smile at the kids and they're already gone there the last one of them's back in the shadows. Until i turn the cabinet walk-in i just the absurdity i dismember noting noting that saturday i was smiling. Hugely. At the human spirit walking towards. The military operation. I'm at this point in story i always skip 10 minutes for it. Keep in mind this image and 10 minutes later i found myself. Sitting in the middle of the street facing bike ride looked with my shirt off. 10 ft away from me there was a soldier with the machine gun pointed at me. There was a jeep with soldiers and it talking on the radio while looking over my documents. I'm in are sitting facing where i just been and a right about where i'll just have been where i'd had the interaction with the kids. There were two military jeeps. With soldiers with machine guns with body armor. I'm with armor plated vehicles. Shooting at the very central in that i just witness. Entering this military operation that shut down entire city. 4 days. Other luckily only three casualties. An eight-year-old boy. An elderly blind man. Another. Is a young teenager that died. Several days later i would, that he went into a coma. There's something or thing. Overwhelmingly helpline. Sitting there witnessing such atrocities. But it is an experience and it is a feeling that i felt often laws in palestine. Like you're sitting helplessly. Witnessing. And watching just the grossest misuse of power. Anthem of the deepest injustice is in the world. This is a picture of that very same operation. Pakistan. Bracing a couple days later. Young girls. Peppa just corned thrift order to get to another house. I'm going to start i wanted you to hear the story from the start the pictures. I guess we go on and this is the same just a story entirely destroyed. Touching occupation is a hard thing to grasp. With the immense privilege we have right here. Living in the united states this photo really quick before i go and say something about it this young boy if you saw in the picture before. He was killed and shot like the kids you just heard about. In a city of jeanine in a refugee camp and i work there later and my time after i was an address. And his his organs were somehow preserved in his shooting. You're 10 years old. And his father decided that he really wanted to donate the organs of his son as a peace offering as something of peace. His organs actually ended up saving the lives of five israeli children and his son was shot while playing in the street. By israeli soldier. Gino's pizza. Soldier look at the pictures when i get some of these facts out here these important things of what occupation looks like right. So everywhere imagine this kind of architecture of occupation there's 500 military checkpoints in the west bank alone these are places such as this where people have to wait ludicrous amount of waiting nauseating kind of waiting waiting for hours and hours and hours and hours and maybe you'll get somewhere maybe you won't it's almost a hysterical thing to be an experience that i think so much of my life in palestine ended up translating into waiting i'm waiting to get permit waiting to see if you can go to the grocery store waiting to see if your refugee camp where you're waiting to see if you'll be able to make it to your university classes. So. The wallet self. In phoning home which rarely happens button invented talking and kind of serving in the role as an educator. With people back in the states. One thing i tried not to do was share of the whole riffic violence's i think it's easy you can talk about the blood can talk about the carnage they're horrifying stories they're realistic lateral it's the real carnage of people's bodies of children's bodies and it's like some of the images we saw and did not see of what just happened in gaza. But then there are the other forms of violence. That are everyday and i think for me they stand out even more because it feels like the slow crushing of already desperate people. It's a kind of suffocation it's a wall. That actually effectively does not divided israel and the west bank but actually cuts in and severs the westbank itself appropriating and annexing. 50% of the land. So think of that 50% of the land farmland people that are not able to access their goods. People that are not able to. Economically flourish and anyway people that aren't able to get to their olive groves children that aren't able to get to school families that aren't able to see each other a husband and a wife who aren't even able to live in the same place anymore. Basic everyday things that i don't think we always think of is horrifying but are fortifying their refugee camps where. Up to 80% 90% of people are unemployed. Where there's protest protest poverty and the refugee camp i worked in large amount of time has 28,000 people and 1/4 of a square kilometer space. Do you think of that sort of population density gaza is actually the most densely populated place on the entire planet. How do you think also those numbers soaring in the westbank. I'm in that kind of systemic violence. The air is police this is over the city of nablus these are children but there's different times. When these kids are inside because there's planes and drones going over head to the air is control innocent or not talk about israel right we're talking about the west bank and gaza so that are is police. The ground itself is still legal for palestinians and most places to use groundwater because that water is controlled through the military that's occupying so through the israeli and american military. These are some children in a theater class movement is constructed so we're talking about not only movement from place to place but when you're thinking of being and tighter and tighter and tighter and smaller and smaller places. Even the prisons one's body becomes. Russell's mother. When should the test statistic about. Landon building. In the past i think that's too early 2000. Over 18,000. Israeli homes have been built in palestine wasn't in the westbank in settlement over 18,000 homes have been built for israeli settlers. In the same time.. Only 100 or less than 100 permit. Have you been given to palestinians to build buildings on their own land. 18000 built for israeli settlers living on palestine. Versus 100 permit. Given to palestine illegal settlements under international law images of the walls you think 30 feet of concrete in some areas literally severn communities this is welcome to jerusalem we see right here at you and things through. Right through the very wall and i think it's. Intellectually know these things i felt very informed and educated about the history behind the winter there. I'm at nathan was sharing the absolute protest. Injustice of it is just overwhelming. I think to look at this wall i mean people are praying and into this is this is something i don't want to seem like a science-fiction movie or something like that with you israeli ministry of tourism right on the wall. There's one woman who told me she talks about drones and planes monitoring everything incursions almost. Almost every single night. And she shares the story of her daughter being shot by sniper that morning. And she said for us. There's nowhere safe to move. You know this is the life. She says it's a prison here prison there. What's the difference. And not only are the west bank and gaza imprisoned by 30 ft of concrete. But much of the population is it in present as well in fact 40% of the male population that still lives in palestine. Since 1948 has been or is in prison. At 40% of the male population i had one day when i'm speaking 40% of the audience stand up. I it is shocking you everyone would know. Multiple people. That had been to prison. And oftentimes attacked why are they imprison the charge that's most common i'm if they're lucky enough to get a charge brought against them. April holding a pebble holding a stone. The children too. Children in israel is classified as 12 and under if you're if you're 13 and over your classified as an adult. I thought you wanted children being rushing part 12 and under are also were arrested for stone-throwing for holding stones often. In one city alone that smaller than a size of madison 120 children so under the age of 15 had been arrested and imprisoned. A lot of time posting in children. And another charger that i've seen multiple times as for having a firecracker. Children having a firecracker and they're deemed as a terrorist that firecracker is threatening the state of israel. Usoc university students who resist any of there's tons of political prisoners one thing that's really interesting and palestinian society and i think nathan had this experience teaching at a university i work primarily in refugee camps. But education is something that's very bad hugely valued and hugely elevated as a form of resistance a form of escape form of you know supporting your society when you're being crushed. And you can see actually in gaza like i would say the strategic. Targeting of universities. But also the strategic targeting to let university students and now between the age so any mail around athens age. And probably. A few of you here today under the age of 35 so between 15 and 35 men are usually denied permits and sorry i usually denied permits anywhere i'm in palestine so even to move i worked with a lot of young men. And young men who are moving anywhere there like we have education but for what we can't even go anywhere to get job we can even move around. Unify families. This is a protest but i want to talk about it i referred to it earlier the prisons not just a literal prison with the prisons that one's body become. And working a lot with theater and working a lot with unburdening and working with trauma intervention the statistics are between 85 and 98% of children and so then i would extend it to adults as well children in the west bank and gaza suffering from post-traumatic stress but i would say that's almost seems.. In the camps it's the night before there's blood stains on a concrete as i'm walking to class they're showing me their cousin who was shot the night before but also there in class and rarely any of them can sleep through the night. The kids have severe urinary problems where there is severe bedwetting but also to control their bladders out of fear out of constant trauma on this chaos is hard to see a future and that's one of the things the ways in which the occupation is internalized. I'm you think of the systems of racism within the united states. Righttime and lightning carceration of black men for example and a heinous heinous black men. In a similar way you look at the way in which palestinians understand the ways in which their racialized. I understand it can begin again if you like understand the ways in which their bodies are deemed. Their bodies are monitored the movement of their bodies are monitored but also the way in which they are deemed as other as worthless as fodder. For for so many people to even imagine a future. Is impossible i worked with a group of. A young student sandblaster camp. Trying to get them to do this imaginative improv game you know of even envisioning something in the future and i think it was very idealistic in my mind but i wanted them to create something. And they could even see beyond tomorrow because their life feel so chaotic. A lot of them couldn't imagine being alive in a few years and attend twelve-year-old eight-year-olds his children and finally one day there was a little boy when exercise were doing was able to see himself in the future and this is painful. Of being a bird. Being a bird. And for him it was also being able to see the land of palestine again it was being able to see the land. Of his family who had been displaced who's originally from the coastal villages of yaffa and haifa. Have you seen that are now in israel proper with never seen the ocean whose only seen you know the concrete containment of this area it was. I just there the week of passover in my cousin was actually married to rabbi intuition living in jerusalem and i had wanted to even be able to go and visit her i was in bethlehem which is very close to jerusalem i was unable to even get there because of the blockheads entire blockaded the westbank during this week apostle of her for me and going to change. Everyone in the camp did not have water. Friend entire week. Has higher week we don't have water. Because again all the water even though it's from. 11 places from the westbank has to be bought back. And. To talk about. Ways in which. People resisted something i wish we had more time to do but i think we're going to hit shara. Short story i'm just exist just being there is really nothing. It really is when you're not allowed to move between cities. I'm going to university is this the largest act of resistance that i can imagine when there are no jobs there's no movement and you still pursue education that sounded. Isaias. Ideal its eyes only i look up tried my so much and and then i'm. But another common thing that. We encountered a lot of i encounter the lot. With talking with. Older adults in palestine had a class of mostly older women. House that had children in. One day we were talking about futurist imagining. And without without. What everyone was the same time everyone thought the same everyone was saying you know we don't really know if we have a future you know we have been moved from refugee camp to refugee camp our children have not seen our home. We. My child was born in a refugee camp my grandson was born in another refugee camp. We don't have much of a future anymore we don't have these helps but for our children. We have hope. I like across the board everyone and i remember the first day we met and so met we experienced several times them in conversation with palestinian saying you know i don't know if i can have. What i want in my life but i know that it is possible that my child can. I just think even being able to imagine that just like being am i able to imagine that you are apart. Is such an act of resistance to a place where when the world is resisting against you and against those dreams and against those hopes. With everything that has. There's an incredible amount of kindness and welcoming i saw this on american us citizen as a white person as someone from the outside coming in with my very shaky arabic even though i was trying to do something even though i was witnessing even even despite that i felt like anger was so justified. And i found this immense welcoming the immense ability to separate ones government even the israeli government from the israeli people. That makes sense i think something far beyond what we're always able to do such as saddam hussein and people you know these kind of things. And. Also there was an incredible sense of the people who remain. People who with every every. Part of their society effective socius i'd really crushing everything from the economy on the social structures the very bodies of their lives of people continue to stay continue to live continue to plant continue to have children continue to laugh continue deb joy continue to cook continue to go to school as these young boys traveling through a checkpoint in the middle of the city of hebron continue to make henna fade. Sweet treat here pepsi this is the city of nablus. In the city of hebron there settlers living inside the city itself there's a woman of settler woman and israeli settler so it legally positioned inside the city that's actually an occupied palestinian home where the family had lived there for thousands literally trace their lineage thousands of years to this single dwelling. I punched him in the mouth. Another settler woman that stood on her rooftop. And sprayed this is in hebron. City. And sprayed the palace the elder palestinian man spice shop in a beautiful spices below with water. Destroying entire thing so these are these other kinds of balances and then i'd like to say sometimes it's not the guns and sometimes it is. I'm sometimes it's young. A young man's father named him his son was named samir and his son was severed by a bullet. That also severed the body of his best friend crushing behind him. And it's really emotional. He got himself straight shot the israeli soldier and he said he couldn't do it. Do it. And every single person in his family is dead. This is inside a refugee camp bc the. Affair there's women have gathered it said that's their main street you think of this tiny corridor sesame street. Desire. Obama which i found helpful in many ways it's the most radical. About palestinians as paris as others. Frightening a scary and i think even internalized telling us these ways we need to rip it off there's this woman and it's actually character i wrote in the play that it's based on a couple different women. I'm older woman at sitting with his older woman she said. You know they always think of that they always think of this is so violent and there's a former president or prime minister of israel i'm golda meir and she says she says this famous line and she says. As soon as the arabs love their children more than they hate us we will have teeth. To think of what the kids and she said arab women she's like you're saying our wounds so the hatred not so the hatred not the bombs not the bullets not the prison you know that that. The hatred is coming from inside of us not from these things and she said look at all of us knew you'd have that violence so you think i'm 99 more than 99% of palestinians as non-violently creatively resisting every single day even living even the protesters even in hanging laundry here even in painting on the wall and coming into a class and showing up to be a clown. I want to leave you with that when even breathing itself. I'm even images like this. Is defiance we want to open it up to question. All right now and kind of a broader conversation we can have animals. Take as many as we can get but also please again if you have any questions about the pictures i know we haven't been able to go through them. Cities are olive trees. Right here and these are actually grown. Big picture. Very very beautiful. And there's about. There's about two hundred of farragut. There's about. Sibutramine gorgeous gorgeous alex rose if you can stay. It's a village of about 200 and on the hills surrounding it unless it's less than 200 isn't it. About 200 less than 200 families have been there for generations their whole income as you know the olives olive oil olive trees everything intending to these fields. All around here are settlements that have taken most of the land on the hills and every single day. The settlers walkthrough with large machine guns illegal for palestinians have weapons which is something we never think about it illegal for housing has had weapons but israeli settlers often carry machine guns in addition to soldiers. And are often times much more violent actually would say even in filters. They're often teenager by 14 and 15 year old is laura settlers with machine-gun in need. And these are fundament like if you think of religiously fundamentalist people in the united states would be people that are religiously fundamentalist to think of. Oftentimes that people you know every every imaginable thing we could think right or something like that if you think of fred phelps. Closer to that is that make sense. And they're actually had there's an international observer house there's a s medical support and there's a hostel almost be a constant presence or else the houses get taken that makes sense they come in almost every night and try to burn houses by to take houses these kind of things for the presents being there actually does make a difference but every night i actually stayed and provided for relief work so that can support workers could be somewhere else. That makes sense i could actually go and get groceries nice nice things. I'm there large strobe lights large stadium satellites that patrol this entire village. I'm up just stupid people that they don't even usually have electricity i would say most of it very very well-liked over very virile village acute stroke like the whole night to just even let them know they're being watched. The short answer is i don't know. The butt. I found an immense. Immense amount of hospitality between cost and their. I i don't think that. There would be able to be a palestinian who is homa i think you would be taking it. I think there are some people that are wealthy enough time it does have. It's a capitalist system that allows a fuel leak and very wealthy but under vast majority. But. Most of them share everything they. As they share they have. Even we were given so much we were given free falafel by a man who probably. Struggles you know every day we were given we all have places to stay all the time. I think my answer is that it's an extremely generous society. There's one there's one straight if you want to think about because i think the thing about poverty's interesting i know nathan's worked intensity express in entirely different form of poverty the biscuit. It's an interesting thing because there's even families we don't always think i think of the dire poverty that's also happening in palestine right now on the malnourished meant the lack of resources but even when he stops to flourish and these systems of sharing and the assistance of kind of finding alternative economies and alternative ways of adapting and making something work. The middle street in bethlehem was severed by the wall so used to be like a downtown state street kind of area and it's now there's a wall through the middle of it right so obviously it isn't that anymore but they have like a wall observatory cafe which is i mean it's funny. There was that terrible thing the people in the town of nablus did and they i mean terrible i'm having quotes around it but they raided apparently group of people rated a un little storage area to get the flower that has been condemned as not fit for human being. That makes sense just to say that there's such pride and such dignity like i had kids that would wear the same outfit every single day i saw them but it would always be done. Dude means the kind of the pride in that but still if you think of the underneath reality of dire poverty for the majority. There's military bases on both of the hills surrounding it's inside the valley. There are israeli military bases on the hills but it's only half painted only. Arabs. Almost family but within their population this huge amounts of christians which i think was pretending a lot of people forget the site where jacob's well is. And the church that hold its daylight s2 douglas gay population and i work with several. And the university of this is true the universe that work with was 53%. All the students for women. And do we think of this in an arab culture i worked in the english department so all of my students were women and i've had the same study english inside the same as branson. Don't these women we had. The first class i taught at 1 unit 1 setting. The first day we. Sat around and we organize we like how can we do this how can we get there you have to go through the checkpoint this day what time can you make it we work cooperatively to find out the way to accommodate as many people as we could and we could not accommodate everyone. Which is so intensely that there's some people that because of the wall up because of the checkpoints. They can't make it university students. Ar. That they have to wait hours to get into that they're from. Outside village to get to university. Oftentimes takes hours sometimes. Daily daily sometimes it just closed. Sometimes there's no getting through so it is university students and now the state is are in, it is intensely hard i don't know how they do it. Someone in the back who has some incredible resources for all of you and it's an amazing resource in our community and then we can open it up i think there needs to be a transition point right okay there's a woman i talked to violence just do things and what. Like as a form of assistance and what time coming up to me as a story of this one young man i knew from the university became university things he actually was studying to play the violin and a very famous university in palestine. And to make it to his classes getaway in a checkpoint for over 5 hours. So you wait in the checkpoint and then finally they ended up saying anybody from the city of annapolis cannot travel to ramallah weber state university where he was setting one. You just don't get a permit class over so he decided to go through the hills instead. He got shot in the leg. Is permanently actually then then his family found him carried him down and tried to get him through the checkpoint he wasn't he lost too much blood in his leg on to be able to save the leg and get the hospital in time which was also in ramallah. Now he's not able to travel to university classes at all. I'm he's not able to play the violin he's had to go into a different kind of work just to meet child to support his family for the large medical bills they had with his like you think of these kind of things that i think of course there's another story. But he can't even make it to jerusalem the palestinian man to even meet with other clown so how he says his piece even achievable you know how is ignorance of americans of israelis because we don't even have the power to get there. Yeah the crushing of people first okay. Please set a join me in thanking saul and nathan especially.

uuprairie_org

Pr121007Pachciarz-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist prairie. Purpose aspires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation we welcome people of all ethnic and religious backgrounds whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure we welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities or your inability later in the service will invite visitors guests and returning friends to introduce yourself so we might get to know you a little bit better on sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services they're presented either by a prayer remember a member of the wider community or by our new minister today will be presenting. About the mcdade. This is a quote by carolyn mcdade to what do you bring your clear passionate descent. And to what do you bring clear passionate essence. Now we welcome our member all of which are soft for a presentation today i don't have a bio to share what you've already seen her a few times i think we all know her well. So the song by caroline mcdavid you're hearing this morning are just a few of the many pieces of music she's created over the years music child it first gain an audience in the 1980s and a continued to be made today she continues to make music in collaboration with communities of women's choruses mcdade songs over the decades and touched on the great causes of our times her songs are inspired by her love of and concern for the planet we live on the ideal of helping humans live in harmony with the planet and with one another and what is a wellspring for her women's spirituality indeed mcdade is one of the women who helped to define women spirituality as much as it can be to find out when i suggested. She provided the music to that and rising greenwich barb just saying i was glad of the opportunity to find out more about this person who could write this music which touches so many people so deeply these songs will be legacy enough but mcdade has offered the world so much more in the more than five decades that she's been creating music but what i'll be saying about caroline the day this morning is based on information she shares on her website on conclusions that i've drawn after listening to her music and on a 2007 article in the new world by written by kimberly french i have to confess that much of robbie sharing is taken from the uu world article mcdade was born in she remembers clearly the day it came to the house her family was not a singing family but she began singing as a young girl it coming naturally to her since she was shy and not interested in sport she turned to her only sister and the piano for friendship washing where she is taken for a ride on a strong current soaked and embraced and then returned after a time to her place on the piano bench to a regulated life in a room with walls water and it's when she was 6 years old and how they intersected this proximity also gave us the greatest moment when the spirit broke through the human structures and economic has she and her family that was a turning point the first time she's song from her own experience come with me to wear rushing waters flow to the sea will share what has been and what's yet to be for now is the time for living go. her be bold bold and climb the mountains up to the sky race the wave rolling so high yell with fury and sometimes crying your life is yours for living. Thank you what you can't tell from the word is what sound palette that mcdade uses. Kimberly french the song describe this ancient love and. Other of mckay's recent song. Flowing and slow low and key in containing musical allusions to birdcalls and rhythms of nature such as the role of waze onto shore a wonderful latest cds my heart is moved mcdade intersperses recorded animal and ocean sounds with her music as i said before for everyone they've been called new ag. Okay. want to be found. So she doesn't often white popular songs but that's not her purpose suitcase music to feed the circle of women activists she works with her maid audience is a generation of women who raised one of one another's consciousness in the 1970s and you came out ready to change the world should we create some music to feed her own spirit she creates music the only way she knows how their own voice and i'd like to show you part of an interview with carolyn today that may or may not happen. In the film you'll see a young child oh no that part i cut out but at the time her granddaughter was living with her she was about 10 years old now her granddaughter the young-adult attempt to always explore as deeply as possible and be as honest as you can with what her own truth is and however she wants to express her others to touch what matters my passion free women's generative energies to act as social planetary cosmic being on behalf of ourselves one another in the well-being of the whole my ardent desire is that as a movement we nurtured the myriad ways of creative expression as pads to deepen human consciousness to envision a society worthy of this blessed creation to act in ways that are transformative. The path carolyn. Keswick has brought her famous certain circles but not much portion she was in cape cod simplicity is a way of life with her she presents retreat programs of social action and music in the united states and canada throughout the year she travels among women's courses working on musical projects that every few years or so result in his cd the women in these courses don't only sing they are all passionately active and working for social justice and the environment to sit among one of mcdade's courses to sing with them says kimberly friend feels like entering a sacred sacred place this is her place for community her work place where her songs live thank you very much. And now we're closing words for today we'll be right back home from by carolyn stayed from the earth charger. This is a time when humanity must choose its future. A future that holds both parallel and promise. The focus not on having but being having or being the choices hours thanks everybody for coming today.

uuprairie_org

Pr120826ClareNorelle-ed.mp3

Welcome to perry unitarian universalist society. I'm penny isla remember the program committee prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color or sexual orientation or family structure. We welcome you no matter your age or your abilities or in abilities. Later in the service we will invite visitors. And yes. I'm returning friends to introduce yourself so that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. They're presented either by a prime member. Remember the wider community. Or by our minister sin. Sandy ingham. Today will be taking full advantage of clarendon wells many talon. Please please welcome for sandbar. Bob parks. Google lidar chalice. When inspiring people i listen to with too much. Back. People lose their ability to think for themselves. Listen to me with suspicion. I should be a sparring partner. Not inspiration. Paolo lugari. Feeling like i've known claire since we first moved to madison around 10 years ago. And we were delighted when she responded to our offer to sponsor someone to go to. Friends of gaviota store. We could have found a better candidate. She speak spanish. And she cares about the things that they're trying to do and gaviotas. If she hasn't already charm you with her music i'm sure she will win you over by what she has to say. So much for having me here and i am so grateful to penny and bill for. Sending me to gaviota it was a very very cool experience. Okay the screen. I was going to go down in front maybe i'll just take the stuff with me and we can pull this. Cleaned out i'm going to tell you some slide or a little dark. Field museum. To help me get it all in a short amount of time. I'm basically gaviotas at this point is a community of about 220 people. It was founded in the colombian man named paula lugati. His father was italian. prefer to move to colombia and homeschool this sun apollo was homeschooled and went to the university when dr. study development in the philippines and came back with this visions for. Creating a sustainable community and. Ecologically conscious community out in the plains the tropical plains of colombia. / /. And engineers soil sciences and the community in the late 60s. I'm in early 70s they began to form it. And so over the. Putting the community together. Sofia the first 22 years the community was really focused. Around developing alternative technologies particularly. Solar technology and winds they developed pumps. Forgetting clean healthy drinking water from deep under the soil because the surface water in that area tended to have a lot of diseases in it. And it was sickening the people in the area. And then. This was mostly funded by the un and by the colombian government. And 1990 most of that funding ran out. And one of the cool things about gaviotas is that they are very flexible and resilient community. And what they did after 1990 is they really began to work with these. Some forest that they had planted in the 80s. Should have said that. Ambit started if they found a way to plant. Pine trees. Out in the very acidic and aluminum field soil of the llanos which usually just grows prairie grasses. And. Starting in the 90s they started to. Exploit these forests and use them in a sustainable way tapping them for resin and making products. And selling the resin. And so for the last 22 years it's gone from being focused mainly on alternative technologies. Tamor howa village can live off sustainably. Off of forest that is planted in an otherwise. Charlie inhospitable place. Assertive gaviotas descanso these two periods of about 22 years. And let's see what else i have your soul in the first 22 years yes they develop pumps. Windmill solar water heaters. And use them to find ways to live in this difficult terrain and if the land wasn't harsh enough it's also an area where there's been a lot of. Worse it's been a war zone for all of those decades that they've been there between the the gorillaz the leftist guerrillas who live in that area and paramilitaries right-wing paramilitary that a grown-up and the colombian government and its. Soldiers as well. I'm so they. Had to find a way to live in the midst of a war zone. The last 44 years. And. So those are the two main things i wanted to say before so i need us lies. If you want to. Go ahead so that was the map of colombia obviously i have these two slides in here these are from madison wisconsin actually the first two i work at lincoln school as a spanish translator. And so i gave a brief presentation about gaviotas to the kids there too in a bunch of classes. And then got their letters and their questions for gaviota. And a photograph. And took those to the kids who live in gaviota. So i just wanted to show you because they're adorable people. This is the other class these two classes in particular sent photos and letters to the kids and gaviota. So yeah there we go this is just leaving bogota should stay in late march i caught a plane from chicago down to bogota. Stayed overnight there and met up in the morning with. A group an international group of people who had been gathered together by friends of gaviota. Do a very brief to her it was going to be a 3-day to her only one of which was spent actually out at the community in the llanos. Because it's considered too dangerous to have stranger stay there overnight. So we have two days one day in bogota one in the town of vfd senseo and then one where we flew it left early in the morning flew out to gaviotas and flew back before nightfall. So this is leaving bogota this is they have this initiative or a couple days a week they closed off one of the main streets in bogota is half closed off for bicycles and pedestrians traffic. That's what that photo was about. Go up leave bogota pretty soon you go through this tunnel under the andes mountains. Coming down the other side is where there's been a lot of a lot of violence on them the banks of the other side of the andes mountains. And so we were stopped. By soldiers. Like every 10 or 15 minutes in this bus going down the side of the nd. That's just one of the stops. Let me gather to the town of via vistancia and this is our motley crew from. All over the world we had people a couple from culusow in the caribbean. Which i'd actually never heard of before trip. And we had a lot about half colombian people. Some americans. 3 french people. Somebody from spain and somebody from japan. And we are all gathered together ready for our tour. And that night i'm sorry again that the photos are so dark but hopefully you'll be able to see something this is paulo lugatti who is now all grown up. And in his late 60s. And so we had a talk with him our first night movie events yard. Very dynamic speaker. He talked for about three hours that night and told us kind of everything he wanted to tell us. About gaviotas. That's part of this conversation. The next morning early early in the morning. We went out to the airport we had to pass through a lot of soldiers and government officials to get out onto the tarmac. But then we went out to these little teeny planes. And this is this is jason who's the guy from baltimore there were. Three of us there who work with low-income kids and families that one woman from paris and then jason in baltimore. And me here in madison. And i think we were the three who kind of asked a lot of questions about social justice and peace. I'm nulastin someway isabel alternative technologies although all of us knew something about those. And so this is my friend id from paris she was my roommate and also works with has work with homeless people a lot paris. And she was actually she was hired by the other two friends women as the videographer. I'm at we drive there. And without them they had not asked permission to take video so this was a little bit delicate they were hoping to make a documentary but had not asked permission. And she was so tired she was sort of caught in the middle of this. Heading out to the plains. Probably we can go through a lot of these fairly quickly this is what it looks like it's you it's lighter than this the flying out of luciano she's got the grasslands there. Where the soil is really acidic and filled with aluminum and doesn't grow it has very few other nutrients. And so it just grows these grasses. And then you got these little fingers i don't know if you can see this but these are called las canas. And their little slow-moving rivers and then someplace large rivers that are like little fingers of rainforest. Running through the llanos. And that's where you find things like. Crocodiles and anacondas and. Happy beres and things like that. So this is arriving in gaviota ruskin airplanes. And we came down there was not a it wasn't like. Samantha it was a grass field that we landed in and the last two are they've only had a few people out on tours. I'm the people i went with a run one tour in 2010. And that time they had to leave early because if it starts to rain too much you can't get your plans off the ground. And actually we landed at the wrong end of the grassfield and we all had to get out and then the pilots kind of pushed the plane up over a little bump and then back into an area where they could get it down to the other end. One of the pilots picking the plains. And so after we got off the planes we were met this is theresa valencia she's the. Administrative coordinator of gaviota. And we are met with pfeiffer and some of the leaders of workgroup. If we can go back thanks. One more. And this is the bus that they use its recycled from bogota. It's an old bogota city bus. But what they've done is they have a tractor that runs on biodiesel and it's biodiesel that they make that. Mixes recycle vegetable oil from bogota restaurants. With pine from turpentine from the trees. And that's what they used to run their equipment and their. Tractor which pulls the bus around for the people the few people who come out to visit. This is our little tour bus for. Going around the grounds of gaviota. Impala lugatti sits in a little captain seats. At the front of the bicycle little swivel seat and he just sits up there and talks. Talks and talks. I didn't get very good photographs of the pine forest i tried to but it's actually one of the very interesting things. About this forest which is about 30 years old at this point. Is it they have not used for besides in it. Which is unlike most. Pine-forest plantings like in venezuela and other places and so it's happened is that the native. Rainforest plants have grown up among the pine trees and there's let them grow with the idea of turning this part of the planes into a parcel of rainforest eventually they will overtake the pine trees. Now they're growing together so this is actually the pine for us but it looks like. It looks like a tropical rainforest. Victory wild thing. This is from arciniega sister head forester and he's been with gaviotas for. I think about three decades. I'm running the trees he was one of the people who helped figure out how to plant the pine trees when they first planted them in the 1980s now the soil out there is so poor it's it's very difficult to plant anything. But they learned about the honduran pine tree. Not native in this was a little controversial. But they. We're able to take this honduran former pine tree and inoculate the roots with my microryza with fungus. And that allowed it to get enough nutrients out of the soil to grow and pompili was one of the people who worked on that and figuring out how to draw the pine trees in the beginning was just an experiment that didn't even know what they were going to do with the pine trees they were just trying to see what can we grow in this soil. And then it became so successful that when they ran out of government funding and un funding that's what they turn to assist pine forest and then they ended up planting 20,000 acres. They believe it's about the size of two lake mendota has set up at one point. Of pine trees that sound right. Okay. Yeah so it's a pretty huge forest at this point. This child is a picture of one of those the revenant tappers. And they have this whole system worked out for sustainably harvesting the resin from the trees we can go back to the. Why is it moving let's go back to the resident. Okay then go back to the resin tappers just so i can tell you what they do they even develop their own tools for doing the resin tapping. One of the things i really it really admire about gaviotas how they adapt technologies from other places and then invent things. Pettyfer every facet of life. Very interesting ways so they made i think they were originally designed revans tapping the you know that would not that would make it easy for the resin tappers and they wouldn't they wouldn't be strained doing this work. It was particular tool they made they they swipe a little cut in the tree. And then if you want to. So the next photograph. They put this anticoagulant. So that the resin will keep running. And usually the best anticoagulant apparently is very expensive. And so they analyzed it and made their own and it's made out of. Wheat bran. And sulfuric acid a tiny amount of sulfuric acid. Which they mix together and they smear it on the cut and that keeps the resin running. And they've been escaping the very fast process they go into go. Chicken cut the cut the bark off. Squeeze the anticoagulant on staple these bags on these little plastic bags. And then they leave them i think it's for about 48 hours to collect. Might be longer than that they clipped it's a couple of days. To collect the resin and then they go back. Take the bags into their resin factory. And the same tree can be tapped. They do different sides like one year they'll do this side and another years older this side. And they can go around the tree and they figure they can keep tapping. For very long time the trees eventually show no ill. On the tapping. Another thing i wanted to say is that. Usually in the pine resin industry it takes 20 years for a tree to mature and they found with the michael rice that they use and with the think it's also because of the biological diversity. Among the trees at these were much bigger and ready to tap after 10 years. After looking at the going through the forest and seeing the demonstration of resin tapping it took us out to this field where they showed us. A demonstration for how they had planted the pine trees they'd invented again a whole can of array of machinery that was run by the biodiesel that could plant a lot of trees at a time. And i don't have photographs of that i took videos but they didn't come out but i do have this kind of interesting this is. Well maybe it's not interesting in a photograph of this is a bottle of the microryza. So basically in this photograph they were talking to us about how they had. Coded the roots. Of the baby pine trees they would grow the b baby pine trees. In hydroponics. It wasn't in water but it was in i think discarded rice hulls. From from nearby rice industry. And then when they were certain age they would take them out. Quicker routes. Coat them in this michael rise and the fungus. And then plant them in the ground. It's what they were demonstrating there and you can see right across. From the edge of the forest. You can kind of see up in the corner as one of their windmills. Which is one of the most famous inventions they invented this particular kind of windmill. That is it doesn't have a tail on it like a lot of our windmills do it it was particularly designed to catch. Both of gentle breezes that often i get the breeze is out there are very irregular. But sometimes they'll just kind of puff this way off that way and it's sometimes very big wins will come up on the prairie. So they needed to design a windmill that could respond. To just a little bit of wind but would also be strong enough to stay intact with strong winds. And that would easily swivel around to catch the front breezes. So that's one of their famous windmills. And there it is again there's three of them in this field. At least three windows are attached to a pump that they also designed the pump that. Pumps water both with it's a double action pump is what it's called so i don't know anything about pumps other than what i've been reading for this. But it is pumps water both with both movements with the up and the down. It's a sleeve pump which means that they invented which means it's less heavy the part that has to lift up. Is a lot less heavy than a lot of pumps. And the cats to their famous windmills so they have three of these in this field. At least three windmills pump from very deep in the ground all the water for the community. As well as water that they now bottle and sell so it pumps. And with gravity flows down to a bottling plant. Cheyenne this is. They're former hospital. It was built from 1982 to 1986. And it's an all solar hospital. It was apparently a very very beautiful and it's still a beautiful building it's no longer used at the hospital. It was designed to be able to use. Solar energy to sterilize everything they had us all solar kitchen in the hospital. They decided to catch the breezes because it gets very very hot out and luciano's. And they have tunnels underground that would catch the breezes from one direction and bring them up. Into the hospital. And it was operating as a hospital from about 1986 until 1995 94-95. When the government. Change the laws. For what constituted a hospital and this became illegal you could no longer use it at the. Because you had to have. A certain number of patients. And you had a certain have to have a certain number of specialists. And so the gaudy alton's adapted and what they did to adapt was they turned it eventually into a water bottle. Which is also sterile at the hospital. This is the this used to be their solar clothes drying which got very very hot and was used for all the sheets. And all the linen of a hospice. And there's a important japanese architectural magazine. Designated this hospital one of the 40 most important buildings in the world. Do years after it was built. And this is their stair solar-powered kitchen. Can't remember the details that use solar power in two ways. One was to the used. Palm oil. Sent it up. Into where it was heated extremely heated and then brought back down. At a high. Temperature. And. And forgetting the other way yes. Those are gaviotas thanks for asking that yeah these are the tiles that are all through the hospital. Wfs means seagull. And if i should have explained that when paula lugatti first went out into the llanos. Looking for a place to villa build a village and he had this idea he knows brother took this long. Jeep road trip out of the llanos and they came to the end of this. There's highway that it built been built by the government about a decade earlier that kind of went out into the middle of the honest and stopped. They just they ran out of funds they ran out of i think the government changed it ran up some they went to the end of the highway. When they got there they got out of their jeep they were looking around this is the story anyway. Looking for a place to have this village and this. Bird flew up. And it's actually not a seagull at the kind of a yellow it's a yellow-billed turn yellow next turn. Which is like a river bird that lives in that region. And when i saw that they knew there must be a river nearby. And the people that region call it a gaviota. So. this is named after that bird. And. The hospital is full of these tiles with these little bird emblems on them. There it is. With a large cricket again i'm sorry this the photos are so dark. That's one of the tiles in a little cricket. And this is one of the guys who was on our trip. Again because it's so dark you can't see very well i just have him there so you can sort of see the size. Also could be with a nice guy. I'm forgetting his name right now but he works. Installing alternative. Pickett solar. Water heaters in a poor neighborhood in bogota. And he was just a really nice guy. Yeah they don't use. Willits. Thermal. I used to know the term and i'm forgetting it this morning i'm sorry they don't use solar voltaic they don't use. Photovoltaic very much they have it in two places. In the village one is the communications facility. And the other was. I think it was in the hospital. Is to place. Yeah they have it there. But it's not. I think it may still be use actually in a water bottle. The mostly they just use. It's. You told me about this pill it's not called passive solar but it's the solar what. Solar solar thermal. Were they either put oil or water in places to collect the sun and be heated. And then use it. And so excited for this photograph this is what this is actually supposed to show is this tunnel off to the side this is facing a place where there are slightly more prevailing breezes. And the breezes blowing through that tunnel and then up into the. Wallet. And because the previous health facility that they had before they built this hospital the heat was the main problem it was just. Sweltering hot it rains i forgot to mention it rains eight months of the year and is extremely hot so people in the hospital the doctors in the patients would be very very. I saw this they did a really beautiful job of making this a comfortable. Place for people to be. Just leaving leaving the grounds of the hospital. Follow lugatti saying goodbye to the coordinator at the hospital. Youtube there's eight different areas of work in gaviotas and each has like a work leader. And the woman who's the work leader of the of the water bottling plant now. I grew up in gaviota. So that's one of the interesting things to there's a lot of people who are there now who grew up who were either. Sent to gaviotas. To go to the boarding school that they had their i forgot to mention that. They had a boarding school in the 70s and 80s. And so their people who were sent from around the llanos from ranches and. Different places and other people who are the kids of people living in gaviota. Went to the school. And a lot of those people have come back or still live in gaviotas are now adults. Running different. Aspects of the community. This is coming up to the factory which. So what i have written down all the numbers for the factory i'm sorry i should have had that. Close at hand it's built out of soil cement bricks. They made in gaviotas they didn't invent. The machine that makes them it's a single ram. The best familiar with that but it was invented in colombia in the 1950s. And that was one of the first places to really make a lot of use of it it's a hand. Run machine no electricity or anyting. Where they mix 14 parts oil to one part cement. Shovel it in there kind of pull this press down. And the. The moisture in the soil cures the cement. And it makes these very durable. Bricks. And that was one of the first things they began to work on when they moved it when they started the community as they wanted to be able to use. The earth cuz there's that there wasn't a lot of trees around obviously they needed to be able to use the earth for their building. So this is actually. It as of 1996. 98 when. The main book about gaviotas written this was the largest. Earth cement. Building in the world. Things that have been made out of. I'm literally built the largest building. So that's and then on top of it i'm sorry there's a fire tower. In the last 10 years. Actually ever since about 1996 there have been a lot of fires that in the gaviotas for us. A couple of people said by parents quietly probably by paramilitary. I'm summer accidental like the region. Naturally has. Prairie fires but there's been way more than wouldn't it be natural for that area and so one of the things that they've had to do for the last 15 years or so is. Build the spire towers all over the community and through the forest. Where there are continually man there's always somebody up there watching out for forest fires. So that they can go. This is coming up to the factory these are bags of the resin. So that collectively little bags putting bigger bags. And pulled on this. Machine you know it's like a tractor. Trap. Pulled over to the factory. Malaguena sister entryway to the big factories it's a it's a very big space and all made out of these bricks. They say also keep it cooler inside. Going into the factory. Can go through these. This is an on landaeta monday the factory leaders this the work leader of this area and he was one of the people who came to gaviotas as a young elementary school student in the 70s. And now he's been running the factory fry think around 20 years. And they're just loading the. The resume. To be processed. If you can see this very well but these are boxes. A resin huge amounts. Actually i would say it's more you would call this part rosin it's after it's been processed into the the golden heart stuff. And they call it. Clementina. No. No no. I forgetting the name of it sorry but but anyway it is it's more like rosnes the golden hard stuff that you would use on violin. Bows and they invented this process usually it's processed. I'm in big bats then people break it up. And then package it for sale and that uses a lot of plastic and it's also labor-intensive and they developed this process where they once the rosin is completely heated and ready to go they pour it directly into these cardboard boxes. Did they invented and so it just comes out. Nice and neat in the right shape than they. Pack it off to the soul. Okay well except i'll show you this. The california that's the word i was looking for in my tired brain. Sorry, the phone is what they processes into this is. A table showing the some of the different process. Products that they make. From their resume. They have three men tina. Tramontina which is turpentine. And california which is rosin. The golden one over there kind of in the middle and on the right is there biodiesel again which combines the turpentine with vegetable oils recycled vegetable oils from from bogota restaurant. And then this is the residue over on the far right that's left over. And was also very interesting things about gaviotas they try to use everything so that would be what would be thrown out ordinarily and they have found a way to use it to pave their roads. Sticky and then it hardens. Yeah they have this distillation tower where they just distill it into different levels of density. They do know the end they have a boiler that is run on called wood from the forest. But they also had somebody develop. The boiler specially designed to pollute very little. And it. The the leftover from the boiler from the wood in the boiler is biochar which they then used to. They've actually started a farm. As and they are using the biochar to amend the soil in the farm and make it so that they can grow vegetables. I'm going to have to probably stop right. And i did want to say before i stop that will do questions. If anybody wants to like. If we could have a mailing list if you want the last time i did this i ran out of time too and i took people's email addresses i have. I have been reading and reading and reading about gaviotas and the political context of gaviotas and all kinds of stuff. And i would be happy to send anybody emails with links. If you want to learn more about gaviotas have a bunch of good articles about it that i found. So we could start up. Somewhere. Oh okay yeah. So people with. Alright. Put it give you the information it's a very long letter. Pages. Access could be put on the website. Okay so now we take questions. Okay question yeah. I guess i will say that this was a fall from our day and god be with us then we went back to bogota and they have a facility in bogota where they show all of their different technology that they've developed. Have a bunch of slides from that too. Paula lugari strongly avoids. Def definition. Well in the end know it yeah a lot of people don't in fact. Yes i think that was an interesting aspect of our trip was that we had the the woman who ruined with me actually had been, that's for many years and her parents were communist revolutionaries in. South america and i don't know if they knew that but. Papa lugatti is. Very reluctant to talk about any kind of political ideologies but they've been funded by the colombian government. And by the un. For those 22 years in the beginning and then more recently as well they've worked with. The colombian military. On a large-scale project from 2006 to 2008. So. You know. That's a difficult piece of this for me when i think about it i think it's a little challenging. And what can i say i have never lived out there and and gone through what they need to go through to survive i think that. You know the whole region became under government control much more after about 2006 2005-2006. And that's when they started working with the government again. So i think that. One of the reasons he avoids ideologies is because. Their funding and their support. As always come from. Sources that wouldn't want to hear about that. And i think personally to he just he has an aversion helalu-agada grew up during love you lindsey i was at the civil war. In in colombia surrounded by really horrific violence and all of his life there's been horrific violence in columbia. I think that may be part of why he avoids. So you probably read the updated version of the book maybe in 2000. 8 is that possible. Just because they were given that in the 2008 versions when he talks about their desire doesn't work on this tomorrow and do a project which has been plans. Did have come up ever since the very beginning they've had this desire to. Keep their village about the same size and then have similar villages around the llanos. And everytime politics.and.war have gotten in the way. I'm in the 1998 version of the book. I think they were already they were talking about it probably there as well. And what happened is right after alan weisman wrote this book which i'll show you. This is how a lot of people who know about gaviotas know about it is from this book. By alan weisman. Just after he wrote this book in 1980 was published in 1998 but it was the last time you visited there during that period was in 1996 i believe. Right after that the region became. Much more violent. And actually couldn't have visitors and by the year 2000 columbia was just in horrific shape it had the second most internal refugees of any country in the world. And gaviotas really just kind of. Turned turned in on itself survived and it is a lovely place. And i think they've done some very good things since then but. Been about these 220 people. Making it through as a village more than. Starting new things then that's that's how it was for about 10 years then when the region opened up again a little bit. They did go back to the government and proposed this idea that was called tomorrow and do a project where they were hoping to have again these different villages around the llanos. And that fizzled out by about 2008 and paulo lugari wouldn't say why but i think there's a lot of there's there's multinationals who were kind of interested in the train the train became more valuable to a lot of people over the last 10 years colton with the very. Rare and expensive mineral was found there in the region they found more reserves of oil so i think that might have influence the government backing off on this plan because suddenly. The area had yet wasn't seen as a wasteland it was venus a place the multinationals hi beautiful.. Yeah and unfortunately. You know the people who the the gorillas in columbia who are mostly communist. Are the different gorilla glue. They've chosen a fairly violent past. Which is. Which is too bad and i think that also might be why one reason why paula lugai backs away he doesn't eat me wasn't to be called i guess there was a chinese delegation that visited there at one point and they said all this looks like a socialist paradise. And he was extremely alarmed. Yeah he doesn't like the word socialism or anything like that. In the end like i said the communists in the area have tended to go for this a fairly violent path. It sounds like it's been different at different periods of time more recently it's the pair of the right-wing paramilitaries it sounds like. And they are much more. Under the control of the colombian government than they were. Earlier. Which has it. Benefits in a certain amount of. Being overseen a certain amount and maybe a certain amount of protection but. A lot of ways are not for. So the right-wing paramilitaries it sounds like they're the main threat at this point. The word gaviotas mean stegall. Only miss he had been in this case they were named after a river gull because they are far from the ocean. My role was that penny and bill from here from your church. They were looking for somebody to go to gaviota. To take pictures and learn about the community and come back and do presentations about it. I got an email from them and i wanted to do it and i wrote to them and they picked me and i got to go. So i was not a translator i was part of a tour. A very short tour of people from different parts of the world. Who went. 2 gaviota and also spent two days. Two other three days until learning about the community. Thank you. Doctor request. Yeah i'm happy to talk to people about this. Announce can haydock will share the closing words. My father would always say. Know all the people in the community. If the community gets so large that this is no longer possible it is time to split off and create a new community powell garden. Thank you all for coming and please extend the hand of friendship to those around you. And join us for coffee and conversation..

uuprairie_org

Pr131013Ingham-ed.mp3

Morning welcome prairie unitarian universalist society. Susan if you would like the chalice please. Began the words that i am going to say our. Auburn bhaijaan. Blessed are those who yearn for deepening. More than escape. Who can we now smugness and be shakin in conscience. For not afraid to grow in spirit. May their light representatives. By the lighting of this challenge. Shine brightly. Blessed are those who support the church with the society. And it's work by their regular sustained and generous giving. And to give of themselves no less than their money. Say they're like. Represented by this chalice lighting. Continue. To shine brightly. And blessed are those who bring. Not send. Their children. Who invite their friends to come along to join in fellowship service. Learning and growth. May their inner light. Keep on. I like to share a short reading with you this morning. Title other than what. Written by unitarian universalist minister david blanchard. He writes. Not too long ago i was signing in at a local hospital. Well i noticed something that it escaped me before. Well checking to see if the parishioner i had come to visit have been transferred to another room. I saw that in the clergy register she had been transferred to another denomination. Other. I can think of three good reasons why the hospital should move us out of the margins of other dumb. 41. There are 21 letters. In our merged unitarian universalist name. Other is short. With only five. Then there is the fact that in numbers we account for something less than an asterisk. Of the total population. When you put. All us others together we count for something perhaps even a majority. Wax. The wii religious liberals are sometimes loath to admit it we often find some degree of comfort. In our obscurity. You know. Quote. You were properly progressive and open-minded. You know who we were and if you don't. Well then we're not so sure you belonged here. End of quote. In the nineteenth century the liberal christian. In the congregational church. Adopted as their own the pejorative name given them by the orthodox. Pics acted and became organized around the name unitarian. During my hospital visit says blanchard my parishioner and i laughed a bit about the possibilities. Should our congregation become known as. The first other. Church. A good graphic artist could easily fashion the chalice design inside the 04 h logo. People who heard our new name would likely be more curious than confused. The modest two syllables of other would certainly be easier than the 10 we currently use. We could collectively save much price. I personally says blanchard think the people who fashioned the birds are of 1961 could have made matters much simpler had they found a shorter and more meaningful name for the new association of congregations. But for reasons that probably made sense at the time they didn't. In the big picture this is not a problem. What we are about as a religious movement is far more important than what we are called. But there is some level at which i'm not comfortable being the minister of an other religion. Then what. That we are different from many orthodox expressions of faith i can accept. Antifer. What's a notion that we others. Peewee unitarian universal. Baja's muslims friends etc. Are less than. Diminished marginalized because of our differences or different nests. It's something i won't accept. We are an alternative path. 4. Spiritual understanding and religious expression religious being defined in a very broad sense we are not an alternative to those ground those grounding endeavors. Our work together concludes blanchard is in finding ways to extend the understanding and practice of liberal religion in our own line. In the life of our communities and maybe even in the lives of those who decide who's the who. And who's an upper. We are an alternative path. 4. Spiritual understanding and religious expression we are not an alternative. 2. Those grounding endeavors rights blanchard. Being an effective alternative pass for that which ultimately concerns us. Being a meaningful safe warm place in which. To celebrate the mystery of life and build a caring community. Requires a thoughtful. Smooth running operation. So this morning i want to explore briefly organizations in general. And the structure of prairie in particular. What makes prairie. I don't mean theologically. I mean how does prairie stay in existence what is our infrastructure what takes place. On a very basic behind-the-scenes nitty-gritty level here. First-time disclaimers caveat. I want to emphasize that anything i say this morning is in no way. To be taken as criticism of prairies organization. I have observed you. For about a year now. And i think that your basic underlying structure is in very good shape. I know that the bylaws have been revised recently did you know that. They're so dessa siri and i know that currently the policies and procedures are being revised and in some cases rewritten. Your past boards and committees are to be commended. For doing the hard necessary work to get this organization where it is today and the same goes for our. Current board and current committees. Next step. Is to build on what has been done and make prairie even better organized and running even more smoothly. So that we can do amazing things both right here in this community and out in the. Wider world in other words let's ratchet it up. Not every committee is represented at a table this morning. On the caring committee sort of out there on its own very effective but it's organized a little differently it doesn't recruit in quite the same way. This is also true of the committee on ministry now calm did you even know you had a committee on ministry. Also known as the ministerial relations committee. If you want to know more about these but it's a don't have a table please talk to me or to bar parkour president or anybody else you can find you think might know this. I am ignoring the board in my remarks today and concentrating on just on committees but many bored people. Are on committees as well. There are tasks. Jobs being done here every week. Especially on sundays by volunteers who aren't exactly on a committee. The most obvious being our teachers. I finally. Wearing more than one committee hat. Seeing you doing that yet willing for that next. Wearing more than one hat is strongly encouraged. And is very doable. Let's start by acknowledging that working within organizations whether they are dependent on volunteers or not. Is. Challenging. I tend to be much more challenging when volunteers are the mainstay of the institution i mean when we going to fire you. We humans are often. Corky. And occasionally zany. In other words we humans can be difficult. We can find ourselves side-by-side. With people who annoy us. Puzzle. Exasperatus. Even though we are all working towards something that we strongly believe in. Yes. Is our training brown. The place where we can learn how to honor zaniness and quirkiness. Without letting our individual personalities deflect us. From the pursuit of our goals. Here. We can practice focusing on the larger picture even when we get in each other's way. It all begins here right in this building. We can't get along here. In this organization and embrace the joy and mystery that go into building and sustaining an organization that has high aspirations. Then how can we. Why would we expect other organizations with even more lost your goals to do so. Like the united nation. What's exact congress. We have to make cooperation and superb organization happen here first. Before we can set. Can successfully take. These attributes out into the larger community. The first set of initials i used in the title of today's reflections is you and for united nations. October 24th is united nations day. Our october 27th service will commemorate that day. When i was in my teens i think i was in love with all things related to united nations. I've mentioned before that. My best friend in high school and i would bicycle along the allegheny river in the town in which we lived in northwest pennsylvania we would go to a place. I called big rock because it was a big rock. I'm overlooking the river and we wouldn't have long conversations about solving world problems and ending war. I believed that the united nations would succeed in creating world peace and i still believe that though with a lot more reservations. Who's the second time in my growing-up years that i was aware of what an effective caring community could accomplish. The first time was within the presbyterian church community where my parents and grandparents were members. I didn't know ruby may then. But i aspire to be her. I was going to be the one to say my friends. Leader of the world my message to you is simple to achieve universal peace and understanding on this planet you have only to speak. Plainly even though you may look foolish. This is a thousand times better than looking good and talking nonsense which we might be able to apply to. Perhaps not surprisingly when it was time to go to college. I began my college career in the school of international service. At american university in washington dc. I was going to be a diplomat. Still try. Let's go down a notch and talking about organizations to a smaller one but one with very large and bishop. Telling the world about unitarian. Universal. The second set of letters i used. Is uua for unitarian universalist association. The usa is not surprisingly has played an important part in. My life. And last time i was up here in the pulpit. Twisted mid-september. I am fought. That i was going to say some. Provocative things. About. Prairie and the uua. Well. You might ask why would i do such a thing. What's makes things a little more like falling asleep but more importantly. To challenge you because prairie. Rightly or wrongly. Has a reputation of being anti-israel to tional. I'm not wanting anything to do with the central midwest district. Now a region or the unitarian universalist association. I certainly have had my issues and confrontations with the larger association but finally gotten to a point where i believe we do ourselves a huge disservice. If and when. We ignored the uua. But at any rate i didn't pursue that line of fun september and i and i won't be doing so today even though the last sunday. October 6th. Was association sunday. When we as. Congregations within the association were supposed to. Casino boston. But it was strongly suggested that we focus our service last week on around there at the new building did you know. That boston has moved its headquarters for arizona process up. Moving from beacon street with my heart. And collection that day last sunday was supposed to have been taken and given to the uua. I think there are similarities between the united nations and the unitarian universalist association they're both working with groups that have little in common. At least on the surface. Both take a fair amount of mostly unwarranted though not in nearly so. I think a lot of flak from the very entities that make up their communities. I wish i had a dollar for every time i've heard someone complaining about the uua. Getting to where we are now as an organization was a long complicated often rocky. Process. Way back between 1818 and 1825 we were just very loose bunch of ministers and congregation. We were defined largely by our opponents. I think we still have this problem of letting. Those who don't understand what we are define who we are how many times have you defended or justified unitarian-universalism by what we are not. Rather than by what we are. In the early 1800s as many of you know the american association emerged out of this ambivalence about being. Organized but it wasn't much of an organization then only individuals belonging to it. Not churches. And it wasn't supposed to serve congregations but it was supposed to spread the word the word about unitarian unitarian to that point universalist hadn't joined us yet. But not very long after the aua was founded. Calvinist. Calvinist. I was raised you know presbyterian. There are also referred to as orthodox christians at this time.. They began to pick ons. Be more liberal christians the ones who would become unitarians. Charged that unitarianism was lukewarm to religion to morality to piety that unitarians cater to fashionable society. And that as a consequence. Of unitary indominus. Vice and crime had increased in boston and moral values were in decline. Furthermore playing the calvinists. The unitarians even though they were minority in the state of massachusetts. Had somehow managed. To gain control of the political structures of the. If they had good pr that's orthodox. As a result of these false claims the constitution of the commonwealth of massachusetts was amended. In 1834 to allow for. The separation of church and state. That was the last place in the country. Where it was not separated. We're taxes went. To the established church. Was the congregational church. Antler all the established church. The calvinist. Okay. Actually unitarians were against this. Disestablishment. Well no more financial support from those taxes. The good news is we continue to be called unitarian. Rather than antidisestablishmentarianism cigar name is. By 1886. Our movement was enlightened enough at least in the western conference part. To stop defining itself as exclusively christian. And the western conference also dropped any theological requirements for membership. In the congregations of that conference and i said last month. This opened the door our doors to our. Congregations to. Agnostics. And even. Presumably to atheists. And it also opens the door for yet more charges and claims of our being immoral and the cause of decline in moral values. And the increase in crime. Implied and assumed in all these rules and principles that our spiritual ancestors were trying to develop in the nineteenth century and that we're still working on developing. Is the necessity of having a strong organization. Do not only spread the good news of you and carrying ism and universalism. Also to be out there. In the world. Which the uua is i don't know how many of you read the world magazine that. Is put out by our figure organization by the us we have. I don't think we've always done that and i don't mean right here at prairie. Will you use. Let's go down one more step on the ladder not down a step importance but down a step in size to prairie you use society. Initially. That was going to be my third set of initials they are titled my reflections but. Puus i think we should change our names or at least that last word. I mean this. I-news. We will use initials a w. Denomination. But that's a topic for another day so i settled on pvs-4 prairie volunteer fair. When we become part of an organization especially a non-profit one that depends on volunteers to stay alive we have certain expectations of that organization. And you're going to say she has certain expectations of us. Prairie is if you haven't noticed you you should have noticed. Prairie is in the midst of its annual canvas. That time of year when we ask you to pledge to keep this place open. Because we. Myself aboard the committees and the rest of the staff have expectations that you will contribute time as well as money to keep us healthy and thriving we decided we would have the volunteer fair at the same time. As our annual fundraiser. You have index cards. You should on your chairs. There for you to write a question if you want to or complaint. Or a suggestion for any of the committees and take that far then to the appropriate table two tables are all around the edges find the committee that you wrote your complaint question suggestion on and give it to them they might not be able to answer you right. Now today because. Hopefully those things will be a little busy at the table. So we want you to visit the tables to take the time. And that brings us to the last set of letters which isn't an abbreviation. The letters are exactly what they look like they spell the word you. We want you to take the time before leaving today to visit as many tables as possible not just because there will be snacks. On the table in learn more about what each committee does and how prairies organize and what's the relationship of the board to the committee's and how can you help the committee's. He want you then to seriously consider signing up to be part of the committee. And as soon as each one of you has done that we will unlock the outside doors home now i know that i possibly walking a fine line here between working up your enthusiasm and he'll tripping you would presbyterian. And i also understand that there are always times in any of our lives when we might want to be a volunteer. But other things are going on. And it's not possible to be doing that right now. I want to be equally clear that being on a committee can mean many different things it does not necessarily mean that you have to attend monthly meetings. There are all sorts of tasks that need doing to keep a church an organization such as this running smoothly one of our goals for you this morning is that you'll realize that if you visit the different tables. Keeping an organization healthy and being mindful of the needs that people have. And aware of the fact that people class a lot. This is hard work. It is often a mystery to me that organizations work at all. And when they do it is also a joy. Committees are a wonderful way to meet people. To deepen friendships. To find joy. And delight in working toward common goals. What if we had no committees. What if we weren't here. What if you assume that prairie was here because it has been here for a long time now. The handheld mic. Okay. Pretend. That our committees have all disappeared. Humor me. And try to tap into some zaniness of your own as i do a riff on it's a wonderful. What if you came here on sunday and found the doors locked. Now there wouldn't be any doors too long because the building wouldn't be here. Or if we're here let's pretend is here but in disrepair because gary's. Buildings and grounds committee doesn't exist. And you can't go next door to see if there's anyone in the news. Purchase house. Because the ad hoc committee. Doesn't exist. The one is going to get that house ready to use but i don't know this. And here i am. And i'm here with five little children. Ps5. Not mine. But i found them and they need. Religious sect. Where are the teachers. Where are the people. Who will impart religious education to these little tikes. Where's the committee. There are no committees. Okay okay. I tell myself stay calm and maybe i'll just take the children and we'll find a worthy cause. There's so many worthy causes out there i don't know which one to pick i will just go ask molly in the social justice committee. But where are they. Where's that committee. I would help with that bridget prison project. But you're not there. Play i can't do that. Okay where's that cash i gave. But we could join moses huh where kathy has he where's the cash. Where the checks finance committee i have no idea where i stand with my pledge. Okay well let me try something else. What'd you say the finance committee like they don't care though they're not there. Well. I think i will find that kids go play outside kids are outside. The membership committee aaron height. I have some ideas for the membership committee and when's that next meeting that tattoo orientation thing i want to go to that i want to share some of my experience. There is no membership committee. Penny. Program committee. I have some great ideas for sunday morning service. I can't find you. But there's no there's anybody to greet me at the door this morning either and when i came into this building that's in disrepair. I know i'll volunteer to help with one sunday morning because those pc program committee folks keep bugging me to do that. But they're politically correct. But i can't find them either. And that. An. Maybe the communications committee can help. Straighten up this mess but we don't have a communications. Committee to send out the word via prairie news-review. Okay how about. Could you please contact. History or the boston say we've got a mess here we don't any committees. You don't exist either. I need a cup of coffee. 30. Or something. Coffee. There is no coffee i'm quite sure that somehow automatically mysteriously coffee appears all by itself. Every sunday morning the same with soup on soup sundays. And i believe we have some sign up sheets do we not barbara. My baby right here. Why don't you pass them around right now. Now i know that there are people who. Don't like that. And i'm actually one of them. Don't like passing around sign up sheets because it offered number of reasons it does it can disrupt the service he also is not particularly. Spiritual although i suppose it could be sacred and spiritual and it puts people on the spot we're getting dangerously close to guilt-tripping again. But. We haven't figured out a better way to it so if you have a better way to get people to. Sign up to do coffee or work van soup sundays. Let us know. Okay. I'm going home now. I'm the rest of community spirit. Laughing and sacred moments i'm empty and sad i'm not energized one little bit i'm not motivated to go out and do things in the world i'm not moved by anything. Portal. Because there no committees. Don't let this happen to you support your committee. Blessed are those who know that the work of the church this place we call the society and some call of fellowship. The work is the transformation of the larger society. Blessed are those who have a vision of beloved. Community transcending the present and who do not shrink from controversy. Sacrifice. Or change. Blessed are those who speak their minds and meetings. You can take and give criticism who keep alive their sense of humor. Blessed are those. Who when asked to serve do it gladly. Realize the changes brought about through human meeting. And to do the doll work of committees. And stay. Kellyanne. Blessed are they indeed. Now you are being asked. Go out and do good things do snack maybe sign up for some things and enjoy your neighbors.

uuprairie_org

Pr150927Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. I am sandy ingham clarice minister. Prairie. Tries to be both open-hearted and open-minded and we do a pretty good job. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color your sexual orientation your gender. Your family structure he went out them you no matter what your age or your abilities for your inability. Sunday mornings are services can be very different so i always encourage new folks to attend more than one time sometimes services are done by me sometimes by members of the congregation and sometimes by. People from outside the congregation. These then are the opening words. Anonymous. Words. May we be reminded here of our highest aspirations. And inspired to bring our gifts of love and service to the altar of fuse me to the altar of humanity. May we know once again that we are not isolated being. But connected. In mystery and miracle. To the universe. To this community. And to each other. Flame of fire spark of the universe. That warmed our ancestral hearth ages of life and death symbol of truth and freedom. We strive to understand ourselves. And our earthly home. I'd like to share a little bit of. Thanks. From. The chosen save some of you may know that pork. Collection of essays john buren's and forester church put together. The first little reading i went to share with you though was written by unitarian universalist minister judith walker riggs. She says long long ago. It seemed so simple. The universe was a 3-story department house. With heaven on the top floor. Full of gods and stars. Earth in the middle. Full of people. The animals. Implants. Angel. In the basement. Full terrible and scary things. God had nothing else to do but sit up there watching us. We were the center of attention. We. Or his people. Then came coronavirus. He said. That the sun did not move around the years that all but was a fixed star. He said. It was the earth and us on it that did the movie. And worse. That the earth was just one. Of the planets. That's so rude. One among many and not at the center of anything. At all. In the last few decades we have been answering a new vision this was written right at the end of the last century. So in the 1990s. We have been answering a new vision of the universe as radical. And revolutionary. As the copernican change over. And we still. Have not worked out what it all means. Either in theology or in our view of what humanity is. And what we ought to do. With our lights. Forester church rights. That's about a funny story about his son. They always call twig. Not going to tell you the funny story right now but forrester says that went we gets a little older. I'll introduce him to the humanist manifesto. Because of age can't we came up with something that sounded. Very. Very calvinist. To forrester church and his wife and his kid was raised in a unitarian universalist. The forester church says when he gets a little older i shall introduce twig to the humanist. Manifest. In 1933 a group of religious. Humanist most from chicago. And many of whom were unitarian. Together compose a brief document. Outlining the basic principles of humanism. It was not designed. As an anti-religious. Statement. But asset estimate. To the religious spirit. As it my. Best buy express. In our own time. The word humanism is. Blasphemy. Too many deeply religious people even. Today. More than. Well then it was more than half a century after this document was composed. It suggests. Godlessness. Sacrilege and immorality. Yet the humanist manifesto. Is a profoundly. Spiritual. Document. Play finally this. Unitarian universalist. The challenge has. Been put to ask to explain. What we really. Wright's unitarian universalist minister stephen kendrick. Now if any of you try to explain that to people who don't know anything about unitarian universalism. You can sympathize. Here's his response. Our congregations freely gather to live out a democratic face. Every human being is holy. And it's called to the tasks and joys of love. We do not limit the truth of god capital g. Even to the word god. But live in openness and belief in human freedom and dignity. Our creed is kindness. We celebrate the gift of life and join in taking on the sufferings of this fragile world. We are this generations bears of an eternal message. An eternal message. That truth must. Grow enlarge and move. In creative freedom. And finally. Revelation is not sealed. What is lived in new in every heart. You say you wanted simpler. Ask stephen kendrick. Try this. We join in celebrating. Oneworld. When people. One love. Which is. Capital. It is a tall order. But our heritage inspires us. Conscious. Compels us to do. No less. Yeah the words to vacuum. That we sang just a few minutes ago the him that i like to call the meditative him. That one i sometimes stick in the middle. In this case number 93 to mercy pity peace and love. The words by william blake. We're written sometime between 1757 and 1827 so i could think we could probably say. Sometime after he's 20 years older. More than 100 years before. The humanist manifesto which was written in 1933. And yet here you have a completely humanist him. With no mention of a deity. And that opening him. Oh what are you piece of work are we which i always transpose am i had 20. What a piece of work we are. Is fascinating also from a humanist perspective. I have avoided this him my entire ministerial career. Just getting kind of lexi. I avoided it well because every time i read the title i cracked off. But now that i have looked. At the words. Carefully. I realize what a humanist song it is. Especially that third verse. But you might not remember so here it is. But give us room to move. And grow. But give our spirit play. And we. Can make a world of light. Out of the common clay. Ouch. The common. Play. And there you have it. Justin that one sentence. Why i became a to iq minist. And why i remain a luminous. Oops i just gave away the end of the story. The punchline. Too soon. However. I'm not the same humanist i was so. About 40 years ago when i first encountered this philosophy this. Belief system. Right over there at first unitarian. I have had doubts about humanism recently. And its validity for life in the 21st century. Have i had reservations about whether or not humanism is strong enough to be a force. In this world as we know it right now in this century. Yes. I have. And my doubts and reservations about being a humanist can be at least. Partially explained by those two words that i used in the title. Boobers. And humility. Humility cording to the dictionary is the quality or state of being humble one of those we have to go back to. Other definition. From greek words meaning earth. And i'm not sure how to say this other one even though it wasn't greece this summer to me. Which means on the ground. Humble as an adjectives means not proud or hot. Not arrogant or assertive unpretentious offered in a spirit of death. But as a verb. It means to destroy. This part i love to destroy the power. Independence or prestige off. To make humble. In spirit or manner. Hubris you probably most of you know what this word means it's not a word that i hear very often. It means exaggerated pride or. Self confidence. Often resulting in retribution. Think shakespeare. Before i say anything more about hubris and humility in relationship to humanism. We need to take a very brief fast look at the history of humanism in general and within unitarian-universalism in particular. This congregation. Prairie. Prides itself. On being a humanist congregation. How many of you. Would identify or describe yourself as a humanist. When the search committee interviewed me. I swear you guys asked me was a very good interview by the way. But you must have asked me 10 times if i was a humanist. But seem like you asked me a lot of. And i know it was very important. What does it mean to be a humanist. And more precisely what does it mean to be a few minutes within unitarian in this context. Context of unitarian universalism. I have to go back to the dictionary just for a minute here for definition of humanism. The first one is devotion to the humanities. Two literary culture. The second part of that first definition is revival of classical letters. Individualistic critical spirit and emphasis on. Secular concerns. Characteristic of the renaissance. You see how far back. Humanism gatos. The second definition simply says humanitarianism. But the third one says a doctrine attitude or way of life centered on human interest or values especially a philosophy. That usually rejects supernaturalism. It always does it just says it usually does. And stress is an individual's dignity and worth and capacity for self-realization. True reason. Are you still with me. It sounds like something that could have come right out of our. Purposes and principles that sir. Sahara. How did we get here to humanism. In one sense certainly human a sin. Humanism have been around forever. Even well before the renaissance. And almost always. Going against the grain. Of the prevailing culture especially in the religious sphere. Unitarian universalist minister jack mendelson some of you will have heard. In his still relevant book. Being liberal in an ill liberal age. Highly recommend this book. Mangelsen traces humanism back to 4:50 bc before the common era. When a man named. Protagonist. Spoke out against that ira's as mendelssohn calls unintelligible popular theology there were just too many gods and goddesses. He said. Ask for the gods. I'm assuming he needs boxes to i do not know whether they exist or not. Life is too short. For such difficult inquiry. Humans. Are the measure of all things. For this proclamation and i suspect other transgressions. Protagonist was exiled from grace. And when he was trying to find a place to be. In sicily. He apparently was lost at sea. His books were burned in the public square. But today we consider him to be the pioneer humanist. And it's definition of humanism remains the classical one. Face. Bought. And action are the domain and responsibility of the human. . the supernatural. Radical candor. 450 bc. So how do we get here how do we get to being a predominantly human is faith. And are we still. Here. As a predominant. Predominantly. Humanist. Within the unitarian universalist association. Not really going to tackle that until next week. Over roughly the past two-and-a-half centuries since before the revolutionary war in this country. Free-thinking people here in what became the united states and many of whom became unitarian universalist they wrestled with these questions. What is the purpose of religion. What is the nature of god are humans responsible for what happens for everything thank god if there was one. Create. And then depart. Leaving off the figure it out. Of course humanist font is intertwined with this history. Of the freethinkers. The concept of god evolved from god as. Powerful. B-mail. Of course. Who gave rewards to those worthy of them and punished sinners. Poodle palace theology. Punish sinners harshly sometime back on who many of us associate with the old testament.. I all. Always there was. Push back we would call it now. From the freethinkers. And there is after all a lot of room for evolving fought. The history of this evolution in the way we think about god and religion may seem irrelevant to you. It might even bore you. Which is too bad. Answer me sad. I know that it is not always easy for us to grasp how difficult it was for people in the early years of our country. During the colonial. on the revolutionary road. To go against the grain of the established religions of the time. That's so many of them came to this country. Am i think we can safely say that this is not your relafen. Adidas still difficult. To go against the grain. Of the so-called habash religion in this country. Remember. We always have to use our imagination and our creativity when we're talkin about historical events. And that's what makes history such an exciting subject. Used to tell my 8th graders that i got through. We have to imagine. Envision. What the context was. And some other ear some other time.. On the unitarian side of our history william ellery channing who has been called the most important figure in the history of american unitarianism. Even. The father of american unitarian. Play the sermon in 1819 in which he criticized. John calvin on you all know probably are many most of you know that i grew up presbyterian i swear i've spent a lot of my adult life. Trying to refute. Lord about telemedicine. Channing in his sermon question the doctrine of original sin he maintained that the bible was not infallible it was not the literal word of god. The trinity was irrational. Danny and sammy said he believed in the unit. Just was. Unbelievably racks. For that time.. That sermon was published in a pamphlet text how people got their news on the other going to have tablets and stuff. And that pamphlet became. The second most widely circulated pamphlet. You want the first one once. Think revolutionary. X. Mary wins. Thomas paine common sense. But i didn't know the channings was. Disseminated in public. Well sure enough as if channing's work weren't unsettling enough. Not too long after he gave that sermon. The transcendentalist movement took off. And more people became aware of it. The transcendentalist movement has been called. The second controversy. In our history the first was. Are breaking away from the congregational churches. But we were all congregationalists. When this country was starting. Most of us work and channing was respond. Not responsible for that breaking away as controversy is the transcendentalist one. Here are these radical unitarian. First they have the audacity to say that the most important thing is our own self-realization our self improvement. God is revealed through nature. And we do not necessarily need an intermediary such as jesus. To find our own way to. The truth. You can see what. A foreshadowing here. Hints clues. Especially hindsight of a coming power and strength of the of humanism and how it will shake up the church establishment i am talking about the unitarians and the universalist goes to church established. I would love to talk about john haynes holmes but i think i'll do that next week. But just mentioning him brings us to world war 1. And how he. Was a foreshadowing humanism. So i'm going to jump now to the third controversy in our history the humanist movement. Of the early 20th century. The big 3 unitarian ministers. They were big in stature. They were just big and important. John dietrich curtis reese and charles porter. We'll have a quiz next week. Dietrich. Was originally a minister in the dutch reformed church. But he was defrost. By that denomination for being too modern. And for denying infallibility of the bible and the deity of christ. Dietrich said that. By religion i mean. The knowledge of man. Horse now i would. Fake people. And our duties towards beach. There's not a supernatural being who's going to. Intervene. The humanist manifesto written in 1933. Think about that. Think about what was happening in this country. We were deep into the depression. And it was looking more and more as if some outside being. God if you will was not going to. Sweep in and solve the problem. That humans had to solve the problem that was very important to the writing of hugh. When i first read the humanist manifesto i should tell you that curtis reese. Who was also on the authors of the manifestor. Said that. Everything is leading up to. A world order. That will be the coming order. A world or his worth. And all i could think of this week was the pope's. Just. What people long for is a world. Order where we all get along found so trying. I don't know any other way to put it. Belong 4. Recognizing are interred. By 1967 and i'm not going to read you any of the. 15. They're only 15. Parts to the humanist manifesto. 15 declarations it's very short document. The first time i read it i was. Sound of it and i still believe in it i might get to some of them neck. Weak but you can always look up thing. Stage right. Lol. And you can read all 15 their brief. For yourself. By 1967. Many but not most. Many unitarian universalist were in agreement that the term god did not designate a tangible supernatural being. That's not even fifty years. That brings me to the 2,000. And. Where we were by van. Where we will have been more and more accepting of skeptic. Of atheist of agnostic. Of the secular and religious. Humanist within our congregation. In 1983 bradbury leon unitarian universalist minister. Wrote a pamphlet back pamphlet. Don't know if we have this one out out there in our lobby or not. The title of the pamphlet is the face of an atheist. Where any says one does not have to believe in a supreme being to find comfort support. Courage and insight in a worship service one does not have to affirm a belief in a deity to feel all inspiration. And mystery. In life one does not have to worship god to be able to lead a life. Motivated by the good the true. And the beautiful. Forester church sat at general assembly in 2003. When people tell me proudly that they don't believe in god. I asked them to tell me a little bit about the god. They don't believe in. For i probably don't believe in him either. God is not god's name. God is our name. For that which is greater than all. And yet present. In each. So now that i thought has firmly into the 2001 last little story about the latest battles. In our ongoing humanists see us. Debate. Struggle controversy put in there. Saw some would say that this is our fourth big controversy and some would say it's just a continuing debate from the third. At that point at this point in time in 2003 bill sinkford is president of the unitarian universalist association. He said. To a newspaper reporter unfortunately. Right before general assembly that year that perhaps. Our association should try to reverse its. Course away from. What he called the language of reverence. And begin to i'm using his words here. Name the holy. A controversy. Was he saying that we should start using traditional language. As an expectation of membership. No. But unfortunately things as they often do. twisted. By the media and of course. Always the rumor mills and it was reported that sinkford proposed adding. The word god. To our purposes and principles. It maybe even wanted to make unitarian universalism. More appealing. Two more mainstream people. He didn't he never said that. Eventually the controversy died down. And frankford was able to better explain what he meant and where he might be trying to go with his own beliefs. But this whole incident was useful. In drawing. Attention to how confused we often are. About our identity. And the elevator speech got really important. Nowhere. Pain that you're on an elevator you pick which flooring and somebody gets on and maybe have a name tag on cuz you worried. Convention that says unitarian universalism. If someone gets on the elevator with you and wants to know what that's all about you have to explain. Time it takes to go down. Paul reiser. Rasor. He is a contemporary theologian. But it's also a unitarian universalist. 6 we need and identity. And i agree with him. Even though. Finding our center and being able to articulate some kind of identity is. You can kind of close to having a creed which of course is a big no-no except for evan free. A tokay avenue can stay. But i appreciate what razor has come up with. What he calls three core values that might help us fill our identity void here they are spiritual freedom. Social justice. Third one is interdependence. I might. Have more to say about this next week. Anyway we have our purposes and our prince. And that maybe is all that we need. To describe who we are and what we believe. Or more accurately not what we believe but if you look great beginning of the hymnal if you're new or forgotten right before the end start it doesn't say what we believe it says what we covenant. To affirm and promote. As member congregations of the unitarian universalist association. The decision was made to use covenant to affirm and promote. Because some people struggle with the words. He believed. I own that we have more to say about that. The question remains. Is there fourth controversy. Going on within our denomination or is it a continuation of that humanist. Theist. Controversy of the early 1900's i can't remember what general assembly this was. I think it might have just been the one in providence the summer before. This one. We're doing one of the business meetings. Part of it was having atheist. On stage with a humanist. And had to know within a theist. And they had this fascinating brief exchange of the civilized exchange. Of what they each believe. So next week we'll look at this in greater depth. But right now i'm interested in knowing. How you became a humanist why you're one if you count yourself in that number whether or not you placed yourself there on the beliefs. Spectrum i'm interested in what you think about humanism as a place of humility. Or hoover. This is a perfect example of how the human has. Redefined religion. For free-thinking people now you know i have done many services on language and i really. Have a hard time with us not being able to use certain words like religion religion this is how we define religion. Closing words were written by theodore parker in the mid-1800s again foreshadowing the humanist. Read definition of religion. Parker says. B h a religion which like sunshine goes everywhere. It's temple all space. It's shrine the good heart. It's creed all truth. It's ritual works of love. It's professions of faith. Divine living. Go in peace but your neighbor. Drink coffee.

uuprairie_org

Pr140824Ingham-ed.mp3

Welcome. Prairie unitarian universalist society. Where we attempt to be welcoming of everyone no matter where they are on their spiritual or face or religious journey and no matter the color of your skin. No matter your background no matter your gender preferences you are welcome here. And as we always say or try to remember to say if this is one of your first times here please think about coming back more than once because our services can be very different from week-to-week cuz they're always spectacular. It is my great pleasure although i didn't do any of the work involved in getting to this point. To announce that we have a new director of religious education. She did help i believe yesterday with the cleanup somewhat clean up downstairs in the work day. And her name is holly. Begins with a t calendar i believe so you will be seeing this person will introduce her again when she's actually here but we are very very fortunate i think she's the perfect match for. Announcers holly soap. We are really. About that. The opening words. Are these. Come into this place of. Peace. I'm glad it's silence you your spirit. Come into this place of memory and let its history warm your soul if we needed more warming of prophecy and power. And let its vision change your heart the words of the reverend william shoals. We come to this time and this place. To rediscover the wondrous gift of free religious community. To renew our faith in the holiness goodness and beauty of life. To reaffirm the way of the open mind and full heart. To rekindle the flame of memory and hope and to reclaim the vision. Oven. Made fair with all her people one. The reading i would like to share with you is a short reading by reverend david blanchard and i don't read him every week but it must seem like that. To some of those. Of you who know him. His titled no place like home. He writes. If a perfect church existed. And i have it on good authority that one has yet to develop. I think it would resemble something like the perfect home. Another institution that lives more in our imaginations. Venom practice. There are obvious differences of course. One usually joins a family by no choice of one's own. At home. Members. May receive an allowance. At church it works the other way around. At-home unlike a church. The leaders you actually have some power. To enforce their authority. Even if it's only because they are bigger or older. Yet we persist. In speaking about. Being at home in church. This is what this ideal means to me. Blanchard says i hope. This home. Will be a place of shelter. A refuge from the tumult of life's disappointments and defeats. A place of consolation. And encouragement. I hope this home will be a place of challenge. Not complacency. A space where we are helped. To mature. And take on a wider sense of responsibility for ourselves. And others. I hope this home will be a place where we can be ourselves. Unencumbered by judgments. Or ridicule. Where we are accepted as we are. Where we are and for whom we are. I hope this home will be a place we might take some risk. Knowing that there will be arms to catch us. If we fall i hope. We will know this home as a place of love. Where life is made whole. Where we may become engaged at the deepest levels of being alive. If we give these hopes life. Concludes blanchard. If we give these hopes life. Amana in the community. That is found at church. Then there will be no place quite. Like it. And we will know. That we are home. Here we are. Gather together again 2. To do what. Worship. Wow there is a word that can push buttons. Ardmore back to say about that in a few minutes. We have come here we have gathered together to do many things. Hopefully to do all those things that i mentioned in those opening words. Come into this place of peace. What is silence heal your spirit come into this place of memory and let its history warm your soul come into this place of prophecy and power and let its vision change. Your heart. Are we here to make a home. The kind of home that would be imperfect. The kind of home at might still be the sort of place which unitarian universalist david blanchard described in no place like home. Yes. I think that we are here to make such a home. But i believe that we are here to go. Even deeper. Then home making. One of my favorite hymns number 389 comes to mind when i think about why we gather. Why we come here sunday. After sunday. Gathered here in the mystery of the holler. Desert here in one strong body here in the struggle and the power. What. Is being invoked in this song. Is the word spirit. A word that we are comfortable using. Giraffes can't dance. And sometimes unitarian-universalist can't speak. Or at least can't or won't use certain words we are like the giraffe. In the story for all ages. All of us unitarian universalist. Freethinkers religious liberal folks we are the giraffes. Searching for meaning and connection and wholeness. Outside of the traditional religious framework beyond what some would call acceptable religious behavior. Sometimes we seekers. Still want or expect to keep something from our first best religious awakenings impulses understanding inside. Sometimes we want to discard it all. Perhaps one of the most important unifying factors among us is that we are different. And we celebrate that. At the same time we are looking for music that we can all dance to. Comfortably. Last sunday i i talked about so-called religious language. Or more accurately traditional religious language. I suggested that we unitarian-universalist are conflicted about the use of certain words. We tend to do one of three things. Went with words that give us pause at perhaps push those buttons one we try never to use the word to we might occasionally use it but generally in a disparaging negative or sarcastic way. But three we might define the word on our terms. A number three is what i want to focus on this morning. I got to the end of my remarks last week without actually getting to the end of what i wanted to say. But no there is no and really when the conversation is about language. Because language is always evolving as is our religion our face tradition. There is a reason why we call it the living tradition. So that phrase may seem to be an oxymoron. When working on last week's service i originally intended to follow up this sunday today with a consideration of the word worship. Very next evening monday i went to the monthly meeting of our program committee. Now we start these meetings with a review of the sunday services that have taken place since our last meeting. Can i go to the august 17th service. Last sunday's. One of the program committee members. Set the discussion of language was okay and probably paraphrasing here as long as you don't try to tell me this is a direct what i believe as long as you don't try to tell me that what we do here on sunday morning is worship. But that is exactly what i was planning. That person might have thought i was choking. I wasn't. That doesn't mean that i have abandoned the idea of talking about worship but it won't be happening this morning exactly. If you look at the last two pages of my reflections from last week you would see a lot of scribbling. And supposedly final copy and adding to another word you would see a mess. Because much to my surprise in last week's reflections i reached the conclusion that i did not expect to reach and apparently some of you were surprised to that i ended up where i did last week so much so that it has been suggested that we start by more than one person. A discussion group to talk about religious or sacred language and maybe that would lead to other topics such as forming a building your own theology group i've been told that i am definitely invited to be a part of this discussion group leader. Fine with me i like to listen. Where did i end up last week for those of you who weren't here. With this statement which i've answered is a radical thought from a humanist minister for the human is congregation she served i maintain that the foundation of any face community this is a face community. Any any community like this one including ours the foundation of any such community is religion. I believe that when you get right down to it we are a religious organization. In making that statement though i don't mean religious or religion in the traditional sense. If i did then our atheist and agnostic. And probably many of our humanness members might not want to be here and we want them here. So don't worry. I'm not going to start sprinkling my reflections with all sorts of religious language. Northampton speak in tongues but. There are words that i would like to use and i'll get to them and just a moment. This is not an original thought the possibility that we are a religious organization i'm not the only unitarian universalist minister by any means. Who has reached this conclusion as i said last sunday i was influenced by a book titled god revised. How religion must evolve in a scientific age. Written by galen. Green gatorade. Senior minister at the unitarian church of all souls in manhattan and here is paragraph of his that reached out and grabbed me so to speak. That's succinctly states what i believe about what it is that we do here. He writes no matter how difficult our circumstances. Or how dire our situation. We need a way to pull everything together and celebrate wholeness we need to affirm what is true. Cherish what is beautiful and embrace what is lovely. Necessity of religion emerges from this. Deep. Beat it. And long-standing human need for connection. And holmes. This is what i mean. When i use the words religion and religious i am referring to that deep. Seated and long-standing need. And i might add universal. For connection. And wholeness. That paragraph speaks many things for me but it speaks to a concern that i have wrestled with since i became a unitarian universalist minister over 15 years ago. Do we have. Depth. With brats and not. As unitarian universalist to be a match. For life's tragedies and traumas are we strong enough to confront life. Hard question to be. Tough enough to battle like senseless violence and oppression. And believe me. By the dollar for every time someone told me that we do not that we're a piece of fluff. That we are only a surface group. That we never go deep that we only believe in putting a happy face on. There's no depth to watch write a dollar for everytime i heard that. What part would be standing up here to traveling so we are the light religion we have nothing under that. The perception. Out there. But under it reminds us that the church is where people should be able to feel comfort. When i get into that dark night of the soul time. We should have. It's his quote. The consolation of face and the solace. A religious community. There was another piece to my conclusion about us being a spiritual i mean a religious organization. I didn't explored in any detail last week i'll say this little bit about it here. That piece concerns the difference between spirituality and religion. Goodrich says that if you take yourself seriously. As a spiritual person. You'll eventually need to become. Religious. He goes on to ask this question what is it that people don't want to be when they want to be spiritual but not religious. And he sees and hears this all the time so do i. People telling us that. Hair spiritual-but-not-religious. Storage. Argues that in religious terms your spiritual experience when added up over time. Would be yours alone and yours alone in yours alone in yours alone it's nothing that ties it together. Well so much for community building and for being. Really connected to each other. Builder rich does acknowledge what i think most of us would acknowledge his quote again whatever people mean by being spiritual. Trying to put that down or am i. Whatever we mean by that is certainly understandable that song so people wouldn't want to be religious. Thought you may have heard about the 1000 lb alligator. That was captured. After being tortured. Man killed in alabama. Dysport 15-foot alligator shot in the head after having several large hooks stuck in it. Buy a family of alligator hunters. And i don't know if it's be relevant to you but just so you know you have to take a training class in alabama. To become an alligator hunter. At the end of this questionable adventure one of the hunter said. We give all the glory to god. I don't want any part of that god nor any religion that thinks god would condone torture of a living being just for the fun of it except the state record. Okay i'm going to tell you something that might that might maybe i don't want you to know i do watch television occasionally. I know. Not just pbs so. A couple of nights ago. I saw an episode of. Bones. One that i had actually not seen i am a huge fan of bone. I don't know if any of you watch it but. Wedding is at its best. And this was true particularly in the early years of the series it tackles passivating theological questions. So the mystery the crime is kind of. You know it's not the main focus. Wellness particular episode booth husband of the woman name. Suggest that they start taking their daughter christina to sunday school. Forensic scientist. Bones a confirmed atheist and this is clear from the very first episode. Reply. An inter husband is a. Confirm. Suggested. Her husband suggested why so she can learn about the crusades and the inquisition discussions continued throughout this episode with booth finally asking the on staff psychologist whether or not he is religious his reply no i'm more spiritual and religious. Furiously. How bones that religion is good for your house and then the psychologist goes on despite all the statistics which i'm sure most of us know. I just need to find one that fits. With your need for mention of unitarian universalism. Because bones reply we can't make good decisions unless were exposed to everything i'm sure that they will end up in a u yukon. What does this piece of information. A 2009 harris poll found that americans are more likely to believe in the virgin birth. That's 61% of the people polled then they are to believe in evolution. 45%. Believe in that. This isn't easy stuff cuz enter this conclusion in his book restless souls. The making of american spirituality from emerson to oprah. Princeton historian lee eric schmidt points out that countless american. Churchgoers have rejected. Their inherited faith traditions. And become what he calls spiritual seekers. These are the people that we need to be finding. Reaching out to them and bring them back to religion except our religion right tradition we need to be able to talk to these people about religion. In a meaningful way they may have rejected that word but they have not rejected what underlies. You need to be able to talk in a meaningful way to attract bees. The seekers. Now i am well aware of the fact that certain words can trigger bad memories for people and using traditional religious language can bring up old wounds and hurts i know that to remind us of all the bad things done in the name of religion. I'm also aware the fact that trying to get rid of all traditional language. Can get just playing. Silly and we talked about that a little bit last week there's someone here who needs to know she doesn't already that recently a high school student in tennessee was briefly suspended for saying bless you. After another. Student sneeze the whole complete story of this you know. Last week i asked these questions if we refuse to use words such as religion and reverence. And if you throw them out while we grow because i can't hear her this conversation ally general assembly i've heard it over the years when we attract more people and i said this last week especially young people. Complex moving words a sacred reverend spiritual awe-inspiring face.. That means that we freethinkers must define the words on our terms we need to make them relevant to the 21st century we must be very clear about what we mean when we use words. Their forwards in particular that i hope we become comfortable using not just comfortable but more knowledgeable about using them in a rational way. In the scientific age. Which we live and which more and more people are questioning a necessity for and usefulness of traditional religion the first word is reverence and i talked about it. Blast. Week. Can i use some of reverend doctor kindle given stuff. Basically she says but. Reverence has to be experienced knothole to us by someone else what references supposed to be. And it can be among other things our response to nature our reaction to stories of courageous people. Who fought for justice and beauty for into oppression stories into your throat or as she puts it that whisper to your secret heart this reverence has nothing to do with dogma or scripture or anyone story from anyone tradition with i can accept. That reverend and reverence are beautiful joyful relevant words then i can accept. But wonderful definition of religious that's my second word which was written by. One of the liberal women ministers who preached and minister to congregations in the frontier actually is really the midwest i mean we would call it that now is that definition of religious being religious means possessing a fundamental reverence for life. You could say that to be religious is to have faith. My third ward. Third ward. Face in what. Face in that spirit. Among us when we gather together faith as hope how about this photo this is a quote from faith requires a leap of the moral imagination to connect. The world as it is. To the world as it might become that is far and away the best definition of faith i have ever come across. Leap of imagination to connect the world as it is. To the world as it might become identified a dollar for everytime usually someone my age. Often and ex-husband says are you still trying to change things. Oh man broke after years of working for and on there is social justice causes here is a word that helps explain why we continue in that seemingly endless endless struggle of trying to mend a broken world safe. And do your riches words looks at what is an imagine what might be. It compels us to build a bridge from what is past what is. Possible. At its best face is a commitment to live with a belief. That life is a wondrous mystery that love is divine that we are responsible for the well-being of those around us. Better way. To come in here and get re-energized to go out and fight. And depression to feed the homeless. What holds face up. Myforce work. Religion. Religion supports this kind of face religion provides a place to go not only when we're feeling discouraged. Victories however small to be celebrated. There are few words that capture the essence of the deep learning humans feel for connection and wholeness. Reverend safe religious religion do that maybe we just haven't gone deep enough. Before. Or ask the right questions why we i do mean prairie the prairie community what else i mean universalism as a whole maybe we haven't gone deep enough for esta right questions. About language which words are acceptable to ind4 unitarian universalist maybe the real question is what do we expect. Or want from our experience at prairie or normandy uu congregation which brings me back to that necessity of religion emerges from our deep-seated and long-standing human need for connection. Impulse. We're not going to call what happened to your face. And religion than what words might we use instead. I'm sure you're all coming to the discussion group to find out. 1 morgan ridge quote in order to flourish the tradition our tradition ruu tradition must provide its appearance with a way of living that is transformative meaningful and satisfying. It's what we do here at prairie. Transformative. Meaningful and satisfying to you. How can it be more so our president of president of the congregation gary gates challenged you to get together. Different discussion group now. About and talk about our mission and our vision. What's our vision such as to be comfortable in this room. Perhaps it is time to move out of our comfort zone there is no such thing as religion in general. They're only particular religions. Philosopher george santayana maintains a tradition has a long history of being relevant. To the times in which it finds itself. Alan debolt home in his book religion for atheists a non-believers guide. To the uses of religion. Says that. There is about him about. But he is fixated on one particular view of god and religion and it is that westernview where god makes the rules. Y'all somewhere up there handsome dances humans as divine scripture but that's out of date no wonder people are seeking 12. And a lot of work to do and this is why i think the sunday assembly folks have it all wrong lunar it says religion is the process of taking everything we know everything we know into account. As we forge a life of meaning and purpose i don't hear any god language here i don't hear any reference to a supernatural being. And we unitarian-universalist are in a really unique position to do this take everything we know into account. To create a life of meaning and purpose because that's what we've done for entire histories. Come let us gather to. To what. Can i get home yes. But to go deeper than that to get beyond our fear of or our disdain for words. But not only enable us to communicate with the seekers who out there looking for us. But also are capable of enriching and expanding our individual experiences. Of the mystery that we call life. Giraffes can't dance. You use can't use certain words as they can and yes we can. We can use language touche far religious face. To figure out what it means to be human leave bougie tango. Rock and roll with other religions in the process of finding the music that sets. That makes us not only who we are but places are right here in this century in time and space. Remember hours is the living tradition. If we must be willing to risk. To keep it that way. If here you have found freedom. Take it with you into the world if you have found comfort though and share it with others if you have dreamed dreams help one another that they may come true if you have known love. I have no idea what you're supposed to do what to tell you if you would found love. Go in peace.

