A View from Nowhere

One role of religion is to give us a view of the vast and mysterious reality we inhabit.  Where were we before we were born?  What happens to us after we die?  What are those lights up in the sky?  Is there anything above the sky?  What happens to me when I’m dreaming?  Religion seeks to answer these kinds of questions by giving the believer an image of the universe that is somewhat coherent and soothing, or at least manageable.  This helps keep our existential anxiety at bay.

The faiths that come out of the Abrahamic tradition - Christianity, Judaism, Islam - use what is known as the Three Story Universe as the default image of reality within which they present their theological framework.  Heaven is up, Hell (or the realm of the dead) is down, the Earth is in the middle.

Within Christianity, this image is so ingrained in our religious consciousness that we often don’t even notice it.    People lift their hands ‘up to God’.  Artwork in new church sanctuaries depict little angels sitting in the clouds or Jesus coming down to us on platforms that looks a bit like cosmic surfboards.  I could go on and on, but for those of you who encounter Christian communities and worship, check it out for yourself and listen for these references.  You’ll be amazed how often they appear. 

Science also presents us with a view of reality and the universe; although it doesn’t seek to answer some of the more personal or metaphysical questions that religion addresses.  And as we all know, science has pretty much discredited the Three Story Universe as a viable vision of reality.  Cue 400 years of Church/Science conflict.

So where does this leave people of faith?  There are many responses and lots of work and answers to this question.  Currently, Trey Everett and I are doing a podcast series on this issue called the Collapse of the Three Story Universe.  Take a listen.

What’s your faithful vision of reality?

Twice a year our Lions Club picks up trash along a two mile stretch of Highway 2.  Like many other groups and individuals who ‘adopt’ stretches of road we fill large plastic bags full of the trash that people throw out of their cars.  Every time we go out I think, “Maybe this year there will be nothing to pick up.”  And every outing we fill multiple yellow bags full of trash.  

Then last week a friend told me that he is working on designing a power plant for a radar station whose sole purpose is to track the garbage we’ve put in space.  This is a multi-billion dollar project for tracking litter.  Think of our numerous budgetary crises, and how billions are now having to be spent on a completely preventable situation: littering.

What is it with us and our garbage?  In the middle ages Europe almost killed itself off with plague because people thought that human waste could just be dumped out the window.  Two days ago I watched someone pull out of our Subway parking lot and drop a huge drink cup, still full of soda, out the window of their car.  Twenty five years ago, I was in Nepal when the Mt. Everest Base Camp was closed because of litter.

One comedian, commenting on the lack of human progress over recorded history, commented that although we have nanotechnology to isolate DNA, we still need bathroom signs telling people to was their hands before they go back to work.  

Of course we have made lots of headway in the area of recycling, but since we now have to track our trash in space, I guess we haven’t made that much progress.

Perhaps because our digestive tract is linear, and the world used to be big enough for easy disposal, we just aren’t yet evolved enough to think cyclically.  Then there’s the problem of ‘mine’ and ‘everyone else’s’.  If something isn’t ‘mine’ then I’m not that inclined to feel responsible for it.  So ‘the street’, ‘the air’, ‘the water’, ‘the ditch’, ‘outer space’ becomes someone else’s problem and a convenient place to dump anything I don’t want.

It is said that the most profound spiritual insight is an experience of ‘the whole’, of the complete unity of all reality.  Perhaps if we had more of this understanding we wouldn’t litter.

And so twice a year, along the side of the road, I think: “When we go out here and there is no trash, we will have entered the Kingdom of God.”

For almost three decades I, along with many others, have been talking about the dramatic increase in the business of our lives.  Slowly but surely leisure time, free time, Sabbath time has disappeared as we have relentlessly scheduled every minute of every day.  The recent arrival of smartphones and various other electronic gadgets have only accelerated this trend as we are now ‘connected’ twenty four hours a day.  

Despite the observation that perhaps this trend isn’t good for us, we have continued to get busier and busier.  We’ve even included our children in this process such that many kids now do not know how to play on their own or even sleep without the TV on in their room and their phone tucked underneath their pillow. 

Recently I’ve noticed something new in relation to this phenomenon.  Over the past year or so many of the events and activities in our community and beyond have been very poorly attended or cancelled due to lack of pre-registration.  

So I’m wondering: have we finally reached a saturation point?  The image I have is of a sponge that is full of water.  It can’t hold any more.  And with each new drop of water that you add to one end of the sponge, another drop of water has to fall out the other side.  Perhaps that’s where we are, or at least are approaching, with our events and activities.  

Because there are so many things to do, and because every organization feels that it has to add more and new activities each year (we have to be bigger and better each year!), it does make sense that at some point there will more to do than we can fit into our schedules.  When was the last time that everyone who was supposed to be at a meeting or an event was there?  When was the last time you went to an activity and no one left early to get to the next activity?  Maybe it’s just me, but I can’t remember when I was last at something and no one was double booked.  

If I’m right about this phenomenon, if our time is approaching saturation, I’m curious about what comes next.  Will we finally begin to go in the other direction?  Will we implode at some point and then regroup?  Will we give up our addiction to ‘more’ and begin to reengage our ability to be present to one another?  Or...?

What do you think?

Believe it or not, growing up in Los Angeles I was a Vikings fan.  Those were the days of Fran Tarkington and the Purple People Eaters and I thought they were great.  I’m not sure why I got so into the tremendous Vikings pass rush, but I was hooked.  It was exciting.  Plus, they could play in the cold and the snow and most years the Los Angeles Rams would go up to MN in the playoffs, turn into large blocks of ice and loose.  Of course then the Vikings would head to the Super Bowl and loose too, but I still thought they were fun to watch.  So I have a positive place in my heart for the Vikings.  

But for me, the situation with the stadium points out much of what is backwards about our society and our priorities.  

First there is the issue of using public money for the stadium in general.  Maybe it would be fine if we had lots of public money.  But we don’t.  We can’t pay back our schools, we can’t help people with property tax relief, the list goes on.  Yet somehow we can come up with funds for the Vikings, an enterprise that is part of a sector of our economy that’s already soaking up billions of dollars.  

