Exorcism video exemplifies why many homosexuals don't trust Christianity

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. - The video shows the 16-year-old boy lying on the floor, his body convulsing, as elders of a small Connecticut church cast a "homosexual demon" from his body.

"Rip it from his throat!" a woman yells. "Come on, you homosexual demon! You homosexual spirit, we call you out right now! Loose your grip, Lucifer!"

The 20-minute video posted on YouTube by Manifested Glory Ministries is being called abuse by gay and youth advocates, who are demanding an investigation. But a church official this week denied that the teenager was injured or that the church is prejudiced...

Full article

Maybe progressive Christians should get in on this:

"You homophobe demon, begone!"

"You Young-Earth devil, you are cast out!"

"In the name of Jesus, depart spirit of unabated corporate greed!"

Coming out of the right-wing Buddhist closet

Are you someone who has politically conservative leanings on economics, domestic or foreign policy, ethical or spiritual issues, or in some other area? Are you often wary of engaging in political discussions with your fellow practitioners because you feel you will either have to hide your views or receive a disapproving response or a even a lecture on the fact that you are being inconsistent, or worse, hypocritical about your professed Buddhist values and your confessed political positions? Or are you someone who feels, like blogger DJ Buddha, that "If you’re a Buddhist, you need to vote for progressive candidates."

In the interest of fairness I should disclose at least my own general tendencies regarding the political spectrum and confess that...

I am neither of these types of people. As far as politics in the United States goes, I generally come out left of center. I don't mind at all, nor do I think that I need to claim to be "in the middle" or a "moderate" in order to be reasonable or fair-minded. I can defend and promote my values without having to be derisive or disrespectful towards others, although despite this I don't always choose such a preferable path. That being said, stereotyping the political perspective of any large, socio-economically and ethnically heterogeneous group is always a mistake, as Jeff Wilson astutely points out in a recent commentary published at the Tricycle Editors Blog. In "Voting Buddhist?" Jeff reminds us of the historically conservative nature of Buddhism when it comes to Asian politics, the complex motives of immigrant Buddhists which leads many of them to vote for conservative candidates, and the results of a recent Pew Forum survey in which a large minority (44%) of convert Buddhists did not identify themselves as being liberal, feeling that their political perspective was more accurately reflected either as moderate or conservative.

I can see some objections being raised to Wilson's analysis. For one thing, Buddhism has been used to promote change, both at the personal and societal level, and in some sense this can be touted as being progressive. But does conservative automatically mean anti-equality or for the wealthy and against the poor? In the polemic tone of modern politics in the U.S., this may seem to be so. Of course, while some Buddhist reformers, such as Honen and Nichiren in Japanese history, were known for trying to stand up for the commoner and liberate practice from the nearly exclusive purview of the elites, the system they were working to reform was maintained and justified by other Buddhists! I tend to agree that in as much as Joshua bin Joseph, Siddhartha Gautama and others were somewhat radical and left-wing in terms of their spiritual revolutions, this does not always mean that such shifts are accompanied immediately by full-scale political revolutions. I am not suggesting one cannot be used to inspire the other, but even after such a change, what was new and edgy is now the status quo. Maintaining that new status quo becomes a conservative effort. Again, this is distinct from the kind of elites versus the commoner parsing of conservative and progressive, in which the face of the revolution is co-opted by the elites to maintain their power.

That suggests that there it is not, in fact, illogical or inconceivable to have someone find inspiration and liberation in the teachings of the Buddha without being a card-carrying member of the Socialist party. People on the left, we love to talk about inclusion, but often this is thought of strictly in terms of the disenfranchised and powerless. When it comes to those with differing political views, it can mean We will work and wait patiently until you come around to our way of seeing things. As Wilson suggests, "The lack of a reasonable argument for Republican Buddhism, therefore, may not be because there is no such argument, but because liberal Buddhists create an environment wherein such sentiments are difficult to express."

So, if you are a non-liberal, particularly a conservative and/or Republican, you are cordially invited to share your experiences in this regard if you will and, if you wish, feel welcome to explain why you believe your position is NOT incompatible with your Buddhist values and practice, as some have argued.

Can Buddhist phenomenology effectively sort the abortion issue?

James Ure of The Buddhist Blog has written about his personal views concerning abortion with the caveat that he is not representing any particular Buddhist tradition, school, or sect. Instead he wishes to use his understanding of Buddhism to discuss and justify his positions on the issue. You are encouraged to go and read his thoughts along these lines because he has put quite a bit of effort into it, yet you will not find a set of point by point counterarguments here. While I do reference his writing, it is not to try to contradict him or critique every single thing he says point by point. Instead his post raises the question about the ultimate utility of such an approach. What does it really offer and what can we do with it?

For starters, James acknowledges that those opposed to abortion point to Buddhist writings condemning the act. He politely points out that some texts which are attributed to the Buddha may in fact have been written by other monks, so he wishes to apply the Buddha's more widely accepted principles (including a model of skeptical inquiry based on the Kalama Sutra). James seems confident that the advice to the Kalama people was a historical event and that it is a sensible model. At this point you might wonder how much of the Buddha's teachings were recorded in his own lifetime. The answer is - none. They were written down during a council of his disciples and students that met after his death. Other teachings, often in sutra form, have been produced hundreds of years after the death of Siddhartha Gautama. For the sake of legitimacy, these were frequently authenticated as oral teachings which had been previously untranscribed. Others attribute them to the development of the understanding of the Buddha's teachings by later Buddhist communities. Neither of these explanations automatically make what is said in these sutras right or wrong. This in turn means that even if the Buddhist writings opposing abortion are not the original words of the Buddha, they may still be consistent with the spirit of his message (as some would say these authors may have been touching the Buddha's "Dharma Body"). James does not provide the details of these writings or there arguments, so we are unable to assess them ourselves.

Next, James candidly points out that he "follow[s] the sutras in many cases, I also use my meditations, scholarly works, mind-set, values instilled by my family, pondering and personal reasoning to come to that direct knowledge of what I believe to be 'truth.' " There is nothing here to criticize, but it is important to note that everything after "meditations" is a product of societal and personal history and the corresponding cultural values attached to such influences. One must be cautious in this regard because it tends to lead even the most fair-minded person, often subconsciously, to a biased selection of evidence in addition to coloring the interpretation of said evidence. Often we have some gut reaction about what we want to believe and then find logical reasons and evidence to construct a justification for that position. It also means someone in good faith could go through the total available evidence and use the same tools as James does to come to a different conclusion about the moral and ethical implications of abortion.

For example, James focuses on the debate of how he thinks Buddhism defines life. To clarify, it is presumed he means sentient life. I make this clarification because many living things do not possess all of the features he mentions. It should also be clarified that the question of when life begins, which generally follows the question of what "counts" as life in the abortion debate, is also inaccurate. According to the best current estimates of paleontologists, life on Earth began roughly 3.5 billion years ago, and every living thing on the planet is a part of that same unbroken chain of reproduction. All the life on Earth now is simply a continuation of the life that came into existence then. What people really mean is "When does an immature individual human organism become a person?" A person is a (typically biological) individual whom society formally recognizes with the granting of rights. Normally such biological individuals belong to our own species, Homo sapiens, although some folks have been fighting to get similar formal recognition and rights for non-humans primates such as chimpanzees. Getting back to abortion, the issue then is when an immature human organism should be recognized as a person.

This helps undercut some of the clutter that get into these debates. Yes, the zygote/embryo/fetus is alive. Yes it is an individual (even if you cleave the zygote they may each survive and grow up to be separate people - think identical twins). Yes it is human. Who cares if it has gill slits and a tail? That is part of the normal human life cycle. Until your late teens/early twenties you had unfused epiphyses at the ends of your long bones, but that developmental detail didn't make you less than human. These facts are not in dispute on whichever side of the debate you may personally land. In acknowledging this we can get back to the central question - when and how does an living human organism get to be recognized as a person? This issue of personhood underlies many of the major abortion debates as those familiar with the arguments will know. But it also drives us to a more scrupulous assessment of when and how personhood is granted, because as you and I and a human embryo growing in the womb are all living human organisms. If we are going to set standards for who has rights and who does not we must be careful we don't hang ourselves by our own arguments.

This brings us back to the assessment James makes using the notion of Skandas, or the aggregates to which a living sentient being can be reduced. These traditionally include form, sensation, perception, mental formations, and consciousness. For example James points out that at certain stages embryos lack the form (biological structures) necessary for the five traditional senses, including physical pain. At different stages an embryo or fetus may not yet have the capacity for perception or mental formations (basic thoughts and feelings), let alone full consciousness. So he arranges his schedule of when he believes abortions should be permitted or not according to how well the immature organism places on a Skanda scale. Thus he writes:

In conclusion, I have submitted in this essay that an embryo (which is the potential human being) during the first trimester does not meet the requirements of all five skandha/aggregates and is therefore persmissable to believe in first trimester abortion as a Buddhist. I do not, however, agree with late term abortions except if the life of the mother is in jeopardy.

