Tag Archives: in the news

Political Theater at a Human Cost

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This week I finally had a chance to visit the Roman Colosseum, something that has been on my bucket list ever since my high school Latin days. It is certainly a magnificent sight and a colossal site to behold, even filled with hordes of tourists like myself during a June heatwave.

Walking through the remains of this stone structure, echoes of the countless human lives lost in the name of empire and entertainment sounded in my heart. As I stood at the cross overlooking the sight of their torture in the arena, I prayed with and for them. I prayed too with the memories of those who watched, jeered, and cheered, and for the political leaders who orchestrated it all for propaganda and ideological purposes.

I couldn’t help but make connections to what is happening at home in my own country even as I stood there in Rome. Today’s people on the margins are being sacrificed for political purposes, whether through the siphoning off of life-saving food and medicine at home and abroad, or deporting and detaining our immigrant brothers and sisters while ignoring the constitutional right to due process. Tears are being shed and lives disrupted and even taken. And for what? Political ideology at best and nefarious intention at worse, with real human impacts at a scale that only history will truly measure.

I for one feel the need to speak out, to pray, and to act. I am in solidarity with the people in peaceful protest on the streets in Los Angeles and across the country. Although I will still be out of the country, my Congregation is one of many that will be represented on June 24 in Washington, DC and in echo events in New Jersey and Washington State for the Sisters Speak Out event, a prayer and public witness for immigrants and a just economy. https://sistersspeakout.my.canva.site/

I am praying daily with the Sisters Speak Out Rosary guide which you can download here. It has special Sorrowful and Joyful mysteries written for this moral moment.

Finally, as events unfold in my nation this weekend, I am proud to be part of the elected leadership team of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace as we have issued a public statement in support of nonviolent action. We also express our profound concern about unjust action against immigrants, the deployment of military forces in our own nation, and the display today in our nation’s capital.

“Consistent with our mission as agents of peace through justice, we reject the false belief that national strength derives from military power and reject the militarization being used to quell domestic demonstrations.”

Persecution and human suffering in the name of political theater is social sin, pure and simple. I say not in my name. I resist and reject it. And I pray for the heart and soul of my nation and all those whose lives are being disrupted and lost.

Chaos, paradox, and prayer

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Things are a bit chaotic these days. (Mis)information flies at us at rapid speed, often before we can process its effect or prepare for potential impacts. The very landscape beneath our feet is shifting, even as the people of Myanmar, Thailand, and China face the reality of an actual earthquake. Systems we have relied on for decades  to hold things together are being dismantled. The list goes on.

What is a person to do? How do we hold fast to love as we seek to be people of peace amid the chaos?

One of my daily practices is to take time in the morning with the daily Scripture readings and reflections in Give Us This Day.

This morning, after reading and praying with the news (see the first paragraph), I turned to this prayer resource.  I was gifted with a reflection by my friend Sister Julia Walsh, FSPA on “The Power of Paradox.” Here is an excerpt:

“I don’t remember where I heard it or where I read it, but it’s been rattling around in my mind a lot lately that the healthiest and holiest people are the folks who are conscious of the power of paradox. These good ones can love those they disagree with and want goodness for those who have harmed them. They are the saints who can hold two contradictory truths together, who aren’t threatened by inconsistencies.

I wonder how different our church and our world might be if we were taught from a young age that prayer is a type of communion with the mystery, that it is the practice of embracing opposite truths as they coexist. Opening ourselves to seeing every side and knowing we will forever be limited in our knowing is another way we can touch the cross of mystery; it is a way we get to put our fingers into Christ’s side.”

And so I pray …

And so I choose to stand in love and solidarity, keeping the peace of Christ in view on the horizon of my heart as I scan the landscape, trying to make sense of it all.

I hold fast to what I know is good and possible and true. I resist being limited by darkness or division but seek light and love, even when it is obscured or makes no sense in the circumstances. I refuse to demonize others or deny their human dignity, even if their actions harm others and earth. God can hold the paradox and the tension. God is bigger than it all, and God is good all the time. All the time, God is good. And so are we. And so are you.

Earlier this month, I had the chance to visit an art exhibit at SFMOMA, an installation by Yayoi Kusama called “Dreaming of Earth’s Sphericity: I Would Offer My Love.” It was a mirror room, filled with color and to be honest a bit disorienting, a chaotic paradox of sorts.

We entered through a WillyWonkaesque door, which required us to duck to enter the box that held the mirror room. Inside our senses were bombarded by this …

It was both expansive and confining. Illuminating and confusing. Overwhelming and enjoyable. We were only in the room for two minutes. It felt so much longer. And so much less.

I was there with good friends who know and love me as I know and love them. I was also there with strangers I did not know and will never know again.

The words of the artist point the way, just as Julia does.