To give you an idea of how wealthy sports figures are:  when an NBA player was recently suspended for only 7 games it cost him, in lost salary, $365,000!  For 7 games!  I have no trouble with the idea of public works projects.  We have a new arena in Crookston that was built with, mostly, public funds.  But it’s for kids and adults to play in and host events.  It’s for the public not for profit.

Then there is the issue of where the money is coming from.  Politicians like to make a big deal about ‘general fund’ money verses ‘gaming money’ verses ‘local money’ as if these categories actually make some substantive difference.  They don’t: all the money comes out of our pockets! 

So we can’t raises taxes on millionaires, because they are the ‘job creators’ and taxing them would eliminate jobs, but we can take money from, mostly, poorer people to create jobs to build the stadium.  If that makes sense in some parallel universe I wish someone would explain how.  

Finally there is the issue of how much time and energy this has consumed.  A friend in Minneapolis told me that there had been a front page article on this issue every day for over a year.  People are taking days off work to go sit at the state house and lobby for the stadium.  But when our children graduate from school not being able to read, where is the furor?  Mostly there isn’t one.

In 1994 the Los Angeles Rams moved to St. Louis.  As far as I can tell, Los Angeles has survived.  I know that there are many benefits from having a sports team in your state.  I know that the stadium will spur a certain amount of economic development in the Twin Cities.  But I also know that more gambling means negative social costs that offset some of the good results of the new stadium.  And I also know that if the public really has several hundred million dollars in its collective pocket to spend on our state then there are many more pressing needs for the money, needs that also generate economic growth.  

Just one example:  It’s estimated that a college degree is worth $1-3 million dollars over the lifetime of an individual.  Even if college costs $200,000 (and state schools are much less) that’s a minimum of 400% return on investment.  And for the $550 million that the public is going to spend on the stadium we could send 2,750 kids to private college (at least twice as many to a public school, junior or technical college) and that investment would generate at least $2.2 billion dollars for our society.  

Let’s see the Vikings match that deal.

Today I just wanted to recommend to you an outstanding, thoughtful, piece of entertainment.  It’s always a joy when someone creates something that makes you think, laugh, reflect, and learn; and that’s exactly what Collin Quinn has done with his Broadway Show “Long Story Short.”  For those of you who get HBO you can watch it for free online.  For the rest, you could either buy the DVD or borrow it from me!  

The show covers all of human history and examines human behavior and human nature through the ages.  Quinn begins by saying that ‘History is boring.  It’s boring because it’s about people, and people are boring.  Why, because we haven’t changed in thousands of years.  That’s why the stories in the Old Testament are the same as those in the New York Post.”  He then goes on to prove that history can be distinctly NOT boring as he works his way from 20,000 BC through to the European Debt crisis and modern America.

Along the way Quinn continually returns to our modern era and the challenges of being human and trying to understand the nature of life.  Whether he is describing Africa or India or China or the middle ages in Europe, he manages to relate life in the past to life in the present day.  As he does this, Quinn reflects to us the way in which people struggle to be decent and loving to each other in the face of the biological need to survive.

We spend a lot of time watching TV and our computer screens and much of what we see doesn’t have a whole lot of merit.  Long Story Short is well worth watching and can provide much grist for the mill of personal or communal reflection.

Most people that I know, and if the polls are true most people in the country, think that we have a lot of present and looming economic problems.  The national debt, the credit card debt, the college loan debt, the European debt, the coming insolvency of Social Security and Medicare, all point to the reality that many of our economic practices are not sustainable.  But the real problem with our economy isn’t a matter of diagnosis, rather our challenge is that we don’t want to change our behavior to institute solutions.  Instead we are all playing a big game of chicken, hoping that someone else will jump before we have to.

This was abundantly clear when this week, the head of the University of North Dakota system announced that the professors at the universities were underpaid and needed a raise.  Apparently full professor salaries of $100,000 aren’t enough to attract the ‘best and brightest’ to the University.  What we heard in his presentation was more of the same kind of logic and economic rhetoric that we’ve always heard: everyone wants more and we need to give them more to keep up with the Jones.

But what will be the effect of these raises on those who the University is supposed to serve: the students?  We know: tuition will go up.  Since the current class of college students began going to school back in Kindergarten, college costs have more than doubled.  This means that society is forcing our young people to take on more and more debt at a time in their lives when they can least afford it.  

We all know this is a horrible problem.  Student loan debt nationally is now over $1 trillion and climbing.  The federal government is going into more debt trying to keep the costs of these loans low, but that too is becoming a challenge.  Ultimately, the only way to solve this problem is for costs to stop increasing.  But that’s what no one is willing to do.

And what do the students really get from their ‘best and brightest’ professors?  Many of these faculty spend most of their time doing research and teaching graduate students.  Basic courses, the fundamental stuff of the college curriculum, are mostly taught by graduate students, or they are overcrowded and understaffed.  Many college students can’t even graduate in four years because the classes they need aren’t offered on a regular basis.  

Most people who get PhDs are pretty bright and there are lots of them out there who want and need jobs in their fields and would be very happy making ‘only’ $100,000.  What students need aren’t more nationally recognized researchers who bring in outside funding that never benefits them.  What they need are more good teachers who can give them a good education at a price that doesn’t bankrupt them for the rest of their lives.  

If we are ever going to come up with an economy that is more sustainable, we need to act differently when we have the chance.  Happiness research has shown that the ability of money to increase happiness stops once a person is making about $75,000 a year.  After that, more money doesn’t make one any happier.  Yes, some people won’t apply for the University jobs that pay less than the top tier; but I’m also willing to bet that there are many people who would apply for those jobs if they understood that the economic strategy was part of a greater strategy to help students and society as a whole.

We have to start somewhere to fix our problems and really the only place to begin is with us.

This past Saturday a group of us took the morning to do some cleaning at the Church.  Two women had scouted the entire building and presented us with a well organized list of what we were going to work on.  Our tasks were not the usual sorts of cleaning chores, but rather the ‘deep cleaning’ activities that don’t get done on a regular basis.  Radiators were scrubbed, closets organized, windows washed, walls and baseboards scrubbed.  It was all very satisfying.