So I am for abortion during the first trimester and only for abortion in the second trimester in cases of rape, incest and when the life of the mother is at risk.

Again, the point here isn't to discredit James' opinion, so we instead can ask - "Are there other situations in which a human organism other than a zygote/embryo/fetus may not be deserving of personhood by such criteria?" If there are, then while his effort gets us closer to an answer, James' position is not complete. For example, some humans are born without one or more (fully) functioning sense organs. Others may acquire such a lack of perception later in life due to illness or injury. Similarly, some may lack the cognitive development and corresponding capacity to process certain perceptual information, or to develop and contemplate sophisticated mental formations. Others may slip into a coma which may include a lack of consciousness. What about them? And is a human organism in a coma not a person if they have healthy neural tissue and a chance to wake up? What about someone in a persistent vegetative state?

This line of thought can then permute in many directions and lead to debates over whether the potential to develop is relevant, the effect of giving something a name, whether or not other criteria can (and should) be used to distinguish human organisms that are still in the womb from those which are not, including the degree of dependence of an individual on some external life support such the mother's body (and whether this is comparable to other supports such as iron lung). These arguments are outside of the scope of the present phenomenological analysis, but they are not necessarily outside of the realm of Buddhist metaphysics. Perhaps they point to fruitful areas of analysis for future contemplation. But they also hint at other more practical questions - is a solid argument for or against abortion based on Buddhism even possible and if one existed, would it really influence those Buddhists who are committed to or opposed to abortion rights?

When is a cracker "just a cracker"

It's just a flag and some rope...



It's just a flag and a badge...



It's just a man and a cracker...

(photo credited to Agencia Brasil)

On a basic level, these statements are all true. However, who can be aware of history and not realize the significance of the Nazi flag and the yellow badges to those of Jewish heritage? Or what the Confederate flag coupled with a noose implies to African-Americans? In the aftermath of the incidents in Jena, Louisiana some tried to excuse the noose that was placed in a tree on high school property as a "joke", and the controversy sparked copycats on college campuses, raising concerns over historical ignorance and and racial insensitivity.

Our realities are constructed in our conscious awareness through symbols that are imbued with meaning, even for those who consider themselves rational empiricists. Even though our cognitive maps of reality may differ and our narratives of existence may vary somewhat from one person and one group to the next, we all have the capacity to appreciate and even tolerate symbols we ourselves do not empower with the same value. In fact this is the challenge of living in a pluralistic society - deciding the rules for respecting each others ways of understanding and valuing our existence.

There is of course a danger when we start to value abstractions and symbols over lived experience or philosophies and affiliations over living beings. In politics this error can be seen in the extreme rhetoric of jingoism, the distorted imitation of genuine patriotism. The symbols of the nation are conflated with the principles for which they stand and in some cases trump those principles - that is, protecting the flag outweighing freedom of expression. Slogans and judgementalism are also part of the mix, with a strong distinction between those who are "with" or "against" a group based on whether they "honor" the right symbols (which in practice is virtually idolatry) and profess the proper beliefs, at least in public.

The same kind of mentality has also been observed for some religious institutions as well. It is also recognized that sacred traditions have the power to magnify what is the human heart, giving birth to some of the worst and some of the best of which humans are capable. When these two trends merge in an ugly way, the result can be religious intolerance and persecution. In some cases, a good-humored satire, a healthy dose of comic irreverence, can defuse the tensions which would otherwise see "Commies", "terrorists", or "blasphemers" under every rock and around every corner. I deeply revere the teachings of the Buddha and Jesus, yet I find the episodes of South Park featuring these characters in absurd situations among my favorites (see "Super Best Friends" or "Fantastic Easter Special").

Of course, not everyone would agree with me and would find those episodes deeply offensive. Yet some of those folks may chuckle at milder forms of parody or criticism. In one sense, whether someone has gone "too far" in criticizing or disrespecting some aspect of another person's or groups beliefs is fairly subjective. But there are some clues which suggest one is headed in that direction, such as: blatant and blanket disrespect towards an entire group which is directed as often or more often at the people than towards their beliefs; open hostility expressed in cruel mockery such as the vulgar abuse of uncharitable strawmen caricatures; and taking pleasure in intentionally upsetting or disturbing members of the groups in question.

Which brings us to a recent controversy over a Eucharistic host, the wafer that is blessed by a priest in Christian traditions such as Catholicism during the observance of Holy Communion, the celebration honoring the Last Supper of Christ with his disciples. In Catholicism it is taught that after the blessing of the wafer it hosts the presence of Christ (hence the name) - it becomes the same in substance as the body of Christ. Only those who have received the sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation and who are in communion with the Roman Catholic Church are allowed to receive and east the host. This isn't just an isolated belief among other beliefs in Catholicism. It is part of a whole in which the faithful seek to honor and obey God by honoring and following the example and teaching of Jesus.

Initial news storie concerning the controversy began by reporting when Webster Cook, college student at UCF who objected to churches holding services on the campus of a public university, removed a consecrated host from a Catholic service. After a sever over-reaction by some Catholics including reports of death threats, the student claimed he had merely been curious about the host and had not intended to cause any controversy or to upset anyone. In the end the Cook returned the host, focusing on his claims that excessive force was used in trying to keep him from taking the host and expressing an interest in a positive fruitful reconciliation of his difference with the local Diocese.

Those who threatened violence against Cook are guilty of that ugliness of putting their reverence of the holy ahead of their obedience to the holy, as Christ advocated love and peace. It is as absurd as the death threats made by some Muslims to the employees of a Danish newspaper which had published (offensively drawn)images of the prophet Mohammed. The local Diocese rightly rebuked any threats toward the young man, who in turn expressed his ignorance of the pain he had caused by his actions.

But the story does not end here. Instead PZ Myers, a college professor and blogger who regularly expresses his disdain for anything promoting or revering the sacred, especially religion, decided to involve himself by asking his readers to intentionally take a consecrated host from a Catholic service for the sole purpose of sending it to Myers to be desecrated. Myers wasted no time going through with his plan.

In describing his disrespecting of a Eucharistic host Myer's doesn't neglect to mention that the badges used by the Nazis to identify Jews (as per the pictures at the start of the post) were first used by the Catholic Church, an organization which has a tragic history of persecuting people of different faiths, and particularly those of Jewish heritage. Part of this persecution included the charge of desecrating a Eucharistic host. (As an aside, it might be possible to find Jews or Muslims who would view the image of the Pope and a consecrated host as much signs of violent oppression as the other sets of images.)

Myer's frustration and annoyance over the revelation that Catholics still revere the Eucharistic host (and that some would even threaten violence over its mistreatment) is part of a larger more generalized hostility revealed regularly on his blog, Pharyngula. Myers appears to lump religion, superstition, the supernatural, spirituality, and any discussion of appreciation for the sacred into a more or less homogeneous stew of stupidity fit for only the weak and the gullible:

There are days when it is agony to read the news, because people are so goddamned stupid. Petty and stupid. Hateful and stupid. Just plain stupid. And nothing makes them stupider than religion.

-from "It's A Frackin' Cracker"


I'm going to need lots and lots of people to rise up and follow suit, subjecting old, dishonest institutions of hardened dogma to our chief weapon of ridicule and deris…our two weapons of ridicule, derision and laughter…no, three weapons of ridicule, derision, laughter, and skeptici…oh, never mind. You know what I mean...

Nothing must be held sacred. Question everything. God is not great, Jesus is not your lord, you are not disciples of any charismatic prophet... You will not find wisdom in rituals and sacraments and dogma, which build only self-satisfied ignorance...

-from "The Great Desecration"

So we arrive back at the question of living civilly in a culturally and religiously diverse society. For those who are not Catholic, or Christian, or in any sense devoutly religious, the idea that people would get so upset over what is presumed to be an ordinary object can seem absurd or frightening. For those who are strongly irreligious and aspiritual, this impression is magnified. Since they have no reason to see the host (or for the irreligious anything) as sacred, neither the body of Christ nor the host is an object of their reverence. But does it need to be in order to be deserving of respect? Is the desire to deflate the beliefs of others a justification for incivility?

On his former blog Even the Devils Believe Chris Tessone, a priest in the Independent Catholic Christian Church, assessed the situation thusly:

Myers' response — and that of his readers — takes much from the unhinged anti-religious movement of Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. The idea is that if any religious people do something bad, all religious people should suffer. If any religious person is a bit thoughtless, blame all religious people for being superstitious fundamentalist zealots.

Attacking people, as Myers does, simply because they hold practices and beliefs you don't understand is one of the most poisonous actions one can take against those who are Other, and the body politic itself. It is disruptive to the best traditions of a pluralistic society like ours — just as abuses against the Koran have been in war zones American soldiers have been active in recently. This kind of behavior has absolutely no place in our society.