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Pr100523RobinProud-ed.mp3

Today we have. A special visitor from the past. Someone who. We all should know better. Margaret fuller. Has. Honored us today. With her. Presence. And. Going to invite. Margaret. To come forward and provide our opening words. Good to see you this morning right. Let me stand in my age with all its waters flowing around me. If they sometimes subdue. They must finally up bear me. For i60 universal and that must be the best. Our hymn is written in honor of this special occasion and is on the separate sheets. The chalice lighting is number 575. And is a responsive reading. Taken from. Women in the nineteenth century. A new manifestation is at hand a new hour is come i new manifestation is at hand a new h come. I knew manifestation is at hand a new hour is come. Where this done. We believe a divine energy would provide nature to a degree unknown in the history of former ages. Good morning i'm greatly pleased to appear before you in this unitarian society augusta kasian of the commemoration of 200 years since my birth. And i'm parking to see that after 200 years i have been proved correct being here in the unitarian society reminds me that. My grandfather being a minister and my parents quite pious. I spent many sunday mornings in church. In those days of course sermons could last several hours. I devised many mental occupations to employ my mind during those lengthy speeches. I pray you will not need to resort to such employment this morning in preparation for my visit with you i approved several issues of your recent newsletters and periodicals today. Excellent article about me in the current buu world and one of them more flattering images of myself that human nature has changed so little. That we may converse on topics of importance. Many of your concerns today are the same as those that occupied me in my circle of acquaintances almost 200 years ago. I am over just made you find us so little progress has been achieved in some of the areas of concern to me. I am freaking from your writings that there is no great to be on the culture of the unitarian and a topic which you call spirituality. Likewise in my time. The same debate split apart the unitarian church. In my youth in the early 1800s. The unitarian movement came to a head under its spokesman who was also my friend and neighbor reverend william ellery channing. His teaching has proposed rationalism and humanism. In opposition to the calvinist doctrine of predestination and original sin. By 1820 an entire group of churches in massachusetts under channing's leadership accepted the name unitarian. Channing's belief in the perfectibility of the human race. Let his followers to support the many reform movements that were then springing up prison reform education reform temperance abolition women's rights and so on. In the 1820s and 30s my youth. In the persons of theodore parker george ripley. Add my dear friend waldo mr ralph waldo emerson. The new liberal unitarianism was already hardening. Into its own orthodoxy. Confining to free spirit such as your waldo. He and his circle of which i became one. In reaction. To the established church. Define the movement which became known as transcendentalism. This name came from the belief that the divine is transcendent or present in all of nature. Arbor felt that the established church was to coldly intellectual. And two removed from human and natural experience. The main tenets of transcendentalism include the essential unity of all creation which we can observe in nature. The supremacy of inside. Over logic as a source of deepest truth. And the perfectibility of humankind. Although we were highly trained in logic and classical western thought and respectful of those traditions. Saunas will the mysticism to be found in direct personal experience. My reading of kant wordsworth coleridge and daughter introduced me to an emotional and mystical world of the soul. Your support raid humans and nature alike. As extensions of the divine. And showed me. That all moments of life can be holy. One must live actively and each moment. Do they charge yourself familiar to you i understand that here in the 21st century. You are once again rediscovering the concept of the soul. Interrelation of humans and nature. And the sacredness of everyday life. We also kept our minds open to a variety of experiences by experimenting with seances and. Mesmerism what you call hypnotism. Exploring the properties of gems and flowers. I understand it in your time also some people seek to find answers to herbs and crystals. Timer for my study. Of your bulletins and periodicals that you sponsor various classes one is called building your own theology. And part of that work requires you to describe moments of high spiritual meaning in your life. I had in my life a number of such moments. One particularly striking and it happened ironically just after leaving the church service. It was thanksgiving day 1831. I was 21. And was obliged to go to church or exceedingly displeased my father. I almost always suffered much in church from a feeling of. This union with the hearers. And descent from the preacher but today more than ever before the service is jarred upon me. I felt within myself a great power and generosity and tenderness. But it seemed to me as if they were all unrecognized. And it was impossible that they should be used in life. There wasn't this time no schooling. No profession and no station in life open to me. Save that of wife governess or companion. I was only one in 20. The past was worthless. The future hopeless. Yet. I could not remember everybody materially to have done a wrong thing and my inspiration seems very high. I looked around the church. And envied all the little children before i suppose they would never know this strange anguish. I was in haste for all to be over. That i might get into the free air. I walked away over the field as fast as i could. It was a sad. Sallow day. Of the late autumn. Slow processions of sad clouds were passing over a cold blue sky. She was an earth word doll and gray and brown with sickly struggles of late green here and there. Sometimes i moan in gust of wind groveleaf reluctant leaves across the path. There was no life elf. I went on and on. So i came to where the trees were sick about a little pool. Dark. Silent. I sat down there. I did not sync. Always dark. And cold. And still. Suddenly the sun shone out. With that transparent sweetness. Like the last smile of a dying lover which it will use when it has been unkind all of hold autumn day and even then. Pass into my thought a beam from its true son. Which has never since departed from me. I saw that. There was no self. But it was only because i thought sell for real that i suffered. But i had only to live in the idea of the all. And all was mine. Micro sleeping at not being recognized never went deep after this hour. At least i wrote in my journal i must admit you however that i still despaired still struggle to achieve some recognition. And still kept a definite sense of self in fact. Some saw thai boran inordinately large quantity of self i often found solace in the company of others yet i also retain my passion for nature my head wrapped in my shawl i would listen to the music of the earth. Raise my head and look straight into the secrets of heaven. My garden was my turtle consolation for the endless drudgery of housekeeping and supervising my younger siblings. The sia tempted to navigate the treacherous waters of my spiritual journey. I see that your church sponsors of committee of religious education and that public education is in your time. A major concern. I am feeling emily qualified to comment upon these subjects as both people and teacher. My father instructed me himself. I was the first born. And he applied to me the education he would have given to a son. I was put it once under discipline of considerable severity and had more than ordinarily high standards presented to me. He hoped to make me the heir of all he knew. Dust i had tests given to me. As many and various as the hours would allow and on subjects beyond my age. I was often kept up till very late. And as he was a severe teacher my feelings were kept on the stretch till the recitations were over. My father had no conception of the subtle emotions of imagination and feeling which were the natural tenets of my character. At the age of six i was sent to reading and memorizing latin. The subjects of my study where the roman ward and the monsters of histology they're unnatural influence on my tender years caused many nightmares i became a somnambulist sleepwalker. And suffered from excruciating headaches which would play me my entire life. What have i gained by my precocity. I have never been happy. I am confident that i should have been much better off had since intellect and passion been brought out in the natural order. I had no natural childhood. I do wish that i had live with toys and played in the open air. Children should expand in the sun. Emma thoughts come to them. They should not through books and today they're actual experiences. But you take them gradually. With me much of life was devoured in the bud. 10 years old i first entered school with other young ladies. My unusual upbringing and bookish vocabulary set me a mediately apart. I was a near-sighted and had to fill up to pronounce squint. I was tall for my age and suffered from a disturbed complexion. In this year's between 10 and 16 i made up my mind to be bright and ugly. I easily captured academic honors but found much more difficult the expectations for behavior of a young lady. As i have been raising my earlier to display my knowledge and whip. It was hard to acquire the modest departments my father now requested apparently my father had never considered to what end he wasn't stealing in me his classical education. I was unable because of my sex to enter harvard as my brothers did. I was unable to support myself by a literary life for a career as young women may and your era. I could not aspire to be a minister a lawyer a professor or a doctor. My only choices were to marry and raise children. To become a governess and care for the children of others but perhaps to teach other people's children. Remaindered home. My father retired from his career as state and later federal representative to live out his dream of becoming a gentleman farmer. However our financial situation was extremely strained and family tragedies to instruct us. Several of the children became ill. And my infant brother died in my arms. My mother was so grief-stricken. That she was true for a time from all household affairs leaving me at age 16. To supervise the cooking cleaning and laundry for the household of seven without i had any of your modern conveniences. As well as educating the younger children. In spite of all the difficulties. I continue to read and study on my own in a scattered moments available. And even projected to write a biography of my beloved goethe. For this purpose i intended to travel to europe. Imbibe the culture that had so influenced me already. But increasing poverty and illness in the family prevented the fruition of my dream. Circumstances decided that i must not go to europe. And shut down upon me the door to the seams i could have loved. At present i wrote to a friend. I feel no confidence or hope. The future brighton for me however. Thanks to my new acquaintance with mr. emerson. It is home i found witt charm and the companionship of intellectual equals. Another common frequenter of waldo emerson's home was the young radical bronson alcott. He had recently embarked on the venture of an alternative school in boston. Wichita to educate by kindness and a socratic method. Rather than by the stick and endless repetition as wasn't usual case. The school was held in such disrepute by many bostonians that the assistant miss peabody still compelled to resign. I had forgot fewer qualms or more need for the salary for i decided to take the position. Although i never seen myself as a teacher. I feel that if i must teach to support myself this would be the ideal place to do so. The methods of the temple school as it was called. Diametrically opposed to the exacting education i myself have received. We were perhaps the first of the country. Twin corporate light and color into the schoolroom. Twin falls children as active participants in their own education. Apparently boston was not ready for such innovation elkhart receive such skating attacks for his unorthodox methods. That enrollment window rapidly. And after one year he was unable to pay my salary. The school subsisted several more years until n1839 he was forced to close for committing the ultimate disgrace of admitting a mulatto girl. Elkhart went on to found a communist which was established on principles of high thinking and frugal eating. But was quickly failed as well in fact his family was only pulled from poverty by the writings of his daughter louisa may alcott. I understand that in your time you still read her books especially little women. You will note that although the story is largely modeled on louise's girlhood in concord a town where i also live. Her father has disappeared from the book. She makes the mr. march eminently respectable unlike her father the wild-eyed profit of concord. And for good measure she banished him conveniently to the war. Another item of interest to me in current-day is existence of discussion groups for women. You are no doubt aware that i was the first to popularize discussion ropes or conversations as i called them exclusively for women. This provided a much-needed supplement to my income. Gave me an enjoyable avenue of development for myself. And approve the outlook of other women. I perceived many women hungry for knowledge of languages literature and history. Which was readily available to men. Microphone designed not only to educate women. But you change their view of themselves. Women have been taught that their brains were actually inferior to those men. But i provided an example that the true difference play only in education. In my group. Women were encouraged to formulate and express opinions on such subjects his art. Health in philosophy. This was a special delight to me as i had always sparkling conversation. I write well but never so well as i talk for then i feel inspired. And the means are pleasant. My voice excites me my pain never what did i could have lived in the era of talk radio and television panel discussion. You cannot predict her opinion. She sympathizes so fast with all forms of life. Picture talks never narrowly. Or hostility. Norbit ruiz like all the rest. Honduras in garb of new words the old ronin cast-iron opinions. Although he wants felt it necessary to remind me that adjectives adjectives come in degrees of which the superlative is only one he also called me. A joyful guest who brought with anecdotes love stories tragedies. Oracle's with her for arrival with a holiday. And he admitted that i made him laugh more than he liked. Walter whitmire intelligent women but they should not challenge too many of his opinions like many of my gentlemen friends he believed the best of women's minds must yet be inferior to the best of men. And like them he married a woman who was quiet and refined. Who offered no challenge to his superiority. Who provided the household support. Which is a spinster never had i had no one to run the house and provide for my well-being while i devoted myself to my writings. Although some of your scholars claim that i attempted unsuccessfully to attract waldo to myself in a more particular manner and withdrew it hurts when i failed. Our relationship was more complex than that. He and i were intimate of mind if never of body. We shared our newest writings and ideas with each other at our you frequently over our opinions. Waldo's wife lydian did go so far as to burst into tears one day in response to the amount of time while the one i spent together. But then she laid the blame on her nerves. Assorted all over whether i was considerate enough. After my being more his companion i reflected that cannot be helped. His life is in the intellect not the affections. He has affection for me. But it is because i quickened his intellect. Several times in my life in fact i found myself ready to offer ultimate devotion to a gentleman. But they always found my personality and intelligence overwhelming. In fact. On three separate occasions. As i attempted to deepen my relationship with a particular gentleman. He hastily departed and soon engaged himself to marry another. Not only mended i love for it is so true that a woman may be in love with a woman. And a man with a man. How natural was my love for anna barker. I left anna for a time i think with as much passion as i was then strong enough to feel. Her face was always leaving before me. Her voice was echoing in my ear. All poetic start clustered around a deer image. She loves me too but more tenderly. Let's passionately. Then again that night when she leaned on me and her eyes were such a deep violet blue. We both felt such a strange mystic thrill. And what we had never known before. And yet. Anna married sam ward one of the very gentleman i cared for myself. Thus i lost both. I decided i should remain alone for life and wrote. No one loves me but i love mini a great deal. Strong feelings require strong expression. I am called to fiery. I wish to be seen as i am. And would lose all rather than soften away anything. From a very early age i have felt that i was not born to the common womanly lot. I knew i should never find a being who could keep the key of my character. That they were benign on who i could always lean. A man's ambition with a woman's heart. Kissing a cursive lot. With the intellect i always have always shall overcome. But that is not half the work. The life. Goodlife omigod tell the life never be sweet. But i digress. I wish to discuss a further point of similarity between us. My friend editor of your newsletter sometimes needs too big for your contributions. In 1839. The transcendentalist club what was the idea of a journal. To be named butt-dial. And emerson refused the position of editor is cell to me. I described the journal to william henry channing as a perfectly free or been to the offer for the expression of individual thought and character. Each month i was compelled to coax the transcendentalist were articles and even with that i must needs provide the largest part of many issues myself. We go down literature philosophy and society. Periodical received mixed reviews. The eminent unitarian minister theodore parker blamed all of the dials false on the unusual gender of its editor the chief thing wrong with the dial was that it needed a beard. I did however manage to offend both alcott and parole by requesting revisions to their work. In the summer of 1843 i undertook a great journey to the american northwest. To the ultimate ends of civilized existence. Milwaukee i observed wonder of niagara falls. And bemoaned the fact already in 1843 that it was being surrounded by buildings for the accommodation of visiting tourists. My account published under the title summer on the lakes was more than a travelogue. I discussed themes of social issues which much occupied my thoughts. I'm glad to see that in your time you sponsor activities of social action and then you have made progress in many areas. And yet in some ways you resemble still the world i knew. On my journey i saw a remnant of indian tribes whose world was fast disappearing. And who from proud keepers of the land where we do statistically beggars. Find my return i took up a bone-in new york and published articles for horace greeley's new york tribune. I visited prisons poor houses in insane asylums. In my columns i called for reform and attitude as well as an institution. Around this time i also published book. Which has grown from an earlier article in the dial. I had called the original article the great lawsuit and stated the radical notion that all souls are equal free slave indian white male and female. My book was entitled. Woman in the 19th century. Innisbrook i encouraged women to postpone marriage until they had developed a sense of themselves. I recommended that women be economically independent. I'm not socially pressure to get married. I advocated that all professions be open to women. We would have every arbitrary barrier thrown down and put if every path laid open to women as freely as to man. If you asked me what offices women may fill i reply. Any. I do not care what case you put. Let them be. Sea captain's if you will. Today you might say astronauts or president but in my time see captains were the epitome of masculine adventure. People were shocked that a spinster of 34 years should discuss the sexual double standard as i did. Mineral out total freedom because of their insatiable needs. Women were to be ignorant of such passions and unyielding please insatiable man. Bon jovi married. After which they must submit implicitly to their husbands. The least appearance of coldness in the wife is wicked. Because liable to turn her husband stopped to elicit indulgence. Any transgressions by the husband then we'll consider the fault of the wife. The educational system i wrote a century-and-a-half ago. Must give girls as far afield as boys perhaps a level. Plainfield. Too much instead of women being educated that they may become better companions and mothers for men. Not one man in the million can rise above the belief that woman was made for man. Each woman must lay aside all thought of being taught in led by men. Even the well-meaning males who seem so good to a steam women whenever they could. Would never in any extreme of despair wish they were women. After over a century of reforms in education suffrage in law. I'm sad to learn that this perception is still a central barrier to chew equality. Freeman in your time. How many men would wish to be a woman. Get man can never be truly free until woman is also. We are one there is no wholly masculine man. No purely feminine woman. An may 23rd 2010 an article talking about the appearance of women and although there are 16 senators who are women not one gray hair. We have not yet attained. The new manifest. I will close by telling you of the happy ending and the tragic conclusion of my life story. In 1846 at the age of 36 i finally was able to visit england france and my beloved italy. The country where i found i belong. Italian sympathize with my character and understood by organization as no other people ever did. They admire the ready eloquence of my nature. And highly prized my intelligence sympathy with their suffering. It was a land of passion and grandeur so different from the cold proprieties of new england. In this magical atmosphere. I experienced one day my own italian adventure. Separated by accident from my traveling companions. I was rescued and accompanied by charming young man. Who turned out to be an impoverished noblemen strong sympathies for the republican movement in italy led by mycenae. I had met and befriended in london. Perhaps it was the freedom from american conventions which allowed me to engage in a happy liazon with my dear giovanni or solely. Scholars still debate whether he and i were quietly married before or after the birth of our son in the tumultuous year of 1848. I shall not spoil the debate by divulging the truth of the matter today. As news of my marriage and child because it was greeted with great disapproval the very individual 1200 me for not marrying and fulfilling my womanly role now denounced me as licentious. And under dubious circumstances. In my happiness i ignored their opinions. But my idol was not to ask. My family's financial situation had improved but little. And my voyage have been financed through loans from a number of friends and relations. Although i had to convince greeley to pay me twice the usual rate for my columns i could no longer afford to remain abroad. Our voyage home on a small bark elizabeth. Was ill omen from the first. After we get see. The captain became ill. We were forced to harbor at gibraltar where he died of smallpox my little son contracted this fearsome disease and none save i believe he could survive. I refuse to give up hope and indeed. He recovered. But on the morning of our arrival in new york harbor. The first made who was now in charge. Made a tragic miscalculation. The ship was driven onto a large sandbar off long island. Pounded by huge waves. I'd like dawn we could see figures on the beach. But all our lifeboats had been destroyed. And there was no way to reach us. Some passengers contrive to swim ashore. With the assistance of wooden planks but i refuse to leave my child and could not bear him through the waves. That afternoon when the tide came in. The ship broke up. And the rest of us were thrown overboard. Our bodies were never recovered. And neither was my manuscript for a book on the italian revolution. I was but two months past my 40th birthday. Emerson sent his friends to look for any remains but nothing was found. Emerson elementary. I have lost in her my audience. The world lost also a voice that would have contributed to the burgeoning women's movement. At the first national women's rights convention in october of that very year the delegates observed a moment of silence. In memory of the woman to whom they had hoped to confide the leadership of this movement. Get my voice has been carried on by others. Elizabeth cady stanton and susan b anthony road. In their history of women's suffrage. Margaret fuller possessed more influence upon the thought of american women that any woman previous to her time. I'm proud to see as well as future unitarian such as you carry on my voice. Your quest for spiritual meaning equality and justice. And now my alter-ego robin will. Encourage you to have questions and discussion. Perhaps i'll say one thing about how i came to do this in about what margaret seems to me into a number of us. Before moving here eight years ago my husband and i belong to a small group about this size outside the twin cities and we had a tradition for a while we're once-a-month remember what percent of famous unitarian and some of these were quite interesting in somewhere the most boring thing you ever want to hear. Started finding out about her and i decided that no one would fall asleep during my presentation and i did this at several of the churches around the twin cities afterwards i saw there was a woman named lori james was a you you was actually done a professional tour where she depicted margaret. A book on her own and with emerson and she's going to be doing her program at the general assembly they're also going to be several sessions devoted to margaret at the general assembly. But as you'll see in that you uworld article there's something about margaret that has encouraged several many people to rediscover her in this last. 10-15 years and to be amazed that she's not better known and that she does sort of take us over most of what i. Spoke with her words of course. And there remains a lot of journals and letters said. That we can draw from. And it's amazing how half the number of things still are. I should also mention that i've mentioned before we're just about all these women i've talked about. Louisa may alcott at the peabody sisters and some others that. The same thing happened tomorrow with that's right after her death she was kind of pretty tough by people who wrote about her and called her mrs. are solely which wasn't title she went by and try to tone her down a bit and then it's. Really i would say in the feminists are that she was rediscovered in some of these things she said we're quite. Outrageous at the time that that women could not only vote but be legislators and their women could have any career no matter what it was. But she did charge a fee for these for these programs at women came to and i think some of our visitors knew more about that out scars how many how many women actually attended they were held in the bookshop elizabeth peabody by the way first woman to run a bookstore and someone that we've learned about here. So she did she charge fees for that and was able to make as much doing it as she had teaching which was not very well paid but she needed to do something to. To help support herself and her family she also did right she wrote quite a bit for magazines and newspaper she was could be considered the first literary critic or one of the first of any gender. And some of the topics that she wrote on the the article in the u world says first public intellectual and she was able to receive some pay for that. She also had a lot of people who are not happy about her she got a lot of the same comments that someone like eleanor roosevelt dad saying she's not really a woman and who was it, was it that said there were three categories. Men women and margaret fuller and that's where lori james stuff at i love lori james's program actually so not always appreciate her. Her passions. They did have a good turnout of number of the unitarian women were the ones who attended. Some of the wives of ministers and other movers and shakers it was a boston-area this might not have work somewhere else but. Boston was. Liberal in that sense that there was a great regard for education and i suppose it was not threatening to man because. It was just women talking and our friends didn't remind us last night that she did open it up two men at one time and it didn't work very well because the men spent a lot of time trying to impress each other instead of took over so she has. And one of the books that i. That i read when it's a little more detail about what she she had to do all this housework basically her her mother apparently fell into depression after the baby died. And was incapacitated for some time and. Some of you that knows some things about colonial history or the west star and i think about how women's lives how much work it was to heat water to wash clothes and to keep a house clean into big bread and to take care of all these children and then on the side study german and translate many letters and so on it's really quite impressive. Right that's right they made their own clothes made their own candle soap all these things at. Aware i'm not available and where someone like emerson had a household and he has a status to that he was able to have servants and of course he had his wife to keep things. Going for him. Some of her writings were preserved and letters because she left them behind in europe and so they were not. They did not get lost with the ship like her manuscript did. And because she corresponds with a number of famous people. Like emerson some of those those letters were kept as well. And as far as her relationship with her husband when she was in italy it was the same time that elizabeth barrett browning and robert browning were there and elizabeth barrett browning said they made an excellent couple because she talked and he listened. Because this young man he was about ten years younger than she was no he wasn't intimidated by her he wasn't an intellectual and so anyway maybe she found a wife you know that if she found us support he was very devoted to the republican cause and italy and that was something that she she also was very engaged in but it was kind of unexpected that at that she never thought that she would have that that side of her life.. Yes it was margaret her husband and the baby all drowned and the idea that they were just off the coast of that's where the world said it's amazing that she hasn't been my kids. 41 +. Over long time history was the. Province of men that is. That was that was how it was done and ann-margret. Stayed within the she was an intellectual tradition her writings are. Rather flowery and long-winded to might seem to watch not so much her letters and journals but prince's women in the nineteenth century she makes all kinds of allusions to classical. Life and it's not the easiest for us to approach but that was the way to write an intellectual book but apparently it did sell quite well and i was was well known at the time and yet i think even in the. She's this really isn't known in the feminist community or wasn't m272 way somebody like stanton and susan b anthony and some of the other stuff we're but that's the interesting thing if she had not died at that time she could have been the the leader of this new movement and that would have been very interesting to observe. Thank you. Me me truth. Unpolluted by prejudice. Vanity or selfishness. Be granted daily more and more. Has a jew inheritance. And only valuable conquest. For us all.

uuprairie_org

Pr160124Converse-ed.mp3

But welcome to the prairie unitarian universalist neighborhood. Our services are conducted by members of the community by our by our consulting minister sand in them or by members of the prairie group our service today is our presentation will be by to member randy conversando middleton. Because our services are all different. We recommend anyone who's new to the shore to come again because it could be a totally different service. If you're a guest here there will be time. A little bit later in the service introduce yourself we mainly like to know a little bit about you so when we get to talk to you later we'll have a starting point. Today's opening words. And you'll notice the. Order of order services will different today but hang on. Opening words family tree children's play as seriously as it deserves. We are helping them feel the joy that is to be found creative spirit. Is the things we play with and the people who helped us play. That make a great difference in our life. Fred rogers. Welcome neighbors welcome to our neighborhood. We welcome you. No matter. Where you live. The color of your skin how you look. And the family you have and the way you choose to leave your life. Welcome. Today i'm very excited because. Mr. mcfeely is coming to visit and bring his friend daniel and they are going to interview me. For the land of make-believe gazette. Until that time my friend kathy will lead a little little obsession with you and. I'll be waiting very effectively for our friends daniel and mr. mcfeely. The chalice lighting today. There are three ways to ultimate success. The first way is to be kind. The second way is to be kind. And the third way is to be kind. Fred rogers. I brought daniel alarm. And. We're supposed to ask you questions. Great. And. You wrote. Some questions for me to ask. So. Daniel would like to know. Were you born i was born in 1928 and latrobe pennsylvania. My my father's name with james. Hillis rogers. My mother's name was nancy mcfeely rogers. And they gave me my grandfather's name fred mcfeely. My dad first job. Was. In my grandfather's. Brick company. They made bricks. Eventually my father. Bought. The operation from my grandfather. My mother. Was very busy volunteering at the hospital. I think she had. I think 2500 volunteer hours. And i would often go down there with her and watch the ladies put these gauze squares together put them in the box. Sushi about the troops. In world war ii. She also did. A very interesting thing. She made sweaters. For the troops to. Every month she would make a sweater. And you know what. Every christmas. We would get a special sweater from her. And you can guess the sweater i'm wearing was made by my mother. Where did you go to school i went to school in rollins college in florida. I had a degree in music composition. And what was your first job. I went to new york city. And became the assistant manager. For the voice of firestone in nbc television. And then. At after that i became the floor manager for. The lucky strike hit parade. Kate smith hour and the nbc. Opera theater. Then what did you do. Well i went to pittsburgh. And work for wqed. And by the way that was the first. Sponsor. Oh i would you call it community sponsors certainly community-sponsored television station. They wanted me to create their program schedule. As a part of the schedule. We helped create a story series called a children's hour. During that time i went to the pittsburgh. Theological seminary. And i also took courses at the university of pittsburgh graduate school of child development. When i graduated. I got ordained in the presbyterian ministry. And but. They gave me a special charge. I was asked to continue my work with children. And families. Through the mass media. But you're in pennsylvania now. How did you get back here. I made a pit stop at in canada. I went and helped them starts a children's series. In the canadian broadcasting corporation call mr. rogers. And then. I came back pittsburgh. What did i do in pittsburgh. Oh yes it's been awhile been awhile. Ask me to start. Creating a series of children's. Store. Andy called mister rogers neighborhood. It was nationally distributed by the national educational television. At which became. Eventually public broadcasting system. Obtaining funds for public television. And children's programming. Is never easy. Could you share with us some of the difficulties and asking for money. Public tv. When i address. Is that a commerce commission i told him three things. 1. Is that. I can. Create more drama showing people. Two people how to solve their problems and bopping them over the head. Is it. The most important thing we can do for children is to show them how value they are exactly the way they are. The third thing i told him was. Feelings are mentionable and manageable. Did you convince the committee. They gave public broadcasting system 20 million dollars. You have received every eligible award. Possum. For emmy awards to peabody's. And the national academy of television arts & sciences lifetime achievement award. In your acceptance speech you ask the academy. To do something very special. What was that. I asked the audience to take 10 seconds of their time to think about. One person in their life who made a difference to help them be who they were today. Once the 10 seconds were over. I said to the audience how pleased that person must be. For being so important in their lives. I have delivered many of your books. And i read them all. You talk about love than your shows and your books. What is love to you. Daniel and mr. mcfeely love. Is when. You tell someone how valuable they are. How special and unique se-r. Really listening to people. And animals. Is important way to show love. We know you feel loving children is important could you share your ideas on how to help children dropped. When children feel pain. It's very difficult. Adult to help them ease that pain. But. We can be available to children. Without controlling. Or coaxing. A gentle availability and presence will give them the space they need. Delta be in touch with their feelings. And what gives life meaning. Meaning. I believe is given when you feel needed by someone. And you get most satisfied. When you meet someone's needs. To err is human. What does that mean to you. If we are very fortunate life the first thing. It to realize when you make an error. You don't. The first thing is when you make an error you're not a bad person. And i the ones you love. Second thing is. The person who you made angry will not go away. They will forgive you and love you unconditionally. On your show. You encourage kids to express their feelings. Could you elaborate. There are no should or should not when it comes to feelings it is a part of life. We wait we must acknowledge those feelings. Confronting our feelings. And finding ways to express and constructively is not a sign of weakness daniel. It is sign of strength. You show real strength. When you let your. Anger flow into tears. Scicon wrote a song entitled. What you do. With what you got. Does that song resonate with you. The daniel. Anniston mcfeely. I feel. That. It's not the blessings you have in life it's important. Is what you do with them. Our wishes important. When we resign ourselves to the wishes we can attain. And put energy into the wishes we can we will be very happy. Does light have any paradoxes. I think. The paradox of an impetus is very. We must. Get it early in life. And then lose it dry quickly. So that throughout life. Are potency will be appropriate. Is it okay to be angry. Anger is painful to feel. But difficult to express. One last question okay. Northway expected of ourselves. But we can. Give them the space to think about how to constructively express their anger. We must be honest with them about why we were angry. We are angry because we love them. When we are honest. Two children about our anger. Then they can be honest with us. When we have the capacity to be angry with children. We show them that we really care we care enough to be angry. The opposite. Love daniel is not hatred it is indifference. Now one final question. If we have. A task to do. Power on this earth. What would you say it is. I think daniel. Our job. Just to show that everyone has value. Are good good exactly the way they are. We need to show them. Helping find their uniqueness. And then find very special ways to express it. Thank you so much. I will deliver this recording right away. You've made this day a special day and i'm glad you're here. Mister rogers will share closing words. If you could only sense how important you are. To every person you meet. If you could only sense. People in your dreams. How important you are. We leave a part of each of us. We leave a part of each of us. To every person we meet. Speaking of meeting people. I would like you. To greet your neighbor. In the spirit of your first principle. Each of us has value.

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Pr110619HowardBellman-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to prairie unitarian universalist church and i happy father's day to all the fathers in the room that decided to make it here today and spend your time with us this morning. But i'm making apps and i am the chairman of the program committee here at prairie. Taqueria spires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation. Gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter your age your abilities or your inabilities later in the service will invite guests visitors and returning friends to introduce yourselves. So that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services when they're presented either by a prairie member-to-member or the wider community as we have today. Or our minister whom we will have here eventually i'm sure we're currently in the recruiting process will be presenting his program collective bargaining. For government workers in wisconsin the challenge of democracy in the workplace and i just like to remind everybody that we don't want to have anybody standing on their chairs and core on the soapbox today we're here to be informed and educated by mr. bellman and hopefully we can keep the political the political conversation download. But this time i'd like to introduce our speaker. Over the years since 1965 mr. howard bellman has mediated in nearly every category of dispute his work is ranch in the most ordinary civil and labor matters to international diplomacy. The significant portion of his practice is included high-profile multi-party cases of public concern such as controversial and used to terminations large-scale environmental remediation school district desegregation. Statewide education financing litigation in indian land claims. Keeping a point as a master or other court adjunct by federal and state courts including the supreme court of ohio. He received the 2003 lifetime achievement award of the american college of civil trial mediators. Fisher bellman received his ba and law degrees from the university of cincinnati and an llm in labor law in 1963 from new york university. She's a distinguished adjunct professor at marquette university center for dispute resolution education. In his lecture that many universities worldwide and we're very happy to have him lecture and press today i miss your employment relations commission appointment of government for governor patrick lucy in 1973 to 1976 in the secretary of department of industry labor in human relations in the cabinet of governor anthony earl from 1982 to 1986 and as we all know this is a topic that is close to our hearts so warmly welcomed howard bellman. But thank you make more than honored by the invitation and it's so nice to meet all of you. I can assure you that i've worked in. Broad variety of venues but. This is the first so that that's that's very enjoyable for me and very flattering. I'm also. Texting the sincerity of your invitation here and i appreciate that a lot. Sometimes i work among people who are not christians there is all of that and i understand that as well but i am play appreciate the difference. When i was i'm still student they had now you know how long ago that was sometime during the punic wars when i believe that since most americans. Adults. Work about 8 hours a day and sleep about the same amount. The nature and quality of their work lot of their work lives. Pretty much characterizes the nature and quality of their lives. And to the extent that they are going to have democracy in their lives. That is to say that they are going to have some opportunity to be influential about the quality of their lives. That they're going to have to have democracy in their work lives. That seemed to me to be a. Value proposition. And i also came to learn very early on. That if in fact want us to have most of us actor have. Democracy in our work lives. We are going to have to be organized. You need to be unionized. But you are a shortstop or a dominant surgeon or an extraordinary artist. We do not have this individuals. Have much power in the labor market. And if we are to have that sort of influence it will be because we are working in concert. With those with whom we work. So. At that point i was drawn to labor laws and opportunity to. Earn a living and to earn a living idealistically. But i learned that long after no surprise to anyone i suppose now that in reality. There are bullies and victims. In our sights of. Bad types. All around the bargaining table. On both sides of the management. Flavor equation. And that at least for me the most comfortable position in that landscape. Was that of a mediator an arbitrator. So that's what brought me in 1965 from detroit. Where all my work was in the private with private-sector employers and unions the unions of the private-sector employers. Do wisconsin. Where there was a job opening for a lawyer's mediator / arbitrator in state government. And where collective bargaining for public employees teachers send. Cops and firefighters in. Public works employees. Was being pioneered. I think you should know that. Some wisconsin public employees. Heaven organized and influential in affecting the policies and practices of their employers for decades. But in 1959 while gaylord nelson was governor. A newly energized democratic party was starting to realize its potential. A statue like no other statute in the united states estatutos no more than two or three sentences. Was enacted. Providing that such public employees. Not only were allowed to organize and make demands of their employer but had the right to do so. To organize and demand bargaining over wages hours and working conditions. I'm guessing cuz i wasn't here in 1959. That this was a response by a grateful governor. And his party to the protest of public sector workers. That. Saw themselves and portrayed themselves as compared to their private-sector counterparts. A second-class citizens. Deprived of the democracy in the workplace guaranteed in the private sector. Federal labor laws that did been in place since the middle 1930s. Still that unprecedented enactment in wisconsin. Hardly compared to the federal law. It was a fuse me it was innocence. A token. A gesture. By comparison. It was essentially a brief start of quotation from the federal law do it three sentences. And it's very important to understand why that was the case. Why the whole federal law was not simply replicated. Forget word governor nelson and buy. Democratic legislature at that point. And this is the bit of information that i think is most. Important for me to try to impart here. Private-sector labor law. The law that. The public sector employees claimed would give them full citizenship. Private-sector labor law requires employers to bargain in good faith. But says very little about how difficult negotiations will be resolved. Private-sector labor law assumes and supports. The economic kombat that we know strikes and lockouts. Is the ultimate arbiter of negotiation outcomes. I would i would compare to the rules for boxing. Yeah the marcus of queensbury rules. It organizes the contest. And then allows the beating. Private-sector labor and management usually settle rather than destabilize their ongoing relationship. Portchester powers and rishta continuity vernon's in productions but that's what the labor law. It has been in effect in the united states since the thirties contemplates. But in 1959. When governor nelson and the legislature were enacting the public sector law of the very first in the country. Endeverafter that. Even if the public sector labor law has grown to be even more comprehensive and elaborate than the private sector model. There has been biting anxiety. Among our political leaders. Both parties. That there is a real possibility of excessive union power. The fear that even. Rapid strikes. When combined with union political activism. Would overwhelm our governmental process. The unions would quote-unquote elect the government. The government management. And then threatened. Just support their demands so it has always been the case. In wisconsin. This strike by government workers are prohibited. In the private sector model has never been replicated. Gear. As a consequence of this partial adoption of the private sector model. I think the public sector labor law in wisconsin. From 1959. 2011. Has been in a state of unresolved controversy in flocks. Quite the opposite of its private-sector model. Because the private sector model. Absent the right to strike if you take the right to strike out of the private sector model. It's an unworkable concept. Vital oregon it has no engine pick your metaphor. And has been in constant need of revision. It may be the case. Didn't know session of the wisconsin legislature. Since the enactment of this law has not revised the law. That's how dynamic and controversial. An unstable that law has always been. And it's important to know that some years ago. When are public sector unions would strike. Despite the prohibition. They came to understand that in fact. Such raw power could. Cause them to lose. The unions themselves became the i rejected became the advocates of arbitration. Guess an impasse resolution procedure that would substitute for the strike in the wall. Some of you may remember the milwaukee firefighter strike so if you remind me remember the hortonville teacher strike. That was followed by the advocacy not for the right to strike but for interest arbitration. Bartlett public sector unions. What is it turns out. That revision of the model of the private sector model. Did not limit the controversy. Arbitration among other things. Turns over one of the most important decisions of elected policymakers. The labor costs that are we included in their budgets. To an outside unelected person. That seems too many. To be a distortion of the general democratic processes in our communities. So the story here is of a multi-generation effort to implemented ideal. Democracy in the government workplace. That has been fraught with controversy. Controversy present even in its earliest formulations. If policymakers have attempted to reconcile the side deal with their anxieties over the possibility of union domination. Of government. Had to do so starting. With a private sector model. It's not really amped. So i would and then i would add. A very important. Exacerbating factor. In the early years of this experimentation. These developments were guided by a particularly civil and constructive political dialogue mainly among the representatives of the unions and public management. Not among elected officials. They seem to understand the needs of the relationships. Did they served at the end of the inevitability of the turning of the political worm. In recent years however. We have veered into a much different style. That i would describe as kicking the pendulum. If they have moved both parties. Into and out of power in the end of capital. The raw exercise of power. Rather than constructive dialogue has been the modus operandi. Now. One-party seems to view itself is overwhelmingly powerful. And without any reference to those who usually suggested. Call sita conservative elected policymakers. If the pendulum so hard. S2 essentially go even beyond the place where my story began. It's as if the pendulum has swung beyond the 12th. Remember even before the pioneering loft 1979 there was some voluntary collective bargaining with government employees in wisconsin. I seen full-blown collective bargaining agreements. From places like manitowoc county. It were entered in the late 1930s. Because snowplow drivers. In manitowoc county understood they had some bargaining power and they knew it and they knew end exercise. I had no idea. But i accepted this invitation. Where that futurewise exactly. But in the very near future. Meaning for collective bargaining. Wanada will be prohibited. It was a time. When it was not. Statutorily supported but it was allowed now we're going to a time when i'm just literally prohibited and that's what i mean about the pendulum swinging over the 12th. I would not have predicted this. It seems to me like a sneak attack. But more interesting to me has been the response of union members in their supporters. The response seems consistent with the profound proposition that essential democracy is at risk. It is. Easily and often observed. The unionism in the united states is it a very low point. In in in our history. Play contemporary economy seems incompatible with union growth. Union leaders have done little to teach their members why unions are needed. Employers have learned to avoid the abuses of their predecessors. Protective laws seem to supplant the protections otherwise provided by collective bargaining agreements. I would have characterized union members in 2011 is somewhere in the range of apathetic. Cynical. In their attitudes. Scored their bargaining agent. Then i would have been wrong. They seem to recognize the.

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Pr150823Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. And welcome to. Prairie unitarian universalist society. We welcome you no matter where you are on the religious or faith or spiritual or sacred journey which ever you prefer or start your own word. We welcome you no matter. The color of your skin your ethnicity your family structure your gender identification. You are welcome here. I always encourage people to come to more than one services this is one of your first because our services are different every sunday morning sometimes i do them i'm a minister here sandy ingham sometimes people from within the congregation do the service and sometimes we have outside speaker. The opening words this morning are these. Your by wendell berry. It is the destruction of the world. In our own lives. That drives us half. Insane. And more than half. To destroy that which we were given. Entrust. How will we bear it. Penny would you like it thank you. Two-face the world's coldness. A chalice of warm. Two-face the world's tears. The chalice of courage. Two-face the world's turmoil. A chalice of peace. May it blow fill our spirits. Our hearts. And our life. This first reading i would like to share with you is written by joanna macy you know i'd love to use joanna macy. Spot the important thing here is here. But she's writing this in 19. 90. 1. We are bombarded by signals of. Distress. Ecological destruction social breakdown. An uncontrolled nuclear proliferation. Not surprisingly we are feeling. Despair. Adjust farewell merited by the machinery of mass death. That we continue to create. Answer. What is surprising. Is the extent. To which we continue to hide. This despair. From ourselves and each other. The cause of our apathy is not mere indifference. It's down from a fear. Of confronting the despair. The refusal to feel. The psychic. Numbing. Impedes our capacity. To process and respond to information. Despair work. The willingness. To acknowledge. Seal. And express inner pain. In an attempt to come to terms. With apocalyptic anxieties. In ways that are integrative and liberating. Opening awareness not only to planetary distress. But also. To the hope. Inherent. In our own capacity. To change. And i should tell you what macy's definition of despair is. Milwaukee. Of the assumption that the species will. Inevitably pool. Trip. And then this from thomas berry. Priest writer social justice activist. This was written in. 1999. Bookends hear the decade of the 90s. Thomas perry ann. Wendell berry are not related. Thomas ferry rides. Throughout the 20th century. The situation has worsened decade-by-decade. With relentless commitment. To making. Prophet. By ruining the planet. For the uncertain benefit. Of the human. The great corporations have joined together so that a few establishments. Now control vast regions of the earth. Perhaps the most valuable heritage we can provide. For future generations. Some sense. Of the. Great work capital g capital. W. Some sense of the great work that is before them of moving. The human project. From its devastating exploitation. 2. A benign presence. The great work before us is this task of moving modern industrial civilization. From its present devastating influence on the earth. To a more. Benign mole. Of presents. And then lastly this poem from anita barrows which was quoted in. Joanna macy and molly young brown's book coming back to life. And i would travel with you. To the places of our shame. The hills stripped of trees. The marsh grasses oil slick. Steeped in sewage. The blackened shoreline the chemical poison water. I would stand with you. In the desolate places. The charger. Places. And where nothing will ever grow. Pitted desert. Feel that burn slowly 4 months. Roots of cholla and chaparral riving. With underground explosion. I. Would put my hand there. With yours. I would take. Your hand. I would walk with you. To carefully planted field rose of leafy vegetables drifting with radioactive dust. Through the dark of uranium mines hidden in the sacred gold red mountains i would listen with you. In drafty hospital. Quarters. As the minor cried out in the first language. Of pain. As he cried out the forgotten names of his mother. Wood. Stand neck. 2. In the forest final hour. In the wind up helicopter blades police siren shrieking the tremor of light between leaves for the last time. Ojai wood. Touch with this love. Each. On each. Wounded. A good thing you like hearing music huh. I would stand with you. In the desolate places the charred places right sonido. Barros. I would stand next to you. In the forest final hour i would touch with this love each. Wounded. Place. Barro's takes us into despair. With most of those works. That leaves us with ways out. Of that despair. Wood travel. With. You. In the places of our shame. I would stand with you i would touch. With this love. Each wounded. We are not alone. In our despair. We have each other. Despite our reluctance to admit. This to each other. Both our reluctance to named desire and our reluctance to admit it. To each other. Pavlov. But we generally greatly underestimate its power. These are. Pools. That will help us out of despair just like holly bloom in the children's story we have to keep looking for the right. Pools. Community is one. Love. Is another. Image illini talked about despair and gave you a homework assignment of sorts. I asked you to intentionally sit. With despair and sorrow and pain not your personal sorrow despair and pain although that generally comes up when we. Talking about. Those things in general but sit with them for a while. Silently. Just sit and wait. With that. I purposely did not have a congregational response time during that. Service in july i do want to hear your thoughts about despair and by the way i'm referring to communal to spare mostly. The despair over the fragile state of our world the despair over how we mistreat mother earth. There are times when we might want to ponder our responses to a speaker and not give immediate feedback. This seems to me to be especially true when we were talking about intense subjects such as despair that demand our complete attention at least once in awhile. And also require are getting in touch with our feelings. So today is the day but i will invite you to talk about. How to get through. Times of despair. How do we come out of despair. After acknowledging. Its existence. And contemplating its consequence. As i said in july by not naming despair by letting it be the elephant in the living room. We stifle. Discussion. But worse we stifle creativity. And ideas for long-term resolution of our huge problems. He's actually okay to suffer. A little. Not talking about physical suffering here. Just sit for a while with soro. Without expecting quick immediate resolution. To problem to the feelings of terror. And fear. It's okay. Even necessary to be still and to give creativity a chance. To blossom. I also talk down about something called positive disintegration. Some of you might remember that i use that phrase. We have his are pretty tough. We really are we're not going to fall asleep. Fall apart or asleep if we allow ourselves to disintegrate a little. By opening ourselves up to our feeling. And admitting that we do despair for the earth. That we are sometimes. Terrified. We break down old defenses. And make way for the release of new energy new ideas more creativity. Validating our despair because it is real and it is important validation of despair is another means of working through it so i guess you might say that the first step in our coming out of despair is to enter into it. Here we need to remember tuesday. 1 we do not have to come up with the answers to all or any of the huge problems confronting us here in the 21st century all at once. Or immediately. Who i am not necessarily talking about hope here. When working our way out of despair it is best. Not to be overly hopeful too soon. Because that can be another form of. Denial. Johanna mason recalls a conversation she had with jim douglas i don't know if any of you will remember that name from the. 80's and 90's. A theologian a writer a man of jail many times for civil disobedience. Dance douglas this question. What. Do you substitute for hope. He looked at me and smiled macy says. Possibilities. He said. Possibilities. You can't predict. Just make space for them. There are so many. This is a form of active. Waiting. And william list tells us. The ability to wait is central. To help. Also there's another tool for despair work. Waiting. Listening for that voice that voice that's still small deep inside all voice. To suggest ways to restore harmony. In a broken world. Tracy calls her. Despair work. The whole bunch of workshops and exercises and practices to help us. In this work she prefers to call this work. Work. That reconnects. You might have to what are we being reconnected well to the interdependent web of course but also to that still small voice. Within us. To our hearts which know what we need in this world. Even though we are so easily distracted. And always always work that reconnects must reconnect us to. Each other. I like to think of the work that reconnects us. As work based on the four c's. Commitment. Community. Courage. And compassion. The problems that we humans face are daunting they overwhelm us. What to choose as top priority. Where to begin. Is there a connection. Among all the choices. Global warming gun violence isis poverty nuclear weapons. And other wmd straddle off just a few. For me and for many others. Connection is mother earth. Learning to live in harmony with the earth. Is the bassist. For solving all of our other problems. Change the story change the future. As david court and says in his book by that name changed the human story. From the current false one of sacred money. And marcus. To the true human story of sacred life. And living earth. Life is sacred money's just a number. We're better. To lay the groundwork and plant the seeds for this kind of work done right here. At prairie. In an atmosphere where i hope. We all feel safe and secure enough to name our despair to break down or defense is to brainstorm. To engage in the healing work of the world. A few weeks ago beth. Jared i think. Arid. That's scary. Presented a service about mondragon. Spain. A town in spain. We're graduates of a local technical college founded something called the mondragon corporation. It was founded in 1956. And by the end of the year 2013. This worker cooperative employed over 74,000 people. In 257 companies and organizations in the fields of finance industry retail and education. In the response time after best remarks one of you. Said. We are so far from that in this country. How will we ever. Get anywhere near building this kind of community in this culture. Well it does seem. And almost impossible. Cast that we might transform this country from what thomas berry described in that reading i did earlier. Moving modern industrial civilization from its present. Devastating influence on the earth. To a more benign mode. What many are now calling the great turning. But changed. Start. And in other faith communities and in similar grassroots organization. Moses comes to mind. I told you a little bit about moses during the announcements and you'll have a chance to donate to moses in a little bit. Change. Even that great change the great turning the great work it's been called all of these things. That we have to do or i believe will perish we humans that is. Change starts by the efforts of people who come together. In places like this. I'm not sure that we ever do or can come completely out of despair and i'm not sure that would be a good thing to do that. Yeah i wouldn't mind having a little less of it. Despair that is. From time to time. A recent image that touched me deeply and put me into despair where i didn't want to go. Were the pictures of the animas river going through durango colorado when i was trying to decide where to live in the southwest and ended up in flagstaff. Durango was one of my choices. And i've walked beside that river in durango so many times. I want to replace that image. I want to replace it with one of clean rivers moving through our country i believe that anything that humans can imagine. Humans can make happen. For good or for evil. To accomplish the great turning we need more bodhisattvas sponsor is. Alright. This is the buddhist term for. Body mint of compassion. Maybe we should be doing somebody shot to training here and i want you to know i've told you this before but like to remind you that i am a certified honest-to-goodness. Bodhisattva. Certified by the dalai lama himself. At a workshop here in madison so if i can do it anyone to do it right. However i am a very long way from realizing my potential in this area. I want to be a better bodhisattva. I would also like to be a shambhala warrior. Might not know what that is. But here's another tool. To help us come out of despair. Rediscovering. Remembering drawing upon the wisdom of the ages telling the story from the ancient traditions is in this tool box. Here is a modern-day version. Of an ancient tibetan story the shambhala prophecy. Entertainment time when all life on earth was in danger. Great barbarian powers have arisen. Although these powers spend their wealth. In preparations. To annihilate one another. They have much in common. Weapons of unfathomable destructive power. And technology. That lay waste our world. In this era when the future of sentient life hangs by the frailest of threads. The kingdom of shambhala emerges. You cannot go there though. For it is not a place. It is not a geo-political entity. It exists in the hearts and the minds of the shambhala warriors. Nor can you recognize. A shamballa warrior when you see her or him. For they wear no uniforms for insignia are they carry no banners. They have no barricades on which to climb. To threaten the enemy or behind which they can hide you rest or regroup they do not even have any home turf. Always. They must move on the terrain of the barbarians themselves. And now the time comes when great courage. Moral. And physical curry is required of the shambhala warriors for they must go into the very heart. Of the barbarian power. Into the pits and pockets and citadel. Where the weapons are kept. To dismantle them. To dismantle weapons in every sense of the word they must go into the corridors of power. Where decisions are made. The shambhala warriors. Have the courage to do this because they know that these weapons are mono maya they are. Mind made made by the human mind they can be unmade by the human mind. The shambhala warriors know that the dangers threatening life on earth are not just added up on us by any extraterrestrial power teutonic deities or preordained evil face. They arise from our own decisions our own lifestyle and our own relationship. So the shamballa warriors go into training. How do they train you might have. Well they trained in the use of to wax. What weapons. The weapons are compassion. And insight. Both. Are necessary you have to have compassion. Because it gives you the juice. The power the passion to move. It means not to be afraid of the pain of the world then you can open. To it. Step forward into it a nap. But that weapon. That by itself is not enough it can burn you out. Weather. Uniden site. Into the radical interdependence of all phenomena. With that wisdom you know that it is not a battle between good guy. I'm back. Because line between good and evil. Runs through the landscape of every human heart. With insight into our profound enter relatedness you know. The actions undertaken. With pure intent have repercussions. Throughout the web of life. By itself at insight may appear too cool to conceptual to appear to an ahead just sustain you and keep you moving so you need a heat of compassion. In your heart. And together. These to sustain us as agents of wholesome. Change they are gifts for us to claim now. In the healing of the world. There are practices. Exercise. Workshops. Design by mac mall young brown many many others. That are designed to turn us into shambhala warriors. They are designed to help us come back. To lifetime out of despair i'd like to work on some of these here. In this community. So let me know if there's any interest in that. I think that we need a support group here. For those grappling with positive disintegration. Or maybe prairie unitarian universalist society could become the fellowship of the bigger picture. Or the church of the larger vision. Everyday i look for signs that the great turning has begun. I look for signs of the great work. In progress or anything that even remotely appears to be. I didn't know leachman of a larger picture in the human story and glance. Of decisions being made with the greater good in mind. Alas often too often i do end up feeling despair for our world. When it seems that we are going only going backwards. The sources that i drew on for today are already. 15 to 20 years old. I think that we cannot overestimate. How much 9/11 set us back. Here's a perfect example of the shortsightedness of humans at least humans in this country. Gasoline prices. You know they're going to go up again. And yet and yet when they fall as low as they have been lately unless you live here i am. People react as if the prices are going to be permanently low. And there is an infinite supply. Of oil. And then they grumble when i go back up. Occasionally though. I feel if not hope. Then at least possibility. And here's an example of courage commitment community compassion. In keeping with the c-word the carter center. I was moved to tears a few days ago. When i heard. Jimmy carter tela so frankly and so honestly. About his cancer. Carter talked about gratitude for his life. Reminding me. My gratitude. For our precious lives is another tool for us. To use when we are mired in despair. And ready to come out of it. But here's the part that made me really teary-eyed when asked what he would like to do. Excuse me like to see accomplished before he died. He said. I want. Blast guinea worm. Who died. Before i die. Do you know about the carter center know that it has been trying to eradicate. Time actually is of the essence here i-90 that earlier and these reflections i said that we don't have to. Do anything immediately but i'd like to qualify that now we are running out of time. To make the necessary corrections. Turning ships and how we. We live. We have the tools. Have the tools to make those. Changes. And to help bring about the great turning. You live in an amazing time we have destroyed and continue to destroy the very structures of life that this planet depends on. Are ways of relating to other than human modes of being. Have created the disharmony that mother earth is finding more and more difficult to self-correct. Enter heal. Back in april and may i get a couple of services based on david corton's book change the story change the future. And after one of those services somebody one of you suggested to me that we have a panel discussion some sunday morning. About what we are doing as individuals. Out there in the larger community. To further the process of. Changing. Community story from destructiveness. To living in harmony with the earth. Well we can begin that discussion right now in our congregational response time. We made a kind of beginning along those lines the first sunday in august when dean henman talked about choices. And invited you to share moments or stories when you witness someone. Choosing. It could have been yourself as he put it a world that's all about me a wii. A world about love. Or we met the other choice or witness someone making the other choice. Choosing a world fear.of we're all about me. I thought that one of the best comments that came out of that discussion was this one like don't necessarily have it exactly right. Remember that the me is part of the wii. But i would like you to do now is ratchet that discussion up a little bit. And how about some. The same store. Of choices. But not necessarily individual encounters rather community choices. Communal story. But you'll be there been involved in. Personally or bet you've witnessed or read about or heard about anything related to the great work. The great. Kearney. Anything related. To humanity turning away from destruction of the earth. And ford living. Harmoniously with here's an example. The astronauts. When the first ones went into space and look down. On earth and saw that. Beautiful. Small. Planta. There's a beautiful picture of that. Outer space. Any of you who worked in the. Grassroots movement beyond war know about that. Poster. The blue marble exactly. And we'll use that poster all the time and indian war and other organizations have used it also. Do come out of despair work we need to stop. Thinking that feeling grief for our world is morbid. And then we need to allow ourselves to feel. A wide variety of things to think about. And some fairy good comments. You know that old saying about we come here to. Afflict the comfortable. Comfort the afflicted. Met with donna little of that today. Closing words are from the buddha. Go forth on your journey for the benefit of the many. For the joy of the many. Out of compassion. For the welfare. The benefits enjoy. Of all beings. Blessed be going pee. Rate your neighbor.

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Pr110904CraigMyrbo-ed.mp3

The process of introducing our speakers starts with an apology to him. His name is misspelled in your program it's marlboro marlboro mirabeau mirbeau myrtos to you for that. Craig is a recently-retired a smoothie. Activist member men stewart. He's a member of the board of the directors of the interfaith council for worker justice. And a member of the sherman avenue methodist united methodist. And his talk today. We just sang it. Is stand by me. Craig. Good morning. Thank you all for math for getting me here peter for helping arrange this. Call you for listening to me as a speech today. Tomorrow is labor day. National holiday set aside on a worker's i'm speaking here today and behalf of the interfaith coalition for worker justice for south central wisconsin. The icw jay is a coalition. Of unions faith groups. I'm concerned individuals both in the face and labor communities. And other organizations. That educates and mobilizes faith in labor communities on behalf of workers especially low-wage workers for information on our work and programs you can stop by in the table outside the door for some brochures. Sign up sign up sheet volunteer sheets or go to worker justice that's all one word. org. We are a local affiliate of the national organization interface order justice. An important component of the fulfilling our mission is coordinating the annual labor & the papas program labor and faultless puts labor speakers in papa's across country in churches synagogues and mosques i'm speaking here today and as part of that this year's program i return on june 30th. Well after almost. 40 years of state service. During my entire career i was active in my union. I'll begin by reviewing. The last six months starting in the middle of february this year. And continuing through the winter and spring and summer. Thousands upon thousands of people converged on the capitol building here in madison day after day week after week month in montauk. In the morning in the middle of the day in the evening sometimes late at night. Sometimes into the wee hours of morning in fair weather and foul. We showed up. We march. We're saying we prayed. We carried signs we listen to speeches we kept on showing up again and again and again. The number for disturbance abdomen swelled and evidence while as time has gone on. Hundreds of us thousands of us hundreds of thousands of us at a time. I participated in these actions as early as february 11th. In organizing the first. Protest. Two as late as last thursday august 25th. I will continue to do so. I'll beginning my perspective. As an active participant knows why this is happening. I'll try to show how this connect. Two-face traditions and people of faith. Why did i do so. Why am i so adamantly union. Because someone stood by me. That's what unions do. In is in the video playing for change the late street musician. Rodger ridley. Introduce the ben e king song that use. Just saying for the following words. This song says no matter who you are no matter where you go on life at some point. You're going to need somebody to stand by you. Stand by me. And the night is coming the way is dark. And the moon is the only light. Ricci. I won't be afraid no i won't be afraid. Just as long as people come and stand by me. The organizer in the film norma rae states that when his grandfather died. His mother and his father attended the funeral. His uncle's attended the funeral is an attending the funeral. And shoulders 862 members. A union also members of his family. They stood by him. Norma rae is a work of fiction but it's been based on facts. The scene may not have happened. In real life exactly as portrayed in the film. But it is truth. I know. I've been there. When i needed somebody to stand by me to roof in my life did. My church and my. In january of 1978 i made a serious mistake on my job. I was fired. My union stood by me. Nice george up the case and file a grievance. The grievance was denied by the state and then filled arbitration by the union. After four months the arbitrator ruled. For what i done did not warrant termination. Good morning discipline. And so and reinstated me without back pay or benefits. During this psychological emotional and personal economic crisis my church and main. Stood by me. Later on when those injured on the job. My unit was there. In my job transition. Georgia blue didn't involve. Heavy lifting. My unit was there. Going to add other medical problems when was there. I've tried to pass this on. I have become adamantly union because other of the examples of others. I have realized the same instincts. Good motivating me as a person person of faith. Murdered me as a union motivated me as union labor activist. The motto of the. Industrial workers of the world. A. Radical labor union early in the twentieth century still in existence by the way. An injury to one is an injury tall is actually a reworking of the thought expressed in the. First letter to the corinthians chapter 12. But we are all parts of the same same body and when one suffers all suffer. Unions call this solidarity. Innocence. Union standings. Together for the betterment of all workers. There's a strong strand in all faith traditions. The support of fairness and equity especially for. The foreign workers. I noticed one of your seven principles. We believe in justice equity and compassion. Dorking out of that. Strand in unions through solidarity. My case is by no means unique. Last year the ex-president of our local. Cast new york local 145 passed away. In the executive board meeting it was noted by several members that he saved their well. Injured salcedo behind he saved a lot of those. As a local we gave to the memorial and attended the wake and the funeral. Pat. In his life was an active. Jordan. Can president of our local who is also active at st peter's catholic church on madison's northside. There are many connections between faith and labor. In february 1968. Two sanitation workers were crushed to death. In the back of a garbage truck in memphis memphis tennessee. Do sanitation workers there people that standed stand by them. Went on strike. The reverend martin luther king joined in that struggle. The struggle for economic justice. Indignity. Martin luther king was killed. Standing by the workers. On the 43rd anniversary of king's assassination. On a cold april 4th evening. In madison wisconsin capitol square i was. Profoundly privileged to carry the icwg banner. With jesse jackson. And two members of that sanitation workers union in daphne 1733. And there's four of us. In solidarity. Space and labor conditions are well until. Entwine. Relationship between faith and labor goes back. Before this year. Before last year before 1968 before 1978 way way back let me tell you a story. A long time ago there was a man who fled the authorities for a crime he's committed. Much later he felt the call to help. The people who are his people were overworked and underpaid. At first his their demands were simple. Time off to worship god and rest. As is typical in such struggles. Production quotas are increased. The workers had to supply their own raw materials. After a series of increasingly disruptive job actions the demands were met. Plus the workers were governesses stancil bonuses. The workers took off for their much-needed time rest. But the employer had second thoughts. And attempted to use the army to force the workers back to work. Moses was that labor leader i have just summarize the fort first 14 chapters of the book of exodus in the torah the hebrew scriptures second book in the christian bible. Seeing and movement has three things that i bargain for wages hours and working conditions. Slavery is no wages. Unlimited hours horrible working conditions. Labor issues matter. Faith traditions. Walter brueggemann old testament scholar. And. Writer. Wrote this book called prayers for fertilization people he contemplated. The stories that i just summarized. In his book price for privileged people. Brick production. We need to be reminded of the ones who lack boys. Bruised voice we know. Do not often here. We think them on like us but they are our neighbors. The widow's the orphans the immigrants the poor. Flavors the prisoners to slave the attics. They are the ones who dwell in place as short of mercy absent of justice. Default sort of gift of life. They are noticed by cute leave a god are they notify us. A prayer protest. Since our mothers and fathers craddolph. Since you have heard their cry and notice. Since we left. The book production of egypt. Since you foiled of production schedules will ferrell. We have known your name. Princess your passion. We've treasured your vision of justice. When and we now turn to you again. Who's precious name we know. Return to you because there are still impossible production schedules. Still exploitative system still cries of painted injustice. Still cheap labor the yields misery. We charge you an impatience and exasperation wondering how long. Before you answer are pleading question pure perdition petition. Since you are not a labor wash and do not set wages. Pre-register up those who can change things. Julia string in the jaded halls of government. Do your steering the cynical offices of corporation. Do your stirring in the mid the voting public too anxious to care. Deer stirring in the church that thinks too much about purity and not enough for wages. Movers removed in the ancient egyptian days. Move the waters in the flocks the herds. Ford's new statutes and regulations towards new equity and good healthcare new diggity cannot be given on a cheap. We know you. Longshanks. To reject cheap grace. Even now we know where you jack chi flavor. God of justice and dignity. Equity. Keep your promises you bought it in jesus the poor major first-class citizens ours. Society that the needy may have good care and respect. The forest may rejoice and well-being. That we may all come sabbath rest together or her leisure class and they were class all at peace and dignity and justice not in the cheap but in good for mater prayers press down running over so why did we keep on showing up. Taking away the ticking away and act 10 of our. Rights and dignity. Reducing our pay. And. Forcing hard economic choices. Thursday august 25th the last time that i was in the. Square. Not the last time but the last time. I will intend to continue. Was impact day. Where's the first bi-weekly check. The larger state employee contributions to health insurance retirement retirement came came out. State employee i know. Had. 208 dollars taken out for health insurance. Hello hundred and $25.73 taken out for retirement. Previous. That check. Paycheck was $240.99 less. In the previous check. Those reductions. For $68. Previously. And $4.32. Somlor paid state employees. In. Clerical. In blue collar. On the university campus. Have to decide whether to. Drop health insurance coverage. Or. Feed their kids. Or. Pay the mortgage. Some state employees make as little as $12 an hour. We need voice. I'm working on wages hours and working condition. We need somebody to stand by us. No matter who you are. No matter. Where you going life. You're going to need somebody to stand by you. In the workplace. It's probably a brother union brother sister. We call this solidarity. Will you stand by me. Thank you. Are closing words are from howard zinn. If we do act and however a small way. We don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents. And to live now as we think human beings should live. In defiance of all that is bad around us. Kids excel. A marvelous victory.

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Pr160918Ingham-ed.mp3

If this is one of your first times here i am courage you to come more than once because their services are different from sunday to sunday sometimes i do them i am sandy ingham prairies minister sometimes people from within our congregation do the service. And sometimes people from the community will do the service. Terry tried very hard and generally succeeds i think. To be a welcoming congregation. You welcome you. No matter what your religion is where you are on your search. On your spiritual journey where you are in life. No matter your abilities or disabilities no matter your sexual orientation or your gender. Preference we welcome you. We like this chalice to help illuminate our paths in the never-ending search for truth. And meaning. In the words of ts eliot. What we call a beginning is often the end and to make an end is to make a beginning the end is where we start from. We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started. And know the place for the first time. Short reading that i've actually used before so if it sounds familiar. I don't remember how long ago i use it different context. By barbara rodier unitarian. Universalist layperson. She writes. We can catch glimpses of who we are. By looking at our historical past. As a denomination and that's a fellowship. Do you know who we are. We must know where we came from. And which ideas moved us. The nature of unitarian universalism is constantly changing. And we have no creed. Yep certain ideas have existed throughout our history. We have always believed. That the source of religious authority does not reside in the pope. Or in the minister. Or in a book. But within the center of our own personalities. Within our deepest selves. That idea has often been corrupted to suggest that all expressions of belief are equally valid. We have always believed in freedom of font. And the expression of thought. That idea has been corrupted so that it often seems to be saying. Leave me alone. Rather than. Tell me. What you see. We have always been an advocate of religious tolerance. But that belief has changed. From saying i won't burn you at the stake. Who sang. I won't let you know i disagree with you. In the great religious division between those who would exclude. In order to purify. And those who would embrace. In order to redeem. We have always been with. The embrasures. We have no creedle requirements for membership which is how it should be. But that does not mean. We should not be. Passionate. About our search for truth. Nor that membership. Has no meaning. How to make an adjustable. Just enough of a glare there. We are passionate about our search for truth. About our fierce. Rethinking this. Which the computer doesn't recognize. About our membership in this unique faith tradition of ours. At least i hope we are passionate about. These very important ideas. The ideas that have moved us are many. That the ideas that have moved us. Have led us to this place. Let's space. On this morning and we stan. Again. We. Stan. Rain. Bye. The words of this him. We sang earlier we're written by john huntley shrine. And carl seibert. Words about ideas that have moved us. Hours. The years memorial store. Honored a saint names we reckon days of conrad's gone before lives that speak and deeds that beckon from the dreaming of the night to the labors of the day shines their everlasting light. Tying us up on our way. Well from our dreams from the dreaming of the night. Tell me ideas that has moved us and that still shape us and that still inspire us to be true. To all those dreams of our forebears. All those dreams of free fonts. A reason as a guiding light. For us. And then there's that very last. Magnificent. Line in this wonderful song. What they dreamed the hours to do. Hope. Their hopes. And seal them true. This morning i want to tell you the beginning of a story. About some people. From a very long time ago. Who had rather astounding. Hopes and dreams especially given the time. in which they lived. Only going to get into the beginning of the story today though because there's too much to tell. In one day or even several days so this story will be continued. More accurately this is a continuing story. And we're part of it. You can't tell a good story. Without entering into the realm of history. Please no rolling a vine. Or having had happy. Eyes. I assure you. History. Coldwell is not one bit boring. I will also tell you something that you might not know about me. You say that you don't like history. Do not scare me. One little bit. Because. I have been challenged. Buy more history resistant people than any of you will ever be now. Because i have to. 7. And 8th grade. One of the biggest challenges that the study of history presents us with is this. How do we. Get out of this mindset. Out of our contemporary place and time and as much as possible answers a time. and the geographical space. That we want to try to understand. The difficulty of doing this increases the further away we get from actual events. The study of history and this is why i love it among other reasons the study of history requires imagination. And creativity. So try. To put yourself into. Time.. Where our story begins. The 1500. Now i think that this time. must have been an exciting time in which to live. More than one historian has pointed out the similarities and technology. Not literally in the technology. But between those times and. Now. Liacouras center. Digital age raised to be seeing what we'll do with that. But in the 1500s the printing press. Had was beginning to really make an impact and i was going to write this down so you wouldn't remember it 14 something. The gutenberg. Printing press. So there's that that we have in common. About to just think about yourself going through a day in your life. And. What would be different from that. If you were going through a day in your life in 1500. I think the time. was probably an exciting time in which to live. 4. The upper classes. I guess i would include the nobility obviously the clergy. Maybe not. Rates of pay button where they stood. Doctors lawyers and even some artists. We can spend the entire morning imagining what it must have been like to live in the 16th century. I suspect it might not have been very pleasant for us on a day-to-day basis. I am reminded of something i read. I wants about one of the interesting aspects of reincarnation. Is that everyone thinks she or he will come back as royalty. Not as part of the peasantry. Well that's not very realistic. Most of us would probably be peasants or common folks if we had lived then. Maybe though if we were lucky. And especially if we lived in the latter part of the 15s. We would learn how to read. And we would have access to new ideas especially religious ideas. From the reformation. We would be. Aware of ideas that could move us change well it's not our daily lives and props are mine. And our assumptions about humanity. For our purposes today. Our story will begin with a young man named miguel cervantes. The we know him if we know him at all as michael. How many have you ever heard of him. Pretty good. And mostly if people today know of him it's because of something he did in the healthcare. Not because of his unitarian beliefs. When cerritos was studying lawn he what he lived from 1511 to 1553. Two things happened to him. That changed his life and eventually led to his death. One here at a bible for the first time. And lo and behold he could not find me hardly any scripture. To support the catholic church's dogma. Define nothing. At all to support the doctrine. Remember my 20 told my mother that my. Wonderful. Born and raised presbyterian mother. Who supported me even though i was seen on being a heretic. Going into. Unitarian universalist ministry. I remember telling her this that there is no evidence of the trinity. In the bible. And she read that new testament. Over and over and back and forth. Finally she said no. Watching remainder presbyterian. Sarita's. I was especially upset about. What do you learned about jesus. When he read the gospels. This was nothing like the jesus said he had learned about in a catholic churches tree. Well the other thing that happened to servetus about a year later was happened to be in vilonia. Miami i'll be saying that correct. Italy when the pope was there. To crown charles the fifth. As roman emperor. Servetus was discussed. Buy a whole ceremony. And all the corruption surrounding it with everyone knew about the corruption. Gyros. With these very eyes i saw him the pope. Born with pump. On the shoulders of princess and in the public streets adore by the whole peoples kneeling. Bigstuf pista most. Most famous apart. That was so beautiful taken that experience. Cerritos was only 20 years old when he thought that he needed to take on me whole catholic church by the pope didn't pay a whole lot of pictures. So his services next. Target. Was. John calvin. That's wonderful. Presbyterian that i've been trying to escape most of my adult life. Tobias was particularly upset as i said by the doctrine of the trinity and the incomprehensible theology and worldly corruption of the church and he wants to protestant. Reformers. Keep a lot of that. Most especially they retain the doctrine of the trinity. They were they rebelled and other areas but they kept the trinity. So here was servetus going head-to-head with john calvin this is a whole story in itself at all talk about some sunday morning some of you may have read out of the flames. About. Servetus is life it's not completely historically accurate. Apparently but what is. Close enough. Calvin and servius began a correspondence of of writing back and forth and helen came to really hate service. Answer me this was young and rash and stubborn and. That tended to dumb speak before. Thinking and right also sometimes before thinking servetus wrote a book title on the errors of the trinity. It was a best-seller. Reinvigorated. Stalled anti trinitarian movement. In germany and switzerland especially most importantly for our story and italy. Unfortunately. Sirenis is natural audience. Which would be the modern. Reformers. Rejected him for two reasons they didn't have anything to do with his book. When was they were afraid the catholic church would come down on them yet again really heavily once they rest on the ears of the trinity. Did reformers not catholics. And then the second thing was it sarita sosa just moving too quickly for them he's just way ahead of them. They didn't make which of course brings up into this today but it brings up that hole. Question and concerned about how to revolutions stay revolutionary. When hears this forward. Looking sinker way out here on the edge of a revolution. And the so-called moderates don't have any. Do. With. Person or persons. Well eventually calvin manipulated the french inquisition. People having a lot of power. I am simplifying the story brightleaf court. And. Servetus was sentenced. To be burned at the stake. Using unseasoned. Law. That's a direct quote from a document. 1500. I would gather that it would take longer. To burn. Well if i said we can spend a lot of time on servetus and and maybe we will later in another sunday. Is there could be a good side to being burned by. Unceasing lost. There was a lot of outrage. After this. And the protestant reformers were in federal path lights were in rage that the inquisition has. Frozen 2. Tip to burn this young man it's a steak because of his. Belief that among other things that the bible should not be taken literally a reformer named. Daisy wrote scarcely. We're services ashes cold before there arose a controversy over the punishment of heretics. Now i'd like to find heresy for you before but just as a little review. The word heresy is from the greek word harry's this meeting to choose. The action of choice. Descent or deviation from a dominant theory. And a heretic is a december from anastasia church dogma but i also want who descends from any accepted belief or doctor. A non-conformist the dictionary tells me. Enter a man named sebastian castellio a frenchman. Who lived in basel switzerland he had been forced out of geneva because he was too liberal in his religious thinking. Any. Tina professor in basel. And a very important man in our story. Just a leo did a little research and he discovered that the majority of reformers including that greatest reform revolver those time martin luther they were all opposed. Most opposed to the use of the death penalty for heretics. Castellio the other these opinions together and published them in a book titled. Concerning heretics. This is a good thing for free thinkers. That is. Heretic. To know. I believe. Because. Well you know that the arguments against burning us at the stake go way back. Good thing for us to know. Even before the publication of that book in 1550. I could give you a lot of examples of important heretics of the mid-1500s. But you probably wouldn't remember them and we do have the internet. I couldn't help but wonder though as i was reading about some of them. What distinguishes a heretic. A free thinker. From a cult leader. Something to think about for future you sleepy. Teacher discussion. And another question what is the best method for making sure that a new idea lives on. This question occurred to me when i was reading about a reformer name. Frankenfeld. You may have heard of him if your german you should have heard of him. I found somebody you haven't heard of. Shrink failed actually not shrink and field schwenckfeld i knew about it but i don't remember a lot of the details like must have run across him and seminary days. Casper schwenksville. Live from 1489 to 1561 so he was a contemporary servetus. He's been called the german servetus both street essential expelled we're lawyers. And both became obsessed with the illogical questions do both remained lay people all their life. They probably influenced each other and we know that they met several times. I am curious about whether the free congregation of sauk county. Started out as a schwenckfeld. Churchill have to. Do a little research on that. Well. Almost no one scared of him of servetus or schwenkfelder course but. Four people probably heard of schwenksville. Because. Of all these churches that got started in his name and they're still around in the world. But the 400 years old now. But no one really has heard of servetus so what's the best way. We were totally different personality schwenkfelder. Was calm and quiet persuasive informed all these churches in cerritos just kept flying off the handle. Well we've been to spain now and italy and germany it's finally time to go to transylvania. And introduce you to king john ziggy's one doctor giorgio beyond rata. And ferrin's david among others. The ideas that moved these reformers of the 1500s. Travel to different countries. Because these people moved around a lot that they either got thrown out of their homes. Or they willingly left to try to find a boar. Responsive. Plants that have their then radical idea. One of the italian humanists rationalists even then. Was this doctor giorgio or we would say george. Deandre. He's one of the most important links between servitas and the anti trinitarians in hungary in transylvania and poland me and draka apparently was it expert. In woman's disease. About what she wrote a lot and now i remember people were starting to read people had more and more information so in 1540b andrada got a job offer he couldn't refuse. He was called to be the physician for the queen of poland. Bonasa rosa. Probably and her daughter isabella. Isabella. Would eventually become. The queen of transylvania. It would be hard to overstate how important having poland. As its neighbor was to transylvania. In the 16th century. The century crucial to our story. Poland was amazingly diverse place. Together with lithuania the kingdom of poland. And the grand duchy of lithuania had the largest kingdom in all of europe. This was space this kingdom was based on a constitution. And the nobility elected the king. This noble class was highly educated politically powerful and very interested in the protestant reformation. Poland was multilingual at that time there were at least six official languages. And multicultural it had the largest jewish community in europe. The polish king cds1 the second augustus. Who took over the throne of 1548 said that he was king of the people not of their consciences. Well not only was at fortune for the transylvanians have poland as its name. A transylvania was also fortunate geographically. In the middle 1500s transylvania. What's a buffer country between the ottoman empire and the rest of europe. Which man it was also a buffer between islam and christianity. Suleiman the first who ruled the ottoman empire during this time supported king johnson casement the old lady unitarian canyon history. And there is some evidence that are named unitarian actually. From islam. Now perhaps the fact that transylvania was a melting pot of sorts. Help transylvania be more tolerant of differences. That's. What series it's kind of nude. For some reason in our history. So now i must introduce you to federal funds aka francis. David. Transylvania was an independent country from 1543 until 1691. And between 1520 and 1556 the country went through the process of. Converting from catholicism to protestantism. Going so far as to dish. Establish. The catholic church. At the end of the strange and 1556. There were three decrees of religious tolerance. Issued in the independent country of transylvania in the 1500. When frances david was the court preacher who was the important figure here it's francis david. But david had such a huge influence on seguine took over the throne when he was. Free my soul. His mother isabella of course a lot of the governing. Until. John got older. The first. Decree of religious tolerance was in 1557 it was renewed 5 years later. In 1563 and then came the famous release it should be famous to you. Active religious tolerance and freedom of conscience. The one that we unitarians know about or should know about because it was the first ever. Decree. Or edict of religious tolerance and it's so crucial to our faith tradition. This one was issued in 1568. It is amazingly short. I'm going to read it to you. His majesty. Our lord. In what manner he together with his realm. The diet they called the. Legislated in the matter of religion at the previous diet. Congress's. In the same manner now in this diet. He. His majesty. The king. Help himself apart more cohesive. He reaffirms that in every place the preachers still preach and explain the gospel each according to his understanding of it and it's a congregation not be satisfied like it well. Well what's the word of the congregation like it. If not no one shall compel them. For their souls would not be satisfied but they shall be permitted to keep a preacher who's teaching they approve. Remember this is the days of all sorts of hierarchy in lutheran church the reformist church enforcement catholic church. Therefore none of the superintendent's or others shall abuse the preachers. No one shelby. Revile. For his religion by anyone. According to. The previous statues. And it is not permitted that anyone should threaten anyone else by imprisonment or by removal from his post for his teaching. For faith is a gift of god. This comes from hearing. Which hearing. Is by the word of god. That was amazingly. So i guess you could say a doctor b andrada. A king johnson guzman. And a preacher. Princess. Go into a bar. They did better than that. They went into history even if hardly anyone is ever heard of them i mean sick of it. This whole country is based on that eating. It came down to that. That way. Just a little bit more about friends with stuffy. He is so amazing. Before he became. Johnson eastman's court preacher and so really a unitarian for preacher. Duffy study for the catholic priesthood. Funny left and he became a lutheran. Not just any old lutheran he became the bishop of all the lutheran churches in transylvania. If any flex app. And he became reformed which is presbyterian to us today. Calvinist. And. Not until after he became the head of all. The reformist calvinist churches in transylvania. Ambitious guy. Add eventually of course he found his way to unitarianism. How many do you know about the debates. Back them. The debates were television. The debate for the internet. Debates radio sings remember then even have a printed word very much yet. So people would go to debates hundreds of thousands of people will go to debate and the debates were always about religion because religion with politics.. Textnow politics religion same thing people got excited about this for the first two debates that francis david was very important to him. We're held at. G y u a l a f e h e r v a r. Beautiful. This is what i learned when i went to rumania. But two months ago.. But that's a hungarian name. That one of the tricky things about visiting in romania's with two languages. The romantic kind of almost get buying because my friends was fairly good. But the hungarian different alphabet different. These first two debates were in. In 1566 and 1568. Medford won the most important one in 1569 was in nevada. Yes i went all this places. It's hard for us to grasp with these debates were like and how important they were david park lykins their attraction to the same attention that american presidential nominating conventions attract now. So think about that since we just. Lestat. For religion then was it important to the people as politics. Today since david parker. Greenwood harris in their book about unitarian universalist traditions. Compare the debates to today's sporting events. Thanks super bowl. Well maybe the. What are those things. Playoffs. In terms of popularity. In terms of. Publicity and what passed for media attention in those days. The king not to decide when the debates were over 14 days. And eventually the kingwood for less indicate who would want to come right out and say it but you got a pretty good idea first debate was inconclusive. David one the second one of the three were talking about. And victory. Cemented unitarianism eskimos popular face. In transylvania. And as for that third one. Well hungarian historian of the time called it but decisive debate which produce the final triumph. Of unitarianism. The debate started the sword to be started at 5 a.m. and went on for 10 days. Big head people. 100000. People went today. Avakin finally ended it by telling the two sides to. Quote this is a quote from king johnson. Seek harmony. Supposedly when david returned to his hometown of coleslaw. Yes i was there. He was greeted. At the entrance to the city and he stood on a large boulder which became a unitary contrived. He told. The crowd that the king was on their side and they would not be persecuted as heretics much cheering from the crowd and says exuberant bunch of people supposedly carried david on their shoulders to the town square where according to greenwood and heresy finished his speech with such eloquence that they were all converted to unitarianism. I need a friend.. So the boulder and cole as far as anybody been to transylvania. We're going we're all going bake sales car washes we're going. The boulder is supposed real boulder is there in a catholic church. A huge catholic church that was originally a unitarian church. It's right across the street from the from the whole administrative headquarters of unitarianism in transylvania. And there is the boulder. In the corner and you can't touch it but you can look at it. And. It's that something as one of these historians said it's. Probably. The only. Catholic church in the world. That gives some space to insurance. David himself summed up that big debate with these words i follow the line of scripture. But my opponents hit it in a bag. Their religion is self-contradictory. To the extent that even say cannot present it as. A hole. Nevertheless they all see that even against their will god will prove history. Eminem's and i am ending with this but i'm going to take up the story again. This year. So i'll begin with this ending. Next time. Princess david was. Betrayed by george vandross. And. David was. Central prison and he wasn't in very good health. And he died in that prison on november 15th. 1579. Hyup i'll just. Briefly say for now that david refused to sign up. An agreement with with the reformers. That okay his report what he wanted his reforms his ideas were great but that was enough. Ichibiri former but he could not continue. To think of more reforms. Thought he wouldn't do that. And yes i saw the prison he couldn't go into it because it's being. Renovated thank you thank you. But it gave me chills to stand. Where. Undoubtedly. So it's time now to find ways to help these good ideas live on where the ones responsible for fulfilling the dreams of these amazing. People. What they dream be ours to do. Hope. Their hopes and seal them true. It's an incredibly complex history. And there were so many different influences their beginning with the romans. And then. You know that magyars. And the. Sechler's. Essity ecklers. The sackler's were varying. They're all sorts of blending. And and then as i said that transylvania with a buffer state. Between your country. Between. The muslims. Christianity. So there are a lot of reasons why transylvania cuz i asked the same question i wondered the same thing. We can get into that and. What's a melting pot. For that time. Definitely not mean that. Everybody got along. But a lot of different people live there and they were in at one point that germans got. They got thrown out. For some reason they made in like they always always had to make alliances with other states. Are small. I think 2/3 the size of maine. But it ain't right. Later but it wasn't that that wonderful. But any interest of truth. That eat it. That that was the first-ever religious freedom eating. Included. Catholics. Lutheran's. Before monsieur presbyterian. Unitarian. Not one word about the jews. Like a problem. Like the car casings. You did. But the part that we are primarily talking about is more rolling hills. And forest. No not any. It's a landlocked country. River tube. Across apple river. Okay. Well again it's i think having i mean there are a whole bunch of reasons there's a lot written about this but. Having different peoples. He part of your culture. But again we always have to say is that there. There's a limit to there. To their understanding and tolerance i mean it was only recently. That. A mixed marriage. Was was allowed is still frowned upon a mixed marriage and transylvania is between a hungarian and romanian. Because transylvania is part of hungary. For great portions of its history. So but the better was just too bright. Time. But these italians and then people from switzerland and. Germany where they had to move a lot of the time it got thrown out of their homes. Because of their beliefs or religious beliefs and they were looking for places where they be more accepted and. One reason they went to the transylvania area was it wasn't very highly popular. I'm hungry too but then your neighbor at this point in time was perfect because poland was so open. And i'm not sure if that earlier history of poland why. I mean who knows why why is the united states at least ed. Historically it is open and wants people now i fear for our future but we are not going any closer to that today. The closing words are. These. Just so ever wishes to know about the world must learn about it. In its particular details knowledge is not intelligence in searching for the truth be ready for the unexpected. Change alone is unchanging. The same road goes both up and down. The beginning of a circle is also its and. Not i but the world says it. All is one. And yet everything comes in season. Go in peace street your neighbor eat soup.