Today, when I came into the church building, I looked around and I realized that what we did was the sort of cleaning that most people who use the building might not even notice.  In contrast to doing the dishes or vacuuming or dusting very visible surfaces; our cleaning was the kind of cleaning that adds to the general ‘feel’ of the environment without it being obvious what’s been cleaned (this with the possible exception of the windows which are more noticeable to some, but not all).

It then occurred to me that our cleaning adventure was a perfect image for what happens with the spiritual life and spiritual practice.  When we participate in the activity of prayer, we are affected and change in ways that, at first, we may not even notice.  This is why some think that taking the time to pray is a ‘waste of time’.  It doesn’t seem to accomplish anything.  And outsiders certainly may not notice any change in us.  

Unlike buying a new wardrobe at the store, or getting our hair cut, the interior life is working on us at a deeper level.  The environment of our hearts and minds begins to change, and we become ‘brighter’, ‘softer’, more compassionate.  But these changes are slow and imperceptible.  Thus just like the church that seems ‘different’ but we can’t exactly say how because it’s been cleaned in places that don’t get our direct attention, a person fully living their spiritual life also begins to seem ‘different’ in a good, perhaps vague, manner.

Of course over time, the effects of our spiritual journey begin to become more obvious. What started out as a series of activities whose value was uncertain, is now clearly the source of our life.  So let us not worry that our prayer, our meditation, seems to have no immediate impact upon us, but rather let us understand that we are getting a good deep cleaning that transforms us from the inside out.  

In 2011 Netflix, the DVD rental and online movie company, and Norwegian Public Television teamed up to produce a show called Lilyhammer, which can be seen on Netflix if you have a subscription.  The show follows the adventures of Frank Tagliano, a very stereotypical Italian American mobster from New York, who decides to turn states evidence on his boss and then take witness protection in Lilyhammer Norway.  He picks this destination because he doesn’t like the warmth of the Caribbean and he saw Lilyhammer on TV when they hosted the Winter Olympics and it looks like a nice place to settle down.  Of course, once he arrives, he immediately begins his usual mobster activities.

The show is a huge hit in Norway and it’s very funny.  It’s also a fascinating backdrop to the current trial of Anders Behring Breivik the man who murdered scores of people in a Nationalistic terror rampage; for many of the issues taken up by the TV show are exactly the same issues being raised in the trial.  Frank has olive skin and so he’s mistaken for an Arab and suspected of being an al-Qaeda terrorist in a society that’s nervous about immigration.  Authorities respond to any anti-social behavior with kind words and discussion rather than punishment.  Everyone is nice and pleasant but underneath the placid exterior lies all manner of perversions and violence.  

Frank, of course, has a very different approach to life then the average Norwegian.  When some school bullies beat up the son of his girlfriend and the school cop refuses to punish the boys, Frank teaches the kid to put rocks in his mittens and whack the bullies in the teeth.  He very quickly finds out that the mild mannered immigrant official is a sex addict; and he uses that knowledge to blackmail him into getting special favors from the government.  The list goes on, but you get the idea.  

By placing Norwegian and American mob culture (which is not too far from much of American culture in general) side by side, Lilyhammer does a wonderful job of examining the issue of human nature and sin.  Both the Norwegian approach and Frank’s approach to life seem good at times.  Talking and being nice is a great thing.  But so are real consequences for bad behavior.  

As the two cultures reflect one another, we see how they both fail and both succeed.  Kindness that denies the dark side of humanity is destined to fall prey to evil, and toughness that denies the drive for power will always become tyrannical.  

When the news reports about the Norwegian trial that allows a psychopath to present his ‘political views’ to the world, we Americans probably tend to react much as Frank does.  We think it’s absurd to allow this, and wish the guy would be locked up for life, or worse.  At the same time, Norwegians look at our heavy handed approach to the world and our huge jail population and think that we could use a bit more kindness and conversation.

Unlike what right-wing ultra-nationalists believe, cross-cultural experience and an openness to one another can be a very good thing.  We can come to see how people have struggled with the goodness and the evil in humanity in different ways with varied degrees of success and failure.  We can learn from each other and perhaps all become better human beings.  

In the world of High School competition, the pinnacle of achievement is making it to the State competition in your sport.  This is hard to do.  You have to not only do well in your regular season, but you then have to make it through the playoffs and rank high enough to move onto ‘state.’  Most schools rarely ‘make it to state’ in any sports, some make it once or twice.  Occasionally a school is able to establish itself in a particular area and records multiple appearances at state.  But this is rare and it happens when a school and a community is able to create a culture of excellence in that particular field of endeavor.  

Over the past 7 years, the Crookston Knowledge Bowl team has made it to the State Tournament 6 times.  I don’t think that there is any other competitive activity in which Crookston High School has been so successful.  We have a true dynasty going.  

Unfortunately, Knowledge Bowl doesn’t really get the recognition it deserves.  It’s not a sport in the usual sense of the word.  So meets don’t get covered on the sports page.  And, sadly, knowledge isn’t valued by our culture the way that physical sports are.  This gap in recognition was made very clear when, after 4 state appearances the School District planned to cut the program, and it was only through a private fundraising effort that it was maintained.  Luckily the district saw fit to maintain the program this past year and we went to state again.  Can anyone imagine cutting a football, or basketball, or hockey program after 4 state appearances?  There would be riots in the streets.  

Yet isn’t knowledge and the pursuit of knowledge admirable, not to mention economically important?  It is estimated that a high school diploma is worth $1.5 million dollars of extra lifetime earnings.  A college degree in a marketable field tacks on another few million.  And as society becomes more technologically dependent, good jobs require education and know how.  

For me, one of the most positive aspects of the Knowledge Bowl dynasty is that it creates excitement for learning and achievement.  After they got back from the state event, I spoke to the youngest member of the state team and he had a big smile on his face as he told be about how well they were going to do when they go back to state ‘next year.’  Of course, in order to do this he and his teammates need to study and learn more and strive for academic excellence.  