Jimmy Akin, a Roman Catholic with an eponymous blog who posted extensively about Myers' attitudes and actions concerning the Eucharist (and who has attempted to spark a campaign to have Myers fired on the grounds he is unfit to work at a public liberal arts university) echoed Tessone's sentiment...

[T]he statement that he would desecrate the Eucharist "joyfully and with laughter in my heart" unambiguously indicates that this is not a dispassionate scientific demonstration of the falsity of Catholic belief regarding the Eucharist.

[I]t's a snide jab at religious belief based on an overly simplistic understanding of that belief.

In Myers' case it is also a deliberate and cruel violation of the most deeply felt religious sensibilities of other human beings. He's not just saying he doesn't see evidence for God. He's proposing to deliberately desecrate what other humans hold most sacred, which is bound to stir passionate feelings and cause profound personal pain to every faithful Catholic who hears of it, including those who are not sending him hate mail and who have caused no harm and done nothing to bring about this situation.

Even if PZ Myers does not respect the Eucharist, he should respect those people...

-from "Bad Science"


Although he carried out his action. in his words, to support the idea that "Nothing must be held sacred" (also trashing a few pages of The God Delusion, a book with which he is in sympathy), he did not merely tell people that nothing must be held sacred. Nor did he argue for it. Claiming that nothing must be held sacred or proposing arguments for this proposition are a subject that can be discussed in a civil, respectful manner.

Instead, P. Z. Myers surreptitiously obtained and then desecrated something that is held most sacred by numerous individuals. He went out of his way to offend, to provoke the most deeply held sentiments of others, and he did so in full knowledge of what he was doing, as witnessed by the fact that he complains repeatedly on his blog about all of the outraged complaints he has been receiving from Catholics via e-mail...

P. Z. Myers has demonstrated that he will go out of his way to offend the sensibilities of anybody who holds anything sacred, to treat whatever they hold sacred with public contempt. The problem thus is not limited to Catholics and Muslims. Since, in Myers own words, "Nothing must be held sacred," ...he is willing to desecrate anything that others do hold sacred...

-from "P.Z. Meyers Must Be Fired"

One irony of this situation is that Myers is privileging his beliefs (including the conviction that nothing is or should be considered sacred) to the point of making it acceptable to treat any contradictory views held by others with total contempt. That chafes against the spirit of the secular and progressive movements' drive for democratic plurality in religious views (including irreligion and atheism), but it does not violate the personal liberty of Catholics.

The personal liberty of one citizen does not permit the subversion of another's - that is, you can believe what you want so long as it doesn't lead to unreasonable inconvenience or harm to someone else. This is the core principle behind many articles of the Bill of Rights, including the freedoms of speech and of religion, as Myers' correctly cites in his reply to a complaint by the Confraternity of Catholic Clergy:

Freedom of speech means I do have the right to malign and make fun of any religion I want. I can't interfere with your right to practice your religion, but that hasn't happened — all I've done is laugh at you.

Each person can decide for her or himself whether or not she or he thinks Myers went too far by employing gleeful derision in challenging a central element of Catholicism, but given that:

• his actions neither prove nor disprove whether a consecrated host is sacred;
• his actions are geared at provoking animosity as opposed to introspection;
• his response fails to address appropriate/inappropriate relationships and responses to what we most revere and cherish in favor of being dismissive; and
• the episode plays into the more banal stereotypes of atheists,

I have to say this has not so much been a victory for atheism so much as an indication of the failures in dialogue between those at the poles of theism and atheism. For those who are adamant that the bottom line in all of this is that "it's just a cracker", keep that in mind the next time someone gestures their strong disagreement or frustration with you. (After all, it's just a finger ;oP)

Confronting injustice and suffering

It isn't simply enough to not personally participate in overt acts of injustice or to not intentionally inflict needless suffering on others. One has to be conscious of the need to actively oppose these wrongs - racism, torture, slavery, poverty, preventable illnesses, to name a few examples. I don't generally like the phrase "If you aren't part of the solution then you are a part of them problem." We are always a part of both. It's just a matter of percentages. It's just a matter of what we actively or passively condone at any given moment. Whether we are aware and try to understand each other and our problems or whether we close ourselves off. We don't need divisive slogans - we need people to stand up and inspire others by their own example. May we all seek and discover the courage and wisdom to do so every day.

An Unlit Candle - Tibet, Passover, and the struggle toward the Light

Politics and religion. Now that should get an "Oy!" A few weeks ago I posted a reference to an article in the Jerusalem Post titled "Are Tibetans the New Jews?" Both groups had an autonomous religious state and highly religious culture which was absorbed into a larger empire. The Romans destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem, and the Chinese destroyed thousands of ancient monasteries throughout Tibet. Many Jews left their occupied homeland before and during a forcible expulsion. Many Tibetans have also fled their homeland and have ended up all over the world. Jews were concerned with how to maintain their religious, cultural, and ethnic identity. Many Tibetans are now pondering those same concerns. This comparison is not intended to be a dig at the Chinese or the descendants of the Romans, nor is it ignorant of the plight of other groups, for example, the many Palestinians who are caught in a conflict they neither want nor desire. Yet it does suggest on some level a sense of shared suffering. And some have now suggested that this be recognized with a sign of solidarity - An Unlit Candle at the Seder Table...

We call on all Jews to include an unlit candle on their Seder Tables this year. The candle symbolizes both the Olympic torch, whose light has been dimmed, and the unmet hopes of a people still living without freedom.

In the Jewish tradition, light symbolizes freedom, hope, and renewal. On Shabbat, Chanukah, and on holidays including Passover, we light candles to shed light into our hearts, thank God for the blessings we enjoy, and commit ourselves to our religion’s ideals of justice and freedom for all.

But for three million Tibetans living under military rule, the light has been extinguished. Tibetans may not freely practice their religion, display their flag, or honor their leader, the Dalai Lama. Doing so puts them at risk of jail, torture, or worse.

The point is not just to have another symbol on your table. Rather, as with the rest of the Seder, the point is to stimulate discussion and action. When your loved ones ask about the unlit candle on the Seder table, talk with them about the Tibetans’ struggle for freedom.

Thanks to Rachel of Velveteen Rabbi for sharing this and to Danny Fisher and all the others who are also passing it on.

The world starts to wake up to Tibet

After forty nine years, at least some momentum may be building in political and religious circles (although economic circles are still silent) regarding the situation in Tibet after decades of peaceful protests over perceived and genuine injustice and repression from Chinese rule have for many Tibetans spilled over to animated demonstrations and violent protest in the capital of their nation, a nation which the People's Republic of China claims as one of its provinces. Despite his emphasis on compassion and respect for the Chinese and the need for a peaceful resolution to the occupation of Tibet the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual and political leader of the Tibetan people, has had to watch from a distance the recent and ongoing retaliation by Chinese forces and the suppression of ethnic Tibetans in Lhasa and other areas, some of whom have taken part in violence towards the Han Chinese immigrants and their property (the Tibetans are ethnically, culturally, and linguistically a second-class minority in their own homeland). Tibetans and supporters of Tibetan political and religious liberty have also been engaging in protests around the world. In many cases they have been extremely peaceful, and in a few cases they have been given to angry displays despite the Dalai Lama's rejection of anger and violence in the name of Tibet. Here is an overview of what has been happening over the past few weeks if you aren't up to speed...

How many nobel prize winners, leading Chinese intellectuals, religious leaders, political leaders, and other prominent figures and writers are reacting to the situation in Tibet...

U.S. should speak out for Tibet, Obama says


FAYETTEVILLE, N.C., March 19 (Reuters) - The United States should speak out for human rights in Tibet, U.S. presidential contender Barack Obama said on Wednesday amid a Chinese crackdown on protests by Tibetans in China.
In a foreign policy speech, the Democratic senator from Illinois said the United States should work with countries such as Russia and China but it should also stand up for rights.
"We can start now by speaking out for the human rights and religious freedom of the people of Tibet," Obama told an audience of military families and veterans.


March 19th, via Reuters/The Guardian

Germany Suspends Aid Talks with China Over Tibet Violence

In a fresh blow to Berlin-Beijing relations, Germany has said it is freezing aid talks with the Chinese government as a result of China's crackdown on demonstrations in Tibet.

Germany said it was suspending intergovernmental aid talks with China if the country did not end a bloody clampdown on Tibetan protestors, raising the stakes in a highly charged international conundrum over how to deal with Beijing's rights violations months before the city hosts the Olympic Games.

German Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul said on Wednesday, March 19, that her ministry would suspend negotiations with the Chinese government which mainly involve grants to reduce air pollution by Chinese power plants.

"Violence can never be a solution," Wieczorek-Zeul said. "The two sides can only arrive at a solution through dialogue. Under such conditions, it is hardly conceivable to be conducting intergovernmental negotiations," she said.

