Tag Archives: Tikkun

For us

Bible, Get on your feet, Justice, Poverty, Qabala, Squalor, The Way of Peace, Thursday posts, , , , , ,

A grassy lot inspires a vision of what can be when a community cares for itself.

When I take the bus to church in the morning, I normally get off at the closest stop, walk three blocks north and one block east.  At the corner where I turn is a vacant lot.  I don’t know who owns it.  In months past, it has typically been heavily littered.

One morning not long ago, as I approached that lot, I saw that it had been cleaned.  I saw this from fifty feet away.  The way things are around here, that little bit of beauty nearly knocked me down.  It took my breath away.  It lifted my spirits.

A tiny bit of beauty can powerfully affect one’s mood.  A mere glimpse of a pretty face can make one’s whole day.

I reflected:  harmony is the essence of beauty, exemplified in the orderliness of the clean lot as contrasted with the chaos of its previous litter.  I reflected on the relatednesses among light, love, harmony, order and prosperity, on the one hand; and darkness, strife, chaos and need, on the other.  What does it take to begin to establish harmony?  I concluded that perhaps love, or self-love, is the beginning of creation.

What if the whole community cared for itself as someone cared for that lot? Continue reading For us →

Where trees thrive, people thrive

Squalor, Thursday posts, , , , , , , ,

This thinking goes back to 1973.

I was a senior in high school, running an errand in the family car.  I must have been listening to WKSU.  This 5- or 15-minute segment came on.  A female spokesperson for the ACLU said that, under the compulsory school attendance law, a minor can only be in one of two places: a school, or a penal facility.  In her view there was no real difference.

I was an honors student and deeply convicted that education is the answer to poverty.  Thus her remarks left me incensed.  More than that, whereas I’ve never been a conservative, it seemed to me that the ACLU and other, like-minded movements were bent on destroying all order in society.  The family unit was under attack.  Marriage was under attack.  The schools were under attack.  Change for its own sake, which seemed to be what these people were after, isn’t good.  Nothing can be built on a foundation of chaos.  A child needs to root oneself in earth that will be in the same place today as tomorrow.  A tree can’t grow in quicksand.

Continue reading Where trees thrive, people thrive →

Notes: Perceptions of order, courage, and fear of the unknown

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As of 2017-02-27, this is a placeholder for notes for a discussion of these things, that may be worked into an actual post either before it’s published or at some later date.

– Courage
– Fear of the unknown, uncertainty, risk, disappointment
– Self-love facilitates desire
Continue reading Notes: Perceptions of order, courage, and fear of the unknown →

* For us

Bible, Get on your feet, Justice, OUR BEST POSTS, Poverty, Qabala, Squalor, The Way of Peace, , , , , ,

A grassy lot inspires a vision of what can be when a community cares for itself.

When I take the bus to church in the morning, I normally get off at the closest stop, walk three blocks north and one block east.  At the corner where I turn is a vacant lot.  I don’t know who owns it.  In months past, it has typically been heavily littered.

One morning not long ago, as I approached that lot, I saw that it had been cleaned.  I saw this from fifty feet away.  The way things are around here, that little bit of beauty nearly knocked me down.  It took my breath away.  It lifted my spirits.

A tiny bit of beauty can powerfully affect one’s mood.  A mere glimpse of a pretty face can make one’s whole day.

I reflected:  harmony is the essence of beauty, exemplified in the orderliness of the clean lot as contrasted with the chaos of its previous litter.  I reflected on the relatednesses among light, love, harmony, order and prosperity, on the one hand; and darkness, strife, chaos and need, on the other.  What does it take to begin to establish harmony?  I concluded that perhaps love, or self-love, is the beginning of creation.

What if the whole community cared for itself as someone cared for that lot? Continue reading * For us →

* Where trees thrive, people thrive

Squalor, , , , , , , ,

This thinking goes back to 1973.

I was a senior in high school, running an errand in the family car.  I must have been listening to WKSU.  This 5- or 15-minute segment came on.  A female spokesperson for the ACLU said that, under the compulsory school attendance law, a minor can only be in one of two places: a school, or a penal facility.  In her view there was no real difference.

I was an honors student and deeply convicted that education is the answer to poverty.  Thus her remarks left me incensed.  More than that, whereas I’ve never been a conservative, it seemed to me that the ACLU and other, like-minded movements were bent on destroying all order in society.  The family unit was under attack.  Marriage was under attack.  The schools were under attack.  Change for its own sake, which seemed to be what these people were after, isn’t good.  Nothing can be built on a foundation of chaos.  A child needs to root oneself in earth that will be in the same place today as tomorrow.  A tree can’t grow in quicksand.

Continue reading * Where trees thrive, people thrive →