On a lighter note....Gandhi and puns

Just completed a class on Gandhi's philosophy...so sweet, so powerful, so convicting! Gandhi believed that as long as the poor are starving and everyone does not have enough to meet their basic needs, that we are stealing from them when we over-eat or consume more than our need. He did recognize that we all have different needs, some more than others, but that we do violence to others when we take more than we need and don't treat our abundance as a trusteeship for those who don't have....So how do I live this way? For too long, I've been content with my hypocrisy, knowing how I should live, but not living my convictions or what I profess I believe. Gandhi said that we cannot separate our values from actions ( the apostle John said it too, didn't he?). If we claim to love God, but do not love our brother...If we say we love God, but our actions are not love, we deceive ourselves and God is not in us. So how do we really live what we say?

Ah, but this is all so heavy at times, so weighty...and you know me, when it gets to be too serious, I resort to puns. In all seriousness, I asked God to restore or even just give me a sense of humor this year! HA HA HA. Well, the inner punster in me kept popping out in my very intense Gandhi seminar class this weekend. I even worked up a whole schtick in honor of father's day yesterday. It's true. My classmates giggled, but more than few groaned and rolled their eyes in agony over the bad puns. It went something like this (let me know if you think I should become a stand-up comedian or not...your unconditional praise...I mean, honesty, is greatly appreciated):

Anyhoooo... It's Punday...I mean, Sunday and it's Father's Day. In honor of my father who loves a good pun, I thought I'd share a few. My dad loves puns! He thinks of puns and the ability to pun as a sign of great intelligence. Not to toot my own horn, but I'm so bright my father calls me "sun." (ba dump dump)

It's true that punning seems to release my inner creativity. One way I express this creativity is in writing silly poems for kids like one I call "Mime's the Word". It goes like this: "Did I ever tell you of the time, I got a job as a mime? I didn't? That's okay. There wasn't much to say." I was thinking about trying my hand at a new form of creativity last night and how I could focus it on puns. So I decided to write a theatrical performance about puns...well, to be modest, it was really just a 'play on words'.

I really thought I was going to be late for my Gandhi class because I was looking for my missing watch, but I just couldn't seem to find the time. (Ba dump dum) Mahatma Gandhi, as you know, walked barefoot most of the time, which produced an impressive set of calluses on his feet. He also ate very little, often going on long fasts, which made him rather frail and with his odd diet, he suffered from bad breath. It's rumored that this made him ... A super callused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

I don't know if you know this about me or not, but I'm an absolute science geek. After some very intense readings about Gandhian philosophy, I decided to take a break and do some light reading about quantum physics, string theories, and all about the universe. You know that in quantum physics there are forces which hold the universe together like weak nuclear, strong nuclear, gravitational forces and this idea that there is another invisible force that we don't know what it is yet. We call it the Grand Unifying Element. So I was reading a book about Anti-Gravity last night and I have to say it was impossible to put down! (ba dump dum). If electricity comes from electrons... does that mean that morality comes from morons? Did you hear? Two hydrogen atoms bumped into each other. The first one said, "I think I lost an electron." The second replied, "Are you positive?"

How many listen to NPR? I love public radio. I always feel more connected when I get a chance to listen to the news. So I was driving back to campus and was catching up on the news when I heard a story about a local man who had been in a horrific car accident. It seems he lost his whole left side! Incredible. The doctors say he's going to make it because he's "all right" now. See? It just goes to show you that you have to get out there, you can't let fear dictate your life. I used to have a fear of hurdles, but I got over it.

I was a little disappointed that in my Gandhian class we didn't really delve into some of the philosophers who influenced him and his work like Henry David Thoreau, Leo Tolstoy, Jesus Christ, even Confucius. Confucius had some really profound and succint proverbs which I still find applicable even today. Did you know that Confucius say, "Man who run in front of car get tired" and "Man who run after car get exhausted"? I used to know so many more, but it seems like my memory isn't what it used to be. In fact, I was trying to remember how to throw a boomerang the other day. I thought I had forgotten completely, but then it came back to me.

Ah, okay, that's all for now. Like the little tire said to the flat one, I'll spare you.

Hope you have a great day!

Letters to my niece series: An Argument for Sustainable Peace

Dear Sarah,

I’ve been thinking about peace again. In my work with sustainability, I often think of how we can create systems which are harmonic and durable. The Bible says, “Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called the sons of God” (Matthew 5:9). There’s something so proactive about the way Jesus states this. We often think of peace as an absence of turmoil or conflict. But in this simple line, Jesus is saying that it’s not enough to simply avoid conflict; we must actively bring about peace. When we do this, people will recognize that we’ve been hanging out with the Prince of Peace. Imagine a kingdom where the rule is peace. What does that say about how our governments could be run?

