This New Story offers us an alternative to the Old Story where so much that causes harm is normalized and justified, denied or minimized, distracted from or affirmed as the only way. This is true whether it's the human caused climate and ecological crises which threaten all life on Earth, endless wars and worldwide militarism, drill baby drill and the devastation of the Earth's life support systems, vast poverty and inequality amidst the continued vast redistribution of wealth upwards, a healthcare system based in greed and profit rather than health and care which results annually in 500,000 bankruptcies and in 30,000+ deaths (which will now increase exponentially with the coronavirus), a criminal system of injustice which incarcerates more people than any other nation on Earth and which also continues to practice the death penalty, young people and others not having access to continued education or being burdened with astronomical student debt, 500,000 people — including 30,000 veterans — living on our streets, 43% of Americans living at or below the poverty line and over half of our population living paycheck to paycheck, approximately 78% of Americans being uninformed about the greatest crisis humankind has ever faced — the climate crisis, and on and on.
There is a reason why the words "revolution" and "democratic socialism" are demonized by corporate democrats and corporate republicans, by predatory capitalists and oligarchs, and by other huge wealthy interests: their vested interest is to keep us asleep, distracted and divided, and projecting our anger about so much injustice, poverty, and suffering on to each other rather than waking up and seeing who and what is actually the root of all of the above. They understand that the deadly status quo of late stage greed and late stage patriarchal neoliberal predatory capitalism can only continue as long as we the people fail to wake up, rise up, and together demand radical systemic change. So our revolution is demonized and we're told that the American people don't want a revolution.
They lie.
Rabbi Michael Lerner eloquently speaks to the truth of this revolution, our human revolution and evolution, in his wise and visionary book, Revolutionary Love. The below is an excerpt.
May we all unite as spiritual progressives and love revolutionaries. May this be the time of our evolutionary leap, our paradigm shift, our Great Awakening, and our manifestation of Revolutionary Love within ourselves and within this beautiful, hurting world that we share. This is my deepest prayer. ❤ Molly
In place of the Old Bottom Line of money and power, a New
Bottom Line of Love and Generosity is possible. People of
all faiths need to shape a political and social movement
that reaffirms the most generous, peace oriented,
social justice committed, and loving truths of the
spiritual heritage of the human race.
— Rabbi Michael Lerner
What Is Revolutionary Love?
Revolutionary love is the love of life and all beings, embracing this world with all its complexities, heartaches, and joys. It is an approach that is respectful and caring toward everyone on the planet, even those whose behavior we hope will change, and toward the Earth in all its magnificent diversity as well. It is recognizing oneself and all others as part of the fundamental unity of all being — and caring for the welfare of every part of that unity. It is transcending one's own narrow self-interest to experience others as manifestations of the sacred, and recognizing that a world where all are treated with respect and nurturance, both material and emotional, is in fact in one's own self-interest as well. It is finding meaning in one's life through relieving the pain and suffering of others, and joining with them in joyous and mutually nourishing relationships.
We see this kind of love again and again in heroic actions throughout the world. People running into the collapsed World Trade Center to help others escape. People jumping into flooding waters to save people, and even animals, from drowning. People chaining themselves to trees to protect forests from the devastation of logging. Native Americans and their allies facing freezing water hoses, rubber bullets, and arrest as they join together at Standing Rock to demand that oil companies and big banks halt the laying of environmentally destructive pipelines and the fracking that is destroying significant sections of North America. It is joining with these indigenous peoples in demanding that banks and investment companies stop funding the extraction and use of fossil fuels and instead only fund development of alternative sources of energy like wind and the sun to run our transportation systems, our communication systems, and our agricultural systems.
Revolutionary love affirms what we experience in personal family and romantic love, deeply values that kind of love, and yet moves beyond these personal experiences to an affirmation of the unity of all humanity and a genuine caring for all sentient life. Revolutionary love is closer to love as understood in the Torah's commands to "love the Other/stranger as yourself" (Leviticus 19: 33-34) and to "love your neighbor as yourself."
It may seem overwhelming to make oneself so vulnerable to the needs of so many others. Yet caring for others often renews us. And we can act in ways that affirm their sanctity and preciousness, and we can build an economic and political system that embodies and sustains that kind of universal caring. Doing so will involve creating larger periods of open time in our lives, in part through a decrease in the hours spent at work, so that we may transcend our customary goal-directed activities — the driven consciousness fostered by a world of material scarcity — and instead aim to create a world in which people spend more time inhabiting states of playfulness, creativity, and joyful celebration. Rather than manifesting only in a long-term relationship with a spouse, partner, or friend, revolutionary love also manifests in an ever-growing consciousness that finds joy in learning about each other and our world through science, literature, art, music, religion, and dance. It expands through genuine caring for the Earth combined with awe at the mysteries of consciousness and being itself, whether addressed through art and music, philosophy, religion, psychedelics, or other sources that lead to an awakening to the necessity of sharing, cooperation, generosity, humility, and joyful celebration of life.