-March 20th, via Deutche-Welle

CHINA: Under Pressure to Rethink Tibet Policy
By Antoaneta Bezlova

BEIJING, (IPS) - As continuing Tibetan protests testify to the failure of China’s policy of accelerated economic development with harsh political controls in the Himalayan region, pressure on Beijing to begin dialogue with the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan leader, is growing.

Large swaths of sparsely populated Tibetan areas have been swarmed with a huge number of Chinese troops while embers of unrest continue to smoulder in the wake of the biggest protests by the Tibetan minority in twenty years.

Beijing has denounced the "splittist" Dalai Lama for masterminding the violent riots in hopes of sabotaging this summer’s Beijing Olympics and promoting Tibetan independence. But even as rhetoric against the Tibetan spiritual leader heats up, there are calls from all sides for China to recognise his undying significance to the Tibetan population and make breakthrough on a problem that does not seem to go away.

A group of 26 Nobel laureates has appealed to Beijing to resume dialogue with the Tibetan leader who has lived in exile in Dharamsala, northern India since 1959.

"We protest the unwarranted campaign waged by the Chinese government against our fellow Nobel laureate, His Holiness the Dalai Lama," the group said in a statement released by Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel on Thursday.

-March 21st, via IPS

John McCain condemns Tibet crisis during France visit

US Republican presidential hopeful John McCain said today that China is harming its world image with its crackdown in Tibet and expressed hope Beijing would seek a peaceful solution to the crisis.

McCain did not discuss the issue during a 45-minute meeting with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, but told reporters later the subject was "one of the first things I would talk about if I were president of the United States today."

China's crackdown "is not correct," McCain said in the courtyard of the French presidential Elysee Palace.

"The people there are being subjected to mistreatment that is not acceptable with the conduct of a world power, which China is," McCain said in response to a question by a Chinese television journalist.

"There must be respect for human rights, and I would hope that the Chinese are actively seeking a peaceful resolution to this situation that exists which harms not only the human rights of the people there but also the image of China in the world."

-March 21st, via The Guardian

Pelosi Denounces China's Tibet Crackdown

DHARMSALA, India (AP) — House speaker Nancy Pelosi called on the world Friday to denounce China's crackdown of anti-government protests in Tibet, calling the crisis "a challenge to the conscience of the world."

Pelosi, one of the fiercest Congressional critics of China, was greeted by cheering Tibetans as she arrived to meet the Dalai Lama. She is the first major official to visit the leader of Tibet's exile community since peaceful protests turned violent last week in the Chinese-ruled region.

"If freedom loving people throughout the world do not speak out against China's oppression in China and Tibet, we have lost all moral authority to speak on behalf of human rights anywhere in the world," Pelosi said before a crowd of thousands of Tibetans, including monks and schoolchildren.

"The situation in Tibet is a challenge to the conscience of the world," she said.

-March 21st, via the Associated Press

Leading Chinese Intellectuals Ask China to Rethink Tibet Policy

Leading Chinese intellectuals and writers released a petition today that appeared on several websites in Chinese, entitled 'Twelve Suggestions for Dealing with the Tibetan Situation'. It is a significant indication that Chinese voices are being raised in China in response to the way Beijing has handled the protests that began on March 10. An English translation is published below.

-March 22nd, via the ICFT website

Pope celebrates Mass in thunderstorm, calls for peace

In a speech at the end of the Mass in St. Peter's Square, Benedict said that on the joyous day of Easter, "in particular, how can we fail to remember certain African regions, such as Darfur and Somalia, the tormented Middle East, especially the Holy Land, Iraq, Lebanon and finally Tibet, all of which I encourage to seek solutions that will safeguard peace and the common good."

Benedict denounced "selfishness, injustice, hatred and violence" between individuals and peoples.


"These are the scourges of humanity, open and festering in every corner of the planet, although they are often ignored and sometimes deliberately concealed, wounds that torture the souls and bodies of countless of our brothers and sisters," he said, speaking over the sound of heavy rain in the square.

-March 23rd, via CNN.com

STATEMENT issued by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu

I wish to express my solidarity with the people of Tibet during this critical time in their history. To my dear friend His Holiness the Dalai Lama, let me say: I stand with you. You define non violence and compassion and goodness. I was in an Easter retreat when the recent tragic events unfolded in Tibet. I learned that China has stated you caused violence. Clearly China does not know you, but they should. I call on China's government to know His Holiness the Dalai Lama, as so many have come to know, during these long decades years in exile. Listen to His Holiness' pleas for restraint and calm and no further violence against this civilian population of monastics and lay people.

I urge China to enter into a substantive and meaningful dialogue with this man of peace, the Dalai Lama. China is uniquely positioned to impact and affect our world. Certainly the leaders of China know this or they would not have bid for the Olympics. Killing, imprisonment and torture are not a sport: the innocents must be released and given free and fair trials.

-March 25th, via the ICFT website

Rice urges China to listen to Dalai Lama on Tibet

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Monday urged the Chinese government to pursue a more "sustainable" policy toward Tibet and said the only way to do this was for it to talk to the Dalai Lama.

"We believe that the answer for Tibet is to have a more sustainable policy for the Chinese government concerning Tibet." Rice told reporters at a news conference with India's external affairs minister.

"We are going to continue to encourage that dialogue because ultimately that is going to be the only policy that is sustainable in Tibet," she said.

-March 25th, via Reuters

Clinton says U.S. should be forceful on Tibet

GREENSBURG, Penn., (Reuters) - The United States should be more forceful in speaking out against the violence in Tibet, Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton said on Tuesday, while declining to call for a boycott of the Olympic Games in China.
"I think that what's happening in Tibet is deeply troubling, and this is a pattern of the Chinese government with respect to their treatment of Tibet," she told reporters after a campaign event in Pennsylvania.
"I don't think we should wait until the Olympics to make sure that our views are known," Clinton said...

-March 25th, via Reuters/The Guardian

Sarkozy Could Skip Olympics Opening
By JENNY BARCHFIELD

PARIS (AP) — French President Nicolas Sarkozy suggested Tuesday that a boycott of the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics was a possibility — the first world leader to raise the prospect of punishing China over its ongoing crackdown in Tibet.

The United States, Britain and Germany all condemned China for using force against Tibetan protesters, but they stopped short of threatening to boycott the games or the Aug. 8 opening ceremony.

China, meanwhile, showed no sign of letting up on its crackdown. At least two people were killed in a clash between protesters and police in an area of western China that borders on Tibet, state media and human rights groups reported Tuesday.

The clashes were the latest in most sustained uprising against Chinese rule in almost two decades...

-March 25th, via the Associated Press

Are Tibetans the new Jews?
By IRA RIFKIN

In 1990, the Dalai Lama hosted a delegation of American Jews in Dharamsala, his home in exile in the hill country of northern India. His agenda was clear. Tibetans had lost sovereignty over their homeland and were scattering around the globe. How, he asked, had Jews preserved their cultural and religious identities during their own 2,000-year exile, and what might Tibetans do to preserve theirs?

Some 18 years later, the parallel between Tibet's unfolding and increasingly bleak prospects and the Jewish historical experience seems all the more relevant.

Just as after the failed first century Jewish uprising against Rome, Tibetans are becoming a minority in their homeland thanks to Beijing's strategy of drastically and irreversibly altering Tibet's population by flooding the territory with Han Chinese, China's dominant ethnic group.

Already, two out of every three residents of Lhasa, Tibet's capital, is Han Chinese. In 2006, Beijing hastened the process considerably by opening a high-speed rail link between Lhasa and Beijing. Saffron-robe clad Tibetan Buddhist monks have been replaced by Chinese-run brothels, karaoke bars and a sprawling amusement park that now surround the Portola Palace, the Dalai Lama's former residence and Tibet's equivalent of Jerusalem's ancient Temple.

But saving the palace does absolutely nothing to offset the greatest threats to Tibet's future as a political entity run by and for Tibetans: the passing of time and humanity's cruelly short memory...

How long will it be before Tibetans are viewed as a relic, and perhaps bothersome, minority in their homeland similar to the condition of Native Americans in the United States, Formosans in Taiwan, or Serbs in Kosovo?

How long must Beijing hold on to Tibet before the world comes to think of Tibet as Chinese territory and favors the claims of the descendants of Chinese settlers over Tibetans seeking to reestablish their historical national rights? Another 30 years? A century or two? Two thousand years?

-March 25th, via The Jerusalem Post

How the Communist Party Leaders and the state-run Chinese media see the situation in Tibet...

Chinese media silent on Tibet

China's official news agency Xinhua on Friday filed two short English-language reports on what it called "violence" in the Tibetan city of Lhasa.

The first report said shops had been set on fire, with the second adding that some vehicles had been set alight and that there had been some injuries.

But the domestic media, including Xinhua's Chinese-language service, has not been observed to mention today's protests.

The focus of all Chinese news media continues to be on the annual sessions of the National People's Congress and Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.