And they need the support of their community and their school.  So Go Crookston Knowledge Bowl!!

A couple of months ago, in the midst of our never-ending presidential campaign season, Hulu (the online TV website) launched an original series called Battleground.  The show is about a fictitious WI Senate campaign.  It’s presented as a documentary and, in a pretty neat small world connection, one of the characters - a nerdy campaign volunteer - is played by a guy who also teaches in our son Sam’s computer science department at UCSC. 

It’s a great show.

In addition to the usual personal drama, the show presents an inside view of what political campaigns are like.  Of course, it’s fiction, however given what we see paraded around on the news every day, I have a feeling the show is a fairly realistic view of what goes on behind the scenes of a political campaign.  

And what are campaigns actually about? Winning, winning at all costs.  This means that all manner of ‘dirty tricks’ and manipulation and lies and gamesmanship are just fine.  As long as you win.  In the show some of these dubious activities include printing up misleading fliers about what day to vote, giving money to a pastor to complete his youth center in exchange for him not driving people to the polls (this is my personal favorite), leaking information about affairs, and producing a constant stream of intentionally misleading information.  The sad thing: as I watch the show all of these activities are completely believable and are somehow supposed to be irrelevant once the election is over.

Now that Rick Santorum has suspended his campaign, we can look forward to him eventually campaigning for Romney.  He will do this with a straight face after calling Romney all sorts of names, degrading him publicly, and doing who knows what privately, and all of this will somehow make sense because all that other stuff was, well, just campaigning.  

The spectacle presented by Battleground helps highlight three very important issues that could make all of us pause and think deeply about ourselves and the political process.  

First, politics and political campaigns are run on the concept that the ends justify the means.  If you win, it doesn’t really matter how you get there, and once you win you can change and become good and moral and helpful.  Ends and means philosophical debates have gone on for a long time, but I would suggest that this idea ends justifying the means is simply false.  If the system of electing people is based upon a process of deceit, then the system of government will be as well.

Second, politics and campaigns are run the way they are because we, the voters, are so easily manipulated!  This reality is even scarier than the first.  By keeping truth from voters, by presenting all sorts of fake images and presentations and distractions, campaigns are able to swing voter sentiments one way or another easily and quickly.  The fliers giving wrong information about voting day work because we will believe any scrap of paper that lands on our doorstep and we aren’t informed about when voting actually happens!  By keeping ourselves in the dark about almost every issue and aspect of our government we can be easily tricked and distracted into voting, or not voting, for someone.

Finally, the fact that winning seems to hinge not on issues and substance, but rather on what bizarre story or bit of misinformation is hitting the airwaves just at the right moment, makes me wonder: are these politicians really different at all?  The true secret of Battleground, as we see and hear about the campaign staff jumping from one party and one campaign to another, is that there isn’t any significant difference between candidates, the only difference is who has the power.  

Of course all of these observations can make one pretty cynical; and I’m sure this is why so many Americans ignore our political process all together.  However I also think that the other message from this closer examination of campaigns is one that encourages personal empowerment and involvement in whatever true, good cause or activity you feel excited about.  The world won’t get better by itself and there are an endless number of people lining up to trick you into giving them your power.  Don’t do it!  Perhaps you can’t change the way politics works.  But you can seek to tell and live the truth in whatever community you inhabit.  And that’s more than a lot of folks do.

And you can watch Battleground for some great entertainment!

As Christians have been celebrating Holy Week this year, thousands have also been flocking to movie theaters to see The Hunger Games.  Before the movie was made, millions read the Hunger Games books as well as many other ‘dystopian’ works of fiction.  For those who aren’t well versed in the ‘opia’ terminology, a dystopian novel is one about a society where things are mostly bad; in contrast to a ‘utopian’ vision in which society has become very positive and good.

Many adults who have watched teenagers flock to these books and movies have wondered, both aloud and to themselves: Why are these dystopias so popular?  Why do kids want to read about a future gone wrong?  Easter Sunday seemed to me to be a perfect day to comment on these questions.

First, I’d like to point out that dystopias really aren’t anything new.  Greek tragedies, Fairy Tales, Dickens visions of the English Industrial Wasteland, many of Shakespeare’s plays, and much of modern science fiction, all present visions of a world in which the dark qualities of humanity have been victorious over the good.  Furthermore these works of fiction have served as a mirror held up to society through which people have been encouraged to see things as they really are.  

Perhaps the surprise then, is not that dystopias are popular but rather that we are surprised that they are popular.  Maybe American middle class adults whose kids ‘have everything they need’ are surprised that their nice looking, computer savvy, high self-esteem trained, mall-crawling child would be attracted to a story about a world that has turned into a nightmare.  

But maybe the kids are more honest than we are, and thus see things more clearly.  

It is a truism of psychology that people on the outside of a situation can see things more clearly than those on the inside.  Young people, who have no power and no say in society, may be able to see where things are headed, or could be headed, more easily than the adults who make the decisions.  Is a dystopian fascist society really that far out of the question?  Isn’t it conceivable that one nuclear accident, for example, could create a cascade of events resulting in the kind of chaos that could cause us to give up all of our rights and freedom in exchange for order?

Or perhaps the growing levels of poverty and disease and dislocation of peoples create enough anxiety amongst those who have power that they convince the ‘rest of us’ that extraordinary steps are necessary to ‘secure our freedom?’  

The truth is that for many many people in the world, life is far worse than that portrayed in the outer districts of the Hunger Games.  And I think our young people know this.

Thus the popularity of such a tale lies in its ability to help the young, and perhaps us older folks too, resolve their psychological distress and try to envision a way out: hope against all odds.  The young heroine of the games cannot fix them, or change them, at least not at first, but perhaps she can find a way to some day become the catalyst for change.  This latent promise of the story provides a sense of relief for the existential anxiety kids may feel, even unconsciously.