Revolutionary love repudiates domination, instead cultivating a fervent commitment to healing ourselves and others, to ending psychological as well as physical suffering, and to fostering the values of nonviolence so eloquently articulated by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. It recognizes hurtful behaviors — such as violence; hoarding and consumption beyond any physical hunger or survival need; or the endless search for more power, more possessions, more sexual conquests, and more obedience from others — as evidence of real connection with others. All these are manifestations of an intense cry from within that has been stifled and misdirected into destructive paths, leading to war and exploitation of others and of the planet.
As it embraces the sacred core of all living being, revolutionary love manifests within us as an intense desire to heal those hurts rather than simply demean or punish those who act out their pain on others. To heal effectively, we must recognize that everyone of us has been wounded in some way and needs forgiveness, atonement, and personal transformation.
All of us? Yes, this also means reaching out to the 1 percent along with the 99 percent, even those who have actively and consciously participated in economic arrangements that hurt the rest of us; or engaged in acts of cruelty; or financed media that spread misinformation and lies while refusing to publicize the ideas of those who challenged their wealth; or knowingly supported candidates and social movements that demean others; or financed pipelines and fracking while opposing environmental programs that would benefit the health of humanity and the well-being of the Earth; or engaged in what Naomi Klein calls "disaster capitalism" (exploiting the pain and the trauma of collective shocks like super-storms or economic crisis in order to build an even more unequal and undemocratic society); or even, like President Donald Trump, tweeted both over and covert messages that encourage violence, racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, and hatred of "the Other." These oppressors too are part of the human race, however distorted their current consciousness; and so even as we must work to delegitimize their ideas, dismantle their power, redistribute their wealth, and in some cases punish their misdeeds with prison sentences, we can still feel compassion for whatever childhood pain and adult life seductions led them to lives utterly detached from beautiful and nurturing ethical and spiritual wisdom, loving relationships, and the joyous human connectedness that continues to provide spiritual sustenance and fulfillment to so many whose lives are shaped by a commitment to higher goals than money, power, or conquests. Being aware of that suffering dimension of the lives of many of the most brutal and uncaring of the rich and powerful may make us more effective and not one once less committed to stopping them from hurting anyone more than they, as well as those who do their bidding and the global capitalist and patriarchal systems they serve, already have done.
Revolutionary love is aimed at building what I call the Caring Society — Caring for Each Other and Caring for the Earth. When we embody that kind of revolutionary love, we are capable of connecting with, fully recognizing, and empathizing with others in all their complexity, and building lasting relationships with them; deepening our understanding of the complicated, multilayered, and interconnected nature of this planet Earth; caring for others without fear that there won't be enough caring to go around; generously sharing our talents and our material resources with others; sharing responsibility for the raising of empathic, joyous, and curious children, and for the care of elders in ways that affirm their worth; taking pleasure in our own bodies and minds and in the bodies and minds of others, and creating respectful, consensual relationships, both platonic and erotic; respecting individual differences and alternative life paths; and connecting our personal lives to a higher meaning or transcendent reality that serves the well-being of humanity, all life forms, and Earth. Some mystics would call revolutionary love "God-ing," that is, a manifestation of the sacred, creative, and transformative energy of the universe (though one need not be religious or a believer in God to seek a world shaped by revolutionary love.)
This is the love for which most people intuitively yearn, the answer to the Great Deprivation. Yet most of us simultaneously believe it to be impossible, and suppress our yearning for reasons I explore below. The conscious reclamation of this kind of love, and the ensuring struggle to realize it in every aspect of our global society, is the key to a global transformation that would not only defeat militarists, religious and nationalist extremists; white supremacists, champions of patriarchy, and global elites who benefit more from our corrupt economic and political arrangements; it would also reawaken tikkun — the idealism, hope, and commitment to heal and repair the world that are keys to saving the human race form further destroying ourselves and the life support system of Earth. Only a full scale embrace of revolutionary love will save our world. This love must manifest in actions to transform the economic, political, social, cultural, religious/spiritual, and environmental realities of our global society and must constantly link each of our particular actions to our larger vision of the world we want, even as we work on changing ourselves.