uuprairie_org

Pr150215JohnWunderlin-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society of being the part-time minister here my name is sandy ingham. And we'd like to welcome you wherever you are on your journey. On this journey of life what do you called the religious journey to spiritual journey the mysterious journey we welcome you wherever you are. We welcome you no matter the color of your skin your sexual preference or gender. I do like to say i'm kind of looking to see if they have anybody. Brand new but if you are new or if this is one of your first time. Please try to come back because our services are different every sunday morning sometimes i do them sometime someone from outside the unitarian universalist community dozen. Sometimes someone i'm with him like this morning with john. Wunderland. Looking forward your presentation. Is there any new people or first-time second time people who would like to introduce themselves we have a. Spot for that later on in the service. The opening words then are these and their carl sagan's words. The cosmos is all that is. Or was. Or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the cosmos. Sterlla. There is a tingling in the spine a catch. In the voice i think since patient as is a distant memory. Falling from a height we know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries. Holly i need a chalice lighting would you like i do. Hope respect and love. Three important treasures of spiritual life. May they always be in our hearts. May we always give them generously. The light of this flame. Is a symbol. Love them to as hope respect and love are the cornerstones. Of our free religious path. And now it's my pleasure to introduce jon wonderland as our speaker many of you will know john. Because he and his wife have been coming here for a while. Don't the founding member of the iowa county astronomers and. A member of posey wyalusing. Star splitters. Star spencer. Star splitters. And the madison astronomical society. East. Been active in the astronomy clubs with. Talks and sharing any of his telescopes. During public. Outreach and did you are you bringing your telescope i heard a rumor to winter. In one of our recent talks in church i was thinking. About giving this presentation i given the several times to. Two schools into. Public presentations at at. It went losing state park. Play i thought it might be appropriate for us. Hopefully you don't all know all of this information already even if you do it's fun to think about anyway. So i wanted to tie the talking a little bit of two uuism cuz it's not entirely. Very much kt tape face. But i wanted to share why what i feel about astronomy and. And why i'm glad it found to you church. I'm in the first of my first point was. How i feel about the scientific method and at first i thought. It's by faith in the scientific method. And i thought that's not really the right word. As mark twain said faith is believing what you know ain't so. So then i got believe in the scientific method and like i almost have to say it's really my trust in the scientific method. And beyond. In the scientific method. Is not really very good at explaining the universe. But it's better than all of the other options out there. Democracy. I'm so whatever is young. I grew up catholic and. And. I always tell people i gave it up for lent. I came to the realization that. If god created the universe for humans. Why is it that 99.999 in this number the nines will probably extend. 22 michigan percent of the universe is completely hostile to human life. Even on earth itself. Majority of the planet. If you're unprotected you're going to drown in the ocean. So that for me that was like. I think there's more to this. But then are we just a lucky accident. I'm not sure. And then against my beliefs. Do we really need supernatural explanations for the universe. When the reality of a natural universe is so amazing. I wanted to talk just briefly about my background in astronomy. My earliest memory. Is when i was i was about five years old. And i was playing in the neighbor sandbox. In platteville. And and my my friend's mother leaned out the window and said john got home right now. So i ran home ran into our living room and came into the family room where our whole family was gathered round. Rtd said and there's a black and white picture. Neil armstrong stepping down onto the moon. And you're all huddled around enter some of you were as well. Depression army. When my father and my father wasn't sales. And he. What a telescope. But i was about 10 years old. It was a horrible horrible instrument that i i realize now that. I took it outside and i appointed it up at at the brightest star i could see in the sky and i got it focused and i looked through it and darkness at star. That star look like a crescent. And and i was. I was completely baffled at the time i was like why. Why does it look like a mini moon. Now i know that that was actually the planet venus. So i just happen to be lucky that a. That i found something like that. I'll make my first real telescope when i was 40 years old. My mother sent me a nice fat check. Play mediately said. Good telescope. So i bought a 10 inch dobsonian. And then spent many many hours is my wife can tell you and that your backyard. I'll looking up at the sky and there's a little computer on it that it could tell me i could point to a whole lot of different objects and it was a great experience. And i got all excited about it. Oh man i got so excited about it i'm a friend and diagnosed with capital website devoted to astronomy. And he and i got together and we decided we needed to start. Astronomy club. Damn that is still going strong we got over 100 members in and iowa county usually have about 20 at each meeting. But that's been a lot of fun and outreach for the public and. It's just it's really an enjoyable. Eminem also participated frequently in university park programs. If you're not familiar with that it's a program that astronomers from you to give madison go out to state parks in lacrosse wisconsin. And do a presentation similar to what i'm doing. I'm in then in a couple comes and looks through the telescopes and it's kind of funny the first one we did the astronomers at madison actually know how to run these small telescope. And then. Once. You get heavy into astronomy. Your wallet opens up and it just leaves all over the place i got into astrophotography you which is not something you want to get into if you enjoy keeping your money. So the first thing i'm going to talk about is distance. In space. Also got a question for everybody if you're in the car driving in an imaginary highway. At 65 miles an hour like highway 151. And imagine there was a road going all the way to the moon. How long do you think it'll take you to get there. More than an hour. Ion year. The answer is. 153 day. No that's without anybody breaks. It's 240,000 miles for the moment. Now how far away is the sun. San diego road rage of the sun. 40 years. * 40. Hebrew. And again still no that's 24 hours a day 7 days a week 2. It's 93 million miles to decide approximately. So miles are not a practical way to measure astronomical distances. Light is the fastest thing in the universe. And it travels at 186,000 miles per second. How fast the beam of laser light goes. Light encircle the earth 7 times in 1 second. Where can i get. I'm glad you asked. So how far away is the moon at the speed of light. You suck at this very quotes it's about 1.3 seconds. Andra neil armstrong when the astronauts were on the moon and they were talking to to to mission control. They went there was always a delay. It would be about 3 seconds they would speak and then there'd be a delay and then and then it come back it's because it literally took a three second round trip for the from light to bounce back and forth.. Oh yeah actually. Actually. Einstein. Did a thought experiment. When he was actually working on the theory of relativity. And his experiment was. What would happen if i was riding with you my boy. So i thought what better way to represent this than a jockey riding a beam of light. So the sun is 8 minutes away. Byline. Set the sun blew up right this instant. We wouldn't know about it for 8 minutes. Then we doing. So it's some other distances distances in terms of time. The moon 1.3 second son 8 minutes mars is about 12 minutes away. Jupiter is 43 minutes. These are all the beans the beam of light. Saturn an hour-and-a-half that interesting so saturn is actually almost twice as far away is jupiter from us. And pluto which is not actually playing it anymore i'll talk about that. Is five and a half hours out. So the nearest star system to us is called alpha centauri. Nfl. The game of life. Will take almost four and a half years. To reach the star system. Trinary star system. We don't have any kids. But. You've all seen star wars the original star wars when luke is on the horizon and there's two stars in the. Two stars in the sky. Potentially one of the planet he was on was it was in alpha centauri. Cuz there's there's actually three stars but that the proxima centauri is this little tiny red dwarf that's way out. But you probably see the two big stars. And the milky way galaxy from end-to-end is 100000 light year. Again same scale. Go from one end to the other again looks like we take 100,000 years across it. And this is actually a representation of. This is the best guess of the milky way galaxy from nasa right now and this is where we're at were in one of the outer bands. Out of the galaxy. They've discovered that it's actually up what's called a barred spiral. That's a relatively recent discovery. So. Are galaxies. the only damn it's either there are billions of galaxies and one of the closest galaxy. 2 oz is the andromeda galaxy. And that's two and a half million years away by bit by a beam of light. And now we're going to the very edge of the known universe. This is actually they found this since since i've done this lie they found something further than this but it's. Relatively. Same distance. A gamma-ray burst there there's some discussion what a gamma ray bursts are they think it may be black holes merging. Is 1 possible. But this this is actually an image from the hubble space telescope. And it is about 13 billion with a b years. By that same beam of light. Do justin summary lightspeed is how astronomers measure distance. The measurement of how far light travels overtime. The moon distance of 1.3 seconds is the same scale. Yes the edge of the universe at 13 billion years. So any quick questions on. The question is do satellites use light. Ticket to communicate and they do they use something called radio waves. Which radio is actually a form of life. And it travels of the same same speed as a beam of light. It's just a different frequency. Yeah black hole a black hole is basically a star. That has gotten so large a beam of light. U p s this beam of light is being unstoppable. It's actually not unstoppable. Gravity in high enough. Getting high enough amount of gravity can actually bend. A beam of light can actually alter its. Direction. A black hole is a star that's gotten so big. That that that light can't escape. So so it's so huge that if you shot this beam of light up it would turn around and come right back down. Jo-ann's black because no light can escape. And it's something on the order of. Thousands of times larger than our sun for the smallest black hole there's a black hole in the center of the milky way. That something on the order of a million times then. Our son. So the question is how how can a beam of light have enough matter to be affected by gravity. And and that's i don't i'm not sure they know the answer to that one either but they've been able to do testing to see that beam that light does move it actually if out if you saw. Headline news just the other day. There was a picture of a galaxy be called the smiling face. There was a there's two really big galaxies. And there was a great big swoop underneath them. In what that swoop is is that he's a background galaxy. Light from the background galaxy that got distorted. It actually got stretched. Into a curve. That was it was just it was a cute picture but it is it's called an einstein. John harbaugh. Is it an einstein something. Einstein predicted that that would be that would be the case but nobody had seen one until the hubble space telescope. So we're going to be 1/2 size now. Instead of distance. So this isn't i'll try to keep moving around. This is the this is from nasa this is the scale of our of the sun and and all of the name planets. 2 scale. Just to give you a we are here. And we're going to do this zoom in a little bit. So we can see the relative sizes of earth venus mars mercury and pluto which is not a planet. Not resuming out years are earth. Jupiter with swallow us and in fact the great red spot is larger than our planet. And here's the sun in here. More than a million earths can be stuck inside of our sun. But. Our son is actually not a very big star. Here's a serious up in the sky. Pollux and arcturus which is. Free huge scale jupiter is 1 pixel in size. In earth is invisible it's so small compared to the stars. Angela arcturus from the last slide. Is still not the biggest stars. They're even bigger ones. Rigel aldebaran betelgeuse in aunt arias. Atari's. Is so large. That your interest. Was our star where our son is. We with the orbiting inside the star and we'll see if this works. Share my personal journey. With astrophotography. This is my house in mineral point. I want my previous houses. You don't live there anymore. And. I built i don't observe attorney my backyard. So this is this is kind of a construction company in mineral point called ivs and they came out to pour this big big 2-foot diameter. Concrete pier in in my yard and and i said i bet you never. Poured concrete for a telescope observatory before it actually. Before they pour the concrete for the for the piers in wyalusing. Where's the foundation. Where's my final my final product. Lake lucien. That's my. That's my main scope at i took all i'm going to share with you all of the pictures came from this. Show me pic. All of these pictures are with this equipment. So here's the moon. And i somehow i lost the. I have that distance 21.3 seconds but you all remember that. So this is the m13 hercules star cluster. And it's about 25,000 years away. Only the moon. I don't think i've got anything in here that's visible to the naked eye. This is visible in binoculars. That's a good question is this a version of the milky way this is actually inside inside the milky way galaxy. I try to think about a hundred thousand stars that are all packed into this thing. And i had a kid a kid at one of my presentation say what would it be like to be on a planet inside there as i do that would be something out the whole star would be lit up. 81 lb. Glow from the. Apologizing you something also be. Star clusters like this are. Very cool. So they're they're some of the oldest stars in our galaxy. So maybe their civilizations in there we don't know. Why are stars round. Because of because they're so large that gravity collapse them. Collapses them into. Emily rotate but it's the round because. Because if anything gets too big it falls down and. Think about it. Is it all in. Oh well it's only. Surface 25,000 years away what are the odds that it's still there really good because most stars live to be billions of years. So it's very likely still looks pretty much like this. Well the stars are made of gas in a burning nuclear fusion. So there. Thermal plasma actually they're not they're not molten. This is a galaxy that i image the m33. Minutes to a half million light-years away. Just a little further than the andromeda galaxy. And there's a there's a nebula right here which i was pretty proud. So it's it's a nebula in another galaxy not even in. Are galaxy s pretty excited about that. Cupini's. This is pretty close to us relatively speaking 440 light years. Kids nebula. These are my pictures yet. If this picture is iu i have a special filter on my telescope it lets me capture near-infrared. Data is it this is almost all in the infrared all of this grab. Colored. Another galaxy m51 there was a. There was a supernova in a p1 last year. And our our club has a one of our members of the hours running astronomers donated. He 17 inch telescope. Which. Doesn't sound like very much but it's about 7 feet tall and has just fantastic near and we were able to see that that supernova. Eazy-e can actually see a lot of the structure. And the supernova was somewhere around here. Right right right 25 million years last year it became visible to us. Yes yeah. So the question is is the is the color that you see in all of the space pictures and my pictures are they actual colors are they they modified i tie in all of my pictures i try to. I don't change the color tone at all i do brighten it so you can see the colors but but most of those pictures are if you're in space it's really it be pretty close to what you see. So they're there their they're normally that's red. Read if you were there you probably wouldn't see nearly as much. But but infrared is past the red end of this to the like the color spectrum. So do most astronomers use red to representative. So if you were there you might not be able to detect it because it's mostly infrared light.. Not visible right. Thought i got a siphon up real quick you i want to talk about that. The question was how long do how long do supernovas the lightning super nose last. Like two more slides. This is the bubble navy alone. This spot right here is causing all of this. Gaston. To expand its called a wolf-rayet. Star and it's vic it's basically a super unstable star and it's. Throwing out atmosphere. This is mostly infrared light. This was a this this picture took me. It was about 8 hours of. Data collection so i hadn't had the telescope stuck right in the spot 48 hours. Another galaxy ngc 891 that's a pretty one. I like the pretty pictures. Crab supernova this is a supernova remnant. And this exploded. This blew up. About 1,000. Chucky. This blew up about. I don't remember the exact numbers but it was interesting about this is that the chinese chinese astronomer at the. Astronomers at the time recorded the event. Bandit at night and it was so bright was visible during the day for a month. That was pretty big deal. And emily faded from view and was never to be found again until the 1700s when first telescope started first decent telescopes. From the supernova. In the city i like this one of my favorite objects in the night sky. Epicenter of this is what's left of the star it's a neutron star. And it's spinning. 2 miles in diameter. And it's spinning a rate of 30 times per second. Think about that for a minute and when astronomers first started using radio telescopes for astronomy they listen to basically radio waves coming from the stars. And i don't know if it was m1 but they they found a neutron star spinning like this. And they didn't know what it was. They just a real estate listing in their headphones and they heard this. Noise and there like we've discovered. Nothing else could be. Kanika a study. Steady repeating pitch like that. But then they gets more research and realize that it's a neutron star that you know in the process of exploding got such a. So much energy infused on to it that it got the super rapid rotation rate and and and is super radioactive you wouldn't want to be anywhere near this thing. Did you add detergent. Yeah the telescopes than the mechanism of the telescope counteracts the earth's rotation so they can stay in the same as the. Stars are rotating it follows them exactly. Everybody that the equipment is actually the equipment isn't really good enough. Purposely do that so i use it i use something called a guiding and autoguider. So it might either one star and it makes. Micro adjustments to make sure that it stays right right there and i also didn't take 19-hour exposure i take a series of small. I'll buy 5-minute exposures and it digitally combined them. Cocoon nebula mostly infrared it wouldn't be this pretty mat1. Is everything still in the same direction. Which state they can skype i think most of the planets spin the same direction except there's one i think that has retrograde. Neptune and uranus one of them is going backwards so it's. I think partly it's the formation of our solar system. Was going in one direction. And i suspect that i don't that's my speculation i don't know that for sure. But it's in an information of the planets. Stuff is colliding with everything and we just depends what your interests are whichever one is going right that's called retrograde when it's going the opposite direction. Must have gotten smacked at the wrong time and got it spinning the other direction. So it was very violent in the formation with you. Yeah right. It's tough getting beaten by. Figure things. The crescent nebula. I think this is actually the same type of star is the bubblegum think it's a wolf-rayet star. I remember right. This one this is called i was used to haul us out it halloween time. You can see the little ghost chair. Guys running away from a ghost that's what the. This this picture was about 12 hours a day then this is very very faint. The horsehead you probably. Probably recognize that one. Orion's nebula this is kind of a fun picture because it's the color for this that i use for this my daughter actually did as a science project in high school. I used her color data and then she has a project with my observatory and then i used her color date and put it on a black and white image from my. From my. Hydrogen alpha filter. Sunflower galaxy there's some really interesting jets right now. I don't know what those are but there. In the black-eyed galaxy. Looks like you got smacked. And last one galaxy. This is one of the last pictures i took. Before we leave. I'm going to skip the telescope i just want talk to him quick 5 minutes. We'll talk about current space missions. There's three really exciting space missions that are that are active right now new horizons dawn and rosetta there a lot of other missions to but these are the three i wanted to touch on you real quick. I'm going to go find blue pants this they want to get to it summer and sharon from january by july we're going to be it's going to be the spacecraft flying past it doesn't have enough energy to stop an orbit so it's going to only be spending a couple of days. It was launched in 2006 to 9 years to get there but it's moving at 36,000 miles an hour ahead to reach it even in 9 years. The dawn spacecraft is a really interesting spacecraft because it uses an ion drive and can actually maneuver for quite a quite a time. Then finally rosetta. It's a dwarf planet. I'm hoping that it's. Rather than to do is scan so that'll. Put the whole fleet of the date the bed. Rosetta's from the european space agency is a comet. And rosetta landed landed up later on surface of rosetta. Last year. Unfortunately i didn't think the gravity of rosetta is so light. That if i was standing in roseto and jumped i could achieve escape velocity i could actually jump off the thing anyway this may. So that the state the lantern had trouble it was supposed to use harpoons the grab grab onto the surface and. And ratchet itself down but the harpoons didn't stick to it bounced. He found several miles in the air three times and landed but luckily it was so you know it's so gentle that it didn't so the solar panels data. But if he's got some really good information back before it died and is as this this is approaching the sun that there's a chance that it will get that lander spacecraft will light up again once those panels get some more tonight so. But this is. This is the comet. On the surface. Emma's is actually a color picture. The color is a pretty much like the moon went to clinton armstrong college magnificent desolation. And then this is the comet is starting to. Become active now too so this spacecraft is actually got in a longer orbit around thing so it's not getting pummeled by the material. A floating opera carmen. But it's going to stay there through the whole orbit assuming it doesn't get knocked out of knocked out of position. And that's it. Closing words. Arby's. Where is a theory. Which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly. What the universe is for. And why it is here. It will instantly disappear. And be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory. Which states. But this has already. Happen. You found this. You. Thank you wonderful. Yes i think it may have already happened we do the best we can. Thank you john greet your neighbor eat your soup. And. Comeback.

uuprairie_org

Pr140309JohnRichards-ed.mp3

Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society on penny eyler a member of the program committee has to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your sexual orientation or family structure on sunday morning. At this time i'll ask phyllis longer come up and share the opening work. This is from the antarctic treaty of december 119:59 recognizing that it is in the interest of all mankind that antarctica shall continue forever to be used exclusively for peaceful purposes. And she'll not become the scene or object of international discord acknowledging the substantial contributions to scientific knowledge resulting from international cooperation in scientific investigation in antarctica antarctica she'll be used for peaceful purposes only there she'll be prohibited any measures of a military nature such as the establishment of military bases and fortifications. The carrying out of military maneuvers as well as the testing of any type of weapons. We have the global challenge friday. Life unfathomable plenty eukaryotes and imbue us and flow around us you call us like everything into being and give everyone our time that we make use of it to come to know you to encounter you in like and shadow we take and accept you and we are thankful find us prepared by hans-dietrich call. Morning services. Kind of a family affair. Our opening song was. Gavin and richardson's. And his father is going to share the presentation with this today. And john richards. Is a computer systems administrator in charge of large data storage. Northern wisconsin ice cube particle astrophysics center. And we're talkin lots of storage. He just returned from the force trip to support the icecube neutrino observation at the south pole and welcome to run. Thank you for coming this is. What i do for work and died of the the joy of it actually being really fun to. I got my degree in computer science so i get to treat the astrophysics part of this as a hobby. Which makes it a i think a whole lot more fun. So i called it my summer vacation at the south pole just remind me to thank my wife cuz the hardest thing about going there isn't for me it's it's for her she has to watch our kids. Usually 2 weeks if that means you're usually gone for 4 because it takes a minimum of 72 hours to get there and 72 hours to come back. So even though she's not here today thank you for thinking of her. Okay. Iq collaboration which is the people responsible for this detector are scattered all around the world. I'm lucky that the headquarters are here in madison because the university of wisconsin-madison is the host institution which means we have the offices and the the accounting folks and the data stored some of the data analysis. But the the work the analysis the ideas for what we're doing come from all over. And. Number. Okay so why called it a neutrino observatory but to understand what that is first thing you need to know is what a neutrino is. Tiny subatomic particle it was theorized back in the round 1910. When all we knew about where protons neutrons and electrons. Because they didn't tell the whole story there was cases where. If you were watching tiny interactions of subatomic particles. You'd see a proton and electron go shooting off. After. A neutron neutron decays. The neutron was just sitting here. Stable and the electron and proton went zooming off in one direction. And conservation of momentum says. There had to be something going off that way that we didn't see because the total momentum has to add up to the momentum of the original. Neutron which was sitting still. But the problem with that is it had to have no charge. Because the electron and proton have all the electric charge going up with them. And as far as we could tell at that time. The mass of the electron and the proton added up to the mass of the neutron so whatever was going out that way had no charge and apparently had no mess. So. The guy who proposed this wasn't sure that it existed and he was actually. His quote that i find fun is. I've been a horrible thing i've invented a particle that can never be protected. But the science working as it turned out neutrinos aren't totally. Not interacting they passed through matter normally without interacting at all but if you get. A low probability collision with the nucleus of another atom. Are you actually get results from that and you can see that. So why do we care about them if they rarely interact. The they travel in straight lines like light but light gets absorbed by lots of things even if you. Look at the son of the late you're getting from the sun is from the 50,000 degree surface of the sun. But what's happening on the inside of the sun is millions of degrees fusion processes. You won't actually see them because they're the light and most of the energy being produced by that is being absorbed by the cooler outer layers. So neutrinos can tell us about what's going on inside the sun for example. But why look other places if we can just prove they exist. Astronomy has always been kind of a science a search for truth. And what we found is every time we look at the universe in a different way we find out new things. These are three pictures of the crab nebula in the one on the upper left-hand corner is visible light so that's what we human beings could see if we had a really good telescope. Then the one in the upper right hand corner is infrared. Actually had some details to it that aren't visible there. Then this one is x-rays and i love the structure of this thing because it actually has some detail to it with this. Rotating and the jets going off either way that we never see what just visible light. Another theory is. We can take pictures of the crab nebula yet but if we look at the universe in general with neutrinos we expect to see something new. So how do you spot them if there's a low probability it'll run into the nucleus and it'll make a flash of light actually what it does is it produces a very short-lived. Then call the muon. Elam you on passing through rice emits drink of radiation a very faint blue light. What you need is something that has incredible low light sensitivity. And so you also need a really dark place because it's it like in here you'll never see that interaction even though it may be happening because of the regular light passing through here. I also sent it to such low probability you need a big detector of the first detectors. We're basically. Big tanks of water in mountains. And that was the way they proved that they existed they started seeing flashes of light from nothing. Could've been anything but a neutrino nothing but a neutrino could have penetrated that far into a mountain. But you need a big tank of water to see an occasional flash we're trying to see it fairly often so we need a massive detector. The icecube detectors named after the cube of ice that we installed our detector in that's basically km3. It's down a kilometer below the surface that's where it starts it goes down to two kilometers below the surface and it's about a kilometer why. Also takes patience we even though we're looking for neutrinos. Cosmic rays a lot of nuclear reactions are. Happening in the atmosphere all the time and they're creating particles passing through our detector actually at a rate of about. 10 billion to 14 just random stuff versus neutrinos. So we have to sort through a lot of data and that's that's where i come in i store the stuff people are looking through over the years. Okay so yes we too detected were using big block of ice. That's be dark has to be deep and what we also found out is the antarctic ice is incredibly clear. Which helps with the propagation of light it means that if light is produced over here we can detect it over here. And this was unknown before we did this the antarctic ice is really. Uniquely clear. Late with men proved photons can travel unimpeded for 300m when in filtered water in labs 10 m is about the best you can hope for. This is that's interesting. Yeah i know what that's supposed to be that's supposed to be a picture of the. What that supposed to be is a nice and unimpeded view of the south pole from in the sky this is the same thing with a little more detail. They're really at the south pole it's a big flat glacier almost perfectly flat when you're standing there you don't see anything on the horizon. So over there south pole station that's where most people live and work. Then there's a runway in between here that's just made of snow. And then on the park side of the runway there is what's called the dark sector where people who are doing astronomy setup. Shop. And one of the things of buildings out there at the ice cube lab which is basically our computer room where all the data ends up. Each one of these dots is an indicator that you can actually see those are markings on where we've drilled 1/1. In the ice to drop down light detectors. So the actual array this is an image of an idea of what the detector actually looks like. So we got up at the top. Do we have a laser here doing. Okay so at the top you got the ice cube lab. And then eat one of these is a was a hole in the ice that we drilled and dropped in light detectors. So. This is one of our light detector. This is basically the opposite of a light bulb instead of you putting lighted energy in and getting light out. This one if mike comes in produces a tiny amount of electricity that's been picked up by a computer up top here. And if it's an interesting enough event which means that. Other light detectors say they saw something. It sends a signal up to the the surface. So any of these holes we got 60 of these spaced about 15. M apart. And. 86. A whole that makes squirrel-like 5160 of these things. Okay so how do we make those holes. We have to make them quickly because as soon as you. Well we're trying to get this thing done in a reasonable amount of time. And summers in the at the south pole is really the only time you can do major work because it gets too cold in winter time. Do we have between about beginning of november to beginning of february. Hazard window to get work done. I'm so tip drill 86 holes in less than a century we needed a way to drill multiple ones in a year. And the. Other way that they did it because it was proved with her predecessor called amanda. With a hot-water drill basically we use a regular just basically heavyweight. To melt through the surface no which is about. Hundred feet or so. Then what you say hit the solid ice. You drop down that thing which is basically an incredibly heavy. Hose. The pumps out hot water melts a hole and then recycles the water back up to the surface 2. Recirculate one of our big footprint things that no longer exists is the the grill camp. The the facility that mainly heated up the water and was mainly made up of powerwash cheaters of all things turned out they were durable reliable easy to service. Okay so once we got a whole we start dropping one of these down this is the case the cable that's actually supporting the whole thing and transmitting the data backup. Do the cables on a big spool and as the cable goes by it pauses to let us put on that these optical module 60 of them. And then you drop them down into the ice. The biggest trick to this one is that you. The whole is going to start refreezing as soon as you stop drooling when you bring the drill head up. The it's mostly full of water you can actually see the water if if that don wasn't in the way you might see some light reflecting off the surface. About a hundred feet down. So the whole starts to refreeze and if it refreezes before you got your things in place you're you're stuck cuz there is no way to to clear it once you've started putting a spring in there. Zoo. But the other trick is this is incredibly fuel consumptive. So that the smaller you can make it the more fuel-efficient it is the better it is for everybody. So yep have to get the stuff in there in 36 hours or it's not going in at all. Find it back. One of the problems that people had multiple times. Is. Drill heads in both the amanda project and one more recent project they tried going on a smaller scale making smaller holes quickly. And what it turned out we had the advantage of. A big heads 10 to circulate a bigger area of water. Motorhead's actually had a problem with the whole refreezing behind the drill head. And once that happened. Others nothing you could do because you said you can no longer move the grill head the only solution was to cut it off. And come back another year because that sort of thing you can't really carry spares for. Okay so. We worked at the south pole but. Wait we can't fly directly there that are ports not set up for that sort of thing. So. We actually come from new zealand which if you're coming from the united states seems kind of inefficient cuz you're traveling it's about a. 16 hour trip from los angeles to new zealand. But it turns out. If you draw straight line between new zealand and the south pole there's this nice. Station is the oldest u.s. presidents on it and antarctica which is called mcmurdo station. The reason mcmurdo. For us you were going on to the south pole another 3 hours from with a different flight to get to the actual south pole. So the flights from new zealand real military once there are us. Will a new zealand and australia have both experimented with actually running commercial airbus airplanes down here and it works but it's actually harder to maintain so. If you're lucky and you're going from. New zealand on a jet it'll take you five hours to get to antarctica otherwise it's about 8. So this is mcmurdo station not the prettiest place in the world we freely admit that but it is the one place where you can get. It is the one place you can get a container ship in. And it's that huge of course if you're planning on shipping any quantity of stuff. One of these containerships carries about wilt actually for a shipping thing relatively small it's just under a thousand shipping containers where is one of those. Blue bastards can carry about 10. So. One of these contrary 100 plates. Worth of stuff in a lot more fuel efficient manner so it all gets unloaded here and then it has to go on then it gets loaded onto airplanes from there. Antarctica desert so. Here you actually you get snow occasionally at the south pole when there's snow in the air it's usually not fresh do what it usually is it snowed and picked up one place. And brought somewhere else. And yeah it's summertime is kind of nice there's actually a great webcam if you just search for mcmurdo station. You can see what the current weather is like and it's getting blue but partly because the sun's getting ready to go down. Okay so. This is just i found the visibility and antarctica very interesting this is the day this is actually mostly justfog. But. From mcmurdo you could see in the distance castle rock and it's close enough that you can make a day hike to it. But that was about the limited visibility. But then the next day i was flying out out of the. Airfield. And. This. This down here. Is actually that rock we were just looking at and i was viewing it from right here. So that was three miles of visibility this is from 32 miles away and i would estimate the visibility if you weren't carrying about details you could see 80 miles fairly easily. And i most directions. Okay so if you're moving on to the south pole this is your last chance to see wildlife president to schools i have to start with. But sue. The. When you talk about environment and arctic is an odd case because the visible environment is it is fairly limited the things that live on land that aren't insects are basically water depending. You'll see seals you'll see penguins. And you'll see. Birds. But they all. Depend on the ocean. But. One thing that you don't get to see this is actually basically right below those birds that birds feet this is mcmurdo sound. Underneath the the ice there's a huge amount of life. And it's not something that the first explorers would ever have known about they don't go scuba dive. So. Okay so this is how we get from mcmurdo to the south pole the. The. Field in mcmurdo is an ice sheet which is about 10 ft thick. At the south pole at all packed snow because the the warmest it's ever gotten at the south pole that we've recorded is 7 degrees fahrenheit. So water never melts so what we've got at the south pole is 100ft 2-pack snow. And it's not solid enough to land the bigger planes. Food. We plan this one and if your plane but these these things are just. At their ugly they're loud but they are other things that they can do or are really quite cool that they were first. Built in 1951 and they're still in production today in georgia. Because. The design is. Will propose designs of come up and they've all been quite expensive. And to high-tech for jobs like this where. Objective is to keep it flying. So this is basically there's a c-130 the traveled all over the only thing that makes this difference is the skis on the bottom. So this is the luxury travel there's there's about four windows total in the passenger compartment because it's mainly cargo plane you sit on the side you face your bag sitting in the middle and the back of the plane is usually full of everything else that's going it to the south pole with you. Okay so this is what the airstrip at the south pole is and we've got a fuel station but it's not refueling that plane it's actually sucking fuel out of that plane because the the main way that all the fuel gets down there is from the fuel tanks of these lc-130. Come down totally. the empty out about two-thirds of their tanks into these and then they fly back on the remaining fuel. And yeah so i thought that was kind of odd. People have suggested overland because yeah overland is. More fuel efficient. And they have done it at the first year they ever managed to do a cargo-carrying perverse. I was in 2006 but it is a thousand mile trip each way and you want to get it done in the in the summertime you don't want bad weather to come in. And you're not dealing with road you're dealing with. Well first let me show you what what the cargo looks like. These are basically sleds full full of fuel those are basically the huge water balloons with. Fuel for the south pole. And on this is the traverse that they've succeeded at it's 110 tons of cargo which replaces 11 plane flights for quite a bit less. But this is the sort of thing you have to deal with this is just one of the of the crevasses that they discovered this one has a 25-foot ice bridge so it was thick enough for all that stuff to go across. But you can't see it if its 86 ft deep and about 40 ft wide. At its widest. And so basically the 1st. Is the first vehicle in the traverse is always one that got radar looking out in front of it to see whether or not. Small things with not a good land bridge. Are in front of you. So. So we mostly play. The united states has had a presence at the south pole since the 50s and i think this thing has been there since the fifties to actually i looked at the bottom the manufacture date is not before 1950 i think. Korean it was actually shipped to the be used in the korean war and not. But yeah it's still in use today that the end. When the south pole is busy this is called summer camp because the overflow from the main station you stay here and. It's actually fairly comfortable because the main people who've stayed in these over the years is construction people and so when you go in there's a whole lot of patchwork insulation the wall in my room was made out of unfolded olive oil can. That someone had recycled. Tempe. Do i did find out. My bag was in a strategic spot i had to send it out a day ahead of me because it had to go buy cargo and that night was the coldest night and it turned out it was sitting in front of a a breeze that was coming on the side of. I was always wondering why i had to unfold my jeans when. So the first step up in housing was the the dome finished in 1973 and it was in use till 2010 though and it's later parts of life it was mainly a big freezer. So you go in there and you see just pallets of flour that sort of thing. But at that point wasn't heated anymore. In 2003 this was. Made habitable they actually construction continued for quite a bit but. This is the new south pole station it's an elevated station it's a little hard to see here because we're on the uphill side but the front of this front being towards the prevailing winds. Zangle tent-like a inverted. Airplane wing to try to speed up the air to scour below it because anytime you put a. A vertical surface at the south pole it immediately starts to get covered just by drifting snow. Because even though the snows not falling yet it's blowing from side-to-side so actually. The the dome when it was decommissioned was almost entirely covered with snow. Edit. Well this is a lot more comfortable and it's very nice but yeah it wasn't built with the idea of keeping it snow free because we hadn't been there long enough. Everything up to the dome had pretty much been temporary mainly containers so every year you could just stick it out and move it but the dome you couldn't so yeah it as soon as it was built. Us new started building up on the outside. So this is a house has about 150 people. only about 45. Stay there year-round. And i got a cafeteria a gym. Generators at nice comfortable 68° in there. Yeah. And it also contains science offices so like. If if we're doing our job right we have two people who stay in the station year round. Throughly the long dark winter and if we if we set up things right they can do all the stuff they need to do from. In that station. This is just what a interior room on the station basically. It's small as possible but still i'm not going to complain it. Play cozy. Quick shot of the galley oh i forgot to mention the greenhouse it's not. Enough to relate really sustained people but greenery when you don't have it is so valuable so. It's hydroponic and they usually wipe it clear ball. A plant's it start fresh and within about three weeks they're getting lettuce and within six weeks they've got tiny little zucchini tomatoes. Okay so. This is our crew standing at the south pole to someone's absconded with the real south pole. This is the the one that your take pictures by it's got all the flags it's got the red stripes on it. But there's also. The geographic south pole and that one isn't as fancy because it moves 30ft 10 every year i will actually it doesn't move we move the whole station is sliding off towards the sea in about 50,000 years it'll get there. But. So this is in 19 2011 when i went back this year the yeah you're already about a hundred feet off to your left. This is what the inside of our server room looks like. The each one of those red wires comes from four carries the dana 44 one of these optical module so. I don't really remember how many cables that makes it but it's a lot. The main type of computer in there is for the reading the data out of those optical modules. We also. Do a lot of data processing down the. So this is our workroom which is a little bit quieter space to working though actually if you look at the back wall. That's ventilation which means you're just part of the circulating system of the air in here aldi return air is passing through this room. We actually don't get this. Because our computers we use up about 60 kilowatts of power. And so our main job is cooling this down. Demeanor are handling in this is mixing outside air. With are already heated hair and trying to make it to a livable temperature in fact we've had problems where it's gotten too hot when the emergency happens fire alarm goes off the system shuts down in our server room reaches about 100° in 20 minutes. Okay this is our fancy of facilities there's no running water anywhere but the station so. Yeah that's. Yep out go out towards someone. They were again it's done by construction engineer so it's as comfy as possible. Black to absorb but sunlight there is the seed is made from basically. 9 reactive sight installation so basically it heats up as soon as you sit down. But you still have a kind of a breeze you don't want to stay in there too long. Will do in winter time there. They don't have a toilet out there they're basically running back to the station or carrying something back with. Yeah because the station has generators and they have what's called a rodwell system where they basically dropped what is like our hot water drill except they just drop it down. Turn up into the ice to start making a hole. And they just keep circulating warm water through it and they melt about a. 100 ft wide by 300 ft deep reservoir of water. And then use that. What station is actually. So clean that they have to add minerals to it to keep it from leaching minerals out of your body and it's it's unhealthy to drink but it is. It's just incredibly clean somebody called it jesus water just because. Is it your melting from the layer that was put down about 2,000 years ago. Oh well it's okay to be to the old basically every once they've emptied out one they start using the old one as a reservoir. Dassault. Very much so you don't want to mix the two up. So i bet. Kind of what it's like at the south pole i got more pictures but my main purpose was to open up for questions if anybody wants to see a couple of quick pictures by summerwind rovers. Of what the. South pole looks like in winter time of the aurora australis the. This is our lab that's the moon in a time-lapse exposure and that's. Other two little lights that you be walking towards if you're going out there in winter time and actually they do the even though we do the best we can computer still crashing they still do make that trip and actually at that point it's foot only you're getting down to near 100 below. And none of the machinery will keep running in that temperature you might get it started but it's not going to survive. So it's. Cross country skis are current winner over brought a wide tire bicycle. Well our distant ear this is about 1 km. Let me just. We quickly scan through a couple more slides. That's. Near. This is at if you wanted real outdoors experience that's a tent you can camping. That's a shot of midwinter where frost is forming on everything. Do when i first got there the outside of this station was actually plywood and it stayed that way for about 4 years. Because. There's no deterioration there's no liquid water hitting it. It was just one of the last the outside there is kind of for prettiness sake they the plywood would have lasted. Put a long time as well. Another shot of a aurora. Okay and then boring details. Yeah that was so i can remember some of my number. Well actually if you're if you are an artist there is an artist-in-residence grant that basically every year they sent down somebody who's an artist of some kind literature painting sculpture. Ed but i certainly haven't delved into it that yes it exists and i'm not literary enough to really know much about it. Okay 300-degree club you have to be a winner over because the 300-degree club depends on a -100 degree temperature outside. And what you do is you go in the sauna you get the temperature up to 200 degrees then you run outside and get your picture taken by the ceremonial south pole. And most of those aren't aren't fit for sharing because usually there's no clothes in bulk. But yeah actually a people get disappointed if there are years where never gets to -100 and people are like i miss my chance to join. I feel like i'm boring people when i hit people with stuff like that but but that's my main focus so i'd love to tell you so. We got a huge amount of data we throw away probably 99% of it 99% of the the events. At the first pass basically by it arrives up and it gets decided that well only. Fiber six optical module saw this event so we'll never be able to really recreate much about it so we're going to throw it away. The interesting stuff. Is about a terabyte today. And that gets saved mostly to take because our. We do have satellite connectivity but most satellite connectivity is by geosynchronous orbit of by satellites over the equator and those aren't visible to us. So are major. Satellites that we use are the old ones that have started to drift because when they drift they actually come above the horizon long enough for us to use them for a couple of hours before they drop back down. We got an allocation about 100 gb a day over that and so we try to make sure that. That's the most interesting stuff because we have to wait till the end of the year for the tapes to come back. People like me have to go down pack them up and ship them. And then tobias to read a mountain that's that's a no leather store. There's a predecessor to this call amanda that the same francis holden news our principal investigator was one of the principal investigators for that that started in around 1994 and they're using smaller modules they're using 8in tubes instead of 10 in. And they didn't go they only put in 18 holes at it was really a testbed for does this idea work. And that actually kept in operation until. What's he probably 2007. We were using it it we actually built this detector around it because we're using the data from it in addition to ours. So our first. Hole in the ice was. A 2005. And actually the way the detector works you start getting data as soon as those are that string is done so there was somebody who wrote a paper on the data from that single string. They what. They actually managed to prove that there. There's a low probability of neutrinos coming up all the way along that string and they found two of them over the whole year. That's where the paper. But. So as they added more strings the it became were complete and so the data becomes more interesting for people who are look. Because you get more about coverage but yeah it was in operation as soon as that one was signed off and and. As soon as the debris frozen. That's one of the this thing is a bit worried about these spirits it's made for deep ocean. Because we're dropping it into water but the other thing it has to survive is the refreezing. Of the ice because you know ice expands and so what ends up happening as the whole refreezes it squeezes. And i forget what somebody said 5000 psi something. But actually we've had the design of this has been remarkably good our failure rate on those. Has mainly been actually from connectors we lost a couple. Because the connector from this to the string broke mainly because when you're connecting it it's cold weather and attempt to crack. The one fun thing about that though is. The ones a lot of the ones we lost. Because it shorted out because water seeped in came back once the whole total erie froze because the no longer sorted out when there was nothing but frost and ice. Well it's so there's two questions there we got the ice cube project which is projected to collect data for the next 20 years and. We're lucky in that we don't go all the way to bedrock if we did we'd have start having problems with sheer because the the bottom layer is kind of getting held onto by the rock and so you end up with bending and pulling in bed stuff like that but turns out where we are we won't see it in the next 20 years the block is going to stay. Anais. A block of ice and. Cell phones convenient for some of our calculations but it's not strictly necessary so the position of our building it would be fine elsewhere we mainly pick the south pole because there was already support there. It's. It's got support for darks scientific telescope. Of the station that sell. That's going to be. It's going to slowly get further and further away from the geographic south pole i don't know what their projections are i'm guessing that the current station one of the ideas was they can be lifted. Yeah it's not a simple task and they'd also have to relocate a bunch of people so they probably need to be building it have a temporary housing or or a s. A building while they're doing that but i don't know the plans exactly. Remove things people do down their close proximity of the south poles not strictly necessary so we may drift a little bit further away before anything new getzville. This is. I was looking through presentations from just two years ago we had we didn't have those named neutrinos yet. I'm going to before i hit you with their names i was going to hit you with a bit of the science. People originally thought up going stuff passing through detector was the only interesting stuff. Because what they're doing is using the earth's surface or the earth matter as a filter because the only thing that could be coming up through our detector is a neutrino. And actually at that point they calculate my storage. Needs a 60 terabytes total for the whole project. Which is what 15 hard drives these days of our storage is currently at 4,000 terabytes in growing about 1000 every year. What that extra data though it's found one of their big discoveries which is. It's big enough that you actually can look for stuff that starting within the detector when we first designed it we figured that sort of thing might happen once or twice a year where we'd have a neutrino that actually came from above or some other direction and not started collision until it was inside our detector. But when people started looking at the data they actually found. Wilbert's to ernie and bert. They found two events that actually they're huge for a couple of reasons one because they exist we only thought that this would be. Well they're also a huge amount of energy. They're about a thousand times as powerful is what fermilab can presento actually i think that i'm telling you the wrong one 1,000 is about. Our average one these are well above average. Thousand times the power of the fermilab could generate. But they're entirely contained within the detector which allowed him to calculate how much energy they're carrying. And. That was kind of exciting because there's no way they could have been produced within our solar system the. Kind of reactions that happen within our son can't generate neutrinos of this energy. Until they're there cosmic. So after they found bert and ernie they found one huge one they called big bird. It would get a paper was just written about just the energy contained in that one because it was the most energetic but then yeah the total is up to 28 of these high-energy. Neutrinos that have been captured within the detector and they're all muppets i can't name them all but yes. The amount of energy and one of the holy grails of this originally when we were just looking it up going neutrinos was. We wanted to see them coming from some spot in the sky. So what the upcoming neutrinos are doing is slowly mapping out dots in the. On a map and what we're hoping is over the lifetime of the detector will start spotting spots in the sky the regenerating. Unusual numbers. This one's been fun because there's definitely seven out of the 28th they're coming from a fairly small circle. The towards the galactic center of the milky way galaxy. We don't know what produces them but it's it's that's what this is all about itsfunneh something new. We don't have closing words today but if you'll join me. And extinguishing the chalice. Extinguish this playing but not the light of truth. The morons of community or the fire is commitment. These riparian our hearts until we're together. Thank you for coming greet your neighbor and stay for the auction.

uuprairie_org

Pr120603TransitionSunday-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. I'm robbing proud i'm the outgoing chair of the religious education committee and a regular. Cheater 4ru. Perry aspires to be bolted open-hearted and open-minded congregation of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age. Or your abilities or inability. Later in the service we will invite visitors guests are returning friends to introduce yourselves so that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services they're presented either by a prairie member. Or a member of the wider community. Or. Eventually by our minister we are now searching for. And we also have some traditional services and involve all of us at the community and that's actually what we're doing today. At times our own light goes out. And is. Rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think. With deep gratitude. Of those who of light in the flame within us. Albert schweitzer. Sometimes i say that. Are persian are just like lake wobegon they're all above-average. Rebecca massey algansee will present the main part of our program and explain about our transition service. Good morning miss you know i'm rebecca milky and i'm the director of religious education for youth and children. As most of you know this year's theme for religious education was social justice. In our children. And when i say our i just i don't mean just the parents i mean the congregation is a hole. I have spent that you're focusing on principles of treating everyone fairly because it is important. In building a peaceful fair and free world. And that everyone no matter how small has a voice in this world. Their many people have made this year possible. And i'll be recognized in them later in the service. And even though you may not have taught this year or volunteered a large amount of time all of you should be thanks for being so welcoming and carrying to our children and youth. I mentioned once how i have been at a conference for directors of religious education. And a number of the people there said that actually think everybody except from he had said that they were real problem with their congregation not being welcomed me into their youth and their children. Some of the complaints they here is that the intergenerational services are filler program. Or that they don't need to have the story for all ages upstairs it's something that the children should just be in their classrooms right away. And i was just. Flabbergasted and i said i have too often times turn people away from volunteering because i have so many people here who want to work with her you. And several years ago we had ended the story for all ages for wild. And i kind of thought that would be something i would mention in between a quiet with a congregation and so many people were. Complaining and it was a it was a very nice complaint to here but people were saying i want to see the children up here we need to bring the children. Story back to prairie and so after year we did but it was it was because of all of you who had. Thank you all for being so welcoming and to all of our children and being so willing to volunteer your valuable time to be with them every sunday. And some of you may not think that it's. What you do is a big deal but it is reading a children's story on sunday morning it's a huge deal for our children. There been cases where children have had a concern and i've had people come up to me and after the service to say that. They wanted to get in contact with that child because they were. Had gone through a similar thing when they were a child and they wanted to be able to reach out and help them and mystery friends writing letters back and forth for a month-and-a-half or you're getting to know the adult i always have to turn people away. Adults for mystery friends because i have so many of you who want to write letters and had been in contact with the children. And these are things that i hear don't happen another congregations but i want to thank you for that. But some of you have volunteered one or two times in a classroom. Help chaperone and ari venter. Like i said took part in the mystery friends. Some of you have offered your assistance in your wisdom and guidance to or you. Everything. no matter how small or large is appreciated. I wanted to talk a little bit about the importance of religious education. There's a book i received during another conference. If i attended last year called the essex conversations visions for lifespan with agitation. Some very exciting and it was and then there is a quote about the importance of attending not only re but families to attend church on sunday morning. Do siri do that for. The question is often asked by people why should we go to church we are so busy and her children are so busy. The answer to that is simple. Because you're so busy. We should go to church precisely because of soccer practice. In violin lessons and hockey and gymnastics. Precisely because more of us are working longer hours. Traveling more and commuting farther. Precisely because our lives are structured. Taft field in gold focus. It goes on to say that these activities take us away from family and friends and then sunday morning it's a time for you to be with your family and friends. Where else can you go where you know you were meeting people with the same values. Where you won't be judge for your beliefs. This is especially important for children who are growing in their face. A man called her other children who have never heard of unitarian universalism. Or in some cases a judge because of your views of god or lack of belief in god. This is a safe place a sanctuary we know we are welcome no matter abilities or inabilities our age or sexual orientation. Four family structure. They're not a lot of places in today's world that will welcome everyone but prairie is that place. And it's important for ourselves to feel renewed and energized spiritually and intellectually. There's another book. Where robbie arab i asked parents. How many of you want your children to be professional soccer players. And then he asked how many of your children. Call me if you want your children to be jews. I think the same could be said of us. How many of you want your children to be raised you you and continue to be with you. But how do we do that. Despite attempting religious education. Studies have shown that those with attended religious education on a regular basis were more likely to stay in in the tradition than to fall away. Our students may take interest in other face but the beauty of the unitarian universalism. It's not that we can believe whatever we want to believe. But that we can explore other traditions like buddhism or paganism or christianity. And they can stay with us. And combine that with our unitarian universalist belief. Ari teaches our children that they're not just studying world religions because it's fun and interesting. Which is it is. But it's actually teaching them about our unitarian universalist routes. It's another way to look at the world. To explore their beliefs and in many cases expand on what they believe by taking what they've learned from one or more traditions. And adding it to their own. And this isn't something that our family should do alone. It's important for everyone in our congregations to support our. And our students in this journey. I would like to thank those who have dedicated their valuable time and energy to helping our children. Continue to grow as unitarian universalist. So i have little gifts for them. And since our thing was so cold justice this year. But teachers will be receiving cloth bag from the. Unitarian universalist service committee. Plant justice harvest peace. So one of the start with paula. she did the high school class and she was the only teacher for that class. Randy converse. I always enjoyed he's dropping on randy's classes. Oh yes randy introduced selling of the goods from the. Vietnam. El salvador. And our next teacher she's a co-teacher for randy was robin. Robin proud of the religious. And i appreciate all of this. Toby wacker has been here almost every single sunday helping out with. The. Or the youngest class the preschool class the three for five and six-year-old she was daring enough to come back each sunday and it's been a huge huge help so i wanted to give you my card and. If you can actually get jen and ulysses. Some of the other people who have taught that are not here today is ken karen deaton andy cars. And jason you were so who moved. And marsha johnson. And also we have two people who have been working in the nursery. We have jed anderson which is the son of molly plunkett and. Peter anderson. And ulysses and they've been here for almost a full year and they've been very dedicated to her euless and her children i know my son's personal just adore them and they are very. Mindful of the students always playing with them always happy and welcoming and i just wanted to thank them too so they'll be coming up cuz they're hard at work but they're also always willing to be here for a service sunday and our events and. Potluck sundays and it's been great having people who are have been dedicated to her young. This is jed. I'm next up. James. James. Will be making a big transition into high school next. And i wanted to talk a little bit about you. Very unique students. I've always enjoyed. Having james your. Every year cancel tell me. Rebecca my birthday is coming up. And i'll say when you going to be 16 now. And the first time he said i said that he said. Rebecca i'm only 12. And i'm pretty good with ages in the following year. Tommy birthday is coming up and i said. Can be 16 this year to be driving 13 and i'm always thinking why do i always think james is older. Can i give you some examples as to why that is. James first started coming here since you were eight or nine. And we had a spirit circle downstairs. And it was right after the new year and i wanted to ask the children you know to. Create a picture of what you want to see for the world this year. Clean water. Plan. World peace. And when we got to james james started talking about kenya and the plight of the people in kenya and i'm thinking. He's 8 years old. And. Another thing that james has done that. And we all have these. X inner inner jobs where we feel like making a difference am i am i doing something to my really reaching out to people and last year during our world religions year. I had asked somebody from circle sanctuary which. The pagan center in barneveld. Common talk about wicca. And. If someone identifies being a u u pagan so for me all of this is very normal talk but i started. Try to look at it from someone who was hearing it for the first time in a solid. Adore you. So i had asked james after what did you think of all of this was a lot of things kind of intense information and. Change game. Perfect example of what i wish everybody in the world. Would say. He said. It's just another way of leaving. Didn't think it was weird you can think it was strange he didn't think they were going to hell you didn't think that you know there was something wrong with these people he just thought this is another way of believe it and i thought that's. The response i wish everybody in this world had when they in. Another route. Another way of believe. So i'm very happy. To introduce. 2 ug. Hi everybody. Excuse my sniffles and stuff like that i just got like a spur of the. I only have a couple things to say cuz i ripped us up at like 11 last night cuz i was sick and tired and i forgot about it. So you know i'm stepping in high school rre class this year. You know it was quite small and cheyenne isn't here today but. Me and her really pushed through the class even though we didn't really have. You know if one of us has gone or whatever we. Try to have a class b going you know our. You know the class we kind of struggle and stuff but i think. We hope this upcoming year would be better luck and stuff like that and hopefully some of these kids would be moving into the high school class or the high school middle school class. So then we can have more kids in that dedicated area. My i kind of want to share my first time here because. My parents always bring it up to me and stuff like that and how quiet why i like the church and stuff like that. The first day i came here. I basically said my mom i like it here and that's basically because of all the teachers and all of you. I don't know how to tell her i liked it here and that was basically the turning point of why we are here today or else we would be going to first. Self and my sister also said the same. So i. Basically i did. I've tons of interest and stuff like that that i want to get into a high school. In high school do in school but then also here in school i'd like to get involved in a lot of av type stuff computer clubs and stuff like that thank you car alarm. I don't know but then here i just like to get into more world religions basically that was my basic favorite unit here. Cuz we met a couple. Well maybe or something we go to different churches or places of worship you know and get to see l and stuff like that and rebecca when the high school class was still here with. I don't know what at the high school class was full it was really fun just going around and stuff like that. I'd like to thank all of you guys for supporting me and i hope to see you guys in the future and then a big thanks to rick rucking wherever he is for kind of helping me through the way through this hole. And james i have a uu. Pain. Some people have necklaces. And i think one of her students. He wanted earrings but. And i've one more person to bank. I wanted to recognize rose smith. Every. Every sunday. I forget to get a reader you know for the story for all ages and. Every sunday i come in and i said hello could you read the story and she always is of course i would love to and we haven't number people who i have read stories alice read stories. And peter and mary. James. Paz. A number of us have done this but roses done it almost every single someday and i wanted to thank you rosa. So next year our thing will be our unitarian universalist principles and heritage. And if you're looking for a rip-roaring good time to let me know about teaching. I'm we're always in the need for teachers next year though i think robin proud has again you can explain a little more about what your class will be doing but also i want you to talk about the length of time. The years you have spent. Volunteering your time it's really quite amusing. Other supporters couple things that i wanted to say here first fault i wanted to do something last week with the kids but not them anywhere here where we talked about what was good this year and what we could do better next year. A couple things that were good words having randy as a teacher was fabulous having more kids was great or thank you. And. Things that could be better well now they have more kids maybe a bigger room so isn't just ideas of things to do and just in case anyone missed it we actually put on to see a trickle presentations or maybe three. Can we do a skip this year at christmas we did it we did some. We did we do the skit about christmas. And when we did the doctor seuss program but we also did one about the the us see some of these kids were here yet but in the fall we did that where it was about the the four bases on the side of that just your table box. So we have some of the things we did. So it seems a shame to have that energy dissipate over the summer. And we don't have a regular curriculum but we have an opportunity to do a lot of fun thing so i just started brainstorming some that i put on here like. Kitchen science experiments with common items somebody to bring in some wood scraps in tools and make stuff right a nature walk in the park or arboretum. Curry olympics you can make up your own sports and maybe make a newspaper or website. Somebody here who has an expertise like princess marsha johnson new about trees so i know what time would the other kids she actually brought in the price of wood and show them how to count the rings and talks about trees while many of you have expertise different types. And also want to make a plug for some people who are not here so if you have. A husband's or grandparents in the family who are not necessarily interested in coming and sitting at our program but they might appreciate what we're doing for the youth and so someone who would like to. Do woodworking or take the kids out for something or. Share their expertise we would love to have that expand our community in. The chance to do that another thing i think would be great on a hot day would be to have a car wash. That's the it could raise money for whatever we want to donate it to and we just have to arrange the logistics to get the cars. In the right places in salon in. Kids can wear swimsuits in. For each other with water and bother washing powder and catherine as one of our leaders i think in our group. Had the idea that kids could start making up their own list and we're very open to that. The next fall. We. We're hoping that rachel long who said she'd like to work with you with would work with the high school because she's been personally requested that was request for you and also dan proud was requested to work with our youth to do a. Judy coming-of-age year which which bar park created last time really is something to get them familiar with uu history. And end with a trip to boston. For the young people that are in high school so that's something you guys can look forward to in a few years. So that's what i'm looking for now this group. I'm kind of torn to this group i i have this concept that that description stay together. And and not necessarily you don't have any of them to split up even as they get into kind of the middle school years nobody seems to get along really well. And we're going to be doing. Some things with you you principles but i'm sure we'll also be doing some drama and some and some creative. Dioramas or other productions would like to do that. And. So will be will be continuing with that we do have openings for people to work with the younger kids who are from about 4 to 7 years old. Somebody has a question back there. He's one of the ones you get to work within that class okay. And. We're looking for people that would do this say once a month. And with that group there's usually a. What an element of education that would be related to the principal sprint to still be a story or the viewing activity and then it's a very active group so anything that we can do to keep them engaged and having fun. a lot of sitting down and lecturing you don't need to have a lot of background yourself to do that. Just energy. So those are some of the opportunities coming up here in the summer in the fall. And i'd like to thank everybody that has helped out at all the different times. Rebecca actually being very modest i wanted you to let everybody know how long you've been teaching this is a great group of students all of them from just. Berthon i just. Welcome students and you have been teaching for a very long time originally my kids were both born into the uu church. We are. Should mention minneapolis where was a lot like here there's big first unitarian society we went there once no one noticed. Then we went to a small place about this size i was also 9 months pregnant. And then. The couture dance singing when the. Seeing what's happening so everyone noticed us. We join both our kids went through there until i taught pretty much every crystal and there was no one came here i didn't do anything for a couple years but. Somewhere when i started teaching some of these kids were in kindergarten and first grade. And i didn't plan this but somehow i just heard moved up with them so now they're stuck with me for the late graduate i think with the kids. but it's really delightful to see them and and. I am with you special thank you to the richards family who doubled the size of our class. Bringing your friends actually one reason i think was that karen dean kept mentioning to jane and john who had been headphones refers to the past or to other places that that we were here and. Got them to come over here so. And. I think i'm actually after we finish this part here we will have time for a little bit of welcoming of some of our new families of which. So yes in before removing i just wanted to recognize susan her home and she will be taking over as the chair of the re. Closing words you want to look in the responsive reading in the back of that same hymnal number 652. The great end in religious instruction is not just a minds upon the young but stir up their own. Not to give them a definite amount of knowledge but to inspire a fervent love of truth. Not to bind them by. Ineradicable prejudices. 2r particulars. Set or peculiar notion. Not to burden their memory but to quicken and strengthen the power of thought. In a word the great end is. To awaken the soul to excite. And cherish the spiritual life. William ellery channing. Thank you for all for coming please extend a hand of friendship to those around you and please stay and join us for our super lunch and our meeting.

uuprairie_org

Pr150712Ingham-ed.mp3

Thank you cece and heidi good morning. And welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i am sandy ingham the part-time consulting minister here prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation so we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color your sexual orientation gender or family structure we welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities for inabilities a later in the service will be a chance for visitors and guests to introduce themselves. If you want to we try not to clear shoe on sunday mornings we provide a variety of services so we always hope that if you are new or visiting you'll try to come back again services can be presented by myself or by a member of our congregation or by someone from. The wider community community. I have one announcement. Two weeks from today is our annual joint service with and picnic. With the unitarian universalist congregation of sauk county. I hope that many of you will be able to make this short journey to sauk city you can't though there will be a program here to. But if you can get to sauk city will spend time with our fellow freethinkers and enjoy that congregations beautiful historic building and grounds so please bring a dish. To pass a note that child care will be provided. Also i promised. As part of what we're supposed to do that we'll have three or four people from our congregation will be willing to tell their stories. About why they're humanists. And how they got to this point. point. That would be humanism. So let me know please if you are willing to be one of those folks i can give you some questions to guy doing it and it will be something we'll want to keep fairly brief. Please van are the opening words. And they are by. Mary oliver. The poet. You do not have to be good you do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting you only have to let. The soft animal of your body love. What it love. Tell me about despair. Yours. And i will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes over the prairies and the deep trees the mountains and the rivers mean wow. The wild geese high in the clean blue air. Are heading home again whoever you are no matter how lonely. The world offers itself to your imagination calls to you like the wild east harsh and exciting over and over announcing your place. In the family of things. Khesari langston's uses words. Hold fast to dreams. Forestream stein. Life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly hold fast to dreams for when dreams go. Life is a barren field of frozen snow. But the lighting of this chalice remind us to continue to hold fast. To our dreams. Of peace and justice for all. I have a lot of readings today don't worry most of them aren't very long. The first one i want to share with you is. A poem by wendell berry. Titled my great-grandfather. Slaves. Deep in the back ways of my mind. I see them. Going in the long days. Over the same field that i have gone. Long day's over. I see the song passing. And burning high. Over that land. From their day. Until mine. Their shadows having risen and consumed them. I see them obeying and watching the bearded tall man whose voice and blood are mine. Whose countenance in stone at his grave. My own. Resembles. Who's blindness is my. Brand. I see them kneel. And pray to the light. God. Who buys their souls with heaven. I see them approach quiet. In the merchandise of their flesh. To put down their burdens. A firewood and ham. And tobacco. Into the minds of my kinsman. I see them moving. In the rooms have my history. The day of my birth. Entering the horizon emptied of their days. They're purchased lives. Taken back. Into the dust of birthright. I see them born. Shadow within a shadow shroud. Within shroud through all night. From their lives to mine. Long beyond reparation. Or given liberty. Or any straightness. I see them. Do in the bonds of my blood. Through all the time of their bodies. I have seen that freedom cannot be taken from one man and given to another and cannot be taken and kept. I know that freedom can only be given. And as the gift to the giver. From the one who receives. Imo. By the blood of all of them whoever. We're owned by my blood. We cannot be. Free. Of each other. Many of you know that wendell berry is a farmer in kentucky. And his ancestors owned slaves. And i read something like that and i think. Is it any wonder we're still not passed. Racism. And hatred. I was in greece in mid-june some of you know it was a couple of days before i returned on june 26th. But i learned all of what happened in this country on june 17th in charleston south carolina. I heard something sleeting lyanna at elevation in a hotel room. On one of the greek islands when my sister and i remember that there was such a thing as cultivation one night but it was in greek. Something you have to wear many jokes about it's all greek to me but i did gather that there had been another mass shooting. I thought that some people had been wounded as all i got out of it. Returning to athens for day before we flew back here. We turned on the television and there we have access to the bbc. And i learned what actually occurred. I didn't believe it. At first i was sure i had misheard. 9 people. Hills. There are really no words to describe how i and i'm sure many of you felt about yet another gun shooting yet another tragedy that didn't have to happen and even worse yet another hate crime. This morning i want to reflect upon the spare. I want us to sit with despair. And sorrow. And pain. Intentionally. I don't want us to discuss it not this morning. Can do that on another sunday morning or we can do it at a special. Discussion group time that we. Decide to have on the subject. I wanted to get in touch with our feelings. Traders that sometimes sounds not to be so much in our heads. As i wrote in the blur but goes out on the calendar this is not unitarian universalist territory usually we don't we don't enter into this kind of soul-searching and naming things very often. Heritage but aren't unitarian heritage. Today then let us take some time to think about wounds. Not i don't mean. The wounding that happens in our personal life. Battleforce comes up whenever we talk about wounding and being wounded i mean. I guess i'd call them the big wounds mass shootings hate crimes environmental degradation we caused in other words i mean. The pain and sorrow that we inflict upon each other knowingly or not. On a universal scale. As april as opposed to that personal level. And then reflecting upon wounds and despairs. I'm going to briefly try to take us into. The place of miracles and. Rituals and how they might have a part in the healing of our wounds. In her. Book world as lover world as self. Joanna macy whom i spoken of many times renowned buddhist expert in general systems theory and one of my mentors. In her book macy has a chapter titled the spare work. She has devoted her life to the healing. Of this broken world and she's done this in many different way she's been active in nuclear. Disarmament protest she had mentioned before that she was one of the first westerners. On the side of chernobyl. Macy describes the spare this way the lost. Of the assumption. That's a species will inevitably pull through. The loss of the assumption that the species will inevitably pull through. Macy says not surprisingly. We are feeling despair for the world i mean for paying attention feeling despair for the world. What is surprising she says is the extent. To which we continue to hide this despair from ourselves. And each other. And then she goes on to say. There are number of reasons why we do this have this denial fear fear if you put it out there in the open it'll i don't know maybe get worse but she says fear not indifference keeps us from naming it and talking about it. Cultural taboos in western countries. Especially this country. We're supposed to not express. Negative feelings supposed to not talk about despair and paying and sora. And then there's always fat. Think we do our emphasis is getting worse i think on quick. Immediate solutions. He said long-term problems. And healing takes a very long time. By not naming despair by letting it be that elephant in the living room we are the elephant on the bicycle maybe. We stifle discussion. But worse we stifle creativity. And ideas for long-term resolution of our huge. Problem the process necessary for despair work is similar. To the process of working through grief although the aims are different. Macy reminds us it it's okay to suffer a little to sit for a while with sorrow and despair expecting quick. Instant resolution to problems. To those feelings of terror and fear that might come up she reminds us that humans are tough. And resilient. As it were not going to fall apart. If we let ourselves be open to pain if we go through what maisie and others call positive disintegration. Positive disintegration. On the contrary positive disintegration allows for breaking open of our shells and release of new energy new ideas more creativity fall apart. And breaks down. Defenses also known as. Letting ourselves be open about the despair we feel for this world leads to the possibility of miracles occurring. The confederate flag coming down in south carolina that is a miracle to me. There's another one they should do it i'll get to that in a minute. Letting ourselves be open about the despair we feel for this world leads to the possibility of using rituals. To help us feel to help us let go. To stop using so many words and start acting on those words. At the top of your order service there is a wendell berry. Quotes. I want to know he writes i want to know as fully and exactly as i can. What the wound is. And how much i am suffering from it. And all i want to be. Sure. I want to be free of the wound myself and i do not want to pass it on to my children. I know if i fail to make at least the attempt i forfeit the right to hope. That the world will become better than it is now. Barbara rohde who is a longtime unitarian-universalist lay leader. Wright's death. Call the harmony of healing. The congregational minister stopped me in the aisle of the supermarket a few months after i have unexpectedly recovered from a serious illness. With a gentle but slightly teasing smile he asked me. How does a unitarian deal with a miracle one which i thought about a lot. I started by asking myself more questions says roadie. What is a miracle. Her answer. An event. That fills us with. Wonder. Is a miracle supernatural. She says that depends. On how 12 find supernatural traditionally supernatural has been defined as something beyond the natural and intervention from outside but the supernatural also might be defined as that which is most. Perfectly natural. That which is hole. That which is completely true. To its purpose in nature. In this sense the eden of the ancient story was supernatural in this sense the occasion when a body is allowed to heal itself and does. Is supernatural. Not all bodies will heal themselves but. On those occasions when everything within the wider body metaphorical is working together. The tremendous skill and carrying of the doctors and nurses the encouragement and love and strength giving apps. A family and friends the amazing healing powers of the human body itself and patient but passionate lice loving spirit within oneself then this definition of a miracle may apply and finally this question what does the unitarian universalist do. With a miracle. She does what all humans do in the presence of wonder she gives. Fatz. I like roadies definition of miracle an event that fills us with wonder. To that i would add. A miracle is any event. That reminds us. Of our interconnectedness our interdependence and brings us back in touch with love. An into harmony my new favorite word. Into harmony with all of life. Including. Mother earth. A miracle to me would be not only the removal of a symbol. In this case the flag that for too long was allowed to be there symbolizing hatred and white supremacy a miracle to me would be to also remove the statue of benjamin tillman. From in front of the capitol there in south carolina. Tillman. Was a south carolina governor and the united states senator who. Probably described how he undermined post-civil war reconstruction. By killing black people who tried to vote. In the 1800's. Tiffany wonder we can't get past it. A miracle to me would be having our government. Presidential candidates are you listening. Our government pay reparations to the african-american community the black community whatever is politically correct to say. And use part of these reparations. For a marshall plan. For the inner cities. You all know what a marshall plan is. We went into after world war ii did states. Help rebuild japan. By giving them a and not punishing them. Here's some statistics a couple just a couple and by the way i lot of what i'm using this morning i've drawn from yes magazine. The summer issue you must subscribe. Information over. It made me ashamed to be white. At the outbreak of the civil war. The market value of slaves in the united states. Exceeded. That of banks factories and railroads. Combined. This reminds me of in greece and i to go you got all those ruins and you see home this magnificent. Stop the buildings and on and on in their layers of them. And then at some point if you're paying attention it hits you that this was all done course. With slave labor. Something like ten thousand slaves a day were bought and sold in places like athens. Back to this country another statistic another. Quotes martin luther king jr calculated that making good on the promise of 40 acres. And a mule. Which would be $20 a week. Now this was a calculation done in the. 60 so $20 a week since the late 1700s for four million slaves would total 800 billion. As king said they owe baby white people they owe us a lot of money. In today's dollars that 800 billion. Is 6.4. Trillian. President andrew johnson overturned. General sherman. Famous promise of forty acres and a mule. Which would have redistributed roughly 400,000 acres. Newly freed black families. Miracles occur. Whenever we pay attention to the voice of love. That is within each one of us. Calling us to recognize our similarities. I just stopped concentrating on our mostly insignificant. Differences. Miracles may occur when rituals are observed. Rituals such as singing telling our stories. Eaton lighting that chalice yes that's a ritual every week. He calls that calls us back. To community to what howard thurman called those moments of our highest. Resolve. Money if you are probably familiar with anne lamott. Who is the author of mine extra. Just from small her book small victories. I love her humor but she's also very serious. So there are why she writes on a plane. Returning home from st louis or rather there i was on a plane navigate. At the st louis airport with i think the not unreasonable expectation that we would be in the air soon. As our flight had already been delayed 2 hours. I was anxious. To get home. Dolphins considered i thought it was coping quite well. Especially because i am a skeptical and terrified flyer. In-between devouring hershey's chocolates and $13 worth of trashy magazines. I had spent the two hours of the delay trying to be helpful to the other passengers. Hoping that once we were in the air everything would go smoothly and my idea she says of everything going smoothly on an airplane is a that i not die in a slow-motion fiery crash or get stabbed to death by terrorists. And be. That none of the other passengers try to talk to me all conversation should and at the moment the wheels leave the ground. Finally we were allowed to board i was in row 38 between a woman slightly older than i with. Limited language skills and a man my own age was reading a book about the apocalypse. Buy a famous right-wing christian novels. The newspaper had asked me to review this book. When it first came out because the author and i are both christians won't know anything about a lamotte's is not a right-wing christian. Although as i pointed out in my review he's one of the author is one of those right-wing christians who thinks. That jesus is coming back next tuesday right after lunch. And i am one of those left-wing christians who thinks that perhaps. This author. Is just spiritualizing his own asteria. How is it i asked going to the best books i ever read. And said you should read it. Cute and says i remembered saying in the review that the book was hardcore right-wing paranoid anti-semitic homophobic misogynistic propaganda. Not to put too fine a point on it and smiled and went back to reading. I couldn't begin to guess what country the woman was from although i think it's possible that she had one last being. Parents. And one korean. The latvian because of language. So anyway the plane finally taxi doubting a man on the right kept reading and. And then all the sudden he started telling an about how his wife he and his wife were homeschooling their children and he described was enormous acrimony the radical free-for-all feminist touchy-feely philosophy of his district school system. And i knew instantly that this description was an act of aggression against me. That he was telepathically on to me could see that i was the enemy. That i would be on the same curling team in heaven is tom hayden and vanessa redgrave. And then the plane break to a stop. Homely little passengers wanted to get off plane. Right then and there we were headed back to the gate we all cry by the good news was back to the gate was you know only a few 500 ft away but the bad news was. That that man because of faa regulations that all the luggage had to come out and sm lamont accidentally left behind their pipe bombs. She's a very dark humor. Well it's actually they burn our they took off and an says we the citizens of row 38 can all ordered sodas and the laughing woman put a walkman on close her eyes christian man continued to read his book about the apocalypse. And then the captain came on again with that seatbelt sign i'm afraid we're about to hit some heavy turbulence. Please return to your seats. And then the plane started bouncing and they had to hang onto the sodas. And the pea. Kyle said everybody hang tough going and. And then he said flight attendants please sit down and you know that you've always been there any of you who travel regularly and everybody. Eventually they got back to you. Stop that you couldn't help. Thinking about a miracle in her. Church and she goes on to describe which may have been a miracle church a few sundays before. The important part is not what exactly happened but that it would not have happened without busey. She writes because music. Is about as physical as it gets. Your essential rhythm is your heartbeat your essential sound your breath. We're chalkware walking humans are walking temples of noise. And when you add tender hearts to this. Mix it somehow. Lets us meet in places we couldn't get to any other way. So not long after the plane steady the pilot came on again and announced that everything was okay except he wanted to know there was a doctor on board a woman behind us who turned out to be a nurse but often went to investigate. But there were doctors on hand in the nurse spot. That woman was going to be okay at lord's as a christian man. We looked at each other inside and took our heads you know how you doing. Cardon said i just hope the snakes don't get out of the cargo hold that. The prim apocalyptic. Man smiled at me and then he left left you laughed out loud and the latvian woman who probably didn't understand it it started laughing to and then and lamont started laughing and she said i hate to look like i'm enjoying my own jokes so much. The three of us sat there and it's terry. If when we were done the man reached over and patted the back of my hand. Smiling gently the laughing woman leans in post me into my soviet airspace and bean i lean forward so that our foreheads touched. For a second. And then i thought i don't know what happened at church was an honest-to-god miracle and i don't know if there's been another small one here smallest possible one but i feel like i am sitting with my cousins on a plane 7 miles off. A plane that is going to make it home. This made me so happy that i thought. This is playing. Pause miracle. For me to reston now. The things. That unite us are greater so much greater. Then the things that divide us. Kind of a ps2 that i found this downstairs i wasn't here on allmusic sunday on the 21st of june but it i love this when i ran across it when words fail. Music. Music. Can certainly be a ritual of sorts. Me give you just a couple of different interpretations of the word ritual now this first one is from that yes magazine that i. Mentioned a few minutes ago. Rituals. Let us explore ways to heal together. Rituals related to acknowledgement of the past. Help create connections between past and present. In order to understand where harms originated. How they affect us in contemporary times and how. We can move forward. To healing. I personally think of rituals in terms of some seward's ceremony. Comfort. Challenge. Community. Connecting. I never thought i'd stand up here and quote a governor from south carolina. But here i am holding some words from governor nikki haley. We saw the families the families of those. Victims of the shooting. We saw the family show the world what true grace and forgiveness looks like. Back. Set off. An action of compassion. Spy people in south carolina and all over the country. They stopped looking at their differences and started looking. At their similarities. One way to continue what these families in charleston have started. Is through truth and reconciliation commission most of you probably know about the one. In south africa. Sort of still goes on. Sort exists a little bit and you'll probably if you've done any reading about that one yet mixed reviews about whether it was good or not i am a huge fan of truth and reconciliation commission zandov restorative justice work sat on a restorative justice. Community council in burlington iowa. So hard to get the pain out there. And to try to reconcile victims in. Those who committed the. Crimes i did not know that there have been two truth and reconciliation. Commissions once called truth and peacekeeping or justice. In this country. And it's one in canada. This country in the year 1979. Members of the ku klux klan and nazis killed. Five people black people in greensboro. North carolina and in 2004. The incident was 1979 in 2004 several people in greensboro put together a truth and reconciliation. Commission. Maybe they still were trying to deal with this so again i say is it any wonder. But it takes so is taking so long to heal from all these wounds there is a current true this is the one that's called truth and wants to speak in ferguson. I know that. Just just began and then the canadian one was formed in 2008 i kind of had a mini vacation before i went to greece. Mini trip i had an entire day in toronto. We're had not been since i was in high school between i was just a few years ago but toronto had changed a great deal and stumbled into other things. You're not in a corporate building which my son informs me it's the law in canada that corporations have to include. Something this was a sculpture exhibition of inuit sculptures. You're full of. News about. This truth and reconciliation commission that did not form until 2008 it was formed to investigate and try to come to terms with the legacies. Of indian residential schools. Which began in 1874. And the last school up there close in. 1996. Canada i mean come on. These schools i don't know how much any of you know about them but we're full of of abusive. Action sexual and physical and thousands. Thousands. Of the young persons who were sent there did not survive. You can imagine how difficult this is for the canadians to try. To come to grips with this. Truth and reconciliation commission zara. Perfect example of both miracle and ritual. I'm going to mention in closing and in very short reading that goes with this medicine wheels. We've talked before about unitarian universalist unitarians. In the seventies and eighties i think one little overboard on worrying about whether we were co-opting. But native american traditions. But i think if they're done if they're tributed to where they came from and done well no we're not we have a lot to learn from. From native americans. Again from the yes magazine. Summer issue i should point out that this issue was published before. June 17th. And any issues all about black lives matter. A 12 people colors life the woman who wrote a one-page article about medicine wheel. I was fascinated by it for a lot of reasons and and she talks about how it can be medicine wheels can be healing the summer she doesn't do the east southwest north thing she does the seasons. Titan with the directions and south is the summer ritual. And the south is the direction of the heart where we try to heal. And repair relationships and i thought how perfect a ceremony plays an important role and for this healing work. The author turns to the condolence ceremony and she uses this. Story which is rooted in mohawk tradition i believe. The story of i'm not going to be able to say that the the leading character's name correctly so if any of you speak. Mohawk please let me know by this the mohawk of the equus honestly community and the story is about ion walk top nan and i want to whose wife and daughters were murdered and remember we're not in our heads. This morning this is metaphor. His wife and daughters were murdered heartbroken he wondered the earth until he came to a lake. Filled with claw hog shells shells white. And purple. Here he began to string these channels onto a thread of sinew. As he beat it at he spoke the blessings of condolences for the sad and broken hearted he said if there is anyone in the world who feels as brokenhearted as i do i will go see them i will take an eagle feather and wipe the dust of death from their ear so they can hear the children talk laugh and sing i will take a soft deerskin and wipe the tears from their eyes. So they can see the beauty of mother earth and see the joy of their family i will cancel them by taking the deaths from their eyes and i will take medicine water and offer it to them so that when they drink it will dislodge the grief and sadness so they will be refreshed and can live again and speak eat and be nourished. To me that is. Trying to bring us into harmony with each other and with the earth. Wendell berry the closes off a short poem by him titled a lovers song. He writes when i was young and lately wed and every fissionable head of this superpower or that prepared the ultimate combat gambling against eternity to earn a timely victory and end all time to win a day. Tomorrow what it is and i pray if it must end but not tonight and they were wrong and i was right it's love that keeps the world alive beyond hates genius to contrive. Which leads us into the responsive reading number 464 so we don't leave on it and note of despair but we leave with some hope. Written by judy chicago. Entitled and then i will read the regular type if you could read their talents. And then all that has divided us will merge. And then softness will come to a world that is harsh. An unkind. And then. Both women and men will be strong. And then all will be rich and free and very. And then. All share equally in the earth's abundance. And then all will nourish the young. And then all will live in harmony with each other and the earth. And the closing words are those of wendell berry. When despair for the world grows in me. And i wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children's lives maybe i go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water and the great heron feeds i come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives. With forethought. Of grief. I come into the presence of still water. And i feel above me the day blind. Stars waiting. With their light. 4 time. Irest. In the grace of the world. And i'm free. So be it. Go in peace street your neighbor drink coffee.

uuprairie_org

Pr121014Bringelson-ed.mp3

Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm penny isla remember the program committee. Hurry inspires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure we welcome you no matter your age your abilities or your inability later in the service we will invite visitors and guests and returning friends. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. Therapist therapist presented. Either by a prairie member. Remember the wider community or by our minister. Sandra ingram. Today karan. Mendelssohn and jaundice. From moses and the 11 by 15 project. Representative day as a member of jab rebuke congregation since 97 karan bringelson. Was first introduced to you you in high school where the uu church in lincoln nebraska open this door for karns. There i had a new neighbor called voices beyond bars which is a organization that works with folks who are getting out of prisons formerly incarcerated individuals and help them get their life in order the way they want it to be and by learning from these my new neighbors i got to hear about the 11 by 15 project. And so did levin is 11,000 people. That's half the prison population we're trying to cut the wisconsin prison population in half. By the year 2015 so that's the 15 part 11 by 15 by 15 is a project of moses moses has yet to be officially sanctioned or officially launched and that is happening the day after a big thing going on here it's happening sunday november 18th from 4 to 6 p.m. yes. So moses there are little brochures and some of you have nearby moses is a an affiliate of a group called wisdom it's a interfaith interdenominational group that's working on the project of the 11 by 15 campaign. It is designed to be based. In its design to seek justice with multiple congregations and the first issue or campaign that is taking on is this 11 by 15 campaign. Moses is one of a number of affiliates which are listed in your brochure. That are from all over wisconsin. So it is. We have folks in milwaukee and folks and why some folks and green bay and all over who are also working to reduce the wisconsin prison. Moses is the dane county branch organization until just now that there's been work being done to gather the congregations especially invoices beyond bars actually as a member also to form a united front for dane county. So you see what i love my 15 is we're trying to transform the lives of people who can get out of prison we're trying to transform our community so they feel safer and healthier and we're actually trying to transform the wisconsin's. The whole state criminal justice. You laugh. Hey. It's you know it's been started and we're just continuing. Well okay it's so you laughed and in your your your readings in your bulletin. Say really what this says you already know all this. It doesn't work that's it. No i think about. Well a lot of the people in prison today are there as a result of the drug war. That's what michelle talks about in her book i got to hear her last year and i'm wheeling well it was in. Illinois somewhere we went. And if you ever get a chance to hear and also if you go online and put in the shell alexander there's a lot of presentations by her. One of the things that she talks about there is that in the 1970s. Oh you know we were all i'm sure we were all concerned about drugs we still are that's the sad part. Drugs take over people's lives and they enter all of us. And so the president at that time. Ronald reagan said let's have this war on drugs and we probably all said well that's probably a good idea let's do it. But now looking at what happened is it put all kinds of people in prisons. That needed treatment. And so it's ineffective we aren't any better off we aren't any safer. We're spending too much money we've got too many people or were missing these people who could be contributing to our our society and. As i said before. It will look at some figures it unfairly a disproportionate for people of color and poor people. In mental illness. So we're going to i mean we already kind of touched a little bit on the ways our current system is ineffective wasteful and unfair we're going to talk about a possible some possible solutions and then we're going to talk about what we can do here and looking forward to a vision of our future together. So. You mentioned ronald reagan but we know it's it's a bipartisan issue they were in our system because of the choices that both democrats and republicans have made. Here's here's the slide i wanted you to specially focus on that the one on. On this side the right side. That's your left side okay okay. Yet the other laptops right and so you can see how disproportionate. It is for us. In wisconsin that is just. Amazing. When i think about this i think of the children. I got to be a substitute in one of our public schools. This week. I was so moved. By the various hues. Of the children in that school every single. Color of skin that you can imagine. Was there at hawthorne elementary school. Think up and i don't know what their proportions are. But think of the children in wisconsin who woke up this morning. Who have a parent in prison. And you can see the percentage is going to be largely. People of color. So what does that do what does that do to us. Yeah it says over half of our prisoners are african-american and but only 6.2% of the wisconsin population is african-american. We have seen that corrections in wisconsin is actually has been an industry. A growth and growing industry there's we have 36 adult correctional facilities we have operating capacity of 17590 or average daily inmate population is 23000 +. Just wisconsin. The cost is huge not just in human life but also in funds $88 a day or 32. Thousand dollars a year per inmate. So we have we do have some community corrections we also not only have people in the prisons and jails but also on probation. And on parole so 47019 thousand for those and we have a in 2010 2011 we had a corrections budget of 1.3 billion dollars. So probation is part of a sentence parole is after you serve some time in prison. I want to kind of go back to that cost peace two or. We have to keep going but i wanted to stay because that original group that i talked about that map group said. The irony of all this is where we're connecting poverty and prison. But what the vying for having more prisons. Are are poor. Wisconsin communities. Who want prisons in order to have employment so. If it's complex but i think we all can figure out there are other ways to use those facilities. That will still include employment for those small towns in wisconsin. Besides prison and we want to look at our neighboring state minnesota. In wisconsin we have similar population. 5.6 million + 5.3 million. Over double the prison population in wisconsin we have 22,000. In in minnesota they have 9400. So in wisconsin imprisonment rate is 38. 387.2. Vs1 77.8. So it doesn't have to do with. I mean we have a lot of similarities with minnesota. Except when it comes to presents. A lot of these figures here's our budget. Between the neck. And a lot of these comparisons came from a professor at marquette university you also i think it's ohio is the other one again you can find more of this online. And it is about the money. In minnesota at my other co-presenter pointed out that. If a person gets diverted to drug treatment instead of prison. They let them they give them funding for 9. Months. Which is effective. Per treatment here. If you are it's it's one month. So these are just some quotes about. Treatment and diversion programs it affects effectively diverts nonviolent offenders with substance abuse treatment needs from incarceration reduces criminal justice system cost. They have positive impacts on individual fenders communities and local service system. And there is a website here down at the bottom right. There's full report of the evaluation. Different types of alternative programs that have been proven. Also in minnesota they do a lot more with restorative justice. And so. Keeping people from even getting to this stage. So there's many in there has been studies done we had a person at the capital this season who told us about i think about. 4 states. Who in the different things that they're doing to. Not have prison but but have been effective at reducing their rates. So we are just trying to imagine what if county. Could triple or quadruple are increased by a factor of ten the number of people served by these alternative programs that's a vision we have. And then wait there are some stories of drug courts saving the lives of people's children that they're trying to find alternatives for offenders and also here's a story from terry my conclusion simple everyone like me deserves a chance to change if they're so inclined the opportunity to change and be accountable is the most fundamental and basic right i have. So we're trying to also not just i think of the human capital and kind of. Imprisoned in our presence right now but there's also the money capital and trying to save money by if counties could earn 15,000 from the state for alternative programs everytime they send someone to a program that saves the state $30,000 out of the state prison system. And counties could tap into a 75 million. State that could ultimately save the state. 30. 300 million-dollar. So there's a lot of financial if even if you don't believe that. That there's human capital imprisoned in our system. There's certainly money reasons to do this. Make these changes to. The same thing you guys get the idea we could save a lot of money. Schools being a really important place. School's not prison so that's an old another program i would think and i think revoice is beyond bars does you know and urban league and madison urban ministries they are all working with folks. Who are coming out of prisons and turns of we have. We have a question for you. About what can you do and we have also an answer for you and that is considered joining moses you can join moses as an individual if you as a congregation decide to join moses i'm assuming there's some sort of process at least a tree we went through some education and the board voted and for the congregation to consider to support the work that moses is doing and we are happy to talk with you after service about what that would entail. You as individuals will sign up to help with this 11 by 15 project which is the first of. Issues to come but it's the one that moses is working on now. And there's different ways that you can commit you can commit to saying yes put me in the press release i'm one of thousands of people across wisconsin that finds this very very very important you can commit by giving money you can commit by attending rallies you can commit by saying oh my kiwanis club.. Should hear this too we are happy to talk to other groups and spread the word because we think this is an issue that's not just timely but so important to our at least to my work as a unit so we want to do some discussion. And isaac. Is it on the moses went yes so. And i know you like more information in that site as really great earlier i'm in a book club and we just talk about books that we've been reading that we enjoy and one member that this book the new jim crow is the only book that should be talking about and i didn't have them before but the author will be in town it's either march 7th or 9th on the uw campus. There is no current initiatives in the federal system should say as of the nineties when i was there, i assume it's the same probably that we are not putting the funds or the mission into rehabilitating folks so that they can come out and be productive members of society it is simply too warehouse though and i know that's right. I'm down there you know this presentation that we did we didn't have to make up these slides. That came to us through wisdom. So really you know other people here i'm sure you're good presents hers too. I mean we aren't we aren't the top of the heat by any means so anyone here who has a group and wants to know how to do this it's not that difficult. And i think that any wants us to move on but let's keep talking after service and you at that time when we're talkin you can give me your commitment sheets you can turn those in today and will make sure they get to the right place thank you so much for having us. This time of ruth called in who'll share our closing words with us. This is by jerry brown prisons don't rehabilitate they don't punish they don't forget so what the hell did they do. Thank you for coming please extend the hand of friendship to those around you and join us for coffee and conversation.