Of course the Easter story, as well as all the hopeful stories of every faith, is also about a way out of dystopia; a way into a resurrected life.  But perhaps until we adults start living that story in greater numbers, there will always be the need for tales like the Hunger Games.  Maybe the real lesson of the current dystopia craze is one we ‘big people’ need to learn.  Our youth are asking us to get our act together before things get even worse.

This past week my wife Debra and I went to the Seattle area to help our oldest son look for an apartment.  Even though northwest MN has been much warmer and farther ahead in the season than normal, it was still somewhat shocking to arrive in a world full of flowering trees and blooming bulbs.  Add to that mountains and forests and we had the usual sense of disorientation that is the result of our ultra-fast modern transportation system.  At one point Debra said, “It’s like we’ve come to a different world.”  Which got me thinking: what world do we really inhabit?

While waiting in both the Grand Forks and Minneapolis airports, we got to listen to, and watch, the endless drumbeat of the news.  The same two or three stories repeated and analyzed over and over.  In that world, there are two or three people, two or three events, one or two major themes.  And that world is always falling apart, usually bad, and very focused on several ‘important’ people.  It’s absorbing and very convincing.

Then as we flew, and drove, and walked I looked around at the thousands of people all around me.  None of them on the news, 92% of them employed, 100% of them NOT shooting each other, most of them pretty functional and behaving reasonably well.  Is this the real world even though it’s not on TV?

Finally I thought about the interior, personal life of each of these thousands of people.  For many of them, even though they look ok on the outside, I know that they aren’t so well on the inside.  Many are troubled, anxious, depressed, sick.  Many have significant financial problems or family problems.  Many have children and grandchildren who are unwell or struggling.  These truths are another ‘world’, another dimension of reality, of which we see only a microscopic piece.

The media world, the outer daily world, the inner private world.  Is one more ‘real’ than another?  Or if they are all equally real, then how are they related? Or are they connected?  

It strikes me that in our time we are increasingly able to separate, or choose, between many worlds.  Those who get their view of ‘the country’ from the media may decide that ‘we are going to hell in a hand basket,’ even if their daily lives haven’t changed at all!  Then there are those who inhabit very small, private worlds, and know nothing about what’s happening ‘outside’ their private sphere.  Their world is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ based only upon what’s happening to them, their friends, and family.  Or we may make our assessments of reality based upon the experience of our race and class which we expand and project upon ‘everyone.’  

I don’t know the ‘answer’ to these observations or questions.  But it does strike me that probably it’s all real.  If someone is nice to me on the bus or in a store, even though they are worrying about their child or their house payment, I think that both their worry and their kindness is genuine.  Similarly, the good and bad of the larger world are also real at the same time.  

Contemplative teachings talk about harmonizing, or synchronizing, all the aspects of our being; when we are synchronized we are the most present, the most true, the most ‘real.’  Perhaps the assortment of different worlds we can inhabit represent the lack of synchrony that exists on our planet.  Maybe someday they will all line up.  Maybe then what is on the news, and right in front of us, and in our hearts and minds won’t seem so different.  Maybe we can help make this happen by being as genuine as possible in all we do.  

The new ‘Obama healthcare’ law has finally made it to the Supreme Court where they will take on the question of whether the so called ‘individual mandate’ provision of the law is constitutional.  Of course this healthcare law has been the subject of fierce debate, much of it fueled by rightwing pundits who have health insurance, and much of this discussion seems to revolve around the concept of ‘freedom,‘ supposedly from ‘government intrusion‘ of some kind.  But what does this ‘freedom’ really mean?

Sadly we Americans, particularly when we are up in arms about freedom, behave in a manner that reminds me of a particular stage in child development.  Those of us who have kids know well the time when our young children insist that they can decide what to do, and they are very vocal about it.  Then when their decisions don’t work out so well, they are also very quick to ask for help from us, their parents.  

We can be like this as well.  We want our freedom to do whatever we’d like, independently from anyone’s influence, and then when things don’t work out for us, we want to sue and blame someone for the results of our poor decisions.  

In regards to healthcare this behavior looks something like this: we want to be able to buy or not buy insurance if we want, we want to be able to smoke as much as we want, drink as much as we want, drive as fast as we want without seat belts, eat as much bad food as we want, because who the #$#@ is the government to interfere with my behavior, and then when we get sick or get in a car wreck, we want the insurance premiums paid by others, or the hospitals, or the government to pay for our medical care.  

This is what the current state of our medical system looks like and it is the reason the healthcare law passed in the first place.  People either cannot afford insurance or they choose not to get insurance, and then they get sick and end up in the ER and the hospital or the government has to pick up the tab.  

At some point I hope that we abandon this supremely self-centered and short sighted approach to the concept of freedom, because it’s not what a true freedom tempered by responsibility looks like.  And I also hope that the vast majority of people, who wouldn’t normally support such a false view of freedom, do not allow themselves to be manipulated into working against their own interests under the banner of such ‘freedom.’

The reality is that we will all get sick and, at some point in time, some of us will be a lot sicker than others.  We all need healthcare and we all have the responsibility to try and live as healthy a life as possible in order to be the best citizens we can be.  Part of what this means is that we all should have access to basic healthcare and no one should walk around, as almost 50 million Americans now do, knowing that one illness could mean bankruptcy and a ruined life.  

Perhaps you are thinking by this point that I am in favor of the current healthcare law, but you would be wrong.  I think it’s horrible.  Basically it’s a massive give away to the insurance companies who currently consume almost 25% of healthcare costs.  

What we really need is a true single payer system that is funded by all of us and that we are all a part of: a system that guarantees everyone a basic level of care.  Of course there would be problems and issues with this system but, looking around the world, such arrangements serve their citizens better than the current American system.  

In regards to healthcare, the vision of universal coverage arises from a vision of true mature freedom: the freedom to live life responsibly in a society with other responsible adults.  

And for those who sincerely want the other kind of ‘freedom’.  Well if you’d like to be free to drive down the road at 80 mph drinking without your seatbelt (or doing whatever else you’d like to do with or without insurance), then I’d like society to be free to leave you in the ditch when you roll your vehicle... 