Other media silent

As of 1200GMT, neither Xinhua's English nor Chinese websites have been observed to carry any reports on the protests in Tibet.

The Tibet page of the Xinhua website still carries Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang's remarks at yesterday's routine news conference, at which he said: "Recently a small number of monks in Lhasa city have continuously stirred up trouble in an attempt to create social unrest.


"This is a political plot carefully orchestrated by the Dalai clique to bring about Tibet's secession and to ruin the Tibetan people's normal, harmonious, and peaceful lives..."

-March 14th, via the BBC

Dalai Lama 'clique' responsible: China

BEIJING: Groups allied to Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama masterminded violent protests in Lhasa, China's official Xinhua news agency quoted the region's government as saying.

"There has been enough evidence to prove that the recent sabotage in Lhasa was organised, premeditated and masterminded' by the Dalai clique," Xinhua said, citing the Tibet government.

"The violence, involving beating, smashing, looting and burning, has disrupted the public order, jeopardised people's lives and property," Xinhua said, citing an unnamed Tibetan official.

"The sabotage has aroused indignation of and is strongly condemned by the people of all ethnic groups in Tibet," Xinhua said, quoting the official.

-March 15th, via The Times of India

Wen puts blame on Dalai Lama for Tibet riots
By Jamil Anderlini in Beijing and Amy Yee in Dharamsala

Wen Jiabao, China's premier, yesterday blamed the Dalai Lama for the worst unrest in Tibet in nearly two decades, and characterised the protests as a plot to sabotage the Olympic Games in Beijing this year.

The incident "has all the more revealed that the assertions by the Dalai clique that they desire peaceful negotiation are nothing but lies", Mr Wen said in his annual press conference yesterday. "Their hypocritical lies cannot cover the iron-clad facts..."

The protests started in Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, as peaceful demonstrations led by Buddhist monks last Monday, the anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule. They turned into widespread -violence on Friday following reports of a Chinese crackdown.

Mr Wen said government and security officials had exercised "extreme restraint" in dealing with protesters, despite claims from Tibetan groups that scores and possibly hundreds of Tibetans had been killed and security forces had opened fire on crowds...

Mr Wen said he appreciated the steps taken by India to limit the independence activities of the "Dalai clique" and hoped the country would stick to agreements with China concerning anti-Chinese demonstrations on Indian soil.

-March 19th, via the Financial Times

China state media slams West over Tibet coverage

BEIJING, March 20 (Reuters) - Chinese official media condemned Western news coverage of unrest in Tibet on Thursday, in a commentary that accused the reports of being "hostile" towards China ahead of the Beijing Olympics.

China says the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, masterminded a wave of protests that were capped by a riot in Tibet's capital Lhasa last week and were followed by anti-government demonstrations in ethnic Tibetan parts of China.
"While we highly appreciate the efforts of the global media in seeking facts and providing accurate, objective and timely reporting, we are somewhat disappointed to find, from time to time, rather biased news coverage," the official Xinhua news agency said in a commentary.

-March 20th, via Reuters

China accuses Dalai Lama of taking Olympics "hostage"
By Chris Buckley, Reuters

BEIJING: China has accused the Dalai Lama of planning bloodshed in Tibet and colluding with Uighur terrorists in Xinjiang as it pushes a security and propaganda drive to stifle anti-Chinese unrest in its remote west...

The ruling Chinese Communist Party's official newspaper, the People's Daily, said on Sunday that the Dalai -- winner of the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize -- had never abandoned violence since fleeing China in 1959, after a failed revolt against Beijing.

"This incident again demonstrates that the so-called 'peaceful non-violence' of the Dalai clique is an outright lie from start to end," the paper stated.

"In 2008, the Beijing Olympic Games, eagerly awaited by the people of the whole world, will arrive. But the Dalai Lama is scheming to take the Beijing Olympics hostage to force the Chinese government to make concessions to Tibet independence."

The paper earlier also accused the Dalai Lama of planning terrorist attacks with the aid of Uighur separatists seeking an independent East Turkestan for their largely Muslim people in northwest China's Xinjiang region.

"The Dalai clique has also strengthened collusion with 'East Turkestan' terror organizations, and planned terror activities in Tibet in a bid to turn the attention of the international community towards Tibet," the paper said on Saturday.

China's efforts to denounce the Dalai Lama has drawn applause from many Han Chinese citizens, who have said Western critics fail to appreciate their government's efforts to develop Tibet and have treated the violence in Lhasa as legitimate protest.

-March 23rd, via The International Herald Tribune

China to boost "patriotic education" of Tibetans

China is planning to step up what it calls its "patriotic education" of Tibet's Buddist monks. in the wake of deadly separatist riots there. Chinese authorities have blamed the violence on the influence of the Dalai Lama on pro-independence activists. The exiled Tibetan spiritual has denied the claim and called for an end to the rioting.

Professor Dramdul of the China Tibetology Research Centre said: "Patriotic education is neccessary because the Dalai clique has been trying hard to disrupt Tibet's development and Tibetan Buddhism. We've been educating the monks to counter the influence of a small group of separatists from abroad."

Protests against the Beijing government continue.

-March 26th, via EuroNews

How His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama sees this situation in Tibet...

Statement by the Dalai Lama on protests in Tibet

I am deeply concerned over the situation that has been developing in Tibet following peaceful protests in many parts of Tibet, including Lhasa, in recent days. These protests are a manifestation of the deep-rooted resentment of the Tibetan people under the present governance.

As I have always said, unity and stability under brute force is at best a temporary solution. It is unrealistic to expect unity and stability under such a rule and would therefore not be conducive to finding a peaceful and lasting solution.

I therefore appeal to the Chinese leadership to stop using force and address the long-simmering resentment of the Tibetan people through dialogue with the Tibetan people. I also urge my fellow Tibetans not to resort to violence.

THE DALAI LAMA

-March 15th, via the ICTB website

Allow Olympics despite Tibet: Dalai Lama

Tibet's exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama says the Beijing Olympics should go ahead despite the Chinese crackdown on protests in his homeland.

"I want the Games," he said, refusing to call for a boycott, as many Tibetan exiles have been demanding.

"The Olympics should not be called off," he told reporters in Dharamsala in northern India, the seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile and the Dalai Lama's home in exile.

But he said Beijing needed to be "reminded to be a good host of the Olympic Games".

"The Chinese people ... need to feel proud of it. China deserves to be a host of the Olympic Games," he added, saying Beijing needed to be "reminded to be a good host of the Olympic Games".

-March 16th, via The Age

Dalai Lama Threatens to Resign

DHARAMSALA, India — The Dalai Lama on Tuesday invited international observers, including Chinese officials, to scour his offices here and investigate whether he had any role in inciting the latest anti-Chinese violence in Tibet. He also threatened to resign as leader of Tibet’s government-in-exile in the event of spiraling bloodshed in his homeland.

He said he remained committed to only nonviolent agitation and greater autonomy for Tibetans, not independence. He condemned the burning of Chinese flags and attacks on Chinese property and called violence “suicidal” for the Tibetan cause...

The Dalai Lama’s remarks to reporters on Tuesday, here in the seat of the Tibetan exile movement, also revealed that he has been unnerved by the violence across the border in Tibet and by the increasingly radical calls from Tibetan exiles in this country.

The 72-year-old spiritual leader of Lama Buddhism said he would step down from his political post if things “get out of control”...

The Dalai Lama said he remained open to resuming peace talks with Chinese officials, and in an impish reference to the criticisms by Chinese leaders, said a solution could be reached swiftly if there were “mutual respect” and a willingness to take Tibetan grievances seriously.

There was no direct criticism of either Mr. Hu or China’s Premier Wen Jiabao, only of local officials whom the Dalai Lama accused of creating “artificial facts.” “Prime Minister,” he said, addressing Mr. Wen, “Come here and investigate thoroughly.”

-March 19th, via The New York Times

Dalai Lama willing to meet Chinese president

DHARMSALA, India (AP) - The Dalai Lama says he's willing to meet Chinese leaders, including President Hu Jintao, for talks on the unrest over Tibet.

He repeated that he's not seeking independence for Tibet, but only autonomy under China's control.

China says Tibet's exiled Buddhist leader must stop what it calls separatist activities, and recognize Tibet and Taiwan as parts of China.

Chinese officials and media are confirming today that unrest had spread from Tibet to neighboring provinces in recent days. Tibetan officials in exile say at least 80 people have died. Chinese officials say 16 were killed.

Violence followed protests in Tibet that began March 10th, the anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising.

-March 20th, via CBS affiliates

Beijing Olympics should go on: Dalai Lama
Press Trust of India (New Delhi)

The Dalai Lama on Sunday firmly backed the Beijing Olympics despite the Chinese crackdown on Tibetan protesters that prompted demands for boycott of the games.

"I have always supported that Olympic Games should take place in China," he told reporters in Delhi, terming as "baseless" the communist giant's charge that he was trying to "sabotage" the premier sporting event slated for August.