I remember how I hated being told by rock stars at antiwar rallies in the 1960s, "I love all of you." I believed then that it was impossible to love people you didn't know, if by "love" we mean the narrower version of romantic love. But you can feel revolutionary love for all of Earth's people, and its animals and plants and geology and atmosphere, and you can act on that love.
Revolutionary love is recognizing, feeling, and acting upon the truth that we are all interconnected. This love manifested powerfully in the horrified response to President Trump's order to ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency) to separate children and nursing babies from their refugee-seeking parents and place those children in cages. Suddenly the normal political divisions disappeared as Baptists, Evangelicals, and many Republicans joined with progressive Catholics, Jews, Unitarians, mainstream Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, atheists, and many Democrats and social change activists to attempt to force Trump to back down. The memory of their own precious experience of attachment to a parent, the love that they shared and in many cases subsequently lost, led them to gather as a mighty, unified force to demand that separation of families at the Mexican border not happen to the children of refugees. When people get back in touch with the revolutionary love that has always been part of their essence, they are willing to put aside their own narrower needs and creature comforts and even wisk their lives for something greater than themselves. When we do so, we become spiritual progressives and love revolutionaries.
To take revolutionary love seriously, we will all have to overcome our internalization of the many constraining ideas our current political and economic system has planted in us, especially those that keep us from believing that the world we want really is possible.
We see this kind of love again and again in heroic actions throughout the world. People running into the collapsed World Trade Center to help others escape. People jumping into flooding waters to save people, and even animals, from drowning. People chaining themselves to trees to protect forests from the devastation of logging. Native Americans and their allies facing freezing water hoses, rubber bullets, and arrest as they join together at Standing Rock to demand that oil companies and big banks halt the laying of environmentally destructive pipelines and the fracking that is destroying significant sections of North America. It is joining with these indigenous peoples in demanding that banks and investment companies stop funding the extraction and use of fossil fuels and instead only fund development of alternative sources of energy like wind and the sun to run our transportation systems, our communication systems, and our agricultural systems.
Revolutionary love affirms what we experience in personal family and romantic love, deeply values that kind of love, and yet moves beyond these personal experiences to an affirmation of the unity of all humanity and a genuine caring for all sentient life. Revolutionary love is closer to love as understood in the Torah's commands to "love the Other/stranger as yourself" (Leviticus 19: 33-34) and to "love your neighbor as yourself."
It may seem overwhelming to make oneself so vulnerable to the needs of so many others. Yet caring for others often renews us. And we can act in ways that affirm their sanctity and preciousness, and we can build an economic and political system that embodies and sustains that kind of universal caring. Doing so will involve creating larger periods of open time in our lives, in part through a decrease in the hours spent at work, so that we may transcend our customary goal-directed activities — the driven consciousness fostered by a world of material scarcity — and instead aim to create a world in which people spend more time inhabiting states of playfulness, creativity, and joyful celebration. Rather than manifesting only in a long-term relationship with a spouse, partner, or friend, revolutionary love also manifests in an ever-growing consciousness that finds joy in learning about each other and our world through science, literature, art, music, religion, and dance. It expands through genuine caring for the Earth combined with awe at the mysteries of consciousness and being itself, whether addressed through art and music, philosophy, religion, psychedelics, or other sources that lead to an awakening to the necessity of sharing, cooperation, generosity, humility, and joyful celebration of life.
Revolutionary love repudiates domination, instead cultivating a fervent commitment to healing ourselves and others, to ending psychological as well as physical suffering, and to fostering the values of nonviolence so eloquently articulated by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. It recognizes hurtful behaviors — such as violence; hoarding and consumption beyond any physical hunger or survival need; or the endless search for more power, more possessions, more sexual conquests, and more obedience from others — as evidence of real connection with others. All these are manifestations of an intense cry from within that has been stifled and misdirected into destructive paths, leading to war and exploitation of others and of the planet.
As it embraces the sacred core of all living being, revolutionary love manifests within us as an intense desire to heal those hurts rather than simply demean or punish those who act out their pain on others. To heal effectively, we must recognize that everyone of us has been wounded in some way and needs forgiveness, atonement, and personal transformation.