“Enter the place of colors

Polka dots let in the sunlight of the earth

The heart is filled with the shining light of the sun

All of the people who enter seeking the joy of being alive

Let there be eternal harmony among all in the circles and cycles of living

Peace and endless love for all.”

Amen

Peace in the midst of turmoil and anxiety

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Today is our CSJP Community Day of Thanksgiving – marking our 137th anniverary. It is also the day after the shameful insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. I shared the following reflection on today’s liturgical readings during our word and communion service today.

During the many tumultuous moments of 2020–the coronavirus pandemic, political upheaval, the beginning of our belated recokoning with white supremacy, and so much more — I found myself wondering what things would be like if people truly understood themselves, and everyone else, as beloved children of God.

In today’s first reading, John tell us it is so. “Beloved, we love God because God first loved us.”

Morover, John says, “we know that we love the children of God when we love God and obey God’s commandments.”

Is it really that simple?

God loves us. We love God.
God loves everyone. We love everyone.
God loves all of creation. We love all of creation.

It really is that simple, and yet, we humans make it so much more complicated. Just look to what happened yesterday in our Nation’s capital.

The Gospel gives us a clear roadmap for our response in times like these as we follow Jesus. Jesus calls us to bring glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and to let the oppressed go free. Jesus calls us to love as we seek peace.

Even amidst the chaos of political events, even in the difficult moments of our own lives, we, God’s beloved, are called to love one another and hold fast to the path to peace.

Our Lady Chapel
St. Barnabas Cathedral

137 years ago today, in Nottingham, England, Bishop Edward Gilpin Bagshawe presided in Our Lady Chapel, St. Barnabas Cathedral, as the first Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace professed their vows. This is a day for which we give thanks for the gift of community and God’s blessings for our community.

Listen to the words that Bishop Bagshawe shared with our first Sisters:

“Our Divine Lord is called the Prince of Peace, and He gave peace to his disciples as his special gift, saying, ‘Peace be with you.’ … To secure this divine peace for ourselves, to procure its blessings for others in the midst of the sin and strife and turmoil and restless anxiety of this modern world is the object of your institute.”

He said those words on January 7, 1884.

Just imagine what Bishop Bagshawe would have thought of the turmoil that unfolded yesterday in Washington, D.C., or the restless anxiety so many felt as they watched our democracy be threatened like never before in our lifetimes.

We, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace, are called to procure the blessings of peace in the midst of times such as these.

The psalmist apparently knew about the type of turmoil that happened at the Capitol Building yesterday.

“From fraud and violence he shall redeem them
and precious shall their blood be in their sight.
May they be prayed for continually;
Day by Day shall they bless them.”

We are blessed with our charism of peace, not in spite of the restless anxiety and turmoil of our modern world, but because of it, for it.

And we believe that peace is possible, that peace points beyond itself in time.

Let us join our hearts and prayers for our community, church, nation, world, and Earth. That we may spread the blessings of peace, in faith, hope and love. That peace may come. That we may truly understand ourselves, and help others to understand themselves and everyone else, as beloved of God.

From Toxicity to Kindness

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The 2018 Oxford Dictionary Word of the Year was announced and it is, you guessed it, toxic.

Not a new word, but a word with a whole new embodiment of meaning. “The Oxford Word of the Year is a word or expression that is judged to reflect the ethos, mood, or preoccupations of the passing year, and have lasting potential as a term of cultural significance. Our data shows that, along with a 45% rise in the number of times it has been looked up on oxforddictionaries.com, over the last year the word toxic has been used in an array of contexts, both in its literal and more metaphorical senses.”

Among the top collocates to toxic in 2018 … toxic masculinity, toxic relationship, toxic culture. As I said in a recent interview, “We all know that toxicity is not good for us.” And yet it spreads, oozing out and choking our happiness like the fog of a group of looming dementors.

But we have a choice my friends. We can be kind, in our relationships, our words, our interactions, our ways of living. Every moment presents a choice. Let’s choose to be kind! Our very democracy and social fabric may depend upon our choices.

Sounds simple, but sometimes the most answers to the most complicated problems are the kind ones.

This Must Stop

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Stop Gun Violence Now.pngLast night I was perusing the CNN Exit Polls and discovered that 59% of midterm voters polled support stricter gun control measures.  I was sad to see that number so low, especially after all the amazing activism of young people after the Parkland Shooting and countless other senseless mass shootings.

Then today, just after reading about the latest shooting at a nightclub in California, I received a text from my sister.  It started out saying that my niece Eileen was dancing at the Borderline last night … the nightclub where the shooting I’d just been reading about happened.

my heart stopped.  what if?

I closed my eyes, said a prayer, and went back to reading the text.  She and the friends she was dancing with escaped with their lives after the first shots were fired. They have since discovered that at least one high school friend is among those killed.