"They are the hosts. The Olympics should take place in Beijing," the 72-year-old Tibetan spiritual leader, who heads the Tibetan government in exile and was in Delhi in connection with a religious workshop, said.

March 23rd, via NDTV

How many Tibetans and pro-Tibet demonstrators are reacting to the situation...


Protesting and rioting in Tibet...

Protesting and demonstrating in India...

Protesting and demonstrating in Nepal...

Protesting and demonstrating in Germany...

Protesting and demonstrating in Belgium...

Protesting and demonstrating in the United States...

Not taking sides: embracing the oppressor and the oppressed (how to address to President Bush on Iraq)

As a follow-up to the topic of fighting the good fight, which is about having an "us" (the good guys, the righteous) versus "them" (the bad guys, the unrighteous) mentality and whether spiritual people of conscience who accept some form of interdependence should take sides, I re-post this letter from Thich Nhat Hanh (text follows)to provide a more specific example for reflection and discussion...

Honorable George W. BushThe White House
Washington DC, USA


Plum Village
Le Pey 24240
Thenac, France


Dear Mr President


Last night, I saw my brother (who died two weeks ago in the USA) coming back to me in a dream. He was with all his children. He told me, "Let's go home together." After a millisecond of hesitation, I told him joyfully, "Ok, let's go."


Waking up from that dream at 5 am this morning, I thought of the situation in the Middle East; and for the first time, I was able to cry. I cried for a long time, and I felt much better after about one hour. Then I went to the kitchen and made some tea. While making tea, I realized that what my brother had said is true: our home is large enough for all of us. Let us go home as brothers and sisters.


Mr. President, I think that if you could allow yourself to cry like I did this morning, you will also feel much better. It is our brothers that we kill over there. They are our brothers, God tells us so, and we also know it. They may not see us as brothers because of their anger, their misunderstanding, and their discrimination. But with some awakening, we can see things in a different way, and this will allow us to respond differently to the situation. I trust God in you; I trust Buddha nature in you.


Thank you for reading.


In gratitude and with brotherhood,
Thich Nhat Hanh
Plum Village

In my last post, I ended by asking: "What is our compassionately informed response to those who we thing are harming the planet and causing immense suffering because of their greed, anger and fear? A compassionate response does not have to imply a whimper - compassion requires a great deal of strength - but deep down do we believe that such an approach will be seen as weak or be ignored by the powerful? And isn't it so much easier to empathize with the downtrodden? Is it a choice between the preferred and the practical, between idealism and realism? Or do we really believe (in) and practice what we preach?"

That post was very general and allows for many permutations of this theme, and it has received replies (feel free to click over and add yours). Here, however, we have a specific example of someone, Thich Nhat Hanh, who did just what I was mentioning. He chose to see Bush as his brother and to appeal to his humanity and his divine/Buddha nature rather than simply mocking him or using angry accusations listing his personal failures and their consequences. So what do we make of this and similar letters, speeches, and other forms of communication? It is certainly something that we can appreciate coming from Thay as he is a world renowned peace activist and Buddhist teacher, but do we really believe that letter, assuming it was received and read, made a difference? And is effectiveness the primary yardstick in cases like this? Do we read things like this and "forgive" Thich Naht Hanh for his simplicity and directness (but also see it as a little naive) because of his status and image? Or is he on the right track, and if so, in what way should we follow his example?

In particular for those who are opposed to the occupation of Iraq and those who capitalized on it politically or financially...

Can you see yourself writing a letter like that to George W. Bush? To Dick Cheney? To the David Lesar, President and CEO of Halliburton? To Erik Prince, founder and owner of Blackwater Worldwide? For the Pro-Iraq war visitors, same question but fill in the names with Nancy Pelosi, or Hillary Clinton, etc.

Or to be really blunt - does such wording make the author sound like a spacey, out-of-touch, overly naive optimist who needs a reality check and to get involved in really making a difference rather than expressing futile sentimentality? Again, I know many or probably most of you might not think that about Thich Nhat Hahn, or if the letter had come from the Dalai Lama, but what if had come from a New Age guru running a crystal therapy center? Or from a Wiccan college freshman taking a course on globalization? Or from your own desk (assuming you are not a New Age guru running a crystal therapy center or a Wiccan college freshman taking a course on globalization)? That is, if you respect Thay's letter and approach, is it because you respect him or because you respect his letter and approach?

Fighting the good fight

If you are fighting the "good" fight, what is your opponent doing? Why is that at some sporting events both teams pray for God to "...grant them the victory", and what about the unspoken half of that prayer which is then implied ("God grant the other guys a defeat")? Taking that line of thought from sports to warfare, I (re-)call attention to an animation produced and published earlier this year of a short piece by Mark Twain called "The War Prayer". For those who cannot or choose not to view the video, the text is reproduced and the unspoken half of "Grant us the victory [in battle]" is highlighted in red. If we embrace all-encompassing compassion and recognize our fundamental interdependence, whether as Buddhist, Christians, Humanists, or by any other name or tradition, when if ever is it appropriate to take sides in a conflict?

I have sports teams I root for, which one could claim is taking sides. I will vote for specific candidates in upcoming elections, which one could also claim is taking sides. To say we cannot or should not ever have any preferences for anything would sound extreme. But do I wish the other team or other candidates harm? Do I feel free to mock or ridicule them? Will the results of the game or the election evoke from me distraction, unkindness, or violence? If I become fixated on one "side" winning, this could be so. But then what was the point of the activity or of being involved with it? Is sports really about entertainment, fitness, and good conduct or is it about having the best score or best record and rubbing other people's faces in it? Is politics about good government for all and supporting the parties and candidates that you feel will be most willing and able to achieve this end, or is it about fear, anger, and wanting the power to impose our will on others so we can feel safe and righteous/prosperous?

There are other angles to sports and politics to be sure, but the examples provided highlight the distinction between seeing all of the participants in such activities as having value and only seeing those who are on "our side" as worthy of our concern and support. In a sense, we are talking about what Christians refer to as the distinction of "Love the sinner, hate the sin." We can appreciate members of an opposing team or party as human beings deserving of our compassion even if we find what they stand for or how they try to achieve those goals to be deluded, damaging, or despicable. This lesson of early to middle childhood, symbolized by the seemingly ubiquitous sportsmanship line-up where two teams file past each other swatting hands and grunting "good game", suggests that you can support a process or activity (such as a game or an election) as being worthwhile despite the outcome as opposed to seeing such activities as valuable only in as much as it produces the outcome we prefer. It also reminds us to see "the other side" as individuals just as we are. And most importantly, at least in my estimation, it reaffirms a fundamental respect for those individuals.

Then we grow up and we are confronted with more extreme and more complex cases. In United States, suggestions of stolen elections and resulting damage to our freedoms, the environment our socio-economic mobility, and to our military and international reputation are pitted against claims of naively supporting legislation and actions favorable to terrorists, attempting to destroy a Christian heritage, and impose what are labeled as unfair restrictions on businesses. Foreign and economic policy are intertwined in an attempt to bolster leverage against other nations even when these policies encourage poverty, poor health, and war and lead to supporting governments based on convenience for corporate interests and fear of economic or nuclear reprisal. All the while issues such as the occupation of Tibet, the crackdowns in Burma, the horrors in the Sudan, as well as thousands of other lesser known sporadic as well as ongoing human rights violations continue.

It is appealing to suggest that the powerful are afflicting the powerless, who are also typically voiceless as well. Speaking up for the oppressed and speaking out against the political and corporate entities and systems involved in generating or perpetuating such oppression seems like a logical course of action for those who wish to make a difference and who are concerned about the proliferation of suffering that goes with such oppression. It is all too easy, to name one example, to see Dick Cheney, Haliburton, and the Republican Party collectively as "the Enemy". One could make a similar adversary out of Nancy Pelosi, the "anti-Christian/anti-American crowd" (the gay community, the secular community, entitled poor minorities/illegal aliens, etc), and the Democractic Party. For many of us the difference is that one of these characterization is correct and the other is not. Should Buddhists "pick a side" here? Should we take up the "good fight"?

In an article entitled "The New Holy War" published in Tikkun magazine, Professor David R. Loy reaffirms the challenge of non-discriminating compassion:

Compassion for those who are suffering is not quite the same as the pursuit of social justice, which takes up the cause of the oppressed against the oppressor...

...a Buddhist perspective does not necessarily imply that we should respond to oppressor and oppressed in the same way. It means that we do not identify with one while rejecting the other. Like it or not, we are nondual with both.