Every year the Crookston Figure Skating group puts on a skating show called Dreams on Ice.  All the kids and teams get to show off their routines and what they’ve learned during the year.  Our ice arena is always packed for the event and many people put in lots of hours making the show as spectacular as possible.  

I’ve gone to the show every year we’ve lived in Crookston and right from the first time I attended I noticed something different about it as compared to other youth athletic events.  In contrast to the many games and competitions I’ve attended, at the ice show everyone was happy!  There were no crying kids or long faces.  There were no angry parents or grumpy fans.  Rather there were smiles and shouts of glee and applause.  

I realized that what was different about the Ice Show was the complete lack of competition in the performances.  They were all for fun.  The kids got to show the fruits of their hard work and enjoy what they were doing and the audience got to appreciate this work without wondering if their team was winning or if their kid was getting enough playing time or if the refs and coaches were doing their job properly.

Many years ago I was the manager for my sons little league team.  As the season unfolded what I noticed was that our practices were wonderful.  We all had a good time.  The kids worked and played hard.  They learned new skills and enjoyed playing on the field together.  The atmosphere was relaxed and pleasant.  

Games however were quite a different story.  In this environment the atmosphere was often tense and laden with stress.  The kids were on edge, the parents were on edge.  If we won, most people felt excited.  But if we lost I had to deal with crying kids and disappointed, sometimes angry parents.  “Fun” was rarely a word I would use to describe this game-time experience.  At some point during the season I said to my friend who was helping with the team: “Do you think we could just forfeit the rest of our games and only have practice?”

As I have continued to watch and participate in youth sports since these baseball days, I have observed many of the same experiences as we had then.  Although competitive sports have their place and can certainly be exciting, much of what occurs in the course of these activities for kids is not uplifted.  And as we push kids to compete at younger and younger ages in more and more sports I think we need to pause and ask ourselves: what are we doing here?  

The Dreams on Ice experience provides a stunning contrast to the competitive model.  The atmosphere there is uplifted and positive.  Everyone appears to enjoy themselves and the kids feel great about what they do and are a part of.  Perhaps we might consider why, when we are encouraging our children to do physical activities, we don’t provide more such venues as a balance to the times that we encourage them to compete. 

March is the time for the NCAA basketball tournaments which are known as March Madness.  Sixty Eight teams participate in a nationwide single elimination tournament and for those of us who enjoy college basketball, it’s the highlight of the sports year.  In addition to watching the games, millions fill out ‘brackets’ where we try and guess who will will each game and, ultimately, the tournament.  

What is most exciting about March Madness are the upsets.  Each team is ranked within one of four divisions from a number one seed to a number sixteen seed.  Of course the higher ranked teams usually win, but in a one game match-up it’s true that anything can happen.  

This past Friday, two number 15 ranked teams beat two number two ranked teams.  Having two such major upsets on the same day of the tournament has never happened before.  And out of 6.5 million brackets that were filled out on the ESPN bracket system, NO ONE picked this to happen.  Which means that it was a greater than a one in a 6.5 million chance event.  Who knows how many brackets would have to be filled out before someone guessed this would happen, maybe one in a 100 million, maybe more.

When we see something like this happen, when we witness such a unique event, it is thrilling, even though it wrecks - or ‘busts’ our brackets.  It’s something that no one, certainly not us, would ever have thought possible.  Why is this exciting at all?  Perhaps it’s because we long for things beyond our imagination.  Perhaps we are discouraged or bored by the routine of our lives, by those things that never change or are so predictable.  Perhaps such unique events give us hope and tap into a spiritual longing for the truth of something greater than what we can normally see.

Whatever the exact reason, we know that to see and experience the unusual is at least a lot of fun.

So consider this: You are such an event.  

Each person on earth is at least a one in 7 billion chance event.  There is no one like you, and before you were born, no one would have predicted your coming.  Yet because we are so used to ourselves we don’t recognize how amazing we are.  We have beat the odds by appearing!  

Perhaps we might try and imagine how much better the world would be if we were all as thrilled by every unique occurrence of humanity as we are when we see an upset that has never happened.  

Perhaps we could try and be astounded by each other, and curious about what unique beings we all are; and then let’s get on with making the world a more humane place. 

Now that would be a ‘bracket buster’!

We are in the midst of tax season which means that lots of people are going to their accountant, or are doing their own accounting at their computer or kitchen table.  Making an account of money or a story is an old practice and from this comes our concept of accountability; as the song says, to make known ‘what’s goin’ on.’

Unfortunately we tend to hate accountability.  So much so that the term ‘being in trouble’ is now a synonym for accountability.  In my role as pastor I’m amazed how many times I ask to talk with someone, usually with the intention of visiting about something positive or just informational, only to be greeted with the response: “What did I do now?” or “What am I in trouble for now?”  

Certainly if we look at how we have come to understand ‘justice’ or ‘truth’ we can see that the practice of finding out what’s happened in a certain situation is often connected to a process of punishment.  These ideas filtered down even to child rearing, where a common phrase from the ‘old days’ of father working and mom staying at home  was ‘wait till your father gets home.’  The implication of course was that accountability was connected to severe punishment.  

In addition, accountability is scary because it requires that we examine ourselves, our motivations, our behaviors and we’d often rather avoid these things.  So we become defensive and angry and avoid being accountable.  Thus, sadly, friendship often becomes an obstacle to being accountable.  How many times do we hear, “Well you’re their friend so ...” the implication being that we won’t want to hold that person accountable.  This is unfortunate.

Because really accountability should be about growth and the creation of a more positive, good world.  Accountability should free us from past debts, or wrongdoings and move us forward in the light of a greater discovered truth.  

Which brings me to the idea of a Crookston town square.

This week the idea of a downtown green space was floated at the cities Ways & Means Committee meeting.  It’s a great idea.  Town squares, or small urban parks, are wonderful communal spaces that promote healthy communities.  So what does this have to do with accountability?

Well the suggested site for the green space is the open area at the old Central High School location.  In the discussion at the Committee it came up that of course the city would have to buy the site from the person who now owns the old school.  The problem is that person ‘bought’ - I think the better term is: ‘was given’ - the school from the District a number of years ago for only $25,000.  Part of that deal was a promise that the old gym would be kept in repair for use by the District; in fact the District was even going to pay to rent the gym. 

