Mary Oliver: Where Does the Temple Begin, Where Does It End?

Where Does the Temple Begin, Where Does It End?

There are things you can’t reach. But
you can reach out to them, and all day long.

The wind, the bird flying away. The idea of God.

And it can keep you as busy as anything else, and happier.

The snake slides away; the fish jumps, like a little lily,
out of the water and back in; the goldfinches sing
from the unreachable top of the tree.

I look; morning to night I am never done with looking.

Looking I mean not just standing around, but standing around
as though with your arms open.

And thinking: maybe something will come, some
shining coil of wind,
or a few leaves from any old tree–
they are all in this too.

And now I will tell you the truth.
Everything in the world
comes.

At least, closer.

And, cordially.

Like the nibbling, tinsel-eyed fish; the unlooping snake.
Like goldfinches, little dolls of goldfluttering around the corner of the sky

of God, the blue air.

 

— Mary Oliver

 

We Live In Capitalism, Its Power Seems Inescapable — But Then So Did the Divine Rights of Kings

I am moved to again post this reminder in the wake of Beto O’Rourke, Elizabeth Warren, and other reportedly progressives declaring themselves to be capitalists. We are far past time in questioning the deeper truths of the norms, values, and stories of our culture and if they are indeed in the highest good for our nation and other countries, for other beings and life on Earth, and for the planet. 

The economic system we’ve been indoctrinated into believing is the only and best way is indeed bringing great wealth to a very small fraction of extraordinarily wealthy human beings. It’s also bringing extraordinary poverty and suffering to the vast majority of the world’s people, endless war and oppression, ever escalating forms of violence, Trump and other toxic and dangerous despots, millions of displaced and desperate refugees and immigrants, the sixth major extinction we’re now in the midst of, global warming that threatens all life on Earth if we don’t radically change NOW, three humans owning as much wealth as half of America, over two million incarcerated Americans, neoliberal ideology and the influence of Dark Money over our political and media systems, and the list goes on. 

We are all frogs in the fry pan being brought more and more quickly to a boil. Will we wake up and jump off this suicidal path in time? I don’t know. It’s up to each and every one of us. 

There is an absolute imperative to no longer accept the toxic and deadly status quo as reality. Another world is possible — one grounded in Partnership rather than the unrelenting violence of domination culture that is the core of capitalism. 

May we all awaken from the dominator trance! Please go here for more: https://www.kosmosjournal.org/kj_article/breaking-out-of-the-domination-trance-building-foundations-for-a-safe-equitable-caring-world/. Thank you. — Molly

Wajahat Ali: Look Out For Each Other. Love Each Other.

I join millions of others who are heartsick and horrified over this latest mass shooting. We all need to be conscious of this larger picture. — Molly

I just want people to remember Trump has said "Islam hates us," retweeted fake anti-Muslim videos by hate group Britain First, promoted a Muslim Ban, spread anti-semitic Soros conspiracy theories, demonized immigrants is & surrounded by people who believe it. There is a cost.

Let me quickly explain why the Christchurch mosque shooting affects many of us, not just Muslim communities. If the shooter's manifesto and social media feed are accurate, he was inspired by a right wing ideological infrastructure that thrives, recruits and radicalizes online 
More
He wrote a manifesto, just like Norwegian mass murderer Anders Breivik. He cites right wing personalities and military battles glorified by white nationalists, such as the Siege of Vienna in 1863 - where Europe staved off Islam apparently.

Like mass murderer Breivik, he wants to punish Muslims and immigrants for allegedly invading his soil, he wants to take revenge. Notice the language of "invasion" - does it sound familiar? It should. It's used against immigrants and Muslims in America - 2018 midterms.

He left behind a video, live streamed his rampage w/ a camera on his head, making it like first person video game DOOM. He shared it on social media sites. He wants to be known. He is a hero, a martyr, the one brave enough to do what others can't to save "Western" civilization

Compare his methods & alleged ideology to Quebec mosque shooter Alexandre Bissonnette, who killed 6. He was a white nationalist who loathed immigrants, refugees and Muslims. Christopher Hasson, a domestic terrorist, just caught, also wanted to kill Muslims, inspired by Breivik

Compare this to the Tree of Life Synagogue shooter in Pittsburgh. He killed 11 Jewish worshippers. He shared a post on his Gad account about punishing "filthy evil Jews" for bringing in "filthy evil Muslims." This was in reference to the Soros-caravan conspiracy theory.

The underlining ideology anchoring all of this is White supremacy and their main fear is "replacement." That the immigrants, Jews, blacks and Muslims will replace them, the Whites. Remember Charlottesville? "Jews will not replace us." See Steve King's tweets about babies

Steve Bannon, Trump's former chief advisor, cites CAMP OF SAINTS as one of his favorite books. He recommends it. It's a racist novel about brown immigrants "invading" and overtaking France. White natioanalists believe Jews are the head of the cabal who use the rest of us

We are dealing with angry, disaffected men, mostly White, who find purpose & community with these extremist groups who give them a hero's narrative through violent ideology of White supremacy. They are saving civilization by getting rid of the rest of us. It's like White ISIS

The victims are not just Muslims, but also Jews, immigrants, refugees, Blacks, Sikhs, Latinos & women (they really hate feminists). It's a zero sum absolutism. No grey area. Just like ISIS. These groups are rising in the US & Europe. They have mainstream elected messengers.