Are we presenting the case for our political choices and support as support for all people or only those with whom we agree? What is our compassionately informed response to those who we thing are harming the planet and causing immense suffering because of their greed, anger and fear? A compassionate response does not have to imply a whimper - compassion requires a great deal of strength - but deep down do we believe that such an approach will be seen as weak or be ignored by the powerful? And isn't it so much easier to empathize with the downtrodden? Is it a choice between the preferred and the practical, between idealism and realism? Or do we really believe (in) and practice what we preach?

edited to add:

This topic has been pretty popular lately, appearing in an article in Tricycle called "Above the Fray" (which was mentioned and discussed at WoodMoor Village) as well as in "Take This President...Somebody, Please!" by Paul Lewis and a reply to Lewis in Tikkun magazine.

Christian movement seeks solidarity with poor and suffering

Have you heard about the movement in (American Protestant) Christianity away from spiritual materialism and toward the vision of Christ as representing God's solidarity with "even the least of these"? These values have always been a part of the Christian tradition, although obviously like any cultural institution such values can become subverted for the sake of politics, and apparently they are becoming more of the central focus for many Christians. That isn't to say that the people who helped to bring the "neocons" to power under the agenda labeled "Guns, God, and Gays" have vanished or that for many evangelicals and other Christians issues such as abortion have become passe, but it turns out that more and more followers of Christ are into- well, I'll let someone who is chronicling this "revolution" describe it:

Elizabeth and I have been traveling the country for the past few months working on a couple of different projects. Right away, we kept bumping into these amazing communities of “progressive evangelical” Christians—that is, people who hold a lot of progressive (even radical) political views, but who believe in an almost fundamentalist theology. It’s a huge movement—possibly of up to twenty million active participants. And so I decided to start this blog as way of explaining it to my secular progressive friends and colleagues back in DC.

I have been watching this “Revolutionary Christian” scene for a couple years already. Honestly, I thought I was exaggerating its size when I was trying to get my friends excited about it. But, as it turns out, it’s far bigger than I ever imagined.

When Elizabeth and I got married, I started going to church with her. We were in North Carolina then, and explored many different non-denominational and charismatic evangelical churches. I was shocked at how radical they were when it came to social-economic issues. They all seemed to be whipped up in the beginnings of some sort of conscious mass return to the spirit of Early Christianity—of leaving your wealth behind, not just helping the poor but joining the poor, adopting kids lost in the foster system and HIV+ babies, etc….

Only small handfuls of people in the congregations were actually doing those kinds of things, but they were being held up as the ideal, while the preachers relentlessly laid down the new/ancient theology of building “the Kingdom of Heaven” here on Earth, and of a Jesus who is “the God of the poor and oppressed.”

For me, surprise turned to feverish curiosity when a mostly upper-middle class/suburban/Republican mega-church had a sermon, based on the New Testament Epistle to the Colossians, that railed against the “Empire” of Pax Americana—the empire of “might makes right” and idolatrous consumerism.

I wonder if there is a connection between this movement and the (environmentally) Green movement within American heartland-style Christianity?


Thanks to Metacrock for bringing this story to my attention.c

How much is your vote worth to you?

If you are a citizen of the United States, what is your right to vote worth to you? If you are a citizen of another country, how might you value the right of an American citizen's vote (given influence the US has on foreign policy, for example)? Consider it seriously for a second, if you don't mind. Do you have some idea in mind of how much a vote in the next Presidential election is worth? How about a lifetime right to such voting power?

Does it surprise you that a poll conducted by students in a journalism class at NYU (New York University) found that the some of their peers on campus would trade their vote for an iPod?

Most say their vote has a price
Lily Quateman
Washington Square News

11/14/07

Two-thirds say they'll do it for a year's tuition. And for a few, even an iPod touch will do.

That's what NYU students said they'd take in exchange for their right to vote in the next presidential election, a recent survey by an NYU journalism class found.

Only 20 percent said they'd exchange their vote for an iPod touch. But 66 percent said they'd forfeit their vote for a free ride to NYU. And half said they'd give up the right to vote forever for $1 million.

But, they also overwhelmingly lauded the importance of voting. Ninety percent of the students who said they'd give up their vote for the money also said they consider voting "very important" or "somewhat important"; only 10 percent said it was "not important." Also, 70.5 percent said they believe that one vote can make a difference - including 70 percent of the students who said they'd give up their vote for free tuition.

The class - "Foundations of Journalism," taught by journalism department chairwoman Brooke Kroeger - polled more than 3,000 undergraduates between Oct. 24 and 26 to assess student attitudes toward voting.

"The part that I find amazing is that so many folks think one vote can make a difference," Dalton Conley, sociology department chairman, said. He added, "If we take them at their word, then perhaps they really think votes matter, and that's why someone might pay a year's tuition to buy theirs."

Sixty percent of the students who said they'd give up their vote for tuition also described their families' income as upper middle or high.

Their reasons for giving up their vote varied.

"At the moment, no candidate who truly represents my political beliefs has a chance of winning a presidential election," one male junior studying film and television at the Tisch School of the Arts wrote on the survey.

"It is very easy to convince myself that my vote is not essential," wrote a female CAS sophomore. "After all, I'm from New York, which will always be a Blue State."

Other students wrote that they were disgusted by the thought.

"I would be reversing history - a lot of people fought so that every citizen could be enfranchised," said a female in her second year at the Stern School of Business.

One CAS junior went even further, writing that "anyone who'd sell his lifelong right to vote should be deported."

{emphasis added}

Obviously one can question whether everyone who participated took the poll seriously, but the results are still interesting. Nor do I think I am ringing some kind of alarm bell here. Still, I find the results of this survey compelling. Assuming that those who would sell their vote or who feel their vote doesn't matter (oddly those don't strongly correlate) are serious or represent some significant portion of their age-education cohort (or even other socioeconomic/age demographics), what does this say about civics in the U.S.? About how things we don't approve of seem to "just happen"? About where civil rights in America will be in twenty, thirty, or forty years? And if you are alarmed or even just mildly concerned, what can/should be done to refute such de-valuing of the right to vote? Are systematic changes in order?

I have a hunch that there is some serious significance in the correlations cited in the bold passages...

Considering how to leave Iraq is your responsibilty too

If you are an American citizen of voting age, that is.

In the current issue of Mother Jones magazine the point is made that whether or not you were for the war from the beginning, or whether you changed your mind after the invasion, or whether you are still for it but realize that the U.S. can't (or shouldn't) sustain the occupation, the debate is still rooted in 2003. Most of the focus in public still an argument whether we should have gone, whose fault it is that things have gone a particular way, etc. To put it more bluntly:

For those of us who argued against invading, it is tempting to simply demand an end to "Bush's War" and wash our hands of it. But as General Anthony Zinni, former head of U.S. forces in the Middle East, told us, "Your conscience is not clean just because you're a peace demonstrator." In other words, just because you weren't in favor of going in doesn't mean you're not responsible for what happens when we pull out...

There are no good options in Iraq, but the options narrow to the horrific the longer our leaders dawdle. Bush seems content—whether out of delusional optimism or cynical "strategery"—to run out the clock and stick the next administration with this mess; only 5 percent of Americans expect him to do otherwise. And the Democrats are playing the other side of the same game—content to let the GOP go down with its man.

So what is to be done?

To help focus the readers' collective attention, and as a means or surveying various anti-war groups with regard to this issue, Mother Jones came up with six questions for Americans who oppose the current occupation in Iraq to consider:

Q: After American troops withdraw, will the violence in Iraq escalate?

Q: Should the peace movement offer a contingency plan for peacekeeping?

Q: Under what conditions would you redeploy American troops to Iraq?

Q: What will prevent Iraq's civil war from flaring into genocidal violence?

Q: What will make the world stop genocide in Iraq when it didn't in Rwanda or Darfur?

Q: Is there any contradiction between supporting U.S. military intervention to stop the Rwandan genocide and opposing U.S. military intervention to prevent ethnic cleansing in Iraq?

These questions are not intended to persuade people to keep U.S. troops in Iraq, but to get people focused on the realities of withdrawing the troops. After all, if there is any way to lessen the suffering of the Iraqi people as we disengage militarily, do not the people who have been arguing about the damage and pain we have been inflicting on that populace have an obligation to fight just as passionately for the most humane process possible?

I find it interesting that in glancing at responses people have already given to this article, there is a common attitude in which "fault" and "responsibility" are seen as strictly synonymous. In my humble opinion they are not and I will explain why I do not believe they are and what relevance this belief has on how I see the agenda anti-war movement. Fault is the attribution of a particular form of responsibility, generally the point at which a pivotal failure or mistake can be identified which led to a particular undesirable outcome. Another way to think of it is "causal responsibility". A particular action or inaction directly contributed to a specific outcome, so we say the person or persons who carried out the action (including acts of omission) are at fault, and therefore in the causal sense they are considered to be responsible for what happened.

But there is more than just directly causal forms of responsibility. Hence in some cases when someone fails to meet an obligation, they may still be considered "responsible" for the failure even if the reason they failed cannot be attributed to a foreseeable and hence preventable set of circumstances leading to the failure. That is, you can be responsible for certain outcomes regardless of personal fault. This is particularly true when you are a part of a larger group. You may have opposed the decision of the group as a whole, but as a member of that group, you share at least some responsibility for its actions.