uuprairie_org

Pr160110_Converse7Principles-ed.mp3

Good morning. And welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. Where we welcome you no matter where you are on your. Religious spiritual faith mysterious awesome whatever word you want to use journey of life. We welcome you no matter the color of your skin your ethnicity. Your eyes are in abilities. For your abilities. Your gender preference. My name is sandy ingham i in prairies minister and we have services that are different every sunday so if this is one of your first time here. We always encourage you to come back. Sometimes i do the service sometime. Someone from within the congregation does the service as today cathy. Going to entertain us. And educate us and inspire. I'll sometimes we have speakers from outside. Prairie. The collection today. Is for a special project in. Rural secondary schools in zimbabwe. There will be envelopes in the auditorium baskets for the rosario girls club which aims to build confidence and life skills among young women. And specifically provides personal hygiene education and products. One example is that girls. Don't go to school if they don't have sanitary pads. Only in a unitarian universalist. Congregation could i say that. Anyway it's a very worthy cause. I would draw your attention to a couple of. What was one announcement in in your order of service. There will be a brief. What is this is more of an informational meeting but it's a parish meeting next sunday to vote on four different what's what are known as the congregational study action issues. Csai. To which will be done. Talk about general assembly in columbus ohio last weekend in june. And because columbus is really within driving distance of us and i've already heard some mutterings at. More than the usual numbers of people might be interested in going. We might want to make sure that we have some. Feedback into what did you say we discussed. The opening words then. May we be reminded here of our highest aspirations. And be inspired to bring our gifts. Of love and service. To the altar of humanity. May we know once again. That we are not isolated. But connected. In mystery and miracle to the universe. Do this community. And to each other. Life is an art. It requires practice to achieve greatness. But greatness is always. Waiting. Ready to be attained. May the light of this chalice. Remind us. Of the possibility for everyone. To achieve true fan goodness in our lives. If we only. Huffy turn it over to you. In. Talking about looking at what. What curry mean what does principles are and how they. Impact prayer you can kind of. Just gather if you've been here for a while pulling this information together was quite similar to herding cats. Very diverse population. But i want to think about that today january 10th 2016 each one of us made a decision to be here at prairie. This probably has many reasons for each of us to be here is there are people sitting here. To me it's important that fact that everybody had their own reason for coming. To get up into come here on a very cold 93 morning. It may be that you believe in the principles of you and your wisdom and i'm which is founded. You may want to maybe you came to seek like lion to people. That you know share your interest and concern. You may have a joy or sorrow which you just shared with us. And you wanted to share it with us because you consider prairie like a family and you know that the people within prairie will support you both in the good times in the bed. It's obvious that we love singing music playing instruments. Dancing eating all of those good things we have food there we have wonderful instruments here. Maybe you came with another person that you care about to keep them company because they wanted to come. Many for many of us probably down deep inside we yearn to find some answers to those haunting questions that we have. I'm hoping that we find somebody else who has the same questions. And even more importantly we might actually find some answers together. If you have children to love children it may be that you do have interest in concerns that they actually learned about what religion is in religions in the world. And you can encourage them to ask if hopefully get answers to their questions and to keep asking more questions. We want our families to have a community where they can have friends. Feel accepted and loved. And prayers when the few people places where you can get a rousing ovation when you play twinkle twinkle little star 4 years old and hannah over reasons are important. It's my intent today to try to bring your hearts and minds together. And individually think about what peri means to us. Today's an introduction to a series of. Play ministry whatever you want to call it of looking at the seven principles. We have a little early intro. In december. Rick rocking to the service in which we split into seven groups and we talked about. The seven principles and last week we had a wonderful to the tune of doe ray me. Kids doing sign for the seven principles elementary. So this is a continuation of that. It's a brief history unitarian-universalism began in 1961 with a joining together of the unitarian and universalist. Religion these are all the religions foot. Shared a philosophy of religious tolerance and questioning. So unitarian-universalism is a religion based on an open-minded quest. 4 meaning in life and to practice shared values. The definition of religion if you look it up simply means. By coming together of people with shared-use and interest. In which they passionately. Believe. And that certainly does describe us. A comprehensive statement of arcana beliefs is contained in the principles and purposes of the uu association. Our sunday service that we have that we receive every week has the seven principles printed in it. And if you have enough you have a hand out of your seat that has a green graphic prepared by a unitarian on the top of the 7 principles. And i just want to take a minute for us to review them and read them if you don't have a piece of you don't have a print out. Is responsive reading 594. It's slightly different than. So i will start and read and you can do that the second line response. We affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of each person. Reaffirm and promote justice equity and compassion in human relations. We affirm and promote acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth. We affirm and promote a free and responsible search for truth and meaning. We affirm and promote the right of conscience and the use of the democratic process. You have a voice and both. We affirm and promote the goal of world community with peace liberty and justice for all. We are firm and promote respect for the interdependent web of all existence for which we are apart. So. What is what i'm going to be doing today or is defining our community. We've read the principles and if we look at this is information that comes from the uua the definition of what you do is a ms. And i'm glad it's saying you can bring your whole self your identity your questioning mind your expansive heart. And we don't have to check a personal background beliefs at the door. This isn't keeping the footless said this morning that you should be able to join together. On your journey.. Honors everywhere you have been and where you may be going. Bright house without walls a congregation without spiritual boundaries. Were you use atheist agnostic buddhist christian hindu jewish pagan in war. And along with our beliefs we believe we bring also bring our talent to the community. I decided to try to summarize for aryan people in zurich. I had fun making the graphic i wasn't getting anywhere very fast. So within prairie history answer the present day. We've got many members who chose careers and lifestyles and or lifestyle. Then embody their beliefs and ultimately the intent of the principles. It's impossible to accurately consider all these contributions and honors. But i will tend to enlighten you to some of these efforts. As we nearing a 50th anniversary we have a lot of contributions to be proud of within our congregation. Sorted divided things sort of generally and categories to find a way of do it and. The areas of which i thought were particularly important. A historical and current within our community. I was in education you can see and i couldn't fit half of them on i just tried to make. Larger topics meme head very diverse experiences. Dimension of few on the top with the sore one of their members when they were assisted the minister admission director at the university of wisconsin. Wasn't charged a program called sore which is for incoming young people to help them adjust to being college life and help ensure their success is particularly important for students in minorities or have english-as-a-second-language. 44 young people who are coming from a family history where there isn't. Hasn't been a lot of people who is fighting a secondary education and they're not quite familiar with the process and it's been very successful. We have many teachers who and individuals who have done a lot of tutoring has spent time working with. Individual children and adults particularly with an english second language program. We have people that are professors as well as people who have worked in laboratories. Not preparing information to bring the other people. An important aspect on the bottom is that. This information isn't any good if it doesn't get out to the public. So it's very important that we have writers we have people that publish books written pamphlets. Put music we have people who have gotten this information such as on the bottom but wfm wisconsin dnr magazine getting information out. To the public on acid rain. So this has been equally important is doing the work as disseminating the information. Another very broad area is science. We've had citizen activist who led the way in banning ddt on the top there with the main process was because of eggshell fittings mddt. Which was a severe impact on the peregrine falcon and bald eagle population. Because if they sat on their eggs they crushed them. Allegedly to banning this product for youth. Are we our green sanctuary this is an accreditation that we got in 2011 and this is based on our service and dedication to the earth. Environmental justice and sustainable living. We did a lot of work here at prairie with our building. What we taught forces retook to attain that accreditation. We have several people who have. Taking the lead and research this is particular picture here was in plant genetics and discovered new species. And also in developing field guides to. Plants that exist here in wisconsin the van and flora oakland to prairie du chien wisconsin. And on the bottom we have a. Remember who was instrument on the intergovernmental panel on climate change. And along with al gore they received the nobel peace prize. Primarily for this work with looking at them. Cubby storage and harvested. Wood products. I'm also just a very few of the many accomplishments. Social justice. I could have five slides because everybody hitting people in addition to having jobs such as lawyers foster care correctional facility and. We add in an atom to that all of the individual work people have done on open housing microloans women's league for peace and freedom. Endless. If we look up at the top we starting early work with members was involved with. Many marching in civil rights and now we're continuing in the bottom right there with. Standing on the side of love in black lives matter continuing for. Looking at equal rights for people up on the top vietnam many people march were involved an anti roar and right underneath that we now have. Several members who were involved with a veterans for peace so there's even a continuation from vietnam going on. The women's medical fund was started by a professor who was a chemist. Of all things but had a strong conviction in abortion rights. Endless women's fund was developed even before roe versus wade it was a fun to help women seeking abortions to have safe legal abortions. In the center we have a lot of with them. Gay lesbian transgender rights. Moses is a newer connection in this is a way for groups to look at public policy issues and this is linked on poverty oppression and injustice for chick-fil-a. Wisconsin. Less honorable mass incarceration. Well caring people have a tendency to care for people decided and everything from animal therapy taking animals to visit people that are sick and all types of. Therapy as mental health and physical health. One of note on the top is that we have a person who. A physician who. Chose to. Work and developing medical schools in uganda pakistan ethiopia these are family practice so they would have physicians. And received humanitarianism in that medicine award. I'm sorry who's founding director of the uw center for global health and still is in that position. Another position we have received the humanitarian and medicine ward was a physician for 52 years. We have another physician who has 208 articles on their website written on medicine and health. Living issues. Blood writing 208 articles. Artistry a bomb with people who win in the direction of art thankfully most people are willing to share i'm always looking for more people who are willing to share like our displays here we're ready for you this way everybody. Envy display not only adult work but you can see up at the top we try to display a children's work both inside and outside down here in the butterfly garden. We have wonderful same last picture out in the prayer. And the lower right-hand corner is our new sign on the annex that ceramic signs made for a new building. One form of art which i didn't include on there cuz it kind of has to stand by itself is music. And music has historically and still currently very important to prairie. I mean we had to move or scream so we could have a heart play this morning home wonderful is that and people have shared their instruments we've had groups. Bottom right-hand corner heroes ethnic connection group which many of you may remember. And. Your left and then in the center of the raisins granny's who had been present for years at most. Important. Protests and. Other activities in a well-known in madison. We have several groups that play together and then we also have. Very brave individuals who stand up and who their things. If you have an experience i retreats we have a special we have a special treat on saturday night we have a talent show. And i would say it ranges from the humerus to the sublime. The topic i just put things we do. We serve breakfast and homeless shelter for men in families for. Decades. We've sat in stood outside protested been arrested. Leaf lettuce made phone calls letters to the editor. Lawn signs. Possibility recycle. Band. On. Unimportant we have 13 members is the person who started the dane dances. Which has been a wonderful community. Strengthening activity. So. The lot of the things we do. So. Most of us believe that it takes. A community to raise children. And children are priority for all of us prairie. Are we try to include them in our services intergenerational we love to hear. What they've done what they've accomplished we've had some wonderful plays in the past year with cows and camels and even the. We have many adults who teach and participate in these activities than the bottom. Right hand corner is a summer spring which is a group of the young people get together. There are people who will read. Two adults and young and luckily it's. Young and young-at-heart. Mactivity outside with adults and young and. In the upper right. Penn quarter we are making an effort to keep our alumni connected and we all had a. Service in which we surveyed all of us young people and ask them what the impact theory had been on them and a young adult life. So the final thing that this brings together is. The fact that were community and and what does it mean to be a community. And i think that to be a community it takes a lot of nourishment. It takes a lot of opportunities in which we can get together with groups and individual people. Because if we don't do that and it just come and goes and we on a community. And if some of you may not know so we have several. Bonding experiences through the course of the year one of them is a retreat. And which we have. Discussion topics in music and art without doors we go for walks we have community meals. One of the things we have the picture in the sender's have a key lock ceremony in which many brave people have let us to know. What's a things in the important things that have happened in their lives during the course of the year. Or things are hoping will happen. In addition we have many clubs and. Bugs groups music group we have circle dinners we have book clubs. Spanish speakers and if you have a group you'd like you can all start your own group. I'm sure if you started look somebody will come. We have the auction which also has activities that get people together up in the top-right this year we had a thanksgiving service for octogenarian and manage an area. And in the bottom center is a sailboat ride out of lake mendota which was another option offering. So i did encourage people to come to the auction. And get some of those experiences much they can do things with prairie. In the bottom right is committees. We have lots of committees i need to have fun on committees and it's a wonderful way to know what's going on at prairie and to bring your talents to help us in our community. I will read this. Unitarian universalist have said for centuries that there's room in our religion for all seekers. Skeptics and poets and scientists are welcome here. Hazard nonconformist and shy and uncertain folk. We believe that restlessness and doubts are a sign of grace. That the love of truth is the holiest of gifts. This is reverend barbara. Intensely left names out because many of you may not know older people and we do have some people who. Are shy and prefer maybes not have the name sensor. There is currently a committee. And the committee is working on gathering information from people and interviewing people and. Bringing all that together and so we are going to we are going to have that we're going to have a celebration and and if you who's the main person to see if you have information. Mary mullen. North paulding are two of those people are heading up this committee. Viper. Also so we do have a committee that's been working in meeting and we hopefully will. Cuz i don't even know all the history either i mean a lot of us don't know the early history. He was a plant. And people can probably contribute pictures to. I mean most of these pictures are. Once a type-a can but i'm sure lots of other people have got. Scores of pictures they've taken over the year. Thank you kathy. If here you have found freedom. Take it with you into the world. If you have found comfort. Go out and share it with others. If you have dreamed. Dreams. Help one another. That they. May come true. If you have known love. Give some back. To a bruised and hurting. World. Go in peace. Meet your neighbor by baked goods drink coffee. All those good things.

uuprairie_org

Pr160228JackieHunt-ed.mp3

Good morning. And welcome to prairie unitarian universalist. Society. I am san diego i'm still standing and i am still your minister. Do i have struggle to remain upright over the last. Chewy. So it is wonderful to be here. Prairie as i hope most of you in this room know. Aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation we welcome you no matter your. Ethnicity or your religious background no matter where you are i'm just journey of life the spiritual journey. Whatever your color your sexual orientation or gender your family structure no matter your age and your abilities or inabilities we welcome you. We provide a variety of services on sunday morning so if this is one of your first time here i heard you to try again come back. Sometimes i leave the service often we have someone from within. Our own community here leave the service and often to we have outside speakers such as. Someone from your hair house this morning. The opening words will be. Read by mary mullen. Love is not concerned with whom you pray. Or where you slept the night you ran away from home. Love is concerned that the beating of your heart. Should kill no one. Are james and rachel. Up the shoes family. The word responsive reading. Regular time. Let us be at peace with our bodies and our minds let us return to ourselves and become holy or so. Let us be aware of the source. Of being common to us all into all living things. Invoking the presence of the great compassion. Let us fill our hearts with our own compassion. To towards ourselves and towards all living beings. Let us pray that we ourselves these to be the cause of suffering. With humility with awareness of the existence of life. And of the sufferings that are have going on around us let us practice the establishment. Of peace in our hearts. So now face i would like to invite you and our. Guest speaker up jackie and. Fuel. Come up here if you would please. Okay. Jackie has worked just as jackie huh. And. She's worked as a chemical abuse specialist for over 16 years. At journey mental health. She's made it her life's mission to bring awareness and acceptance of mental illness to the black community especially in impoverished communities. She's dedicated yourself to bridging the gap between those living with mental illness too much m. Mental health services. She's created her own unique approach to helping her community. By providing programs and events. Promote overall wellness especially at critical times. Two partnerships for their church fountain of life. And the nehemiah center for urban leadership development. She's been able to assist individuals and families by being a resource identifying resources in the community. And making them available to. Help families move from helpless to hopeful. Mahatma gandhi said and i quote. Be the change you wish to see in the world today. Jacqueline's own personal testimony of recovery. Her desire to serve. An escort is the foundation upon which she serves. Her favorite scripture is jeremiah 29:11 so she does not take lightly the journey which goddess place to run. She recently was recognized by delta sigma theta sorority incorporated as a 2016 humanitarian of the year. She's a mother of seven beautiful children. And grandma is 7 amazing grandchildren. Anna. She didn't want me to tutor horn. But i'd like to say that she is an amazing person i met her because i am a member of your house. Because of my ptsd and chronic depression. And she's come. In and his really is really working to bring our services into the black community. Which is no mean. And she is just. An amazing person because she can operate in both world. Is really wonderful integrating. A fabulous. For women. And i hope you give her a warm. Can i can i can make me feel. Like i'm somebody like they said. Thank you so much. First of all four. Allow me into your place. You know we are all family we're all created you know to be equal right and the images. Who i believe. Tubi. Our lord and savior. And our god so. That's where i'm coming from. Anna. Faith knows who i am and what i believe. And so she invited me here to talk a little bit about your house. As you can see. I'm i'm blessed to be able to work at a place call your heart house. These are amazing people in our and i see them these are real life people that i like touch-and-feel and work with every single day. And they're amazing journeys of transformation have. Yeah they have. Increased my knowledge and awareness of mental illness. And a little bit more of a background for for me and i feel like you need to know this before i continue. 5 minutes. Okay cuz i don't need to read that part i can just share with you openly about who i am and how i came to be right. So a lot of years ago. I was one of those i was. A person who was struggling. What substance abuse issues depression. Homelessness. All of those things that the people who want him able to work with now. I experiencing so. I believe that i'm in the unique position. To empathise right also encourage and support. As they move from hopeless. Too hopeful right. About five years ago when i worked at journey mental health another substance abuse counselor. After graduating from matc in 1999. Received a licensure or with a certification at the time through the state of wisconsin. To do substance abuse counseling along with my associate's degree. I did that for a lot of years like. 15mm in a tent 10 years. At some point i realized that there was a connection that mental health and substance abuse. We're heading hair sometimes people say what what are you do you treat the mental illness first and then address of substance abuse or do you make person be clean and sober before you begin to. Address their mental illness at i would like that that's not work because those things are like the person and a half. So anyway i started researching and began to. Bring both worlds to the table right. But what i comfortable what i realized was that. I really wasn't educated enough i wasn't equipped. So as a single parent of seven. With children across the lifespan. Mike i had kids in every. At elementary middle high school and college. And grandbabies that was still in diapers and preschool right. So i had them across the lifespan but i said i'm the journey to improve my own trip to make myself a marketable one. But also so that i could be. Qualify. To do the type of work that i believe i was called to do. So i'm 50 i will be 55. In march so i'm celebrating what i consider my double nickel birthday this year but i went back to school 5 years ago 6 now. And i started a program at upper iowa to receive my bachelor's degree first right because i didn't have that. Then i graduated. Hats off to me why would i left them going on. I went on to receive a master's degree at lakeland college just last year in counseling. I thought you needed that background so that you could. I'm eating my own horn but just so you can really understand who i am. And why i'm so passionate about your heart house in the work now work it outpatient services as a therapist. For all those years. And then some things happen. Managed care. Badgercare on all of obamacare all of those things happened right. And. Our agency had to make some tough choices. Right. But those choices didn't. Reflect. My vision for my life and my willingness and ability to serve. So i sought out opportunities and i landed at your house. So your house is was called the clubhouse. People become members. And the only qualifications you need to have to become a member is that you have a mental illness. And that you're over 18. Planet simple right. So then you go to this interview in process. You can't be a threat to the house you can't be someone who's coming in. At a hyper-vigilant state right you have to be managing your mental illness to be a part of the membership right. But with all things intact once you become a member you are a member for life. You are able to work with in a community where the hole. Running of the clubhouse is done by members. Along with staff not by staff along with members to hear that. Paxton members are the ones that prepare so i work in a cafe department there three department. Three major departments for members. Which is the cafe department the mc which is the communications department and then the business business the best. Business which handles all the running of the house for all the members. So members can have checking accounts that can pay their bills that can get the checkbook they can get assistance. Balancing their checkbooks paying bills all of those things that come with. The running of the household right. An mc department this video was made. Nrmc department by memphis every person on that video is actually a member of your house. Then in the cafe department which is where i work. Alongside with members. We plan a menu. We shot for membership for the menu. And then we prepare it and remind you. Fairly new to your house i've been there only started in that position in november. But what amazes me is that so. Shared it out i'm a single mom so i'm one of those people who. Really have to be mindful about the meals that i plan for my household and things like that. Yahara house does every single thing from scratch. Not a not a very very seldom is there a can opener for anything. Everything is fresh. And the members died sandcut and sautee and season and it's just a beautiful thing to watch. Somebody sitting at the table chop and potato somebody sitting over here chopping carry somebody over here making the broth from vegetable stock. To make it is so awesome to just watch. Members thrive members are also able to once they've become once they manage their ability to be in the house and show up on a regular basis. They can sign up to go out for temporary employment options right. These temporary employment options are supported by their caseworker. And it might be anything from cleaning to delivering mail to. Labeling medications in the pharmacy like. People are all over this city. Working who are members of your horror house. Because they were able to find life. Just as you saw on the video. Once they've been in the temporary employment. Position for a time and they've shown that they're ready. Now they're also still managing mental illness so they're still taking their medications they have they have symptoms that things that come up and trigger. And they come to your house and they sit down with their case manager able to talk and work through something. Put a plan together to be safe and then generally that get back on track it's amazing. Nothing like the work that i was doing an outpatient services seeing a person 1 hour week. And expecting that that's really going to be something that they can i don't want to buy a therapy because therapy is good right. But it didn't feel me the way that being with people every single day does at your house. Then the last thing i'll say is that after the te position. We have members who are working out. And regular job. And now that i'm at your house i'm more aware. Of our members when i see them in the community i'm like. I don't say it but you know i just do my own thing just you know a little wink or something like that to let him know i see you you know what i'm so happy for you because mental illness is really a serious illness. I don't know why we have. Took. Have a separate. Mental health. Services but. The overall well-being of an individual is. Michael. And that's what i operate from. And if it is something that's emotionally tearing a person down. It's going to eventually have some physical. Locations as well. As i learned from my own depression. And a recent illness or physical ailment that i had to struggle my way. Cell. Anyway that is your heart house. I'm so grateful to be there did i leave out anything fast that you would rather want me to call we also have social recreation activities. Once a month we have a support staff for our for our temporary employment workers wear once a month i get to come and talk about what's going well and we prepare they prepare a meal. Together with staff. Chihuahua. To talk about what's going well on their employment. And their employment. We have self-help groups in the house where people are able there's a dual recovery group there there is a cultural competence group that means there so there many things within the clubhouse that members are able to access. We also have. A psychiatrist psychiatrist who is on grounds. And he serves the members that we have at your house as well. I think that's pretty much it. he's members who go out for jobs are supported by us asthma at staff. So i don't know does anybody have any questions that they wanted okay alright alright so. So we have 140 members active members once people become really stable they may have secured. Their own their own it. Employment and they're doing well they can't become a cough associate members. That i'm not quite sure exactly how many associate members we have up there are 140 members. And we have special events as well like one of the most one of the largest events that we host is called the day of giving thanks. And that's where the house prepared this immaculate thanksgiving day dinner members are able to invite their families in and. Give me and i eat in shifts. Which is the way the work order day work it goes at your house and people are able to bring their families and on that day i think it was like 150 people i never saw so many people in that little space before in my life. So anyway everyday we plan meals for a lot for about 50 people. Sometimes this is the only nutritious meal that our members are going to receive. And we do make the meals very nutritious sometimes i try to spoil them we have regular people in the clubhouse who come in and back like so tuesday house meetings we know we're going to have rebecca's cookies. And on the 1st. Saturday of the month we know we're going to have peter's birthday cake for everybody in the house who has a birthday in that month. So this is an amazing community i i mean i could go on and on and on about all the wonderful things that your house does but. I want to make sure that i have time for the question. So i also work for nehemiah community development corporation as a member of their justified anger team. And because i work right over here in the dones marsh. Neighborhood and meadowood which are two highly. Populated. By people of color and low-income. the other part that's babysitter share that probably wasn't in my. It doesn't matter well first of all. African americans are less likely to seek out formal services for mental health or anything else for that matter right we just that's just the reality they're the mistrust. Of the black community with service providers. Specialty healthcare and even more so mental health provider. So my goal is outreach person over here in ally does march community what's the bridge that got. So people will come in and i just talked to jackie can i talk to jackie yep absolutely have a seat so we sit down and talk and i said well maybe you should consider going to therapy and having you know a regular counseling they say. Are they alright. Telling people my business or when you sit here talking to me like this is exactly what counseling. Really yes baby yes i'm even willing to help walk you through the process so. That's part of what i've been able to do over here in our lives. All of the alliedone smarsh community and now to justify daniel i'm trying to bridge some of those same gaps. And provide that resource remember family members over in the meadow wood community. We also have. Committee members do the hiring and a policy maker. Our house too. What committees infect committee members hire j. Yep and. We make policy and one of the things were moving forced to do is move we have a beautiful old mansion on the lake on gorham street. And because journey mental health is our office agents. Sometimes unfortunate. Because they're a giant mental health conglomerate in there being they are shaped by forces way behind us. They want to sell that building for a big profit and you're forcing us to move. So anyway. Pirate pirate from the membership staff teams. Is a planning committee and. We're looking for a building and also we're planning. We're doing some planning about. How would like to save herself in the future. I want wait we did a big survey on one of the big. One of the results of the survey was feedback we got it's that we need to really diverse. And i changed our membership you know we need. How to uncrease intervarsity vern membership because it's. Piranha. And. To do that we need to change the composition of our staff to. So we know that we're trying to change that but it's a slow process. Jackie knows how frustrated i get. She is certainly missed her some way she calms me down he's eating and but you know people are very open-hearted. It's a process. And we want to go into the jails and recruit people i want to go out to jmf. But to keep people there and to get people there into institutionalize it takes time. Okay no i'm not a token black i really good at what i do so they sought me out. I just want to also say that i recently applied for my lpc so that's my licensed professional counselor in training angry at some things that were going on that journey and i thought i was going to be leaving our very very very very prayerful and then this opportunity presented itself to me so. Instead of just jumping out there and taking whatever i found. I was able to stay and work on something now i have some tangible goals another thing that is happening in my life as i created a program of my own call power. And the power program is for people who are returning to the community from being incarcerated. Or from being in a hospital or institution for longer than 2 years. And the reason why it has to be longer than 2 years because so many things change in that. of time. And people need to be able to reintegrate and their families and understand the dynamics that are going on and i'll give you just one brief example if you were a provider. For like your family and your crime was drug-selling and then your significant person had to maintain for two years while you were gone and they have a legal job now they have an apartment they're stable and then you get out and come back and think things are the same well they're not. So i want to help individuals who are coming out be able to stay out. And if there's anything that you and me if you want to know more about power. You know because i really need some support with that i wrote the program i don't have a lot of fun thing to do it. But i am really passionate about what i do and sometimes i just do what i do because it needs to be done without any compensation in my family. You know you know is my family suffer sometime but i always i always try to make it up to them. So anyway if you want to know a little bit more about power. Ask me and also my program call foster. And i have families overcoming struggles to encourage restoration i have many irons on the fire because this is huge you know and my desire to help and serve. Is truly because of that mantra that i carry. You know i'm going to be the change that i wish to see in this world and that's that. Each member is assigned to a case manager. Ali clubhouse specialist his what are official titles are. But we also have groups like right now one of our member one of our staff is providing a microsoft word. Class. But at 12 weeks what people are able to learn microsoft word. On the cultural competence is a group of members who are chosen to come and talk about culture. And i do think like watch movies read articles and then have discussions about them. So that kind of is that kind of what you're talking about and then again i think i said this before i'm not sure if i finished my thought but once a month we have an outside rack activity. Where each department is responsible members can sign up and do something fun together. This month coming up. Cafe is responsible for the rec event so we'll have a number of member sign up we provide transportation and we pay. But people and we're going bowling so it'd be a a day at you no fun the bowling right. And then other members who don't get to ride in our van can actually meet us there and still have. Stop. The mommy march i think members where i thought maybe i was on. Yeah. Clubhouse is international. And we have members who are friends board have sent to those international conferences one of our members is on the assurance quality assurance not. Came in heat well what is it what is it that mark is on. Accreditation team and he goes all over the state. The help clubhouses meet the conditions so that they can be accredited as a clubhouse the clubhouse is international it is in i don't know how many countries but if you just kind of google it you will definitely find clubhouse is all over and even in the state of wisconsin. We have always received the highest. And the longest accreditation when our clubhouse is under review. Just recently here. This new thing i call it the beast. Ccs transform house services provided. Now i think ccs is intended. Should be i think it's community comprehensive services. I think it's meant to be a good thing but what i wish. Is that dane county with a waiting. Just put on hold until all the other counties work out all the kinks do you know and then said okay now will come on board but unfortunately. It didn't. that beast. That i fled outpatient services trying to escape and walk right into it now as a service facilitator at at your house. But they're you know we don't have a waitlist we want people to come in we are able to like if people come and they can meet those two requirements. And they are able to get an interview. And become members if funeral long as they're not a threat to the house or won't interrupt you know. What's already happening in that in the facility. And yeah. Journey sd. Hospice agencies for us but. We are also a camera like we do our own policy think everything in your house is done by consensus. If the members don't want it it doesn't have. So the members drive this house and what happens then. Thank you for having me thank you jackie that was really good. Go in peace read your newsletter you won't be is so inspired if you read your newsletter that's coming out but your neighbor than coffee enjoy.

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Pr130331Pryor-ed.mp3

Okay welcome everybody to perry unitarian universalist society on penny isla remember the program committee prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure we welcome you into matter what's your age or your abilities or inability later in the service. Are opening words today will be read by barn park this is a reading by e.e. cummings i thank you god for most this amazing day for the leaping greenly spirits of trees and the blue true dream of sky and for everything which is natural which is infinite which is yes i who have died i'm alive again today and this is the son's birthday this is the birthday of life and of love and wings and of the gay great happening it limitedly in in illimitable earth how should tasting touching hearing seeing breathing any lifted from the no of all nothing human merely being doubt unimaginable you now that years of my ears awake and now the eyes of my eyes are open. At this time please welcome john rebecca indeed karen gelato chalice after which we'll have a moment of silence on which we recall the world stories we light the flame for easter which reminds us that love is our greatest challenge for the opportunity to be alive in our president. At this time we like all the children and all the children at heart did anybody have a easter egg hunt today yet did you had it go i. Right so they really are touchpoints for the moment in time in which they occur if you go to necedah it is stuck in the 1950s and 60s if you read the signage it's it's concerned about the length of skirts for women for instance you know cuz i was the day of miniskirts and so of those that have a more universal message are going to fare better in the end of it and then related to even go back are very conservative men most of the bishops are very conservative so i'm assuming that one of them in green bay is that conservative-leaning and the reformist message that comes out of that shrine uniwerks towards that end. My folklore is buddies in chicago took me to that overpass underpass and we saw the salt stain and end the devotional space that had grown up around it and what was fascinating was when when you looked at it to use your imagination to really see mary but you know was that it was that kind of oval kind of portrait kind of profile silhouette. I'll tell you the necedah apparition birthed one that was in bayside queens for a long time veronica lucan they met at the former vatican pavilion in bayside queens at the old work fairground are the four years so that was kind of like it's the next generation one there's one that i started in cincinnati where there were three and five sites and kind of a complicated setup. So they've been jungian analysis of that there's been no, feminist analysis of that and it doesn't exactly addressing what you're talkin about compensating for that missing fourth element that got the trinity but four is really the more complete rounding number and that 4th would be a female end of the devotees as a mother they might be having problems with their children they are women they see her as a fellow on this path of motherhood and turn to her for help as a pair as a fellow parents. The visionary typically is female at not exclusively but typically back in the nineteenth century they were often young that wasn't the case in the 20 is at least the latter half of the twentieth century was mary people which was pretty unusual it was adults which was pretty unusual but but it is pretty common that it that is a female on seeing this the others the the written text you know the bible itself request but it's of a different assistant. When i was in cincinnati i was attending the 1st john i'm in there was a ufo fellow there who really wanted to engage me in that conversation and i just had enough other stuff to pay attention to it now about many of these visionaries submit themselves to physical and psychological test cuz they are so secure in their belief that they are willing to be tested and then they make a video of abc the woman just wired. Pete's.

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Pr111106TaraConverseRollins-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society my name is nick apps and i'm your program committee chair. we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure we welcome you no matter your age your abilities or your inabilities later in the day we are currently in the process of recruiting today tara converse rollins will be presenting get moving and introduction to dance movement therapy and hopefully all of you will get moving much more than the most potent antidepressant drug. When i was a time all of you been waiting for i'm sure our presentation today. As i said earlier earlier tara converse rollins will be presenting get moving and introduction to dance movement therapy tara is currently a therapist at rogers memorial hospital in a volunteer dance movement therapist at the hancock center for movement therapies she also works as direct care staff at st charles youth and family services where she hopes to develop a creative arts therapy program. She has a bachelor of arts from knox college and psychology with a minor and dance and she earned her master's degree in dance movement therapy from drexel university. Tara specializes in working with children from ages 2 to 17 who have experienced trauma and with a variety of behavioral and emotional issues she also has experience working with adults with mental health issues. Tara grew up attending prairie with her family from h7 on and this happily return to madison after 10 years to pursue dance movement therapy everyone please welcome. Hello alright hard to tell i can't tell if i'm not hear me or not. I just said my name is tarah converse wrong some longtime prairie person and i'm so excited to be asked to come here and share with you guys about dance move therapy which is something i have felt passion about for a long time i was talking to my parents on the last couple weeks is planning this and talking about what's been one of the services have been so far in prairie and i know that the last few have been on death and dying so i really wanted to make a connection as i start to what i'll be talking about today and what you guys have been thinking a lot about. There is a strong belief in a foundation of dance movement therapy the healing effects of dance to help work the experiences of grief and loss so. I hope that maybe you will get a piece out of this and something made that you can take and incorporate in your life and help you deal with something like that that is very challenging. So i want to start out talking about. What the heck is vans with therapy because. Are you don't know and that's okay you will know by the time we're done dancing with therapy or i'm going to be calling it dmt is defined by the american dance therapy association as a psychotherapeutic uses movement as a way to help people find expand their emotional cognitive and physical integration. In a person emotional cognitive and physical integration can be defined as cream connection between each system so the actions of one system can facilitate the workings of another. Stampy is conducted in mental health rehabilitation medical and educational settings as well as nursing homes. Daycares disease prevention and health promotion programs in private practice. Dmt is used to people of all ages races and ethnic backgrounds and individual couples family and group therapy structure. Dmc's a therapy intervention for people with developmental medical social physical and psychological impairments. And breaks i'm very excited to say the dancing therapy is not only something in the us actually it's throughout the u.s. and canada europe south america asia the middle east africa and australia the really exciting couple weeks ago i attended the adt a conference in minneapolis and they've an international panel that they do and it's different therapist from around the world. Phenomenal. only because then maybe i can your child to another country and do the same people around the world are realizing what wonderful things they can bring. To give you a little idea of what it takes to become a damn therapist therapist test to complete a two-year master's degree program and dance therapy the title of registered dance therapist or ardash dmt is grand entry level dancing with therapist who completed a program which include 700 hours of supervised clinical internship. Advanced level registry is board-certified dance with therapist or bc-dmt and this is there i need to change them so i have to remember what they are only 140 hours of supervised clinical work in an agency institution or special school with additional supervision by bc-dmt. Lots of stuff that goes along with that i just say that because sometimes. Legitimate. It actually isn't a recent phenomenon it became a distinct profession in the 1940s started by a woman named mary and chase and she's been teaching dance classes to children of all ages and asked to leave dance group at st elizabeth psychiatric hospital in washington dc. When they still do they have therapy now. Chase's wells maine psychiatrist at the hospital begin to notice the therapeutic effects of these dance groups on the client's health and the people involved in the group themselves. Talked about getting physical and emotional benefits from them. So she was asked to continue working with the clients. Making her the very first dance therapist. He mostly did group sessions in the main area on the units of the clients who come and go as they wanted to or could watch the session as their way of participating she also did individual sessions for people that the group. On structure was too much for them. How does work came the miniseries and structures that are still used in dmt today. The field and emt was influenced by numerous other fields such as neuroscience stands in europe and united states nonverbal communication anthropology and psychology. The american dance therapy association was founded in 1966 by a group of dancing with therapist to study with chase. This association established standards for professional practice education and training and the association was also created to create channels between dance with therapist who work in a very diverse settings. So. Dance therapy in a nutshell fan therapy history. The nitty-gritty yesterday so now to get into. What goes on in the dancing with therapy session what are we thinking when we're. Looking at clients and figure out what we're going to do. One of the main goals of dmt as i mentioned before as to help clients integrate their mind body and emotions and through this integration fine emotional growth in self-definition. A person who has emotional and by integration can use their body to express how they feel emotionally. Physical therapy has some major theories and basic assumptions that we all learn and we all use our foundation first is movement reflect personality. Second is the mind body and emotions are interrelated. Third is the relationship established between the therapist and the client through movement. Supports in the neighbors behavior change. Significant changes occur on the movement level that can affect total functioning. And the body does not lie. Stop those are the basic assumptions and then through that we also have most of their first follow the general structure of a warm-up theme development enclosure for the sessions both group and individual destruction therapy sessions helps to contain and support the clients as they work under a schools. The warm-up usually starts with the group standing in the circle so they can become aware of others in the group and make connections. When doing individual sessions the therapist and client often face each other. The therapist moves together with the group or individual acting both as a leader in a follower of movement. The therapist picks up on the movement of the clients and support them and meeting the goals for the warm-up section of the session. The warm-up focuses on three main areas. The body so warm in the body feeling the muscles. Body-mind connection so now we just being your head but connecting to your body feeling what's going on and the sense of the group being part of something. The main part of the session is the theme development and it focuses on one or several themes and topics these things are often chosen from what has emerged from the movements such as feelings concerns and stressors and current issues in the clients lives. The therapist works to develop an address these themes and topic which provide growth and development for the clients. Dancing with therapist use verbalization during team development to facilitate activities. Support the group and help group members make connections between movement experience and real life. Imagery and metaphors are often used in dmt. And as we saw with our kids props are also often use drinking developmental process some kind of purpose. And relevant to the goals of the session and encourage moving you saw them with the scars we have bubblebalz parachute stretch cloth musical instruments balloons and have some in the back over there with the articles if you're interested in making. Sing have a copy but elsa having stuff around and you guys are going to experience some of them besides us carb later. Sometimes it helps kids or adults especially to is to have some kind of processor using so some of them it help maybe help them focus on the story or maybe they'll be answer you're talking they can have this car. And moving with that as help. Encourage moving it's easier sometimes to move the prop. Then this move your body. Then we have the closure which is important because it provides time to resolve things that have come up during the session enough so the client to live comfortably and safely. Definitely therapist health clients cooldown by slowing down their movement. Make a movement smaller and less intense. Taking deep breaths and eventually stopping movement in order to process the session. Therapist point of things that they notice in the session what schools were learned discuss issues that came up acknowledged experience of the group and individuals and help clients transfer what they learn to the outside world. Apply those in real-life situations use those in your life whether it's a coping skill wallet understanding of yourself but you can't do that you have to help the continental to do that because that's where the real powerful. Fork happens is that we can do other things in the section integrating i'm here it's support but if i get a situation i can't use that coping skill or can't use that insight then stuck. Next i want to talk about quickly a couple assessment tools before i. Just move my stuff 1 assessment tool is called the kestenberg movement profile and you guys have it one side of your sheets of table and this is a set of developmental stages from birth through. alton and danced with the therapist looks to see at what stage individuals functioning at compared to their age. I'm not going to go through all this if you have questions anyway you can see how it goes through and there's different things that develop over time and is also caregivers packet different ages and what they would do. Not all of us have that could you describe the golden tower. There is once i go through that there's planes that they use. In movements than there is african rhythms with another assessment tool is observing and teaching will can't movement characteristics so there's a column that says rhythm and as a child develops they will they learn each of these movement rhythms and then after they then they begin to integrate them together and using all of the rhythm. Leonard also efforts which is the same another movement quality and they're in terms of space waste time and flow and you'll see that on there too. And with. There's kind of a there's two two sides apples there's indulging efforts and is fighting ever. Funny friends are bad because it called fighting at versus just there two different qualities it's really important because they know. Fighting efforts are bound direct strong quick. Lentojen efforts are free indirect light in sustained so they give you some examples. Combine them together because what rhythms. And if someone were to use. Found movement. Lysosome on burleigh. Or remove someone might be directing their moving or they may be indirect. They may be strong and what they're doing. 4life. Quick. Or sustained. And then the rhythms belongs at 2 you can do those. Jimmy corporate is called a sucking rhythm and so it's what you think. Even consistent movement which is. Think about is. Sucking is nursing. Is the rhythm of the heartbeat the baby hears when's in utero. It's rocking. It's a soothing rhythms that they develop so you also somebody who's. Going through traumatic experience while conversing with their trip is on the tv whatever and they're rocking. They're doing that self-soothing sucking rhythm because that's what. Babe. Be happy to talk to you guys later about ben gets kind of this. Understanding as they get older they combine them together a preference to use certain rhythm. Or efforts or have a lack of certain rhythms in effort. The result when someone being delayed in their development or absence of important developmental skills which can occur choose to various negative. Experiences during childhood neurological issues environmental issues in dmt2 therapist-client expand their options of movement so they don't react in the same way in every situation so. I think about that everybody has a preference of certain movement qualities that they like to use you may know someone that uses. Halogen vs. fighting vanessa therapy we think you want to have a balance you want to have all of these has skills that you can use and you can make about a different task. You know i'm going to light a candle. Quickly stained movement as i'm lighting it stained and i'm doing direct. Indirect lighting channel. It may be jarring to somebody else's so we help them. Florida mall. Then go get some clinical example started to see specifically how those we used when examining moving issue with month someone is abused they have a tendency to disconnect from their body as a way of disassociating from what is happening to protect themselves so in dmt we would help them reconnect with their body. Another example is a child to me i've been in many foster homes did not have a chance to attach to a caregiver. Would likely struggle to develop help it healthy relationship and be empathetic so. We would help them practicing dmt how to connect with others how to have someone a tune to you listen to you on a movement level on a verbal level that they may have never experienced before. Another example is working improving focus say someone has autism or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder we may use props such as balloons or balls to help give the client something to focus on. Do nativity such as mirroring or follow-the-leader to help the client passing focusing. But allowing them to be active at the same time i'm having that balance. Another example is to work on controlling energy level improving self control. Teaching physical skills to help clients be able to calm down and control their energy. Help clients when the sequence their movements and behavior. Do start-and-stop game be able to move and stuff. Relaxation activities and using props to encourage movement the clients had a lack of energy sometime people have hired hard to control sometimes opposite someone for a depressed have a single physical limitations medication complications sometimes it's harder for them to move so we'll use. Props often times cuz it's easier sometimes to move the prop instead of moving whole body but you can feel engaged. We're going to expanding movement repertoire engage clients and activities that make them useful qualities or efforts that they don't normally use so they don't use indulgent after it's me have them do bubbles balloons scarves maybe they don't miss fighting efforts me work on assertiveness have them throw ball hit a pillow. Or we might have them switch from using indulging efforts to using fighting efforts with the same activity. And talk how it feels different how's it feel to throw ball slightly in the air and then throw it against the wall. And the last thing which is what i'm doing right now is i'm working with the director of hancock center on and we work in elementary schools with students and teachers to teach movement-based skills to help reduce violence and bullying improve self-control stress management improve energy modulation develop spatial awareness. And manage anger both empathy skills can also be beneficial for older children and adults with modification so doesn't mean the date. In seattle just for an elementary school class cheer. So am i. The teacher guys animated a liz before bees with. Other side of your sheet and this poker game was created by woman and rena kornblum with the director should have mentioned her name. Helping you out here she's my supervisor and amazing schools. Having a discussion. We're going to be some movement text cuz i feel the best way to understand dance therapy is to move. Cars if you want to write your name down if there's a certain article that you're interested there's different articles on different populations that damn therapist work with. We're right down your name i can make cotton you make copies and bring here if you didn't get a copy of this and you wanted. Let me know. Alright well i went to the front one more time for a closing words having accomplished her goal of getting us moving today christmas help and imitates what he does until the child is comfortable with her and she attempts to be his body double with all his disturbances and his withdrawal his autism then she slowly changes just one part of the child's moving she attempts to become part of the space and rhythm around him or where he ends and she starts he doesn't know and after many weeks or months she slowly disentangle herself very slowly and hopefully. Gradually he recognizes her as an entity. Cease where she begins. He begins and she starts. Mitchell dragon. Thank you tara and thank you to all of you for coming tara will be available as she said after the service greet your neighbor and stay for coffee and conversation afterwards and let everybody know.

uuprairie_org

Pr190519JeanPapalia-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society. In a little different format today are usually. I am farber chadderton i'm chair of the hospitality committee and a longtime member of prairie. We are gathering here today our hearts alive with hope that there. That here we will be truly seen that we will be welcomed into the garden of this community where the simple and the elegant the fluted and the frilled the shy and the dramatics compliment one another and are treasured. May we know that here each contributes in their own way to the beauty of the whole. All are welcome all gender sexualities politics clappers non clappers progressive or conservative ourselves in the values of this community compassion courage transcendence and justice. Prairie programming like our namesake is a mixture just like the prairie is outside which is growing back up from the burning. We have presentations by friends and members of the congregation or today outside speakers on a variety of different topics. Are offering today is going to be dedicated to the tenant resource center. The opening words today. One word can end a fight one hug can start a friendship one smile can bring unity. One person can change your. Entire life. Israel amor alvor. We are very pleased to have jean papalia here today she is speaking on qpr glad you asked and unfortunately i lost the thing that she rode out to introduce her properly i am so sorry you found it. It's not covered between a salad. So jean retired in 2012 from the madison police force after 26 year as a patrol officer. She worked the majority of her career downtown including as we williamson street neighborhood officer and is a mental health liaison to the department. In 2008 she became a qpr suicide prevention trainer. Thanks to the support of safe communities madison dane county. She has trained more than 2,000 people. In suicide prevention but it isn't enough she is a co-founder of safe storage a state communities project. To stop gun suicides. We are very happy to welcome jean here this morning. Andy i'll let you start. It's always good to start with movie. Research shows that the odds of surviving a heart attack in a public place are ten times greater in regions where thousands of ordinary citizens are trained in cpr. It's called bystander rescue when someone shows signs of experiencing cardiac arrest the response of nearby friends family or co-workers is critical. The effective use of cpr doubles or triples one's chances of surviving a heart attack like cpr qpr is an emergency intervention for someone experiencing a life-threatening crisis qpr's easy to learn and easy to remember but it takes courage to overcome our fears about reaching out to help someone who may be considering suicide research also shows that where qpr is widely taught suicide attempts and death decrease just like cpr qpr requires quick-fold and informed action because suicide like heart attack remains a rare event we must train hundred to save one. Thousands to save hundreds and millions to save thousands. There's an old welt saying no great misery goes unspoken when we have a toothache we tell people we don't hide our pain but because of the stigma and taboo around the word suicide many people considering suicide don't speak plainly about their suffering they fear our rejection they fear that if they say something we will ridicule them or make fun of them as a result people thinking about suicide often use indirect language they hint at what they're thinking of doing they send us coded messages and i suffer in silence. Called suicide warning signs qpr training teaches you how to recognize the warning signs quickly decode them and then questioned the person in an informed and compassionate manner to learn if they are considering suicide. Just as talking about physical pain help diminish it. Talking about suicide with someone willing and able to listen reduces psychological pain almost immediately trained qpr gatekeepers are merchants of hope and hope help prevent suicide millions of people have now been trained and qpr rigorous independent research studies support qpr's effective and thousands of personal stories assure us that qbr is saving lives when you use qbr not everyone will be suicidal some people are simply stressed to the breaking point but they still need help help you can give please note that you cannot put the idea of suicide into someone's mind people are either thinking about suicide or they're not the fear of putting the idea of suicide into someone's head is a myth a myth that keeps us from acting when we should do just the opposite qpr is a universal intervention for people and pain whether they're thinking about suicide or not while it takes a special courage to overcome our fears we will teach you how to ask about suicide and to offer hope through listening listening is the power tool that restores hope in the hopeless we know you can do this and we will show you how preventing suicide it's what people do. If i had an hour i'd be honored to train you all. And qpr and send you forth as gatekeepers or. The phrase i love to use. I want everyone to be emergent. Hope. I teach qpr for free to anyone willing to come. And we can talk more about where you can join me for free training. But in the time i have with you now. I want to talk about suicide prevention. Using a public health. The public health approach is simply a framework to be used to consider how to problem-solve and respond to a potential crisis so he randy will click through this. What's the problem. What risk factors are the cause. What works. And how do you do it. I want to talk about risk factors for suicide. But i also want to talk about. Protective factors. Think of it like a playground seesaw. Where we recognize and acknowledge risk factors for suicide has a community. We promote protective factors in order to balance out the respect. And here's the good news. Protective factors benefit us as a community in so many ways. In 2017 we lost 917 people in wisconsin. Did suicide and in dane county we lost 700 i'm sorry. That would be awful 70 people which is more than a person a week. But by contrast we lost 710 people to breast cancer. Is suicide is the number one cause of violent death. When i was growing up and many of you may remember these times as well it was entirely inappropriate to say the word breast and say the word cancer. You whispered. Cuz if you said it out loud. You bring it to you. I have endless respect. For susan g komen foundation. Who in one generation. Brought the conversation of breast cancer to mainstream conversation. We talk passionately about research. In treatment. Care and survival. We proudly wear pink ribbons. A tire football team send their support and encouragement. Have a neighbor who has an enormous pink ribbon attached to her house that lights up at night on the roof. And she is survivor. Respect for susan g komen yes. But also in my case little bit of jealousy. I think i need to take a page from her playbook. When will you lose a loved one to suicide and as you can see that number surpasses breast cancer desk and continues to grow rather than level offer decline. We don't lose someone after a courageous battle with cancer. Any obituary. Our loved ones just died. Unexpectedly. We cannot possibly talk about suicide. Many people feel uncomfortable. Talking to family and the survivors are attending the funeral. Suicide deaths provoked questions of shock. Anger and guilt or depression. Annette on answerable question of why why. Just echo sadler. Well every suicide is a tragedy. And most likely people in the room have a connection to someone lost to suicide. We never talked about it we don't start the conversation about it. And we don't even dare to use terms like. Solvable. A preventable when talking about suicide. But suicide is not a mystery it's well-studied we know from research that these are the risk factors for suicide. We know that depression and certain other mental illnesses particularly schizophrenia. And bipolar disorder. Play a large role we also know drug and alcohol dependence and abuse. In fact. 90% of all suicides are those two. Drug and alcohol dependence. And a depression or other certain mental illnesses. Impulsiveness aggressiveness. Anxiety and rage play a role in fact anxiety plays a much bigger role than we previously knew. A family history of suicide. Now that's not to say that suicide runs in the family more likely it's the genetic predisposition to depression the continues go to go untreated through a family. A previous attempted suicide can also put someone at a higher risk. About a third of the people who died by suicide have had a relationship crisis in the weeks preceding their death. Recent losses are setbacks withdrawals from supports can also contribute. Many people describe feeling trapped. No sense of purpose. Feeling trapped can sometimes look like a benefit to us. Young man talked about. He had been given a college scholarship. To play football the first one in his family he was champion of the state team for for his town everything was riding on him keep his first one to go to college and his family. But yet she told his guidance counselor she's just looking for a way to make all the pressures go away. The weave with a few demands having everything going for him but himself is feeling incredibly stressed. But often people talk about feeling hopeless. So this depression. And certain other mental illnesses is a risk factor so let me show you what this list look like. This is a depression screening tool. There's no blood test or x-ray for depression. They simply were going to ask question. And this is how we find out. In fact. It seems like a lot of questions the first two questions are pretty effective. Have you felt sad or empty. Everyday for the last 2 weeks. Have you lost interest in previously enjoyable activities. Have you noticed changes in how you sleep how you eat how you interact with people. You can't concentrate indecision. Like the bad seed do you feel like you're in a dark can by yourself. Depression is a very common medical disorder in fact 60 to 80% of the time people respond to treatment. People get better. And people recover. But depression is fatally coded. In stickman. All of which is untrue things like. Depression is a weakness or depression is the result of poor parenting or depression is a moral shortcoming or something that people make up to get attention it's something you can cure yourself i just going to door county for a weekend no no no depression is the most common. Mental health disorder and it's treatable and manageable. Usually with therapy sometimes medication and always with support and care. From those close to you. If you hear nothing else today. Take away the message. That seeking treatment and encouraging someone to seek treatment for depression. Is fundamentally how we show affirmation for life. Worth. And dignity for every person. We know that recognizing risk factors and taking bold action to help people in a crisis worse. That's what qpr's all about. But we also know that. Creating a loving protective community. Is just as powerful. And is key to prevention. So we have two parts of each slide the risk factor slide. Are known risk factors for suicide in this case we know that job problems financial problems eviction and housing problems. Poverty particularly in later life are also risk factors. So when we promote fair wages. Access to benefits. Government and non-government programs that support people. During the financial crisis. We are preventing suicide. As mentioned earlier we know the treatment for mental illness in addictions can be effective. So anything we can do to promote access2care. To address provider shortages and underserved areas. The urge people to seek help in a time of crisis. What prevents suicide. When we talk about addictions. In a voice of compassion. And use our voice of support and encouragement. Wood nonstick matthijssen language. We can help someone get better. Dr. thomas joiner. Perhaps one of the most passionate and respected scholars and suicide. Was asked on a radio interview. If he could fix one thing. To prevent suicide. What would that be. And he answered it with a single word. Relationships. Anything we can do to promote social connection. Means we tackle isolation. And nothing is more life-affirming the movie reach out to someone who is in a crisis sometimes a place so dark that they had completely lost their way. When we specifically work. To honor the role of people in our community such as seniors and volunteers. Wise elders and treasure children. We foster relationships. We break down barriers and we grow compassion and understanding. As a merchant of hope we bring that light to the darkness. People need to be needed. And know their value. For who they are wherever they are in their life. Other risk factors. Unable to problem solve. Anxiety. A lack of skill for coping and crisis resolution. Feeling hopeless and helpless. Do not allow yourself. To think. 22 mistake a problem. With an expense. A flat tire. Is an expense. The breakdown of a valued friendship. Is a problem. Because no amount of money can fix that. But when we continually work to develop problem-solving skills. When we purposely develop in practice problem solving skills. We feel a great sense of control over our lives and we can manage stress and anxiety. We build resilience. The copyrighted tagline. For qpr is. Ask a question. Save a life. Promote qpr training but if it's not qpr. I'm just happy for any evidence based program. That looks educate people on how to take bold action figures others. That are out there they're all good. My husband said we get invited to more parties. I just said i was retired and stop right there and didn't sally forth about information about suicide the statistics in the toilet a. So please. Join me and being that socially awkward person who talks about suicide. Because it's a conversation worth having. Suicide is complex. But so is religion. Parenting. In growing old. Climate change. I'm preparing homemade pasta sauce. But that doesn't make suicider well. But you can sue about it. Topic. It's a topic of urgent importance. Am i loved ones may be living with a mental health problem. Or an addiction issue needs my support not humiliation. Or stigmatizing language. And enclosing let me tell thank you for allowing me to share this time with you on this fine mayday and i'm honored to be here. And i welcome. Any of your. Or discussion. And i'll say that right now right here in wisconsin there's a task force for suicide prevention going on they're having listening sessions that are going throughout the entire state and i am working with other people to say we we really need to talk about. A wide range of ideas. I don't want you to say well. We gave $50,000 to the hope line and i think we got this thing. It needs to be more and in you're absolutely right.. To take a mental health worker i expect them to solve it all just isn't going to work not when they're extinct. Young people as fast and as hard as they can. Absolutely anna and sometimes people say. I worked with this woman i was the crossing guard i did the morning to the afternoon and i said. Just like you know. Sing i got to do in the morning with you can we switch and i'll to the afternoon to the morning and if it's just a little training thing. And i just left it at that. Because whenever i say. We're going to go out so. She said she said but what you trained and i'm like. Malay i asked i said it's on suicide prevention and she said. I lost my dad to suicide i didn't know that at all she said. I would do anything to have him back. I'll work any morning when you're going to do that for quite a while and under the other kit everyone you start the conversation it's like this secret club that we all know somebody but. You know like like my husband tells me to do but when you start my conversation at the party about how it is a difficult topic to just simply talk about. But you know things as difficult to. And we're not there anymore so when we can talk about it. You know openly failure somebody died cuz they had a mental order or mental disorder or substance abuse addiction and they didn't get the help they need at the time. You know and we miss them terribly. And we we we greet them just like we would have said died of. Old age or getting hit by car in a number of things it's just a sad and tragic and we miss them the same. Yeah i've often said that. I am people ask that question it is there a time. When you should be able to take your life. My dear friend sue who lost her brother to suicide says absolutely and that decision should be made when you are in no pain. And under no illness. Nnn. And under no mental illness subscribe picture for mental illness and she said if you are in that condition i think you get to make that choice. But i have yet to see someone so tell you my part time job. I know this sounds strange for the department of health services. And the center for disease control and prevention. Collect the data on. Violent death. And they get it from every state so i'm the person for wisconsin. Who reads all the homicides. All the suicides. All the undetermined. And i read the coroner's report the police report. The toxicology the autopsy. I get to be the fly-on-the-wall. For all the suicides here in wisconsin. But almost. Twitchy. It involves. Just becoming overwhelmed. Pain people say in their suicide notes which i am. Privilege to read their last thoughts almost universally start out with. An apology i'm sorry. And i can't go on anymore i just can't take it anymore they have just reached their end. And then much like what the video showed i think the world would be better off without me i just can't do it anymore i'm more of a burden that sense of burdensomeness. An antenna sense that they're isolated because whatever they do just doesn't turn out right they have too much. Problem not enough give back to the community is extremely common and i know that all the people it was constant or not. The divers are not connected they're not like having conversations like what do you what do you put in your universal theme that appears. Is suicide notes seeing some i don't just cuz the way you know that i can mentation comes through but it's almost you don't does make me wonder if there isn't just kind of up a breaking point that people reach. Kevin hines is a gentleman. Who jumped off the golden gate bridge. Any left he's one of the 19 people that lived of the over i think it's 502 who jumped off and died. And he said just like the he said i'm going to tell you what the other 19 people told me and have continued to say the minute i let go with a bridge i realized i had made a mistake. That that all the problems that i thought were problems weren't problems now they were solvable what was unsolvable is that i was. Falling into the bay. And i think that's that's the suicide that you're talking about where it's where we can work together that it's and we know that suicide is extremely transient feeling one person said sometimes it's just one more dawn in other words just one more day can change things and among young people suicide is particularly difficult because that use an impulsive. You know my daughter always this to me how do you know all this stuff and i said i've been around like almost three times as long. You know. What depression does this tell you. You you can't change this is how you've always been to this is depression coates you with the idea of an inability to see the option. To relieve your suffering. That's what depression is. You think you've always been this way that's how you were when you were young when you're old. Maybe that's even help for your family's been. So when you sit there and tell them. I can help you you need to change i can help us we can do this. Do people build a resistance cuz remember this disease townsend nothing is going to change. So it was really easy as a cop because you had much willpower to kind of. Oh yeah you're coming with me you know because at like using the power to the good you know it wasn't an arrest power it was a life-affirming power. That we often use them in there were a number of times. When i admit it was probably questionable policing on ghetto entry and a number of other things that got me into somebody's house that said no no you're not going to end it this way we're going to we're going to you if you want to kill yourself it's not going to be at my shift you can do it later. You're going to come with me now and in a lot of that is is is the the impulsivity the. Inability to problem solve the lack of support no one to call feeling isolated overwhelmed that's it's all those complex things coming together. I must admit most people don't think about mendota and see it as a place of great hope. But you know that's not their first thought. But when people would go there i found everything from the guard who opened the gates to the admission people. We're calm. Tender compassionate in pretty much knew that. These people needed help right now and they were going to give him that help it was it was amazing. Thank you very much. The benediction for today is this by theodore parker. B h a religion which like sunshine goes everywhere. It's temple all spaces it's shrine. The good heart. It's creed all truth. The ritual works of love. It's profession of faith divine living. Good words to live by. Please greet your neighbor.

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Pr130728MadisonLaughterClub-ed.mp3

Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist. I'm penny eyler member of the program committee. Prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation or families. We welcome you no matter your age. Your abilities or inability. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of sir. Or by our ministers. Today we have a rather unusual service led by the madison laughter club. Dissipate. For opening words i feel like as a coordinator for the. Program. I need to explain my. Seemingly frivolous choice of topic. I found a blood bhayani blond. On the care to make a difference website. The captures my sentiments. Many religions and spiritual path. Are built primarily on bricks of cheers. Others demand almost superhuman courage. Decline there tall trees. And pick their fruit. Still others seem to just want to scare a silly. So we start behaving. According to their dictator. Our own impulses. Truth spy. And why doesn't laughter seem to fit in anywhere. This thought-provoking piece will really get you thinking. It's not. Actually laughing out loud. Why is there no place for laughter at the banquet table of organized religion. Could it be that if invited laughter would behave so badly. It might upset the first cart during the golden apples. Being served as a first course of temptation and enslavement. And then the whole table as well. Is the high priest chair the one place on the face of the earth that is off-limits to a whooping. What became. Other smiling buddha. With the rollie pollie bellas in the laughing. Orthodontist. I'll just before they died concealed fireworks under their robes. So that the mourners gathered at the funeral fires would be giggle tickled raleigh. Or ruled out of their grief. Compassion is one of the most powerful. I'm beautiful forces of human nature. Pattaya smile. As of wick around the glass jar compassion. Billet with the fuel of laughter. You have a molotov cocktail. Capable of sending the blue meanies itstriangle our souls racing. The blank are childless springs like to the room i smile can increase the brightness of the light exponentially please join me in reading the big smile and old fallout chalices lid. I do song i'm sorry player. East side of my mouth. Smile at dolphin that's possible. I agree to laugh several times daily. I had to give and receive at least three hugs per day. About to have frequent bouts of silliness. And our happiness for no reason. From this day forth. I promise to laugh long and prosper. Normally the chine would signal week. Today. Seriously silly. Laughter is the music of the soul. Get ready to make a joyful noise with the mask madison laughter club. This group is certified laughter yoga leaders and teachers. Will help you to become charged with joy through playful laughter and breathing. These joy ologist. Are here to share the mission of worldwide laughter clubs. Which is tonight the world in hell. Happiness. And world peace through the universal language. Thank you for having us as nancy said and i love all that you have put into this service outside of what we're doing. On the topic of laughter. And i'll tell you a little bit how many have even heard of laughter yoga before. Awesome. Will be do have some handouts i'll say this just so i don't forget there are handled outside of the door. Where you can learn a little bit more about laughter yoga and more about the health benefits. Of laughter in general they actually this actually was developed through. Studies that were done on laughter. And all of the benefits that we received both mind-body-spirit through laughter. So. It was actually developed by a doctor from india dr. madan kataria. He was a doctor who really truly did believe that or does believe that laughter is the best medicine. And. We do it first of all one because it's fun and laughter unites all people. There are no divisions and we in our training we actually got a dvd with people laughing all over the world and it's news. You laugh and you connect to. With people. The language. That bond. All people. So and fun fun and childlike playfulness. It's magic. And. Does the same thing finds us. 2. Is who developed this with dr. madan kataria as i said. Anjali studies in one of the studies. He found that when you laugh you release you know this chemistry this kitty cocktail. Of healthy chemistry for you that boost your immune system helps your heart rate. Tons of health benefits they do it in the cancer treatment centers of america now some hospitals do it when people receive chemotherapy it's it's actually really it is laughter is the best medicine. He decided let's put this to the test so and he's from india and he went out into the park. In india i just started gathering people to laugh and you know and then he started asking people. How they felt afterwards and everybody you know. Felt better after laughing and. Through that. Actually that was the first laughter club laughter yoga is now worldwide. I'm in like 60 different countries there's like 60,000 different left for clubs and growing growing growing all the time. And it's it's it's. It's healthiest that you're free to put you in the moment. And the yoga part is actually we're not going to make you get down and do downward dog and laugh for. The lap the yoga part is actually deep yoga breathing. In between some of the laughter exercises. So you'll feel a little of that too today too. So. I think i've covered. What's the weather. Let's just get into it. How we. The clap that we do. Okay. Okay how about this all right we got to go now. Okay we're going to want to do to start out with is a clapping. And michelle and. Betsy i wanted to call her becky all morning so. Becky. Everybody started okay and. Our fingers. In our hands together and we're going to be stimulating are pressure points on her finger. A little clapping thing goes. Ho ho ho. Hahaha. Ho ho ha ha ha ho ho hahaha. Oh oh hahaha. Yay. Childlike self just feel really open and fauna just have fun with it and this is going to hit is going to be fun but we're going to do that little piece between exercise. So that we know. That we're ready to come back to the next. Okay. And let's do a little stretching will soda little stretching. Come into the center it is the circle. Center it if you feel uncomfortable or anything. And. It's right as you're able or abel. But we also we don't want to forget anybody who's sitting so those who are standing and those around those sitting. Can also reach out and do the exercises to. To everyone. It's important to have really good eye contact. And when we do the exercise we actually want to try to circle around the room a little bit and actually actually. Come in contact with. You know several people in the room if we can. Okay. Alright have explained. Everybody okay. We will we will. Show you how it goes. So basically. So basically you're going to look each other in the eye because part of laughter yoga is truly is a worldwide peace movement. And laughter unites. And looking each other in the eye unites it. And bonds all people so you look each other in the eye. And your greet each other like you're so happy to see each other and yell loud. What did you know what the name of it is okay okay thank you. My stomach is hurting already how are you. Every first time i ever went to a laughter yoga class. At the end of it. Got to do this more omigosh to do is cellphone. There you can either. Do it. And actually as nits remind me there are studies that say that when you. Like talking to anybody there just. I'm also an occupational therapist and when i work with my patience i always. Say okay you know what even in the house. Or your imaginary. And and laugh have the best phone call from your best friend. Let's do a little bit of a breathing exercise okay so let's just go ahead and lift our arms up to the sky take a nice deep breath in. Through your nose. Hold it hold it let it out and laugh on the way down hahaha. And then laugh on the way down and it's okay to bend your knees okay. Yeah alright. Okay michelle. Okay and we're going to take. Two glasses okay. I'm the one glass is going to be full of. Wonderful yummy joy juice. Shake it up okay so we're going to pour it into the glass you're going to go. Back to the one at the other one. Shake it up. Hahaha. Shake it up. Okay the next one is actually a chant we do all kinds of things a laughter yoga one of them is a chant and it goes like this. I am amazing you are amazing we are amazing hahaha. Okay ready for that alright. I am amazing you are amazing we are amazing hahaha you are amazing amazing haha. Okay since. Spare time of the year. We're going to take a little trip to the fair we're going to get our wisconsin creampie yeah but today we're doing. We're going to take our cream puff. And we're going to have a. Cream puffs. Like a cream puff fight. Creampuff love. You conducted and try to miss the creampuff but we're not share are cream puffs alright. Breathing. Time for the yoga breathing time. Alright let's all be angels. If i get out your angel wings. Okay. Okay let's just kind of flutter around and. Think happy thoughts. Everything is happy and joyful. And playful and fun. You can giggle wiggle. Love for somebody to walk in off the street right now. We're working on the at the laughter. We're going to have. Some help. For our vowel move. I like this exercise to the. I'm closer to my mouth. We're going to go through the vowels. And for each vowel we will laugh the vowels. Okay. Alright so we're going to start with a. So you might be familiar with namaste. You put your hands together and technically the namaste translates. Various ways with basically my light shines on your light. Laughter yoga. My laugh lines on your laugh we are going to share our last blows with each other. Okay. Alright. It really really since oxygen throughout your in. Everybody in. Oxygen is life. Rings youtube. And so we're going to get out our oxygen masks and take a little breather here everybody grab your oxygen masks like. Okay whatever your nose and take a big deep breath of oxygen. Okay another breath. Laugh for me. Alright. We're coming near the end. I'm sorry. But we need we're going to do laugh formation. So we're going to have affirmation. Of each other. With laughter. So we're going to appreciate. Yeah you're not supposed to talk. And laughter yoga me say that. Okay. We're going to wind it up here. By throwing out all of this love and laughter and peace. Out into the world to all the places that really need it. So this is called touch this guy laughter. And those who are sitting. You will join us by raising your arms up when we raise our arms up. We will all join hands in a circle. Okay. And we're going to start like. I kids out on a playground and if we can get every everybody who's standing if we can get them in the circle. We can make another circle to. In the middle. You want to make a. You want to make a s circle they're okay and then those sitting on the chair when we raise our arms you'll raise our arms your arms with us and we're going to take that all of this. Awesome energy and out into the world. Because laughter yoga is a worldwide peace movement. So we're going to go we're going to raise their arms and and laugh as loud as we can. And send it out into the world. 123. Okay if we could just all kind of close our eyes or just be real quiet we're going to do just a little meditation. And it kind of houses to cool down a little bit from our great are rubik activity of laughing. I laugh with joy. When i hear someone else. Laughing. I off the lap to. They're chuckle or giggle makes me smile. And i feel joyful and light-hearted. The matter what is happening in my life. I can connect with my joy-filled inner child. I remembering silly things. Fun experiences and times. When i laughed until i cried. When i feel down or sad. I become still. And a spirit. Remind me of uplifting memories. I recall the blessings of my life. The times when i've experienced great joy and happiness. I let those memories. Watch over me. And i feel my joy begin to grow. Joe expresses first as a smile. Girl was at the laughter and expands into radiance. Which shines from within. And blesses. Those around us. When you're ready you can open your eyes. So usually take little time to check in and. See how people are feeling now compared to before you did laughter yoga. Myself i feel like invigorate it and full of joy and yet relaxed at the same time. It's amazing how it it kind of does both of you'll sleep very very well tonight. Actually doctor kataria his philosophy is try to laugh at everything and in fact in laughter yoga a lot of times we take things that are. That are stressful in life like we have this one. Call dum slam the door where you. You know you think about the stress that you have at the office or whatever works school wherever and. And then everybody says you want and we slam the door and we all laughed. If you do that especially in stressful moments in life even if you smile you change your chemistry. And especially laughter you can grow new neural trans. New neural pathways in your brain. And learn to respond to stress. In a different way and fill your body with. With chemistry that fights disease rather than create. Soon. Part of the just pure exercise of it. It's not. Humor it's not. Jokes whatever it's pure laughter. You know what's funny do you isn't funny to somebody else or whatever you know across cultures countries everything. Things are differently funny for different people so that's why some of these exercises just just bring pure laughter it's not necessarily a joke or whatever is more universal just a laughter. They did a study on the cardiovascular. Benefits of this and they found that like one minute of this if you really keep a laughing deep for a whole minute. It's worth ten minutes on a rowing machine. And my favorite thing that your body doesn't know the difference between you're laughing at a joke or you're just laughing. What doctor kataria says. Fake it till you make it. With us and came back and they said it when i heard this. Rock. Laughter and looked out and i knew what they were doing well after y'all got walking through the streets. Doing laughter yoga did you personally fake it till. I personally laughing my sleep so for me. And. It really has helped me a lot with my depression i am mom. Clinically depressed and. Since i've been doing that for yoga actually take less medication now and. All which is really really helped its you know it's all those great chemicals that are stimulating in your body. Is it easier to laugh now. At a lot of other things things used to be really serious. When i was depressed i just couldn't seem to get that laugh out in. Is actually a dvd that you can get to the library it's called a apology. And i highly recommend it because the gentleman in that. Dvd. Loses his laugh. He's on a mission. Defined as laughter again. Don't have a date. Bonita. Over here first. Italy actually releases serotonin and dopamine and you know all that chemistry that. We are pretty serious. Piety. I mean that's pretty amazing stuff. There was a study of laughter reader's digest i think posted this. And different places have there was a huge study done on laughter in children. In adults. And they found that children about the age of 45 laugh around 400 times a day. And adults laugh only about 15 times a day. So as we age we lose our laughter and that is not healthy. We're on a mission. We actually have an amazing laughter yoga teacher mike. Who does this every single week at the center for conscious living. There's that's in the handouts there to sunday that 230 he does it every single week. We do it at gilda's club also once a month every third saturday. So. Yeah yeah there's more opportunity if you want to do it. More in it at the center for consciousliving and gilda's it's free. The center they just asked for a little donation to help pay for the space. But yeah it's in a few. Go on if you look at the handout laughter yoga. org. If you're from somewhere else or you know somebody who may want to do this. Somewhere else it's it's all over. The country and other countries. Is awake find a laughter club laughter yoga.org that's dr. qatari has. Seitan. So. Now it's there actually is in that's on our our hand out there to there is a 24-hour laughter yoga. Mine or laughter line if you need a good laugh or you're somewhere where people are being too serious and you want to put them on the mic. Around-the-clock laughter does release natural painkillers. And your body. I'm so you can feel better my. My personal experiences my first laughter yoga class i went to and i talked about was that gilda's club because i'm a breast cancer survivor. I had to run back to base and i never took any painkillers i laughed. And i worked on my breathing. I also just had a hysterectomy a few weeks ago. Did not take any of the painkillers. We were actually laughing a lot before i even went into the surgery. I love this. My surgery was delayed cuz the one before me kept my ob longer. And so my nurse came in and sat with me 1.2 talk and we i started telling her about laughter yoga and all the benefits and how wonderful it is and she's like that. What is grade. And she went out and 10 minutes later she came in with a braid of four more nurses lined up at the foot of my bed because listen to her laugh. Okay thank you very much thank you. Closing word children are so receptive to a smile. Did a parent could make just one change in a 30-day.. To vastly improve their parenting style. I would suggest smiling more often at their children and offering more hugs and affection. Read the big smiling olsat breakfast with your family and share stories at dinner time he teasing. And there will be story. Diana loomis. Thank you for coming today. Add today if i give you permission. Greet your neighbors. With one of those hugs you swore you've been today if you and your neighbor are comfortable with that. Then you can join us for coffee and conversation. Thank you.

uuprairie_org

Pr130922Lowe-ed.mp3

And rebecca always thank you very much. Religious background color or sexual orientation denver family structure or age or abilities or inabilities. Today will be having a special people be having a little speak. On the. Penokee hills. And the. Debbie klein. Alice fighting and the susan the light the chalice and patio opening words. To encounter the sacred is to be alive at the deepest center of human existence. Sacred places of the truest definitions of the earth. The status of the earth immediately and forever they are and shield. If you would know the earth for what it really is. Burnet through a sacred places. You become one with the spirit that saturday is geologic time in space and some scott momaday. No time for our special presentation by dr patti loaches a professor at uw-madison and the department of life science communication she's a documentary producer former broadcast journalist. In both public and commercial television she's a member of the band river band of the lake superior jukwey companions your ward winning author of the indian nations of wisconsin histories of insurance and renewal just won the wisconsin library association's 2002. Outfit a book award. And native people of ascots which won the 2003 best juvenile nonfiction award from the wisconsin writers council new book 7th generation earth ethics. Is scheduled for publication in spring 2014 i have time to do these talks. Getting me set with the technology. And i'm sorry i didn't bring hat didn't bring my tools and didn't bring my chain mail or my armor and i'm kind of worried hermoso. And you know i really appreciate the fact that you it doesn't. It doesn't escape me that you intentionally incorporated some nature-based themes into this presentation in this day which i really appreciate i thought that was very sensitive. But thank you. And i'm really excited to hear that david newby is talking at union cell. With mama the madison. Action mining. Association which means that labor. The labor is now joined forces with some of the major players who are opposing this mine. And what's really important about that is this mining legislation which i'm going to talk about just a minute. Has framed this whole you know it's been framed within a job creation. Right. First of all the unions are not on board. I think it's an important thing as witness fight as evidenced by david talking with the mama post in the bedroom.. But also i've been doing a little checking into where the money companies are investing their dollars. The research money. Because you don't that's what that's always a good indicator if you know where companies are investing their money you. Get centrum where they like to be 10 years from now. Andrea tantaros make and some of the other mining giants have been putting their money into the robotic center at the university of sydney. And touting the fact that they expect a fully mechanized automated mine with intended hopefully. They they they're saying within 10 years. So now you can go online and you can find if you just google you'll find these images of. Driverless trucks that are carrying the ore from the mines to the processing plant. Hydraulic drills that those yellow horsey face robots that bc onkar simply lines. A little bot. That are planting explosives. So i think when you hear that there are going to be 700 jobs. Creative. Around this open-pit taconite mine. I think it's really important that receptive gone ask well where exactly are these. Jobs going to have it because. I based on what i've been reading and i don't think there are going to be 700 job. The other thing for those of you know i know that that plenty of you in this room are pretty socially active and you may already know this but for those that. That maybe haven't looked at the new mining law. I think it's really important get some highlights. First of all. Right now. Any mining waste waste drop and tailings can be dumped in any non federally protected wetland. There are going to be 850 million tons of. Acid generating rock associated with this mind that now can go into any wetland as long as federal federally protected list. That frightens me. The mining law shrinks the permitting. which used to take about four and a half years. 24-hour 400 days. And if the buy is the dnr. Hasn't. Made the determination on whether the mind goes in or not. If that determination has been made. Within 400 days the default is the mind will be permitted. And some of the things they're particularly disturbing to me is the dnr has been saying we don't have the capability to act that quickly. And. The state's response has been to eliminate jobs in the dnr's water quality. Section. So it seems you know i just it's really heartbreaking to me was happening. High capacity wells now can be drilled in any wetland as long as it's. Not on a federally protected list. And the final most egregious paragraph in this bill which is not law. Is that if any. Wisconsin administrative code. Law. Or policy. Comes into conflict with the mining law. The mining law prevails. So i mean it really a goosebumps just thinking about this. One of the really interesting things is you know the safe held one public hearing. Honest honest bill it was he held in madison. 300 some miles away from bad river. People had to get up at 3 in the morning and get on the bus to come down to testify some of them that never had the opportunity to testify because testimony was cut off at 75 many of many people including be. We're not able to offer testimony. And all the the. Pro not another the company got more than an hour of testimony time. Everyone else got no. 2 minutes including the only independent geologist to study that area professor from lawrence university. I think she got 15 minutes. And all the pro testimony was stacked early in the day i think maybe to discourage. People who opposed the mind sticking around and also to play the television cameras we have deadlines and he did believe a tree in the afternoon suddenly that's when all the. No opposition testimony was was collected. Still out the 1,200 people that testified or either in person or left as i did. Written statements. 1127 i think. Testified against the bill. Which i think is really revealing and. And one of the things i don't know if you saw the survey that that just came out this week. Done by an independent. Economics professor at uw-superior. Who did to survey a random sample and people who sell selected to take the survey. The people who sell selected to take the survey. 84. something percent. So they were posed to the mine. The random survey was i believe it was 67% of people were either opposed or generally opposed. And then there was a few that were neutral and only 13% of the people in. The county's ashland and iron county. Will actually be affected by this mind only 13% of people in random. Sample. Supported mine. And you're only 70% said there's no way they would ever consider working for the mine. So this. First of all we have a lot of that was. That was ran through and lightning quick fasten. S. It was pushed through this is a bill that. Later go get back acknowledge. It didn't back right the bill this was a bill bitten by the company that monitors the permit and at first it was you no no no one would acknowledge that but eventually because of some freedom of information. Request that were filed by the state journal on the madison center for investigative journalism. It came out at the end and everyone is acknowledged that the company did write the bill. So. There's no public support for this in the communities in which this mine. Kobe situated. Are our legislative process i believe it's been horribly, compromised. And. At this point the company it has done its sample drawing. It has applied for both. Sample permits that's where the. The issue is right now. And bad river is trying to create a legal defense fund and kayak at the trying to do public education efforts. A year-and-a-half ago in october of 2011 and all of this started doing full. I decided it was time for me to retire from journalism. I really do feel that this is a life-and-death issue for my my child. I need to starve. And you know i have all these fancy fancy doctorates and master's degrees in a better professional journalism for all these years and i figured it was finally time to. Tigger. Be the voice that my type needs at this point and i could be more effective. As an advocate for my tribe then. Anything i could do as a journalist. So i'm now. A former journalist and the first time i. Spoke out in public which was. In february 2012 at a rally at the capitol. We have never been. More scared in my life i have sweaty palms my entire life has been you know objectivity and i certainly have my personal opinions on things but. As a journalist you know our ethical standards require us to rush limbaugh. Be fair provide equal time and. And now here i got a microphone in my hand and then about to address the crowd and and you know and and it was really frightened i couldn't believe it but as soon as i open the gates open the the sun began to shine. Pretty blunt lovely here today the one of the things that was that i thought would be really helpful would be to do a documentary about our rice and mine. And because my my tribe really felt pretty left out of the process we there were no public hearings in the norm nobody came to us beforehand and. And asked what we thought about this. And this is corey you may know the ojibwe tribes sign three treaties that essentially gave the northern. I'm just going to do about the find gold here in the northern third of the state. North of phoenix point. Generally. We were forced to give up his land but in exchange we insisted on the right to hunt fish and gather on the land we were forced to give up because our ancestors knew that the reservation land we had would not be enough to sustain people on a hunting fishing gathering. And this is very. In keeping with our seventh generation philosophy some of you may be familiar with this. If it's a long-range vision. Basically that says every important decision that you make today. You consider how that decision is going to affect. Seven generations into the future. So you're always looking 240 years ahead to what you do today how it's going to affect your children your grandchildren and great-grandchildren. It might mean he plans an old rather than a pint. You might not be able to enjoy the open your lifetime but your children and your grandchildren. The missus. Really important. Philosophy and organizing principle it's. It's really important when you think about environmental vision. And the signers of our treaties understood that and our trees reflect that kind of thinking. Well as i began thinking about a documentary i thought well you know what would be really effective. Is a documentary told from the perspective of. Our young are young people. And. And. I think it's it's. Really providential. That. Our. Teenagers are the 7th generation from the signers of our 1854 treaty which established these trerice. And for the pat wilkins 2007 i've been working teach digital storytime. Two middle school kids on various reservations up north. Because. Are natural resources. We don't. We've got tremendous poverty but i don't want to say workforce because we have these wonderful natural resources. We have this rich culture. But our resources make us really vulnerable to those corporate interests who are interested in logging and mining and all those sand water. Scooby the next big battle i think. Exo. I i go to grant the first people spawns at which allowed me to buy a camera and leave it in bad river. And and work with three of my graduates from my middle school program for now entering high school. And so. The three of them. Shot every piece of video. Wrote every word. Narrated it and composed original music and i think the music is absolutely mind-blowing. And this young man david a thomas who composed the music. Was just elected one of wisconsin's music ambassadors and is. I believe the first native american student ever selected and he will be joining a time for us. Some country 10-city tour of europe. And i'll tell you the kids this young man comes from a family that is. Really hard scrabble i mean his family at huntsville. Precision gathers. Anna. Pretty much does subsistence basis there's always a deer hide. Hanging. You know over the clothesline backyard and. And his family is very traditional so this is. I'm so thrilled for all three of these. Discount people but i want to show you first of all a map. I'm going to. I'm going to freeze the gear. Alright so here's the. Your cereal talking about. One of the things that we did in this document at the youth storytelling. Workshops that we've been doing. We've been trying to engage kids and science. Because we need when we need people in our communities who. Because we have all these pressures from corporate interest. We need people to safeguard our resources. And storytelling is a rich tradition in our in our communities. The stories are usually. Told my grandparents who passed the the stories on to children's the way we. We teach culture. We have this this rich traditional ecological knowledge. So our program which is really a bottom-up kind of program we we go into communities and spraying we meet with elders and culture keepers and educators. And we are. What do you want your kids to know. And and then based on the information of the the community wants us to to teach. They provide the resources we we use. We invite. Scientist. From great lakes indian fish and wildlife commission this is a hard science space organization guy took up and women. I got peaches and. Fancy titles after their name in biology and wildlife ecology and. And we are children to interview their grandma's and grandpa's about the observational changes they seen in your lifetime. And then. We helped the kids integrate those two. Webster of those two scientific approaches together until story. And so we're trying to grow the next generation of storytellers we're trying to throw the neck. Generation of lance stewart who can help protect our resources and. Come up with their own vision of what we see are our future to be within the start of 7th generation philosophy. So. Again northern wisconsin the geology is such that the penokee hills are in upland area about. The pinocchio's are in the upland area. About 20 miles south of. Lake superior. And they're all these rocks and this is a portion of the documentary that. Is it. Everybody hear me by talking enough. So these these rocks were. It's the layers of rocks that were. Stacked on top of each other about 1,900 million years ago and then everything tips. North toward lake superior. It's. A wetland area as you can see you know i mean it's nothing but wetlands. And everything 14ft depere. Lake superior is i believe 600 600 ft above sea level so everything drains downward into lake superior. Through the bad river all these. 18 rivers and creeks and streams and brooks. All converge into the potato and marengo and tyler. Rivers and then they converge into the bag which drains into lake superior. And at the the confluence of the bad river and lake superior there's an area called the bad river and coggins flu. Which. Okay. So. It's. If you don't know what it's lucy is. Imagine the florida everglades everglades. Take off the cypress and put in wild rice and that's what this is looks look like i think it's like 75 76. Acres. Of wild rice. Ancient wild rice bed. And. That area represents 41% of the wetlands. On lake superior. So is this is such an important. Mexican place and and not just in our estimation. Ramps are of the un has a rams are list of most significant wetlands in on the planet. And last year the kakaga and deborah's lose were added to that list that was the u.s. entry so this is an area of worth. Protecting because. It's. It filters our water. It nurses. Fish this is this is where are game fish or it's a giant nursery is what it is for the same fish and sport fish and small mammals and waterfall. It supports of an incredibly abundance rich. Ecosystem of plants and animals. So. So i work with these three fourteen-year-old and i want to show you a couple of excerpts. The first. Excerpt. Really kind of puts. The significance of our rights into a cultural. Open waze. Cotton candy. plan to. I survived for a thousand years in the future. Thank you very much. In the way that our ancestors thought was to look at the bigger picture. I like to know. Hi my name is nia jax's this is a battle reservation it's really pretty and as a lot of woods waters wild rice and this is shania has family are traditional ricer so this is her. He's composing the music the three of us are making his documentary about lions in the snowmobiles to help educate people. Because it plays a strong part in our got my dress in the store. And one of the one of our people leona snowbaby migrated from the east coast. Getting back to their original homeland. They were told to look for science. There were many scientists one of those science. Was the food that frozen water they were told to look for the food that grows on the water. So they're your migration story is a long story. Locked up. Giannis in albany, oregon. All the way from the east coast. Roma. And island in the st. lawrence river to our. Niagara falls to detroit. Manitoulin island. To santa maria. all the way over to duluth minnesota. Safe mode south river. That's what they wanted when they sent their scouts out to look for the food that goes underwater. And they call him i don't mind going in those lights over there in minnesota. But they were also told laptop. And prophecy that done their journey would not be complete. And throw away the secrets album i guess appeared for the seventh time. So they went up to the highwomen on there. Do i do medicaid in the past. Vision quest. And i saw there there were messages at the end of them for a promise. well i was at a place called spirit bomb. There were passages at the end of them from the screwup to go back to a place called when it only one fine day and saw that that's a native word for around madeline island what a man is a woman the old mariner are the yellow breasted woodpecker. And so they go back to madeline island worthy i might disappear down for the 7th time. They know their journey was completed except. And was declared that sacred and plays a very strong role. And abuse that ceremonies and everything that we do today. But with society today things have changed. These are trucks up here you could see the massive size of it. Naughty hills where there are lots of streams and rivers. The ojibwe sign 338 in the 1800's. Laporsha girlfriend that eventually became numbers in wisconsin but in the cu territory reserve the right to hunt fish and galaxy. Will pre-race. And they are in the sea the territories. And their pinocchio ridge lies well within the city of territories. We have the right to hunt. And i got her. And i was territory ceded to the united states. And if those ecosystems if those blasts i was almost. If that water. Is threatened in any way. We are about legal recourse. What we're dealing with here is the. It's a life-or-death of our community. And that's really important. There's also an incredible ecosystem here. Environment is amazing we have beautiful rivers and sloughs is lake superior. And there's a lot of people who can. Grab onto those things and say. That i want to join with bad revert to this end. You can just keep this place. Well i don't like the idea. O'mighty. At all but especially your not. And the very delicate area of like my principles of mine is. That would basically their shots directly sell directly north of the mine this is what. I do recognize that. Metals. However i don't believe it should be at the cobb. Old people suite life. And that's basically. What's going to happen if those. Sulfites sulfates and i'm about to come battery acid basically dumped into a river system. I just. I can't see it. Play future friends of people here that happen. Because our people are so depending on our systems. Every little creature that feeds the fish that ducks. Swans geese. Every every living being. System. Good clean water to live in they need a place to. So this is a half-hour documentary i know what i don't want to take up all of your time i don't want to leave sometime question so i'm going to just jump to the end where we talked about concerns about pyrite and how you know what when aaron water gets sulfide and come sulfuric acid we're talkin about. Blowing up 22 you know miles. Of pristine. So i'm going to jump to just the end and i want to play easy closing compositions not because i think it's important because it's my favorite musical composition. Can you get us to the end here. Krewe of. Any degradation tour mother. .. The mama gina. Is the word. And my mama takes care of it. And we know. Thomas the beginning of time that as long as we took care of her she would take care of it. And. Today society is changing so much. A forgetting that. Where everything comes from. And they're looking at something totally different from what the earth provides and not seeing that in the destroying the earth so significantly we are destroying people. Dad and talk about what they knew before the story of our. Stop the video are actually the 7th generation for the 1854 treaty that surrounded. As we. Fight to protect ourselves and trouble we walk me and ryan are our mission is essential in preserving water and follow your life for native and non-native people all across the country region thank you. Composition of this composition. Taconite is actually a very low grade of iron and the penokee hills deposit they figure it's between 11 and 18% taconite. Antagonizes use to make ball bearings and alternative supportive things it's not it doesn't have enough integrity to be used for a funeral for structural kind of thing and the vast majority of taconite in this country is exported to china. Some of you may remember the ugliness on the boat landings in the 1980s when the fishermen and hunters the resort people showed up and they were concerned we're going to take all the fish and they were violent confrontations on the boat landing. Interesting as that died down interesting lee enough the next big issue was a huge x on copper and zinc mine at transit and a lot of the same hunting and fishing groups. Looked at the future and saw the only thing standing between them and and total economic ruin. Where did trivia crack. And so there were these really odd sort of political bedfellows polish inset that a road and some of those very hook-and-bullet clubs the trout unlimited and you know. Go to conservation groups the pheasants forever. We're signing friends at work race. Were the ojibwe on the treaty rights issue. And you may remember that in 1995 the state was able to pass a mining moratorium that imposed. It didn't end mining but it required the eddie mining company that wanted to do sulfide mine which is different than iron mining. Had to have three examples of where am i. Like that. Had operated for. At least 10 years and been closed for 10 years and successfully remediated with no environmental damage. Cuz i couldn't be that and so we haven't had no sulfide mining in the state so. I mentioned crandon because those same coalition's now are for me. The midwest treated support network the trout unlimited the sierra club that all those conservation groups at the sierra club. And and i don't want to imply that the trout unlimited people were either. But some of those. You know traditional hook-and-bullet club people have gotten on board right away instead. Look at you know we don't want a 22-mile long taconite you know open set mine. Because that's going to infringe on our rights. But they see that the legal tool. The black mine is within the treaty rights. So that's why they're they're supporting that. It's going to be premiered at the tales from planet earth festival here in madison on november 3rd. And then it goes to the big water festival on november 8th in washburn then it's at the green base on festival in february is making the film festival circuit and then uploaded. To youtube so that's available to everyone. But i think it's really important. You know what you mentioned about the jobs being imported. Couple things first of all. You may remember seeing pictures of commandos are penelope's. That was for the company's first opportunity to hire locally and where did they hire out of arizona i think that's interesting and second of all it's not known. Why blade is that that taconite mine in hibbing. Poison 100 miles of the st louis river and there's absolutely no rice going there anymore killed all the rest so that's and yet. you so that motivated to share this. Do you even like that to help with the word out about what we could leave here and do today. Wiggle hilda or whatever that what is that thing called. Msn.com. That will get you you'll see bettersworth website and and that will provide an effective you know what i could do is i can send these lights to. That would be helpful to know if you're inclined to. Donate money there's the link to beverly wood fence file. Visit the great lakes indian fish wildlife commission website.org and i'll send that to peter as well. The way things were because of our treaties. Are tribes. Have jurisdiction over anyting on our reservation. But this is off the reservation we have this organization that protects our treaty rights in the state of territory. And so look what is the first line of defense on this issue. And their website is against apart science. It's so dense with longitudinal studies. Health effects messes mess of the oma report. Gis maps of overlay showing you where all the potential mines are and where all the owns the mineral leases. Really great site and then i would also encourage the penokee hills education. Project. And they have a facebook presence and a website and i'll share all this with peter. Yeah that's that's where you know we've all got our fingers crossed at this point we have given up on the state where. Zetazen clear opposition to our our killing tata. The federal government now if the dnr approves the bolt sampling permit this is when i suspect that the lawsuits will start to fly from the tribes. Because it's not just the bad riveroaks away it's all of the ojibwa in 33 states alexa. did wayne michigan wisconsin and minnesota have common hunting fishing and gathering rights in the state of territory. So the same is going to be the same song second verse from the walleye lures and and. Spearfishing. Dispute i think you're going to see that. Culver's you come together. But the other tribes this date have also. Supported us and i think they're looking at those gif map saying oh wow i'm a pi maybe a menomonee but. Kennecott has got a sulfide mine plan there and i maybe ho-chunk but they're going to do you know pressed and lightning over here and so in all the tribes have publicly stated their opposition to this i wouldn't be surprised if. Some of them five fingers well. Then you have the wisconsin leave the conservation voters to sierra club that all these other environmental groups wisconsin wetland sociation. And i'm not part of your internal structure so i don't know for a fact that they're going to file suit but i wouldn't be surprised if we see some lawsuits coming out of the mainstream environmental groups. Or at least amicus brief friend of court brief filed. From from that's when the federal government once the bulk sampling if if the above sampling and a permit is is issued. Then it goes to the army corps of engineers. Then it goes to the epa. Then it goes to dia and the justice department which is charged with. Protecting our interests under the federal trust responsibility that you have on. This could be a while. Driving time from work questions at the service but if you could. Dave barry white man and the native americans were able to the spirit of goodwill and compromise to reach the first. What would become a long series of mutually beneficial reached agreements unable to two cultures to exist peacefully restriction of 25 time. Percy is a spiritual benefits of living in rock-strewn sectors of south dakota was found out of the land.