All of us? Yes, this also means reaching out to the 1 percent along with the 99 percent, even those who have actively and consciously participated in economic arrangements that hurt the rest of us; or engaged in acts of cruelty; or financed media that spread misinformation and lies while refusing to publicize the ideas of those who challenged their wealth; or knowingly supported candidates and social movements that demean others; or financed pipelines and fracking while opposing environmental programs that would benefit the health of humanity and the well-being of the Earth; or engaged in what Naomi Klein calls "disaster capitalism" (exploiting the pain and the trauma of collective shocks like super-storms or economic crisis in order to build an even more unequal and undemocratic society); or even, like President Donald Trump, tweeted both over and covert messages that encourage violence, racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, and hatred of "the Other." These oppressors too are part of the human race, however distorted their current consciousness; and so even as we must work to delegitimize their ideas, dismantle their power, redistribute their wealth, and in some cases punish their misdeeds with prison sentences, we can still feel compassion for whatever childhood pain and adult life seductions led them to lives utterly detached from beautiful and nurturing ethical and spiritual wisdom, loving relationships, and the joyous human connectedness that continues to provide spiritual sustenance and fulfillment to so many whose lives are shaped by a commitment to higher goals than money, power, or conquests. Being aware of that suffering dimension of the lives of many of the most brutal and uncaring of the rich and powerful may make us more effective and not one once less committed to stopping them from hurting anyone more than they, as well as those who do their bidding and the global capitalist and patriarchal systems they serve, already have done.
Revolutionary love is aimed at building what I call the Caring Society — Caring for Each Other and Caring for the Earth. When we embody that kind of revolutionary love, we are capable of connecting with, fully recognizing, and empathizing with others in all their complexity, and building lasting relationships with them; deepening our understanding of the complicated, multilayered, and interconnected nature of this planet Earth; caring for others without fear that there won't be enough caring to go around; generously sharing our talents and our material resources with others; sharing responsibility for the raising of empathic, joyous, and curious children, and for the care of elders in ways that affirm their worth; taking pleasure in our own bodies and minds and in the bodies and minds of others, and creating respectful, consensual relationships, both platonic and erotic; respecting individual differences and alternative life paths; and connecting our personal lives to a higher meaning or transcendent reality that serves the well-being of humanity, all life forms, and Earth. Some mystics would call revolutionary love "God-ing," that is, a manifestation of the sacred, creative, and transformative energy of the universe (though one need not be religious or a believer in God to seek a world shaped by revolutionary love.)
This is the love for which most people intuitively yearn, the answer to the Great Deprivation. Yet most of us simultaneously believe it to be impossible, and suppress our yearning for reasons I explore below. The conscious reclamation of this kind of love, and the ensuring struggle to realize it in every aspect of our global society, is the key to a global transformation that would not only defeat militarists, religious and nationalist extremists; white supremacists, champions of patriarchy, and global elites who benefit more from our corrupt economic and political arrangements; it would also reawaken tikkun — the idealism, hope, and commitment to heal and repair the world that are keys to saving the human race form further destroying ourselves and the life support system of Earth. Only a full scale embrace of revolutionary love will save our world. This love must manifest in actions to transform the economic, political, social, cultural, religious/spiritual, and environmental realities of our global society and must constantly link each of our particular actions to our larger vision of the world we want, even as we work on changing ourselves.
I remember how I hated being told by rock stars at antiwar rallies in the 1960s, "I love all of you." I believed then that it was impossible to love people you didn't know, if by "love" we mean the narrower version of romantic love. But you can feel revolutionary love for all of Earth's people, and its animals and plants and geology and atmosphere, and you can act on that love.
Revolutionary love is recognizing, feeling, and acting upon the truth that we are all interconnected. This love manifested powerfully in the horrified response to President Trump's order to ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency) to separate children and nursing babies from their refugee-seeking parents and place those children in cages. Suddenly the normal political divisions disappeared as Baptists, Evangelicals, and many Republicans joined with progressive Catholics, Jews, Unitarians, mainstream Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, atheists, and many Democrats and social change activists to attempt to force Trump to back down. The memory of their own precious experience of attachment to a parent, the love that they shared and in many cases subsequently lost, led them to gather as a mighty, unified force to demand that separation of families at the Mexican border not happen to the children of refugees. When people get back in touch with the revolutionary love that has always been part of their essence, they are willing to put aside their own narrower needs and creature comforts and even wisk their lives for something greater than themselves. When we do so, we become spiritual progressives and love revolutionaries.
To take revolutionary love seriously, we will all have to overcome our internalization of the many constraining ideas our current political and economic system has planted in us, especially those that keep us from believing that the world we want really is possible.
— Rabbi Michael Lerner
Excerpted from Revolutionary Love: A Political Manifesto
to Heal and Transform Our World
Revolutionary Love proposes a method to replace what Lerner terms the “capitalist globalization of selfishness” with a globalization of generosity, prophetic empathy, and environmental sanity.
Please go here for more information:
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| Sharing a loving embrace with Rabbi Lerner |
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