That is why voting and other forms of civic participation are so crucial, as we all bear some responsibility for what our leaders do in our names. And it is also why to use that tired old excuse "I didn't vote for the person" fails to miss the point. We are not a collection of individual autonomous polities interacting on the world stage, we are members of a particular society in a specific nation and as much as we may not always like to recognize it, we support and receive benefit from our connection as a nation and as a nation we exert influence on global policy regarding trade, the environment, war, etc, even when that influence is at odds with our personal beliefs and our work with charitable groups and NGOs.

So, then, rather absolving ourselves by saying it is "Bush's occupation", or the "neocons' occupation", or that because they didn't vote to cut off funding it is also now the "Congressional Demoracts' occupation", it is important we never forget that as Americans, even including Americans who have fought tooth and nail to oppose the invasion from the start, it still is and will continue to be "our occupation" too. It is eating though the mental and physical health and the lives of our service people, our taxes, our reputation in the world and on and on (and that's without reflecting on what is doing to the Iraqis).

Therefore I thank all of those who have, are, and will spend time considering how to end our occupation and how to do so in a way that gives the greatest odds for the best scenario for our military and for the people of Iraq, especially those who are taking action on these issues. Lest anyone think that I am writing this in a smug fashion, or that I have a better understanding of the situation, or that I have "done" more than you, please know that this is not the case. I am posing here an issue that I found compelling because I felt you might as well. To those who would ask me, "So what have you done about these issues?", I simply say, "Not enough."

Critiquing contemporary religious progressives

Thanks to Faithful Progressive for pointing me toward "The Reckoning: The proper place for religion in politics", an article by Catherine Tumber in the Boston Review. It is focused primarily on a critique of the current state of the progressive spirituality movement(s) in the US, in particular as expressed in (Judeo-)Christian terms by authors such as Rabbi Michael Lerner (The Left Hand of God: Taking Our Country Back from the Religious Right) and Jim Wallis (God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It). I think there are definitely some points worth very serious consideration even for those who may not be rooted in Judaism or Christianity. Given the ongoing debates among Unitarian Universalists about just who they are and what they are about (small example), I think UUs will find these points particularly challenging and hopefully rewarding...

[A] vague sense of interconnectedness and existential marvel are pretty watery gruel for serious spiritual hunger. They can hardly rival what conservative religion has to offer: an overarching eschatological narrative, beginning with First Things and End Days, in which personal salvation and eternal life are secured; ironclad rules for living—a precise sense of sin—along with serious cosmic and psychological consequences should they be transgressed; and a place of common, often joyous worship, where pride in offering one’s gifts to the assembled is tempered by humility before God...


What’s troubling about Lerner—about spiritual progressivism in general—is the idea that inclusiveness itself is the principal act of spiritual formation. At its best Lerner’s religion offers little more than therapeutic anarchy... Religious convictions offer interdictions that provide grounds for moral censure and restraint when people are carelessly harmful or intellectually dishonest. Absent those convictions, as Philip Rieff argued 40 years ago, the rich healing power of religion descends into self-manipulation...


The inverse of right-wing moralism, which treats interdictions as invitations to punishment, Lerner’s progressive spirituality is instrumental religion at its most breathtaking. Not only does it lend itself to utopian naiveté, it closes the circle of meaning so securely around the self that it locks out mysterious truths gleaned from contemplation of the transcendent. It is hard to respond to that universe with awe and wonder, no matter how fervently Lerner insists we do so...


Wallis might be one of the few liberal religious leaders who has reflected enough on the subject to guide his more secular and modernist brothers and sisters toward reckoning with the limitations of reason and human will. The stakes are high, because the absence of such a reckoning can unleash a drive toward perfectionism, through either an aggressively purist, world-denying gnostic spirituality or a non-transcendent, heart-squelching materialist reliance on science and technology. Not only is the quest for perfection a terrible and even fool-hardy burden, it is antithetical to the very spirit of Christian humility Wallis calls for...


[Martin Luther King, Jr.'s] own social-justice ministry was not crafted for politics but rooted in a sense of cosmic struggle that grounded hope itself. King was never much troubled by the “literalism” that discredited so many white evangelicals’ eschatology in the eyes of liberals, because the black church had always relied on figurative biblical interpretation; literalism had, after all, given warrant to slavery. Though he took in the theological currents of his day while in seminary—the personalism taught at Boston University and Niebuhr’s “Christian realism,” with its insistence on spiritual discipline against resentment—and though he had once been “embarrassed” by the “emotionalism” of the black church, with its talk of “mansions in the sky,” he ultimately drew on its cosmic, catastrophic story line. In black-church eschatology, “what is hoped for is in some sense already present,” as King put it in a 1966 sermon, as evidenced by those who refuse to give up on Christian hope itself—the slave forebears, the sick, the abused and tormented—hope that is never confined to personal desires but is always extended to others. The mystery of the “already”–“not yet” motif holds the eternal–temporal divide in tension and could never warrant a simple linear optimism or a belief in moral progress. As King said, “human progress never rolls in on the wheels of inevitability.” This is the conviction that underwrote the black church’s ministry of deliverance and forgiveness—crucial resources for King. It also made it possible to accept unmerited suffering as aligned with the purposes of God, with full knowledge that one can retain moral control of a situation, even in the teeth of agony....


Learning from King, contemporary religious progressives would do well to look for signs of religious integrity—a mood, a set of convictions, an orientation specific to religion—without using a political prism. Among them might be included a double consciousness of knowing yet not knowing God; a humility before the majesty of the heavens; a sense of worldly alienation that dares hope for reconciliation; a sense of mystery breaking in on the prosaic; an understanding, with Kierkegaard, that faith often requires a “leap”; a reckoning with the limitations of life that surpasses stoic resignation; a sense of a cosmic future that will outlive us, upon which to base present hope. Without at least some of these elements, which capture facets of God’s immensity, religion loses its shape and becomes all too malleable to human purposes.

I must admit I recognized a lot of what Tumber is describing here. For example, in October of last year I wrote: "[I]f there is a standard or banner for progressive politics and liberal religion/spirituality, it is inclusiveness." This compares rather well to Tumber's assessment that "What’s troubling about... spiritual progressivism in general is the idea that inclusiveness itself is the principal act of spiritual formation."

I agree to a point, at least if I am understanding Tumber correctly, as I wrote next:

Unlike the characterization often made by those who oppose such a perspective, it does not mean having no standards or principles or accepting any standards or principles, nor that there is no discrimination. The issue is what is being accepted and what is being discriminated.

Quite simply, what is being accepted are people. That is where the inclusiveness comes into play. If you are a sentient being, a human being, then you are accepted. That is the liberal idea of inclusion, especially the religiously/spiritually liberal form. What is challenged, differentiated, and judged? Beliefs and behaviors.

So in the sense of the word spiritual as I prefer it acceptance, or opening one's heart, to all people is the core of spirituality as it practiced. Yet the question is valid - upon what is the practice based? Which is why I appreciate the critique Tumber offers. It is one thing to suggest there is something lacking in the general milieu of contemporary progressive religion, it is another to then suggest where we might look to find examples of it. I think it is why I have emphasized being cautious when trying to "sanitize" sacred traditions rather than trying seeing them as the continuation of an ongoing dialog on the human experience with the Source, Being, the Divine, etc. A (sometimes flawed or frustrating) heritage perhaps, but a rich one which can inform and nourish the current experience if seen as a part of a living tradition or which can smother and petrify it if seen as a straight jacket for the heart and mind.

Perhaps an as yet unspoken problem with the lack of conviction in certain areas of contemporary progressive religious debate is the desire to not wish to appear as fervent or "serious" in one's commitment to God, the Transcendent, etc, much less the teachers such as Jesus or Mohammad or the Buddha, as those who could be labeled fundamentalists, in particular the religious far right (conservative Christians) or groups such as the Taliban. Is there an implicit assumption that it is somehow the degree of devotion or commitment, rather than the nature of one's understanding of Allah or Vishnu, that makes religious people (potentially) dangerous? Is the mere idea of committing oneself to a holy life enough to set off quiet alarm bells among many liberals who are indifferent toward or dismissive of religion? I suspect this may be so. If it is, No wonder so many get the impression that progressive people of faith, in particular Westerners and especially Western politicians, do not take their religion(s) seriously!

But yet such devotion and commitment was, as Tumber suggests, key to the effectiveness and lasting impact of the efforts of Martin Luther King, Jr. I believe the same can be said for other figures who are often favorably "claimed" by liberals of both religious and non-religious persuasion (Mahatma Gandhi, the Dalai Lama, etc). There needs to be a frank discussion in progressive spiritual and liberal circles about the idea that people are somehow decent and respectable in spite of their beliefs. Otherwise, to modify a well-known political acronym, we might as well be liberal RINOs (Religious In Name Only).