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Pr140511Celia-ed.mp3

Good morning everybody. I'm going to switch things around a little bit this morning and introduced celia right away at the beginning before she shares her prelude with us. Celia's joining us today she's a singer-songwriter comedian who's been described as a cross between an early and enya or is he and you. Joan baez and tina fey. She has open for notable authors neale donald walsch marianne williamson and dr. masaru emoto providing live music for the broadway production of vodka. By the international just plain folks award. Her symbol song has been named. The anthem for the veterans pentacle quest in support of religious tolerance. Phyllis from wisconsin and currently a call prescott arizona her home. She's touring with her 10th album shaman shaman journey and album design for meditation massage yoga in movement. No matter how many times you think you've seen celia you can never predict what she'll do and how deeply she can reaches the song. I would like to start by blessing the space and bringing us all into 141. So i'll recording track and then play it back and then record on top of that and then play that back and then recorded. Good morning everybody welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm lynn podolski a member here. At prairie. I just like the welcome everybody this morning let you know that prairie aspires to be a open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome everybody regardless of ethnic or religious background. Whatever your sexual orientation. Color sexual orientation gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities or your inabilities. And later in the service hopefully you'll be if you're new to prairie if you maybe haven't been back here for a while. I would love to be introduced you were reintroduced you so later the service will have a chance. Aubrey to stand up and say hello to us and we'll say hello back after the service. On sunday mornings we provide a pretty wide variety of services presented other by members of the broader community such as celia members here of our congregation or are in today for cecilia. So are opening words today or going to be. Share by julie line. For the beauty of the earth the spinning blue green ball yes. Gaia mother of everything we walk gently across your back. To come together again in this place. To remember how we can live to remember who we are. To create how we will be gaia our home. The lab in which we live,. Please welcome the hughes family we've got the paul and heidi and rachel up here tonight or. We light this chalice in tribute to the mothers in each of us. We like this chalice to celebrate those women and men who have taken on the task. Of raising a baby into childhood youth and adults hood. To celebrate those who have nourished the light of truth and compassion in growing minds and hearts. Just celebrate those who have committed time money energy to the children of this world. We like this chalice. Celebrate and hold dear this flame of love. Well i've already introduced her and she did a better job of introducing herself so i'll just hand over the stage here to celia for her presentation thing.. I'd like to start with a song that celebrates all of the different facets of womanhood and the fact that we women have different. Different gaits. Call women with weave. We women with wings may. Or may not be mother's. We all have. Mothers. And there are so many different ways. To mother. I love this little cafe that's out in black earth wisconsin. Called the luckenbooth anyone been there. Yes okay good for you know tiffany vaughn. City honors. And they really should something with me that changed my life. They both came to each other as a couple with many children. And so altogether they have an uncountable number of october. And. They said you know what i has there are no steps. They are all our children their nose. And on father's day. They have a deal where you get a free piece of pie. Your father. And i mother's day gift. Pipe your mother. You also get a free piece of pie if you are single father or a single mother on either one of those pain. Because they both know. How. Big overall it is to be both parents when you're single. This song is about. That urge that we have to care for others the mothering urge the nurturing urge. Inspired by when i was a little girl and a storm would come through and the barn swallows would fall. Out of their nest. Little person fall out of their nest and i have. Desire. Because my mother wasn't able to come care for them anymore. It was then brought forth when i was living in new york city. I was. Tommy makem the pub tommy makem the godfather of irish music yes you know. And i found a little bird that needed some guidance in this is the story. I want to tell you a story that i came to me just before we started service. I pranked him and said hello to me and reminded me that we hadn't seen each other for 15 years. That's what i just started my career was living in new york city which is where that song and fun. And he reminded me of the show that we did together at folklore village. Which was something that my mother had set up i was visiting from new york. And she was playing at a ceilidh band and was calling the kaylee. So what that means is she was calling the dance moves. So she couldn't play the bar. The bar on it's an irish drums made out of goat skin that's how i get the stones out of the bathtub. It's the enlisted me to play the bottom. Which i had never done before. The my mother taught me how to play this instrument 15 years ago and it is because of her that i now have. Instrument in my arsenal and this is louise the guitar and this is. Thelma. And frank was there when it happened. Do we have. I believe that every woman no matter her size her shape her store in her past whether she's a mother or not whether she's educated how much money she makes when she's married or not or ever has been. Every woman embodies the goddess of the tactic and do we have any goddesses hair. We come in this in our culture i've noticed that we come from a culture that it's that says no i am not worthy. I am not enough. How could i possibly call myself a goddess i am just poor little v. And this song when i first wrote it. I was a little. Afraid to sing it because it was a it was a bold statement. Because the song is called everyday goddess. And thank you willie porter who produced the album that is on because he said no to that one. To think it's really in this song is for all of the beautiful women here and i do not want to disclose other-than-honorable sexy handsome men. So you can decide if you want to stay long when you hear the words. But please repeat up to me if you feel so loved. It's really no big deal i'm just an everyday goddess it's real. It will come around again don't worry but there is a spot that goes in your room. Personally i think it was rather gender-neutral. Two fellas please join us if nothing else. Dedicate this song to all of it awesome women here in particular my friend carolyn you came all the way from argyle wisconsin just to certain time with me this morning thank you are sister who hasn't worn this dress. 50. Purple who has a sandblaster. And this is what this song is about the goddess. Embodying everyday. From the goddess of venus to kali the destroyer it all within us. Dermatitis again call responsible ticket in. The mother the crone. It's just another day. Yuma. What about the men who celebrate the god and it took me about 7 years to come up with a verse. We live. Biggie. Sea level. I would like to. Introduce you to my mother. Some of you may even know her she has a store in spring green wisconsin across from the general store called 4390 north or. Where she sells books. And jewelry and metaphysical things and beautiful beautiful items. When i'm in the area with her and like to do this piece with her but she is. This morning in her store. So what i did is i put my mother in this little box. Don't you wish you could do that. And it's a way for us to be able to do this piece together. As. Schulman's. We connect to the lillian. No are ancestors and then of course our children who come forward. And there are so many different ways to parents and mother. I want to acknowledge all of the single pan. I want to acknowledge all of the gay and lesbian parents. I want to acknowledge all of the people who chose to parent a child that was not their own by blood. And all the people who chose to adopt a child. And shoes to parent that child. A real life. There's a lot of ways to mother. And yet our children are not. Our children. The words to this piece are by hut hildebrand. Animelody is by sweet honey in the rock. And i like to do this. And introduce my mother who will come through the box. Herbalife login. Our. I'm not they are at your son and the daughters of life law. They come. They are not. Do they are with her. Alarm. Robinwood. We may give them our love. They have the road blocked. We may hold is their bodies but not their stone but their souls. Tomorrow. We may give them our love. Not always thought. They have their own. We have our own place. We may how is the body human how's our bodies but not there soon. Dwell. Tomorrow. Visit. Not even. So bear with me. Now you see me. When i have a hard time with human people i go to the standing people. Thanks so much to everybody for coming this morning please stick around after the service say hi to everybody enjoy some coffee.

uuprairie_org

Pr200209RProudRDeschard-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome my name is renee tashard i pronounce are she her hers. I am the prairie fire newsletter editor. And i am on the program committee and the design committee. And a search committee and i think the communication. I got a lot of committees. Hi. first be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation family structure. Age or abilities. Later in the service we want visitors guests and returning friends to introduce yourselves so that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services. They're either prevented by a prairie member like today or a member of the wider community also congrats to everyone who brave the snow that's still following. I label you as true wisconsinites. Snow is no barrier. Opening words today are to love life by daniel chesney cantor and bar park will be. To love life. Is to notice the wonders that abound. It's a notice the wonders that abound is to be grounded. Here and now. And to be grounded here and now. It's the beginning of finding love. For this life today. Lettuce ground ourselves in this instance. In the worship of all things good. And right. Let me have the chalice lady it's lettuce look first through responsive love and it's by maureen. Killoran and. It is dawn. Your man's coming to read it. In these hard times. Let us look first to the response of love. In the midst of challenge. Marcello's. Playing bear witness to the inherent worth and dignity of every human being. In the midst of uncertainty. May our challenge be a beacon to the encouragement. That our values make guide our choices. Let us look first to the response of 11. Alright so. Time for our presentation. Five love languages presented by robin and myself. Robin proud has been auu for over 40 years. She speaks regular bleach unitarian groups on subjects from literate church wounds history. And we've had many. The awesome. Service robin. And i. Send a bachelor of science in elementary education from uw-madison. And a library a master of library information science from. University of washington seattle i went to to uw-stout on purpose not sure how that happened. I worked pre-k through 12th grade public schools as a school librarian. And robbins going to start out our presentation and then i'm going to kind of interject. Because i read the the children's one and the single. Security. Typical scene in a marriage counselors office. So there is a. Couple say john and jane are unhappy and unsure if they can stay in their marriage. And james says. And the husband says well how could you think that i work all day i come home take care of everything and what i try to get close to her she pulls away. Well not only are these two people talking about different things. They aren't. Even really understanding each other's complaints. Gary chapman as a christian minister in marriage counselor. He created the concept of the five love languages over 25 years ago so how many people have read this book the five love languages. A few. He doesn't close some christian references in his books. But that's not necessary to understanding. His main approach and actually. This is not unique this kind of analysis exists all over the place has anybody ever had that myers-briggs personality test. Oh yeah. Muhammad ali. Or you might have taken some kind of assessment at work there's one called adiska disc model there's one where you have different colors red or yellow. And all of these are designed to categorize people's communication style or leadership style learning style. And the point is not to label people or limit. But it's to make us more aware of our own tendencies. And those of our family members or coworkers. So we can work together better. It might be helpful if you're on a committee with someone to know something about that. And helped us appreciate those who are different from us. On a work team i'd be happy to be the one that gets up and gives a presentation to management. But i also need my colleague who's very detail-oriented to make sure we have all the statistics right. Anyone who has been in sales nose. For some customers all they need to know is that the car is red and goes fast. And other customers want the consumer reports rating of reliability and mileage. If you try to present the wrong information to that customer you're just wasting your time. Or another book title but i'm not crazy i'm just not you. So the original book. The five love languages how to express heartfelt communication to your mate was published in 1992. There have been update there are number of options for instance dealing with children. Which rene is going to talk about some of these. And yesterday i received a magazine from toastmasters which i belong to it and they had an article i guess because of february about the five love languages and how you can use that in your toastmasters group so it's something that's out there. Let's look at the overall structure of the book. So. Most relationships. Start. With. The in love experience. Scientists have called this. Limerence exit it's actually something different from love it's a kind of infatuation intoxication obsession. The brain activity is similar to the effects of some drugs. Under the influence we often think that the other person is perfect and life will be a dream come true. Especially if we're quite young and we've taken most of our ideas for books and movies and popular songs. This state doesn't last. There's a reason so many fairy tales and romantic comedies end with a kiss or the proposal where the wedding. Or maybe just a tragic ending they both died so that you don't have to deal with the rest of life to take out the trash. Or when prince charming thinks that cinderella spent too much on shoes. So those are very stereotype examples but you get the point. And just a general comment we all appreciate all of the five languages. It's not that we don't have all these needs. But generally one or two of them will be most important for each of us. To really feel loved. Chapman talks about how we each have a love tank. And the contributions of others. Help us keep that tank full. Make it easier for us to reciprocate. In loving them. The first language. Is words of affirmation. These are verbal compliments on our partners activities qualities appearance cheeseman's. Just reminders that we love them. It's easy to take our partners or our children's good actions for granted and only speak up when we think something is wrong. Now some people grow up without a lot of affirming words. Some cultures are known for being stoic or limiting praise so we have this the famous scandinavians or the tiger mother who feels like too much praise would spoil the child. Of course the words of affirmation need to be sincere. Anime chick practice. Dr. chapman encourage his couples to write down list of things they admire and appreciate. About each other. And words of affirmation could be written a note left for a spouse or text could make someone's day. When we have a request. We can phrase it honestly and positively we could phrase it with an affirmation. Of the other person. A pitfall of his language is manipulation. In a way you could say that about all the way in which has the point of this book is not to give you ways to get your partner to do what you want. It's just like the first song that we had. You begin by giving love away. It's to show you how to give your partner the love that you really do feel for them. Or your friend your child and so on. Supper words of affirmation it's not about pressuring your partner for instance i'm encouraging myself to lose weight. Windows phone has never expressed any intention. Certainly there are many ways to support a spouse in something that they do want to achieve. And sincere and firming words are a large contribution. Renee has something. If i just have like a slide after each one that's kind of i read the child edition 14 children and then. Affection love is expressing the appreciation for the very being of a child of being of the person. I got it's not meant to be manipulative as robin side. Praise we think appraisal lot with kids but praise comes into play it. Everyone really. Chapman says make it true and specific so instead of saying good job. Good job on. Spending time building your block structure something little bit more specific than just a good job. Encouragement. To still courage give courage to attempt more i saw how you did act. So you're just like saying that you noticed something that they're trying. You don't have to judge everything that a person or a child does he can just say i know is that you did that and then listen to what they say back. And then i love you not conditional statement again it's not like i love you will you do x for me it's not manipulation and then something has to quickly apologized for any harsh critic or negative statements especially with younger people i meet with everyone really but you know everyone smiling might say something that we regret and it's really important to apologize. I'm saying i'm sorry doesn't really take it away but at least it. Make a little bit better and then one example that they had four kids which my phone mounted and i really liked was a note and you like a lunch box. And i just something not always like for a specific reason it was just. Sometimes like have a great day and sometimes it was like a birthday note or something but i just thought that was a relief. Nice one children. Okay the second love language is quality time. It's the first example the woman was complaining that her husband was always busy. Quality time really varies from couple to couple. Depending with the form to you some people go dancing right. For some people watching tv together could be a way to avoid each other but other people might be sharing experience and discussing what they saw. This is another example where couples are encouraged to make lists. Maybe there are some activities that one partner doesn't like her can't. Physically do. Some people thrive on group activities and can't wait to go out. With friends after work. Maybe the partner really needs quiet time to recharge. So we could be creative. People really are busy but maybe you could schedule something meet your spouse for a short lunch even if it's just for fast food. Set up ahead of time a date night or a. Time to spend time with a friend child or so on. A pitfall of this language is feeling pressure to be together constantly. It is healthy for each person to have interest in friends outside the relationship. One person might feel they're being dragged to something they don't like on the other hand they may learn about something. That they enjoy i would never following enjoy baseball that weren't for my husband. I want me to pick up mention here that love languages can change over time especially if they're based on assumptions from our childhood. When i was young my family lived on a farm. My parents never went anywhere that you've been there was nowhere to go we spent time at home so i thought that was normal. Dan's parents. We're very involved he lives in the suburbs and they were on the church for the park board to school board and many other activities. When we got married i used to complain that damn was gone too much. Vinny playlot sports. Off and i would go along to his games just because i had nothing else to do. But over time i started to get my own life. I went back to school i got jobs i join groups of my own. Our kids grow up so i wasn't so desperate for him to come home and take them off my hands. And now he's last couple decades he does travel a lot and i usually just say bye have a good time enjoy having that house in my time to myself. So over time some of these things may change what's important to you. Surely that would make sense with children. So quality time is also getting to know a child or person better is not just like the time you spend with them. And i had a bunch of example get a bunch of examples and these are ones that i'm sure lots of us can think of including kids and chores and errands trying to be a part of it and i was like sometimes that's easier said than done. Take her child child to a toy store just to look at the toys but not purchase anything. Scheduling one-on-one time is really important so things like that jason i do is. Why did the other prisoner break but also to have some one-on-one time is like on the weekend. I'll take saturday morning i'll take coraline the folder 12 like an indoor play place. And then jason's at home audrey he'll take coraline. I'm grocery shopping well audrey nelson the afternoon and then i get to do what i want so it's. She gets one-on-one time with each of us alone which i think is important but then also we get a break which is important as well. Alright the third love languages receiving gifts. This one is low on my priorities. Remember a co-worker being really upset because one of her four children didn't send a mother's day card. I really felt like she was speaking another language but obviously this really meant something to her. Now doesn't mean i don't enjoy getting a gift. But i can't i think it's a reflection of how i grew up my parents were really not interested in mother's day father's day their own birthdays or any material things. But for some people it's not that there. Materialistic but certain things have a real importance to them if they got that from someone they love or inherited it from a family member. They represent something. I just did i have to be a labrador expensive. It could be bringing home a single flower. It could be. Making a little paper sculpture. If your if you have a spouse with this love language and it's not natural to you you could make a list of small things to do to please your partner. Often a clue to the partner's love language is what they do all the time. So my sister-in-law and i'd only tracks everyone's birthday. An anniversary and gives thoughtful gifts and sends cards but she presents them beautifully it's always wonderfully done with sam basket ribbons everything coordinated. So what's a person who doesn't think of that sort of thing naturally i try to make an effort to remember her birthday with a present. A pitfall of this language is substituting money for love. The spousal tries to buy someone's affections is probably doomed to fail. And we need to at least try to give a gift at the other person will actually want so that's his typical sitcom thing where the. Husband give the wife of vacuum cleaner as a birthday present when she really wanted jewelry. Another hand i would much prefer the vacuum cleaner. So it shows that you know your spouse if you give a gift that. It's something that they will really enjoy. Languages for kids especially. This was one that actually came from those singles edition was the level of gift-giving can have a mismatch so like for example if you're dating someone and you give them like a really big expensive present the other person doesn't feel like they're at. Level of a relationship. Make someone really uncomfortable so you have to really think about what level and again talking communication to important relationship. To make sure you're at like a similar thinking level. Chapman suggested other than like birthday is amazing winter holidays choosing some guests together which i thought is kind of nice and that's a nice way to know that you're going to get something that's the other person likes especially with kids kind of hard sometimes to know what exactly they want. Who's my daughter. I asked her for christmas list this year in. I asked a couple times and each time i asked it was like totally different objects so we just. Made our best guess on that one. And then i thought this was kind of nice is finding a special place in your house or in like their room if it's for a child or grandchild and. Haven't talked about. For those who have receiving gifts as a love language y'all when we can kind of clue in on this as if you noticed but they do probably like display guess and they like. Will show people yes i'm in the room or in their house so that can also be a clue at this is someone's. Fort worth language. Is ex of service. This is the one where in spouses what do you mean i don't love my partner looking all the things i do around the house. Is a partner's love language is words of affirmation. Or receiving gifts or quality time. They may appreciate their spouses work but it doesn't particularly make them feel loved. I know. i am all over this one. Never mind the flowers they're just going to die anyway. Fix the leaking faucet or take the snow off my car i'm thrilled. I love it when someone does things that make my life easier. Suisun area where stereotypes continue to play a role many people grew up with a father. Rarely enter the kitchen or mother who never mowed the lawn. We bring these expectations to our new partnership. Without even discussing them. And then we were done our partner for not doing what our parents did. Why aren't you baking like my mother. And this is why studies have showed that same-sex couples have fewer arguments about household chores. Been heterosexual couples they don't start from an automatic default. They have to discuss who's going to do what based on preference availability other factors. Phoenix down loves to wash dishes so he's a good catch for somebody. A pitfall of this language is assuming you know what will be a service to your partner. Now you probably do know many things do appreciate but it never hurts to ask or make a list are they may have been hinting ornegi about something. And. Where i think about this is these days there are a lot of. Services available to do things for you for instance for groceries you can either order ahead and pick them up or you can have them delivered. I like going to the grocery store i like to see things that touch them and try samples. And no one has ever come up with a service i want which is to take my car take to the gas station and fill it up with gas check the oil because there's no aesthetic component to the gas station. So just knowing what your partner would like. It's always helpful. Acts of service are physically attending physically emotionally demanding so we also must pay attention to our own house. And loving service is a gift on freely again not trying to manipulate like i'll do this for you can just for me type thing. One thing that chapman talked about in one of the additions was asking because again you might think you're being helpful by cleaning up but some people actually will. Finance something like why did you do that i can do that myself. I think so. Would it be helpful if i did act can be useful this was. Contacted like a roommate situation but i think you can also work out their contacts as well. Africans being a role model for doing acts of service when we think of. Like social justice type things. Yourself you can be a role model. An example specifically for kids with like you know how practicing throwing and catching witch. Serving others and i put the bike in there cuz he also mentioned like fixing to be like fixing a bike fixing something that's broken for a child with like a piker getting something ready can be an act of service this is not have to be some really huge grandiose. Small thing. And. Fifth language is physical touch. Satanic human need. In the early stages of love there's usually plenty of touch. Even for those people who don't consider themselves huggers or touchers. Historically reason to get married was to be able to have physical contact sanctioned by society. Physical touch runs whole gamut. Many of the couples massage after chapman had reduced physical contact and they assume that's just what happens over time. But often this reduced contact stem from resentment. Over not having their love. Needs fulfilled such as hearing affirmations or feeling their partner's attention. And just like the. Hedgehogs. Or that sheep some people are more physical than others. It might be due to how your raise your personality experiences you had. Again he recommends practice. Midas my partner. Once physical contact and i feel like well i'm just not a. Huggy person he says you could practice. The pitfall of this language especially when we're talking about people who are not in a permanent relationship is a whole world of consent. When dating or put even in a committed relationship. It is important. For partners to communicate what they want and don't want and have that honor. Yeah and i can sense. The book for children was written in 2012 and then the one for the pringles with 2017 and i actually did see quite a difference between them. There was pretty much no mention about consent in the children one which i really didn't like i thought there should be some discussion on that but then in the singles one there was a little bit of like. Inappropriate touching like abused so there was some more dedicated to that but this was an area i have was that i would have wanted to be a bit more. So. Figure out a primary language for children under five according to chapman. And. Do you have a primary one but the other four are also important and at the primary one can change like through childhood and i actually think it can change also after childhood as well depending on your situation and unconditional love. So these are the languages and so they're a couple questions that people have will what if your partner's love language doesn't come naturally to you. Dr. chapman says so. He said my wife's love language is acts of service. What are the things i do for her regularly as an active love is to vacuum the floors. You think that vacuuming florist comes naturally to me. My mother used to make me vacuum all through junior high and high school i couldn't go play ball on saturday until i finished vacuuming the entire house. In those days i said to myself. When i get out of here one thing i'm not going to do i am not going to vacuum houses i'll get myself a wife to do that. But he says i vacuum our house now and there's only one reason love. You couldn't pay me enough to vacuum a house but i do it for love. And next question what if my partner isn't being lovable. Do i have to be 21 to do all the work. Well jesse chapman addresses this with a passage from the new testament. But. Secular counselors and self-help books basically say the same thing the only person whose behavior you can change is your own. Chapman's clients regularly found that when they took on showing love to their partner without expectation of immediate response. Surprising results dedecker from their partner. So we can't go into an order to make the other person feel or do anyting. It really is like that song you have to give it away. Enchantment states love is a choice and there might be relationships where it is necessary to end the relationship but so many of the couples that he mentioned really wanted to be together they wanted back what they had. When they first met. No one should stay in a relationship that's unsafe or unhealthy. Another question is how to know if you're giving your partner what they need. Well you could actually ask. So at the end of the book is it talks about her like a job. Review. Tell your spouse you've been thinking about your marriage and have decided you'd like to do a better job of meeting his or her needs. Their suggestions will be a clue as to the primary love language. Or if they don't make suggestions you could get the love language based on the things. That they've complained about over the years. Then for 6 months he says focus your attention on that love language so there's no instant gratification. And at the end of each month ask your spouse for feedback on how you're doing and for further suggestions. You also could begin to start asking. In a positive way for the things that you need. This book is quite a fast and easy reader many copies in the library. If you like you can skip over the references to christian teachings is really the information stands. On its own and i would say just like with any self-help or self-development book i recommend. You use what works for you. And don't worry about the rest. If nothing else you could have an interesting conversation with your partner and there is a quiz in here you can take. 4. Determining your. Love language if you are not sure. And you're something else.. Find any of my people to see how these could also apply with siblings. How could this sibling be so different from me. Or. Work people at work. Definitely. You may not think of it at the love relationship but it's a relationship where you need to support each other. And being able to give people what they need. Could make a big difference so do we have some comments questions. Well yes we do have a lot of tendencies and sometimes our tendency under stress is different from our tendency when we're not under stress. But we do tend to have default that are the most likely. To apply in certain situations. Yeah i was reminded of another somewhat related thing at work we actually. Our managers asked us how we want to be recognized and i would love to go up in front of the group and everybody applauded and some people that would be a punishment to them they just want to have it may be an email that says good job you did this really well and they do not want to be singled out in any fashion. It's all in the same that could really apply with children. The things that one really thrives on another one. Coors. That's actually one of the stories in. Actually that. Channel manuel's. To practice. Supposed to end his phone call with his parents who never said i love you to say i love you at the end and the first couple times it was just like silence was interesting later in a conversation. But you did it over like months like. Continue just to say i love you at the end of the. Phone conversations and then. At the end of several months the dad said. I love you too back and for the. Very meaningful to actually have. Heard it like he knew that it was there but so that was another one that you can't like change other people but if you. Continue giving things out sometimes you can get something back in return so yeah that was actually up in the that was in the buck maybe it was. In the termite you could also be generous with our partner is trying to. Give love. Stan's dad. Forever if you did was 60 years old and his dad would say enough gas to get back so you know dude did you check your oil and every so annoyed at me driving for so many years and is easier for me cuz it wasn't my dad but. That's your dad's way of expressing his love for you he's concerned about you. Thank you everyone for your comments. Closing words before we go and kate is going to come back up. Having let go. Set our intentions. Named our curiosity. Committed our energies and given ourselves over to live the balance. Purpose and meaning. Let us begin again. In love. Thank you all for coming please extend a hand of friendship to those around you and greet your neighbor if you can join us for coffee and conversation afterwards thank you all for coming.

uuprairie_org

Pr110130EducatingtheJailors_Drapkin-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome welcome you all this morning. If i wanted to say that we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure. And we welcome you no matter what your age are your abilities or your inabilities. Later in the service we will be welcoming visitors and friends and guests and returning friends we're here at prairie you you and we look forward to getting to know all of you better. On sunday mornings here prairie we provide a variety of services and they are presented either by a member of prairie a member of the wider community or by. Me your current part-time minister. And today marty drapkin is going to be our presenter and a little bit later before i introduce maria will read his short bio and very glad that we have a nice turnout today for this very important and relevant and interesting service. Our service today. Is going to be a presentation. On educating the jailers. Presented by marty grafton and i will read just a little bit about marty and then he can. Present himself in more detail when he comes forth. A former prairie member marty griffin is the director of wisconsin's program for training county jail officers. Working for the wisconsin department of justice. He has been involved in jail officer training for more than 30 years and he has also written several books. And numerous articles on jo issues. He is also the author of the novel now and at the hour. Which is set in a mental institution. So we welcome party this morning. Thank you reverend james. Morning everybody glad to be here. My presentation is a little bit of a follow-up to. Margaret carpenter is a presentation last week for those of you who are blessed to be here in here that great presentation. About. Prison state prisons were few words. And i'm going to talk a little bit about county jails. What i'm involved in so what am i to do is talk a little bit about three issues and then open it up for questions but i'm not sure what kinds of issues are really interested in. Then little bit about. Prating of jail officers. Avengers some issues they have to do a county jails and then we'll see how that goes. Last week about prison she works for the state department of corrections and as the education director for. Bat large bureaucratic agency. So prisons are not the same as jail sometimes the terms are used interchangeably but they're different prisons are either state institutions as margaret talk about or federal dave johnson for example last week mentioned that he'd been a volunteer. Are for the federal prison here in wisconsin which is an oxford. Oxford correctional institution they call it. County jails in the other hand are. County institution. That's operated by and solutes there's a number of differences between them. Prisons hold everybody was in a prison has been found guilty of a criminal offense and sentenced to serve time they're so margaret for example last week said that the people are there as punishment not for punishment meaning. That the fact that they were incarcerated the freedom is taken away is the punishment. Punishment for having been found guilty of committing a crime. So that's what the ponytails are very different however. Some of the people in county jails are there as punishment. But many are not why because county jails hold a lot of different types of people. Some of whom have been found guilty and are sentenced to serve time in a county jail often with what was called huber privileges. But for short periods of time prisons people are often there for many years. County jails. It could be. Weeks months. Apri are sometimes a little bit longer but much relatively shorter periods of time. That is true of a princess. But many of the people in county jails who are incarcerated, details are not there because they've been guilty and are there as punishment instead they're there for the purpose of that they're rested their brought the jail they stay stay in jail for a. of time. For detention. So that there's a guarantee that they'll be available for court appearances hearing trials that sort of thing many quarts are. Released on some form of release. Personal recognizance bond bail. Things like that at some point either early on or a little bit later but. Then you're not. For that purpose for detention not as a form of punishment you can't be punished until you're found guilty of having done something county jail's also. People for other purposes people who are in transit from one place to another. People who are there are probation holzner worth around the community on probation and their probation officer. Field violated some condition of their probation so they they bring it to the county jail in their carcerated they're on while they probation people are are determining whether. What to do with them with me clued revoking them with me. Probation. And perhaps returning them to jail or prison to a lot of different things. Prisons because they sort of hold just people who are found guilty and are serving a term of incarceration for the punishment. People are in jail. Generally for much shorter periods of time some longer but many shorter so often times people are only in jail for days or weeks. In wisconsin we have 72 counties 71 which have county jails the only one that doesn't is menominee county which is primarily the menominee tribe. And they have a tribal jail but all the other 71 counties have jail some very big so very small. Milwaukee is the biggest 3000 inmates. Dane county is about 1000 a little bit less probably the second biggest. Rural counties are very small you know 20. It makes something like that. So there's a great variation between them. Jails are under the control of a sheriff was an elected official for four years so he or she is sort of the main person that has a number of responsibilities a biggest width of wichita county sheriff's department is running the jail. They're funded by county boards of supervisors they made the. So also elected official. Elected official that runs the place and elected officials who make funny decisions on them no surprises political. And also politics unfortunately i guess. Sometimes fortunately enters into decisions on. What happens in county jails later. Kind of a big difference between jails and prisons that enters into a lot of what i do in terms of the trading is that. A big. Characteristic of county jails is uncertainty on the part of. The inmate. Prisoners were in county jail. 4 people go to prison. There's so that uncertainty. God know it's tough to be in prison. At least there's not that uncertainty. People come to county jails and they don't know what's going to happen to the many that are how long are they going to stay there what's going to happen to them in the legal system is their probation going to be revoked are they going to get along sentence. What's going to happen and they're faded. Are there any criminal justice system in the criminal justice system is big and powerful. There's police there's course there's prosecutors and defense attorneys or jails or prisons the big thing and here's this little guy. Their fate is out of their hands so there's a lot of uncertainty. Plea-bargaining and enzo's lawyers are making the decision court you're making decision and here i said you know i'm in this place and they're telling me what to eat. Where i'm going to be hosting. Yeah you know what my baby at a cell with several other people and there's a toilet over there and i'm going to the bathroom in front of. So many people in this house a lot of people in county jails. Have a number of problems. Medical mental health alcohol and drug abuse everybody but for many people. So there's that difference also between jails. County jails and prisons. Not to say that easy for people in prison. Not at all different in many ways. Is robert jay said i work for the state department of justice a little bureaucratic agency that i work for it. Golf training and standards bureau which is in charge of. Training a lot basic recruit level training of law enforcement officers jail officers. And people working secure juvenile detention facilities. Way worse in our state is at the people who work in county jails again or county employees not state employees. Are there either deputies. Or. Civilian correctional officers depending on the county dane county here for example. The people work in the dade county jail our deputies their law enforcement officers. That's what they do is they work in the county jail for a few years and then. They do what they really want to do witches be out in the street in a car with a badge and a gun and all like that that's what they want to do it. The way it works is that the states. Has the responsibility of doing basic training of other deputies instability correctional officers. We set the standards for what the training is recertify the training academy certified instructors that sort of thing. Tornado the course training course for jail officer is 160 hours in length so get we stayed set the curriculum. Trainer requirements basic training materials that sort of thing. And the training is actually delivered regionally throughout the state. Another if we don't have a centralized training academy. It's regional and most of the places our state technical colleges or in some cases they're what we called playerbase academy. Like the milwaukee county sheriff's department that sort of pig. But they don't have to do the same basic curriculum. The train for people work in the state prisons as longer i'm not sure it's about. Six weeks gateway something like that. 23 months. But yeah. We also a requirement that one somebody is ghosting that trading it is certified as a j lobster didn't have to get 24 hours of training annually. But we don't stay requirements for the training it's the local decision. I want a person certified to work as a jail officer he or she is eligible to work in any any jail in the state so then go from here to there cuz it's all the same basic training. So this 160 hour course is designed to give him a basic knowledge and skills. About how to do the job of working in a county jail with which isn't an easy job. Sold the course covers issue is such an overview of corrections all history of correction. On basic goals and purposes of jails. Chantix decision-making big issue. Interpersonal communication skills which is biggest issue. Because basically were. You know the man really the main thing is to teach people how to. Communicate with other people within me. Dairymaid mention to treating people nicely. And fairly. Well that's face before trying to do. What's involved in all that. How to talk to people how to listen to people listening skills how to ask questions how to respond to question. And that's really the biggest issue because a lot of. People coming into jails. Chameleon no surprise with some authority and attitude. They don't it takes awhile to grass that thing that people are there as punishment not for punishment they sometimes have the attitude. William b. Agent of punishment socastee teach these people. It's not easy but we do the best we can and we're continually improving that part of the most important thing that we try to do it too. Listening communication skills. Undergirded by an attitude which is to treat people. Politely respectfully. Weather. Dignity. If we can do that basically then i think we've accomplished a lot. It also covers. Skills and supervising inmates. Fraternization. That sort of thing a big part of it is supervising to recall. Special in me which means those who have. For those who may be emotionally distressed mentally ill which is a big problem in jails his old mansion. Possibly suicide risk developmental disabilities. Sexual orientation issues lots of different. Categories like that so we spent a fair amount of time in the training focusing on that. In a lot of that is if it's a combination of education and training. In regard to people with mental illnesses mental disorders. Education in the sense that we try to focus on his understanding of. Mental illness. For example what goes into it what it's all about. Because you know there's a lot of misunderstanding about that a lot of stigma attached to mental disorders. With people who have. Who may have mental disorders. We spent a fair amount of time on what we call serious and persistent mental illness is serious depression bipolar disorder. Schizophrenia and anxiety disorders anxiety disorders. Why do people have them. So anyway we deal with that and that's a big issue legal issues and what are the legal responsibilities when you work in the jail was where the basic core standards that have been set down. So that they have an understanding of bad state rules statutes. Report writing. Stop admitting and releasing people. Security procedures you know how to do collins and sell check filter variety of. Education on the one hand to sort of understand. Beyond the train and event training specific skills and the other hand use-of-force is a big part of it. Pretty good program part of the problem with it is that you know we're doing basic training this recruit level training now they go back to those county now in those 71 county jail. Summer progressive. Some are doing pretty good job some have a good climate that they're working in sometimes the sheriff. Run the place for the jail administrator make clear to his people that he or she expects them to treat people politely respectfully so on and so forth. Valor cases that doesn't happen. So the training the basic training that the state does start can only go so far. If the people in that particular jail don't reinforce that. And set a kind of a tone if you will. Sometimes it can be a problem. Just some key issues in jails. Aside from the training. I mentioned before that uncertainty has the big issue among people who are in jail and that leads to a lot of boy by call emotional crisis situation. People in jails. Very common big they come in many then come in there and toxicated on alcohol or drugs. Anthony robinette they stay in jail. The uncertainty of jail the experiences of being a jail. The insurance about what's going to happen to them. Being away from their loved ones being away from their employment if they have that. Not knowing what's going to happen to them in court for facing out has leased to a fair amount of. Uncertainty and emotional. Crisis to one degree or another. So we have to train people did to deal with that to recognize symptoms of somebody being an emotional crisis and dealing with that. You're acting out behavior and then and that sort of thing. So i'll just have to be trained to recognize and deal with that quite a bit. Early on and later on i felt a connection.. Another issue is that because people are in jail generally for relatively short periods of time it is hard to do effective treatment of them. In a lot of ways it's really mental health treatment. Margaret made mention last week of education. And talk about what what station. Well. County jail's not so much do a pretty good job of. Education programs. Whether it's adult basic education or more commonly ged is probably the most important thing. That happens in jail. But unfortunately most information out there long enough to really take advantage of that could benefit from that. But again something better than others. Another problem made message to briefly is that because females are. County government. You know what elected officials in county government there's really a great variation. I've seen over the years i've been doing this answer to the level of professionalism. Incarnation and level of commitment to programming. Four inmates and factors one is. But their elected officials who descended another have to kind of i don't want you to work pandora but i guess that's what it is to their constituents tough on crime. Rock and roll baby these people while they're here. That sort of thing. Difficult financial times for county's more and more which so there's a lot of money for programming and amenities. I just simply different personalities. What i've observed is that. The bong. The county board of supervisors the sheriff's to jail administrator depending on who's in there they can be wonderful or they can be terrible. Just recently for example accounting in northwest wisconsin near eau claire. Brigadier general administrator there who have been there for many many years. Great guy ran a sewing machine repair business on the side. And so he was just a person who had a great level of commitment to. Law enforcement type person on the one hand but he also. What's a person who had a feeling for the deeds of inmates on the other hand and. Udo advocated for programs educational programs. Life skills programs anger management i programmed all those things that are designed to help people even though they're in for a short. of time. Did a great job he retired. Was replaced by some people some guy who came from a prison out-of-state came in with a hardcore attitude every thing changed. That's what happens i'm sure it happens and state government but i think it's more pronounced even at county government. And that sort of thing. You know sometimes. A certain amount in training. You do the best you can and sometimes that doesn't work as well as it could because of personality. Butt enhancement it works wonderfully the other way she talked about education last week 1 county i know of the sheboygan county. There's a woman in there who works for the. Local technical college system. But she's real advocate of education and she's one of these people who the word know is not in her vocabulary anything is possible so she's been there for a number of years and it doesn't matter who. Steamrolling over all of them to get educational programs in that jail. Just a personality. So there's this that variation. I guess that's just the way it is. If i have another factor about jails they made mention to briefly is that really doesn't people with justin. Wide variety of problems a lot of people come in with medical problems. Sometimes very serious medical problems. Lot of mental health problems. Jails county jails are actually unfortunately some of the biggest places that hold people with mental illnesses. Los angeles county jail for example if the biggest inpatient psychiatric facility in the united states right now in cook county jail. Harris county houston houston texas rikers island in new york. That's just reality that's the place where people would because it. Durand other places for them. Do jails hold a lot of people with mental illnesses substance abuse problems. Lack of education developmental disabilities so on and so forth. And it's. Dart just aren't other good places for than there are simply aren't good community treatment options. Some more more there are diversion programs. Interstate we have 14 clark county has a mental health court. There are various drug court there's even a couple of veterans court. So there are some things that are positive but for the most part it's a fairly bleak picture. And so jails are not designed as treatment facilities their design for a fairly narrow purpose in the criminal justice system but de-facto they are treatment facilities are people there. Recognize in. Effectively deal with people with a wide variety of. Emotional mental health substance abuse problems. But it's one of those deals where the start of the best you can do is kind of tread water. And suicide. Factor in that regard we always have more suicides in county jails than we should in 2010 for example we had 10. Which is a high number or a lot of suicide attempt. And i think. Just from what i know of a lot of that. Goes back to that sort of uncertainty and. Being sore points in the criminal justice system for example just anecdotally in county jails. We know that. A lot of the suicide attempts in his successful suicides are. Not necessarily people who have a serious and persistent mental illness like serious depression or something like that. Instead they're people who. Felt a lot of people kind of come into jail. Low-grade depression and anxiety. Something that's a factor in their lives all the time. Now they're in jail. At the hands of the criminal justice system on the one hand there away from the. Sort of things that they normally do to try to manage the stress that they have. Which. Unfortunately. always good thing alcohol. Drugs marijuana that sort of thing. Catherine jail they don't have those stress relief factors. Can they have stress because you know i'm not like a lot of things are going on. As i said before people are making decisions for them so sometimes people get bad. Phone call a letter visit. A very commonly though they'll go to a court appearance whatever it maybe. Or their lawyer will give them information things aren't going so well for them as they thought they might in the criminal justice system. They come back. And also a lot of more people with poor impulse control. And so they deal with the problems in a negative way by making a suicide attempt. What county jails are dealing with people who. Difficulties in life and emotional situations and that sort of thing. So that's what we're dealing with and we're doing the best we can to try to. You don't help. People do it so it's it's a little bit. Enforcement agency a sheriff's department that runs a correctional facility. The best i can to be professional about it it's not a treatment facility but yet they're dealing with a lot of people who. Should. Beginning treatment and and the other thing that happened good in some places and not-so-good another places is a cooperation. Between jail officials and. Treatment providers county treatment providers. Whether it's medical mental health substance abuse. Sometimes it works pretty well dane county was pretty well today county mental health center who staff the dia county jail. Picture of the mental health. Other places. So just trying to give kind of an overview of.. About the situation. I think i'll stop there and just see what kinds of questions that you may have. Don't talk about. Correctional officer. And i should have mentioned in terms of requirements for. Fat people working at county jail. The requirement that the state level is a high school. Degrees for high school diploma or equivalent. Brass for law enforcement officers the state requirement is it has to have a minimum of 60 college credits. To be alone so there's a difference. With some education of primarily on many 4-year degrees but. A lot of them have two-year associate degrees. Police science corrections science that that sort of thing. Answer the question. Well, he certainly go through that in the state department corrections certainly has hiring standards they do background investigations and that sort of thing. Not if you want. She said that they do screening to to try to determine beforehand that people who are hired are. Are pastry humane people and not trouble just decided murder. At the county level 2. Doesn't work that way but. One answer to that. You know they serve our whole philosophy of having jails and prisons is that. People don't want to be there that people would rather be free than be there. Reality is that for me for many people to some people. This is a sad statement but being incarcerated is better than what they know outside three meals a day. Roof bed my own bed to sleep in are you kidding me. People not walking on me all the time and. That's what i said about people with mental illnesses. To meet again you would think somebody. So that would be a terrible thing it is bad for people with mental illnesses to be incarcerated no doubt about that. But. Something i've become aware of is that. There are times when family members of people with mental illnesses. Are happy. Short-term that their people are incarcerated. Because you're not on the streets are not homeless or away from the drugs alcohol give me think about that think about what a situation that is that family members are. Not happy but please their loved ones are in a jail. Answer your question but yeah. Being in jail. For some people it's better than what they do otherwise in other cases being in jail is now a rite of passage. For many people for gang members in that sort of thing it's like when i got that was a rite of passage for me the same deal. I just want to add something to what marty is saying in that respect we have actually seen and not to great degree we've actually seen prisoners a derail their release her because they are afraid of going back and and and in failing i've actually watch that in the juvenile arena as well them of doing things and violating rules and regulations in order to prolong release and in that is a sad state that's a sad state of existence for us in terms of our society and and i think that's where we need to continue to look at how do we change the services that we're providing is society so that we are. Diverting in the first place people going into jails and going into prisons cuz sometimes many times prison jail release right to prison which you said marty but we watch that happen numerous times. It's interesting that the united states supreme court case on protection of invasive that being one of the issues. Was based on a transgendered person in a 1994 case called farmer versus brennan. In which icon. Person who was. Male want to become a female was on the way and was receiving hormone treatments. Baba and not yet had the surgery was it a state prison. And. So the hormone treatments give a person feminine characteristics and they placed him in a. Male general population rate visit as you suggested physical email you're with other males. He was physically and sexually assaulted he sued and went all the way to the us supreme court supreme court found the prison officials liable for failure to protect him. Categorical establish the standard. The bisons done. Which is that once. Jail and prison officials are where. Sirius respite thread. Their failure to do something about it. Make them liable for failure to protect i bet that's one aspect of it. But from a trade perspective we teach that but we also. Do the best we can assist to teach. You want to talk a little bit about transgender people. But the prison system is seen more of more than the county jail's not that many. But we county jails are seeing more people who are sort of. Getting the hormone treatments in a little bit. Another legal issue in wisconsin state state legislature passed a law. Saying that taxpayer money. Cannot be used for. Farm. Treatment. Hormone treatment i believe in certainly for the surgery. Are people who are incarcerated. Play with that log when it was. Passed by the legislature was challenged by the aclu and. Some of the group. On the basis that the failure to provide that treatment. What am i allowed to deliberate indifference to a serious medical need of a prisoner and they specifically cited it.. A disorder. American psychiatric vsm450 for diagnosing mental disorders gender identity disorder which is a serious disorder. Causes depression anxiety suicidal feelings without certipay. Not sure what happened to that challenge do you know. How do you know. Currently a gift inmate comes into the system already on the treatment we are required by law to continue that treatment so that's a recent ruling. Before before i step off i just want to read one thing shot county jail. You're nice thing called memoirs from behind the gate. Whitey's playing mason just want to read one called doing time. I've been to jail i've been to prison i've lived a life in hell itself. The choices i made with wrong ones no.. I've tried to live a life without negatives in my side but everywhere i turned drugs were within my bike. Problem. I've always been responsible for the wrong choices so now i want to live a better life and make all my dreams come true. Sooner or later everything will come to me my life will be true and free my life will be as i dreamed free and full of forgiveness from my pure hell. I will escape my drug-filled life and create a better one which i know is within my sight thank you. But thank you very much marty and of course marty will be here afterwards there's a luncheon afterwards and time for talking and and asking more questions cuz that was just the tip of the iceberg or sure so thank you very much. We're hate rules let us bring love where sorrow joy let us drive more to comfort others than to be comforted to understand others then to be understood to love others more than to be loved. For it is in giving that we receive. And in pardoning that we are pardoned. Going pee.

uuprairie_org

Pr130113Para-ed.mp3

Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society on penny isla remember the program committee prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation or family structure we welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities or inability later in the service we will invite visitors and guests and returning friends to introduce yourselves so that we might get to know you better on sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of. Closing words from dr. james hansen one of my heroes what do i know protesting in front of the white house and what would you do if you know what i know and the ted talk thank you for coming.

uuprairie_org

Pr160814SandyIngham-ed.mp3

Good morning. Welcome to prairie. Unitarian universalist society by name is sandy ingham i'm prairie. Consulting minister. If this is one of your first times here on a few. Are just visiting us we doing the time a little later on in the service where we will. Invite you if you want to. Introduce yourself. And if. This is one of your first time we courage you to come back more than once because our services are very different. Sometimes i do them sometimes someone from within the congregation will do a service. And occasionally we will have an outside speaker. We welcome you. No matter who you are no matter where you are on life's journey no matter your your gender preference no matter your ethnicity no matter your background no matter your abilities for your inability. Age we welcome you. Wherever you are on that journey. All today is service. Will be different from our usual sunday programs and i'll pay a little bit more about that in a few minutes. There will be several periods of silence. I'm hoping that you can think of today as being more in quaker mode of gathering. Rather than our usual. Presentation followed by response. This morning's offering will be shared with the literacy network of madison and there is an explanation in your order service about the literacy network. On. August 23rd mark cocaine who is our representative in congress. We'll speak about a trip that he made to israel and palestine. That will take place and at first united methodist on the square 203 wisconsin avenue. In our time of grief. We light a flame of sharing. The flame of on-going life. In this time when we search for understanding and serenity in the face of loss. We like this sign. Of our quest for truth. Meaning. And community. Today. We offer you a place. And a space. To heal or. Begin to heal more accurately perhaps ponder ways. Ways through ways of recovery ways of moving forward after so many weeks months years of one terrific killing after another this is a tricky thing to do in a unitarian universalist congregation maybe. Not going to have a response time. Think of this is. As i said earlier more quaker like. If you are moved to say something. Something on point in something breathe during the moment of silence that are interspersed. Brought the next few minutes. That's fine. But this is not. The time. Or the place or the space. To search for specific answers this we're not going to try to solve anything this morning. And this is not the time for judgment or blame or pointing fingers or even trying to make a point we we do that almost every sunday morning during our services someone has said to me we have to have or we should have a response time because we need to talk about her feeling i hope it's some point we'll do that we're not going to do that today other than what you might feel moved to say. Drink. Reflection time. But we can do that. I'm always up to having a session to talk about feelings we don't talk about feelings though. But if you really want to do that either on a sunday morning or at a different time than a sunday morning break will do it. 1520 minutes isn't really enough time to. To go to deeply. But i believe that there is a collective greece. Hey sorrow. In our country. Delete almost everyone is suffering and feeling pain. Because of the tragedies and the traumas that have been occurring with much too much regularity and consistency. We need as a nation. To acknowledge and respect. Our shared grief. And sorrow. So use this time i hope for. Quiet. To be sad. To breathe contemplate. Cry if you. Where picture. April of 1999. Columbine high school. I have a six degrees of separation connection to columbine. Eric harris. One of the shooters. Lyft in plattsburgh new york. Mid to late nineties. I was minister of the interior universalist. Congregation in plattsburgh in. 98 + 99. Eric harris left. Plattsburgh in july of 1990. Free he was 12 years old. He have lived there since. 2nd or 3rd grade. Wyoming plattsburgh attended. The plattsburgh unitarian universalist society. He went to through the religious education program. There. After the shootings. I remember he was a senior and dillon were seniors. After the shootings. Beyond beyond. Who knows who else. How many other bureaucracies to cia. Appeared in plattsburgh because our juniors and seniors. At the plattsburgh, new york congregation or still emailing eric. Any touch with him right up until the week before the shooting. So all of their laptops and so on were confiscated and with the help of a wonderful director of religious education and seem to always look out with yuri we we did we did several sessions with the young people. A sharing and talking about their feelings. I could go on and on from that tragic event in april of 1993. And they are 99 and name. Too many other senseless shooting you know the litany. I wish that i could stop with the sandy hook elementary school shootings on september on december 14th. 2012. That's the one that i cannot get past. That's the one that makes me want to flee this country and go i know nowhere yet it continues. Orlando. Dallas dallas. Baltimore madison. As i said you know the litany. This poem by edna st. vincent millay is in memory. Of all those laws black and white young and old and in between. In memory of victims yes but also in memory of those who are responsible for these things. They were victims of a different sort. This problem is for all those lives lost over the last. Several decades. Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring. And all the flowers that in the springtime grow. And dusty rhodes and crystals. And the slow rising of the round moon. All froats that sing the summer through. And each departing wing. And all the nests at the baird branches. Show. In all winds that in any weather blow. And all the storms at the four seasons spring. You know more on your exalted feet up past that only mist and morning. No. Or watch the win. Or listen to the beat. Of a bird's wings too high. In air to view. But you were something more than strong and sweet and fair. And the long year. Remembers you. How to spend a few moments in silence now. Tell me about despair yours. And i will tell you mine. The line from mary oliver's poem wild geese. She goes on to say meanwhile. The world goes on. Nuclear weapons genocide chemical warfare. Global warming. The list seems endless. The list of ways. That we are capable of destroying life on this planet. At least human life. Joanna macy tells us that we are in denial about this. Macy is a buddhist scholar a general systems theory expert a woman who has worked with many victims of tragedy. Including the people who live near and were affected by chernobyl. Macy's not the only scholar with been trying to wake us up she says that we americans refuse. To feel. Yep grief and despair. Must be acknowledged. And work through. If we are ever going to solve the seemingly overwhelming problems. Here is macy's definition of despair. Olas. Of the assumption. That the species will inevitably pull through. The american dream does not include acknowledgement of despair. It can even be seen as a lapse of faith by avenged l equals. Buy some. Mainstream christian. Acknowledging despair might also be. An acknowledgment of powerlessness. Certainly admitting that we are in despair doesn't fit with our culture's craving for instant gratification and instant solution to problems. But there are useful steps and despair work and despair work must always be done in community. And if there's enough interest we can have workshops gear. About to spare. This is i hope a safe place they face. The steps in despair work. First of all. Having feeling grief for the world is not morbid. Remember that door staff quotes and i used last week not all are guilty but all are responsible. We need to recognize that all of us grieve almost all of us i think. For the state of the world. This is also known as some of you may know this term positive. Disintegration. Very much like that turn. Positive disintegration. Second step in despair work is allowing ourselves to feel. Feel all the emotions not just the so-called happy ones which were the only ones that we were encouraged to feel in my family a horrible but to feel all the emotions images to arrive of our creative cells. Energy will be created. But we have to remember how important it is to wait. Wait this is called active waiting. And we're making space for possibility not for hope. Forget hope right now hope is labor. We are making space. For creative solutions. Howard thurman rice. I share with you. The agony of your grief. The anguish of your heart finds echo. In my own. I know i cannot answer all you feel. Nor bear with you the burden of your pain. I can but offer what love does give the strength of caring the warmth of one who seeks to understand the silent storm swept barrenness of so great a loss. This i do in client waze. That on your lonely path. You may not walk alone. Fall. 19. 94. I'm a newbie. At starting school for the ministry. No idea what i'm doing. But there we were that first semester. I'm in the laundry room by myself. Winning walk. Samuel. Big black man. I don't know anybody yet really. Samuel comes in. Samuel from south africa. He doesn't have any laundry detergent. So i lent him some. And then he said. May i ask you something i have not met. That looks mean the laundry. He said well i have an assignment. In a class and it was his first semester also. We're supposed to tell our stories. And of course because it's seminary a spiritual sense is if you will. And kind of try to explain why were there in seminary. And anyway. I didn't really know what to say i wasn't sure where he was going with this and he said i don't know whether to tell the whole truth or not. And then suddenly took his shirt off. Any turn to me. Back to me. And it was. Stars. Well. Pizza hut. I was a protester of apartheid. In south africa has 94 apartheid officially ended i had been through all the many many of the protest there aren't any words for that thing i said tell the whole story. Robert frost poem acceptance. When the spence son throws up it's raised on cloud and goes down burning in the gulf below. No voice in nature is her to cry aloud. At what has happened. Birds at least must know it is the change to darkness in the sky. Murmuring something choir in her breast. 1 bird begins to close. Faded i. Or overtaking too far from her nap purring low above the ground some waves swoops just-in-time to her remember tree. Atmos she thinks or quitters. Softly. Pace. Now that's a night be dark for all of me. Let tonight be too dark. For me to see into the future. What will be. Be. And this from mary oliver. Her poem in blackwater woods. Look. The trees are turning their own bodies into pillars of light. Are giving off the rich fragrance of cinnamon and fulfillment. The long papers of cattails are bursting and floating away over the blue shoulders of the pons. And every pond. No matter what its name is. Is nameless now. Every year. Everything i have ever learned in my lifetime. Leads back to this. The fires. And the black river of loss. Who's other sign is salvation. Booze meaning none of us will ever know. To live in this world. You must be able to do three things. To love what is mortal. To hold it. Against your bones. Knowing your own life depends on it. And. When the time comes to let it go. To let it go. I don't know his name. But i adopted him ten days ago. For about 10 hours. On august 3rd. On that 10 hour flight. From rome to chicago. He was from libya. He was young. Not just in years. But it immaturity that's so so exuberant. So much for sleeping on airplane. I did look at his passport. Anna's pizza. Because. He showed it to me and i couldn't understand any of her not even his name i'm not sure what language that would have been. Olivia. Definitely in arabic woman but don't know which one. He he was he was. He was the one who would be profile. He was. Dark skin. English was really good and was coming to this country. To go to a bar at least a month-long language institute. When he was probably 19 2020. The isle. And okay let's pretend. I'm here. Honestly wanted the window right. And he kept coming over into my space really into my space from me. But. At first i was a little irritated and then i realize what the puppy dog. We are at the agricultural product to him because you have to. Whether you're carrying. Carrie manatee sayings into a $10,000 here. I hope he's not still in customs i lost track of him after we landed. But. We were probably an hour at least maybe 2 hours at when he looked at me and he said. Chili he said could we trade seats. We traded. And he just was bouncing as we got. Finally you can see chicago asking me all these questions about the united states. But in the midst of that 10-hour flight when i adopted him. We can have a conversation about isis. In about muslim muslim. He asked me to make sure there was no pork and what we were going to be served. It wasn't. But i don't think he was strict muslim. But we did talk about about what makes people join isis. Now i'm worried that he'll. Yep picked up. In chicago. For nothing. I don't know one single black man hasn't been stopped more than once. And i know a number of black. What will happen to my libyan friend. But i'll end on this and i already had this in my notes mechie 2 days ago i was walking through the hospital parking lot. The driveway and has a mess up in there and there was a car stopped maybe. but i always like to make eye contact before i'm the one who stepped out. Music music blasting away. .. About the middle of where scar was trying to make eye contact and he finally looked up and pushed his head back. A little and i don't know why but i smile big smile. I have rarely seen. Such a smile. As i got. In return. It had gone through my head that is his car was there trying to get into the parking lot because some medicine. Either he knew someone there who who was in distress. Or you someone there who had a happy moment. But one that i meant. And i worry about him too. Closing words. Mary oliver poem. The pond. August. Of another summer. And once again. I am drinking the sun. And the lilies. Again are spread across the water. I know now. What they want. Is to touch each. Other. I have not been here for many years. During which time i kept living my life. Like the heron. Who can only grow. Who wishes he could sing. Wish. I could sing. A little fang. From every fruit. Would be appropriate. This is how it has been. And this is how it is. All my life. I have been able to feel happiness. Accept whatever was not happiness. Which i also remember. Each of us wears a shadow. But just now it is summer again. And i am watching the lilies bow to each other and slide on the wind. And the tug of desire close. Close. To one another. Soon now. I'll turn. And start for home. And who knows. Maybe. I'll be singing. May it be so. Sewing piece. But your neighbors.

uuprairie_org

Pr111127CarterDary-ed.mp3

Okay i will say that our presenter today is reverend carter dairy a retired evangelical lutheran church of america pastor and chaplain will be speaking on the statement. We the people are living in a dangerous time. Are opening words and i will be provided by marsha johnson. Pictures of the word and not merely hears those who look into the perfect law the law of liberty and persevere. Be not hearers who forget but doers who act. They will be blessed in their doing. James 1. I'd like to introduce our speaker today. He will make his presentation them as usual will have some time to ask him questions or maybe to make a comment or two. Our speaker is irreverence carter dairy. I'm sorry i guess i should say the retired evan telephone lutheran church of america pastor and chaplain. He's worked in hospitals and nursing homes in minnesota and also in the hazleton drug and rehab center which is north of saint paul. And before that i assume it's before that he was a lab technician a lab manager and operations manager and marketing manager in the lab supply. Industry. And he will be speaking to us on the topic of we the people. You haven't heard the speech yet so then we the people and i'm going to say this several times and i want to read to you this morning the preamble to our. Constitution we the people of the united states. 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. I am here this morning. To warn the good folks here but i think you already know because i had a little conversation with this young lady in front this morning and she had some very direct conference comments and shall we say a new description of our governor. When fascism comes to america. When fascism comes to america. It will be wrapped in the flag. And carrying the cross. Now is. Has ordained minister in the church of christ. These are words that are a little bit. Daunting. Because obviously i felt that i still do i feel that call to ministry that has never changed. But i'm also very where that we live in a democratic society. Can i believe that there are those among us. In the millions. Who profess to be christians i quote. Who don't have the foggiest notion of what it means to live in a democratic society. We the people. Play perfect. Union. Think about it. We are now fifteen i just read this this morning so i had to correct my my script. We are now 15 that's 15. Trillion dollars in debt. That's not the deficit that's the debt. We're not going to pay that. Our children won't pay that our grandchildren won't pay that. And why. That's the question. And the answer is very simple. Missiles ships. Planes bombs troops standing army. I want to remind everybody here cuz i know you're all well-read. But one of the things that. The framers of the constitution were most concerned about gardening. Was a standing army. Now i'm going to read to you something i wrote to the wisconsin state journal while ago. Had to tell you i was flabbergasted when they couldn't i don't think of them as exactly liberal bastion if you feel it's military-industrial complex that interested in galling at the same time. Sending all the budget discussion and mudslinging. One never hears about substantial cuts in the defense budget. The cold war is over!. Based on my reading my educated guess is that they're about 20. Nuclear-powered missile boats. That is submarines with 2424. Trident. Missiles with independently targeted 5 megaton. Megaton 5 million tons. At&t septran of power on each of those missile. What adversary is out there that justifies this kind of threat of total annihilation. At the same time conservative know-nothings are shouting for cuts in medicare medicaid food programs education the environment and any other federal program designed to help people. Do you see the fight frightening hypocrisy here. They're only too happy to pay more than 188 billion per year to kill people and as little as they can get away with to help people. Does this sound like the party of lincoln. Teddy roosevelt and dwight eisenhower. Does anyone remember eisenhower's farewell address. He warned the nation of the dangers of the military-industrial complex. The military-industrial complex has stolen our tax dollars increased our debt beyond possible payment. That made the american dream a nightmare. For millions of our citizens including me. I'm not here to whine about my circumstances let some ways i made my own bed and i have to lie in it. And that's not line okay. I want to read something that thomas jefferson said. Under the height of title of we the people. To establish justice the second park. Ivar preamble establish justice. I believe this is. Thomas jefferson i believe. The banking institution. Are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Office right can we hear. The corrupting influence of wall street folks is ruining this nation. Jackson meadows president jackson wanted. A federal bank. He wanted to do away with private banking remember. And so it cost him his presidency worth at least the second cup. Poverty in my lifetime and yours and many of your older than me but i never expected to walk down the streets of madison wisconsin my boyhood home that i was so proud of and find sleeping people sleeping in doorways. And i got to tell you some i'm very angry about that. Because that could be me. That's the truth. That could have been me and my wife living in a box under a bridge. And now you know it's not it's not about me okay. It's tacos wonderful little people that were down here in front of me that's why we have to save this country from these fascists. We the people. I want to one of my favorite quotes is something that winston churchill did. When he was asked by president harry truman. One of the last real populace that least in my opinion. When president truman invited him to speak to the harvard graduating class. No picture that's this is harbour graduating class so here are these faculty world-renowned people orders of the first order. Philosophers all okay in this graduating class all anticipating the speech. Call arguably the finest orator of his time. Winston churchill. No longer in office. So they're looking up there and they're looking at churchill and they're anticipating what he's going to say they're moving to the edge of their seats. He stands up. She walks the lectern. Just like i have.. He stands and he surveys the crowd. For a very very long time. Find me yes. he says. Never. Napa. Never. Give up. Never. He sat down. Now that's called stagecraft then i'm guilty of the same thing as you can already tell however. We're talking about ensuring the domestic tranquility this morning preamble of constitution. Let me ask you a question. Does pepper spraying children at a university. Does that constitute. Ensuring. The domestic tranquility. In your mind. It certainly doesn't mind. Doesn't in mind i want to be very clear about that. Police riots in 1968. At the democratic convention. When the cops were turned loose. The beat on everybody that was in the way. You know that when the cops turned around and they saw mike royko standing outside of the. The big hotel anyway i'll get it. True story. They chased him down the streets with their batons and i'm going to tell you right now head they caught microcat raikou. They would have killed him that night. I know i lived in that say it's a boy. Can i know what they're capable of but there were enough in there that we're daily fans and my daily hated so. There you are. And finally under the aegis of insure domestic tranquility. Do you see the hypocrisy. And what happened. On usa campus. When the chancellor told. These cops. That in my mind were nothing about a bunch of thugs. Dressed up in in gear. Pepper-spraying these children. Do you see those pictures. They're kneeling. Hunter hansen he's there not do anything wrong didn't call him names i just got he just walked up and down the line pepper spray. I have a very compromised. Okay. Heart attack in plugged up. That would kill. Yeah cuz i would have been able to get enough air and gone just like that know maybe some people say good whatever. Provide for the common defense. Provide for the common defense. Trident missile submarine. Folks. Those are what's called a first-strike weapon. They're hidden in the seas all around. The north of europe. They can launch their missiles from at the arctic circle. Those missiles will fly 3500 miles. Most of them carry multiple independent recovery vehicles or merv's that is the missile the actual. Farm if you will. The warhead. Can be independently targeted on these various site. 24 * 5. Do the math. 11 bissell bolt won. Can take everything in russia. It's nothing more than glowing rolling rub on everybody's dead. There's 20. Provide for the common defense. I don't know if you're aware of it but by the way the only company left in the business of reassembling nuclear warheads. And that has to be done on a regular basis because the trigger for a fusion bomb. Is a fission warhead. Santucci that kind of heat to cause the hydrogen explosion. Connecticut until they have to be disassembled and reassembled on a regular basis. General electric corporation. One place down in florida. All gated in nobody gets in nobody gets out. Well-paid book. Mellow and profitable. No. Don't you love it. Remember who the president knighted states was in 1981. Ronnie ray god guess who he work for a long time. You know how much tax. General electric pay throughout his entire presidency and all of that is judge george bush. The first. Nada. Nothing. Hundreds of billions of dollars they beg. But they laid off a lot of people didn't they. Never that kind of jack welch. Got the name neutron jack. Because wherever he went. The visitor plan. All the people disappeared and there was only a building left. Define. Bye.. Congress has given. Didn't given by this constitution the authority to discipline. The military. Also to appoint general officers. When's the last time you heard of any general officer in the united states military regardless of the service regardless of the rank regardless of the reputation when's the last time you heard of any of them being disciplined. Remember a guy named oliver north. Send from the committee. It was rude and arrogant and insufferably vain. Been called a world war hero who had been maintained to the point where he couldn't use his arms anymore. The senator from honolulu hawaii rather you called him a coward. What would oliver north know about courage. I'm sorry. What would he know. I'm digressing here moment. Finally we have. Promote the general welfare. Tommy thompson when i learned at that guy was it i was out-of-state i've been gone from wisconsin for 43 years just came back here in time to see my lovely wife. Have 46 years died of metastatic breast cancer. Don't you know that was a good time. I love her with all my heart. And i had to watch her die by mm. Promote the general welfare. Tommy thompson. The end of welfare as we know it. Remember that. The end of welfare as we know it tommiebaby thompson. Pardon my language i'm going to use the word and i'm i'm sorry if you're offended by but what the hell would he know about welfare. A privileged person and he's going to speak to us about it. I've been on welfare. You going to be surprised to know that that was when i was going to the cemetery. Cuz i sold my home and ate it. 401k and ate it. Pension and that's all i was up cuz i was still raising three teenagers and i had a disabled wife. I'm not trying to elicit your sympathy i'm trying to tell you the story of a person in a family that fell through the cracks. In our friend downton abbey thompson in this moron that we have in the state house right now i'm going to tell you right now they don't have a scintilla of an idea what that is nothing. Privilege. Privileged people act. Look it up. Back to work he said everybody back to work. No more take care no more welfare. Now they're stuck with getting jobs at mcdonald's. They have. No health insurance. They have no benefits. They're working for something just above minimum wage they need childcare. But then i could get it cuz they can afford. So now those children are turned out on the streets. That kind of poverty folks creates crime. Juvenile prime shot through the roof after this idiot. Got what he want. The bottom line is folks we have now. The best congress money can buy. Haha. Best congress money can buy. Haha. And finally when i find it but near finally secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity remember i was talking about earlier. These children. Not it's not a case that i don't understand that i'm important to me and i'm important to my 14 grandchildren. And my one great-grandchild and my three surviving children we lost a son in 04 in an auto accident just 30 years old. Talk to beautiful kid. But. These are what's important not me my days are done. You know. I'm not home clipping coupons by the way i'm home trying to figure out how i'm going to pay for my next meal. So in this sentence and serve the blessings of liberty. Sakura try and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. Identify 15 trillion dollars. That's hardly securing. The liberty. Of our posture posterior it hardly makes it. Cut social security and medicare. That's what they're talking about the supercommittee. What the hours are super wealthy and they don't give a hoot about us that's what they are. My wife didn't didn't qualify for social security and i have a question for all of you right now. This lovely lady she was she truly was. This lovely lady. Raised. For kids. I was traveling nationally. She had multiple sclerosis. She handled those for kids. Can she handle a fifth kit. Me. Very immature self-centered jerk. Okay. Not anymore but. She handles all of that. She didn't hold a job for she built up credits for social security. So she got nothing. Except one half of mine. No i asked you what is him in jacqueline kennedy once said jacqueline kennedy once said. The most important job you will ever do in your life. Sister ray. Children well. That is the most important job you'll ever do. Kinetix exactly what she did. And she did have help from me. Another talking about cutting benefits as we know there's an assault on unions now and union bargaining. These these actions folks and this is why i'm calling forth this morning. I'm calling forth an effort i'm tired of all of us these actions are not simply. A cause-and-effect. They are an assault on democracy. They are in a salt. Democracy. We the people. Frightened people equals. Disorganization. Everybody's looking out for himself. Right. I have to worry about paying my bills. I'm not sure i can worry about the people next door. So yes it is apply. Koch brothers. Oil money. Just flowing in. Like oil being poured. Out of one of these great ships at sea. End of the republican coppers. To make sure that this guy stays governor of the state of wisconsin because trust me this guy is the trojan horse believe me that's exactly what he is he is the trojan horse of fascists. And he's in our war within our walls now. We've got to get this guy out of office.. But i have to tell you that man is felipe. A genuine threat to liberty make no mistake about that. So we have to organize and that's why occupied. Wall street. Just doing what they're doing. And that's why isn't there's an organization called united wisconsin within part of. But we must stay the course. Henry must never. Never. Never. Give up. Thomas jefferson. Again. I hope we shall crush. Emmetsburg. What's the 200 years ago. I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our money corporations which dare to challenge our government to a trial by strength. Gambit define. The laws of our country. I'm going to read that once again thomas jefferson. 200 years ago. I hope we shall crush in its birth. The aristocracy of our money to corporation. Which dare to challenge. Our government. To a trial by strength. Can bid defiance. The laws. Of our country. We the people. Thank you.

uuprairie_org

Pr120513MaryMullen-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to prairie unitarian universalist. I'm lynne pavelski member here at prairie. Perspire should be both an open-hearted and a-bolt open-minded congregation we welcome people of all. Ethnic and religious backgrounds whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure. We welcome you no matter what your age abilities or an abilities. Today mary mullen one of our prairie members will be presenting. The program. Now we're going to invite all the children and parents the front of the room for a children's story today's stories going to be shared by mary mullen. Well how many vehicles know that today is mother's day. Everybody had. If the day that we honor our mothers and they can be mother's or grandmother's or any women who have provided that kind of service like a mother even be a babysitter. The story i want to tell you today is about my grandmother. My grandma lived on a dairy farm near seymour wisconsin that's it in your green bay everybody knows where green bay is right. And it's a story about her favorite song. The song that much ian and i sang at the beginning was my grandma's favorite song. My grandma lived in a really small house that she and her husband who was a farmer to built new when they were ready to retire from farming. It was so small that when you came in the door and you went through the kitchen to the living room you could just barely squeezed between the stove and the. Table. Just a really small room. And then when you got into the living room and you looked. To the left. You saw my grandma's favorite possession it was her player panel does anyone know two player piano is. Will you pump it. Okay here's a picture this is very much like my grandma's. Player piano look. And you see there's a little space up here and like on here. And then there would be rolls of paper. That would go like this. And you pump. Pumping area. You put your feet on these a new pump up and down. And that would make the roll go around. And there were these little holes in the paper. And it would play the piano automatically. Is really fun to do. So. Anyway i was really fun to play this and we always beg to go and play the player piano and went to see my grandma. And 1 time i was pumping the player piano and my grandma said to me that's my favorite song. Well i was playing the song juanita that we sang a little bit earlier. And the word you might remember our. As iso list we should part is very sad song. And of course the piano didn't say the words but i think my grandma's sing-along when she told me that was her favorite song she had a very low voice kind of like ants but kenner. And maybe the words right even even printed on the piano roll like they are in this one picture here. This is the king in his counting-house and you can see the words are right along here. Okay. No i think i was only kid who remember that this is my grandma's favorite song. So the next part of the story is how i found out who wrote that song. It started when my youngest sister wanted i told her this was my grandma's favorite song and she's never heard that it was. And she said well tell me more about this song and where it came from. And i didn't know. So now if you didn't know that somebody asked you to say find out who wrote a song how would you find out. Ask my grandma was i would but she was not alive anymore. Duet go on the computer that's exactly what i did i went to the internet. But it was very frustrating because what happened when i went to the computer that took me to jim reeves a country singer singing this song in the early 1960s. And it said that he wrote that song. Well my grandmother was already dead so i knew he did not like that song. So then i looked on the computer some more and then i found. Said it was in the list of songs from the civil war that was in the 1800s 100 more than 100 years ago 150 years ago. And. But it's that guess who it said wrote it. Anonymous. No. Can you say that word anonymous anonymous anonymous mean. What's it mean. Games that you don't. You know you're absolutely right because anonymous usually means a woman wrote it in backing the 8th 1884 that women weren't supposed to but they're only supposed to be in the home they're not supposed to be writing songs and that's supposed to be drawing attention to themselves in the public. So. I didn't really think of that at the time but anonymous so i was really feeling bad about that and then i remembered. Oh you know i have some old books. And maybe they have books from the civil war. So. Take a look at this book see where the tab is. Let's see. And go to where the tablets do you see that song there wanita. Okay and it tells you who wrote it. Juanita right here. Let me read it to you because. Find a hardware juanita for many years of favorite was written by the granddaughter of richard brinsley sheridan the irish wit and playwright. Okay he's the one that wrote school for scandal for those of you who. Study that's a good thing. The honourable mrs norton as she was called adapted her text when old spanish are andre arranged it much in its present form. Oh so now i could go to the internet and find out who she was. Wow. Hundreds of things on the internet. She wrote many many poem she wrote many songs she wrote novels. And i found out last more about her. I found out that she was a very famous mother would had a husband who is very mean to her. And she wanted to she didn't want to live with him anymore but the laws in england said that. The kids belong to the father only. And so she just took them away. And she couldn't see them she didn't see them for about 6 years she had three little boys. But. She was not going to stand for this so she helped change the laws of. England. So that mothers could keep their children until they were seven years old. And then they could have access to them they could visit them if the father decided he wanted them after that. So. Now as you leave to go downstairs don't leave just yet i want you to remember three things. Sometimes you might find. Out what your grandma's favorite song is and you might want to know a little bit more about the song. And second when you see anonymous. It might mean that a woman wrote the song. And third there are laws that women have worked for to protect women and kids. I'm speaking this morning is mary mullen mary is a longtime member of prairie and is currently a member of the program committee. She's a former high school and elementary teacher and likes as you saw earlier likes to share her discoveries with anyone who will listen. Well i don't have quite enough time to tell you everything that i found out and but i'd like to first of all to look at that. Set of pictures that there those are out mostly paintings of caroline northland who we're talking about. And that's she's coming around of pictures. I don't know if it was clear but she was a woman who who was in england not in the united states. And as i told the children i discovered her by chance. And you might say that because of my search for more information i really open that pandora's box. And the discovery was all the more poignant because at first. I couldn't even find who wrote the song juanita that was written by her. What i told the kids was just the tip of the iceberg of what i learned about her she was otherwise known as the honourable mrs norton or the wife of george norton. Together flavor of the store and had happened i want you to try to put yourself back into the early 1800s. Caroline norton was born in 1808 she was a child and a young adolescent. In the during the team's in 1820s and she married at age 19 to a man who is 7 years older than she. And by the time she was 25 she had three boys. This was at the time of early settlement of. Wisconsin so that kind of sucks it in the historical context. These are the times that are depicted in the popular tv series like upstairs downstairs or downton abbey remember the flowing. Dresses and. The hugest states parties the plight of the. Young woman young man of noble class who didn't have enough money. The issues of an older daughter who should marry before the next one marries. And the younger daughter that's waiting for the older one to get married. And the part that servants can play in the relationships between the principles you know the upstairs people. Caroline was part of the upstairs people. But she was poor. I posted those paintings in a photo there's one photo of her the one in the lord left i believe. And then the one that's on the right on the bottom is not really picture of her it's. It's a coca-cola ad. And it's. A picture of. Juanita so to speak. Well jaundice and her personal stories also important to know the backgrounds were family. And her husband's family. His family was on the tory side and you might compare it to the republicans of today. And by contrast her family was where died in the world radical whigs. From the time of her grandfather richard brinsley sheridan and he was the playwright who wrote school for scandal as i mentioned. So think of liberals and democrats and think of people who are you know just on their side. Well her grandfather sheridan was more than playwright. Soon after his popular playlist produced. Kid met charles fox who was a leader of the radical wing. And he gave up writing to go into politics. He became a member of the house of commons. And he held some other government post depending on whether the elections brought in the tories or the whigs. That but no matter what he kept his radical beliefs for example you supported the resistance of the american colonist. That wouldn't. How to make people in england say something at him. He defended the french revolution. He was a strong supporter of the free press. Any post opposed the act of union with ireland. He also had the reputation for being one of the finest orators in britain. His strong beliefs was passed down to his daughter or his granddaughter caroline as we're all of his literary talent. No wonder she clashed with the tory sensibilities of her husband. There was still another factor they might say. Set carolyn caroline and her husband apart. Who's our personalities and how they were brought up. The sheridan swirl really spend loving and. Talented family caroline was. The third child in a family of 7. And the children are all described as extraordinary like good-looking. With dark hair and landed eyes. Caroline's eyes were black just like i pointed out you know destiny i think would be like a young caroline. And it's reported that when a grandfather saw her when she was just a young child maybe a baby. He commented that he wouldn't want to meet her in a dark wood. About the sheridan children were all nurtured to sing dance draw you know have all these abilities. And they were really tight knit family probably the more so because their father had died when caroline was just nine and there were four younger children after her. When caroline was 11 the kids received a book about an illustrated and ebook you know that men will often the men dressed as dandy's you know very fancy. And this book the dandies showed the dandies of the day and made fun of them and so caroline and her older sister was just a year or two older helen. Did their own book with sketches and rhymes and one of their friends. Publishing saw it and publish 15 copies of this book 1. Brenda. That should make schnoor sister threatened when she was 11. And when she was a young girl her. Caroline had washed your uncle charles sheridan working on translating poetry and she was so inspired. But in a letter to a friend later on she said. I am very good left to study with. An enthusiastic determination to write a long poem of my own and she did this azan. she wrote many long poem. Well these kids also put on what we're called private theatricals almost every sunday. That is sense of fun and irreverence and of all the sheridans caroline with the most outspoken and rectum that was not really expected or even a favorite in a girl. Or young woman. In fact that suggested that the reason caroline was the only kid to be sent away to school rather than being learning at home. Was to tame her wildness. One source i read compared caroline to one of the heroines of her writing she wrote novels also. Just compared to beatrice from her novel lost and saved. And i've asked barb park to read this description to show just how passionately caroline road. As well as to show you what caroline was like. She was quick. Ardent and sensitive. Capable of all sacrifice for those she loved. Capable of all energy. For that what she desired to attain. But with eagerness. Full of enthusiasm. Pitiful and tender. Something of a rare earnestness than in her was in her than in others and warmed you while she spoke like a flame. It is in vain to argue that matter. There is as much difference in sensation in different persons as there is difference in their physical strength. Or intellectual capacity. Beatrice enjoyed more. She's suffered more. She felt more than a great proportion of her fellow creatures. Like thrilled through her. As you may see it through in the delight of sunshine through butterflies closed wings. And to such as she in whom the visible world and the life of sensation for dominate. The temptations of this world are most powerful. Her heartache. The tears rushed to her eyes at some touching picture. Or some mournful song. The breath of a warm spring day the scent of flowers. The purple of the distant hills. The freshness of the wavedashing upon the shore. Filter with a vague yearning. Well her biographers describe caroline is just the opposite opposite of her dull husband george. They just weren't zip for each other. A 1909 biography by james ray perkins describes the pair in this way and i've asked you to read. Perhaps in any ordinary case she would have been right. But certainly no two people were less fitted for each other for all times and caroline sheridan and george norton. Indeed it seemed as if all the differences of two opposing races and temperament. The inherent misunderstanding of the count and the saxon lay between them. And held them apart from any real union. She. Gifted impetuous stormy tempered with a reckless specious tongue. With an instinct for taking the lead and getting possession of everything around her. Magnanimous and generous incapable of hoarding injuries and paying back old scores when once the first ungovernable outburst of resentment against them had subsided. And he. That dangerous mixture which is often found in dull nature's week but excessively obstinate and suspicious when he thought he was being led. Narrow spirited intolerant slow-witted yet not silent. Rather with a certain power of nagging comment for everything about him that he was least able to understand. Not without. Surface kindness and humanity fond of children and animals but course natured and self-indulgent. With a capacity for cruelty and brutality and slow revenge when once convinced he had been aggrieved so unlike any quality possessed by his wife. Did it seem to confuse and stun her like a blow when she found herself opposed to it. Indeed it actually did at times take the form of a blow. Why you may wonder how these two very different people got together. What george became aware of caroline when she was just sixteen her governess at that school that she was attending. Brought her to the grantley estate which was the estate in the area. His eccentric sister augusta took notice of her talents and writing and singing. Anda curry stir so i suppose that's how. George came to notice caroline. After george and caroline were married married augusta and caroline was one of caroline's worst enemies. And caroline to tested her as well. Being embarrassed by the fact that augusta dressed in men's clothes and just you know wasn't the fancy woman have. Of the day like she was. Although he was 7 years older than she he wanted to marry her. You know even though they haven't really talked to become friends or anyting. And her mother said that a 16 she was too young and she needed to finish school and so on and caroline no doubt agreed. Her mother said that george would have to wait he said he would. So. Although it was knowing that the sheridan family didn't have any money. The father had died knowing and they didn't have any means of support. The sheridan girls are really sought after because of their looks and because of all their talents. At this time in england in. The oldest girl had to marry first and then the next one and then the next one. And they're also coming out party so when it was time for the girls to be married to gold there was a coming out party to present her to society. And the the. Parents hope that she would find a good match. In a rush so that the next girl could come along and kept married to. So anyway how long was the first in line and she got married and then it was caroline's turn. She had to get married to because she had a younger sister who was a beauty and everyone would want to marry her not that all of them are beautiful. So anyway. When she was 19 her mother urged her to marry george norton even though she was not in love with him. And hardly knew him. And perhaps she. Caroline and her mother thought she would get to love george norton. And her sister helen said well you know i married a man who i didn't love when i first knew him but now we're very much in love and so she encouraged her. And so they were married and it was a huge huge mistake. And it wasn't only a mistake because of all the reasons i've mentioned it was a mistake because george's family had far less money than he had told them so then they would have money rose on top of it you know how that can affect a marriage. So then the soap opera of their life began. And it's really a tale of abuse and how caroline is responded to it. Her response was personal she didn't have a theory about how women should be equal as men or anything like that she thought women should be protected by men because that was. The police of the day. A bit in the process of trying to right the wrongs that have been done to her and going to the law and getting the lost change. She made life better for mothers and for women. Altogether. But they got married in 1827. And that's when caroline found out how abusive her husband could be. And she gave an account of how you do just in the first few months of marriage she was. Attack physically by her husband. You'll see the hurt sharp time did not help matters at all so lynn. We'd been married about two months when one evening after we had always drawn to our apartments we were discussing some opinion mr. norton had expressed. I said that i thought i had never heard so silly or ridiculous a conclusion. This remark was punished by a sudden and violent kick. The blow reached my side cause great pain for several days. And being afraid to remain with him i sat up the whole night in another apartment. For five months afterwards when we are settled in london we had returned home from a ball. I had then no personal dispute with mr. norton. But he indulged in bitter and coarse remarks respecting a young relative of mine who do married. Continue to dance. Practice mr. norton said no husband permit. I defended the lady spoken of when he suddenly sprang from the bed sees me by the nape of the neck and dashed me down on the floor. The sound of my falwell. My sister and brother-in-law who's left in the room below. And they ran up to the door. Mr. norton locked it and stood over me declaring no one should enter. I could not speak. I only moaned. My brother-in-law bruce the door open and carried me downstairs i had a swelling on my head for many days afterwards. This abuse persisted. And was worse when he was drinking. I was some better times in between but. But caroline complain to her family about this i mean is obviously you probably would although many of these people women don't complain to anyone they keep it secret. And when george suspected she was writing a complaining letter one time he said i can tell by the look on your face. He ripped off her letter. And then she being like she was stubbornly started another one and so then he grabbed his her stationary and burned it all in front of her. And there were many many occasions like this. Well nevertheless a couple stay together they had these three boys and by the way on that timeline her first boy was born in 1829 at 1827. She temporarily left home in 1835. And her friends and family or just a apart because they knew the story. But george wrote begging letters tour and promised that he would abuse her anymore. Stay with and protect. And so caroline like many abused women also wanted to believe that. He said he meant that he wouldn't have used her anymore. Well i'll while this was going on caroline was also taking her place in the literary and social society of london she attended parties involved she has salons in her home. She attended those of others she's the life of the party with all her talents. She can sing. She wrote poetry and so on and she was an excellent conversationalist. And people just love to have her there. She was very bold in her remarks and. That's part of why she was alive for the party i think. Shuffle came in contact with people from government high up and government. And a literary circles to her social life and george was not really part of this you didn't really approve of it i think. If he was so different. But one friend she made was experienced politician lord melbourne. He became a prime minister he may have been prime minister more than once. And he was later the favorite advisor to young queen elizabeth who was crowned in 1838 i believe victoria. She met melbourne because her husband george has georgia lost to seton won the election when the whigs came to park power he was a tory. And. In 18. So he was he was out of a job and you know they didn't have money to start with. Watch not much money so. George asked his wife to see if she could use her political connections to get him a job. And she sent out a bunch of letters and one of them was to lord melbourne and lord melbourne responded and got her husband a job for a thousand pounds a year which is a fair amount of money. Them. And then he got to know caroline. And this was a beginning of a very intimate friendship between the two. The george seem to condone after all he did. Got this big job and sometimes. Melbourne would stop after being in the house of commons when he was going home he was stop it. Caroline's house. Almost everyday. They would have conversation sometimes a family would be there another sometimes it would be with caroline alone. But sometimes she went to his quarters and. Her husband walked her over there and so on so everything's going to be fine. Besides the social activities caroline begin writing and selling for work early in marriage. She needed money to support the family. And of course she wanted to write poetry her that earlier. And with the income from her first poetry collection. She bought a piano for herself and also paid for the. But her first consignment when she had her first child. And i think they're writing off probably gave her release from her marriage which was not good. The timeline gives some of those publications but by no means all. She's known best for her political pamphlets now not for her poetry or her songs or. Who plays or her novels. And her writing continue throughout her lifetime. All the political writing was done after she separated from her husband in 1836 and the ones that are most prominent are the ones about custody for mothers. Custody for kids. With their mothers and also the economic rights of married and divorced women. And her time when a woman married. Oliver income all of her personal property and real and she owned a real estate belonged to her husband the minute she got married. Are the kids also belong to the husband. So that if there were separation. If amanda is a husband didn't want to let his wife. Ex-wife or separated wife have the children. Too bad you just got got them it was that's just the way the laws were. Everything belongs to him. By contrast if you were an unmarried woman and you had illegitimate children or you were just a single woman you own property you had all the power you know didn't have to share it. Well. As i pointed out carolina george's marriage foundered because of his abusive ways. And although though there was never a divorce i would characterize the relationship after 1836 as being the dirtiest of dirtiest devore. A dirty divorces. Divorces in england that at that time required an actual act of parliament. Actual act of parliament. And only the husband could ask for one. A woman could get an ecclesiastical. Ecclesiastical divorce which is really only a separation you know if she acquired a divorce and that way she was still married to him all her property and everything still belong to him he was just separated from him. Well. In 1835 caroline had left her husband for a little while then went back. Then an 1836. It was around eastern she'd made plans with her other siblings to go to her brother's house and take the. The kids. But george wasn't invited because by this time he had not he was. Persona non grata you might stay with her her family. And george's sister and some of his relatives were always stirring him up against her. And so he said these kids are not going you're not going and she said well i'm going. And they already had the. Luggage packs in the carriage for the next morning. And he said unpack it also he had the servants unpack at all and. Thanks for not good the next morning she. Got up early and went over to her sisters not too far away. To talk about what what should i do about this. And while she was out of the house he packed everything up. Kentucky kids away and that was about the last time she saw them for six years except for maybe half an hour a year. And once at christmas time she saw them for several days that she couldn't keep him overnight and her place. That's what kind of a guy who was. And then he started look. At ways to get back at caroline and so we did some. Some people out to see you know is he she having affair with someone else. Couldn't find any evidence of anything like that. Does any lit on lord melbourne who was her good friend and he. He decided he'd. Try to have a suit against them and also that would also bring more money because you know you was to somebody and get the the man in question. Got a lot of money and so he was hoping to get a lot of money that way to. At that time it was only a matter between the two men. The woman had no she couldn't even defend herself and say this didn't happen. What's all the trial happened. This is just a few minutes after they separated. It was a nine-day trial. And it was such a travesty that the jury that heard it said. They. They did not even want to hear the defense. The defensive the lord melbourne because. This was such a crazy. The people that were presented as witnesses were. Like. Drunken coachman and you know somebody who servanthood been paid to say something that's what they assume. They didn't even leave the jewelry box. And they found that this suit had no meaning. And so lord melbourne was. He was. Exonerated but of course she had lost her reputation. From then on. Caroline. But she was devastated and she tried for months and years to. Geto boys back or at least you get to see them. And finally she realized there was just. No way the laws were just said against her. So she used her literary talents and all our political connections. And. Eventually got the law changed. So i'd like kathy converse to read some of her writing here about. The ancient custom of what she wanted to do is have. Cuz i have mothers have custody of their kids until they were aged seven and then after that have access to them. She did get that law change. The stuff to give you a flavor of this 125 page-long. Track that she wrote. Kathy's going to read a little bit. There were six different of. Arguments that the opposition was using and one of them was that if you pass this law it would give women. That would give women access to their kids it would render reconciliations impossible between the husband and the wife. This objection is founded on the notion that if a woman could see her children without returning to her husband it would not be worth her while to return. But this is an argument based on very false notions of the degree and strength of a mother's love. To be allowed to see a little child occasionally and be satisfied that it was apparently doing well. Might satisfy a father because at the best he does little more in his own home. But no woman who could be with her children would be content to merely see them. The permission to visit them might be an indulgence and relief in comparison of being utterly excluded. But it could never be held to be the same thing as living with. So this bill did pass both houses in 1839 i know it's time for me to stop so i will in just a second. It. She didn't get the kids then because he took them off the scotland in the law didn't apply there. And it did take a tragedy. Before she did get custody in the fall of 1842 when our youngest son was 9. He fell from his pony and got a scratch on his arm got infected with either lockjaw or blood poisoning. And he was very sick her husband called her but it was by the time she got there. This little boy died and it was after that that she he gave her custody of the children. They are not here. Are closing words were written by charles dickens. It won't do to have truth and justice on our side we must have law and lawyers. Thanks for coming.