Nigel Dower (2009) writes that pacificism is a philosophy of sustainable peace. Pacificists concern themselves with making peace and creating systems which ensure lasting peace. He says that pacificism is characterized by “a belief in the possibility of making peace a more durable and robust feature in human relationships, both locally and globally, and in its ethical desirability as something that ought –morally—to be the object of human endeavor” (p.144). So what? What does this mean for us? How can we contribute to sustainable peace?

For me, sustainable peace, global and cultural competence, and an ethic of care are the hallmarks of educating for sustainability. One of the tools I enjoy working with is international service-learning. In international service learning, students begin to question their own assumptions such as imperialism, nationalism, consumerism, materialism, capitalism, etc. Though some studies have shown that most of a student’s learning occurs in-country, rather than pre-departure (Citron & Kline, 2001), issues such as service, partnerships, learning, interculturalism, ethnocentrism, power, privilege, oppression, and justice can be addressed before students land on foreign soil. I believe it is critical that students begin to address these issues and creatively think of scenarios wherein they might be seen as perpetrators of ethnocentrism or cultural imperialism.

How do we prepare students for intercultural service-learning in a foreign country? It begins with pre-trip preparation which addresses not only the details of the trip, that is, the nuts and bolts of the itinerary and cost and insurance forms, but the ethical issues surrounding service-learning. Pre-trip preparation can lay the foundation for creating an atmosphere of global understanding and intercultural awareness rather than “acts of cultural invasion” (Lutterman-Aguilar & Gingerich, 2002). Without pre-trip preparation, students are more likely to unconsciously become exploiters in the new culture or “unwittingly act as cultural imperialists and do more damage than good” (Lutterman-Aguilar & Gingerich, 2002, p. 19).

Other pre-trip issues which may be addressed are motivation, service, social justice, personal myth or worldview, transformational learning, and courageous conversation techniques.

If Dower (2009) is correct in stating that there are no simple, one-size-fits-all solutions to the question of peace, then we must prepare our students to act as global/local peacemakers. How? When love is our motivation for serving, international service-learning becomes truly collaborative as students develop an ethic of care and a relationship of trust with their community partners.

In peace,

Aunt Gigi

Letters to my niece series: The Case for Love

“Love without courage and wisdom is sentimentality, as with the ordinary church member. Courage without love and wisdom is foolhardiness, as with the ordinary soldier. Wisdom without love and courage is cowardice, as with the ordinary intellectual. But the one who has love, courage, and wisdom moves the world.”—Ammon Hennacy (1893-1970)

Dear Sarah,

As you know I’ve been thinking a lot about love and reading the sermons and writings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Sometimes it helps to know what something is not, in order to be able to understand it better. Love is not separateness, fear, passive, or destructive/violent.

To say that love is not separateness is to say that love is kinship. Fromm (2006) says it another way; love is oneness. Love sees others as related to self without being selfish. Much of the great work of psychology and sociology came from Germany in the first part of the 1900s. Arendt, Fromm, Frankl, and Bonhoeffer were just a few of the great minds who sought to understand what drives us. In their own ways, each one came to the conclusion that we all have a deep need to belong, to feel that we are not alone. But receiving love is not enough, we must love. Love is an action.

I know I am speaking of it as an object, but love cannot be love unless it is in action (Fromm, 2006). That is why I say that love is not passive. Some people think of love as weakness, that somehow it is a passive, apathetic response to aggression. On the contrary, love is courageous. The kind of love I speak of is the kind of love that forgives. This is radical love. This is the kind of love which few people who are only concerned about rights and justice ever understand. This is the kind of love that prays for the abuser, the killer, the enemy.

Fear of others is not love. The Bible says that where there is perfect love fear cannot remain. Fear leads to violence. Love chooses to turn the other cheek, rather than repay evil for evil. Love is not destructive. It doesn’t rejoice when bad things happen to other people. It doesn’t keep a record of grudges. It is not bitter. Martin Luther King (1986) wrote that “Hatred and bitterness can never cure the disease of fear; only love can do that. Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it”(p. 514).

Love is connectedness, confidence, active, peace and life. It always hopes, always trusts, always perseveres (I Corinthians 13). Love recognizes itself in all of creation. Love understands that we are all related. When we hurt our sister, we hurt ourselves. When we love our neighbor or enemy, we love ourselves.

It takes great courage to love the way Jesus, Gandhi, and King spoke of. They suffered greatly, but they chose to love their persecutors. This is transformational, relational, redemptive love; the kind of love that moves mountains.