Active shooter drills were not a thing when I was in school. I guess I should be grateful that my niece and her friends knew what to do in the moment.  Eileen told me that she’s not hurt, except for rug burns on her knees from crawling her way out to escape, close to the ground.  Of course her spirit is wounded.  As should ours be.  We allow this to continue to happen.

Yes, it’s a cliche that it’s different when something like this happens close to home.  And this certainly did.  My other niece lives down the hill from the club.  My sister is a professor up the hill from the club.  The shooter is from the town where they went to high school and where their little sister goes to middle school.

Given the lack of common sense gun laws, this will happen close to you one day too.

We must pray.  We must act.  We must join together.  We must make gun violence stop. Now. Seriously. Now.

If I haven’t convinced you yet, please read this column written by Emma Gonzalez and David Hogg, two of the students from Parkland, that appeared in the Washington Post the day before election day and a few days before my niece escaped the Borderline with her life.

Over eighteen months before the shooting at our school, 49 people were killed at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando. Four months before Parkland, 58 people were killed at a concert in Las Vegas. And on Oct. 27, 11 people were killed at Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh. In all that time, not a single federal law has been passed that addresses gun violence. Not a single law. Our nation’s leaders have failed to protect citizens where they live, where they learn and where they pray.

As they note in their last sentence:  not only must young people (and All people) vote, “the day after the election, the real work begins.”
  • Be the voice of reason.  If you have friends who are part of the 37% who do not think we need stricter more common sense gun laws, tell them about my niece and her friends.
  • Bother the you know what out of your representatives in Congress, no matter what their party.

    My niece lived in Alabama as a child, and her Godmother who still lives there just posted on Facebook that she tried to call her representatives to call them to support gun reform that would have protected her Goddaughter and was HUNG UP ON.

    Not ok.  But they hang up … we call back.

  • We write.  We text.  We march.  We become a broken record and a strong loud voice speaking for every man, woman, and child who can no longer speak for themselves.
Because silence is not an option.

Speaking truth to the Speaker

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My latest Global Sisters Report column has been posted. This time it is an open letter to House Speaker, Representative Paul Ryan, sharing my concerns about the proposed federal budget.

Here’s a snippet:

In your conversation with Sister Erica on CNN, you shared your appreciation for the model of Catholic organizations that help the poor. You expressed that they do a “fantastic job in spite of government doing wraparound benefits for the poor to make sure that they get to where they are — from where they are to where they need to be.”

My religious congregation, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace, sponsors and supports nonprofit services for low-income women in Jersey City, New Jersey, and Seattle with a similar model. Both the York Street Project and Jubilee Women’s Center provide such wraparound services, treat the whole person, and assist the women they serve on their journey to self-sufficiency.

I found it interesting that you referenced the year 1985 in your response to Sister Erica, because that is around the time my sisters started both these innovative programs.

I agree with you that we need to encourage and support such programs, but as partners with government, not replacements for our civic duty to promote the general welfare. Such programs do not do a fantastic job in spite of government, but in tandem with life-giving government programs like the Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), which are in jeopardy in the budget proposals under consideration. At the York Street Project, for example, CDBG funds support the job readiness program at Kenmare High School, helping women who previously dropped out of the public school system to find jobs that will support their families.

Visit Global Sisters Report to read the entire letter.

Believe in Goodness

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I have not posted in this space for quite some time. Life has been busy and the world has been crazy, you know how it goes.

But tonight, with the President choosing climate denial over truth, short term profit for a few over long term sustainability for this little planet we call earth and its inhabitants, isolationism over true leadership … I feel compelled to write.

The past few weeks have been a tough run. Terrorism and hatred in many forms grips the headlines, from Manchester to Portland. Terrorism in other parts of the world, places like Kabul and Bagdahd which have been ravaged by war, we try to ignore.

Then there is the ridiculousness from covfefe to the very probable meddling of a hostile foreign power in our democracy and hints of possible collusion by government officials.

It can all be too much, but in the midst of the swirly nature of life right now, I feel I must proclaim these words.

I believe in goodness.

The goodness of people to stand up to hateful speech in my adopted hometown of Portland, risking all for goodness.

The goodness of folks who stand up for what is right, on behalf of our immigrant brothers and sisters, Earth our common home, healthcare, justice and peace.

Yesterday I had the privelege of being with lay leaders from our csjp sponsored ministries in New Jersey. Day in and day out they provide compassionate care in health care, education and social service to people who are poor and vulnerable. We had the chance to hear stories of how the mission is alive today. In the midst of the challenge and strain of this crazy time, goodness abounds.

There is much we cannot control, but we can believe in goodness and act that way. We can choose to bring goodness into this world, little by little, relationship by relationship.

Pope Francis recently called for a revolution of tenderness.

Let’s be good and tender. Let’s follow that sage advice from Micah. Let’s act justly, love tenderly and walk humbly with God.

I have to believe it will make a difference.