uuprairie_org

Pr140817Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society we attempt to be welcoming of everyone no matter where you are on your spiritual or face or religious turning this is one of your first and there will be more about that than a little bit. The congregations but you are definitely welcome no matter as i said where you are on your journey no matter the color of your skin no matter your gender preferences welcome1 enel. Mary would you like to challis place. We gather this hour as people of faith with joys and sorrows gifts and needs we light this beacon of hope. Fine of our quest for truth. And meanie in celebration of the life we share together. The reading that i will share with you is a rather short poem of mary oliver's titled on traveling to beautiful places. Everyday i'm still looking for god. And i'm still finding him. Everywhere. In the dots. In the flower beds. Certainly in the ocean. In the islands that lay in the distance. Continents of ice countries. Ups and each. With its own set of creatures and god. By whatever name. How perfect to be. Aboard his ship. With maybe a hundred years still in my pocket. But it's like. For all of us. And in truth. The only ship there is. Is the ship we are all on. Burning the world. As we go. I was surprised by oliver's use of the masculine pronoun in this poem of hers. Everyday i'm still looking for god. And i'm still finding him. Everywhere. Is this my mary oliver is she trying to annoy me i mean about the same age we live through the the same feminist movement vietnam civil rights movement. That inappropriate to me use of language later in the poem with words bod. By whatever name. But still. Certainly a poet of all people. Understands the importance. Of words. I can attest to the fact that constant use of the pronoun he tends to lead to feelings of low self-worth. And low self confidence on the part of those who don't happen to be peas. Words. Matter. How would use language. Matters. What we do with the meaning of words. Matters. We unitarian-universalist have a split personality when it comes to language. We are conflicted. To say the least. We say that we want language. That is all-encompassing. Yet throughout our history. We have often been too eager to discard good words. Sometimes with the false. Hope that we will grow in numbers. If we get rid of certain words. Or phrases. What part of this might stem from the fact that the word unitarian was first used. By our enemies our theological animes that is the word unitarian was originally used as a derogatory term. We weren't trinitarians. Therefore. I noticed that we have not discarded that word. However. I believe that how we determine what word we are going to use especially how we are going to use or not use so-called religious language. Falls into three. Categories. We try never to use the word. That's the first categories. 2. I usually use the word. But generally in a disparaging negative sarcastic way. Horse free. We. Transform or rediscover the words. True or perhaps original meaning that is we use it in a way that works for who we are at this point in time one example of this third option might be use of the word heretic which every time i use it i try to convince you that it's a positive word and that all it means is to. Shoes. Consider this morning's opening and closing hymns. What feeling. Store bought. Things your mind as we sang the opening hymn. When are buttons pushed there. We're following that old unitarian tradition of failing to sing as well as you can because you were reading ahead to see if you agree with the words. Note that i deliberately said unitarian. Not universalist. Universalist. Have been much. More accepting of supposed religious language than the unitarians. Look at the dates of the opening ham. It's number two but i'll tell you the date the words were written in 1935 the music in 1940. It seems backwards. B simone. When we sing the closing hymn. You should notice the different uses of language between the two hymns you can look at it it's number 354. You might also notice that i think these two him say the same thing as their message might be the same. The date. Of the him that we're going to sing at the end. Where are 1980. For the music. So what 75 almost 75 years ago and the words were written almost 80 years ago.. I mean. Yeah thank you. No wonder i can't do my expense account yes. Thank you so we have but we have. I think this figure is still correct. About three-quarters of a century. Between 22 hymns were written about 75 years. For a couple of reasons. What it means for the continuation and the ongoing health of a face community such as such as ours. And secondly what it tells us. About the underpinning. The underlying structure the foundation of that face community. Get ready for a radical thought. For my humanist minister. For the humanist congregation she surf. I maintain that the foundation of a face community is. Wait for it. The foundation of this community is. Religion. If we refuse to use words such as religion. And reverence. Words some people might consider to be god language. Well i would disagree that squad language but anyway if we throw out these words. Will we grow what we really do that magic thing where we started growing numbers will unitarian-universalism attract more people special young people if we can figure out the right words to use to draw people into our buildings. Now. I don't think so. We are diminished. I believe. We are diminished. Both personally. And it's a very old faith tradition. If we refuse to use such rich. Complex. Moving words. As sacred reverence. Spiritual awesome in the best sense of that word. Face. Even the word god. As long as we are clear about what we mean when we use the word god. Struggle over language and how to describe who we are is not new. Nor is the accompanying conversation the discussion that happens simultaneously with any discussion of what language. To use to describe ourselves. How can we get the word out about who we are if we aren't clear about what language to use. There was a good discussion last sunday after gary gates are president of the congregation after his reflections on his general assembly experiences. If i closed my eyes during that discussion though i could have been in any number of unitarian universalist sunday morning services. Or any general assembly over the past 30 plus years that i have been going to them not to mention district meetings regional meetings and ministers meetings. Before i go on it should explain what i mean when i use the word. Theology. So you are not pondering the word and missing the content of some of my remarks. Theology a rational irrational interpretation of religious faith practice and experience. The analytical and. Historical study of religious. Italy's the interpretation of religious beliefs in relation to contemporary. Thought. And it's not something that we just do there for history. Contemporary thought in life and finally my favorite definition and inquiry that seeks and adequate interpretation of matters of ultimate. Concern. Words words words sang eliza doolittle in my fair lady i am so sick of words while i know the feeling. All summer i seem to have been caught in a vortex a swirl of discussion about language actually the language conversation began in mid-may when i was visiting friends in minneapolis. And one of them who was born and raised unitarian universalist told me about being out with friends on a gorgeous spring day in the in the boat and and one of those friends. A christian. Use the word laughing. My friend turned to me and said universal was okay with using that word or is it too religious. I was taking a bath i had never considered the word blessing. To be a religious words. And not long after my return to madison wanted fuse objected to my using the word blessing. Blessing means approval. Encouragement. Blessing also means a present. Or a gift. A thing to do stuff to happiness or welfare. As in life is a blessing this day is a blessing being with friends is a blessing the word can also mean to praise. Language conversation intensified when i first heard about sunday assembly. By now many of you have probably heard of it too. A church. 4. Atheists. A place to experience and build community but only among atheist. Doug erickson religion editor of the wisconsin state journal road that sunday assembly will replicate aspects of a religious worship service. Without the god talk. My first reaction to that was actually a bit of anxiety. Because the more i learned about it the more it seemed that we were after the same audience so speaks we have acs in our congregation i am very very happy that we have. So i thought you know they're going after the unchurched one of those words i don't really like but i guess it describes things well. We are going after the unchurched. So i thought the best thing for me to do was to meet with one of the organizers. If i did. In recounting the story of her religious journey. I kept expecting to hear her say that she had visited the unitarian universalist congregation and she said that. I'm her friend said you sound like that you you. But she never did visit one of our congregation. I asked her why she said why i looked at the principles i don't know where she looked at the. And then she said and i quote. The use of religious language kept me from pursuing unitarian universalism. I have i had a moment of thinking i'd lost part of my memory instantly because. I don't remember that and it's in the principles and purposes are in the right in the front of the book. So course i wasn't carrying my wallet card highly recommend that you carry the little wallet card that has our purposes and principles on. I mean there's nothing remotely related to any kind of a religious work. Looking at the sources. The different thing. How do you explain the sources. Without using christian traditions without using. But at any rate after my meeting with her i was less anxious i also have to thank the parts for. For reminding me that i'm supposed to be open-minded on sunday assembly is twofold. I think they're reinventing the wheel. I also think they may be too. Elusive. A general assembly in providence wonderful name. For a general assembly when you're wrestling with religious rhode island from other places where i serviced their minister if they ever heard of sunday assembly no. One day i fought i'll do ask if they human is stable now any of you been to general assembly know that there's a big. I don't know what we call it the area where all the tables are and all the booths and you can by such wonderful things and you can spend a whole bunch of money in the bookstore without even try and different groups. Really got into quite a heated debate. Epic humanist table with a rabid reminisce about my age. And he kept you insisted that we were seeing the demise of religion. Even unitarian-universalism not only the demise of religion also of unitarian universalist seminaries. Pushing either mine seminary starr king school for the ministry norm evil lombard would be around much longer. We didn't exactly yell at each other before he says were raised. He went away and there was someone else. Personating the table and this other person was a young man playing ears i asked. He didn't agree with the older man about the demise of religion. Nor the end of religious institutions seminaries. However. He thought that the end of religious language used to religious language was at hand and if we want to attract younger people we have to stop using all religious language that became a very interesting discussion. What we would keep and what we wouldn't he said sacred spiritual church face grace redemption. Salvation course god all these words have to go you'd be amazed at how long the list is he wanted to strike the word awesome but he was okay with all inspiring about the word mysterious. Has to be a disturbing conversation. The next day i had a i had an interesting exchange with a woman in a coffee shop when we were both waiting for someone in those someone's were like now. I know this person. Never met her but it never occurred to me that she might be in providence for general soundly because. Her canvas bag said something about the bible on it. Navigate to buy bikes. Well it turned out. That. She. Had just been granted preliminary fellowship which is one of the hoops you have to jump through to be a uu minister and that that means that she'd already seen what we called the committee on ministry. And then she told me about this great app on her cell phone. The bible. And gran and all versions of the bible and what i like to hear that days is for racional verse. Before i could object she read it to me. Words words words. I was so stunned to be having a conversation with an apparent. Christian unitarian universalist salinas. You think i've never met a christian you you i'm sure i have. Mystical eyeball verse stickley shared with me. Something's wrong. If we can't get past. Buzz words with words that push our buttons and seen a person saying the words and listen to the content behind within those words. I don't think we'll attract or not attract. People. By abandoning so-called religious language. On the contrary i believe that we hurt our cause. And maybe even betray what unitarian-universalism means. If we stop using good words. We welcome everyone of whatever theological beliefs. Or non-belief. Atheist should feel as comfortable here as sis. You you christians should feel as at home here as humanists. A mystic so get as much out of this community as a muslim would. Buddhist. Should feel as moved and inspired after a sunday morning service here as a jew would. Our task is to build the beloved community by welcoming all of whatever theological pinion no matter where they are on their journey and we always. But i want me a man that our task is to do more than welcome all. Unitarian universalist minister reverend dr. kendall gibson says the task of our liberal religious communities. Is to share the adventure. And help each other remember the open. Secret of our unconditional worth and dignity. Even when we doubt it. Most. And to grow together toward the ideals that arise out of our reverence. For the good. We can be skeptics and doubters and freethinkers and still be. Reverence. Because reverence is among other things. A response to nature. Are reacting to stories. Of courageous people who fought for justice. 4beauty financial oppression. Those stories that bring a lump to your throat as givens. Puts it. Or. Whisper. To your secret heart. Such a story might be the story of jesus. Or the buddha. Hacker. Mantella. Hamid. Topix. Are the women of the prophetic sis. Perhaps you got a lump in your throat or whisper in your heart learning in recent news articles about the and i don't know if i'm going to say this correctly yazidis those unfortunate people trapped. On a mountain. In northern iraq. Being either christian or muslim there a target for violence and persecution. They were yazidis. Spent a lot of money and seminary i did not know this group and why shouldn't they be able to practice. They're fascinating religion. Which one article i read described as an ancient. Monotheistic faced with roots in surrey aspirin ism and beliefs involving a twelfth-century mystic and a peacock angel. Now i might be tempted to make fun of that. Of course i shouldn't do that. I hope we would all welcome the yazidis in our midst should we ever find any. Unfortunately we all come up short from time to time in the making fun of other religions department. My reaction to that newly-minted would buu minister with her bible verse. I'll bet that most of us have had our moments of sarcasm. When speaking of the beliefs. Of others. I saw a bumper sticker the other day that says sorry i missed church. I've been busy practicing witchcraft and becoming a lesbian. Estes. Wonderful. Fantastic awesome. Community. Referent givens calls this way of being reverent that is. Experiencing. She says this doesn't have anything to do this should be obvious to all of us. Any dogma or any scripture worth anyone's story. Orthony one tradition. We. Can use religious language to describe it though. It can be useful. There's so many. Great religious language traces the jewish phrase on which i buy never pronounce correctly pecan olam. It means healing of the world from the buddhist enlightenment native americans with. Of the word just the word beauty the mystics tell us. We're talkin all talking about the human condition. I don't know how many of you saw the the. Cartoon which i saw they had but i think it's downstairs in my office but i think i remember it in last week's is swiss right on the second page inside cover and which we are feature. Well unitarians are they didn't quite. Name prairie. But that it was about sunday assembly and enforces sarcastic and the first. Efrain has. Someone up here saying here take of this way for cuz it taste good. You think you know on campus and what it is. And the third is someone up here again bashing religion organized religion and and and then turning and saying but thanks to the unitarians for letting us. I had a hard time. I mean i can have a hard time but there's no ending here. What kind of a little more this next week. Ions i'm surprised at the direction. My thinking and my research talk. Because i didn't ever intend to stand up here and say that this congregation as are all unitarian universalist congregation. The foundation is religion. Well then i better describe religion heaven. So what that led me to galen glen goodrich who is also a reverend doctor. A union minister and senior minister. At me or new york city's all souls church. I highly recommend his book god revised. How religion must evolve in a scientific age. I just want to read this one. Short paragraph of his because it's at the root of how i got to what i said he writes no matter how difficult our circumstances. Or how dire our situation. We need a way to pull everything together. And celebrate holness. Levana. My work now we live in a broken world. And we are not at 1 month. Atonement. With ourselves with each other or with the world as a whole. Who got rich goes on to say we need to affirm what is true cherish what is beautiful and embrace what is lovely. Vanessa t of religion emerges from this deep-seated. And long-standing human need for connection. And wholeness and that's the real issue. Part. Need for connection. And wholeness. I won't get into the roots of the word religion right now. It's probably not what you think. And the definitions are probably not what you think yes you can read about the divine and god is referenced in the definitions but it's much much more complex than that the definition of religion. Stop. I thought you mentioned earlier that i i debated about using the story and that's why that's not in the order service the name of it is service but i i finally. Kicked it because. It it seems to me 2.2 want doing the rich and i myself are trying to say about religion spirituality. Spirituality. Is. Pickin pickin pickin pickin. And the rich says. Or maybe it was. Kendall give us but one of them says. That is like trying to have a conversation with somebody and ticking. Different languages for each. Sentence. In your conversation it doesn't make any sense. We're not staying at spiritualities bad there are good things about spiritual vision is the foundation religion is the underpinning religion leaves us. To hope it leads us to keeping on keeping on. But even when all the people. Destroyed and it looks like life is over and it's nothing but blood and violence in the world. Oh i like today. With. The whole world seems to be at war. Through all that. Religion. Sustains us. If you use religion. In the right way i mean if you define it in the right way. Of all the birds not one remains. Silence hung over the gardens and over the length. But then an egg hatched. And a small bird staggered out. And they looked at each other and i love this part that they looked at each other. With curiosity and with trust. Are they going to see the differences they only saw the similarities. Tattoo legs. Together in peace. And unafraid to face the day and the world that's why we need religion. Kendall gibbons says. That we're on a pathless. Journey. As unitarian universalist. I would say that that's an ongoing journey full of words words words that confuse us. We have to pick and choose. And i think that it takes a very long time to become a unitarian universalist. And a lot of work you see what you're in for new members the goal is connection. And wholeness. The goal stays the same. But the means of getting there. Constantly shifting. I know it's late but i have to tell you this one quick thing i got an email from calendar. Those of you who were there a free weeks ago the last one. Someone wants to try to form a singing group they're at because they put those people from prairie who came up here the end of july really know how to sing and they put us to shame. Closing words. 1st and oliver poem. This morning the beautiful white heron was floating along about the water. And then into the sky of this. The one world we all belong to. Where's everything sooner or later is apart. Of everything else. What's thought made me feel for a little while. Quite beautiful. Myself. And from uu minister sara campbell. We receive fragments of holiness. Glimpses of eternity brief moments of insight. Let us gather them up. For the precious gifts that they are. And renewed by their grace. Move boldly into the unknown and to bring our neighbors.

uuprairie_org

PrSAC-7JC090726rights.mp3

Seven jewish children. I play for gaza by caryl churchill. Seven jewish children is carol churchill's response to the situation in gaza in january 2009 when the play was written. Copyright 2009 caryl churchill limited. The play was first performed at the royal court theater london. On february 6th 2009. Performances are license free of charge provided that no admission fee is charged and that a collection is taken at each performance for medical aid for palestinians. London. Web address www.ma hyphen uk. Dot-org. The recording which follows is a performance of the play by members of the social action committee of prairie unitarian universalist society of madison. At the congregations meeting house. On the evening of july 26th 2009. Tell her it's a game. Tell her it's serious. Don't frighten her. Don't tell her they'll kill her. Tell her it's important to be quiet. How is you'll have cake if she's good. Tell her to curl up. Is sushi sinbad. But not the same. Tell her not to come out. Tell her not to come out even if she hear shelving. Don't frighten her. Tell her not to come out. Even if she doesn't hear anything for a long time. Tell her we'll come and get her. Tell her. We'll be here all the time. Tell her about the men. In the story. Tell her it's a story. Tell her they'll go away. Tell her she can make him go away. If she keep still. Like magic. But not to sing. Tell her this is the photograph. A grandmother. Furuncles. And me. Tell her. Her uncles died. Don't tell her they were killed. Tell her they were tails. Don't frighten her. Tell her her grandmother was clever. Don't tell her what they did. Tell her she was brave. Tell her she taught me how to make cakes. Don't tell her what they did. Tell her something. Tell her more when she's older. Tell her there were people who hated jews don't say that. Tell her it's over now. Tell her there are still people who hate jews there are people who loves you. Tell her when she's more when she's older. Tell her how many. When she's older. Tell her. It was before she was born and she's not in danger. Don't tell her there's any question of danger. Tell her we love her. Tell her dead or alive. Her family all love her. Tell her her grandmother would be proud of her. Do telework only forever. Chicken rachel friends. Maybe her friends could come and visit her. It's sunny there. Tell her. We're going home. Tell her. It's the land god gave us. Don't tell her religion. Great great great great great granddaughter. Don't tell her he was driven out. Tell her. Of course teller teller everyone was driven out. Tell her that country is waiting for us to come home. Don't tell her. She doesn't belong here. Of course she likes it here. Shall i get more there. Tell us an adventure. Tell her no one will tease her. Tell her she'll make new friends. Tell her she can take her toys she can take all her toys tell her she's. Special girl. Tell her about jerusalem. Don't tell her there. Tell her something. Don't know about camels in the desert. About they live in tents. I mean. This wasn't their home. Don't tell her home. Not home. Tell her they're going away don't tell her they hate her. Tell her to be careful. Don't tell who used to live in this house. No. But don't tell her her great-great-grandfather used to live in this house. No. But don't tell her. You still sleeping. Tell her not to be rude to them. Don't frighten her. Tell her. She can play with the children. Don't tell her. That they can come into the house. Tell her they have plenty of friends and family. Trailer for miles and miles around to have lands of their own. Tell her again this is our promised land. Don't tell her that it was a land without people. Don't tell her i wouldn't have come if i'd known. Tell her maybe we can share. Tell her we won. Tell her brother is a hero. Tell her how big their armies are and that we turned them back. Tell her we're fighters. Tell her we've got new land. Don't tell her the trouble with a swimming pool. It's all water. I have the rain. Tell her it's not water for that field. Don't tell her anything about what. Don't tell her about the. Both of us. I'll tell her not to look at the balls. Don't tell her the. Bulldozers. Knocking down the house. It's a building site anything about bulldozers. Don't tell her about. Well the queues at the checkpoint don't tell her that. Tell her we'll be there in no time. Don't tell her. Anything that she doesn't. Ask. Don't tell her. The boy was shot. Tell her. We're making new farms in the desert. Don't tell her about the olive tree. Tell her we're making new towns in the wilderness. Don't tell her they're throwing stones. Tell her they're not much good against the. Don't tell me they set off bombs and cafes. Tell her. Tell her they set up fox and cafes. Tell her to be careful. Don't. Tell her we need the wall to keep us safe. They want to drive us into the sea. Tell her they don't. Tell her they want to drive us into the sea. Tell her we kill far more of them. Tell her that. Tell her we're stronger. Tell her we're entitled. Don't understand anything except. Tell her. Tell her we want peace. We're going swimming. Tell her she can't watch. The news tell chicken watch cartoon. Tell her she can stay up late black friends. Tell her they're attacking us with racquetball friday night. Few of us have been killed. Don't tell her her cousin refuse to serve in the army. Don't tell her how many of them have been killed. Hello there. Hello there. Don't tell her about the family of dead girls. Tell you can't believe what you see on television. Tell her. Tell her we kill the babies by mistake. Don't tell her anything about the army. Tell her about the army. Tell her to be proud of the army tell her about the family at the dead guards. Why not. The whole world knows. Tell her. The dead body. Did she see babies. The others. Nothing she should be ashamed off. Pretended to themselves. Tell her they want their children killed to make people story for them. Tell her. I'm not sorry for them. Tell her she should not be sorry for them. Tower world war 1. We should be sorry for. You can talk suffering to us. Tell her where the iron fist. Tell her it's the fog of war. Tell her we won't stop killing them until we're safe. When i saw the dead policeman. Animals now. 11 ruble. Tell her i wouldn't care if we wiped them out the world would hate us that's all. Tell her. I wouldn't care if the world hates us. Tell her. Wooper. Tell her. What is the chosen people. Look at one of their children covered in blood. And why do i. Feel. I feel happy. But it's not. I don't tell her that. Tell her we love her. Don't frighten her.

uuprairie_org

Pr140323JohannaHatch-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society my name is christina and i will be your provider today.. We welcome you no matter what your age or ability or inability on sunday morning to provide a wide variety of services they remember a member of our community or by our minister sandra ingham. Today our own johanna hatch will be presenting pope francis after one year in office and i'll look forward to announcing joanna in a few minutes. All we have to do have a few announcements this morning so just a reminder tonight. Are pete singer sing along here at prairie 5:30 potluck 6:30 the sing-along starts led by dan crowd so that'll be a lot of fun. I'd like to read a few opening words these opening words were said by pope francis i prefer a church which is bruised hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets. Rather than a church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security. More than i buy a fear of going astray my hope is that we will be moved by the fear of remaining shut up within structures which give us a false sense of security within rules which make us harsh judges within habits which make us feel safe while at our door people are starving and jesus does not tire of saying to us give them something to eat. X lighter chalice i'm pleased to invite on. The reuben and manuel. So you'll have a hatch join the prayer community in the summer of 2013 with her family. A lifelong catholic johanna attended the college of saint benedict in st. joseph minnesota and volunteered with the sisters of st jonah joseph of carondelet. So i'm thrilled that you're going to. And talk about a saint francis after one year in office. Love you well first of all i just wanted to say that i was so grateful if not a bit daunted to be invited to share some of my thoughts on the first year of pope francis's papacy. As you can see by the slides that i got up here. Francis's image in the secular media has really been that of a pope of the people even as a radical reformer. And i think to a certain extent a little bit of a cute pets in a white cassock who kisses babies and so when penny asked me to share some of these. Thoughts i warned her that this is decidedly not my take on pope francis i'm a little more like the image to the left there. Some things change some things stay the same. So as someone who really has been actively involved in the movement to reform the catholic church for most of my adult life. I would describe myself as somewhat of a contrarian on the topic of pope francis so this is a bit of a forewarning and for folks that may not be familiar with how i kind of. Ended up here at prairie and my background with the catholic church. Christina shared a little bit of that in my introduction but. The vast majority of my life i've been engaged with the catholic church in one way or another i was baptized at st. joan of arc church in orleans massachusetts which i think is a bit prophetic of all the saints. I received all of my sacraments in the catholic church growing up going to mass on sundays. I. Was also an altar server i was a canter so i sing at mass so my family was very very involved in the life of the church. When it came time for college i pick the college of saint benedict which is a catholic women's college in st joseph minnesota and it is sponsored by the sisters of the order of saint benedict. That was really my first introduction to women religious in the catholic church. And from them i received what i think was a very solid education in both biology and feminism with a good dose of the importance of one's individual conscience. I'm following graduation. I then spent a year with the sisters of st. joseph carondelet in st paul they're very progressive. Order of nuns. And i sent to your volunteering with them and doing service in the community. And it was these women that really gave me my formal introduction to the church reform movement prior to that i didn't really know that there was. All movement within the catholic church that was really trying to challenge some of the more restrictive teaching. Especially around the role of women the place of the lgbtq community. And teachings about sexuality and reproduction. So they brought me to my first call to action conference in milwaukee which is basically the annual national gathering of. Reform activists and organizations. And they also sent me to my first. Women's ordination conference events. Which. Pretty much laid me on a path to more more radical feminism while trying to reconcile that. With still kind of identifying as catholic. And following that i spent a year studying at the washington theological union which sadly no longer exist anymore. In washington d.c. they close about a year after i left. I hope it wasn't my fault. Focusing on christian spirituality studies and then after that myself and i move to madison and here we are. So from my perspective. I think there are really two competing narratives about pope francis. That of the rockstar on the cover of rolling stone. The new world pope shaking things up in the vatican. And that of what i think is really just a new friendly face of protecting orthodoxy. On issues of gender sex and reproduction. Furthermore i think the world's obsession with pope francis calls to mind to things for me. One i think there is a great under misunderstanding about the role of the pope in the catholic church. And two at the same time i think it really illustrates as great. Longing for healing and for reconciliation. And for the example of someone who authentically embraces the really radical message of jesus of nazareth. And i think it's natural to want that hero but as charming as pope francis is. I do not think he is that hero. Paul baughman who is the editor of the catholic magazine commonweal wrote in an article for slate. That the obsession with francis quote. Encourages the illusion that what else the church can be cured by one man. Especially by a new man. In truth no poke possesses that kind of power thank god. The rockstar status of francis. And declarations of his quote radical statements about things that i think should simply be a baseline for christianity. Really removes the responsibility of the people in the pews from critically engaging the institution to which they claim their loyalty. It also minimizes the struggles of many of those reformers that i just started to mention who work tirelessly against the continued marginalization of women and the lgbtq community. Next slide please. You got a pair. So. There you go. There was much much ado about his statement. If someone is gay and seeks the lord who am i to judge. But in that same exact interview he also said on the ordination of women the church has spoken and said no. John paul the second in a definitive statement or an excuse me a definitive formulation said that door is closed. We should also keep in mind that even such a bold statement as. Who am i to judge. Does absolutely nothing to change the teachings of the catholic church. Which is that any sexual orientation beyond heterosexuality is considered and i quote this is from the catechism of the catholic church intrinsically disordered. It's following that i will also never forget how it felt to be told by someone who. Calls herself an atheist and a feminist. When i critique the pope on this very point. That i needed to be patient. But these things take time. And eventually she was sure of it it's good jesuit pope was going to allow women to be ordained. Allow families to make their own decisions about their reproductive choices. And would finally treat lgbtq folks with true dignity. And keep in mind also that i'd already been president of women's ordination conference for about a year at this point which is the oldest and largest organization in the world dedicated to women's equality in the roman catholic church. So. To be kind of in that place of. You know. Challenging a popular notion about the pope and then being told by people who are not as familiar with the church that. I really just needed to calm down because you can't do this all at once and i know i've been doing this for a little while. That being said to wear a year out from the election of pope francis and we're still waiting we're still waiting for any sort of substantial change. The next slide please. So. I really like this image because i think it does bring. Bring up a good point it really cannot be denied. That francis has brought a radically different posture to the papacy. Then either of the previous popes of my lifetime both john paul second and benedictus. His first acts as pope were simple. Eurocentric i believe. Rejecting much of the wealth and majesty that his predecessors. Embraced in favor of a more simple way. In his first holy week as pope leading up to easter. I i truly watched in wonder as he. Holy thursday there's a traditional ceremony where the priest or leader of the community washes the feet of usually members of their community. In their churches who who serve the community and pope francis. Went to a prison for juveniles and wash the feet of a muslim girl. Which. Really was shocking to me especially when you consider that in churches around the world including right here in the diocese of madison. Women are barred from that ceremony. So. Yeah pope francis washes the feet of a muslim girls bishop morlino will not allow women who serve as religious educators and administrators and pastoral associates. To participate in that ceremony right here in madison. Is rejection of much of the finery embraced by his predecessors especially benedict. Choose what i believe to be really an authentic and a and refreshing attempt. Two more closely embrace the roots of christianity. His style has been lauded as pastoral over political which for the most part i i would agree with. But even while i embrace the words of a pope. As illustrated by our opening words. Places of very high priority on what catholics call the purple works of mercy. To feed the hungry. To shelter the homeless. To visit the imprisoned. Over the orthodoxy of the faithful on what many called the pelvic zone issues. At the same time he has heartily and forcefully close the discussion on those very issues over and over again. Brinston even though 98% of catholics in the us have used a method of birth control that has not been approved by the church. And the church's immovable stance. Against the use of condoms even to prevent the spread of hiv. Has contributed to unknown amounts of suffering. Francis has gone so far as to call the decision. By pope paul the sixth. To ban all forms of. Natural birth control. As. Courageous. So the real struggle and speaking adequately about pope francis. His role in the church and the world. Is that while i would. Drive myself as critical to the point of cynicism. Perhaps the eagerness to embrace him illustrates perfectly. The hunger and hurt felt by many. Liberal. Former or other exit otherwise exiled catholics. But when i'm honest with myself it's really not hard for me to understand why. And this is where i will take a more personally reflective turn in my talk today. So i would like to play with my favorite party games if you'll indulge me it's called two truths and a lie so there are three quotes that have been attributed to pope francis. Two of them are real one of them is not so i'm just curious if we can if we can guess so the people as god wants past pastors not clergy acting like you're or government officials. Are churches big enough for heterosexuals and homosexuals for the pro-life and pro-choice for conservatives and liberals even communists are welcome and have joined us we all love and worship the same god and get behind that we must restore hope to the young people help the old be open to the future spread love. Before among the poor we need to include the excluded and. So. How many do you think the first one is a lie. How many you think the second one is a lie. Oh yeah you know what's up. The indeed it is it's the second quote. Talk about a little bit. We find where i. So you did you pick up the fake very good restoration as i've watched self-identified feminists and progressives. Gush over pope francis's words and actions. In a particularly frustrating turton and internet hoax in december of 2013 declared that pope francis had declared hella heresy. He declared all religions as true and that full equality for women in the church. Had finally been achieved. This is something that i. Circulated through my facebook feed over and over and over again particular from progressive religious folks. Folks that used to have identified themselves as former catholics who left the church for various reasons. Another social justice advocates. What was surprising to me is that no one seemed to notice that it only appeared on one block and wasn't covered by any major news sources. And as for that second pro comes from as well. And then i end up feeling really terrible when i have to break the news to them that know the church hasn't radically change. That pope francis really is maintaining the status quo. In fact he stands strong against these kinds of reforms this eagerness to embrace a pope whose introduction to the world was that little shy wave and a name of a saint who we have all noted for his rejection of worldly glory i think really illustrates. A deep ache that many of us carry. Is it perhaps. Because so many of us actually want the roman catholic church to want us back. For me dissociating with the church is very similar i think to leaving a family of origin or being a refugee in a new land. Yes. I will claim it the catholic church is an abusive and dysfunctional institution. Yes it has purposefully excluded women and lgbtq people and has had the audacity to call it the will of god. But it is the language that i am fluent in. And it is a culture that still influences how i am and how i view the world. And as is becoming increasingly visible critic of the catholic church. I've been exhorted many times to repent and quote come home. But what those who ask this of me don't seem to realize is that in order to come home. I must reject my most basic beliefs about my dignity and worth as a person. In fact until i reject the notion that women and lgbtq people are worthy of full equality. Home does not want me back. And if i'm being honest that does hurt. As i said earlier pope francis probably can't fix that. No one person. Can instantly heal the broken necks of that institution. Nor do i expect him to. What's a gloss over the fact that francis continues to stand strong against women's ordination reproductive justice and the full equality of lgbtq people in his church and in society at large. And hold that as sacred teachings. Minimizes the very real harm that continues to be done. The next slide please. Rent a couple different term. If we believe. That the church has problems can be solved by one charismatic man. We are not acknowledging the depth of the problems. 1 figurehead is not enough to truly reform an institution of 1 billion people. At the same time expecting him to do so. And that if we get a quote good pope the work will be done. Completely denies the real power of catholics around the world. Even as those outside the catholic church. If we place these high expectations on pope francis. We deny the conscience and humanity of each person who must choose to remain complacent. Or to challenge the status quo. Every day there are catholics actively rejecting the belief. That women are less than men. Or that speak gay is to be deeply disordered. Students at eastside catholic in seattle walked out in protest after their beloved vice principal mr z. Was fired for marrying his male partner. Father word bourgeois who has been one of the greatest influence in both my social social justice work. And now in my feminism in many ways. Maryknoll priest for 40 years. And is very well known as the founder of the movement to close the school of the americas which is a military training school. 4 latin american soldiers at fort benning georgia. Was stripped of his priestly ministry. And excommunicated. For refusing to repent of the belief that got equally calls women and men. Think about who the church does not excuse. Around the country catholic lay people. Have been at the forefront of movements for marriage equality. Even while their bishop seek to silence them that last picture is sister jeannine gramick and i'd love her sign sister says vote no on 6 which was in the state of maryland for marriage equality. Continue to step out in this movement all over the country. Well none of them have been on the cover of rolling stone they are my rockstar. You didn't call them prophetic or delusional. But they do not accept the devitt that division or oppression are the will of the divine. They do not need permission from any pope. To do what they know is right. This in my opinion is the only real way that change can take place in the catholic church. And i would encourage those of us outside it. Especially those of us who have actively chosen a different path. To stand with these allies. If there is a key to changing that institution. It will not come from the top down. But from the people in the pews. Whose consciences have been formed by the radical notion that jesus of nazareth nazareth. Was serious when he asked us to love our neighbor. My hope however slim is that a pope francis's next year. He will truly as the benedictine say. Listen with the ear of his heart. To the people in his flock. If that occurs then we've truly would see radical change. And even if that doesn't happen as i suspect it won't. I hope that even more that is people of goodwill we will continue to extend the hand of friendship and solidarity. To all those anonymous sing. To give him the give of themselves everyday to create a more just church in the world. I see the hand popping off so i'm we do have some nice time to i'm have some dialog so i'm dan has the. Yeah and i think. Winning is really difficult with catholicism. You know it does it stop down its hierarchical. It's. How much you know a kingdom. With pope as king and we are the serfs. And. You know so the idea any facility even the idea that the pope can magically change everything unless there are steps taken like that to really change. Who is empowered every level and at the same time i don't lose this really great quote from francis kisling who is the founder of catholics for free or now catholics for choice. Do you want said that. But she liked about that work was that the roman catholic church was the only government she could overthrow without going to jail. At the same time i do it it's hard for people who want to. Change the structures of the catholic church but it is i also think it's not going to change unless there's pressure on both ends. We can't say we can't abdicate that responsibility all the pope will fix it. Because if there's no pressure on them to fix it then what do they have. And i can really only speak from my perspective as to. Why. I'd say i started in high school really questioning especially the teachings about lgbtq people and the role of women in the church and why it took me you know 15 years to finally say no i got to go somewhere else which is kind of how we ended up at prairie partially but i'm still very attached to a lot of his movements and i am still kind of like giving them away. Like i said it's. It's my language it's my culture it's how i i understand the divine and community and there's. It's just it's very deep it's very much apartheid say of my culture and it's funny too if you ever came to our house for an atheist and whatever the heck i am we have a lot of catholic kitchen our house we got a lot of things. It's part of that language and. I think it's also very difficult it when you are taught as i was i was raised in a relatively progressive parish that god is love and we are to serve one another. You don't want to advocate that to the people who want to make it about exclusion. And so i think for a lot of people of the decision to leave is the decision to abdicate that. But for me personally with lakewood roudebush why when he was excommunicated i finally decided. I can no longer binds my loyalty or any sort of credibility to an institution that would kick out somebody for believing. That i'm a person equal to him. I don't want you anymore. When the pope says things knows something like i could talk for a whole hour about like weird things about the catholic church. So you know you kind of hair like old up the catholics believe the pope is infallible when in fact the pope is only infallible when the pope says he's infallible so the pumpkin say any number of things like you know if someone is gay and loves the lord who am i to judge. He can say that but he hasn't said. And i. From the chair of peter as. Bishop of rome. Do hereby declare. That i infallible estate xyz if he was to do that on the issues issues women's or or excuse me or nation which is essentially what pope john paul the second did in the opposite direction. I'm done it actually which it would change the teaching and. Come down if you would have to figure out how to how to adapt to that but. Yeah until he says. Ian solidly statex. Doesn't doesn't change anything at all. But he could if he. So felt moved. I would agree with that and there's a party you know i'm very cynical about pope francis perhaps more than i should be but i do think that part of the reason that he was chosen as pope was really to counter the image of benedict the 16th to make the church. I'm a little more pr friendly to really. Clean up the mess little bit and try to embrace the people or try to make people feel embraced even though we aren't actually being embraced. To to come back and to maybe try to minimize a lot of the harsher things that the church is done and in. Not least of which is a sex abuse crisis and really trying to just. Put a shiny new face on the church and i think to a certain extent it's worked for a lot of people who are catholics they feel like. Especially people of my generation and younger are the millennial generation as they call us much more than any previous generation have a very high level of skepticism for hierarchy for immovable institutions they are more embracing of lgbtq equality than any previous generation and so i think especially among young people there is a lot of frustration with the catholic church and kind of going into directions there's a small kind of bunch that kind of jumped on the church reform movement and there's a lot to just kind of walk away from religion in general it's also generation that's highly highly skeptical of any sort of organized religion. So i think. Yes the catholic church's waiting a lot of people aren't going to new institutions or movements or religious communities. But i i can't. I can't say that for sure. Really important things the first that. The catholic church is a successful institution of you look at how long it's. Maintained itself if you look at the size of it like i mentioned as 1 billion people globally it is the only religion that has a seat at the united nations general assembly even though it is a non-voting state it is a state. And it has used that position to influence a lot of movement particularly on women's rights and on lgbtq rights and reproductive rights globally so they do have that you have a successful model. At the same time like your friend who said the pope's authority ends at our bedroom door i think that's a really american catholic way of looking at it. Like i mentioned. You know there was our friend i don't know as much about the friend. 98% of catholic women admit to using a non or an artificial method of contraception that's a pretty sound rejection of that teaching. In the us. I had i don't i don't know numbers globally but i think 44 marin catholic a pretty sound rejection of that teaching. They don't accept it which i think leads to two things i think i really interesting about catholicism and probably kept me there longer. Then was healthy for me the two ideas one being. The right of conscience. Surprisingly the catholic church does teach. That. Each individual is blast with. Their conscience which they call the aboriginal vicar of christ stripub a little poop in your heart but you are. You are bound to that even if it goes against the teachings of the catholic church. You will be judged by how well you followed your conscience. When it comes down to the end of your life. I'm in as being withheld the the sense of the faithful or sensus fidelium in latin. How much is the idea that. A teaching cannot really be deemed a teaching a true teaching of the church until it is embraced by the people. And these are two things that i think the higher key does not talk about because it will impinge upon their power and their ability to kind of control the message. But those are those i think are some some reason flights and then going back to aaron's question i think that's why some people stick around. For a long time because if you really embrace that then you can say that you can make that very clear distinction and drawing that line. Where the hierarchy has a right to step into your life. Yeah and the church was growing in africa and even the other bishops in the communities there tend to be a lot more conservative on certain issues then definitely the american church which is a little more. If a free-for-all. But i think that's a real challenge to the church but i think it's also. I think it's also an area that many people love about the church that it is that global face and that it is challenging and we have to like you know try to figure out how to all be under this together. But. Maybe i am to american and i'm just not patient enough to be heard for all of them a challenge that i do not want to take on i would not want to take on. A closing words today will be provided by mariemont equality shouldn't stop at the doors of our churches. Synagogues are mosques refuse to tolerate discrimination against women in our secular institutions why then do we accept it in our religious institutions since religion significantly impacts the broader culture the marginalization of women in our faith communities affects all of us this is by lori winder lds feminist and representative of ordain women movement.

uuprairie_org

Pr120115Bellmore-ed.mp3

Walking a unitary unitarian universalist society. Nick apps and i'm have the program committee here at prairie and thanks everybody for coming out this sunday even though i'm sure all anticipating that winter is going to continue to make up for lost time at some point. Prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded community religious background. Every color. Sexual orientation gender and family structure. We strive to be a welcoming congregation. No matter your age your abilities or your inability. Later in the service will invite any visitors and guests that may be here today and also returning friends when we haven't seen in awhile. Introduce yourself so that we might get to know you better. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services here at prairie. And they're presented either by a remember i member of the wider community as we have today. And eventually if we do have a minister again that minister will be presenting. Prison. Well now is the time for a presentation. Today's presentation is entitled bullies victims and bystanders and schools presented by dr. amy bellmore developments in the department of educational psychology at the university of wisconsin-madison she received her doctorate in developmental psychology from the university of connecticut at following her graduate studies she completed post-doctoral training in the department of education at ucla her primary research interest. His house school-based pure elation ship sequence adolescent development and she'll be giving this presentation as the first in prairie series of programs on parenting so please welcome dr. amy belmar. Thank you so much for having me so just. The previous so i love professor by nature so i'm here to present information that's the way so to buy you what i do and it within that i also use a lot of numbers and facts and figures so. That's the way i'll be presenting this but we can have a conversation about it afterwards i went to begin by defining what bullying is and what we mean by bowling at psychologist we actually a very specific definition even though this is a term that is really prevalent. Within our society today when we talk about bullying we meet it as this. So a student is being bullied or victimized when he or she is being exposed repeatedly and overtime to negative actions on the part of one or more other students. And in order to use a tumbling there should be an imbalance in strength or asymmetric power relationship. To their couple of things that are important about this definition when is it notice it's referring to students that's not a requirement but this. Idea of bullying came to attention because of what happens with a group within school settings on so it's not a requirement of this only occurs between students could take place in the neighborhood could take place between siblings even are between. Parents and children but the other parts are important so the 1st of this notion that it's something that happens repeatedly and over time so that idea is to differentiate this from just one single event which certainly we could describe as victimization but it wouldn't get classified as bullying. This idea is actually being challenged today people say well one of them could really be extreme until why does it have to happen repeatedly so people are sort of debating about part of this definition the other part that was not up for debate so that idea that there's an asymmetry in the relationship and the notion here is that one person is really targeting another person self and this little drawing. So the behaviors that you should defend balloon won't be yes nothing so won't be all that surprising to you we've defined blowing up including physically aggressive acts things like hitting kicking and shoving verbally aggressive act which are by far the most common tasks that kids report experiencing or that they report engaging in and is it because we have fewer sanctions about these in school so these include things like teasing and name-calling. Insults and ridicule and then there's a whole other class of behaviors that it's in the past 15 years or so have gotten more attention and these are non-verbal and on physical in nature but they include things like being the subject of rumors and gossip. Being excluded or isolated from events are this could take place though they there's a birthday party and the student lets everybody know you're all invited except this person so being excluded in that way or being isolated on the playground ammar examples of that. Having your property stolen or damaged and a lot of times as takes place with kids in the form of the third light keep away from one will grab a backpack a hat or something and keep it away from the student for a while and then i'll suggestions get included in in this category. A lot of people are paying attention to cyberbullying now and that phenomenon isn't distinct from any of these except for the physical forms it actually is just a different venue so the verbal aggression and the sort of rumors and gossip and isolation all of that can occur. Within the context of cyberbullying or within face-to-face bullying. How common it is it's actually remarkably. Common so 70% of middle school and high school students report that they have been bullied at some point in their secondary school year so while they've been a middle school student or a high school student they can report that it has happened to them. On the other end of things in terms of who's perpetrating these actions again a large proportion of kids have said that they either initiated a bullying action or taken part in belong in some way. Within the past school year the twenty-two 40% of kids that's a big rain this is based on a nationally representative you ask ample. In terms of the kids we worry most about though we call these kids the chronic victims and chronic bullies and these other students to are exposed to this so repetitive actions and these are also fairly large percentages of kids so five to 15% of any kids if you think about a classroom with kids by to 15% of them might be connected. I'm coming to 12% chronic belize. However what i want to leave you at the impression with today is that it's not just the bullies and victims that we need to think about actually all of the kids. In a group where this is occurring are impacted so certainly. We can worry about bullies and victims but we also need to think about other kids so we define kids who. Don't initiate the bullying but joining with a blank as a assistant so they would have. Otherwise not targeted a kid but if their friend is making fun of someone maybe they. Start to join in with that kid. We label them as assistants. Reinforcers are maybe even more insidious kids because these are kids who don't initiate and don't actually directly ever target anybody but they sort of exile boliyaan so they might be laughing it's what's going on and the consequence here is that then. The bullies out of getting with thereafter so they might then escalate the event and make it worse or they might continue to do it on more continuous basis they today. Imma victims end of things we have kids who might step up and help the victim in this is really i think what. We want to promote a psychologist and this is really where we're directing our intervention efforts today so talk a little bit about how we can get more kids to step in and be defenders but they're also. Can everybody else. And we leave all these individuals by sandra cities are kids who. Usually directly witness the events but don't. Become involved in any way. Or they might hear about the event later on so they might never actually seeable a targeting the victim but they know. Turn who has a reputation as a bully or victim because they hear about these events so they're aware that it's going on within their contest. I've done a lot of research asking kids to describe what exactly it is that happens to them or what they see going on in their schools to try to understand the phenomenon and how back we can shape their. The interpretation that they make about the events instead of. Help them want to intervene when they see things happening and i'm always struck by sort of how readily they can just describe events that. Do as adults don't happen test in day-to-day life and they might not seem all that extreme different a one boy who's a middle school student. I was just walking quickly too. three so i didn't see much what he did see was that an older looking boy took the kid probably to impress his friends. The friends started laughing i'm not sure if anything else happened because i had already passed. So this is not that extreme student is getting tripped but. This witness is describing this as a bowling event and he also demonstrates a lot of insight into what is happening so he sang the boys probably doing it to impress his friends and in fact the friends are laughing and so there's this for. Implicit. Reinforcement of the behavior and so this boy who passing on his way on. three really doesn't have an inside them. To step up and intervene. Another student wrote about something more extreme. This kid was walking but that means other kids surrounded him and said something i couldn't hear and pushed him to the ground and thruway's food. Then take him and laughed this is quite extreme. I noticed here that this student doesn't explain i stepped in my tried to do anything or i told the teacher about it or that a teacher stuff done or the other kids were there to help really amuse events and kids to describe these events in whatever way they chose a really just focused on. I saw this happening and really no one came to this student's aid in this instance and this is certainly whatever physical forms of aggression are involved this is when we would expect teachers are adults to intervene but it's not happening here. So then the question. That should be after that i'm asking is who can students hands-on are there people in their environment who will help them when they're bullied and in fact. Most gentle port that that no one came to their age when they were picked on and again this is based on asking students. At the end of the school day tell us did anything happen to you today and then did anybody help you and 64% of the students. So that no one helped them. 32% of the students said another student helps them and the important part here is that. 100% of that time of those 32% it was a friend of theirs so it's not that just another passerby or a kid that they know from class is likely to step in its really only. A student's friends who are willing to step up and defend them. In terms of what those other students do. When they step in to help most often they confront the bully in this usually takes the form of the. Defender saying totally stopped. That's as far as it needs to go. it's not making fun of him those are the types of interventions that are extremely effective so when that happens the bullying so people have done observational studies of this and they've shown that the bullying stops within 10 seconds. That's not to say that it might not start up again later on in the day when another setting but in that event it really stopped. There are other things that witnesses can do that i think that we should arm children with we should let them know you don't have to stuff in so certainly we don't want kids to feel unsafe. Or that they need to. Conceived the day and that way in the moment they can tell an adult about it so often times as a teacher or they can tell their parents or they can tell somebody else about it later on they can also offer comfort to the victim so. And not earlier spyware students are describing whether or not they got help this included times when in the event nobody stepped up and did anything but later on someone came up to them and said i saw it was happening that wasn't right. No it was wrong how do you feel certain text up on them. It's a really effective way of helping that might not be obvious to kids. So in terms of. The implications of getting help it's actually remarkable in the positive effects it has so recall that when students get help most often it was from another friend so then we also measured when you got helper if you didn't get help when you are victimized. How much depression were you feeling so the outcomes that are associated with victimization are depression and anxiety and lower feelings of self-worth here we examine just depression. And this is a scale of 0 to 4 with 4 just more feeling this isn't clinical levels of depression this is just feeling bad about yourself or feeling bad in general the scale only goes to 4 and you can see when kids are bullied and they don't receive any help there for them almost at the top end of these feelings of depression. However. When they did receive help those feelings of depression a remarkably alleviated so much so that in fact that they don't differ statistically from kids who aren't picked on it all so just having someone's no help you in that moment or later on offer comfort to you. Is really helpful to kids as they deal with individual bullying events. A little bit about the importance of friends just in general because we don't really know. For sure how that process works but. One thing you know is that having a friend will protect you from being targeted so bullies are opportunist and they look for. Sort of weakness and put that in quotes because that can mean a bunch of different things about one thing that right being is just being alone so having someone with you protects you. From being targeted by a ballet. This is probably the process that explains what was on the earlier side so having appear who's empathic and can understand your feelings will make you feel less isolated about your experiences in this is really. Important effect. And then also. Obviously if you have friends they're more likely to defend you from the bowling when it occurs is also represented on that side. However so i don't think i need to argue about the importance of friends but if you want to put. Igf-1 like caveat so with kids their relationships change a lot more than ours do as adults so the stability of their friendships change especially as they move maybe from one school to another school as we have these normans transition from elementary school to middle school middle school to high school so their friendship has changed and so when our friendship goes awry. Important information about each other and they can use that in a ways to then target each other maybe if you know me norway's then people who don't know each other as well could so there is a possibility of that friends actually. Can turn on each other that needs to be considered in this. So what about teachers and other adults. The. Amount of. Hope that soon as a part of getting from these individuals was very well. So only 4% of the instances. And the main reason for this is that most of the blame happens when another adult is not present so again believe they're opportunists and they're figuring out when can i do this when it will be effective and for the most part. They're not doing it to get attention from an adult they're doing it because of the reports and they got from their peers and said they choose when to do this and so. I most often adults are present but this is doesn't mean that every time an adult was presents that they intervened there were also times when kids be described as being present. He didn't do anything. So i think to understand why it is that adults do anything i want at present this scenario here to give you an idea of the complexities. Involved in figuring out who is a bystander and from whose point of view might be perceived as a bystander so this is taken from a bullying website i don't belong in this scenario here i'll read it for you but you all committed as well. So daniel and gabriel playing cats when alex walked over give me the ball alex demanded daniel held onto the ball it was his he brought it from home. Alex hadn't returned the ball he took from daniel last week. Give it to me alex demanded again we need a ball for a game. Daniel looked across the field where a group of boys waited for alex to return. He looked toward the school where the after-school teachers were deep in conversation and daniel handed his ball to alex. He knew he wouldn't see it again so we wouldn't necessarily think oh this is a bullying situation but certainly daniel feels threatened in this situation it's happened before where alex has taken his ball from him so i think he knows some ways it does fit the criteria of bullying. And also we can see that there are a lot of bystanders here so certainly gave who is present who is papa zoo mobley daniel's friend because they were playing cats together. The boys across the field who were waiting for alex to return. Potentially are bystanders in the situation and after school teachers. Who are also present. Different daniel point of view he might see all of these people in his bedding and nobody's stepping up and telling kay alex knock it off. Don't take the ball from him daniel feels like he has to give up the ball because no one's saying that what he's doing is wrong and so i don't have any other recourse than to give him the ball. However from the people they just named from their perspective gabe might actually not know what's going on he might not know the history of. Alex having taken the ball before he might not be paying attention to what he saying right now spending on how close he is in the game of cats. The boys up at the field might have no clue what dallas is doing and how he's getting the ball from him and the teachers even though they're after school teachers and seems like their job might be paying attention to what's going on what's going on. So from your point of view it might look like nobody stopping in to help me. And they're all aware of it and that gives him the impression that okay people are allowing this but actually from the other people's point of view maybe they aren't truly bystanders and that they have no idea. I'm what's going on here is just to show her how tricky it is to figure out. Who actually is a bystander who knows about these events as they're occurring. So. When was that a little bit more information about why kids do intervene when it is if they intervene in first i guess so. The predominant reason that kids say that they don't intervene is because they don't want to be harmed and usually this isn't physical harm usually this is just a product there. Sense of self they don't want to be humiliated or embarrassed this is dylan so fully to turn their attention to them. In anyway and that's a reasonable motivation that makes sense and so that i think might ask. Is to help kids feel more empowered so that they don't feel unsafe in. Making an intervening in bowling situations that certainly the role of teachers and other people within schools to give students the power so that they don't feel unsafe. Some of the other reasons that kids gave though for why they didn't intervene. I'm is it they trivialize the event. Today just that sort of like oh yeah that's not a big deal so on that earlier slide you can imagine that a bunch of kids will say what. Outlast adjust what alex says he just takes the ball from people we just come to expect it that's that's not a big thing that's not bullying. Some kids would disassociate to the event meaning that will this isn't my problem so maybe get back with gabe that he said. This is just going to let daniel deal with it i don't have a problem with alex i'm just going to. Let him deal with it. They might be busy with another priority so we heard that in the other examples where the student had to get onto his. 3 class. Or the teachers their priority is talking with each other but never left their busy doing something else responsibility transfer. The example there so there were simply three other bystanders the teachers might be saying well. Maybe gabe can help daniel out. Keep my think it's the teacher's responsibility to do something there that adults. And the boys might just be saying. That game or the teachers should step in if they think alex is doing something inappropriate. One of the least common reasons though which is the reason that people had hypothesized kids don't intervene is because they don't know what to do so it's not the case that kids feel uncertain about what to do they do know what the right thing to do is or what they should do but they have other reasons primarily that they want to stay stay some self for not intervening. When they do intervene the reasons that students offered. We're more varied there was no predominant reason actually when i looked at these reasons and then i looked at the principles that you all promote and embraced a bunch of the themes that have overlapped so these are things that seem to be that kids carry with themselves as they go about the day unto some kids. Reported that i helped i did intervene because i wanted to make the other students feel better. Wanted to alleviate that person's concern or i felt empathy i know what that feels like i knew he was feeling bad i wanted to do something to stop that. Simpsons talked specifically about because it was my friends so that's why i did something. But then another group of students reported that it was just wrong so the bullying was wrong or it was wrong that the student is feeling bad so they have this sense of what is right and what is wrong in social interactions and that's what compelled them. To act. Smallest stupid kids reported that they did something because they knew what to do and this is a group that i think might be some most interesting to sort of changed because if we can give kids. The skill to know what to do. So that they can remain safe so that we can sort of combined those two slides that's when we're most likely to see intervention by these kids. So just leave you then with it a few themes that i'd like you to take from what i'm talkin about today so the first is that you should never ignore a bullying incident so especially in the context of we know that adults are very unlikely to see these even occurring you're probably really unlikely even hear about them occurring as well so when you do hear about it or when you do actually witness it. You should definitely intervene in some way. This been the follow from one another you should set an example with your own behavior so obviously i don't need to tell you this this means not engaging in bullying on your own but more specifically it means stepping in when you see something that is wrong. Two-thirds are relating to this when you hear about these events are you see these events and this might be you see them on tv and a television program are you see them in a movie or you hear about something that gets publicized within the community yard and national-level to take those as teachable moments to talk about. The implications of bullying and talk about to how universities experiences and the implications that has four victim but also what it is that kids can do to help kids who are being victimized. What goes along with the stand is thinking about all of the role player so the bullies the victims and the bystanders. And us as adults our job is to help kids think about. All of the behaviors that they could use so that they don't feel like they just have. One venue so on the bullies end of things we need to give them other methods than using aggression. The victims ends of things we need to think about how we can help them cope with victimization or how they can avoid. Being susceptible to being targeted by a bully and then from the bystanders on the things we need to think about how it is that we can help them feel like. They know what they can do sometimes they know the right thing they know what they can do and they can remain safe as they're helping the victims of bullying. I'm going to leave it right there. Feverfew minutes for some discussion questions i know they're probably a lot so. Peter has a microphone. Yep so i think so proud of this involves the start starts at the top down right so we have to school closures that don't permit building that is much more than or so i've been studying this for 15 years and every school that i go into now has some sort of bullying program but that doesn't mean it alleviates. And adults at a minimum hopefully it's their peers as well since the peers know this is a culture where this doesn't happen but i think the maybe a more strategic point of you cuz i'm not someone who wants to confront people i would opt for the other way it's so comforting of victim later on or talking about it with an adult or a teacher i'm letting my parents know about what's going on so that. You know i am actively informing people who might have more power than me putting those strategies because there's going to be just as effective. I'm we should inform kids about those. Yep yeah i think so i have it some ways. Devoting all of my time to studying this but i have a little bit of a negative point of view in this from the point-of-view of that we can stop bullying right so this is something that happens in every culture that we've studied there's not a culture yet across the world where we studied it that hasn't happened happened sort of in the same percentages so this is this is some sort of group face phenomenon that happens when we get kids together so. I think the efforts that it's a can't prevent it completely certainly i mean we should still try to stop it but we also need to i'm kids with coping strategies ways of making sense of the events that are happening to them. And also i'm empowering me feist and this is why i think they leave the power of other people coming in and instead of changing the culture of the peer group or of the school can be really powerful so there are people testing this now julian scandinavian countries and finland in particular i'm to see if when we empower bystanders what affects there will be. But beyond that yeah i agree with you it's impossible. So i think so there are at least two main empathy for people who study bowl8ng bullying and particular so there's a group of people studying whether it's fully lacking social skills and. I'm in that in that includes helping parents deal with their kids taking it from that angle there's another group of researchers more. Along the lines of the way that i have been trained to understand this as fully doctor actually are quite skillful so taking this you know social skills deficit approach won't work actually these kids are figuring out this is how i gain status this is effective for me it's giving me the rewards i want it's not the rewards that adults think are important but it's getting me what i want so. Burnett and the thing that's trickier because then that really requires as adults to come in and put of infiltrate. No the norms and the values that kids have and that's potentially possible effectively i would. You running advertising company and making trillions of dollars infiltrating kids norms and values but so i think that two-pronged approach is the way to go but i'm not sure that. Will ever effectively be able to get into those norms and values for the bullies. Yeah that's a great point so i should have said at the top actually these terms of the term victimization i like the term in some ways because it illustrates the severity of the action but you're right in terms of labeling the student so you text on a couple of things so the interpretation that the victim has that i am not being victimized by this that it is the action of the other person is critical for healthy psychological. Targeting individuals until it changes the way that person interprets that experience so that's really important the second part of that it's none of these labels ever get you into siding with school so when we describe the events we often times actually don't even use the word bullying so we just talked about specific behavior so. I'm eating that they associate with that but for the most part we focus just on the actual specific behavior is so that's a great point about using these labels i don't know what goes on in schools if they actually are using the term but we don't use those words. Vegeta time constraints a further comments or questions will have to wait until after the service but thank you doctor bellmoor inn. And once again let's take her for being the closing words will be read by heidi hughes. I've been really been actually really very pleased to see how much awareness was raised around bullying and how deeply it affects everyone. You know you don't have to be the loser kid in high school to be bullied. Bullying and being picked on comes in so many different forms. Lady gaga and companionship.

uuprairie_org

Pr190526_various-Walls_Talking-ed.mp3

Welcome everybody i have the old welcome so. You'll recognize it as you know. fierstein open-hearted and an open-minded congregation and we welcome people of every ethnic background every religious background and whatever your color your sexual orientation or gender or your family structure. Well i'm sunday morning please provide a wide variety of services and i think that'll be even more crew this summer. They're either presented by a prairie member well it's a bunch prairie members today remember the wider community and today our service is called walls talking. And there's a slideshow should be going in both rooms. You may or may not be able to see it maybe i'll tilt it one way here for the beginning and it shows. Opening words you only grow by coming to the end of something and by the inventing something else. This is by john irving in the world according to garp how many read that book i did many many years ago. Alright well i'm talking service today and we have never people who are already have given some thought to what they wanted to talk about and penny i was going to lead us off with talking but annual services. I thought today was going to start the conversation and we hope for you. But. For the for the program committee duties. Annual services makes our job a lot easier we don't have to think of something new to do. We have one coming up next week. And it's the transition sunday. And it's a sweet sweet service. When we get to learn trivia about our youth and things we never would have known without pet service. And we get to see their talents and stuff and wish them well on their new journeys. Summer breeze. That's a really popular program everybody we had we see people we rarely see, for some reason because everybody wants to share their favorite stories and books. And we have two annual services that really. Don't have anything to do with the walls here in in prairie we had the subsidy sharing. And the retreat. And hear the walls. Are very quiet. We have a a video either of the rare lecture or a ted talk. And some coffee and notch. And then the day of the dead ceremony and. This is one. Do you know. It means a lot to some people and other people just aren't comfortable with it. But though we try to do it up right with some. Some beautiful decorations and. A somber tone and everything. And of course. Finally we end up the year with our symbol tree in the santa lucia. And i must say. I wasn't here when you did it with real candles. But i'm glad we still have a building. So that's taken care of the. Regular services and there are too many. Schedule annual services. Even begin unless you've got one that really stands out to you that you'd like to share your memory about. Next barb is going to talk about music. Do you want people to share things about annual service was now or wait till the end. You know that the old sob out unitarians can't sing well because they're always. Hold up by reading the words ahead of time before they're willing to sing them and this congregation doesn't do that apparently because they sing very well and. Evans very musical right from the beginning you know i you probably heard the story and somebody at asking goleta visitor coming and staying. Have to be a musician to join this church of of music at prairie and early when we first moved into the building there were several people that were sort of key people for one of them was deleted to prove whose piano that is for every person who walked in the building by the time they walked out she knew. If they sang what instruments a place and had them signed up never quite gotten that skill that she had. One of the memorable things that was the accordion orchestra. Then. We had warned hagstrom always did an annual program on a composer. And it was never never recorded music he collected all of the things that he wanted to use to illustrate his talk and then recruited people to perform and that went from you do piano 22 singing to whatever was needed but the only time i ever really had a fight with ralph pazinski was when he used recorded music in the service of something that i knew the congregations was very capable of singing. Organize the cabin. Fever reliever program 11 night that was great and the course that was george collin and bruce and always did george plays a mandolin so he was a part of most every musical program and the recorder group played and george and ruth sometimes just played mandolin and recorder so they were standard. Fear and then mike briggs who we haven't heard lately in those old days for he could really rock those him generations moved on mary mullins joined us and dan proud and carl wacker and we switch to a lot more guitar music and that's been wonderful and then into 1994. Eileen said we need a permanent choir we had some 40 things of two christmases we had done like little coral recital sort of thing or program but so we thought. Beautiful talk. And then and most recently we've got an amber to join us and. You know she not only place she right she plays saxophone. All right randy converse was going to talk about sleepover. Sleepovers where is it tradition that prairie grove over 20 years. It originally started about it would 33 act 3 seasonal activities and something was added later on and it's in existence it was. Fall frolic welwyn train. The beginning of. That enterprise was an obstacle course which erin boss started and carl wacker follow through with his usual creative ed's adaptation over the years. Wealthy want to say the activities other than obstacle course or coarse marshmallow roasting. Dancing with strobe lights. Game infamous or famous wink. Flooding fashion show. Late night videos by the teens that was a big deal to a chaperone and had to make sure the teens were quiet enough for the younger people to sleep while they did their video thing of course during the before the sleeping started there was a lot of arts and crafts and eating of court needing was a major deal along with that was. And after in the morning of course after the overnight there was homemade breakfast and my memory controller. Most of that and sometimes can school would be a very capable substitute. Summer spring summer. What's the weather like thank you was on the end of its 10-year and a lot of them have a good time at his at his spread. Near the end of its existence the overnight part kind of fizzled out cuz no one really wanted to be a part of it anymore so what do you can turn it all today as we had roller skating and more sweating and things like that rather than appear overnight. Annual program director who was dale haglund and has continued in the main idea was to. Have a time for kids to get together. And make gifts and then wrap them for friends and family i gave him a chance would. Kids shopping and they could buy something and make it and wrap it could be a surprise although many of the kids were as soon as they saw the parents. In 1990 i believe it was. Banana. Change it. But that is stayed consistent music. 30 kids and. We do projects for several hours in the morning. But the natural product. Pine cones only had snake twigs. All different kind of leaves in these printing and things like that for we tried to use things that are recycled. You'd be amazed what you can do with a future pics of tongue depressor since them. Busting blood. It really limit the kinds of paints in blues and. Things that you use otherwise i would never be able to. So. You're still doing it. I'm slowly climbing. I still help. Project will be coming up in december. Been a great fun to the to the kids over time. Last year we did an adult mystery gift and we're doing it again. In two weeks. Auction offering. Step higher in the challenge for what you get to do. What are the thing in one dimension talking about i wanted to say a big thank you to all the pieces prairie who helped me keep the display. Going at the front of the main room it's the way i think five years now that we've had really nice artwork up there we do start work it was people's individual work members of their family or collections of aren't they had collected over the years and had in their home and so. Hopefully in the new space when the request i had was a gallery. Hanging system so that we don't have to use curtain hooks and i'm looking forward to a lot of new people. I was asked to talk about the plays that remire classes if you've been coming here for a while he's probably. Anyway yeah doctor seuss books and. I remember us getting a box that one of us had to hide in for one of the pieces that i remember doing yertle the turtle which involve people climbing on each other that is fun. I know we did. Stone soup one at one point the time machine the i don't remember what the story is called but the one where you go back and step on a butterfly in the future is different that one is was fun we spent a long time making a time machine in the big room downstairs that used to have murals and that was in the corner for a while we spent a lot of time playing with that leading up to it catherine what the dinosaur. Get up and do stuff on stage has been a big part of my experience here has been just always having me get up every now and then is he part of the service. I can remember when i first came to prairie how odd it seemed to me that the kids got so much play you know i'm in the service because my father was a minister in his so he was the main show always and the kids. You all know of soup sunday since you've been here recently. But so much more food than that is made in our kitchens and enjoyed how many of you have ever had a circle supper in the building over there. Wedding for example caitlin got married here. And barbara and ron got married here we have to get gas. All kinds of interesting of late interesting dress-up dinners that we've had with all kinds of costumes. Aunt karen was carmen miranda it whenever giant fruit and flower we've had renaissance dinners revolutionary dinner a victorian steampunk tea party canada party jimmy durante's 115th birthday cowboy party. And i didn't even know about the kids overnight saturday in cooked mostly for quite a while. For those. Game night has just recently kind of fizzled down but they used to have meals and then they went to pizza but that was food we have a men's group and women's group and there were very ambitious dinners for those they had they would evolve into luncheons were. Things like that. We had some touching and memorable funerals here where there was a lot of food served mike sheehy mary lou deal bob lawrence dave johnson even watching the pictures makes me cry. Big birthday parties like you had one. All kinds of. Spanish speakers potluck i had to look in the history books to look at some of the old things that were going on anything that was going on for a really long time and actually started in 1987 still going. Thanksgiving. Just really you don't even know all of the food preparation and meals that are enjoyed in this group to separately from the sunday services and really it just makes all of the experiences richer and more complete thank you. Thanks bud. Are closing words are. Transitions themselves are not the issue. But how well you respond to change by jim george greet your neighbors have coffee and come back next week.

uuprairie_org

Pr120527SteveKrallis-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to unitarian universalist society. Hurry aspires to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color your sexual orientation your gender or your family structure. Start memorial day service today will be by. Steve kraulis. He is retired. From the army national guard the 23-year veteran. Outreach program supervisor for the wisconsin department of veteran affairs. He and he lives in. Madison. So he might be out and about if you see him around ever. He's the also works with kids in drug and alcohol prevention. He's been doing that for 18 years i believe he said. And. He said he got but he did not drive here today a brand new harley on friday so if you hear the room broom look and see if it's him. And one of his big models in life. Life lived in service is a wife life well-lived. Please welcome steve. Good morning i hope the height of my nervousness today so as i speak this all gets better i suppose. Which is odd considering i've been doing public speaking since getting sober on may 14th 1991. And. I'm very proud of that in in for a reason that i will talk about later in my presentation. In the end it's. It's not just being sober it's it's it's service to your community of service to your fellow alcoholics and drug addicts. And it's. It's it's a new way of life that. That as part of a greater part of greater health i guess. Worth personal in metal. But that's not what i'm here to talk about today i'm here to talk about. Veterans issues and problems facing veterans today. And what we as. Members of the community can do to assist our veterans. I'll tell you that. It's my belief. That military service. Is. It's my belief that military services actually very much in keeping with the principles that i've read about this congregation. It is a service to others. It's a commitment to the greater good. It's. You know that the brothers and sisters that i served with over a 23-year career. Starting out in the marine corps seventeen-year-old kid two weeks after my 17th birthday. 45 years in the marine corps as an infantryman doing long range patrol. Six-man teams by myself out 20 25 mi. I had of the main organization. That camaraderie in that sense of purpose. Was it really wasn't a political. It really wasn't denominational it really wasn't religious it was just about. That connection in that commitment that i had to that marine standing next to me. And after leaving the marine corps after 5 years. And not adjusting well to civilian life which is a very common theme among veterans. I went back in i joined the army and i did 18 years in the army before i retired in 2006. And. One of the things that i noticed as a service member over that span of time was. The tremendous amount of difficulty i had reassimilate again to civilian life. I even when i left active duty and became a full-time national guard soldier. In my career i would go to work in my uniform and i would be around people that understood. And i would get off work at 4:30 in the afternoon and i would drive to my house on mandrake road and i would put on my levi's in my polo shirt and i didn't fit in anymore. And i do know i've looked just like my neighbor and i might as well live on the moon. And. In this night and i need that i need to stress something is i'm a cold warrior i'm not a combat veteran in the classic sense and i'm going to talk about who combat veterans are. I had a job that was very important. I collected intelligence. My job was to observe it wasn't to carry a rifle and shoot people. It was to hide in observe and report back in. And tell people what was happening in. And i'm i'm truly blessed that i never had to use those skills in active combat. Although. Many of my friends dead and paid the ultimate price. And then continue to pay that price now going forward. And i. So what we talked about when i wanted to talk about the issues facing veterans today it's it's that background it's that very common experience and that sense of belonging. When you're in uniform and then you're suddenly thrust into civilian life. After your tour of duty in. And for national guard and reserve soldiers. Sailors airmen marines. That's you know they get uprooted from their civilian life. In this part time job and they get sent to iraq or afghanistan or the horn of africa or. Various other places that we're currently engaged is global war. And. For a year 18 months 24 months of their life. They're exposed to the harsh realities of warfare. And it doesn't matter if you're a cook. Or i mechanic. These days everybody is a warrior first. And everybody is exposed. To the harshness in the dangers of war i don't know how many veterans we have in the audience right now and it certainly under no obligation to identify yourself but i bet. That you understand where i'm coming from when i speak to that that it really doesn't matter what you did in the military that. Harshness in that reality of conflict. It's is very real regardless of what the job was. And. When that tore completes and not veteran returns to civilian life. Oftentimes they don't have a job. One of the main concerns. We at the wisconsin department of veterans affairs. Are working on this year is veterans employment issues. We're putting on business symposiums to educate. Employers on the value of hiring veterans and how to understand how veterans think. Speak. What items on their resume mean. For instance. Towards the end of my infantry career i became an instructor because my body just. Flat could not tolerate that type of lifestyle anymore. I practice six vertebrae in my back i dislocated my left hip. Both shoulders have three skull fractures. I broken my left hand three times. My left foot twice. Milwaukee medical study i could probably use some of these grandson over here you just bring the graduate medical school. And i. So what happens if we come back and and their jobless. They're dealing with this rather sudden reintegration into civilian life. And i. And that's. Unfortunately they stay speak a different language now. And their experiences. Separate them from the very society that they protected and that they want to reassemble it into. And so. As a result of that our unemployment rate among veterans is national eat about 3 to 3.5% higher. But it is among the general population. So i depending on how you look at unemployment rate in the united states right now whether it's six or eight percent. And whether it's. 8% if you count everybody who's unemployed 6% if you don't count the people quit looking. You take the veteran unemployment rate is between 11 and 14% depending on how you do the math. And so. We're trying very hard to address that and and in doing that we're also putting on hiring fairs and bringing those employers in it. Bringing veterans frozen players to try to assist them in finding jobs. But that's a problem that everybody face. So that's not knew what i'd like to talk to you about is. The increasing incidence of post-traumatic stress. And. And thankfully. Be there starting to take the d off the end of ptsd. When do the new diagnostic. Criteria come out. It'll be post-traumatic stress and instead of supposed to medexpress disorder. And the reason why the veterans administration in mental health communities working towards accomplishing that goal. It's simply because. If i have a disorder i don't want to tell anybody about it. And you know i'm ashamed to walk up to somebody and say i have a disorder. Because i feel like i'm whole. And i don't understand why i have nightmares i don't understand why i can't sleep at night. I don't understand why my wife doesn't doesn't know who i am anymore. And i'm not talkin i'll talk about my personal experiences in a minute but. What i hear from veterans is. that's a very common. Feeling it's a very common experience. It's date all that's very real but to come in and say that i have this disorder that's there's a stigma attached to that were. And. When we're talking about 10 to 30%. A veterans returning after multiple tours in the last 6 years. Are being diagnosed with post-traumatic stress. So either one and ten or three out of ten of every veteran that return. And i want to give you some perspective on numbers in the state of wisconsin since 9/11. We've had over 30 3500 veterans return from. Active service. Okay that means. And 50% of those are national guard and reserve so they're already members of our community. And. They've been uprooted and taken away from their homes and their families and they serve and voluntarily in. And we're all grateful to do that but then they come back. The other half are active duty soldiers that are gone for three or four 8 or 12 or 20 years. And their tour ends and they come back to. State of wisconsin. And they try to reintegrate. That's. If you take 33,000 and look at. 30% of that. Suddenly weird that's an astronomical number for us to have to deal with. And i'll get into some of the steps that you was a group and that. We at the state are doing to try to address that. But i do want to talk about it one other significant problem and that is. Tpir traumatic brain injury. I spoke about the multiple concussions that i ever see. That's the concussions that they know about i was. Imma demolitions range when i was 19 year old marine. And i was teaching the class. And. It's when you actually set up a daisy chain and that's and bear with me while i tell you how the story works but. A daisy chain is when you light a fuse and you hook up to a length of det-cord. And that detonation cord goes out and it branches off to 6 or 8. Quarter pound charges a plastic explosive in newberry that into the ground. And use as an instruction tool to teach him how to setup the explosives how to setup the detonators. How to setup the fuse line. And oftentimes you have an eighteen-year-old kid who's been in the military about nine months. Is the one that ignites the fuse and they're nervous and they're afraid. And they're jumpy. And you're standing there and you're telling them don't you light that fuse until i tell you to light it and. You see i'm a soldier right forgot the night handout my apologize. And. The kid hears me say when i say paul. And he pull. And it's the fuse lightest setup for 2 minutes is which in a perfect world has plenty of time. To walk not run up over the berm and get down and wait for it to go boom. And but i have to finish what i'm saying cuz it's very important safety information so now i have less than the allotted amount of time. And i say that and i get everybody in front of me like i'm hurting young children over the burn. And i'm standing on top of the burn when it detonates. And the blast comes behind my helmet and it lifts my helmet off my head. And throws me headlong into the grass on the other side of the burn. Now. I look fine. No scratches. Not a single ding my eyes are red my ears are ringing. You don't have a tremendous headache. But honestly there's no visible. There's no visible. Insets of my injury. And for three days. I didn't report the incident because. I'm a tough young marine and it was just a headache and it's no big deal and then i finally have to go in and talk to the medics. And they go. You have a traumatic brain injury. And. It's these issues that that. Where are you overtime repeatedly and that's a very common there's a lot of blasts roadside bombs. You know explosive devices. Vehicle accidents these types of things. That it's a very common injury and it's a hidden injury in the twin at we don't see. So these are the things that were plaguing veterans as we go forward now what i want it the incidence of this is maybe 50% or less. But we don't know who they are until the problems. Arise and we have to address them. There are organizations out there and there's efforts are being made one of us is dryhootch dryhootch dog award it's a veterans assistance center on excelsior drive. On the westside of madison. If you are looking for someplace where you can meet veterans. Engage with veterans assist them in their assimilation into community. Be of service in any way that you fine. That's a place where veterans go to meet it was just recently opened last week. It's run by a nonprofit organization out of milwaukee. It's a. Mendez place. For healing and that's. Where veterans and community can engage. In a non-confrontational very laid-back environment have a cup of coffee and get to know the members of your veteran community. And i strongly encourage all of you. 2. Avail yourselves of that organization and if you ever feel the need. To engage with the veteran community that's a great place to start and that can grow into what other organizations are affiliated if there's more than you want to do you can branch out from there. We have. I want to take too much time i didn't realize it would fly this fast and i apologize. We have a women's veterans initiative that i just started five weeks ago when i was hired at the outreach coordinator. I have a women's veterans coordinator her name is carolyn morgan. And she is specifically tasked. With engaging women veterans in the community and identifying and trying to assist with homelessness. Which is. Compounded when it's a woman veteran because they tend to have children. And it's not just a veteran that suffers in this case it's the veteran in the children that suffering as you all know i'm sure. That is as far more. Grave of a problem when it involves children then it is when it involves just the battery and as a veteran myself i know how hard it is to have to deal with these hurdles i can't imagine what it would be like if i had to worry about my children to say. So we're trying to address that unfortunately anytime we have women veterans homeless facility require 24-hour. Security a bunch of the things. Victory school buses. Trying very hard to get the funding to provide that. But it's limited right now. And then lastly i want to talk about why i mentioned my sobriety for 21-year. The true danger that we deal with. Is ptfc combined with drug and alcohol addiction. Okay. It is. It is tragic when you see this happen. It's extremely common post-traumatic stress disorder i don't want to identify that i have this problem so i hide it and i attempt to self-medicate. I tend to self-medicated by drugs and alcohol that's what i did. That was the solution i tried. It didn't work but it masked it well enough for me until my 24. When i was 24 years old. And i ended up overdosing in my living room at the age of 24 and was rushed to the emergency room with a 375 blood alcohol level. I was lucky enough to survive i got medical attention when i needed it my heart stopped twice i had to be shocked. Injected with epinephrine to raise my heart rate. It was so it's a miracle that i'm standing here before you. We lose a veteran suicide every 80 minutes in this country. It is commonly the combination of post-traumatic stress. And drug or alcohol addiction. Whether it's by self inflicted. Or an overdose or and a vehicle accident. The department of veterans affairs considered that to be a suicide. They recently committed to hiring 2019. Additional mental health professionals. That over the next 24 months. They've hired several in the state of wisconsin. Wisconsin 115th fighter wing with wisconsin army national guard hired a full-time mental health professional. The army national guard has hired a suicide prevention specialist to medical professionals. And triple the size of their family outreach program. They're trying very hard to stem the tide of this program. Are stem the tide of this. Dangerous and with our veteran community. But we do actually need your help. And we need your help to reach out it's not a political issue it's really a community issue and. I want to thank you and i'll be happy secretary starbucks in wisconsin department of veterans affairs i want to thank each and everyone of you for asking me. To come speak to you i hope that you've gotten some medicine out of my coming here. I will tell you this and i this is not. Part of a professional presentation but. We talked about how military service touches all of us. Can i get a lot of flack for these two flowers that i wear on the inside of my arm. And a lot of my friends will say you're just big tough marine why do you have these flowers on the inside of your arm. And i tear up sometimes my talk about this. Itube very dear friends. When are you at marina want to soldier. In an opening weeks of the gulf war. The marine that i serve side-by-side was blown up at friendly fire. And iraq. He lost his life. In the first two weeks of the afghan engagement a soldier that i served with an active duty. Was killed in a roadside bomb. I wear these tattoos as form of memory. And i'm close on this memorial day weekend with this. I love that poem that you read. But i want extend that one a little bit further by saying. Soldier. Never dies in vain. Because they always die. The service and protection of their fellow. Soldier. As long as we remember that. And we never forget. Because we promised we wouldn't. Then. It's all okay. Because we serve. And we make that sacrifice. So you can live a better life and in standing up here before you in a congregation made up of people of differing philosophies and different views. And the fact that you had the compassion to ask me to come here means a tremendous amount to me and i'm honored to be up here to speak before you and thank you very much. Invited steve to stay up here for about 10 minutes or so discussion mario bring the microphone around. And please understand. As a representative of the wisconsin department of veterans affairs i'm prohibited from responding. To the political side although i do understand your angst in your concern and your your feelings towards that. And i'm. I think you might be surprised. How much many of the men and women that i work with. Support your views. Yeah i think i will tell you that. I didn't touch on it today but that the incidence of. A sexual assault within the ranks is. Is a horrific problem and it's one that we could never ever. Devoted enough time to the department of defense or my organization it's just simply impossible because of the magnitude of the damage it's done. And my department is is charged in ny in federal department of veterans affairs is charged with. Dealing with the carnage that comes from that conduct in and my heart goes out to you sir for you and your family. And i will tell you that. Asset as a soldier a marine a veteran nobody wants peace more than i. I'm so tremendously sick and tired of losing my friends. Both in conflict in in the conflict that ensues when they come home. I didn't talk about a friend up in tomah who's. Struggling with ptsd and alcohol addiction and everytime the phone rings and i see it's him a breather sigh of relief because i know he hasn't killed himself yet. And you know. He calls me. And he'll say i've got my gun out what am i going to do and i have to talk him through disassembling it and putting it back away and promising them that it'll get better and thank god that the phone calls are farther between each other now. But he's done three tours he's dying. You know i'm almost 4 years combined total service. He's been wounded i don't know how much is the expected to give. And yet he shares the same guilt that i do. About when we lose a friend we feel like we haven't given enough. And that's that that's the mindset that. Unfortunately continue swallowing. I live actually right next. To the memorial mile and i walked out and i have coffee with those veterans. Several times over the course of this weekend. I visit them in the middle of the night when they're holding the visual over the grave markers in. And i'm not a member of that organization but. I am quite familiar with them and i'm quite familiar with the effort that they're doing it. There's some of my very dear friends her returned from afghanistan and iraq to join that or no. No they're absolutely a veterans organization no different than the american legion for the veterans of foreign wars or for the vietnam veterans association or any of the axillary. The. And actually there's members of that organization that work for my depart. Can dominican quite you know. It's. You know they're not. Is widely known nationally as some of the more traditional veterans organizations that started post world war 1. And we're really popularized after world war ii. But they in my opinion just my opinion are very similar to the vietnam veterans association that was started. After vietnam when the bfw said well that wasn't declared war so you can't join the vfw for years. There was some blocking of vietnam veterans returning to bfw and thankfully that that insult has been corrected. But. Sono i. I consider the veterans for peace to be a bonafide service arkansas. I can tell you that not serve in combat. I don't want to. I don't want to overstep. You know i don't want to presume to speak for someone else. But there's no place else on this planet that i would rather be. Been standing next to somebody else in you. The fact that my body prevents me from doing that job anymore i was telling one of my friends is on any tours in afghanistan. When i'm looking out at the world i can't see what's behind these eyeballs. And in my head i'm 20 years old and i can carry 110 lb pack and walk for 5 days with an m16 and i don't even think twice about it. But then when i get out of bed and my back sounds like rice krispies and my cat running in front of me can cause a catastrophic knee injury that you know i have to understand that i can't do it but it's it's it's really hard to explain it really is but. And then i served with guys who did one tour in afghanistan got home. out. But their uniforms in a closet burn them whatever ever want to have anything to do with the military again. And i certainly by no means do i disparage that because. In this current environment less than 1% of the us population ever put the uniform on. You know i soft first of all sir thank you. For your service. For the bottom of my heart i don't care what you did. Or whether you got out and ran back home and never wanted to be a part of it again. The fact of the matter is that when your country called you stepped up. And and i. Whether it's military service the peace corps community service working in a soup kitchen or protesting the war i think when you speak from your conscience and you take your responsibilities within your community. A life lived in service is a life well-lived. I'd be happy to address both house and i'll address the initials first it out i'll tell you i specifically did not include that in my talk because. They're passed by the current administration. These 23 bills actually and i didn't want him to turn this into a political talk and i don't believe that you are so i'm happy that you asked me so i can speak to this. Three initial setup and started first of all a bill was recently passed and signed in as part of the year the veteran. Where they are encouraging the wisconsin department of safety and professional services other regulatory and licensing agencies. To give direct credit for military experience to licensure for professional license. I specifically we're working with department of defense for respiratory therapist. To give the training that you receive in the military towards licensure and state of wisconsin. But more importantly we have the veterans in piping. Which is a steamfitters program. We had just started to actually would wdva had no. No antonis septa publicized your bj can on your dane county veteran service officer that did this. Start a pilot program with metc in the insurance industry to. Take veterans with administrative experience. And give them credit towards. Insurance certificates and get them jobs with participating insurance company. But. Department of safety professional service has been tasked by the. By the capitol. 2. Engage department of defense and look for places where we can give credit towards licensure for veterans. Secondly there's a reciprocity act where if active-duty service member is transferred here either for training or further to our duty and their spouses license in another state. They're did wisconsin is now required by act. To get reciprocity free licensure if they pay their license. And equivalency so they can practice here instantly soon as they get here. And then lastly. There is. Work with workforce department of workforce development. A&m department of veterans affairs. We're we're engaging. Skillset and using the dwp computer system to. Courtney. Place veterans in jobs based on their experience. Talk about alcoholism. Wisconsin department of veterans affairs is not the agency tasked with doing that. We have better we have. Homes for retired veterans. And then we have educational programs but i'll tell you the federal va has a phenomenal treatment center here in madison in tomah. And all throughout the united states and they're doing a very good job. Providing inpatient treatment at no cost to the veteran and long-term support in the dryhootch. Is working in cooperation with the federal department of veterans affairs and we're going to have a meeting specifically for veterans at busting veterans from the treatment facilities. To the dryhootch so they can get a 12-step self-help counseling. So. Again. There's only so much that the federal and state va can do because unfortunately everything comes down to money and and we don't get to determine where that comes from. But we're we're trying to engage.. I'll be happy to stay here afterwards if anybody would like to talk to me one-on-one so i'm being ushered i think off of days so thank you very much. Thanks so much. I'd like to ask you one more time to read our closing words. Lebus might be somewhat appropriate. It's okay to cry it's okay to be afraid okay to be weak. It's okay to be vulnerable it's okay to be human. It's from all these elements that we grow. Kevin morris. Thank you.