Pay attention. Take this extremist ideology & terror threat seriously. Be wary of politicians, academics & media heads who give it a platform and spout it under the guise of "free speech" and fighting "political correctness." Look out for each other. Love each other. END.

— Wajahat Ali

ACROSS THE GLOBE WE STAND TOGETHER AGAINST HATE AND FOR THE HEALING AND WELLBEING OF ALL LIFE ON EARTH

Yes! We all must stand together against hatred, fear, ignorance, white supremacy, the poisonous propaganda of polarization, and all the many faces of violence, separation, and unconsciousness. And as we humans individually and collectively assume the responsibility and commitment to do the courageous work of identifying, owning, healing, and transforming any of those qualities within ourselves, we then claim the potential and the power we hold for wisdom, integrity, authenticity, understanding, connection, compassion, kindness, and love. So vital to cultivate what we stand FOR and allow that to be ripples we create and the Light that we shine in the world. 

Bless us all, no exceptions — Molly

INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE HAS BEEN WARNING US ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE FOR CENTURIES

Such an excellent and incredibly important article! — Molly

  

Nishnaabeg scholar Leanne Betasamosake Simpson explains why "green growth" isn't enough to save the planet.

By MALCOLM HARRIS

The most common introductory example we use when we teach kids about interdependent ecosystems is insects They may seem gross and small compared to the charismatic megafauna, we say, but insects play all sorts of important roles: pollinating plants, breaking down organic matter, feeding bigger animals. Without insects the whole web would collapse. I don't think many of us who have given this lesson actually contemplated the mass death of the world's insects as a possibility, imminent or otherwise. We should have.

A new study  in the journal Biological Conservation takes a look at the global status of entomofauna (insects), and the picture is not good. The topline finding is that over 40 percent of insect species are threatened with extinction. That's a situation hard to describe without sounding like a heavy metal concert billing. (Megadeath, Ecocide, etc.) And the lesson about the ecosystem wasn't wrong: Without insects, Earth's environment as we've become familiar with it is toast. Even our apocalyptic thought experiments are coming true.

The trouble with combating climate change, we're often told, is that it's hard to imagine, hard to see. The philosopher Timothy Morton calls climate change a "hyperobject": It's so widely distributed and conceptually sticky that we can't really perceive it except in partial local instances. "When you feel raindrops falling on your head, you are experiencing climate, in some sense. In particular you are experiencing the climate change known as global warming," Morton wrote  in 2010. "But you are never directly experiencing global warming as such." Humans don't have the right sensory faculties.

Maybe it was possible to think that way in 2010, but, less than a decade later, I think many of us have developed the ability to see global warming. We are no longer empiricists who route information through our senses to our brain for analysis; we're conspiracy theorists, every raindrop or sunbeam encountered as hyperobject. Now the totality hits us first. At the beginning of this essay, I didn't say the insects were being killed off by global warming—but didn't you assume it?

To people who don't feel the omnipresence of global warming, people like me sound off. Not necessarily because they refuse to believe the data, I think, but because some of us are no longer bothering with the scientific method. We're not analyzing evidence to develop a theory; we are convinced of what's happening before we hear the particulars. Our question is not whether today's forecast reflects climate change, but how. And we're not wrong.

Since global warming is a fact and in one way or another an imminent threat to the well-being of every living thing known to mankind (including us), I think our increased ability to perceive it represents progress. The positivist method is not the only way to produce knowledge, and though "science" gets a lot of credit for sounding the alarm on climate change, it has been comparatively slow on the uptake. If we pay any attention at all, we can see and feel and hear that nature's cycles are broken, and some peoples have understood for centuries that a society built on extraction and accumulation would burn the whole planet alive. Western science has a lot of nerve showing up just as we're on the precipice of a biospheric death spiral to brandish some graphs and offer to block out the sun just a little.

"Indigenous peoples have witnessed continual ecosystem and species collapse since the early days of colonial occupation," says Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, an activist/scholar from the Nishnaabeg nation and author most recently of the book As We Have Always Done: Indigenous Freedom Through Radical Resistance. "We should be thinking of climate change as part of a much longer series of ecological catastrophes caused by colonialism and accumulation-based society."

Please continue this article here: https://psmag.com/ideas/indigenous-knowledge-has-been-warning-us-about-climate-change-for-centuries?fbclid=IwAR25_ysOJ8txdcM-xBo4sm-vCqcewczho1L99HhKmROLdhbJ6lzp1TcI5q8