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Mid-week Inspiration,
This is the last week of the International Season for Nonviolence. Sixty-four days will come to a close on Tuesday the fourth of April. For most people in our towns those sixty-four days will have gone by with little or no inkling of how far removed most people are from a life of peace and comfort. We live in such secure isolation from most global events. We are good people. Most of our world is on the front lines of war, starvation and pandemic. Ethnic cleansing, forced occupations, epidemic aids and starvation wages for work, if work can be claimed, are the global norm. Most of the world is hopeless, they will be born and they will die with less hope than the lowest of the low in our beautiful City.
A concept that is fast being redefined in our world today is the idea of citizenship. At one time it was synonymous with patriotism. It meant standing behind our country. When World War One happened my Grandfather joined millions. He dropped everything to go off to war. There was no question; that was the only thing to do. Today more and more the term global citizen is being embraced by a general public. Yet there is no clear understanding of what that means. We easily make claims as long as we need not take action, we don’t really understand that our complacency here is affecting the lives of people over ‘there’. I heard a statistic the other evening on CBC. I quote, Stephen Lewis, a past ambassador for Canada to the UN. He stated in 2005 that Western and European governments subsidize cows to the tune of two dollars per day per cow. He went on to point out that two dollars a day is twice the earnings of between four and five hundred million Africans. He said that subsidies like these make it virtually impossible for third world countries to benefit from the concept of free trade and hence pay off their debts to the IMF. Still in our country, in our city we argue about what we believe. Subtle conversations about our religion and their religion dominate religious views for many. Converting a few more people because ‘our brand of religion will save them better than theirs’, if they even have a religion. And even that is excessive for most people. We often show up to fulfill an empty obligation. Very many of us in this day belong to no group, we go it alone, practicing in our closets a brand of religion that allows us to be nice people among nice people. If we are not truly, deeply interacting then we are not truly, deeply growing! The one who can live in peace on a mountain top does not bring one iota more peace into the world if he or she can not be at peace in the midst of conflict. The greatest question we can ask of ourselves is who am I? From there what we need to do to bring balance becomes apparent. True religion is not what we believe; it is rather how we live what we believe. I would rather adhere to any religion that reaches into the world giving freely with no need to convince another of its rightness than belong to a ‘pure’ group who do nothing to better the lives of the world around them. Those who remember the ones in need are the ones who I choose to remember. Who am I, and how can I walk in greater integrity with who I am? Good questions to ask ourselves on this journey of discovering Gods Love within us. Blessings, 
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