Except that promise was immediately broken.  The old gym was left to deteriorate and now our kids play sports in gyms that are too small and not built for anyone except tiny elementary age students.  And now we are talking about buying back the empty land for more than was paid for the entire piece of property, building and all.

In a world where accountability was a serious and positive part of our social contract, everyone would ‘’fess up‘ to this unfortunate situation.  The District would admit that it made a mistake giving away this property and the current owner would admit that he didn’t keep his promise.  But rather than resulting in punishment or retribution such an accounting would result in a search for a positive solution and the owner would just give the property to the city for a town square.

This past week Rep. Mary Franson, R-Alexandria got in some hot water by comparing the poor who use food stamps to wild animals who shouldn’t be fed lest they become ‘dependent’ upon such feeding.  Even though she has apologized for the comment, the reality is that disliking the poor has a long and well established history throughout all of human civilization.  And not only do the well off and successful tend to dislike and look down upon the poor, but they also do almost everything in their power to not know, or have any contact with, poor people.  

What’s up with this?  I believe that what lies at the heart of this problem is a fear of our creatureliness: the reality of being a biological, material entity.  Because if we face this fact, then we also have to face the reality that what happens to us, the course of our lives, is almost completely out of our control.  And that truth scares the daylights out of us.

When we are in denial about being a creature we can imagine that our success is our doing.  Therefore someone who isn’t successful must also be doing that to themselves: poverty is their fault.  

This neat delusion allows us to ignore the seemingly random nature of our birth location, family, skin color, biological attributes, and the opportunities, or lack there of, afforded by these basic facts of our existence.  We don’t want to think about the potential disease that could end our run of success or the tornado that could destroy our lives or the massive recession that could end our career prospects for years to come.  

Because to acknowledge these things is to face the reality that we are all incredibly dependent on each other, on the rest of the world, and on the greater universal consciousness some of us call God.  Those who are rich don’t like thinking that they are dependent upon the maid making less than a living wage when they stay at a hotel.  Or the factory worker living who makes their children’s cheap toys in life circumstances that they would never choose.  Or the migrant farmers who pick their vegetables in fields sprayed with poisons that make them sick.  

Thus hating the poor keeps people from experiencing a kind of survivor guilt; the feelings that can overwhelm a survivor of a terrible accident or other tragedy.  It’s the ‘why me?’ question.  Why did I survive and they died?  Why was I born to buy the cheap toy rather than make it?  To acknowledge that we are a creature is to acknowledge that we don’t have an answer to this question.  Such a realization brings us to the deep abyss that is the truth of our material existence.  And let’s face it, it’s more fun to pretend that we are in charge!

Of course the life of faith points us in the opposite direction.  We are charged by God to embrace our creatureliness: to acknowledge our dependance.  Of course we should try to use our gifts to the fullest.  But, if we are fortunate, we do so knowing that we could become ‘poor‘ ourselves at any moment or that we could have been born into circumstances that would consign us to such a life.  The fruit of such a realization is compassion and a desire to be in relationship with all sorts of people, but especially the poor.  And when we do so we recognize our dependance as well as theirs, and we work together to lift all and dignify every person as a beloved, not hated, creature.  

Since the workers have been locked out of the American Crystal Plants, I’ve been doing a lot of listening and asking questions.  I’ve listened to workers, and growers.  I’ve gone through the contract line by line with a union official.  I’ve talked to people observing the dispute, and I’ve read dozens of letters and opinion pieces.  Perhaps the only people I haven’t spoken to directly are the high level Crystal administrators.  

I would say that the vast majority of what I’ve heard and read have the usual, ‘us vs them’ approach to conflict with the idea that the writer or speaker is correct and the other side is wrong.  People are accused of being ‘greedy’ or ‘pro-worker’ or ‘anti-worker’.  Rarely does one side give the other side any validation or credit for their perspective or point of view or concern.  Of course this approach mirrors the increasing polarization of society as a whole.  

So, after months of listening, I’d like to suggest a different approach.  What if we began with the notion that BOTH sides were right and BOTH sides were wrong and then went from there?  

Let’s start with greed, a core accusation in this dispute.  There is no particular class or group of person that corners the market on greed.  Rather greed is a basic human quality.  We are all greedy in that we are all biologically programmed to try and do as well for ourselves as possible.  Is trying to make $2 million a year, as the CEO of the company does, greedy: yes.  But so is trying to have a guaranteed job no matter what your job performance, a key stand of this and other unions in the modern era.  Furthermore it’s also ‘greedy’, in a globalized economy, to somehow think that making over $20/hr without even a high school degree is a ‘bad offer.’  And are the farmers ‘greedy’ for always wanting new trucks and equipment and ‘toys’: yes to that as well.  

At the same time there’s another side to human nature which is the impulse to work and live and act in community.  We are social animals.  Thus along with greed, it is also important to acknowledge that everyone in this dispute has worked incredibly hard, together, over the years to make this industry the amazing success that it is today.  The farmers have taken significant risks and had many bad years, but right now happen to be having some very good ones, and this is the fruit of their labor.  In the same way the workers and the administrators of the company have also worked very hard so that the product coming out of the plant is the best it can be for the market. 

Control is another core issue in this dispute.  Both sides want as much control as possible over the work, and how it is done and by whom, at the plant.  This desire for control is closely connected to our capacity for greed and is quite natural.  Control also happens to be a key issue in economics in general and capitalism specifically.  Owners are seen as the ones who control the business.  Of course, because of human tendency to greed, this control can lead to exploitation which is why unions and social controls on business exist in the first place.  So, again, both ‘sides’ in this dispute have valid issues and concerns about control.  The owners rightly feel that they should control their business, and the workers also have a valid concern about that control not becoming abuse.  