I hope that you will read some of Dr. King’s letters, books, and speeches and that you will live and experience this transformational love for yourself, for your generation, for your world.

Love,

Your Aunt Gigi

Letters to my niece series: Cosmopolitanism, a new world view

Dear Sarah,

I’ve been reading Nigel Dower’s book, The Ethics of War and Peace and Shane Claiborne’s, The Irresistible Revolution. I can’t help but think back on the months immediately following the attacks of September 11, 2001 as Dower talks about pacifism, pacificism, and cosmopolitanism. Pacifism takes several forms, but basically it is an objection to violence and killing. Pacificism, in general terms, has more of a peacemaking emphasis, while cosmopolitanism is concerned with global citizenship. In Dower’s philosophical approach, he weighs the pros and the cons to every argument. I suppose I had never really thought about pacificism before, even though I believe that we should be peacemakers.

All of these concepts remind me of the dangers of nationalism. That’s not to say that nationalism is inherently evil. In fact, it’s natural in the sense that we all want to belong to something greater than us, to feel kinship. I love America. I feel lucky to have been born here. But even when I was about your age, I remember questioning if my allegiance was supposed to be directed at one nation only. I said the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag every morning in school, but the part of it that thrilled my heart was the “one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all” part.

In a sense, we are all global citizens. As citizens, we have a responsibility to care for one another, regardless of nationality or language or tribe or color. As a Christian, I found it disheartening after 9/11 to see so many followers of Christ “rally around the drums of war” (Claiborne, 2006). Jesus called us into his kingdom, to follow him, to love God and to love people (everyone, including our enemies). When we chose to follow Christ, we were adopted into a new tribe; one without borders or nationalities or race. What grieved me about the American Christian response to 9/11 was that we became stingy with the love of God. Claiborne says it like this, “Patriotism is far too myopic. A love for our own relatives and a love for the people of our own country are not bad things, but our love does not stop at the border….These earthly allegiances create a myopia that stands in the way of God’s vision and justice…Violence is always rooted in a myopic sense of community, whether it be nationalism or gangs” (2006, pp. 202-203). Martin Luther King, Jr said God has called us to a worldwide fellowship and unconditional love for all.

Jesus warned us that everyone “who lives by the sword will die by the sword” (Matthew 26:52). We believe that violence can save us; that violence can force peace to happen. But violence is like a cancer that eats at our hearts, our homes, and our world. Gandhi once said that we forget that the means become the ends.

So what does this mean for us? The Apostle Paul was proud of his “dual citizenship”. He was a citizen of Rome, but he was also a citizen of the kingdom of heaven. We can still be citizens of the United States of America and enjoy the responsibilities, privileges and joys that come with citizenship. But we are foremost citizens of heaven and we share that citizenship with people all over the planet (even the ones we would like to write off as “evildoers”). God loves them, too. And that’s the kind of radical love which is powerful enough to turn the world right side-up.

In peace,

Your loving Aunt Gigi

Letters to my niece series- Ethics and the Use of Force

Dear Sarah,

As I struggle to understand various reasons for war, conflict, and peace and to understand my fellow human, I cannot rid myself of my eternal optimism. I've been accused more times than I can count in my adult life of being "unrealistic", as though only a pessimist sees the down side of life and that a pessimistic view is a "realistic" view. No doubt, you, too, will face this same opposition. You will be told that you have your head in the clouds. People will tell you that you are at best a dreamer, at worst an eccentric, that somehow you are disconnected from reality. But in this letter, I will argue that transcendence of the human spirit is the greatest hope for our future and for future generations; that transcendence is our greatest connection to what it means to be human. Perhaps together, we will awaken the dreamers of the world to call them to manifest a new vision of "reality".

Last week, we talked about the war on terror. This week, I’ve been reading an interesting article by Bryan Hehir about ethics and the use of force. Hehir points out that there are differing views about war and the use of military force. The top three arguments about war are 1) non-violence: war should never be used, 2) realism: rules don’t apply to war, and 3) just war theory: sometimes war is acceptable, but only as a last resort.

Hehir believes that the United States was justified in responding with force to the terrorist attacks of September 11^th, but only so we could prevent future attacks. The problem which I see and which Hehir also points out is that terrorist groups often are made up of people from several countries. As such, we can’t just pick a country and say, “you have bad people in your country, so we are going to come in and kill them.” The United Nations Charter says we have the right to defend ourselves against attack. On the other hand, if we invade another country where terrorists live, that country’s government may decide that they need to protect themselves from us!