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Pr150517LorryBondPennyEiler-ed.mp3

So good morning and welcome. Girl unitarian universalist society. Antonio aguilar. Perris fires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background. Whatever your color sexual orientation. Gender or family structure. How come you no matter what's your age. Or your abilities or in abilities. On sunday mornings. We provide a wide variety of services. There is a presented by a prime member like we are today. Or that somebody from the wider community or what. Consulting minister sandra ingram. Okay later in the service will have time for. Welcoming visitors and guests to not a requirement but we want to get to know you better so. This morning her opening words. Until the great masses of people shall be filled. With a sense of responsibility for each other's welfare. Cancel justice can never be attained helen keller. Electra glide orange and insured relative to her global chalice lighting. And we've been turned invited our special friend carolyn briggs to actually like the chalice for us today and we welcome her. We are unitarians so what do we celebrate. We celebrate the faithful way of love freedom and truth. We celebrate the message of tolerance inequality. We celebrate all missions to unite face cultures and peoples. In the face of division and exclusion. We celebrate the pioneers of social justice for speaking out their reason often at the risk of losing their career reputation or even their life rosella bird how unique mysterious and powerful each life is we celebrate. We celebrate the beauty of the earth and the impossibility of the universe we celebrate the potential for good of the local and global community diversity of each country we celebrate our meetings of peaceful fellowship. So. In july payday is going to be 25 years old and 22 commemorate that we wanted to do a service i'm going to take parts of the service here and the presentation and give a brief history of ada and mus and glory. Like all human rights struggles. Fruit. Juggles for the americans with disabilities act has a long history. And the struggle will probably never be finished. In colonial us the care of the des taylor was a responsibility of the family however beer shame. And lack of understanding led some families. The hide or just song they're disabled members. Or allow them to die. Those individuals whose families were unable or unwilling to support them a system was developed to. Forman mill. Do people who receive public assistance to provide room board and care. This is some survived until. The late night. Latter part of the nineteenth century public's concern over buces. And cute including recorded cases. We're care providers collected their fees. And lots of people with disabilities in attics to starve or freeze to death eventually this led to a change in focus. A shift towards more and organized institutionalized care. Began in the 1820s. The term warehousing. Sometimes used to describe the type of treatment. And refers to the fact that most such care with custodial in nature. And resulted from a v with people with disabilities as defective incompetent and need of special institutions care and services. Which isolated them in society in order for them to survive. Specialized institutions for individuals with particular types of disabilities were developed like home for the blind or the death. And these also were custodial in nature. This pattern of institutionalization has fallen into disrepute for two principal reasons. The first individual living in these institutions were subject to abuse. And neglect on a massive scale. S. And even more fundamental. It was not the purpose of these institutions. To promote the productivity. Or the independence of those residing in them. Because of prevailing concept. A disability at the time assume that to attempt to do so would be futile. The protective isolation model operated on the assumption that people with disabilities needed protection from the hardships of society. As medicine improved over time. Emancipation. Survived injuries and diseases. The order instead of dying. World war 2 the korean and vietnam war veterans we were returning with disabilities. The raj number of resulting disabled attitude on retail rehabilitation for return-to-work. As being inappropriate goal. Advanced rehabilitation services. Advocate advocacy morph. From charities. For specific disabilities run by the non-disabled. Into coalition of all the disability types. Run by the disabled themselves seeking civil rights. The 1973 reloaded rehabilitation act. And section 504 of it. And has served as a later model for ada. Was a significant milestone in the civil rights of the disabled. I have to share a personal story here i remember. When that started. And we were visiting bills grandparents i've been grand rapids. And we were in our late twenties about them and they were. They're in their seventies. Everything took a shopping. And as they drove by the handicap parking spot. To go further out they explained to us that. That parking. Was for old people. We had a big laugh about that because at that time 70 seems like the very definition of old us. So. Anyway. And then. Senator tom harkin offered ada. And what does cheese sponsor in this setting. Parking. Delivered part of his introduction speech in sign language. Saying it was so his death brother could understand. It was signed into law in july 26th in 1990. By then-president george h.w. bush. The ada is a wide-ranging civil rights law. A hibbetts discrimination based on disability. It affords similar protections against discrimination. To americans with disability. As a civil right act. Of 1964 which made discrimination based on race religion sex. National origin origin and other characteristics illegal. In addition i'm like the civil rights act. Data also requires covered employers. To provide reasonable accommodation to employees with disability. And opposes accessibility requirements on public accommodations. Googling ada started getting into the weed. There are pages upon pages upon pages. Of dry compliance regulations. Why every government agency and an endless list of lawsuit. One result of all the lawsuits was. The ada amendment act. A 2008. Sign by ironically. George w bush. What is that congress. Overturned several supreme court decisions that congress believed had. Interrupted the interpreted the definition of a disability. Tuner ali. Resulting in a denial of protection. For individuals with impairments such as cancer diabetes. Epilepsy. It also directed the us equal employment opportunity commission. To mend ada regulations to reflect the changes. Made by the ada amendment. Senator harkin's committee. Commissioned a report that takes a closer look. At the population that came of age since the passage of 88. Including their experiences with education. Disability benefits. And transition programs. And participation in the workforce. The report outlines four key areas of opportunity. To improve support. Remembers of the ada generation. Didn't senator hawkins words it is increasing support for high school students. As i transition into the workforce. Improving their experience. As i entered post-secondary education in the labor market. Changing the requirements in disability benefits. The mets discourage young people with disabilities from working. And leveraging employer demand. Well establishing supportive workplaces. Repairing the ada generation. To compete in today's labor force. Must begin while they're in school. Providing it was access. Twirling early work experiences and internships. I just two ways that will help them succeed. Higher education plays a critical role. In helping young people in tain attain employment. And that is especially true. For young people with disabilities. Yeah only 15% of high school graduates with. Disabilities attend 4-year colleges. Compared to the over 30%. Other general population. And that didn't our talented young people with appropriate pro. Secondary opportunities. Including certificate programs. Career and technical training opportunities. Community colleges. Two and four-year degree program. Will help them enter the labor market. With the skills and knowledge they need to compete successfully. Changing the incentives. Of disability benefits is another critical priority. We must. Take up to help the ada generation succeed. Under the current system. This this 1099. People with disabilities must prove that they cannot. And will not be able to earn enough to support themselves to receive personal attendant services. And our support. That this support would allow them to be independent. This is sensually commits them to a lifetime of poverty. We need to modernize these program so that young people are not punished for wanting to work. Another barrier to employment. Data generation faces. Is a perceived cost. Of worst place accommodations. Employers often overestimate these cost. Well under estimating the contribution workers with disabilities can make. In actuality nearly 80%. A workplace accommodations cost less than $1,000. And studies have shown that hiring employees with disabilities. Can increase business productivity. And decrease absenteeism. In fact young people with disabilities austin drive-in. Competitive environments and leadership positions. Adding value to the workplace far beyond the cost of any accommodation that they need. And i'd like to end up with my experiences. This end of april at the people of faith. United for justice advocacy day at the capitol. I learned about another privatization. Asking in the governor's budget. That would dismantle. Wisconsin. Top rated long-term care system. Including the elimination of iris. A program which was started in 2008. To provide a non managed care. Remarketing alternative for people who want to self direct. All of their service. And this. Popular unique inflexible program. Has grown rapidly to his current enrollment. 11500 wisconsin residents. And enabling them to live at home instead of in nursing homes. Good news. I heard on the news friday. Did the budget committee. That's found at the governor's proposal is unaccepted. And for now irises. Yeah. So that's. The nuts and bolts of it. Landlord can give us the personal side of it now. Animal facts. One of the things i say. That defeat was i didn't know if i could roll on top of this carpet. I have. Magic carpets rolling on top because they get caught in my wheels. So. And also the pattern i can't look at. I think first of all i'm going to life take my glasses off so. I can read my notes. I'm just going to tell you. A little about my disabilities. I've had. I have several. And a lot of them have to do with brain damage. I did not know i was born with hydrocephalus. Back in the late 50s. Of course they didn't have the technology back then. To say hey. This kid's got hydrocephalus. And. I became disabled completely 21 years ago. Last month. Again i thought it was. From the hydrocephalus but now. A few years ago they told me. No that was my ms multiple sclerosis. I'm right now in what they call the. Secondary progressive. Ms. So. When i asked what that meant they said well that's just. That just means that. The lesions on your brain are growing faster and faster. So. I have. I'm one of these people that cannot work. I'm glad penny talked about the. Yeah the right-to-work statutes. Ions on what that means. Because there are several of us simply cannot. I work for the state i was on probation parole agent. And. One day i was out. Twilight. They had to have a car back then. I got into a series of car accidents identical. And. Cuz i started to brandon college i have a master's degree in. Counseling. Bachelor's degree in social work so. Studies of brain and. Okay so i'm trying to make a lane change i don't see the car i make the lane change. And i guess yet. That happened four times. And. Person at that point i asked. And one of the police officers that routinely work with. You think i should give up my license i don't know what's going on here. Even though i had been seeing a series of different doctors. And since i started having nose bleeds everyday same time of the day. And. Just awhile at work and. At first i said nothing is wrong. And each time i saw a doctor there was one further thing wrong. And nobody at that time said ms. So i thought i was on disability for run. Hydrocephalus. Turns out now they told me know you had ms starting from. Day one. That's when it kicked in. So. Not only do i have. Hydrocephalus which means. The more activity i engage in. More pressure on my brain. And i can just shut down. Billy buckley. And i have ms. I'm also missing the. Piece of the brain that connects the two halves so. It takes a little longer for me to comprehend things. So the fact that i got a master's degree. The doctors can't figure that out. How i managed it through school. But i did and. I worked. Well. From the time i was seventeen and working office jobs. My parents knew i had. The disability but never told me. And so they scared me into office positions. I hated office work. So. Went back to school. 23. Got that master's degree. As i said before work is probation parole agent. So. And the other thing is i'm also legally blind i have this condition called blepharospasm. That one of the reasons i took my glasses off. And one of the reasons i had them. Put that. Chairs they originally the chairs were in a semicircle. And i said. No that's not going to work for me. D'amore. Colors ice-t the more people i see. The more stimulation for my brain. The worse it is. And that is caused me to have two strokes. So. The last time i was in the hospital and doctor couple. Watching out to doctors up said. They're amazed i'm still alive with all this happen. And of course i flipped them i said to them. The 1 a.m.. Dnl. We never know when we're going to die. And it could happen today if it happened tomorrow. We don't know. And to another i said well there must be something i have to do yet. Maybe giving this presentation was. One of those things i had to do yet. So. And feel like i'm kind of rambling on but how the ada has affected my life and i'm going to add to what penny said to 1973. The other people working with tom harkin. Word ted kennedy and bob dole. And that's you all remember bob doyle was disabled. I'm in the war. And the fact that. They were polar opposites. And politically thinking. They were right on. When. In terms of. Looking at people with disabilities and including them in society passing the americans with disabilities act. And it took many many years and he said for that to happen. You know when i went on disability i wasn't aware of the americans with disabilities act. I just knew. This is who i am this is the way it is. And what's important to remember about the ada. Is that. It is a federal program. Businesses. Have to comply with the ian. And schools have to comply with. Standard but churches do not. And that's because of the theoretical separation of church and state. In our society. Although i find it interesting that our money says in god we trust. Like. Tumi. Inn at there is no separation but that's why. Churches don't have to. Have ramps they don't have. Things that. We here at prairie du. Just because it's the right thing to do. I've also noticed the quaker community in this city. Also. That's that. We don't need the ada to tell us what to do we know. And. We know how to make things right for people. And i think that's really important. Different thing i wanted to talk about to was. At the provisions in that. Ada app there are others besides education and that sort of thing. Curb cutaways. Came into existence. Back then. That's interesting to know. That. The bus i would have to take you one of the reasons i take paratransit i'll talk about. Paratransit. Is the bus stop. There does not have occurred cutaway. And this is 25 years later. And a progressive city like madison. The curb cutaways around the inside of the square. Are very very scary and fact. I have. Knocked off the power in my wheelchair because it got caught. Point down one. Because first you have to go down and then. Up to get. Painted the road. And for that to happen so close to. A state capital. Again it's one of those. What's going on here. Who's banking. And. Dinner time. Thinking of that. And i kind of alluded to this that was walker. Things are going i mean he's. Eradicated a lot of things and. I'm afraid that he may or. His drawings may try to eradicate. All that we work for. And done with the ada. I don't know what's going to happen was that. And of course building code. Those buildings especially. Apartment building. Apartments. Now have to have. 3% of their units be totally. Wheelchair accessible. Are those built after 1991. It was interesting. Just called a new apartment. I saw a new apartment building go up in the neighborhood i want to get back downtown. Say in a high-rise. And i will do you have any. Will you do you have any. Wheelchair accessible apartments. Odorol wheelchair-accessible. But every single one of them has a bathtub. And i said do you realize that you are in violation of the law. Silence. Bugsy interesting studi what happens with that. And in a penny talked a lot about the history. Of the ada. And john. Mute my feeling on the 88 to is that. It is an enhanced version. Of the separate but equal. Legislation passed in the 1950s. And it is a part of the whole civil rights struggle. But. And i appreciate the efforts of those who work tirelessly. When i became disabled actually there was somebody who said to me. Oh so now you going to work for. People with disabilities. No. Just because i'm disabled that doesn't mean. I'm going to focus all my energy on that. Right now 21 years later. Don't have much energy. So all i can do is sit back and. Fortunately the 88 the accessibility coordinator for the city. Is a good friend of mine lives in the building next to me. Can i at one point had talked about. Going down. No.2 the square. So he could make notes. It would have to be on the outer square. And present those. Yeah to his boss the mayor. We have yet to do that i asked him about that just the other day and he said you know i'm so busy with everything else. So. Network. Donate to happen superb cutaways the. As an example. And one of the. Things that i've noticed and what. People have said to me. What's in a. The diamonds in the road in the curbside always. Actually they served a purpose they were put there for people who are blind. So that. There. If they use a white cane their canes and feel that. Nothing winter around here so that's why you see more metal. And the curb cutaways. With the raised. With the right buttons. I spent time walking. Weather weather. One of those pains when i walk i i go blind. Walk anymore. You know i used to service dog. And that too is also addressed and. It's legislation. Most recently. And i'm not quite sure when this happened but. The service dog. Language. Was taken out to the amended to service animal. Because it's not just dogs who help people with disabilities. Monkeys. Have been shown to help people with disabilities who have no use of their hands as an example. I've heard of people using shuttling ponies. I don't remember the reason why. But. But i think but again there's been a lot of abusive that. In elder are schools where service dogs guide dogs are being trained. My dog and a back. When i got her. Called owner trained service dog. And because there's been a lot of abusive dad. That has been. Tightened and i was part of that mark miller came to me and said how can we fix this legislation. To prevent abuse. And i said well mark. Here's what we can do. Because my dog could do. A lot of things for me. And i said to him. And i know others have said and it's been amended to. If it's an owner train service animal it's got a performance three functions. That help you with your disability. And one of my friends kind of joke to me. You know. Your dog does that in the space of ten minutes. And i know if you remember her i brought her here a couple times. For the end of her life. And. She did it. I remember going into a home depot. Where at. You know they had a no dogs allowed. And. I was walking with her. One of their employees approached me. And. At the last minute so i her. Take her snout and move my intern my leg. Because she knew where we were going. He walked away. And. With her there. I carried the statutes on. Questions and answers. Four pic one businesses that's was put out by the department of justice. I always carried that so i could show that. Tuesday if i had problems. And you better believe i went to the yeah. Managers at home depot instead. Look at this. It never happened again. Because they said. Oh yeah. Service dogs do not need to have a. Vest on. But we just do it because then there's no question. You know it's one thing. Not required by law. So anyway.. Talking about service service animals. And another. Point that i wanted to make make. I wanted to talk about the. Different words that we use. That are used. Disabled. A disabled person. Invalid. If you look at it on paper. Invalid. And i have friends to this day who use that to describe themselves. And i just fringe. Bad. Several years ago i think it's odd that end of the 80s probably starting with the mid-70s with the women's movement. In the term differently-abled. And i remembered. Being with. Two of my friends one who. Was disabled from polio. Effects of polio at 3 weeks. And one who had. Progressive ms. At that time i didn't know i too had it. And we talked about. What do we call ourselves. And each one of us had a difference. Terminology. You know. For me. I like per person with a disability. And you say that in. Literature 2. Short-handed to pwt. But i'm a person first. I have a disability or. And my kids several disabilities. But i am a person. And i was going to try as i said before i was going to talk about paratransit. We are lucky here in madison. That we haven't go to paratransit system. As we want. It's not perfect. But. I have had very few problems with it. One of the reasons i get here early on sunday morning is. If i don't schedule my ride by 9. I'm not going to get here. Because they don't have enough drivers. City only has so much money and. They're only two providers. The weekends words during the week there's. For i believe. But. And it only cost me $304. Each way. Whereas i was talking with a friend. But i knew who. Had cerebral palsy i know we're in high school. We were good friends. And she said. Believe it or not for her. Paratransit is $40. And this is in a small city. The size of the campus here. The city i grew up in. I am occasionally think about moving back there. And don. To be with my family that's why they're all at. But. I couldn't get it any better than living here. We have a good service we have. Good things for paratransit for people with disabilities. In fact one dave just love it was. Running for mayor. I want to a breakfast where. All of the mayoral candidates were. And i had my dog with me. And if you remember sue baumann. She saw that. she turned around and gave me the dirtiest look and this breakfast was put on by i believe was alliance for animals. So i know several people in there. They've just levitch came to me got down on both knees and said. What can i do for people with disabilities. And i said dave there's not enough time right now to talk about it. But one thing dave did was. Appointment to be on via commission on people with disabilities. I served on that commission for. Couple of years i believe. We tried to. Pass. Something in the city that. Apartment complexes apartment buildings had to have 5% of their units be. Wheelchair accessible totally wheelchair accessible. And they were talking about that and talking about that. Until. I got appointed. And i. Said. You know this is never going to fly. And here's why. Federal government. Only 3%. And. An attorney came to talk to us about that. And that's exactly what he said that madison. Cannot have it any better than the federal government regulations. Even though madison is tried. To get. A lot better things on the playground penny was talking about. My hope i don't know what kind of flooring that they'll have. Destin. Can i go over pete gravel. Without me getting stuck. I can't ride in the grass without getting stuck. So i do believe those will be having just a fine layer of. Audubon park. On them. Because. That is the most accessible. Material to have on a. Underground. And one of the final things one of the personal things. Normally you see me come in with without shoes on. Bad again. If there's a business that's a no shoes no shirt no service. Doesn't apply to those of us who use wheelchairs. Our feet are not going to hit that touch the ground in most part. And i know our friends have had fun with that. When. Approached. Shoes. I'm going to stop there. I know i kind of rambled on and i have three pages of notes. Tried to keep it inside something that but. You know. Data has a long way to go just like. Any other legislation and now put my glasses on and if you have any questions or discussion. Thank you lord. Foreclosing words have a quote from stephen hawking. My advice to other disabled people would be. Concentrate on your. Disabilities doesn't prove you doing well. You don't regret the things it interferes with. Don't be disabled in spirit as well as in physicality. Let's it richer neighbor and thursday for suisun sunday and this is mating.

uuprairie_org

Pr211010questionboxRevMattAspin-ed.mp3

Today's presentation is question box by reverend matt aspen. Take it away now. Alright good morning everyone is very good to be here with you as always. I got a few questions ahead of time i see that there are some questions in the chat of try not to like read too much and think too much so that i can be as promptly as possible. I've seen ministers through this before and i just think it's a really good way early on for us to for you to be able to kind of get to see me. On-the-spot you learn more about me if you have questions question what you what you what i believe and i just kind of get to know me a little bit better. Hopefully we can have fun with this. So i'm going to try to go in. Not going any particular order but. I'm going to start with what i think was maybe the easiest question i received is it is kind of a warm-up it's also kind of fun so and then we'll. Deeper. What is something about washington that you miss and something about wisconsin that you really enjoy. I i said to. Message my partner i actually. Visited me several times it in washington it is stunningly beautiful in in the pacific northwest you've got you go from the ocean up to the mountains and out to the desert. Very short amount of drive. And it's just the mountains when they're out are absolutely. It's monstrously expensive i don't miss that at all. And i love but i lied about the pacific northwest was it was very much west coast they were really always trying to push the boundary of things and so that was kind of cool i'm from boston which is a very. Since they have a great tradition with fruit. What are the year. My partner said. As we were talking about the beauty the pacific northwest she said there's just as much beauty here you just have to look for a little bit more closely. And i'm absolutely found that to be true. I found some beautiful. Lakes and the the skies here gorgeous and there's the seasons there's no seasons in the pacific northwest it's nice to have the season. I've really been enjoying the thunderstorms. And i really like the people to i chose meadville lombard middle of the country i could have gone to harvard divinity. Seminary there's meadville in the middle. And then they're starting in the west in those those really do echo the the people that that are that are there. Mute the harvard once much more traditional. Starting one is far more like. Make up your own thing. And the. The senate the one in the middle of the country is much more. Roll up your sleeves and and what do we do in social justice in the end. Thanks for danette so that i like i'm finding that i now that i'm living here i actually like this. Answer to that one. Let's see let's pick one from the list year. This is this is actually kind of scary so. How do we stay positive when there's so much bad news about the environment divisive politics and pandemic that is excellent excellent question. I actually. I'll answer that question but but i'll first test the assumption that that. That we need to remain hopeful. I read a lot of. Theology. From. Marginalized authors. That challenge people to. The challenge the premise that we need hope to carry on and i really struggled with this i had. Who's the class one time. And there is anthony 10 was was was challenging us that that we we rely on open carry on with cold is now he's available in the same like you have to have a theology that can thicken. I couldn't get that my head. And i had a i had a colleague. In my class who. Had a young child with with severe physical and mental challenges. And. She said to our small group she said. Every morning i wake up. And i know what i have to do to take care of my little boy. And it takes everything i can do to do that and i and i have to get up and. Pens like pushing a rock up the hill all the way to the end of the day. I know there's no hope that he's ever going to get beyond a certain level he i don't even have both of these might even live past cent birthday. And she said. But i have to just keep getting up and doing that i'm taking care of my little boy. And like that was that was that was the lesson that reminded me that. There are situations in life that we can't just rely on. Reliant hope to get through we just have to keep going no matter what happens. And i fear that as the world gets tougher and tougher we may have to like. Remember that something. That's said i think there is so much hope to travel. And the miracles of everyday life i mean just looking at a flower just looking at a bumblebee going around looking at looking at a rainbow looking at. The good deeds that people do looking at the miracles that happen every single day around as i think it's important to. Not lose sight of that the beauty and the. In the wonder of this world and those are the things that i find that that give me hope she just looking and you say there are there are miracles that happen every single day and and i think staying grounded in that sense of gratitude. Ism. Is there a story about the beautiful painting of the tree behind. Yesterday is my partner's an artist. From her. These two trees are actually from a walk that we went on at doctors park. Park in the coast of little bit north of milwaukee. And as she saw them she just. I think we're walking long and she's probably leaning on me and then she saw the trees and and these two. Chilli chillies she always calls me her her big oak tree and so she just the visual of of a of a tree leaning on the other and being supported. Was was what inspired that. That's a question. What is the most influential class you took in seminary question. There are so many that the change that change my home view event. I think probably the most influential one. Gosh this is just say we did a summer course at the chautauqua institute. And we got weed it's a multi-faith. Gathering inn. Western new york. That's been going on for hundreds of years. And. There were. There were. Leaders of all different faith communities that spent a day with us talking through and helping us understand the air. They're different perspectives in it just the relationships i've developed with the folks that were the presenters over the years. Has been. Has been kind of kind of interesting one at one of them was. The woman that was on the she was to swim or choose the one more traditional christian denomination. And she was there with m.l.k. she was she was friends with. With that whole crew and it one point we bumped into her and set down for coffee. Is she invited us for coffee and she said i might have to have to go if if jesse calls me but but but then you know i want to talk to you for as long as i can't all the sudden. Jesse jackson calls her and they're coordinating about some plan they're going to do together and i'm sitting. And they have that person talk about. All the leaders of the dm the civil rights movement. With blake. That the short names that she had the familiar name she had with from them. It was just so there's so many there so many made. Platt electric. Methodist minister you might struggle between delivering talks that using the congregation wants to hear and talk about something you're excited about. It's coming from your heart. When you have to say when what you have to say might turn some people off i struggle this myself in a different context how do you navigate this. I think one of my favorite quotes i can't remember the the new. Person that bet that printed this anyways back in the 30s. But i'm sure you can might have heard it the idea of comfort the afflicted comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. And i think oftentimes in uu circles at work is really much more tends to be more opportunity. To try to afflict the comfortable. And. Remind. Those of us that are that have privileges in the world. That. The part we play in some of that some of the challenging things that that the time you looked at 2. Make sure that we are going with eyes wide open. I think. You're going to hear me roar like a broken record on a couple of things one of them is covenants. For me covenant is the mechanism by which. We can begin every conversation. From a an agreed-upon intention. It can be a way to equalize power dynamics. If we set out and we say. That we are going to listen to each other and respect each other and each of our opinions matters and we are committed to the relationship over and above. I'm getting getting. Getting our way. It just creates a lot of opportunity to be able to have harder and harder conversations especially practice. I think. I think it's also. The foundation of that and then the the use of it overtime. Can can really strengthen and deepen trust and i think trust is the is the path to get to be able to have those harder article. How would you say your time is prairie is going what is exciting and fun what is the most challenging i am having such a good time. I was nervous coming in i knew like i intentionally decided to come here because i loved your independent spirit and how you sort of have always taken care of yourself and. And all this thing's and as you might imagine that that is a little fearful coming in to say okay are they going to come i going to have any. Folks has been open. I've been invited into everything. I. I can tell you that my senses that your search process. Was open and honest and transparent and what i was sold is what i've experienced. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. And i'm sure that i'm sure that i'm sure it will but so far everybody spin been super welcoming economy accommodating. And i've really tried to. 2. Come in as as i said i would which is not to change anything but to learn from you. And to bring whatever i have to develop trust to say that if there is something that i have that could could add two to what you're doing then then you'll be open to to consider it. And i hope that i've said i've done that so far but. So far i've got i love getting to know everybody there's there super interesting people here your group i can't wait till we can get back together cuz it's just it's easier to get to know people when you can. When you can. Come around it in person but. Departs been amazed. University. Uucw church west. Had a chili cook-off yesterday and i went to that and it was one of their first times getting back together. Outdoors masked all the things. That was really fun so i'm i know y'all have things like that but like sleep cook-off was surprisingly good way to bring the community together and have taste testing. Outside. See what else. Am i doing on timer 20 questions i want to make sure i get to but i don't want to. I think i've got 10 minutes left. We can go a little bit later so. Answer people if your question doesn't get answered today math. We do all the questions will be recorded so matt can go back and look. Through them. And then i think you mentioned that that you could. You might address movies like in a newsletter article or other. Other mediums future talks or i might follow up with people one-on-one yeah yeah we definitely will make sure that that you get some kind of response to your question. Alright this is a question that that is a version of which came up on email on so it's not play with this. Thoughts on how to engage people in the other tribe dancing mask anti-vax anti-science people it seems the hostility and richard become. Margin in anytime i can. 4% of 5 million possible to do that right. Yeah social media is definitely. There's a lot of proof that people that show that people are more willing to say hurtful things. When they have the vale of the internet between them and the other person. Person is definitely. Crepes better social bonds. Actually had a personal experience which i'll share which i think. Sums up the the approach that i would recommend in memorable way. My divorce is still processing and it's part of any divorce proceeding at least in washington state you have to go to a parenting class. And. The lesson is today that i took away from the parenting class which i thought was really really mindful was. The idea that as you're splitting his parents. You have to do all you can do to be the parent you want to be and you. Assertive assertive take away some of that ability to influence the other person. And what you hope is that your is your way what you feel is the right way. Is going to be imprinted on. On your child and he's going to influence your child and the other parent is doing their best and they're doing what they're doing. But you you certify. You should really kind of give up the idea that you are going to have. Weather lesson i think that's that's kind of the way that i i think that's a good lesson in terms of how to approach these things. All we can do is. All we can do is try to be the change that we want to see in the world. And if one of the challenges that we see is people isolating in the silos and digging in their heels and getting separate and we don't want to see that in the world it's sort of i think it's incumbent on us to. Try to with all with whatever and body power we might have to lean into some of these conversations. Broken record i would say a way to do that is to is to try to try to start a covenant try that try to welcome people in a conversation to say hey. I i think you i clearly you and i disagree on this. And i want to understand end and it's challenging and i know that you're going to find some people that i've tried to be in conversations with people. I've remained. Facebook friends with some people from high school that clearly are we we hold different we told different. And it's been frustrating and there's been it's not always been easy but i try to always be respectful. And there have definitely been times where i've appreciated hanging into the conversation. Far longer than i felt probably was productive to change minds because somebody planted the seed that help strengthen my. My understanding of the world or my understanding of the other person. I've always kind of said. You know do you care about being rider you care about being in a. And in some cases if it's if it's causing harm to people. You know we have to kind of we have to try to. Stay with stay strong with with what we believe to be riding and push for those things. But i think there's always a balance of trying to do everything we can do to. Model the relationships that that we think will lead to healthy outcomes in the world. You can always know what the other person's response is going to be but i think if we start out with with trying to start conversations by saying. I value you as a person. First principle. And we have a disagreement i would love i'd love to hear you and listen to you so i can better understand. What you're coming from and then maybe how you might not change your mind that day but maybe somebody's watching that facebook conversation maybe you plant a seed and then they have another excuse. We can always know what impact our. Our actions can have fully. But i do believe that the more positive ripple so we can put into the world tomorrow. The more positive energy gets the more likely we are to turn things in faucet. I'm going to go to one of the. Questions on the. That was sent in earlier cuz i think this was this has been on a few people's minds after this before their cyclists the question about calling me reverend and then questions about. Extol. Me personally i totally get the the hierarchical thing or the hierarchical field have. Many people come to us with many different. Levels of trauma induced by orange juice no religion. I don't want to have that conversation. I think the the question about reverend becomes slick do you know straight. Nothing. As of. Body that embodies all of the privileged in this country i don't need anymore. I don't need anymore titling 22. Tick ticking power to gain more power. But. What is the reason i have the reason i thought about this request this. Is not necessarily for me. It is for my colleagues who hold let's positional power. Who may come after me. Because there is a distinction between administering a community and. I think we are all equal in fact you are actually above me in the hierarchical scale i report to you you have the collective will to either hire or fire me. I am holding to your vision and your mission and. And trying to bring those things to life i don't write those things you do. There is no you do have positional power. But. What i've heard from my colleagues female colleagues trans colleagues. Colleagues said from communities of color. Is that they need that title. To be able to hold on to any authority that they can. To avoid being steamrollered by. The community which is above them. And so i am choosing to hold this title for that reason. If anybody has. I understand that there is a lot of baggage that comes with a lot of this religious stuff. From from before and instilling in this country now. Want to have those conversations with you. If so that is my request is to call me river bad if it's not comfortable for you i don't want it to get in the way of our relationship but i would like to just have a conversation about what it means for you i want to hear. I want to hear what it does but that but that if you know what kind of block that that creates. And like i said before as long as we start that conversation and covenants with with an idea that we are both trying to get to understand each other better. I will always remain open to the possibility that i've i'm happy to change my. To change my. To change my thoughts. But it's also one of those things where there are so many big things in the world 2222 reckon on. I would hate for us to get stuck on. You know what what somebody's earned title is. You know we wouldn't go to the doctor and say i i don't i don't want to call you doctor. It's that tenure. Again it's not going to kill me i have i have by embody power. I will be fine with it i am i'm choosing to hold it because i've been asked to. Bye-bye people. And that's for the stole. Religiosity. For as many people as there are in this community for as many people as there are in nu societies is probably as many. Opinions about how much religion is too much in and what we should do is. And etcetera i will tell you just in the interest of time the. The store in you. Circles is sorta viewed as the. The mark that you have. Gone through the. The fire becoming a minister. And you're not allowed to or not encouraged to wear stole until you are actually ordained. Each of the stores that i have has been given to me by. Either a community that i've served or my home community oregon ommp chisholm has has meeting for me and the imagery that is usually. Is that aveyo you are taking on the yoke the weight of of the community. And i would say both the title and the and the trappings. From me. Remind me. That i am. I am choosing to take on. Not only the choice but also the the challenges of this community. I have been in communities where. Where young people have lost their lives. Many communities as well. But this for me is is is a reminder that this is. Whatever however you wanted to find where only this is holy work. And it helps me to remember to i'm to be solemn and intake. Responsibility. I think rats. I think we're about it time. You one more question question oh my goodness. Let's say. There was a question about. There are several questions about social justice and how do we get in piano more engaged in a community. I will. Echo some of the words that have been shared by the group that did the widening circle work the present made a presentation to the board whose work will be sent out pretty soon. One of the things that i have learned fatada ninben learn from being. Left behind many curtains in many different communities is. The fear that exists. And the trauma in the damage that that that has been wrought by communities against that are made up primarily of people that look like me. And i've learned a lot about. Importance of. You can't you can't do enough things to try to try to generate trust and trust like anything else can be can be wiped away. There is a lot of internal work. Bad bad is being asked to be done by march and formally marginalized communities currently marginalized communities. To say this is this is these are the things that that make us feel different. I've seen this community has done a lot of work in this area. And it's a constant and into constant i'm set of work i think i think you're you're well physicians i think there's there's always more work to do. I will tell you that as a rule. If i'm speaking to someone with a marginalized identity i don't tend to recommend. That they go and visit a uu congregation in their community because i have been around the country. There is a y. Range of how much work people have done in this in this area and i've heard story after story after story of people that have walked into a. A well-intentioned you use community and and been harmed in some way. Either right being either on the greeting or or overtime because people. Have been to insularity if not recognized that the potential negative impact of their privilege cell. This is work that i know that you have done this is work that that it is that's that group and others in this community have the continued to do. So i feel like i feel like we're close i feel like there's there's there's that but. I'm still analyzing and trying to see. Trying to get my sense of how safe this community really is i think you've done a lot of work. From there i think. The other thing that we're trying to do is. Decenter ourselves from solution i've got all kinds of stories where i've seen well-intentioned. Books with power and privilege try to go into march life communities and fix things. And really what they're trying to do is just get the community to change it and be more like it which is which is just a form of colonization. And so. What i would hope to do is simultaneously as we are continuing to work on making sure that we are truly widen the circle and being as welcoming as we can for everybody. To get out of already connected with several local. Nonprofits in the area. Continuing to try to listen to the l most communities. And as i begin to develop relationships and develop trust in and they say. This is what we need. Not seeing where we can wear week. Go with go where we are asked to go to do the kind of work that week that we might do and for me. This is all political. The. The white liberal. Contingent. And. All. Different communities. There is a very aligned. Political will on the right say we want things to stay just the way they are which in many ways is damaging to people. Added politics you are as good as your relationships i think we have we have an opportunity. At this moment in history to. To continue to to work on ourselves to make ourselves. Better equipped to actually develop meaningful strong deep relationships with people that we can partner with. 22 forward the agenda the genders of upholding of people and humanity and. And i think that's i think that's the work that they were here to do. That was that was amazing for me i am grateful to hear what's on people's mind i hope i was able to share a sense of of kind of my approach to things. A reminder that the next one scheduled but i've started to do to have a series of droppin chats. I'm online so i don't think they're up to nexans rough yet but i'll get those up in a couple weeks. And i'd love to continue the conversation there and if i didn't get your question i will definitely make sure that we. That we find ways to to get those answers out. Thank you all. Thank you matt reverend matt. I really enjoyed learning more about your thoughts about these issues. And look forward to further discussions.

uuprairie_org

Pr130414Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. We welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color your sexual orientation your gender your family structure we welcome you no matter what your age or abilities or inabilities later in the service and gas and returning friends to introduce themselves if they want to. So that we get to know you better. We always urge you if this is one of your first times here to try this out more than once because we provide a wide variety of services they are presented either by a member of our prairie community or by someone in the lighter communion or by me. The opening words. Are words of mary oliver i have resisted using oliver because once i get started using mary oliver. I may not stop. Why i wake early. Do you have to use your imagination here a bit because the first line is. Hello sun in my face. Remembers. Hello you can make the morning and spread it over the field and into the faces of the tulips. And the nodding morning glories. And into the windows of even. The miserable and the crotchety. Best preacher that ever was deerstar that just happens to be where you are in the universe. To keep us. From ever darkness. To ease us with warm touching to hold us in the great hands of light. Good morning good morning good morning watch now. How i start the day. In happiness. In kindness. We like this plane. To remind ourselves. That each one of us has an inner light. And that inner light. Is the spark of divinity. Let your own light shine of course. But never let it shine so brightly. That is blind you. To the light within others. This morning. Story for all ages. Is one in which. Two pigs. Two british pigs. Unwittingly go in search of the divine. It is a tale that reminds us that playfulness. Is an example of the divine. Of divinity at work. Might also be a lesson about. Believing the grass is always greener on the other side. So invite any of you want to come up please come up whatever your age. Like that. Yes you will know this story. Okay. Pigtail. This is the story of to board pigs. She was called bertha and his name. Was briggs. They would lying in the grass and moan and complain nothing happens to us. Everyday. Is the same. Bad bunny to eat a warm stye. With a savage this is a british author expires i fat. Ruth's place 2. An orchard supply in and trees for scratch pool mud for a wallow field full of flowers soft grass for those orgy bot support hours. 1st and briggs. Never content. On money and riches their two minds were bent. There were so many wonderful things they would do only then would they be really happy. Then one sunny day. I keep coming back to sleep. Then one sunny day they were nosing about when briggs grubbed up a chest with the end of his. I opened the lid with a swing of delight for the chests contain. Ranger all glittering bright. Play cry it out as they clean themselves down and clutching the chest they set off for town. The noise of the traffic. Alarm the two pigs. Amber cyclone tight to the trotter. Of brakes. Briggs was soon. Dreaming of shiny new cars. Well bursa gazed into shop windows for hours they came to a bank and looked shyly about tilla manager angrily ordered them out. They were to vegas with no clothes on. And they were scared people. So the man tank manager ordered them out and then you notice the box. I had a gleam like a wily old fox. He lifted the treasure the lid of the treasure so rare the manager daft and said why don't you please take this. Dear madam and sir i will give you some cash mr. briggs if i met you will find it simpler than jewels when you pee. So i gave him a whole bunch of cash. Thank you said bertha with bleach. Come briggs let us start on our great shopping spree. They went to a large and luxurious store where bursa brought dresses and hats by the score briggs turn was next. You felt quite this well he tried on for suits and they fit him. Wow. And then they went. To the. Car store. Fisher room. And they hurry. Showroom to buy inexpensive new car this models the latest the car salesman said they haven't said briggs. Feeling light in the head. In jump the two pigs. All there. All their stuff. And they spend on their way to purchase a house. By the end of the day they went to an agent who hand it to briggs some pictures of houses just right for two pigs. Bertha soon spotted the house with most charm the one she had seen from the gate on the farm the ancient escorted them both to the door then left them alone to go and explore. It took them about 10 minutes to buy their new house. That night they were happy as two pigs could be and they talk. And they planned until well after 3. Bersa made breakfast break sputtered about that you know swimming pool. Polish the car she clean the house out. Bertha cook dinner while briggs satin red. He made a few phone calls they watch tv until bed. One day feeling restless with nothing to do. Alberta was busy. Repairing a stew. Brakes trocas new car through the green countryside. Speeding down ways that we're not very wide england are not very why. Suddenly one out of the engine. They're shot a cloud of black smoke. And a steam boiling hot. The car gave a cough and alerts and a leep then roll to halt. You're a flock of white sheets. The hood prodded around but the cause of the trouble. This could not be found. The longer he struggled the matter he got till it last in despair very tired and too hot he's through down the wrench. And under timon he just have to start on the long walk. Home. So then you got home. We opened the door breaks instantly knew that bertha's new gadgets were troublesome. Seems the blender has has overflowed and the oven is having a problem and it's a mess. Call briggs. What a miserable day i've been working so hard at have no time to play. From that moment on nothing seems to go right. Washing machine trunk all their clothes. On the dryer. House garden and pigs were a terrible sight at last the two pigs couldn't stand anymore riggs crab versus arm and a dash through the door but not before birth through something at the television. And broke the television. From the garden they gave that the country beyond and briggs in a rage pushed. His car in the pond. They felt no regrets as they ran through the gate and away from the life they had grown to hate. They pulled off their clothes and ran on faster still didn't even look back as they tore up the hill. Breathless they ran through the old. What's your date for a roll in the mud but two pigs couldn't wait to be careless and free and drop into play was all that they wanted to do everyday. That night as i lay gazing up the sky. Ursula and briggs. Keep the raptors. Let's stay here forever said bertha to briggs. And they fell fast asleep too quite happy pigs. Readings that i would love to share with you this morning so i will. Or to mary oliver poems. First one is entitled. Spring. Somewhere a black bear has just risen from sleep. And it's tearing down the mountain. All night in the brisk and shallow restlessness of early spring i think of her. Her for black. Fist. Flicking the gravel. Her tongue. Like a red fire touching the grass. Coldwater. There is only one question. How to love this world. I think of her rising like a black and leafy ledge. To sharpen her claws against. The silence. Of the trees. Whatever else my life is with its poems. And it's music. And it's glass. Cities. It is also. This dazzling darkness coming. Down the mountain breathing and tasting. All day i think of her. For white teeth. Forward lessness. Her perfect. Loft. And then this one. Titled. The sun. Have you ever seen anything in your life more wonderful than the way the sun every evening relax. And easy. Floats towards her eyes. And into the clouds of the hills. Or the rumpled c. And is gone. And how it slides again out of the blackness. Every morning. On the other side of the world. Like a red flower. Streaming upward on its heavenly oils say. On a morning. In early summer. Perfect. Imperial distance. And have you ever felt for anyting such wild love. Do you think there is anywhere. In any language a word billowing enough. For the pleasure that feels you. As the sun reaches out as it warms you as you stand there. Empty. Hand. Or have you to turn from this world. Or have you too. Gone crazy. 4 power. 4 things. Long ago and. Without my realizing it. The poet's undid me. Unmoored me. For my primary theology. Theology with which i was indoctrinated as a child. Some of you may know i grew up presbyterian. Walt whitman may have been the first. The beginning of my undoing. As a mainstream believer. Carl sandburg had a hand in it too. And then along came john charlie. Followed by rumi. And realty. For the past decade or so. There have been so many poets who have pointed. The way to the divine for me. May sarton. Denise levertov. Wendell berry. Mary oliver. To name just a few. I read their poetry. And them caught up in a dance. With the divine. For many years i rejected all of that primary theology into. Which i was born. The presbyterianism in particular. And christianity. In general. Eventually i realized that i didn't have to. Throw out. Throw everything that i had learned about the divine. From those early years of my life. I just needed to add. To it. Edited. Find unit. I need you to keep it from being my only definition of the divine. The only way i knew how to experience. Divinity. From time to time when i'm up here. Indus. Free puppet. Which i am. Eternally grateful. I will be examining our theology. Our unitarian universalist. Theology. I want to know if. And how. This face tradition of ours. Works. For you. If it is mit enough. To be there for you when things are going well in your life but also when you are going through rough times. Fastest question because unitarian universalist. Are often accused of being. Soft. On theology. I've not really believing. Anyting. My question for you this morning is. How do you define. The divine. Just hard to say. How do you define the divine. Also known as the sacred. This morning i don't want to focus just on that word divine i also. Want to focus on on what our experiences of the divine have been and on how the divine manifest itself in our lives. But first we do need to briefly. Consider how the dictionary defines the word. I found very few definitions of the word divine that did not use the word god. As in of or related to god. Oregon. But to god capital g or a goddess small g. Devoted or address to gone. Those were not my favorite interpretations of the word divine. However i was okay with divine being defined as religious. Holy. Sacred. Especially like this definition. Concerned with sacred things even though my dictionary informed me that it was considered to be a now obscurity meeting. Or how about this definition. Supremely good. Or admirable. As i. Always say and you'll hear me say it many times we shouldn't let the language get in the way of where we are trying to go. There is nothing wrong with using the word god to help us define divinity as long as we then define what we mean by the word god. Doing me. That which ultimately concerns us. And or the ground of all being as paul tillich did. He wrote this. About trying to define god and from that divinity or the divine. The name of this infinite and inexhaustible. Depth. And ground of all being is god until. Uses it with a capital g. That death. Is what the word god means. And if that word. Has not much meaning for you. Translate it. And speak of the depths of your. Life. Of the source of your being. Of your ultimate concern of what you take seriously without any reservation. Perhaps. Sottile. In order to do so. You must forget everything traditional that you have learned. About god. Perhaps. Even. That word itself. A few years ago a woman named carter hayward. Some of you may have heard of her. A writer a theologian and then a catholic nun. Came to the conclusion. That god and the divine were found mainly in our relationships with each other. What goes on. This. That space between me and you. After much scholarly work and much praying. She eventually decided. But that was the only way. To define. Thought. How we relate to each other. For this she was excommunicated. All that long ago either. Definitions of the word divine and god. That are not found in the dictionary can be very useful. I believe. The contemplation of the divine. And or the sharing of experiences of the divine by people like walt whitman and mary oliver can be helpful to us when we are trying to define the divine. Divine am i inside and out and i make holy whatever i touch. Or in pots. From. The scent of these armpits. Aroma finer than prayer. Wright's whitman. And this from j.d. salinger. I was sick. When i saw that everything was god. And my hair stood up. It was on a sunday i remember. My sister was only a tiny child then and she was drinking her milk and all of a sudden. I saw that. She was god. And the milk. Was gone. I mean all she was doing was pouring god into god. If you know what i mean. He writes. I do. I dunno what salads are me. But yeah i awesome. Forget that i know what salinger means. The divine is everywhere. Did everything. The divine cannot be limited to a supernatural being or to an everyday here-and-now god. The traditional use of the word gaunt is only one way to attempt to define the divine. When people say usually despairing. Disparagingly that unitarian universalist don't believe anything. They misunderstand. It is not that we don't believe anything. But that we consider everything. To be divine. Or almost every. And that we see divinity in all of life. We are help in our efforts to lead divine lies when we recognize this when we acknowledge the presence of the divine all around us and we live our lives accordingly by giving thanks by being grateful for our lives. Edward hirsch wrote and only then did i understand it and it is with a capital i. Is jeffrey. Lexus cat. And only then did i understand it is. Jeffrey. And every creature like him. Who can teach us how to pray purring. In their own language. Resetting themselves. In the living fire. John chartier upset. What lifts the heron leaning on the air i praise without a name. Cry anyting please. Raise. By any name or none but praised out all else. But. Bertha and briggs. The two british pigs. From the children's story could find something more divine somewhere other than where they spent their daily lives. So off they went on their adventure and where did they end up. Bye. Were they started. Of course. The divine as manifested in what we call the adventure or the journey or the dance of life. Is everywhere. Whether we deliberately set off to find it or whether we stay where we are in it. Finds us. Take an ordinary week one of your ordinary week. For example of a week that you've experienced recently and reflect upon how much dancing with the divine you did. What's first. Consider this. Where do pain and soro greece. And bad things happening to good people fit. Inner contemplation. Of the divine and the sacred. What about evil. A subject we will probably revisit one of these days where is it. Within the larger context. Ava devine. When tragedies happen. When those we love dawn. When people near and dear to us. Struggle with addiction. Auras mental illness. Orbitz terminal diseases. Where is the divine then. Where is the sacrum. And does our unitarian universalist faith. Have enough with. And brett. And that's. To sustain us. Through the dark. X. Is the dance still irrelevant. When life is not going smoothly. How do we keep from being overwhelmed by sadness. And pain. And despair. When the world gets to be too much for us. To bear. How do we keep on dancing. There were several deaths in the past week. Some people who died were known too many if not most of us not personally. But we recognize the names. Margaret thatcher. Annette funicello. Jonathan winters. Other deaths this past week. We're people props not so well-known to us but they still touched us. And saddened us because of how they died. My son because he works in global studies. New the 25 year-old foreign service worker. The young woman was killed in afghanistan. This past week. The mother-of-three in sun prairie running training for the sentence mi. Was killed by an inattentive in a tent. Tiff. Probably had too much to drink driver. One of her three children was on my granddaughter's hockey team. Last year. So much of our sorrow. And grief and pain. In this world is caused by loss. On a matchless serious note. But still within the context of loss. I know. Many people who have broken bones this winter. Looting some folks right here in our prairie community. Nicki minaj and escape the perils of the ice entirely tumbling my way here on. Palm sunday. And one black ice was only there for about 10 or 15 minutes. One of one of those tumbles i landed my entire weight which is. Fairly substantial on finger. My forefinger. Now i know this is nothing compared to. A broken leg or a broken arm hips and all those things. But of course it was on my is on my dominant hand. And all of us. Tumblers. Lost something we broke an arm or leg finger. At least for a while we lost something we lost some mobility some. Taken for granted skill. For me i said things. Probably a good thing i couldn't point but tying shoes. Said forget that flossing teeth and worst of all writing. Because i still do my writing my thinking on paper with pen some people say everything happens for a reason. I don't know if i i don't. Can you believe that. However. I wonder if perhaps. The divine. The sacred. Is to be found or. Resound. Somewhere in this process. Bad things happen. Loss occurs. And with the loss pain suffering sadness. Even despair. And then eventually if we are paying attention and struggling mightily. The divine reappears to us. Or we realize it was there all along. It's the divine there. In the loss. Or. Is the divine apps until. We acknowledge it again because of the loss. Is this love dance. Now back to finding the divine in everyday life. I will end with. With two examples from my own life. What happened many years ago. When my first granddaughter. Name is clara. Was. 3 or 4. And i happened to be staying at her house at my son's house and my then daughter-in-law's house and i was up early riding with. You paper and. Eventually i hear the pitter-patter of little feet. I mean cross the hallway upstairs and i mean downstairs and. There's clara. Because she always stressed out my name sandy sandy is still as a joke with us. I got up. I thought dress. The divine. In our everyday lives. My second example. Easter sunday to weeks ago. I was not here. For legal reasons i was in charge of my 10 and 12 year old grandchildren that day and they're not allowed into the customer custody agreements. To go to church. So. Palmdale. So you know it's easter and it's. Not very nice out but i picked them up from their mother's house and. I said. Where we going that we weren't going back to their dads. I said well we're going to start a new tradition. I'm winning a big-time here. I said we're going to go looking for something sprouting. Now easter was what may i mean monster. March 31st. So. Sometimes you can't find pigs. Anta. Well i also wanted to wear them out so we went to a couple of parks. We went to while owen is that the one on old song. Where do i hadn't been for years i love that far can we transfer the mud and. And slid down the ice still ice aaron but we can't find anything sprouted. Then we went to picnic point. Had a great time we're out there for long time. You still in finding things probably. I decided we'd go get some hot chocolate or coffee or something in coffee shop so i'm driving through shorewood. And i glanced. And i almost wrecked the car i slammed on the brakes luckily nobody behind me very yard. Firefield in a little yard of. Purposes. Purple crocuses. And even though you were impressed. The 10-year only 12 year old. There you go. The divine. Everyday right in front of us and i'm still looking they're still struggling. Divinity. The sacred god if you prefer. Is all around you. Go out and look. Or as mary oliver expresses in. A poem of hers entitled mysteries in this line 1 line she says truly we live with mysteries too marvelous to be understood. And as she also puts it at the top of your order of service in her very short poem. We shake with joy we shake with. Grief. What a time they have these two. How's as they are in the same body. You are invited as always to respond. Well i would say. Find reduce the prison population in in. Wisconsin. So we we were very much in the minority will you use. But the other was a keynote speaker of wonderful i thought it was great but he was christian. And then there wasn't someone followed him to speak i lost track of three wise men. An independent news a stereotype here story. But big black guy big hellfire and you can just tell he could do hellfire and damnation. And he was he was also good though but he kind of lost me when he got in all the god language so i'm daydreaming and i so much jesus and. And all the sudden i hear this man site and we have to remember the inherent worth and dignity of every person and i'm trying to catch your attention pam cuz you were seated down the road from you. When someone taps me on the shoulder and it's karin gustafson from first unitarian. We're all talking about the same thing we're just using way different language sometimes and we we. And of course i have to end with a mary oliver poem where does the dance begin where does it end is her title. Don't call this world adorable or useful that's not it it's frisky. And theater. For more than fair winds. The eyelash of lightning is neither good nor evil the struct tree burns like a pillar of gold. The blue rain sinks. Straight to the white seat of the trees whose mouth open. Doesn't the wind. Turning in circles invent the dance. Haven't the flowers moves slowly across asia than europe and tablet last now. They sign in your own yard. Don't call this world an explanation. Or even and education. When the sufi poet world. Was he looking outward. To the mountains so solidly there in a white captive ring. Or was he looking to the center. Of everything. The seed. David and it was also their beautiful as a thumb curves and. Touching. Singer. Henderly. Little love ring. At seaworld. Ochako of breath. Garden of dust go out and dance.

uuprairie_org

JudySkogBarbPark110807-ed.mp3

This is green environmental interview with. 2d scope and barber park. Would like to start talking about the solar collectors on your homes. We have solar hot water we have no more solarwindow otherwise we would have more. Maybe photovoltaic but. The solar hot water assist our. Regular hot water heater which is. Gas. Appreciates the water. So it cut our firms in half. Over the course of a year. Price-wise that's $10 a month but. It's still important to do. Qualified for a focus on energy. We got the full focus on energy rebate the full federal rebate and when you subtract it out. Those things from the cost of the system. It cost us about $1,000. Unfortunately the rebates you know that kind of. Regulatory stuff is going. Away. So they'll be less help for people. Sadly. Midas focus on energy is. Gone are going well they're cutting their. Funds they outsourced it to a out-of-state company. And i'm we have essentially the same. Experience that. judy has that we have a solar collector for hot water. Pumped of the solar collector is photovoltaic. But we also pretty much used our. Solar window. For that. Covington. Trees on the property. Another lender can't do too much about that. Reset the angle of the collector to the fixed angle we said it. So that we get a larger. Bank robber buck as it were in the wintertime. Because that's my way. You know the sun is the lowest. So we had to pick an angle so we picked it. Supermax maisto. Winter collection. Crispin fall anyway yeah and end. When it kicks in you know it's kick i mean sometimes. That the regulator so can't get the water can't get too hot. But anna. Cloudy day versus a sunny day you can tell the difference when you're taking a shower. Oh yeah that is it's a big difference. A lot of. In the winter it's a lot of hot water in a little bit of cold water and in the summer it's a lot of cold water in a little bit of hot water does the water comes out. From the solar collector so hot. You're all so you both have rain barrels. Are f****** rainwater for your gardens. We have a 200 gallon i guess you'd call it a cistern it's above ground. And. Well the 50 gallon rain barrel is the overflow for that but we also have. I'm capturing rainwater and otherwise on the property as welders. Terrain gardens in the backyard and yes you can have a shade. Rain garden. There are plants that will grow just fine. And actually we have a tree growing out of ours on purpose. It's a swamp white oak. But in the front yard i have a whale. It's basically a ditch. Coming out of the downspout that runs. Down the drive down next to the driveway and then it makes a writing turn and runs along the sidewalk for ways to capture all of the water off the front of the roof and soak it into the ground and then i have plants there that utilize the water that i've. Put into the soil. And i planted three plum trees in the corner of the l. Spring. To take advantage of that. I have one downspout left but there's nothing worth. Watering from it. Do we get chickens or something. Now we've got them. Rain barrel. And then we have. A big. I don't know what you call that thing big collector anyway. We used to collect in 25 gallon. Containers. From that we have a. Plastic. Chain goes down out of the. Like a rain check rain chain and then but that the 5-gallon ones filled up awfully fast and what 30 seconds. Water softener that's about 50. And then in the front. There's a downspouts double that goes straight into a garden. So. Most of that's been collected now. Partly for watering plants on the deck. Watering plants on the deck and filling the little pond. Sometimes. That water to zed that's down at ground level downtown at ground level. And sometimes i'll use the water from the rain barrel for that. I got hoes coming out of the rain. Rain barrel. So. That's why we don't have any. Rain garden jet we would trying about. Talking about replacing them. Driveway i mean it's it's certainly permeable. Not intentional. Benign neglect. So says one of these days we really need to replace that and so i've looked at. Been looking at permeable options for that and also. For a new walkway up to the house right now we just a piece of plywood there which are permeable. But. Ultimately i did look at doing that actually in a formal permeable one with a contractor in the price was. Outrageous. So do it yourself project. You should talk to my neighbor. We have a neighbor who wants to. Get up. Sheridan order of crushed limestone. Probably use that for. Front walk. Birthstones. Our neighbor. Built. Part of his driveway with some kind of permeable brick. Did it himself he's a contractor. Ann and i seen sono from what i was reading. You know the old-fashioned ones where you just had surgery. Two rows where the wheels went and then there was grass growing in the middle and that's that's it. Inexpensive way of getting a pretty permeable. Driveway because it's only the interested and that was one of the things that this website i was looking at cash budget you know we went to making a scraping rod driveway isn't go skinnier go to a little drive to the least amount of surface passable. Is your non-permeable surface so forward. That's a ways away yet because like i say now. Our driveway is really quite formidable. We're waiting for the. That is cemented to deteriorate ken doesn't know this but we're right waiting for this i'm waiting for the cement to deteriorate sufficiently so that we can put something permeable in there or. Maybe not even. Just i'm not. Steve parton. Are you need traction. Probably talk to him about gardenspot you talk about. Oh. Well i've been i did a new garden this year that's mixture of vegetables and. Perennials in there's a bunch of annuals in there too because forneus alarm new. And i. Was also looking at things that would be. Butterfly friendlier bird friendly or hummingbird friendly that kind of thing. Exorcism nectar this is at home yeah infront of fun in frenchburg new edition. Sound fortunately the rabbits have been. You're doing your mom way so i don't know if some of these. Perennials going to have enough energy to. Put out again next year and every play some of them. And then. We have button-down in the backyard. Is. Quite. Is low compared to the house so there's quite a. Steep angle between the front and the back. Soyeon mysunbelt. What terraces for planting and then a terrorist person steps going down. So that. Decrease the angle of that cuz that you was to. Beaches wildin again. And shirt with carrying dirt. To the people behind us. But now everything is pretty densely planted so i don't think we're actually losing any soil anymore. To the to the. People behind us but they had they really were getting a lot of our soil for in when we first moved in. So that's much better. Rabbit-proof garden. Put in a square foot gardening there raised a little bit of a raise because i needed it cuz get black walnut tree in the front so yes and i needed to separate the dirt. From the levels that had the black walnuts so we ordered some topsoil. That so-so by made me this. It's just this once just four by four. And put in dirt that wasn't contaminated by the. By the black walnut and then put screening around at that's not real high but so far the rabbits haven't gotten it yet. And then i had a top that i put on it. Except that plants are getting too tall for the. Chat so we're going to build a second one so we'll be able to grow. Some vegetables supplement what we get from our csa from a permaculture perspective there are things edible things that grow under black walnut i'm just not remembering them. Permaculturist talk about plant guilds so a particular tree. An apple tree there certain plants that might like to grow under an apple tree in. There are plants that will tolerate the juglone. Dom from the walnuts in there. Plants that do just fine under pine trees which is another one. Or at least get the drip line. But i did also want to mention with gardening that when you're doing even ornamental gardening it doesn't all have to be non-edible. Some people should consider. Putting in. Pruning bushes or. Pruning tree or a nut tree. As part of their birdman. Mulberry trees for example feed the birds and volunteers. And then we have volunteer room. Elderberries. Lucky you and sis -. I planted one on purpose that i got at the arboretum in that one didn't make it but we have volunteer ones. Making it. You're awesome. Service the neighborhood garlic mustard police. Which the neighborhood is doing really well on that now. Cuz we were kids as a neighborhood getting this infestation of garlic mustard so including. I was appalled to find some in our backyard. Do it when is it was right at the four corners with three other. Other neighbors so i talked to all of them in with a neighbor behind us said i just thought that was really healthy creeping charlie. So he. They've all pulled it out and some of the neighbor kids have been hired to. To keep on top of it for like an elderly. Neighbor who can't do it herself. They just volunteer to go over there and pull it so they've been really good about that. Cuz you can cook with garlic mustard. I have although i need a good recipe. At the one i made. Was not very. I'm not a pistol fan so. That's one i've heard and garlic mustard pesto i tried it in a stir fry. I wasn't impressed. Do you get questions about invasive plants at the hobart library. Who yes. People sometimes. Firstly i was getting them a year or two ago and people were first discovering garlic mustard people would call in and say. Help. How do i get rid of this person. I would have do it multiple ideas plastic bag. Bad and dem. And how did you know. What i had to do with mine cuz i had such a big area. Is anise in the wood so i covered it with i pulled it. Then i covered the area with stick newspaper that would biodegrade and then i put mulch over that. And that pretty much got it now you know you are getting occasional one that i'd go out and pull in the spring or the fall when you really can see it. But but that really did cuz i had a big area where. It's hard to. Thoroughly hand toilet so that worked. Well then that's a that's a permaculture wave building soil to cheer squad sheet mulching. So it worked. Fourth-grade question carbon. Here in the city of madison. What do you do to get rid of the garlic mustard u-pull-it. Welive. Baguette in the city of perfectly willing to take. Provide that to label act. Darlington city won't pick up. Garden waistband. What do you have to put on the bag. Actually what i do is i just throw it in the trash at. After i. Separated cuz you did so only the. You know the seed head and flowers that you need to. To do everything else can be recycled the first year. Can we recycle our unicorn your compost. For the lower part you just can't put in the compost. The part that flower and seed. Does that will mature and. Creole girl in the temple little yes exactly in and around the compost. Think quite that quite well. Before which happened to me before i knew what garlic mustard look like. If you have a lot. And put it in a plastic bag that said he will pick it up as long as you label it right invasive species are garlic mustard or something. Yeah i did that with my way had scraped the house and then paint chips got mixed in with the. Believes and i just labeled the the bag that i had paint chips in it and they took it. Cityofmadison is really. Good that really turned into this sort of thing. That that was one of the reasons we had to. When we redid our kitchen. There were several layers of linoleum. On the floor. And we had to have it analyzed. For asbestos asbestos right and unfortunately one of the labeled one of the layers of this bestest about what three layers down or so. So we had to actually hire somebody. To come take it out. Not so much because we were afraid to work with it as. That had to be properly disposed of. And the homeowner can't. Properly dispose of dust bad access. Exactly yeah we had the same problem so yes we had to pay. I came in there have matt suits and. Ventilation so good. Filled the room yet. Interior filter before went outside. Can you say anything about the old brick library as a resource to environmentalist. Well. Holbrook library. I have heard. Is the largest. Home gardening library in the world. Wow. And at some of the resources there are just. Amazing so when people come in and of the library supposed to be the librarian 2 is supposed to be resource. For people when they come in and ask me questions that i i know nothing about which is pretty often. I have this. Yeah room full of references. Which i do know a lot about so i can say or do you want a picture of begonias while if it's not in there let's go look in the shady. Perennial shade garden party and see if there's pictures in there that you want to her. Couple of kids came in the other day and wanted references for. They wanted to be able to was like a challenge to find what you could eat in your front yard. So i gave them you know bunch of references for edible plants in wisconsin over wild and that they were thrilled they had no idea that there was this much. Written about it. So you know even if i don't have the answer sometimes i have the source of the answer. Enough. In the library and it's. Opened anyone to use in the library and four members of old brick. Can take books out for 4 weeks. Or magazines for one week. Or new books for two weeks. So it's wonderful resource. What day of the week is it open 7 days a week. Even 3:50. 3:50. Dreads. What about csas. Community supported agriculture. Weeping. Doing it in parallel for forever forever yeah. Community supported agriculture you pay the farmer. Depending on the payment scheme that used to be in pam upfront like in march for an entire season's worth of. Vegetables that would be harvested on a weekly basis and. You get whatever is right. For that week. But that was a long time ago in the. Farms. Branched out in terms of how how you can pay now and we do since it's just kind of me we have and every other week. Fox now cuz we can't eat our way through the boxing. In a week we can either way through the box in 2 weeks but not as month at a single week and our particular. Format we do 12 months electronic funds transfer to the farm. Which gives a stable income. Through the whole season and then every every other week we go pick up our box of vegetables. Pretty much ditto for us. Cuz we're down to every other week cuz there's just the two of us. I think we paid quarterly. But. Thanks usa. Wait we we went through several csas before we got on to our current one because they kept going out of business under us. But you can if you're interested you can contacted. Contact macsac madison area area community supported agriculture. But i don't see stands for. And they have that yeah they have a list of all of the csa farms in the area and then at dharma's different when they have an open house at old brick every spring. Anyway there's an annual. Can you open houston housing and then. February january february i'm not quite sure so you can scope out. What the farmers offer you can have a discussion with the farmer find out if it's a good fit for you because every time is different than what they plant. What they plant where they deliver where they deliver timing which day they deliver right when dardanelle some places. Some places you get eggs some places to get one place once you say we were in we got goat cheese. Some places give you flowers it just. During the lot song. Organic meat. Hello well the firmware in now has organic meat but you pay extra. Bellamy chair. And are supposed to end of january starts again and i think they probably have the longest season yeah and then they end and then they start again with the. The ramps and early let admissions never end title. And that. Vegetables are all locally grown. But we also have a foodshare organic fruit. From really around the country including i think mexico. Yeah where they look around in the photos from mexico is a couple of. Tropical things are mangoes. Mango smoothie from california. But it's all organic. Kiwi. Key west and that the every other week. Thing. Local strawberries. Csa is it the fruit of the. Vegetables are the fruit are picked. Ripe. As opposed to pick. 4. Orscheln like they're not grown for shelf-life and they're not picked for shelf-life so the slavers wonderful flavor is amazing the corn on the cob is. Corn on the cob is. Amazing what they have to go through to get it. That's a particularly difficult crap to grow organically and i at least rcsa does fabulous job. And they explained it in the newsletter did yes it comes with a newsletter and keep the critters out of the field cuz all the critters like with the corn to the raccoons in the deer. Think that's the main ones are. But having your dinner put oil on the silks to keep. But i mean they're very complicated what they have to go through any way to get a. Crap morning and it's fabulous. You're going to mention your steel roof. Well. This area had hail damage and number of years ago and almost all the roofs in our neighborhood were replaced. And i talked. Canon to paying the extra to get them. A metal roof. The advantage of the metal roof is that it's. Will asphalt shingles it's 10 to 20 years max. Car before they need to be replaced unless you have hail damage and. And. Tarte bad storms like that are coming more and more often to. But with the metal roof its 100-year replacement. So you know it's going to outlive me. Play make them with a certain reflective coating. That mega. Reduce your air conditioning load. It's it's more. There. We did get a a small $500 rebate. On the roof i mean. Compared to what it cost to put the roof in it was a tiny rebate but. In the south in particular where people. The air-conditioning what is a lot higher like here it's the heating load in the winter. That it's really important to do. That kind of roofing. In the south it's not at all noisy we have a cape cod i sleep directly under the roof. I can't eat i can't hear things i used to hear. Before we put the roof on. Septa squirrels when they gallop across the roof. Do they put. No but it sounds like a herd of herd of elephants going across the roof. Do they grab nuts ecobank. So are gutter to just grow maple trees. Transportation. Oh i love my prius. We try to drive the prius to get the maximum. Amount so. I was disappointed if i'm running under. 50 mi to the gallon. Which happens sometimes this time of year if the air conditioning is on too much in the car. Or in the dead of winter the battery is interest efficient. So you'd get more in the forties. In the winter in a spring and fall. Get the ideal mileage. And then we're down to one vehicle. And then bob mostly rides a bicycle. If it's. Anywhere 40° enough shut up. Gotten along. Fine with just the one vehicle every once in a while they'll be a little bit. Baby. What quarter once a quarter or something where they'll be a problem both of us go by your home yes bus goes right by our house where you was take the bus right and that was one of our requirements when we were looking for house with the on the bus route. And southern baptist the bus all the time to work when i couldn't bicycle. It was a little. Too awkward for me to take it but i carpooled. So transportation options are. Hybrid. What we're doing is. We have a. But a 10-year old camera we're going to drive it into the ground. Which is the other way to save resources. Because of the what they call the embodied energy of making the vehicle mining me or and. And you should damn what plastics 250r take now 150,000 mi right now.. When there's a dent. But sol transportation options are. Hybrid driving your car into the ground. We don't get good gas mileage with the begin about 22 miles to the gallon. Community car community car which is it car sharing member base car sharing organization. Biking in busing. Can and i share one vehicle also i'm retired can still working. And it doesn't happen very often that we need two cars. And you know that we're going in opposite directions at the same time. And that's what community car comes in really handy. So are you you use that occasionally occasionally mostly we use it the nice thing about community cars they have a large passenger van that you can fold the seats down and use it for. Transporting stuff that's not dirty but they also have a small pickup truck. Which is the most fuel efficient for ed's. Category. You know they're not super fuel efficient but so we've used the truck the most for you know katie moved her friends are moving. I want to get mulch whatever. Dirty stuff you know rocks rocks and mulch and things potted plants. Although i haven't actually done that. Don't have to go to action. Very good any other environmental success stories. You can think of. I just really want to encourage people to plant food crops. Perennial food crops on there wherever they have sun on their property. And you can do that every night perennials but you can you can grow food in an apartment you don't have to have. Ground. Dirt. Property you don't have to own. In the window there are systems ready bro. Or inside to inside the window shelves in a sunday of sunny window. We found that the outside flower box helps keep the rabbits out of the garden elevated enough i haven't had any problems with rabbits and laughter slugs with the issue and i never had any plugs in my. My herb garden because he has elevated so that was a real advantage i'm not so. Big island. I don't. I can't tell the difference between a fresh urban a dryer cooking but. I need to buy the herbs that i have in my garden. Are totally buried under the mint which is growing out of control. I put that on the deck. Out front when we grew mint at the farm we are at the house by lake wisconsin we had a. Cement chimney block that we put the mint in. Which is only partially successful cuz the mint will go underneath and out-and-out right so it takes more than one. Chimney block. To block them but you know you can go and you can harvest food from your yard. There are lots of things that we call weeds that are actually edible lance quarters would wood sorrel. Pick up my kids i'll call that sour grass while yeah. Very good thank you very much. and barb.

uuprairie_org

Pr131208PaulRusk-ed.mp3

Welcome everyone and good morning to welcome prairie unitarian society my name is melinda gustafson to be both an open-hearted and open-minded congregation we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure. On sunday mornings we provide a wide variety of services they are presented either by a prairie member a member of the wider community or by our minister reverend sandra ingram today paul rusk the director of the alzheimer and dementia alliance will be presenting and now we will later challenge with the assistance of dean and orange. Everyday bring a struggle everyday brings joy every day brings us the opportunity to ease the struggle of another to be the joy in another's life may this flame remind us to carry our light to each other and to the world. All right so we are now at the point of the presentation segment of today's service and as i said it's my pleasure to introduce to you paul rusk who is the current director of the alzheimer and dementia alliance and he has held that position since november of 1998 are able to have a fairly high quality of life through the disease process and that's what we're all about at the alzheimer's alliance we really want to assist every single family that's in and. I sort of james the technology it's year of your folks did a really good job with setting it all up but this is this is kind of typical of you got started after wwii and had a lot of children well you did a very good job having children and as you can see the statistics it could double by 2030 and right here in wisconsin we have over 100,000 in dane county about 9,000. Add this young baby here if she's born recently she has a life expectancy of 100 years we've done such a great job that she will likely live to 100 unfortunately in the alzheimer's area if we don't come up with the cure soon half of the young babies born today will come down with some form of dementia nextfly please dementia is a medical term it's the broad term that all forms of memory loss fall under the term dementia with alzheimer's disease being the most common at about 60% and the key thing here is a normal thing it really really is a disease these years ago and in the early stages and they often it's mixed. Done a good enough job president obama did increase it somewhat but our worry is if we need to put more federal money into research so we can figure out a solid cure or something that really really works for prevention because as i say there so many baby boomers were going to come if we come down with the disease with the same rate as our parents we have a really a terrible problem so if you want to sign up to be an advocate we will let you know when important things are happening in in in congress we also work heavily with the state government and the federal funding for the alzheimer's disease research center was just up for renewal and we have a public policy director and and our job was to line up the entire congressional delegation to send a letter with the application saying how important that federal money was to the university of wisconsin and we did pretty well we got it bipartisan we got a letter from governor walker. Stem cell research. In the alzheimer's area. You're not. So we had a letter from governor walker in our application we had a hundred percent of all the democrats and we got three or four congressional republicans to put a letter in the application in the it's all peer-reviewed so the score we just heard about the score about 3 weeks ago the score is really really low which is a good thing confusion anger and guilt i don't know what i've done without you. You may not do a complete meal early but you can certainly designed the facility so there's a little kitchen right near where mrs. jones is and you can get her going it's usually later you can make adjustments and that that is a thing is making those adjustments so i'ma have to be bacon and eggs and sausage but it's a warm friendly person there and descent of kutch you have that all the way to the very end and so we tell everybody continue doing those regular visits all the way to the end it also is helpful for the staff at the nursing home. A lot of the newer facilities have kind of sunroom concepts and it's also nice is a lot of energy and people want to walk so if you got a sunroom and you can let them wander around safely indoors that really helps. That's the most. Difficult question of all and it's the end it's the. The. The hardest thing. Our social workers are are are pretty good at trying to maybe get her to talk about what she's experiencing and then depending on what she says you can very gently try and move her forward but you have to be exceedingly gentle and you have to read the facial expressions and sometimes it's best if it's not one of the kids sometimes you can get somebody a little bit removed its you know the nurse maybe except everybody is so busy now with healthcare it is a real challenge and if she's not really ready to accept if there's not a whole lot you can do about that if she won't so you have to try and make the environment as safe as you possibly can so that what you're worried about doesn't happen. The key prevention regular exercise lifetime that you can pick it up in your forties and then very healthy lifestyle as far as what you eat i'm so that your your cholesterol screen is very good the three or four numbers you want to keep the overall cholesterol low and and all that you want to avoid diabetes and high blood pressure and diabetes is is related to what you eat and how much exercise you get and high blood pressure can be lessened by by regular exercise so it's interesting how exercise. I'm going to i'm going to give you my card and we've got a huge library and i'll ask the social workers tomorrow morning what would be the best book for her but that's the key thing where the caregiver get so stressed out taking care of the person with dementia that they're going to predecease the person with dementia then you're really a tree you don't have anybody to do anything and real trick you can do things like oh by the way we've decided we're bringing in meals and we're coming in on you know you can line up meals from the county you can do that do that. We're pretty good at improvising. We'll come up with a neighbor will come up with a former colleague of the person that they do when they worked we will use the there's a whole network in dane county there's the focal point where they're the senior focal points will get in touch with the the senior focal point see if we can come up with a volunteer we are not fussy sometimes people are over you don't have them forget you can't wants to come to a number of our programs and we lined up available and a lot of what we do is available there and hopefully as the baby boom generation ages and you know society becomes more. Thank you all very much thank you and i opted to take the closing words for myself barns burnt down now i can see the moon then master master hide my apologies if i got that until we until we meet again.

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Pr090201Shoup-ed.mp3

I now get to introduce james shupe who i just met for the first time this morning. It says she's a professor of merida in my biography here a biological sciences at purdue but i understand now that she's also pretty actively teaching what she said this morning to me was that being retired means you can do whatever you want if it sounds like it doesn't mean you stopped teaching and she shared with me that for the last 8 years. They've been doing a week-long kind of crash course in environmental sciences for purdue students on their land. They have a 150 wooded acres and a fuller home. In northeast central wisconsin. She taught for more than 30 years at purdue and holds a bachelor's in biology from university of rochester and phd in theology from university of chicago. She's presented several short courses on darwin and his legacy. The six. Mass extinction and living within limit. She's a lifelong unitarian and she's also here with her husband. So please join me in welcoming james true. Thank you very much i have food to be here. Several years ago author christopher hitchens commented. What can be asserted without evidence. Can also be dismissed. Without evidence. How much better the world might be where this axiom more frequently practice. Acquiring evidence. To support hypotheses is the province of science. And science is under orchestrated attack today by religious dogmatism. The life and monumental work of charles darwin provides an unparalleled example of science in action. Darwin's intellectual journey included initial unquestioned acceptance. Of the prevailing assertion of the nineteenth-century creationist doctrine. His increasing doubt. And those verities and finally his dismissal of the biblical explanation. Based on exhausted scientific evidence. And reason to reveal the truth. That is his revolutionary theory of evolution by natural selection. It was on february 12th 1809. 200 years ago next week. That abraham lincoln and charles darwin were born on the very same day. Both were to become great emancipator's. Lincoln to free american slaves from physical servitude. And darwin to liberate the human mind from the bonds of supernatural dogma. Charles robert darwin was born in shrewsbury england. His parents were the well-known and respected physician robert darwin. And susanna wedgewood darwin of the prominent wedgewood family world-famous as the makers of fine china. Charles grandfather was the imposing and unconventional erasmus darwin physician and philosopher of the 18th century. On both sides it was a prosperous well-educated upper-middle-class largely unitarian family. Believing in the unity of god and skeptical of trinitarian doctrine. They were nonconformist in a society where most people were members of the church of england. Charles mother died when he was 8 years old and so he was brought up. Predominantly by his older sisters. Who exerted a loving humane sensitive influence on him. Darwin's childhood was otherwise unremarkable. He thoroughly enjoyed outdoor pursuits. Especially hunting and collecting wildlife specimen but show no signs of genius or future greatness. In fact his father the corpulent doctor darwin is reported to have one said. You care for nothing but shooting dogs and rat catching and you will be a disgrace to yourself and all your family. He didn't mince words how ironic that young charles was to go on to deduce what can arguably be acknowledged as the most important contribution ever. Defiance. Now robert dreamed of his sons carrying on the medical tradition of himself and his grandfather erasmus. At age 16. Charles went dutifully off to edinboro to study medicine. Within a few months however young charles realize that he was quite unsuited and disposition and personality to this profession. He was sickened by the sight of bloody operations performed without anesthesia. And appalled by the prevalence of body snatching to provide cadavers for dissection. Eventually the elder darwin suggested that his son change his career objective sociology. An appropriate location for a person of his social status. And agreeable enough to young charles as in his words. I did not been in the least dogs the strict and literal truth of every word in the bible. I told charles darwin transfer to cambridge in 1828 where he completed a degree in theology. In his years there he read and was greatly influenced by the late 18th century theologian william paley. Patron saint of today's creationist and intelligent design proponents. Paley's 1802 book titled natural theology or evidences of the existence and attributes of the deity. Proposed that quote. In nature the marks of design are too strong to be gotten over. Design must have had a designer. That designer must have been a person. That person must have been god. 1802. In his autobiography darwin recalled. I do not think i hardly ever admired a book more than paley's i could almost have said it by heart. During his years at cambridge darwin became close friends with several influential faculty members notably the botanist reverend john henslow a strong proponent of natural theology. And also add the geologist adam sedgwick who were the catastrophic. Deleting in biblical interpretations and catastrophic events. Like noah's flood as responsible for the earth. Present appearance. The prevailing intellectual view at cambridge and elsewhere and body the concept of natural theology as proposed by reverend paley. That is. The goal of knowing and understanding god through study of his work. The idea that nature in all its splendor reveals god's divine plan. In other words the study of nature was viewed as an act of religious devotion. Aside from several important friendships he made darwin's educational career at cambridge was not particularly noteworthy. He graduated prepared for a quiet respectable parish clergy position contemplating his ultimate future from a position of sound family financial background and without any immediate or pressing demands on his time. It was that fortuitous. That is botany professor john henslow. Recommended young charles for position as gentleman naturalist and dining companion to captain robert fitzroy commander of the hms beagle. Which was about to embark on a hydrographic survey trip exploring the coast of south america. The chosen man was too was required to be tapped and fitzroy's approximate age and social class. Darwin jumped at the opportunity and despite initial family opposition he joined the entourage and set sail on the beagle in 1831. And just as an aside i have a list of recommended reading if any of you want to go into the subject any further but there's a lovely little book called three men of the beagle that i discovered in i discard been at barnes & noble or someplace and it tells the story of the voyage of the beagle the first boy to the beagle and then the second. And what happened is that the three-minute the beagle are darwin captain fitzroy and jimmy button. Who was the aboriginal indianwood been captured on a previous trip of the beagle. And i jimmy button and several other legend indians were taken to england to be civilized and subsequently turned return to their land here at el fuego in an orderly feudal and disastrous. If not arrogant and ill-conceived attempt. To introduce christianity and english culture aboriginal tribe so it's a good book. Anyway the darwin began his voyage on the beagle trained for the clergy and a believer in the biblical account in genesis. And an unquestioning christian. Indeed as the lake biologist and unitarian garrett hardin has commented. Most lone surviving religions call for a commitment that discourages the asking of questions. My first we all just contemporary darwin was a creationist believing that the exquisite adaptations of many species were compelling evidence. That a designer had created each species. Fourth intended place in the economy of nature. An idea often called the fixity of species. Now significantly darwin carried with him aboard ship a copy of the first volume of young charles lyles very recently published principles of geology. Which challenged the catastrophism of darwin's professor adam sedgwick and others. And posited instead the principle of uniformitarianism. $3 word which means the idea that geological. Changes that are currently at work such as mountain building and erosion. Are the same processes that have taken place throughout the earth's history. And most importantly lyles ideas suggested a much much older earth. Been accepted at the time. No darwin's friend from cambridge the deeply religious spotless. Henslow had warned him against the heresies of wild ideas especially the age of the earth. And so the beagle set sail from plymouth england on december 27th 1831. A date that darwin later vowed to commemorate as the birthday of his second life. She crossed the atlantic and traveled up and down both coasts of south america. West of the galapagos archipelago across the pacific to australia. Around the cape of good hope in southern africa and eventually in 1836. Return to england. It was by no means a picnic. Darwin's quarters were in the chart room which measured 9 by 11 ft. With five foot headroom. He slept in a hammock. Conditions aboard the beagle were miserably cramped and the voyage which was envisioned to be completed in two years extended to nearly five. Added onto this darwin was tormented by continuing seasickness. Captain fitzroy was intense authoritarian puritanical and aristocratic. And prague alternating periods of depression and passionate outbursts of temper. Perhaps in part a result of conflict with his own intense religious beliefs. What does the bike considerable hardship the voyage awakening darwin his innate scientific instincts. He kept copious notes. He was cautious. Compulsively industrious and exacting in his work. According to his son francis. Doggedness expresses his frame of mine. His almost fierce desire to force the truth to reveal itself. For five years and exotic lands darwin explore coral reefs in riverbed. Hike the argentine pampas inclined andean mountain. Experience volcanic eruptions in a chilean earthquake. Recorded stratifications of rocks and soil discovered fossils of conifer shellfish and mastodon. Collected flowers birds insects and reptiles. He observed distributions of organisms that did not make sense unless some natural scientific laws were governing their past history. He saw evidence of extinction when he honors that money under the bones of fossilized mammals in patagonia he found at least nine large mammals fossil mammals that were unknown or barely known to science at the time. He found seashells more than 12,000 feet above sea level in the andes mountains. Evidence that ocean floors have been uplifted in the remote geological past. He saw a remarkable adaptations of plants and animals to their surroundings. Traveling northwest from the chile and costa beagle reach the galapagos archipelago and 1835. A place that has often been credited as the site of darwin's most crucial observations although some scholars disc. Think that his observations in south america may have been more important. In any case that you can laugh at those islands were formed by volcanic eruption in a comparatively recent geological past about 2 million years ago. Darwin realized that this phenomenon must have presented life with vast new opportunities. Occasion sport appearance of new life-forms new species even. Gyros. Can spoken space and time. We seem to be brought somewhat nearer to that great fact. That mystery of mysteries. The first appearance of new being on this earth. He reasoned that the novel galapagos peak species must have originated as accidental colonist. From central and south america only to modify their adaptations in subsequent generations. In response to different environments on the islands. And he at last began to recognize the critical importance of immense amounts of geological time. Any accumulation of tiny changes that eventually lead to the experience to the appearance. Of new species. So when darwin return to england 1836 never to leave the country again he was already famous. His letters to his teacher john henslow had been privately published without his knowledge and distributed to leading naturalist in britain. And he had sent home more than 5,000 specimens which were being examined in categories categorized by experts. For example the anatomist robert owen and the ornithologist john gould. But when darwin returned to england. He returned a changed man. A zealot carlson the distinguished geneticist and historian a science that has put it. He returned with a secret he could not share. He had lost his face. He had demoted himself to a dia. That unitarian like penultimate descent to atheism. Back in england darwin live several years in london where he consulted with experts attended scientific meeting published his journal and continued to identify and catalog the specimens that he had collected on the voyage. How darwin was a compulsive list maker and scribbler throughout his life. He even drew up a balance sheet. A list of pros and cons of marriage. Marianna left-hand column not mary on the right. Now if you stay unmarried he would be free to do what he like. Free to choose his own company and listen to the conversation of cleverman in club. They would not be forced to visit relatives and he and he would have time to work. On the other hand a wife would be a companion for old age and take what take care of the house. He would enjoy the charms of music and female chitchat. Only picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa he wrote with a good fire and books and music. Such a wife is better than a dog and a how and so he concluded that marriage was unbalanced preferable accordingly then he proposed. They soon settled advair at a comfortable country estate in the small village of down about 16 miles from london. Now most of the wedgwood and darwin's were unitarians but none of them was particularly devout. In fact charles grandfather erasmus had once described unitarianism as a feather bed to catch a falling christian. Emma wedgwood darwin was a rather devout christian. Although his father robert had urged him not to share his religious doubts with emma charles nevertheless confided in her from the start of their marriage. Yet still he respected her cinemas and let her set the tone for their domestic life. Only in his autobiography did darwin express his religious opinions freely. Emma. Was the model victorian wife devoting her life to caring for her husband and producing children 10 of them at respectable intervals all were baptized and confirmed in the church of england. After a stay in downtown charleston grounded by his devoted family work in comparative isolation and relative comfort. Although dog throughout his life 5 for health. He spent the next twenty years patiently sorting out all the data he collected on the voyage of the beagle. And using it to construct a unifying theory to explain the transmutation of species that's those were his words we now call it evolution. During a design an experiment to test his hypotheses he examined breeds of orient ornamental domestic pigeons. Skeletons of rabbits wings of ducks and devoted eight years to a detailed study of variations in 10,000 specimens of barnacles. He examined the viability and dispersal of seeds. Kept notebooks on transmutation and discuss the species problem with close friends. Before he finally dared to begin writing his great book on natural selection. His dangerous idea. Because he understood the strength of conventional opinion on the fixity of species. Darwin's doubts about christianity can be traced at least in part. To his encounters with slavery and slave owning christian. A practice condoned in the bible. He had observed firsthand considerable brutality amongst slave owners in brazil and had argued bitterly with captain fitzroy over the subject. Darwin was an ardent supporter of the north in the american civil war and he even canceled his subscription to the times of london because of its pro southern fire. In fact there's a new book just out recently called darwin's sacred cause. Which makes the case that darwin's interest in evolution can be traced at least in part to his hatred of slavery. His work demonstrates the error of the idea that the human that human races are fundamentally different this time many people thought that races were human races were different species. Furthermore darwin was profoundly trouble. By the problem of evil. Believers including fitzroy argued that suffering is ennobling. But darwin's knowledge of a suffering of animals not to mention that of humans. Prevented his reconciliation of theodicy that is the conflict between evil and suffering versus the goodness of god. Darwin saw kind of war or struggling nature in which organisms produce far more offspring that can possibly survive. He saw what looked like a massive destruction of life especially among the newborn. Was god indifferent to the suffering of millions of lower animals throughout almost endless time yeah. And why would a benevolent god has created all his wondrous creatures only to allow them to die out in the mass extinctions that clearly had taken place over time. Moreover the agonizing death of his favorite child annie at the age of 10. Threw him into deep despair. And further estranged him from religious belief. In his autobiography which was only published in on expurgated version in 1958. Darwin ride. In the years immediately after the voyage i was led to think much about religion. I had gradually come by this time to see that the old testament from its manifestly false history of the world. Informative tributing to god the feelings of a vengeful tyrant. Was no more to be trusted than the sacred book of the hindus or to the beliefs of any barbarian. The more we know of the six laws of nature the more unbelievable do miracles become. I gradually came to disbelieve in christianity as a divine revelation. I was very unwilling to give up my belief but i found it more and more difficult to invent evidence that would suffice to convince me. Disbelief crept over me at a very slow rate but was at last complete. The rate was so slow that i felt no distress and have never ever since doubted even for a single second that my conclusion was correct. I can indeed hardly see how anyone ought to wish christianity to be true. For if so the plain language of the bible seems to show that the man who do not believe. And this would include my father brother and almost all of my best friends. Will be everlastingly punished. And that is a damnable doctrine. Darwin's words. In 1838. During his years in london after the voyage darwin read the economist thomas malthus essay on population in which mall has stated referring to human populations. Population when unchecked increases in geometric ratio. But subsistence. Increases are aesthetically. Darwin was already seeing failure to adapt as a key to the evolution of species. Did come to the conclusion from his observation of domesticated species. That selection another words non-random reproduction was the mechanician mechanism of change. And then after reading moffis conclusions about human populations. Get one saw how to apply this mechanism to populations in nature. He realized. That in the struggle for scarce resources. Favorable variance would tend to be preserved. An unfavorable ones would die or fail to reproduce. As a result over long periods of geological time. New species would appear. Darwin staunch friend and supporter the brilliant biologist thomas henry huxley later to be known as darwin's bulldog. Famously quipped. How extremely stupid of me not to have thought of that. A 1942 darwin wrote the first abstract of his theory and he expanded the document in 1844. During this. he correspondent frequently with his friend the botanist james dalton hooker. To whom he provided privately. At last gleams of light has come and i am almost convinced. Quite the contrary to the opinion i started with. That species are not immutable. It is like confessing a murder. In the next dozen years he published the voyage of the beagle and a number of monographs on his research topic. Most notably and extensive treatise on barnacles based on that eight year study i mentioned before which established him firmly in the scientific community as an expert. An authority in a specific narrow field. By the way this book remains the definitive work on barnacles to this day. In 1856 his friend the geologist charles lyell strongly urged him to publish his theory of natural selection. But darwin was still reluctant and he procrastinated. No doubt because he realized what a bombshell this would be a real paradigm shift a change in basic assumptions about the diversity of life form. Then unexpectedly in june of 1858 he received a stunning letter from a fellow naturalist then working in the east indies. Alfred russel wallace describing his own recent discovery in a flash of insight of the principle of natural selection. A little background on wallace and by the way if you've seen the december issue of national geographic there's a nice piece. By david quammen on walla. Because title the other darwin. Wallace came from a middle-class family and supported himself by collecting specimens to sell from the amazon where he had traveled for a number of years with henry walter bates and later in the mail a archipelago which is now indonesia. Wallace said red lyle the geologist and was convinced of evolution. And he was seeking evidence to corroborate and discover the cause. In contrast darwin had allowed the patterns of the natural world it to seep into him absorbing almost subliminally the cleat the key clues pointing to evolution that had impress themselves. Upon him during the voyage of the beagle. And are you recall that went when he left on the journey and late 1831 darwin was as much a creationist as any of his contemporaries. Took him a few years to a few years for him to bring the clues of evolution to the surface of his mind as an explicit thought. So anyway i darwin received this letter from wallace and he was shaking and incredulous. And he reported to his friends lyle who probably arranged a joint session of the linnaean society. With presentation of short papers by both darwin and wallace neither of them by the way with presence. Darwin then quickly finish the 1844 abstract and published. The origin of species in 1859 he called it my abominable volume. Darwin bombarded his readers with so many facts that the cumulative weight of the evidence in support of his thesis became overwhelming. He had anticipated many if not most of the criticisms that would arrive. And he answered them in advance. Response in much of the scientific community was generally positive. But the anticipated storm soon broke among the clergy and the general public. Among the most famous of remarks regarding man surmise descent from 8. Was that attributed to the wife of samuel wilberforce bishop of oxford. She is supposed to ask that. Let us hope that it is not true. But if it is true let us hope that it will not become widely known of evolution. If not the theory of natural selection which explains the fact of evolution. However many were uneasy about where the evidence and their reason we're leading them. Some try to incorporate a deity into their thinking either as an original creator or as a guiding hand in the process of species change. By the end of a nineteenth-century science was recognized was a recognized profession liberated from physiology. Evolution was established as a fact. In the public mind. And a darwinian theory explaining natural selection as the primary mechanism of evolution was accepted by many intellectuals. Some very important scientific questions remain but many of these were cleared up in the first half of the twentieth century when darwinian evolution theory merge with mendelian genetics siri can what became known as the modern synthesis. So to summarize the lines of evidence assembled by darwin includes the geographical distribution of species over the earth. The fossil record record that is replacement of older species going extinct by newer ones over geological time. Anatomical similarities between groups. It's between species group in the same category as for example the same skeletal elements make up the forelimbs of all mammals humans task whales bats. Even though they have very different function. The similarity in developmental stages pass-through by closely related organism. All of these observations darwin concluded our best explain not by creationism but by descent with modification. Or evolution by means of natural selection. The darwin wallace theory can be outlined in brief as follows. All species have excess reproductive capacity that is bacon safe may produce more offspring than can possibly survive. Secondly. There's considerable individual variation within species. And this variation is heritable. No. The sources of variation in the mechanism of heredity were unknown in darwin's time he wasn't until the 20th century that this is all worked out. The fourth point is that some individuals are better able to survive in under given environmental condition. And the best adapted individuals will survive and reproduce passing on their advantageous traits. To the next generation. And finally species change over time. Anna a new species appear as a result of accumulation of new traits. To put it another way in the words of richard dawkins. Given sufficient time. The non-random survival of hereditary entities. Which occasionally miss copy. Will generate complexity diversity beauty. And an illusion of define so persuasive that it is almost impossible to distinguish from deliberate. Intelligent design. The impact of the theory of evolution by natural selection has been profound. All the more so since the modern synthesis incorporating genetic theory in the 1930s and 40s. And the most recent late 20th early 21st century breakthroughs in phenomenon of embryological development known as evo-devo. Which are now providing many important clues to the appearance of novel form such as wings & limb in the evolutionary process. Give me in 1973 the geneticist he famously remarked. Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution. Evidence leads us to conclude that life on earth has diversified on its own without any kind of external guidance. Evolution in a pure darwinian world has no goal or purpose. The exclusive driving force is random mutations. With every new major scientific exam to protect its divinely revealed domain. Copernicus and 1543 had to conceal and water down his idea of a sum. We're going too fast universe. Giordano bruno was burned at the stake and 1604 his heretical beliefs including copernican cosmology. Galileo was arrested in silence. For his support of copernicus. Denial of geocentrism. Annie wilson who has recently published a new edition of darwin's works points. That the revolution began by darwin with even more humbling. It showed that you manatee is not the center of creation and not its purpose either. Evolution by natural selection is applied to humans means that the essential qualities of the human mind also evolve autonomously. However elevated in power over the rest of life. However exalted his self image. We were descended from animals by the same blind force that created those animal. And we remain a member species of this plant biosphere. Darwin turn our attention to the astounding power of a natural creative process and the magnificent. Out of product. David quammen in a wonderful little book called this way. Scientific inside and religious dogma had never come more directly into contact conflict. It was a bigger issue than whether humans with lobsters and dandelions and all other living creatures share and adsense of divine especial divine appointment. In plain language a soul or no soul. An afterlife or not. Are humans spiritually immortal in a way that chickens and cows are not. Or just another animated for another form of animated meat. Darwin and his friend thomas henry huxley were often accused of being atheist but both consistently maintained. A gnosticism. Pratap frappe today we might call them negative atheist. They did not outright deny the existence of a supernatural power but we're skeptics non-believers. As a result of lack of evidence. Atheism without theism. It is hard to believe that today 150 years after the publication of the origin of species. And after a monumental accumulation of peer-reviewed supporting evidence by the scientific community. We are still fighting a rearguard action against the forces of religious doctrine or ignorance. The recent intelligent design shred is testimony to the dangers inherent in literal belief in any mythology in which reason we are not permitted to share their light on truth. The christian right is embarked on an unrelenting. Cycling attempt to roll back the clock to the theocratic tyranny of another age. When the reveal biblical message was essentially on challenged in western world. In the western world among developed nations america is being chastised and even ridiculed because of our societal and taught tolerance of creationism in this scientific age. Darwin remains a figure reviled by evangelicals and other litoralis. Because as richard dawkins has put it. Darwin's ideas carry to their logical conclusion undercuts the very basis of christianity if not indeed all theistic religion. Evolution has made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist. This is why in my view we must openly confront and criticize the outdated beliefs of the great a abrahamic monotheistic religion. There was a mistake and political correctness notion adrift in our society that religious ideas are outside the realm of acceptable criticism. That criticism of religion is taboo. So why should this be so. Any ideas whatsoever especially those that are divisive destructive and irrational demand serious scrutiny and criticism if not outright condemnation. Sam harris and his best-selling book the end of faith with this way. The idea that anyone of our religions represents the infallible word of the one true god. Requires an encyclopedic ignorance of human history mythology and even arts to be entertained as the beliefs rituals and i can ography of each of our religion attest to centuries a cross-pollination among them. Whatever their imagine source. The doctrines of modern religion are no more tenable than those which for lack of adherence were cast upon the scrap heap of mythology millennia ago. For there is no more evidence to justify a belief in the literal existence of yahweh and satan then there was to keep zeus. Perched on his mountain from for poseidon turning the seeds. Did my mind science and religion are unquestionably in deep conflict. And religious beliefs are perhaps the major forces tearing our world apart. It is an affront to our intelligence that today we must waste our time and effort fighting to protect our school curricula. From the intrusion of iron age religious ignorance. And a fend off a full-scale assault at the highest governmental level on the wall of separation between church and state. Nobel laureate christian to duke has retinol. It is tempting to say that dialogue between science and religion will be possible only by compromise. Let each and some water to their wine and there will be understanding. Unfortunately we are not dealing with a political or ideological conflict. But with respect for truth. On what has been convincingly demonstrated. Science can make no concessions. If there is conflict between what science knows. And what religion believe. Religion must give in. This is the crux of our dilemma today most of the world is locked and dogmatic belief system which issue or even just staying critical thinking. The new enlightenment born of doubt and forged on the rule of reason and free inquiry is by no means assured. Back in the 1960s historian lynn white made the following observations which i think is still. Pertinent today. How are science and technology have grown out of christian attitudes about man's relation to nature which are almost universally held. Not only by christian and neo christian but also by those who regard themselves as post-christian. Despite copernicus. All the cosmos rotates around our little globe. Despite darwin we are not in our hearts. Part of a natural process. We are superior to nature contemptuous of it willing to use it. Floraflex slightest whim. Charles darwin at a time when it was even more difficult to speak out with contrarian views. Broke the taboo against unquestioning acceptance of christian doctrine or belief. To repeat. Christopher hitchens observations. Darwin realized that assertions made without evidence. Can be dismissed without evidence. Darwin the reluctant revolution revolutionary. Was a quiet retiring kind and patient man. But he had an unrelenting thirst for evidence to bring real truth to light. The unifying theory of evolution by natural selection is his great gift to us. It is incumbent upon us not to waste it or set it aside out of politeness or political correctness in the face of religious polemic. Rather we should continue to be inspired by darwinzon poetic and uplifting words at the conclusion of the first edition of the origin. There is a grandeur in this view of life. With its several powers having been originally breeze in into a few forms or into one. And that whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity. From so simple a beginning. Endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful. Have been and are being evolved.