So where might the new solution lie?  All over the world, and certainly in our society, we are beginning to see the limits of the classic capitalist system.  At the same time, we have also seen the complete failure of various ‘socialist’ systems, in which the government controls business.  What we have seen increasing success with are business models in which everyone in the business is an owner.  Everyone has a stake in both the success and failure of the business and everyone shares the risk and reward.

I would suggest that one possible solution to the problem at Crystal is to make the workers part of the ownership structure of the company.  This would give them some of the control they apparently wish for but it would also require them to share in the risk of being part of a farming business.  When there were good years, they would do better economically.  But when there bad years they would have to take less.  

This solution would require both sides to give a bit and gain a bit.  And it would acknowledge both the greed and the spirit of working together that are aspects of our fallen human nature.

This week, parents in Ohio will be burying their children who were shot dead in school.  With this shooting incident as a backdrop, MN legislators are considering a bill that would make it legal to shoot someone on the street who you thought was threatening you.  This bill is being touted as an extension of the laws that allow you to shoot someone who has broken into your home.  Only now you could shoot someone anywhere, just because you felt you were being threatened or attacked.  

Since 9/11 our collective sense of feeling threatened and unsafe has skyrocketed.  Our response to this experience has been more weapons, more guns, more surveillance, more suspicion.  And despite a complete lack of any evidence that these measures and actions have increased our actual safety, we continue down this path of violence.  Hence the new shooter bill.

What’s particularly interesting though about this current piece of legislation is that every law-enforcement organization in the state is opposed to the new law.  Hardly a left-wing anti-gun bunch, police officers have immediately grasped the highly dangerous nature of the legislation.  

Let’s imagine what could have happened in Ohio had such a law been in place there.  It’s bad enough that seriously disturbed teenagers have no problem getting their hands on a gun to bring to school.  Only now, in this hypothetical new world, all the teachers are armed as well.  One of them turns a corner in the school and sees the student shooting in their direction.  Perceiving a threat, they start shoot at the kids.  Now another teacher comes from the other direction and sees the first teacher firing on a student.  They assume that the teacher has gone crazy and they start shooting at the teacher.  By the time the police arrive, there is a full fledged gun battle raging inside the school.  One could imagine a similar scene at the rally where several people were shot in AZ a year ago.

Yet our legislators have, to this point, completely ignored the expert opinions of our law enforcement organizations.  Why?  Because they apparently feel that they can score political points by playing off of our fears and insecurities regarding out safety.  

There have been times in human history when everyone walked around armed.  In our country we love to watch stories about the ‘wild west’ and romanticize gun battles in the streets.  In the middle ages in Europe and around the world, those who could afford armor and swords felt free to terrorize their neighbors.  Were these times really safer?  Is a return to the Wild West a sign of progress?

In one of the most violent places during one of the most violent times, the First Century  A. D. in Roman occupied Palestine, Jesus wandered the streets unarmed promoting love of neighbor as a solution to the problem of safety and anxiety.  In a world of 7 billion people and climbing, such a message seems even more important and necessary.  

I understand the biological imperative of our ‘flight or fight’ hormonal response to threat.  It’s very powerful.  However all spiritual teachers and leaders have suggested that we as aware human beings attempt to transcend this chemical impulse and try for something better.  Too bad that in this one particular situation, our political leaders seem to be trying to lead us backwards.

No this isn’t about American Crystal.  But it is about crystals, water crystals.  As winter seems to have finally arrived I thought I’d share some reflections about water crystals.  These ideas were inspired by the beautiful hoar frosts we had here a couple of weeks ago (for those of you reading this blog in sunnier climes, hoar frost happens in foggy cold conditions when the moisture in the air crystalizes onto all of the trees, grasses, bushes etc).  If you want to see some pictures of the hoar frost, you can check them out on my Facebook page.

Water crystals are pretty amazing things.  We’ve perhaps all heard about how every snow flake is unique.  No one really understands why this is so beyond the recognition that water is exquisitely sensitive to environmental conditions.  In addition, the number of possible permutations and combinations of crystals based upon water’s six fold symmetry is very large.  Thus every minute change in temperature and pressure in a cloud or the air or near an object, will result in a different arrangement of water molecules as the crystal forms.  

A few years ago, a Japanese scientist, Masaru Emoto, claimed to have evidence that the formation of ice crystals was influenced by human thought and emotion.  When exposed to ‘positive’ thoughts and emotions, he saw beautiful crystals while ‘negative’ emotions created ugly crystals.  This work hasn’t been replicated scientifically, and it’s not clear if the emotions were helping create the crystals, or if Emoto was just looking for beautiful or ugly crystals based upon what he thought the emotions should produce.  

However, here’s another way of looking at this interesting relationship between our thoughts, feelings, and water crystals.  I know that when I looked at the amazing hoar frost crystals, when I really looked at them, I felt good.  Their incredible beauty influenced me in a positive way.  Furthermore I know how good it feels to drink cool, clean water when I am thirsty.  One might ask, if the water can influence us, why can’t we influence it?

Jesus talks a lot about how our minds can influence the material world.  The book of Proverbs talks a lot about our interaction with the material world can alter our minds.  Today, a great debate is raging about just how true these ideas are.  The second notion, that the world influences our mind, seems much more obvious and acceptable than the first.  If we hit our head against a brick wall, our head hurts and we are likely to be grumpy.  But we’re not too convinced that our thoughts can hit the wall back in any meaningful way!

I think that part of the problem with understanding the influence of our thoughts on the world is that the effects, if they are there, are very subtle and hard to both detect and replicate experimentally.  Yet we have all had the experience of ‘knowing’ something from outside of ourselves that we ‘couldn’t’ have known; we have all been influenced by thoughts from afar.  So why not the other way around?

Even if we cannot order water crystals by our thoughts, it seems to me that there is an overwhelming amount of evidence that our minds are not simply trapped inside our heads.  Our thoughts effect the world.  Perhaps Dr. Emoto was just trying to show us this truth, give us a glimpse of the power we have to effect the world for good or ill.  

One thing is crystal clear: when I see the beauty of the invisible water made visible, it impacts me in a positive way.  The least I can do for the world is return the favor with my thoughts and feelings of love and care.