These issues are way too complex to discuss here in detail. At times, one is relegated to the use of oversimplification for sake of brevity in argument. I'm afraid these letters are often given to oversimplification for that very reason. In reality, war, violence, fear, love, and the use of force are decisions which are mired in a multitude of reasonings and rationalizations; way more than I can elaborate upon in these brief notes. And that is what we always come back to, isn't it? Everything is interconnected. The universe is complicated, complex; an intricate fabric woven in time and space and in its infinite relationships which we, as humans, often try to define in finite terms with precise solutions and prescriptive answers.

Though it may seem that I argue only for non-violence (and this is, indeed, my hope for the next generation), I recognize the complexity of the issues which led to the decisions to engage in the use of force to try to combat terrorism. I also see the futility of such actions in the long-term. When will we recognize the power of love as a force which cannot be subordinated or oppressed? When will this generation grasp the infinite, eternal, transcendent power of love and forgiveness, not as a passive-run-over-me-if-you-like type of power, but an active, beyond-reasoning, overwhelming type of power which leads the offender and offended to redemption, renewal, and life? Frankl (2006), who endured the deathcamps of both Auschwitz and Dauchau, argued for the transcendence of the human spirit in the midst of grief and suffering. He spent the rest of his life trying to convince the world that we must face violence with grace, death with hope, hatred with kindness, and force with the infinitely greater force of love.

In peace,

Your Aunt Gigi

Letters to my niece- Ethics and the War on Terrorism

Dear Sarah,

You were only four years old when the planes went down on September 11, 2001. For most of your life, the United States has been embroiled in the war on terror. As you enter your teen years, you may begin to ask, “What do I believe and why do I believe it?” You might even begin to ask questions about ethics and human rights such as “When does the end justify the means?” and “What is freedom?” and “Why do terrorists use innocent people as targets?” I hope that you will ask questions like: “What is the purpose of humanity?” and “Is it possible to lose our humanity?”

I was reading an article today by Maryann Cusimano Love. The article, called Morality Matters: Ethics and Power Politics in the War on Terrorism, was written only a few months after the twin towers went down. Love reminds us that violence in response to violence does not address the root causes of terrorism. If you want to know the root causes, you must begin to ask the question, “Why?” Why did Osama bin Laden attack the United States? What did he hope to gain? Why did he believe that killing us was a good idea?

Our war on terrorism is a losing battle because we are trying to stamp out terrorism (attacking innocent civilians or non-military personnel) while we engage in conventional warfare which kills even more innocent civilians. Love does not argue for non-violence only, but she does make the point that underestimating the long-term impacts of violence and warfare is a huge mistake with devastating effects.

There are some who would argue that we were compelled to go to war, that we had to respond to the terror attacks with force, that we couldn’t just “sit back and let them [the terrorists] get away with murder.” Others would say that the only language Osama bin Laden understood was violence, so we had to use military force against him and his terrorist network, al- Qaeda.

You’ve probably heard by now that “all is fair in love and in war.” In other words, rules don’t apply in these circumstances. Another way to say this is “the ends justify the means.” But do they? Is it okay to torture prisoners of war? Even if the information they have will help you stop an attack on more innocent civilians, is it okay to torture them? According to some people, torture and inhumane treatment of others is completely justified if it leads to the prevention of more attacks. Is it? Is it okay to torture someone if you think one of their friends might hurt someone else? Don’t terrorists use these very tactics? How are we different if we treat people the same way?

When we resort to inhumane treatment of others, when we torture and humiliate, when we use weapons and bombs, when we invade another country because we are afraid that they might attack us first, we have begun to lose the battle where the cost is our humanity. I do not say we should just let murderers and terrorists get away with their actions, or that we should stand by passively while they kill others, but we must maintain our humanity, our compassion for others-- even our enemies. If we do not, if we resort to violence and hatred, we will become our enemies. We cannot, we must not abandon the Judeo-Christian concept of the universal, inherent dignity of all human life or we, too, will find ourselves on the slippery slope of questionable morality.

Viktor Frankl (2006), even after experiencing the horrors of the Nazi death camps, still believed in the transcendence of the human spirit. He wrote about the kind of “world which no longer recognized the value of human life and human dignity, which had robbed man of his will and had made him an object to be exterminated (having planned, however, to make full use of him first—to the last ounce of his physical resources)…” (Man’s Search for Meaning, p.50). If we are not careful, we, too, will fall into that same Machiavellian mentality and morality.

We can be better. We can make ethical choices which do not destroy life. We can choose a better path. Indeed, if we are to live in peace, we must.

In peace and hope and love,

Aunt Gigi