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Pr131117JohnMix-ed.mp3

Thank you marion carroll that was fabulous good morning and welcome to prairie unitarian universal society my name is christina class and i'll be your provider today prairie aspires to be both an open-hearted and an open-minded congregation we welcome people of every ethnic and religious background whatever your color sexual orientation gender or family structure we welcome you no matter what your age or your abilities or your inability. Are opening words today will be presented by rick beckett. From an anonymous wisconsin circuit court judge. Alternatives to incarceration save money and save lives. It's much cheaper to treat people then to lock them up. And you have better outcomes. There's less recidivism. Fewer victims. Unless use of the justice system. You end up with contributors to society and all of the benefits of that. Kaitlyn and her family will provide our chalice lighting today and moved towards the resolution of true equality and to share that love which is ultimately beyond even our cherished reason that love which unites us peace talks. Now we invite children and parents to the front of the room for a children's story which will be shared today by reverend john mix. You guys like a story. Yeah you like a story i like stories. And i expect i could tell a lot of stories. That's the way people learn from each other. I'm actually not going to read a story this morning. I'm just going to tell you a little bit of a story. Okay. How many of you are in school. You go to school night. Yeah lots of you. You know that's really important. To do. Yeah. And we learn a lot right. Years and years ago. They didn't go to school. Didn't have much in school. In fact not many people. Would even read. If you'd go maybe back thousand years or so. Most people wouldn't be able to read this. No they wouldn't know what these marks on hearsay. But you're in school right. And huh. When you learn how to read excellent. You read my mind. That's good. And. Is she yeah yeah that's awesome. In dead 2. Boy that is just so good. I just want you to know how beautiful it is. To be able to read in to learn to read. As i say years and years and years ago. People didn't do that very much. They relied on other people. 3. You know maybe the minister in the town would read and maybe the doctor in town you know they'd know how to read. Well. I work. In a place called r county jail. And if. As a person does something wrong in madison.. It's wrong and they get arrested in the policeman sheriff comes there. And brings them downtown to to the jail and they have to stay there for a while. And. I just tell you about a fellow who i met down there who's in the jail. He was locked up. And. We were sitting at the table in the jail and. He told me that. He sold drugs to support his. Three kids. And. And then he kind of said in a hush. Tony boys. You said but i can only read at the third grade reading level. No. Having three kids growing in school he knew. That his kids pretty soon would be able to read better than he could he was 25 he was a dad. And a tear came down his cheek when he told me that he could only read at that level. And i said. Would you work with somebody would you like some help with that. And if we had somebody come into this yell to help you learn to read. Mrs. yeah i would. Well. That day. I said. We are going to get some volunteers. To help us. No come into the jail to help people like this who need to learn better how to read. You know. So. Just to give you a little bit of the end of the story he i found out later and from a teacher he got in touch with another teacher in the jail. And. The teacher told me she said. Jj's shouldn't have been kept in the special ed class. That he was in in school when he was a kid. He was in there to get some help but he stayed there. And you never got out of that that special class. A could have been. Taken in a moved up into a higher level of. Abilities. So. In other words he can he didn't get all the help he needs it again. And so he's if you can't my dad and then wow he just didn't know how to how to help his kids spend any got in trouble. So. I just want you to say to number 1b. Thankful that you are learning how to read and that people read you stories. It's it's fun. Is exciting. And you know what. Houston here's the sum of the greatest beauty of this. Is that. You. Get to discover. What you can do. In this world. You know cuz if you would learn to read. Everything is open. To you. You can learn what you want to learn. You can follow. Tell me some things if you're excited about that you like 22. If you like your grandma's house. Yeah yeah. There's good things happen if grandmas. What are some things that you. That you like to do or play with. Yeah and she didn't hear you like to go in your grandma's rocking chair. And sometimes your grandma's in that rocking chair and she'll tell you a story. Register. Okay. Well. I i just thank you for coming up. And for the gift that i that you are you just remembered okay. That you are an awesome beautiful gift to this world. And reading. Is going to help you. Become all that you want to become. Overtime okay. Thanks for coming up. I'm very pleased this morning to be able to introduce our guest speaker reverend john mix discovered his calling as an artist after serving lutheran church as a pastor his study of creation spirituality with matthew fox and 19 8283 enlighten the connections between art spirituality and social justice as a freelance artist from 1986 to 2006 he discovered prison ministry part-time and became certified as an 80 rocks that process teacher the phrase similar to art therapy since 2007 reverend john mix continues to paint landscapes and portraits in oil and pestle and has the support of area churches to be a full-time chaplain at the dane county jail he also facilitates. Welcome. Thank you for the opportunity to be with you and sharon. Some of the work that i do and some of the work that we share together. This is joy. just tune to know that.. Unitarian became part of the moses organization. It celebrates a year in existence this very month ashley last night. And i will share some of the work that i'm that i'm involved in and just fyi for there's more that you would like to know about our field ministry the website madison shield ministry.org. I would get you. Our website about the work that we do there and. Chaplain julia and i blog on occasion. Experiences and they are on that website to madison jail ministry. org. My journey. As a. As a minister as an artist is. Different than most. I didn't realize the yard was a part of me as deep as it was until i got into the ministry. Never thought about taking an art class and. All those years of college and seminary. But when i got to my first parish in the little town in iowa. I'm at the presbyterian pastor who had an acrylic painting hobby. And it went click i want that. But you know you're going to paris and starting to raise a family and minnesota and another pastor who is an accomplished. And that's part of what. Led to the occasion of hearing matthew fox speak on the connections between art and spirituality and social justice is that was the program that he started and offered semesters said in 9 months. In chicago at that time back in the early 80s. And so. When i rolled in that we move the family to chicago to this program. First class i ever had was painting as meditation. And a catholic nun blanche gallagher watercolor artist. Not this class in amazon about discovering the wisdom both of in the in the gifts of the mystics teresa of avila on meister eckhart. And some of their contributions to. Where we are what this world is in and how deep the beauty is and discovery channel of discovery and and interaction with the your own life and the earth. So one more time in parish ministry after that. But it was the administrative management part of courage ministry that's just. Kind of tired and tore me down. And it wasn't enough of the pastoral care in the counseling which is what i really like to do so i left. 86 and i said that's it. Would have said if you got a good job you you keep it you know and then when you retire you can do what you want to do you know. Well that wasn't going to work for me and i wasn't going to fly it because my father died of cancer at the age of 52 is a farmer in minnesota. And i was just six weeks old and so you know my experience was not everyone makes it to that proverbial retirement and then. Got to go now and so at the age of 35 i enrolled in drawing 101 and i knew i'd come home to a part of myself that has been asleep and yearning for discovering and so the depression that i experienced in perry's ministry. Wasn't that. God and the universe something's not there something's missing. So. One of the things that i struggle with in that transition was. The sense of calling. You know if you feel called to a certain work. No. You can be called out of it and you can be called something else. And. I just want to share a definition of vocation that i found just extremely helpful and. Frederick buechner. Is an author theologian who says. Vocation is that place to which god calls you. Where your deepest deepest gladness. And the world's hunger meet. You love to do it. The way i paraphrase. And the world needs to have it done. Where's that intersect. You love to do it. World needs to have it done. Well. Are those things that we truly enjoy our deepest gladness. It's in there it's in us for a reason and so we had our own peril ignore those those calling sin those earnings. So it's been very healing for me. Personally just to embrace the artist within into to get on with it. And i'm. But it was down that road. The pursuing our. That i discovered prison ministry part-time. I heard him. Actually i was in the setting similar to this and the speaker was speaking on prison ministry. And i was in where you're sitting and i heard that and i said to him afterwards. A curious what what's that about in. This is well let's have breakfast and pretty soon. I was going one day a week to a medium-security prison an hour west of this. Chicago suburbs where i was raising my family. So that's how the the connection got got moving in in me i didn't know in 1982 and i was invited fox's program and creation spirituality that. Art and spirituality and social justice would. Show up in my body. As you know i've got it for soulard and then discover prison ministry. And and that whole connection came together in me. Joint. Talk like this to a congregation some years ago and. Talking to a woman afterwards. I've never been arrested i've never had the drug and alcohol problem. Do you tap me on the shoulder and said. Never too late so let's hear it. But. Just to give you a bit of a snapshot of. My work in the jail. Is it champlin. The real essence of that works is i put in put in 33 different things. Number one is presents. Ministry of presence. Jailbait definition just cuts people off from the community. Unrestricted access to them. And so i give thanks that after forty years churches in dane county have said we want to have someone inside. And be there with them when they are cut off from us. And. So. My discovery that. i really like that kind of work. Was the way of saying yeah this is. This is what i. Hardwood i'm cut out to do. And being present means just where people are at and religion or no religion that's just not the issue. Is to be there to listen and that's the second thing present listening. Is the second i hear what they want to share and. Dance is healing actually. People can request i what i'm doing is answering people's request to see me. No they'll send a little request weapon essay can you come and talk to me. I need to buy more to run some other spiritual material. Bring them whatever they ask for it if we have it and most of the materials are all donated then. So. And that's the other part of the. Think about jealousy that i that i appreciate that it's interfaith it's. Respecting everybody's place no matter where they are in this in this life journey. In the third thing beyond presence in prayer and listening is prayer. Quite often they'll ask for or. Definitely say yes when i asked them and i'm willing to share our prayer if you would like. And very often lately except that. I'll never forget. The womanizer. Who has an addict had to bear the news that her daughter. Overdosed while she was there and in jail and. She was able to keep rational. Wait just spoke in a level tone more or less as she shared what was going on but it was in the prayer that she just plain broke down and cried through the entire prayer. So nothing will really replace being there for someone who is in in misery you and i know that about he's about ourselves. And i just want to lift that up to you as a faith community as the gathering community. Celebrate give thanks. For the gift that you are to each other. Because you know that if you experience a loss in your life setback you have. Shoulders you can rely on yardley no cry on here and i want to experience that almost no one. In our county jail has had. When people share. Some of the life experiences that they do and i'll give you a couple examples. I asked him have you ever sharing this. Was someone before. Virtually never here yes. So that is one thing i would invite you to remember if you forget everything else i said. Today. The underground river. Underneath the entire criminal justice system in my opinion. Is unresolved. Brief. Unresolved grief. So much loss. So much abandonment so much abuse and violence. That has never been spoken of. In a place of safety and care. That. I hear that and see that. Continually inconsistently. So just a snapshot of in terms of the jail itself we're talkin 900 vernay burrs. There. About. 750 women by men rather in about 150 women and by the way champlin julia weaver ordained ucc minister is my coworker so there she sees the women there and i work full-time with. Mental health director. So stink 250 to 300 people who depend on medication to modify their their symptoms. Clearly 80% of the reason people are showing up in jail. Has some connection to addiction. Using selling arguments because of that drinking. That's. In the picture on that to that significant degree that's going to buy a cell block one day and. I want uses real name but robert said to me champlin i'm a failure and i knew when i heard that that weave. And is 52. We've been in and out of the prisons in jail for his most visit don't lie. So i said would you be willing to talk with me one-on-one just have the deputy let him out. Where to get started with the alcohol. Cuz everybody is struggling was just an alcoholic. He said i was 16 and my my brother and i were really close he was three years older than me. At 19 and he said my brother went on a canoe trip. And drown. He said. Could you talk about your feelings of sadness and anger and loss. As a family. And that when it happened and he said no. We we can talk about about those kind of feelings as a family. And so within a year he turned into the alcohol. And it wasn't too much longer after that course that it became full-blown alcoholism. Would you be willing. To write a letter to your brother. And just put down on a piece of paper you know every feeling that you've got. About your brother i mean whatever it is just write it in a letter. And just keep riding until you said all you want to say. This is yeah i suppose i could. So few days later i came by his cell block and. He says champlin. I wrote that letter. And so i said to him. If you're willing to share i'm willing to hear it. We went in the room again the two of us and. Even sit down and read three pages. Written. How he felt about that loss. And it was like hearing this death happened 3 weeks ago it was just still that that rob and. And there was a significant shift in robert after that granted it's only a beginning it's a it's a small thing but. There is nothing that replaces and maybe. Confidence safety listening sharing their what's real you know at the moment you experience of the moment. Sometimes we'll use. Art media getting to that that type of spot. Training is is to use simple materials in pastels oil pastels crayons and markers anyting let them express visually experience of this moment is and then once that's made. This expression of what is the moment in. Again it's creating a safety and a listening for that. And the. If. There are times when sometimes you don't even know what you feel cuz it's so overwhelming and. Given time and given a little space like that there is opportunity to enter in to the experience and be present to that moment i mean that's that's the essence of it. Timeless young young fellow in 22. But at 17 under the influence of marijuana in his car wandered across the centerline and. Collided with another car and a man in the oncoming car was killed. You got drugs to drug court after that because he was so young and. Nearly completed it put failed and. The stayed sentence then came into play and so now he's up at dodge. His father was feeling when he left here and died after he went to prison. And so since you and i had worked closely together time was an excellent artist i mean the guy could just. Deidre portraits all night long of his family and huge beautiful and he still still doing it i personally wrote to me. But one of the different outcomes that i wouldn't have guessed could happen for him was that he is now volunteering in the prison of the dodge. In the hospice program in the present so many sent me a small sketch would have remembered to grab it from my office so it looks sketchy a den of this man that he had been sitting with in hospice in prison. So i seen him you know he knows that. He's got to recover from this this burden of of. Realizing that his his lapse in judgment cost the life of another person but. I see him plowing that energy into or in to. No caring for another through hospice in and so when that's occurring. There's there's hope because. But we can change our relationship to that pass. And that's where forgiveness comes in this we're listening comes in that's where healing and and embracing this moment comes in i'd like for people to be able to answer answer. It's good that you put the clock back there cuz i would not be able to be honest. Again i'm thankful that that you have chosen to be a part of moses i helped form that organization when i given my experience i said we've got to work with our legislature and this system we have in wisconsin because. Besides the huge numbers. 22000 give or take in our prisons. We have so much to learn from our neighbor in minnesota less than half of that in their prison population basically the same similar demographics but. It's a paltry fiddling and my honest opinion but it's in the right direction at least and we've got more work to do as you know as people so. Let's take a few few questions. Questions about the how i confront alcoholism when i see it or hear it. Yeah couple of standard questions if they're young number one asked him if they finish school and i hear no way off in the more than i hear yes and just a little footnote. 75% of people in jail in the united states did not finish high school. No sew. That tells us a lot. But it's true the alcoholism considered treatment. In our conversation i can usually tell pretty soon how much pain there in about it you know and what kind of yearning there is 4c for an alternative worth life where's the good stuff. So. And also parenthetically when when i see people coming back. No i've seen them before and and they're back again. Outside did you reach out to. Aana. The church group support group anyting. Too often i hear no i thought i could do it myself. Know that that just points to me too. A fundamental fabric of the way this universe is put together that we are made to connect. You and i and weed when i made to do this life just to show low hermit you know the distance we need each other. But then the other part was about the therapy process know if i direct that someway or let them. In terms of the subject. First of all if. For most people that they're not used to as adults some crayons. Little intimidation factor for many you know. Cuz there's a dog's we all learn to do it right and all that. It's alright part of the initial thing and and by the way i'd love to do an exercise with y'all some other time. Where we just invite. That sense of letting go and welcoming and it's okay no matter what goes down there. So. Just for some i can get the sense of them pretty easily in terms of how ready or willing they are to just figure holding but if they are just jump in and start moving. Judgment but if they. Reluctant fearful. Omg. Sometimes give them a topic like. You could go any place in the whole world could be there. Vertigo and just let the imagination run with that and. Do i have some standard questions like that what's your earliest memory. Never forget. With a group in prison in the treatment center in prison in illinois before i came up here eleven years ago. I said what's your earliest memory is 30 guys in tuesday room and. Guy came up to. Of the muses paper and a rectangle in the paper and you put a jagged line through there. Any other stick figure standing next to that. Rectangle mini road at the bottom. When my dad broke out all the windows. In the house. I said how old are you. Meet at 6. He said grandma and i ran upstairs. So here and how do you know he's 26. Message in all these years it's been twenty years have you thought about that that memory of your dad being an alcoholic. The know. Joe. Just that little piece becomes this bridge. 2. Experience of fear that's been running this life for. For all this time and lack of security now being in treatment for the same thing that it was father. Struggle bus. So they. Education in middle in mental health. Weather the least one person overnight in the jail from that department and truthfully are great team and their office is right next door to the chaplain's office which i appreciate and so we can interact on various people if there's somebody needs a follow-up from one or the other and all that. That's good but. Essentially what is happening with mental health staff though as they are monitoring no meds and in there that that contact with. Because we have medical staff as well there are nurse nurses who distribute meds but mental health staff is more or less keeping your monitoring of how that's how that's working and going but honestly they don't have enough people to sit down and do any kind of counseling. People under 18 and under whatever high school. Potentially finish and i'm always happy to go to a graduation when when one when does complete so. Yeah. Just how much people have been informed about the focus of moses sense. Prior to the budget being passed in the summer. It was all about increasing money for that we spend in wisconsin for treatment because if we do a dollar we spend on treatment. Saves wisconsin $2 and avoided crime and avoid incarceration as documented proof. They hard data. The committee that i own that result said that's even the most conservative estimate of the savings. It's about re-entry issues when people are coming back to our community. How do they read reintegrate. Intro back to this business about the education and the jobs you know. The. This is so much to say about. People embracing the the value of. Digging a hold of education and saying what skills do i need i might just add that we have julian die. Bethel lutheran church square space to meet with huber inmates. And for the beauties of that program is that we get to bring community resource people there too. Where is they would not this easily be able to come into the jail and talk with them. And so people who are put them in touch with apprenticeship programs and the other job training programs that exist. Help people get entry-level jobs trades building. We'd do better to invest the money hidden in treatment in and then education then to. The ridiculous war on drugs. I don't know anybody who says that's a success it's just an absolute failure. Thank you for your attention and your work and our partnership in this community to. Keep moving forward so thank you. Are closing words addiction should never be treated as a crime it has to be treated as a health problem we do not send alcoholics to jail in this country over 500,000 people are in our jails who are nonviolent drug users ralph nader. Before we extinguish the chalice this morning i did want to mention that they pieces of art that you see up here are downs at work are very beautiful. Put in your program could we speak in unison the extinguishing the chalice words please. We extinguish just playing but not the lightest screwed the warmth of community for the fire of commitment these we carry in our hearts until we are together again. Please stay for conversation and coffee and thank you for coming this morning.

uuprairie_org

Pr840923Zakem-ed.mp3

As i wrote in the fray fire my trip to the andes was kind of to fill in some gaps in my education and it's hard to do sometimes to look at a country or a continent such as south america with all this going on all the way here about the papers and all the issues that were concerned about with latin america it's kind of hard sometimes to go and just appreciate a culture without all these other things coming in today all i just really wish that whatever. We'll have to let that slide today not demeaning it or saying it's not important very important but we want to come put that out of the way right now i'm just going to take today we're not really going to look at that issue we're going to try to look at the culture in the uniqueness of the indian culture. We're going to have a few younger people join in and blasting music as we go along to so we have slides we'll have a little things on with it this is starting out. What we've heard about el nino the current that runs through there in a lot of things to take place so far the andes is really dry. just never melt. Set two different kind of andy and chains. This is not empty el monte mountain mountain of the sun. There's ncle bonnie in the background again looking over the paws and it's kind of like. I stayed up in the small indian hotel up an indian quarter and you can see looking down the street towards the center counted it goes about blocking just dropped right off and kept going straight you could walk right on top of the tower there in the church so it really drops quickly it was six blocks up the still there. Phillipa soo. A city that's about a million people and it's 85% the population 85% indian people now. And there is a division there though between the kazi. The old standards of who gets to go where like the. European people live down in the bottom of the city which is contrary to most schemes that you have of the city cuz it's better climate down there and you don't have to climb around the indians live up on the edges of the city or up the hill just park was a kind of unique part of its real park it was situated on the border between the european section in the indian section though and it's right in front of city hall. And so this is the distinction. Lowest elevation park that's open kind of an indian park or the highest elevation part that the european park most of the higher parts are for indians in the lower parts are for the europeans they kind of set it up that way. This is right on the border. And this is what i went down to see this is the gateway of the sun and this was built somewhere around 1 to 380 somewhere that area. And this is supposedly what started this culture called to anaco this is a side of to anaco this culture was supposed to have started. The kind of the organization of the andes unlike it has never been before. And they're not really sure what all this is about they call this the gateway of the sun. But the figure is not really a son figure it's an old god that they took from another culture the sabine culture that's called a staff god. Miss holden to staff sunnyside, god it was just a common local god that people kind of picked up on and so they had this called gateway was done now and no one really knows for sure. Who this guy is. The figures on the side i'll show you a little bit better description of them in the next five or so it's a calendar it's supposed to figure now it's a calendar on cycles of they don't know what. But usually these are working around when our new rulers going to come in or something's going to happen with their kingdom. So this is a calendar and they don't really know exactly again what this was all about but it's. Most famous thing in bolivia as far as the motifs and things are spread all through the andes. No one knows what it's all about this is a animal teeth that they used in oblivion some of their modern buildings. Using the god the son and they put snake they have snakes. And of all around is decoration. That's another very common thing from this era. These are. The runners supposed to the culture was organized they don't know how they organized that they don't know what happened because all there's no writing back then and everything's been destroyed and could give them any idea and the incas came along without writing and the incas rewrote history when they came along. Starting in the 1200s with more than 1,400 completely rewrote history. And they had no writing either so we just changed the oral tradition so lot of this is lost. But the figure on the far left is a condor. Supposed to be a messenger to condor in the next one is a man and that's the route runner and these runners suppose he went around to annotto carry messages and things and the incas use the same system when they finally got their empire together 700 years later. So that they are vestiges of the incan empire starting already way back now from these times. This right here is this is the actual stout right there. I think you see a lot of these kind of have some similarities. Betty afterwards and go get a base i brought to this previous to this culture even that really looks aspenk12 so. This is the actual site of tiahuanaco it's not been restored much at all. Does the swimming pool like place was a temple. And it was covered over in some respects they don't know really how it's how it looked and some people have made some very portents and reconstruction of this site so it's not all exactly as it should be archaeologist haven't been able to find enough to put it together the gateway the sun was just dug out of the ground in 1906. Unearth that 1906 so it hasn't been standing around as a shrine for all those years a lot this is just been excavated recently. Just beginning to become national park now but it's taking a long time to really good together. It looks like. 1 long 70 mile. Prairie life. That's that's the biggest coming next that's the big thing this is looking from down in the swimming pool area which was the temple and the figures the little kids all around the side of it we're supposed to be representing tribes it would come into this area and give tribute as so that's they know that there was some sort of organization into a place. The big stone in the back you can see a big doorway on soil close above that that's the thing that they really are concerned about because it's just the stone is so large and they had to like bring at 6. Some some places six kilometers from where they cut at. Overland they had no animals that could carry these things because the alpaca and llama are very strong little tiny legs they can't cure anything or pull anyting human power is nothing. But maybe ropes and that they made out of divisor and themselves. This is a tremendous organization that took place to bring us together. That's gives him an idea that there was a real organization. Cuz of the immensity of this. They figured that was real that's the real construction as it should be. Got it was on earth but it was put together to the archaeologists are happy. With speculation that extraterrestrials came here and they get into the same as this. They can't let me look at these these are very large and. Play policies with sand they didn't have any tools backed into the gorilla is promising because they hadn't really gotten to smell things yet. The english pick us up and they brought people from tiahuanaco this area the aymara people the bolivian people to the incan empire and kind of revived the stone polishing that they had some of these stones are absolutely glass smoothie just wouldn't believe how smooth it could be with no tools. The incas picked us up. 700 years later and brought this a revivalist stone polishing. Did the same thing they put their emphasis on the important parts of it and then the rest of it they kind of did whatever they needed to do to get the building together the craftspeople in the artist.. This is a bad back then against the staff god holding two things they don't know really what this was the spanish came and the people were still kind of giving veneration to this one and the spanish wherever they would go they would take the incan sites or the older sites and put a little temple up there or a crucifix so that was sanctified then when the people worship. And he has will tattoo on his right shoulder so he's been sanctified so this guy's okay. They don't know who it is but what is all about no records. This is another one. Yeah. And so they feel that they really didn't. Find all this they knew of it but they really didn't know exactly what was there. So it just has been covered over as civilizations tend to have happened to them now they go out of style people move on.. There were no cities in southern peru for 700 years will farming areas but no cities for 700 years until the angle came along. Do i say this again they look at this one say this would be an extraterrestrial this is kind of unique thing it was a big hire people with meat and they would have someone speak and then the lower-caste people have to stay outside and this rock is amazing because it has like a nautilus shape on the other side until the people in this side of the building will speak it will go through that little hole in will amplify outside i was inside speaking these guys. His good lady that day. Not during the day was a strange lighting mixtape this is from t guanaco kind of looking back towards la paz and see into that lonnie in the background there so you can idea. It's it's the snow and the rain that comes from the snow since this is an area where you would get pregnant red ring federal agriculture. About leaven 11002 murano. This is going across lake titicaca. I'm from bolivia across the lake on a boat. The other side with rising out across and legs over there. The spanish build a little city they're called. Cochabamba. And. The spanish when they came to the new world had just driven the moslems on spain the moslems in the jews and they came to the new world to start all over and kind of a find a new place but they brought so much of the islamic motif with him and they're building this this place is just from a lock over somewhere which it's amazing with the vehicle is that they brought with them. And so this is star of the origin of the agriculture system that the incas use and jenny's going to tell us a little bit about. Has finally developed. You see all right up there. Create event agriculture what are the greatest contributions come from the cultivation of the potato is drawing techniques for preserving potato head certain altitude in the end every night and it's warm and sunny in sulphur. Vanderbilt japan for agriculture again. You can see a line going across the middle kind of their tacit irrigation canal and the incas were really great at moving water and they could just irrigate every australia valley. Later let's just beautiful from new edition. Yeah they have the wither and the summer seasons are. So it's just more sunwest on luca colder. And some rain but not not heavy rain. This area was the arrow. The women all have different hats on and these hats were modeled after the spanish riding women's at they were so you'll see like five or six different styles but they pick them up in the spanish riding women. These people were real billing skirts with five or six skirts on and they also pick that up from the spanish riding women when they came from the medical is pleased to wear when they were riding. A lot of styles today are. Drive someone from the spanish and then modified. It's a valley between. Lake titicaca and cusco is going on the train crossing. Remoteness but i heard that there's a developer folks want to get in on the 1st and developing and pillow condo supermarket up there. And the the incas latest on the shape of a puma. And the spanish came in and ate like the grid kind of shape so they put the cathedral down in the bottom part of the picture you see there and then laid everything out from plaza all the cities are no classes and then always b going out. But the incas did not believe in time as being important they believe in spatial relationships is important so everything they did was laying things out. In a space of relationship to the stars and to the sun everything is laid out that way so time temporal things meant nothing to them life and death was nothing it was how you arrange things on earth to reflect. The natural elements and to kind of partying with a natural element so everything to them was laying things out spatially. So in spanish came and seen the city just got through their worldwide wack finished enough as it was but just totally reorienting everything. Bojangles use that spanish brought the tiles so everything's the same. And the. The music we hear today is. The indian music is kind of a through several generations as change but the incas used to have people marching these the march alot and they had a steady kind of temple. Back then and ruth and georgia going to. Play a little bit of a steady tempo did the incas originally using their music. Video of the incas orientation oliver building they put so much work into the looks of it and appeal of their back on this. Reply before you can see the black star just cut their inventive and then they have invitations around the edges and this would give it a different kind of effect and so this is very important for them to spend a lot of time doing this when they wanted for show. And then this was one of the remains of the temple of the sun. And this is where the gold was and this rounded part there was a part of the foundation of the temple of the sun. Most of the buildings in because they were having trouble dealing structurally with things kind of collapsing so they give you a little bit more tension so things wouldn't fall out as quickly but the earthquake this. The temple of the sun was here the spanish took a lot of it and cut it up. Field other things but they left the foundation cuz the foundation was so good but they built their church on it. The church of santo domingo. 1956 there was an earthquake. And santo domingo just demolished but the incan foundation was left intact then people decided that well the incan foundation is more important than the church of sons of the mango so we want to rebuild the church but we want to be seen until they opened up a lot of the areas where the incan foundation was and used it and the building of the church. So this is the part. The little builder games of a sample of gold now i have a couple of guests today francisco pizarro was here the last of the incas. I don't believe you can do what you say you don't have this my phone even though you are alpacas in the garden of solid gold trees and flowers. Lincoln foundation in comparison to the new modern high-tech. Work that they do. This was a temple or house it was built in honor of serpents and had servants carved into stone all around the pc it's a little bit of work together with vivint use mortars to all these are put together without mortar and again after all these things i just haven't moved the they like to choose different shape so everything wasn't uniform they like to kind of a slow two things will use different shapes to do it kind of shimmer and kind of flow. Which were they. Some cultures did your painting stuff at work but the incas were very simple and they would put a band of gold or something on a building but generally steer they like the sun the shadows to do the coloring for them. So there was no painting originally on that these painted afterwards because they what happened. That temple of a surface which is spanish had trouble with the serpent's on there they use that you can see here the doorway and they changed it a man built his to use it as a house and then he kind of went out of favor and then it turned into a convent but when the man owns it he put he can't seem to other two mermaids up above the doorway there and put mermaids on the kind of land of the snakes and with the mermaids that can affect rather than religious veneration of snakes. Dara. Pre-cana players and. As i was traveling their music was awesome interest to mine. But also the music and relationships with people and often in these places you can see people playing the cane or playing the harp. And. Just like you just gave them money because they were beggars but i had read a couple books and one of them talk about the experiences of. People who play for money and they feel that they are musicians and they are artists and they spend yours address and it just so happens that they choose to play their music even though the music would make the money so people look them as beggars it so it changed my way of thinking a little bit as i was coming to kuzco. i want to see when i get there or these people are playing if i can appreciate their music and not just give them money because they're bigger. And so i came upon this man the threat read was about a heart player blind harp player than cusco it was a blind harp player. And. George and ruth have rufus. I want to give you a difference in the melodies that they would play. They they talk about two different kinds of melodies what is he get robbie which is the deep soulful andean. Music and the other one is the wino which is a more of a high-paced dancing light music so the beggar's play the utah be when they really want to play their own music and they don't care if anyone gives them money they play the wino when they want to attract a crowd and just have people throw money in those were two parts of el condor pasa 1. As i sat here listening to this man play the harp his wife with her girl came along they said down and they were talking to him is it really interesting again my perception i was really glad that this would happen allowed me to stay a little bit longer listen to him and to see this that here is this man who plays and his wife comes and talk to him he's not just a beggar hanging around he's got a family's got a life and forget about people that all people have life going on and i was really pleased that this would happen if it says she came along just at that time she also has an address on you know it's a little bit different than the other one. Spanish k one of the things i did bring that the moslems have brought to spain was the guitar and so the incas had no string instruments all they had were wind instruments and drums and so they disbanded brought the guitar and the string so they can have the tarps and george and ruth are going to play another the kind of brings us together in the the incan wind instruments the indian wind instruments and the new the old world guitar right there's a mandolin. Has a shot of turn-of-the-century incan band stephen back then quickly. As i travel around a lot of demonstrations a campesino rallies against the government of poor land reform and this is one that i have just come on in cusco heading to see the women with background again is a different styles costumes don't have a kind of fedora styled women have stovepipe hat the background and a man wear their knit caps which are modeled after conquistador helmets so the incan cancer from conquistador helmets. If there had lost on a big thing about laws now they're putting their money into irritated lansdowne coast rather than the small plots up in the highlands that's what some of this was about this is a portrait outside of. People archaeologist archaeologist and people say that this rivals the construction of a lot of greek and roman buildings when you look at how small the people are there again huge rocks huge stone. That some of these they got now looked at the the content of these some of that came from 6. Others came through thirty kilometers away so about 18 miles they had to bring these huge boulders and cut them up either cut them up there or cut them up here some of them are cut out this mountain here because there was some stone there they could do but the other definitely they found the sources work at least 18 miles away some cases. So it's it's probably it's hard to say but it's probably. It might have been filled in after their something again the incas had trouble with their foundations going out so they really took a lot of precautions and so they probably put foundation very deep and then put something up there the spanish took this down and again use it to build another building so. This is just a structural part of it the real city was up on the top that's all been gone the real good work was up on top so probably filled it in. Just buy sure later. Ropes and people last people the incas had a system. No big trees are no big trees that area they're all tiny trees do trees they planted eucalyptus are bigger but those appointment recently came with the spanish they have llamas alpacas and beer. The inca the inca did get into a smithing so they didn't have some tools. Not real strong tools but enough that they could get a few trobar type things and things and. And working some cracks and fissures in thanks so that's. This is the year bangla valley this is the holy valley of the incas is where they counted on to have all their grain taken care of and then. Who's all the way up the mountain this is just the beginning of the terracing the territory was just exquisite in unbelievable. But this is leading down the valley toward this is actually the one of the source rivers of the amazon so this is the beginnings of the amazon miura bamba. And the english were really great on protecting the riverstage they built walls along the rivers and everybody in the foundation of this little bridge to big foundation they're not the cement block one but the other one is income still think of times in the big rock that's in the middle of the river there was put there to break the water flow so it wouldn't wash away the foundation so they had some idea how to detect their foundation so they put that big rock in there. You see the primitive terracing all the way up the mountain does not use today. Could you. This is a shot of a place called sasha twyman. Lucky bamboo. This was a place where the incas when they're on the trail could stop and get a furnished and everything so they had a lot of terrorism here and you can see the terezin has steps on it. So they could move from terrace to terrace and the really were transportation routes to so this is a good idea of riri big terrace a very well-constructed tear someone with smaller butt smaller. But terracing is abandoned and so accrue has problems food they could use some of the terrace and was they are now trying to think of how to use this again. They're trying to do this again. It's called modern efficient use of the soil if you know you have big farm you don't have little terraces anymore people say we want to go back to our plots and do this but the government and that's what that rules about the government won't give them the money because it said it's a waste of our time. When they're showing now that it would be really beneficial to do. And i am at world bank and exports and other stuff that i just this is machu picchu and this city was only discovered 1916 it was a lost city of the incas someone discovered a kind of like following up on old stories and hiram bingham. Discover this and it's supposedly was built. The last inca at wobble when he was killed. They. Spanish tried to make a deal with a new income put a new puppet on the throne and this puppet. well spanish are going to be nice to us after all that's gold and then they'll be nice to us. They think he's retreated to this city which was just another city along the way. And lived here until he died with dad about thousand people a figures lived in this city 250 dwellings about thousand people. That's what the speculation is they don't really know so. They don't know what happened to me. But you can see the pete rugs and everything misses real reconstructed income dwellings there and depending how they did it. There's an ancient that. Reconstructed. This is about 70000 ft. This this is a great thing about machu picchu that the people founder. When the spanish would come into ankeny area the incas worship the sun and there was a big ones on the soul stirrers when his son was going to leave our realm and this is called the hitching post of the sun so that you can people get out there the elders the people who knew how to stop is if they are. Well the religious think they wanted to bring the catholic church in the incan bureaucracy were pretty much the same all they want to do is knock off the top top down and they had control until they just try they really made some attempt to understand the inca and the quechua so that they could take over their system and not lose the organization that the place so they want to keep that attacked. Be honest. This is the incan jail in machu picchu of england's didn't like anyone to be lazy they said i have to do is little bit and will provide for you so they would put people. Lock them in this thing they had little loose they would lose them in and kind of feed on them for awhile today. Vegas had a greeting that kind of said when you met someone who said. Don't be lazy don't be whatever and don't be something else and the people would say back to them and don't you be at either so that was the common greeting so they didn't like people be lazy like to be working and doing things. a load. City of a thousand people it was pretty hard to escape and go and do something else. Yeah from machu picchu from i was up on i went up on that big pqc yard so if i'm there i stayed a little city down below there what's that for. Ethno archaeological ethanol historical value is really amazing this little say the only way to get to machu picchu is to walk the inca trail over the mountains or to take the railroad in. Sos2do city aguascalientes was down below. I stayed in there and they people live around the train. You're coming and going. And the. They grow corn in that area on the andes and they make beer out of it called chicha. And whenever anyone has cheetah that they presley trousdale put this little red flag out. Peaches been the real life. Indian people go on for so long. Corn potatoes. Barley house big crap cuz barley can be grown at a very high altitude we're even higher than corner everything else so they grow out of borrowing now just a little bit. And this all over all over it everywhere i went little villages big villages everywhere so i just couldn't scape it. It's fine they know it's the government they know it's not the average person that's the segundo. Hammerhead that they're playing a guitar and singing folk songs and things done just like our pc to rally's in 10. I think we have someone here could tell you about that. And all the women on women wear goldie. Roll your neck and now it's come from czechoslovakia tree ornaments. Where they get their imports from now. Do they make tree ornaments. Oh i. I was really out of the speakers i really had a choice a telephoto lens from oceanside. Don't believe in intruding at people's lying back it didn't go to someplace just because it would be an intrusion. It so i really feel. Cross street was doing this i was they weren't aware i was around a couple of. This quiet market legacy was so quiet it's just beautiful and then the truck rolled out but loud speaker. I think george and ruth and david and jenny and dana for a joint in italy. I wouldn't give her as everyone give david a good program. One final thing i've got some things hanging up there i'm willing there's a charge of south american archaeology for people who really want to get up for school but works he will not go to take this pit in and what's going on there and look at them afterwards he will not go there and. Simone bolivar this is his 200th anniversary of his birth this year and so 150 years ago off so he said united states appears destined by providence to plague america with miseries in the name of liberty and that that i thought that was something they said that. There's something going on even though we're kind of. Not involved in politics i think this year really is a critical year in case we break us90 now or do we just kind of go rolling along so do it's been 150 or 200 years that are involved what is taken out in self-interest of latin america.

uuprairie_org

Pr091213Rasouli-ed.mp3

Our speaker date today if sammy rasouli who will speak about the muslim peacemaker teams in iraq and the building of peaceful relationships between people of iraq and the people of the united states to the araki art project the sister city project. Water for peace and letters for peace. Sammy is in a rocky american he left iraq in the late 1970s and he lives in the twin cities area for more than 17 years. Then in november of 2000 for nearly 30 years after leaving to return to iraq. To help rebuild his country. During this time he founded and he supported the development of the muslim peacemakers team. Which a group dedicated to. The principles of non-violence he recently brought a delegation of 13 araki's from the city of knives not yeah. To the city of minneapolis is part of the sister city project. And it was through the initiative of the prairie social action committee. That prairie of the congregation became a member of the wisconsin network for peace and justice. It was through that membership that were made aware of his current speaking to her. And arrange for him to speak to us. So that meets all yours. Thank you very much. Okay actually mike is my driver and leave there is in the chicago he's down there too. Ability. What's gyro. Sitting here it's it's flow pictures you going to. See how we who are successful to link the children of eric and children of america between the two cities minneapolis and niger with you pronounce to be sister city last july 30th when the city council members voted unanimously 12 20 that the children as well be adults about it you should be announced at sisters and brother that was the quiet accomplishment. Well. I'm really feeling warm by the cold weather outside and snow storm started earlier last week we got only in minneapolis to inches but you got i think 17 or almost a foot. I'm here with another unitarian. Universalist society where the big warm heart is and i am telling you this because every time i'm in such community i really feel home. But thank you for having me. In 1976 i was young man. 20 40 years old amassed teacher won the previous. Government of iraq address the people and told them hey if you're not with us. You are against off. So the process of the beautification started that you are beginning with v. Education sector but i was working. They thought so important. Toward the. Pan-arabism. And that was the main philosophy. The.. Is an arabic word meaning. 3 nissan. Newborn arab. And that's political party. Philosophy based on. Uniting all arab countries in one just like the united states of america. Maybe it would be you at. 82. Because again united. Dates of. Arabia start with a 2. And the people. Live. Within a social free society that was the main objective. Hope that political. Pacquiao. Tablet. At founded by a christian assyrian. Color named michelle in 1947. Cecilia became. Country. At arab nationalist. Politically where. Inspired the young people in iraq so your attitude because it's just next door. And therefore. Saddam hussein. His colleagues. And his comrades and others the party who adopted the bad party. They started to botify. The pure hockey. Now i just want to remind you the first. Order. Put anna place after the occupation 2003 the second. Civil administrator american civil admitted all bremer if you remember he set the first order. Among a hundred orders he came with to build the new iraq and that was the d-backs ification. The second was. Actually the killer to disband the army araki party and have it dissolved so. Sami 24 years old listening always to john lennon and voice of america that was broadcast from beirut lebanon was inspired by the western civilization democracy and freedom that was no place for me. Covina. I love. The objective of the back party political tonight all arab. Countries nothing wrong with that but the way that that particular party was imposed enough. Ford greeley projected by many teeth but not too many people could leave at that time i could leave i had my uncle who live in dubai united arab emirates and he said 10 if you want to come i can find you a job and he did so for six years i was a teacher. And united arab emirates and dubai iraq in iraq and they had no choice only to become body they wanted to survive and support their family lots of love.

uuprairie_org

Pr140126Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning. Sometimes our services are done by people from outside our congregation sometimes they are done by late leaders in the congregation and sometimes there's a bunny and sandy so if you are new or just visiting us grace. These men are the opening words to pueblo song. But this is all for young people who have been here yesterday and some of you have more here overnight it also goes along with the story for all ages. Everybody wake up. Samba. Hurry clouds. From the four quarters of the universe. Allheart be glad. The words of denise levertov and all so quiet. I don't know when it began a gratitude had begun to sing in me. For some moment. Dividing song from no song. When does dew fall begin. When does night over our hearts. You cherish them. When is date. Tattoo very short readings i would like to share with you this morning first. A little more than we deserve. I heard the second brandenburg concerto play in honor of bach's 3:00 day. And i was swept away. I remember the story about the people who send messages into outer space. Someone suggested sending a piece by ball. That would be bragging. I say we get what we deserve in life. But i don't believe it. We certainly don't deserve.. I have not done enough justice i have not love my neighbor or myself sufficiently i have not praise the universe enough. Laverna gift like this. Life is a gift we have not learned. And for which we cannot pay. There is no necessity that there be as universe about a world moving toward life and then self-consciousness. There might have been. Nothing. Apple. Since we have not earned. Or purposes. For lovers. The best we can do. Is express our gratitude for the undeserved gifts. And do our share of the work of creation. The other one. Former marine. No one lives in syracuse new york for long without finding some way to make peace with winter. No manufacture the most around here mixes with falling leaves early in november. Yes i am hammer ready. When i woke up there when i go to 6 in the other day i muttered about search. A scraper for the car before starting out to an early appointment i was lost in thought about possible delays to a flight i was scheduled to take the need for new tires or just need to get the store windows in place leaves rags and garden mulch all the standard winter worry. Like a bomb awakening me a snowball splash against metal. I thought so cute. Had chosen my car with a handy target but i should have thought it was the stop sign that had been. I looked around see the culprit. Fairy water-breathing broadway. Rubbing his hands together in pride over his bullseye. Hello about 80 years old i weigh smiled i smiled. Had a feeling he knew something about winter that i could stand to learn by the time i was over most of the snow had melted i had missed my chance to welcome winter. A little practice i'll have learned something by april. Great. Grace's one of those words that stinking humanists often don't know how to interpret. What do we even mean by that word. Is there such a thing as grace. The universe. I have grappled with grace and grief. Wrestled with grace for at least a decade now. More accurately. I have put a lot of energy into trying to reject the idea that grace might have anything to do with my life as rebecca parker says. If we take an honest look. Anarchist. Ourworld. And ourselves we have to admit that trust in a grace that upholds us all is not. At the core of most of our being. I believe we profoundly. Break. Complete parker. I believe that also. That we profoundly down grace we liberals that is human is agnostic atheist religious liberals. And yeah. I have to admit that i have experienced. I rattle and doubt because. Can't easily fit the concept of grace into the part of my brain that demands i be sensible and logical i can't make a reasonable case to either prove or disprove that there is grace in the world i can't give you any scientific evidence that something profound which is what grace is does that work in the world. Robert walsh has more than we deserve reading interprets grace as a gift that we did absolutely nothing to deserve this example of this is a powerful musical work examples. David blanchard playful using on learning to live with winter reminds us that well gray's. Is ever-present. Issaquah. Good knowledge and accept. Or reject. I'm looking closely out of word i start with a dictionary. Not necessarily a computer dictionary i still have three volumes.. Lego there and most of the definitions in the my possibly outdated webster's third new international dictionary are variations on this one. 8. Or generosity. Show my god to man. Helpful definition. How can i use the words love. Or universe or god which. Something that irene more palatable. But the idea of a supernatural be out there giving me something isn't particularly useful for this buddhist leaning unitarian universalist. Nor do i think that these definitions are relevant in the secular world in which we live. My other go to work besides the dictionary that i use when i'm trying to get a better understanding of words that trip us up or push your buttons. Is kathleen norris's book titled amazing grace. Vocabulary of state her essay titled grace. Is vanya olivo incapacitating interpretation of the story of jacob. There was no punishment. No death sentence for jacob rather. What is jacob a blessing. Norris conclude. That god shows that reactions jacobs wrongdoing. Pause.. Right through that tough little schemer and saw something good only a capacity. For all. My beautiful friend. Have the capacity for. Brave definition. I didn't depend on music work off or using god language. Well there's that definition in more than we deserve work walsh defines brightness undeserved yet. That we did not earn it we don't have to know from whence. I found this vermin by unitarian universalist minister maryland school titled appropriately amazing grace but i already had mine for. Full episodes walsh. Race isn't here she says an undeserved yet. That is bestowed upon us out of the bounty of life. It just shows up one day. And announces itself off and when we least expect it it is constant. There no matter what we do. Rebecca parker and one of the most respected theologians in the world right now turns to the universal aside. Of our heritage to ponder what grace is judas she goes back in the 1800's when university lizum was one of the largest denominations in the united states. It's doctrine of universal salvation. And its insistence that a loving god would never and damn anyone to everlasting hell. Made it a very popular religion grace. For the keystone universalist bialigy. Universal. Parker rice. Universalist interpretations of universal salvation are very but i believe all of them. Can't be read as an effort to give expression to a d. Glitches. Intuition that all of our lives are unquestionably grounded ingrained. There is a gift that is given to all people and embraces the whole creation. A gift that does not have to be earned that will never be lost and. That cannot be taken away. Photoshop time this morning to delve into universalist we all again a connection between the universalist belief in universal salvation and grace and loving god. Was tried for the crime of heresy. In 1872 the only time in our history. Amir heresy trial. And he was tried for heresy partly because what you said about bridge. Instrument he gave in march of 1870. And natural religion there is no yes. Is b-rabbit. Salvation does not come by drake. Parker says. Perhaps this is the essence of heresy for universalist. Parker containers with astounding statham. Perhaps this denial still trouble the relationship of universalism. Communitarianism. Think about that. Perhaps the unit are in tennessee has died brace for anything that can't be proven still trouble. Relationship. A hand carrying his opinion reversals. What did she's onto something here we've hacked jokingly described unitarians is operating from their head but rarely from their heart and say that universalist. Certainly i acted out of their hearts on their head. Those early nineteenth-century universe was warned anti-intellectual. But they were i would venture to say more well-rounded theologically than the unitarian so usually were more likely to take intuition and experience into account. And not just. Their cat. No they would look at equal questions. Well now i'm getting into mystikal. I find intriguing. We are here. Fall in love. Not just intellectual. But also. With our emotions and feelings. With our heart and body with our whole salary. We have to fall in love with creation. With one. Maybe even throwing some snoopy dancing or celebrating of the dawning de grace is all about. Supported his wife. Enveloped in race completely caught up in love in the same way that we are surrounded by the air that gives off light we are quite literally in love. You can't feel it at times because were alienated from ourselves and others and the universe sometimes including full as they augustine said our hands are too full to receive the grace that is offered because our lives are too busy. Footstools expressing much of what i grapple with and then he said we're getting we're not getting into mystical teratorn you're getting into the important big theological questions. What is the meaning of here who are we. Happening loving god let us make sacramento does everything happen for a reason does anything happen for a reason it doesn't matter if you use the word the illogical or not. Law. Fight. Everything. Robin's right here waiting on his back who can believe in this kind of love. And that's been leaving bread and still live in this world this world and such a mess. Full formal thing and unbelievably sad pattern. I grapple with break-even as i continue to find examples of grace everywhere. I need you know that i spent the last several weeks traveling with. I'm kind of bob a dragon. Kohl's. A few days ago i was being alive and no i wasn't on drugs. Thousands of windows were broken some people were temporarily blinded over 1,600 people were injured. No skill in this city of 1 million people grace happens. Last week one of you and you. Told us about not being able to stop hardstop fine and deboning a truck i believe. Grace happens maryland hotels this story about grace one time i did a very foolish thing the loss of foolish thing she said that this was a dangerous and foolish thing when my boys were 10 and 11 they spent the summer with me in berkeley where i was stunning they asked to go up on the roof of the apartment building and play. The new friend of theirs was visiting a little girl about their age. So i told the three of them. Okay thank ago i knew the wall around the roof with fairly low reason that they were responsible enough to handle being there alone. After about half-an-hour i call him to dinner taking everything fun it was two days later that my children confessed what has happened their new friend who apparently was a sort of daredevil on top of the wall stories. For me it was a great act of grace that my misjudgment did not lead to disaster. Bring happen. I'm on most recent trip into the grand canyon just a few weeks ago i rounded a bend on a trail in a box canyon and came face-to-face with a deer. You big tigger. Break. Now i suppose. Not great. But for reasons i have trouble explaining i am not willing to concede that it was just luck. Of course i'm not willing to attribute these doors to divine intervention either. I admire and respect the olympian for seizing the opportunity to show us what break woodring looks like. When it is literally in bonnie in. Well. Being open to the possibility of grace and be scary and risky and probably a little crazy. Fall in love with this world despite all the pain and sadness and gloom and doom that don't get me wrong this isn't supposed to be a feel-good sermon for humanist. Or anyone to accept the fact of grace requires toughness. Suspension of disbelief on letting down a letting go of our defenses. Allowing and encouraging ourselves to be vulnerable. An open to the mystery the all of the universe requires that we sometimes back away from rationality reason logic and from having to have life defined always and only in these maybe we're missing something something. Is it possible that between our unitarian heritage which encourages us to use our intellect. Spell anymore. So many of the other aspects of being human in it possible in combination with our electronic gadgets. The possible that this combination keeps us ever more removed. From the world. Another cultural expectation in play here too i think. A cultural expectation that assumed that eventually humans will be able to explain everything. Applications ultimately control everything. Well that is very well over the last couple of centuries. Rebecca parker says that are universalists ancestors from the 1800 who's bought that the lovin. Hear it. Will bring about happiness and holiness for all seems naive. In a world that has seen the gas chambers of wwii. 20 john 5:24 shooting too much miles how and we believe in grace. Woody allen makes a good point when he says. If there is a god. Clearly this thought is an underachiever lost track. Great. Always there. Just fail to recognize as president. Is that because we are too removed from the real world. Alienated from our whole salad. And each other and the universe. Also called love for god. And the more we move we are from the world. And doesn't that make it easier to destroy it. Unthinkingly. Weather with bombs and drones in faraway countries or to our inability to take proper care of the environment or unwillingness to share the wealth of the world. We humans have a capability to men. Eating break. Grace connect to our lives at anytime but perhaps it shows up most often. When we are in the midst of 3. Toro despair pain. We can be open to the possibility that it will enter our lot. Will it. Interline. Not the other way around. One last story about grace. A story told by rebecca parker. It has been a year of grief. In a situation of broken love. I chose to have an abortion. I found it was the only thing i could do. But i was taunting. By the loss of that surrender. Child. Migraine steven. As days pass. Time was not healing mansoura. And i spiral deeper and deeper into despair my day and at this point in her life rebecca parker wasn't nothing. What day i would do to fellini's and all appearances cheerfully for for my sponsibilities as the minister of a small and vibrant congregation button. I couldn't sleep. Idrive. Pass. The empty malls. The parsonage. My despair and isolation came to a crisis one night i was past living one day at a time or even one hour at a time and was down to the question. Deep philosophical and theological question of whether i would be willing to continue to live. At all. In the depths of that sadness. I decided to stop pacing the hall. It was after midnight i left my house and walk down and get lake union. In oakland. What city was choir. My face was wet with tears as i set my course for the water's edge. I was determined to walk into the lake. Cold darkness and find an the consolation that i could not find within myself. At the bottom of the hill the street and then the lakeside park began. I walked across the wet grass. Antoine the last ride before the final descent. The water's edge. The crust of the rice i discovered a line of dark objects between me and the shore a barricade i was going to ask. Cross in the water. Didn't remember me barricade being there before. But i couldn't tell i was seeing. Closer i discovered was a line of human being hunched over some strange-looking. Bentley equipment. It was the seattle astronomy there with their homemade heathkit telescope. Deer and tennis shoes. Amateur scientist. Make my way to my dad. I had to get past. Into the app. Fairy wand. Red orange. Spiral galaxy. Benny ferguson on jupiter. Am i to see the giant glowing planet. Could not bring myself to continue my journey. In a world. Or people. Get up in the middle of the night. To look at the stars. I could not and. I know there is great. Because mi. What state. Fun seattle i have never experienced anything quite. Find my phone. Halogen. The sun. With incredibly exquisite trees with northern lights once by luna was swimming a few feet away from me. Wants by finding myself suddenly the middle of a herd of elk. Anybody that scary encounter with a deer last month. And how's your grace. It doesn't matter whether or not i can watch it watch it fully explain it. I want to learn to trust brain. The world is too big too mysterious for anyone of us everything. Sometimes i can be incredibly graceless. I was on the square few days ago capitol square i always go to the doctor homeless person i did this in san francisco to i have one person that i talked to a lot and leaves again and. And you're chatting and i'm an airline came back. I found that you could imagine and he was a crack up. I look at that bumper sticker on the back of my car and my inability to live up to it and so asian. It's right there on the back of my car must be true it says brace happen. And by extension in this kind of love i'm still live in this world this world is a mess. things and unbelievably sad happening though and not believe in brain. How can we not trust that there is grace at work in the world. Grace. Bring home. Great. Yes i'm through the cold night. The gift of grace surrounds us. I think we are called to give back to the world. Slimbodi race instrumental grace and in the middle of our trials our tribulations are traumas in our tragedy we are called by the universe and by that interdependent laugh except break. Find the place of primal thanksgiving. Fight ever grace hat. What's stronger buster posey worth. Intriguing breast growing noli's gathering no life and trace themselves delicately against dawns and sunsets the clarity and brilliance of the winter sky he liked balloon lafon softens edges long the eyes and ears of client awakens buy risk the unquiet hello darkness no emblem of individuality liberality winter and pregnant negative.

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Pr100905Bauer-ed.mp3

Welcome to prairie unitarian universalist society i'm rachel long one of the prairie members no special office unlike the last three years so i don't mean to grin open-hearted and an open-minded no matter what your racial or ethnic background no matter what your religious background your age your abilities or your inabilities later in the program and he returning friends or visitors will have an opportunity to introduce yourself and we hope that you will do so so we can get to know you a little bit better. Pray offers a wide variety of services on sunday mornings sometimes one of our own members presents sometimes a member of the wider community or our new consulting minister jean espensen will be presenting to us to from time to time and today we have power and will be introducing her a little bit later. Are opening words. Are responsive reading and they'll be led by gavin has the person who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit at the seat of mockers. The one who delights in the law of the lord. On labor day weekend we lift up employers who follow god's law to treat all employees justly and fairly following god's law & justice with their invoices the blessed one is like a tree planted by streams of water which yielded fruit and season into sleep it's not really whatever that one.. The ethical employer is like a tree planted by water i want to see you not so the wicked. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment. God watches over all who would labor. Treat their employees fairly clean. also knows those who exploit and take advantage of workers. know those long word. For the lord watches over the way of the righteous. And rebecca is actually going to be introducing our presenter today rabbi renae bauer of south central wisconsin a nonprofit and labor communities to bring economic justice to all she's also a member of the madison as many of you know i have met here for many years at prairie she was in madison with her 20 months 21 months old daughter and her partner lori. So i want to begin by just sharing a history of the interfaith coalition and then getting into more and what we do and then a little bit more about stories of workers so 10 years ago face and labor leaders here in madison and. Creative the interfaith coalition for worker justice of south central wisconsin out of the desire that in the past in throughout american history. Groups and faith leaders have been central to passing important labor laws and moving forward labor right including having a weekend having an 8-hour day child labor laws and the right to organize. We sometimes forget that it was faith communities that really stood behind these movements and in the past few decades these rights have been eroding especially i want to just said that you know she tried to organize her workers and then i can get into more of this if people have questions about it but the laws around unionizing and helping and allowing workers to organize and protecting workers rights to organize. To protect workers and to enforce employers not getting in the middle of there's all these late at union-busting firms that businesses will hire and prevent workers from organizing and the the laws that prevent that have just eroded and aren't and aren't strong enough to really do that. So that's a very common story that you know try to unionize but couldn't. So anyway so labor and religious leaders here in madison came together and formed this coalition as part of a national movement actually to create more of it to re-strengthen and recreate these connection and we are affiliated with a national organization called interface worker justice and that began a few years before our chapter began and that was the desire of seeing that there had to be something that would move the labor force forward and that the use of the religious community really needed to be revived and instead of an economic and political issue. People of faith and clergy people come and speak on an issue the attention suddenly rise is much higher we got you know last time or what brought workers stories to the front page of the state journal was actually a letter from from our clergy about it you know it wasn't unfortunately wasn't by the press. And so so what do we do as a coalition we do a lot of what we're doing here today of doing education and faith outreach and we in the past few years have really branch out beyond just the christian christian community and we now have a muslim member of the board and have just started working with the buddhist community in madison and sofia and and obviously have some jewish leadership so far our world is getting the table is getting broader which i think is both important and also a pretty powerful statement. So in some some projects besides faith outreach that we've been working on is something called wage-theft which is when workers don't get paid either for because they aren't paid overtime they're forced to work clock out and then work and not get paid for those extra hours they either leave the job or you know are asked to leave a job and they aren't paid the last 2 weeks so all those reasons and more are when slavery indentured servitude. Can get away with it much more easily so we've asked for meeting and i think we're going to have to ask a few more times but we're working on it. We support unionized workers who are already and either the process of creating unions or are fighting to keep their union so we've worked with wood woodman's workers who were. We're in the middle of. Figuring out whether their union was going to dissolve which eventually it did and currently we've been giving advice to workers on strike have been on strike since march up in merrill wisconsin. So and again we used to do much more work around helping people unionize and helping and united workers but as unionizing campaigns get less and less we see that. Blessing us in our work and actually right after the presidential election was we are working on legislation that would strengthen those laws and then call the employee free choice act. And that is currently. I don't know somewhere in washington that's no longer on the table but hopefully it will come back on the table and we'll work again on that. And then we i'm help support workers who are joining together who aren't you guys who were protesting some kind of violation so last summer the workers had mentioned was a group of workers who were summarily fired latino workers who was fired from taco bell and still we went with them out and protested and help them who are used. His immigration status is used as a threat. And. Employers i think things like well you know they are lucky to have a job and if they start complaining there's a threat to call immigration so i was this year on a task force of dane county of how to improve relations and protections for immigrants because was interesting. If immigrants can be not paid or immigrant workers can be underpaid or taken advantage of the whole bottom the whole floor of you know the workforce gets the drops so it's often employ. These workers that i have to follow so the labor laws are supposed to cover everyone has working in this country. And a couple other things that we've worked on his. Been part of. What's called sweat-free wisconsin which is more related to international workers who 2 to make sure that our city and county don't by sweatshop. Products from abroad and we. We helped with recently and we were just supporters of a student group that really pushed you w2 speak out and to pull a contract from nike not enough people know this but because nike had. Had not had fired and subcontractors and hunter is there was this whole sweatshop problem and uw's pulling up a contract i'm actually nike has now made the workers coal and has. It's amazing to me that that that student organizing still works in that way so that was a recent victory that we were pretty excited about and then as i mentioned and we work on legislative issues like the employers resource. Ordinance that's actually didn't pass the medicine but then was taken to san francisco and washington and passed and all other places to get to guarantee that workers have a certain number of sick days every year. So does have a type of things we do and we use both will use all different we use the same voice to do this work because of different faiths as an open and affirming community like this one knows believe in justice and caring for the oppressed and that's sort of one thing that connects all different faith communities. We often forget about and. And that together we can make this work more powerful. So i want today's focus i wanted to talk about wage theft and originally i had two workers one or two workers coming with me who often speak with me about their case and. I want to talk a little bit about their story but also i want to talk about why they're not here cuz i actually think as rachel said if that's part of the story so. We're not facebook and amanda number of occasions a couple with three children he's at he is a latino immigrants still working on getting documentation and she's an american-born i think from wisconsin and they have three children and gas money to get to the church and help them out. They want to tell their story cuz i think that is empowering to them they don't want to take handouts but they're really struggling and then you know she got called into work this morning so she's not going to turn down working then. He forgot that he told me and he felt bad but i feel like part of the stress of them you know this has happened a number of times i've had workers who were supposed to come and speak with me and they don't come in but i actually think that's part of the story that you know figuring out how to put food on the table when they're taking any job they can take you know having a commitment like this and figuring out how to get there so get here so. More material waves without. Stop being a m you know that's a power differential to. So i want to tell you the story of shannon and andres so. There are two of workers who this happened to. Many that happened in madison everyday they were working at. I guess i can say the name of the restaurant they don't always say it but i'm at palace cafe on. On regent street and before it opens so she has a history of. Working in and management and restaurants and sushi created lots of systems to set up and basically the owner didn't pay them and didn't you know first said well i'll pay you after your first month and then he said he didn't have the money and then went and then when when she decided to leave he said he just wouldn't peritol and had told her he didn't have the money to pay her and then she found out he had gone on a trip abroad. Local. Version of the the labor department and nationally and. And and her case.. Was found in favor of her complaining so he was then sent a letter that he had to pay her and then he said she wasn't allowed to come to the restaurant so i think she was accompanied by think by a police officer and finally she got her check and then the check bounced. You are taking from the system we'll see employees were paying them she wouldn't have let you know she she would have been on food stamps if she's gotten her her peso and is i don't remember. I don't know if he did food preparation or what he did exactly but again work there for nearly a month and wasn't paid and when he left he said he also filed a complaint but it hasn't. He basically still haven't gotten paid and so they're going to small claims court. This month and so. And these are two people who are real fighters and. Any more willing to stand up and find they found the workers center they then found the neighborhood law project lawyers who would help them go to small claims court cuz most workers can't go to small claims court house at work or going to go to small claims court and but really struggling to keep up with all this lost wages and. And you know i don't know if his case. If he wasn't able to push his hard with the employer for it's his case didn't get settled in the same way because he's an immigrant worker and it's always hard to tell that but what i do know is that and what he would say is that many people in his situation just won't even fight because they don't they're afraid of losing their john they're afraid of not being able to get more work they're afraid of having anything to do with a government agency or law enforcement because they're called immigration is called on them. So that's that's their story and unfortunately common story but important because this happens both to have american-born workers and immigrant workers and. So a few reasons why people don't get in what ways people don't get paid i'm sometimes it's contract workers and just won't don't get paid at all sometimes they're fired and don't get paid their last week of work and. In madison we work with a partner organization that we actually started and now his own nonprofit called the workers rights center and in the last year at 4. Over the last year they have recovered at least $50,000 in unpaid wages and what was interesting as when i was asking him about their numbers from the faster they said yeah that's $50,000 the the. And nearly 41% of the around 400 cases that the workers rights center sees every year is around wage that so it's definitely a majority of cases and. We assume that this small workers rights center is just a very small portion of all the claims that happened cuz first of all people don't know that they can do stuff they don't know that i'm in the center and so we assume it's much larger and there's actually been a new study last year nashly to give some orange 2008 there was a study that said that the average of $51 was stolen average of $59 was stolen or 15% of the pays in low-wage industries in three major cities so in new york chicago and los angeles they studied over 4,000 workers and found that that was sort of the average of what wasn't getting paid and. This is representative of about 1.6 million workers or 15% of workers of those three cities and those three cities are in states that actually have. Some of the states that have better laws than other parts of the country so why is this going on why are huge issues that the laws aren't tough enough to favor businesses so. They might not be large enough to deter them right if i have to be large enough to deter a restaurant so for example la hacienda it has. Been found guilty of this kind of problem a number of time and continued to do it we haven't seen workers from their in a while so maybe now it stopped but you know i think it's one of the cost of doing business like. You're going to get fined $10,000 well you just got like hours and hours and hours of work and maybe you know it might you may never get caught or you may. Gourmet takes so long those workers are far gone you know from getting any help so. And then there's not enough enforcement that's one of the biggest problem that i've been learning much more about recently. Sew-in and i'll just give you some statistics is in 1941 the us department of labor's wage and hour division that deals with these kind of issues had 1700 investigators so. And. And at that time to work 15 and a half million where i'm covered by the laws but they enforced and in 2008 they were only 750 investigators responsible for enforcing these laws and there was now 130 million workers 170,000 workers and. So again meeting with government agencies bringing this this please information to the public and meeting with the de-icer helps hopefully change some of this and think i'm going to pause there for me and let room for some discussion about this and. As women and men committed to serving the well-being of others. And if people committed to one another's dignity and welfare. We seeing one another and in those whom we serve your divine signature lord and we honor it everyday. We know that you are present among us today. And we offer this common prayer and one voice to you. Lord god of compassion and mercy. And we ask that you remain with us and strengthen us as we endeavor to ensure that your justice is served. We know that our creativity is a gift from you. And we commit the work of our hearts and hands and minds to your service and to your glory and all that we do. We remember today those among our brothers and sisters who are without meaningful and sustaining work. Those who struggle to provide for themselves and their family. We ask that you guide us and grant us the wisdom to address the problem of unemployment and underemployment. In our communities and in our nation. Encourages now lord as we seek to find solutions to these challenges. We gather here today lord and your presents and filled with hope. Determined to preserve the well-being and dignity of working people and their families across the country. Let us do so always with faith and hope and in the sure knowledge that justice will certainly triumph. Together. Will be outside i'm after and we have information so can i see it like a 30 second thing is just at what i didn't say the beginning was that we are a coalition that is. Coalition of faith in labor organizations and that it's faith groups that support us make us running and both with no funds and time so we'd love to have more of you on board that would be great. Wonderful to see faith in action. Ben are closing words today they're on the back of the same sheet with the responsive reading this is a prayer for all workers loving working god on this labor sunday we ask your special blessing on all people who labor either for pay for as volunteers in jobs or it's cool in the workplace or at home in the us and around the world. We especially pray for your blessings on workers who do not have jobs and for those whose inadequate pay does not allow them to live the full life you and 10 for each of us. Creator god help us to build a new world in the midst of the old a world where all workers are valued a world where those who clean houses are also able to buy houses to live in. A world where those who grow food can also afford to eat their fill. We pray for the coming of a world where all workers everywhere share in the abundance that you have given us. We ask these things knowing that you gave give us the courage and strength. To live out our faith in the workplace and the marketplace as well as in the sanctuary amen. Showing peace preacher neighbor stay with us for coffee and community.

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Pr130818Ingham-ed.mp3

Good morning welcome to universalist society and where we try to welcome everyone and every sunday morning no matter your visiting your gender preference your theological beliefs you are welcome here. Either us or unitarian-universalism because things are different every sunday sometimes our services are led by an outside person sometimes they're led by one of our lay members and sometimes they're led by reverend sandy sandy is fine. These then are the opening words they were written by karl seberg. Let there be joy in our coming together. Let there be truth heard in the words we speak and the songs we sing. Let there be helped. And healing. 4-hour disharmony. And despair. Let there be silence. For the voice within us. And beyond us. Let there be joy. In our coming together. Mary would you like the chalice please. Ba lamps on to yourself. Be your own confidence. Hold to the truth within yourselves. As to the only lamp. So the buddhist talents. The poem by mary oliver like to share with you titled the buddhas last instruction. Make of yourself a light said the buddha before he died. I think of this every morning as the east begins to tear off its many clouds of darkness. To send up the first signal. A white. Fan street with pink. And violet. Even green. An old man. He laid down between two sala trees. He might have said anything. Knowing it was his final hour. The light burns upward it sickens and settles over the fields. Around him. The villagers gathered. And stretched forward. To listen. Even before the sun itself hang disattach. In the blue are i am touched everywhere by its ocean of yellow waves. No doubt he thought of everything. That has happened. In his difficult life. And then i feel the sun itself as it blazes over the hills. Like a million flowers on fire. Clearly i'm not needed. Yet i feel myself turning into something. Enix. Applicable. Value. Slowly. Beneath. The branches. He raised his head. He looked into the faces of the frightened. Cry. There must be. As many myths about buddhism out there. Is there are about unitarian universalism. I mean but with poems like that one. Or the story for all ages. And all the riddles. In zen buddhism. What i want to do this morning is take a somewhat playful look at buddhism. Give you some idea of what meditation is all about. I want to wake you up. If that's what buddhism is all that lease end buddhist. Some of the words that i hope you take away with you today when you leave this building and go about your daily and weekly pass through these words. Mindfulness. Awake. Loving kindness. Bodhisattva. Give me buddhist. According to westerns. Beliefs. Is to go with the flow. Be cool about it. Now course i'm being somewhat facetious here mocking that popular notion of what buddhism is. In an issue of shamballa son a bi-monthly buddhist publication had a lot of fun with some of the popular misconceptions about buddhism. So you want to be a dude. He begins. With the. Use hyphenated. It's easy and also fun especially if like me and most americans who enjoy relaxing on the deck and talking about buddhism. You know very little about it. I mean the kind of people who when you get a little ticked off at them for breaking the gears of the bicycle they borrowed from you yesterday say. Please try to be a little more buddhist about this. And any. I think this will include all of us who are now dealing with depending on which direction you came from this morning. The getting here. And the extra little. Roundabout to do and. I had to keep thinking this morning. Car was way on the near east side. Be a little more buddhist about this. The first thing you have to do. Says that daniel menaker is renounce desire. But since you want to renounce desire that's desire. In and of itself. So we now have the desire to renounce desire and you can do whatever you please. Trying to get. In good with your. Old girlfriend tony. Plus become an ipso facto buddhist at the same time. Sweet. No. And the real buddha. Can't object. Because they are enjoying to universal kindness. And have to keep on breathing. That real buddhist g. The next thing you have to do is decide on whether you're going to say. Buddhist. Buddhist. Prismatic her says that for his money the first sounds low-rent buddhist. Find. Ghostlight. Casper the ghost and the last. Sounds. A little floral. There are some people who do say button. And also could be heard us but. So the second it is buddhist. Rhymes with wood. And even though in order to say it that way you have to press your lips in a. Strange manner but okay you're well on your way. The next thing you have to do is know some terminology. Or at least pretend to know it. So that you can use it when the conversational waters get heavy. Well i'm not going to give you a lot of. In the way of terminology this morning almost sleepy using words that you're familiar with. But i may give new meaning to some of them. So now seems like the right time. Do a little buddhism with you and in true buddhist fashion. We will calmly accept the gift of this time right now. And do our best to be present to it and the word for that a course is. Mindfulness. At any rate here we are and i fought in keeping with the spirit of buddhist philosophy. That we would simply. Meditate for the next 20 to 30 minutes. And i'm just kidding. Although i do have a couple more medication x thrown in there so be patient. The lack of the congregational response time is on purpose. Partly because this is a meditative service. Partly because it's the middle of august and we can experiment and partly because we both have time. After all that matters. I'm not an expert in meditation techniques nor am i an expert on buddhism in general but i do know enough about it to believe. That there is much in it. That is important. Much that can be useful to us in our everyday life much that should not be dismissed as weird or exotic for other. One of the aspects of unitarian universalism. That i particularly value. Is our respect for other religious traditions. I learned from other faith traditions and i discovered tools. That help me on my own religious journey. And here's some of the things that i have gained from a knowledge of buddhism and from. Meditation. Once i said that and i said medication. But now i need. Clarity. Constant clarity but occasional glimpses. Clarity. Loving kindness. Compassion towards all sentient beings. Leading to i hope. A greater understanding of the interdependent web. A stronger call to social justice action. And most importantly. For me at least. Mindfulness. Mindfulness is the aware balance acceptance of. Present. Experience. It is opening two or receiving the present moment. Pleasant. Or unpleasant. Just. As it is. Without either clinging to it. Or rejecting it. Sometime i'll. Possibly do a sunday on the. Hindrances about. The buddhist outlook on life and the wisdom of the dark emotions. And i would also like to. Do it sunday on how buddhism. Promote social justice work. I've been trying to remember how and or when my interest in buddhism began. I realize that simply by virtue of being a unitarian universalist my interest in an awareness of buddhism was made possible. First because of max gaylor now mr emeritus at first unitarian society here in madison and then because of michael schuler the current minister at first unitarian. I had the privilege. Appearing several excellent sermons by both max and michael on the subject of buddhism. And i was also such as some of you know i have the privilege of working on the staff with michael. Who was then a practicing buddhist and i assume he still is. Then there was my oso brief relationship with the dalai lama in the early 90s some of you have heard this story. I went to hear the dalai lama speak. And he was at the field house. On campus and i got separated from the people i was with when i was going through the parking lot. Trying to find them and i'm sorry to cross one of the lanes in the parking lot of car. Almost hit me. And it came to a screeching halt in the course i'm ready to use some swear words and the back window rolled down and it was. Haven't. Achieve nirvana. We didn't exactly have a relationship but we did have that real-life encounter and obviously it made a lasting impression on me. And i was so intrigued with this man that i spent three whole days with him and i think 2009 will mean a couple hundred other people at the alliance center. Which was just amazing and somewhere in the course of that. 3 day. Workshop i became a bodhisattva which is a buddhist nun i did not know. And outreach and social justice. What kind of life philosophy belief. Please lead to the kind of peacefulness and. Waited from the dalai lama. What could produce such a beautiful smiling face in the fall of 1994. I signed up for not one but two classes on buddhism only i didn't know one was going to be a class on buddhism. I'll get back to that in a minute but the one that said introduction to buddhism was taught by a monk from sri lanka his buddhism was out here somewhere. And i really don't know what happens that whole semester i got something out of it some appreciation of buddhism. He was way above our heads. Sylvia boorstein whom some of you may know. In fact i bora the title of one of her books it's easier than you think. For this morning's remind reflections this morning. Borstein says. In a brief section title demystifying. Spirituality. I don't want to get in i don't want to get into finding to defining the word spirituality today. But horst signs point. I think is that spirituality. Is not necessarily what we think it is or what we have been culturally conditioned to think it is. The spiritual includes the ordinary. Borstein says being a meditator and developing equanimity do not mean becoming. Weird. Practicing buddhism. Means having some very useful tools for everyday living. In your toolbox. Most of us manage to. Me an age. Sort of muddle through life. Somehow or other at least it seems that way. Buddhist. Gives us the means to manage more. Gracefully. Buddhism helps us to wake up to the truth. Which can indeed set us free and bring us happiness. As well as bring us peace. And compel us to take. Compassionate action in the world. Buddhism is about paying attention to our lives. What the buddha taught about how to find wisdom and happiness in this life was simple. Borstein puts it this way. Essentially he taught that it doesn't make sense to upset ourselves about what is beyond our control. We don't get a choice about what hand we are dealt in this life. The only choice we have is our attitude about the cards we hold and the finesse. With which we play our hand first though we need the map for living this life or the maps the maps for the journey to wisdom and happiness and the most important map. On the road to happiness and i don't mean i don't mean surface see cherry that smiling face happiness i mean a deep sense of peace and compassion the only on this road is the one known as the four noble truths before we get to that i would like to share a poem with you but loud sue a chinese taoist master who lived 500 years before jesus was born let your heart be at peace. Watch. The turmoil of beings but contemplate their return each separate being in the universe returns to the common source returning to the source is serenity. If you don't realize the source you stumble in confusion and sorrow when you realize where you come from you naturally become more tolerant disinterested amused. Kind-hearted as a grandmother. Dignified as a king immersed. In the wonder of the dow. You can deal with whatever life brings you. And when death comes you are ready buddhism to me. Is that meditation especially for those who have not grown up with it and i suspect that includes everybody in this room. Meditation can cause you to fall asleep. But the outcome of meditation is to wait up. To be awake. And where. The buddha was asked. Are you a god. Are you an angel. Are you a saint. Are you in kane. Then what are you i am awake. Join me in a few more moments. The four noble truths in a nutshell and rapidly. The first one. Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional life is difficult life is mysterious life is unpredictable life is scary being alive is very dangerous and every moment of life is very precious all relationships and in los. Loss is painful.. We have named if not all that most of the elephants in the living room. And even after acknowledging them it is possible to be happy. It's that deep. Contented rootedness happy. Because pain is inevitable but suffering. Is auction. The second noble truth. Clinging. Is suffering. I'm in the midst of moving. I know a lot about clinging. And not being able to let go. Suffering is what happens when we struggle with whatever our life experience is. Rather than accepting an opening to our experience. What's wise. And compassionate. Response. Suffering. Is an optional extra. Sylvia boorstein. Everything changes. Pain and loss are inevitable. But our response to them is not inevitable we can struggle and resist or. We can stop clinging except. And. Learn. This does not mean that we become indifferent to life this does not mean that we cease to be passionate about life the trick. To learn to live passionately without clinging without attachment. Without wanting. Craving anything is. Suffering. Borstein tells a story about her son's mother-in-law who manages gracefully when things are unpleasant. She is the only person i have ever driven with on los angeles freeways with cars whizzing in and out of lanes arbitrarily and snarling congested smoggy traffic. Tie-ups who sells with gentle and all wow. Look at all these people going places. I am i try when i'm driving and i want to you know. I want to say something really nasty i try to stop and think when someone's cut me off or something well maybe their mother just died we don't know. And the good news isn't that if you meditate long enough you will have no pain. The terrific good news is that we don't have to suffer. See a pattern here. Our minds are so conditioned we are so stuck in our psychological and spiritual mind habits. That we have a difficult time getting to. Peace of mind but it is possible. And that's what meditation is fort altivate a mind. So wide open it can be passionate and awake and responsive. And involved and care about things and not struggle. Borstein was once asked by some of her affluent students who thought that the buddha was that billions them. Sing joyous. Do buddhists have birthday parties. But she had a friend who people called the first patriarch of berkeley and he died of cancer in his forties he had everything career wife children he wrote a letter to his family and friends a letter he wanted them to read after he died. Entity said i would have wanted more but i never wanted other the fourth noble truth is the eightfold path. Which is actually another map. And the buddha. Offers that to us borstein though as two other names for it the eightfold circle or the eightfold. she likes the circle description at any point the religious spiritual. Whatever is this is that we're all on the journey of life it's always the same circle. But a path analogy implies that you need to begin at the beginning and then you're going to proceed in a linear matter sound western and until you know. The buddhist said you'd know you were on the right path or the circle if you saw any of the eight special markers or signpost those in just a moment it doesn't really matter because each one has all the others within. Before i tell you about the eight markers. On the path to happiness and they're very brief i'm going to have you meditate again for a few minutes perhaps i should have done this at the beginning till the end for a reason. Don't let the word meditate throw you try to approach it. With that open empty mind. That won't happen. All sorts of random irrelevant seemingly inappropriate. Pepsiven perverse thoughts. Will enter your mind. Grocery lists or to-do list me pop up in your hat that's fine. Simply recognize them for what they are and send that spot right out of your head same thing with sounds i got a little hung up on that bird. Bird sound. Monkey mind so we call this. It's a reference to all that stuff that floats around in your heads and gets in the way of clear compassionate wide-open peaceful mind. For me i often return to a favorite spot on pacific coast in mendocino county. To bring me back. To place of peace and quietness. Now all the meditating i'm done over the years i truthfully i rarely bought into. But it's gotten less cluttered there are so many things you can bring yourself back to picnic point. Flowers in your yard if you need something a little more cerebral to meditate on trying. I don't know try thinking about no hate try to breathe in compassion and loving-kindness piece. Boundless goodwill and breathe out the hatred and the garages and the fears in the prejudices and the judge. The first time i got serious. Was wednesday i got serious about meditating but that's not true the first time i ever meditated was in joanna macy's class how many of you ever heard of joanna macy. Wow. She's quite a famous american buddhist shero world as lover world as self. California. She has been a lot of work with the tibetans. And they're being exiled she went to chernobyl and did a lot of work with people. They're always as a meditator. And how everybody into our class you had to write a little blurb about why you want to take this class someone had given me a hint that if i mention i've been active in a group called beyond war. Joanna macy help form and start in california i could probably get in. But we meditated for 20 minutes. Or i should say we sat there. Some of us fell asleep. Including me. Her response was. Maybe not getting enough rest. She had no sympathy for any pathetic excuses. Try breathing in breathing out try not to think of things like when is she going to ring the chime. Try to empty your mind and find some peace. How long do you think you meditated first time was just short of two minutes. The second time was two-and-a-half minutes the third time was 3 not much time out of your life one and just elaborate briefly first one right understanding nothing is forever changes inevitable everything changes nothing is permanent. Number to write aspiration which is behaving in a way that. Directions for limits. Conditioned response. If you want to live in a way that is loving and generous and fearless then you have to practice. Overcoming any tendency to be angry or greedy or confused. Think of life as a terrific. Gym gym. With ongoing opportunities to practice. Buddhist call this cultivating. Non hatred. Nan greed nan delusion. Right action. Which mean don't cause pain. Every religion or ethical system has a code of ethics. And alyssa. Of do's and don'ts. Buddhism is no. Exception. Buddhist express it this way every single act we do. Has the potential of causing pain. And every single thing we do has consequences that echo way beyond what we can imagine. I wish our leaders would rasmus. Anyway right action doesn't mean we shouldn't act. It means we should act. Carefully. Everything matters. For right speech. Be completely honest and helpful. Don't gossip. This may sound simple but just try it. Try giving up making comments about people and they're not present. Borstein says that very high-level right speech. Requires awareness of intention in all communication not trust god. Can't be done by being present. By being exquisitely. Present. And by observing the 60 second rule. Which is also a quaker exercise. Pause 60 seconds before answering a question. I have a 24-hour rule i'm not answering your email for 24 hours if. Are things that i need to put back burner. Number 5 right livelihood organizing your financial support so that it is not abusive non exploit and non harming. Sylvia boorstein admits that this is harder to do now than in the time of the buddha right livelihood also includes your internal attitudes about work. As well as what you actually do as war. Number six right effort. This would have been my mother's favorite had she been a buddhist practitioner because it can. Roughly translated as don't worry be happy. Her mantra. The buddhists say it more eloquently every mind moment conditions the next. Every mind moment conditions the next. Grumbling gets the mine bog down in the weariness of its own. Story. Happiness. Pulls it back out and gets it going again. Borstein tells the story of one of her teachers who always ended their sessions with. Remember sylvia be happy. For longtime says borstein i thought it was the casual have a good day that we all use. And after a while i realized it was an instruction. Number seven right concentration the ability to let the attention become absorbed in one single thing. In other words paying attention. To the moment to your feeling. To that ballast. Quizlet balance. That it is possible. To maintain by being present in each moment. Buddhist do not multitask. Number 8 right mindfulness. It's right. Concentration that leads. To the last of the markers write mindfulness balanced acceptance of president. So that's it. Feel simple it is. It is easier than you might think mindfulness as i said at the beginning. Is opening too or receiving the present moment pleasant or unpleasant just. As. It is without clinging to it or rejecting it or judging it. Think of it as freedom. Every moment of clarity you have. Is a moment of freedom. And you get that clarity. By being so in the moment. In that moment. Tensions of judging or preferring rejecting or desiring are not. There. Sports sciences. We have only moments. Right now is the only time. We ever have. I'll in my reflections with a contemporary buddhist gratitude prayer a very short one i am thankful that the bus far today i have not had any unkind thoughts. Oersted any harsh words. Or done anything that i might regret. However now i need to get out of bed. And so things may become more difficult.

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