Rendition for Americans?

--by Mike Adams

A few months ago, I was sitting in my allergist's office waiting the required thirty minutes to ensure I wouldn't have an anaphylactic reaction after being injected with all the things my body is allergic to. I was scanning the magazines, I usually can't stand the reading choices in Doctor's or Dentist's offices but on this occasion, I found a Mother Jones magazine, with a headline article, "The Science of Why We Don't Believe Science." I was intrigued and proceeded to read this article with great interest. Ultimately, this led me to purchasing a subscription to Mother Jones and I have not been disappointed. This is an incredibly well written periodical and the investigative journalism is second to none.

Where this is all going though is that yesterday, as the result of my being a subscriber, I read an article called, "Did Congress Just Endorse Rendition for Americans?" Which details a recent law passed by congress allowing for US citizens to be detained and transferred to foreign custody should they be considered unlawful combatants. This was all of course, quite disturbing, but what really hit me were the comments. The venom and upset...all punctuated by very little action as far as I know.

It suddenly occurred to me that if we are losing our democracy, we certainly aren't doing anything about it...not anything meaningful anyway. I posted the following response on the page and I hope that one my two or three readers will find it worth reading, perhaps thought provoking and hopefully action inspiring.

December 28, 2011 - Posted by "WeDecide"

The past few years have showcased political fights that show a few things:

1) After electing Obama, we rejoiced and went back to our lives, having elected "our savior", who would magically change everything without our having to do much beyond elect him. We needed to provide the political base for Health Care. We needed to grow our influence, double down for any kind of national health plan, rather, we left Obama to defeat the most filibuster happy congress in US history alone.

2) Internet discussion will not reverse the patriot act or reverse the US course on civil liberties. We need to be (at a minimum) as engaged and active as Reagan's supporters were in completely altering the political landscape in the '80s.

I'm as guilty as anyone on this, but the truth is we've not been asking the hard questions of ourselves...questions like:
"Calling Republicans Nazis...is that effective or even accurate?" Nazis killed millions of people in a cold, calculated and efficient manner. The term Nazi or comparison to Hitler should be reserved for people like Joseph Stalin or Slobodan Milosevic and never used to score cheap political points.

If we are going to reclaim our democracy, we must collectively and individually realize that this is our democracy and we have to take it back, which will be difficult! We'll have to walk door to door and converse with our neighbors, listening and responding respectfully to those who disagree even if they are rude. We'll have to address their concerns (many of which are valid).

Until we are willing to pound pavement, make phone calls, work hard for our future, we'll continue to have this dysfunctional government. MoveOn can't save us, the coffee party can't save us. Occupy can't save us, we have to do it. We'll have to stay focused, ignoring unimportant or irrelevant tangents. We'll have to be smarter and more committed than the oligarchy. We do have the power, we have simply to assert it. Government operates with our approval, even if that approval is some version of apathy and inaction.

Now someone can argue with me! :-)

Open letter to Mayor Quan of Oakland regarding Occupy Oakland

--by Mike Adams

Dear Mayor Quan,

First, I'd like to thank you for your willingness to serve as Mayor of Oakland. Being a public servant is a difficult and usually thankless job. In fact, I've been asked by several members of my community on a few occasions to run for school board. Having been assured that my chances of election are high due to the fact that I'd likely be unopposed, I declined, primarily because I've seen how our public officials are treated and it seems that I'd be volunteering to stand in the middle of several disagreeing groups of people and saying to them all, “Hey, I'm here...you may begin throwing rocks now.”

That being said, I write to you today about a troubling topic and I assure you that my intention is to avoid throwing any verbal or ontological rocks.

I write to you as a former Bay Area resident and frequent Bay Area visitor. I currently live in Los Alamos, New Mexico, but spent sixteen years of my life in the Bay Area and I love Oakland.

Today, when I came home from work, I logged into facebook and saw links to news reports, youtube videos and video news feed of Oakland police using teargas, flash bang grenades and rubber bullets against unarmed and peacefully assembled Occupy Oakland (Wall Street) protesters.

I find this deeply troubling, particularly coming from the city, which only a few years ago held a public protest against the invasion of Iraq, where the city's mayor led the procession. I find it heartbreaking and very shocking that one of the places I consider home, one of the municipalities that I have grown to admire, a place that I have been willing to point out as an example of how the rest of this troubled country should conduct the business of governance has now taken a leadership position in attacking it's citizens with force and brutality because the city's government has decided that it is time for these citizens to stop asserting their right to publicly assemble under our Nation's first amendment.

I beg you Mayor Quan to do all that you can to prevent any further violence from the police against the OWS protesters. Not everyone agrees with their message, however, they are merely exercising their first amendment guaranteed right and for that they ought not be retaliated against.

Our times are tumultuous and our people are troubled. Real unemployment hovers near 15% nationwide, our governments are burdened with a mountain of debt, there are an average of four unemployed people for every available job vacancy and many of us fear that our children's futures have been sold to multi-national corporations. Please, Mayor Quan, do not allow the citizens engaged in this effort to reclaim our children's future be treated with brutality.

Sincerely, Michael Adams

Religion is Like...

My wife shared this picture on my Facebook profile and frankly, I Love It!

I immediately wondered how I could write a blog post to compliment the message, thereby having a good excuse to share the image on my blog.

The challenge being, the sign pretty well covers it all...there is nothing more to say! Not unless I want to be both redundant and repetitive.

So, while this sinks to a lower level of crass than what I will typically post on my blog, it is representative of my conversational humor and the type of banter in which I'll participate.

I Believe this picture is by - Jason Robinson

The love a family has

--by Mike Adams

I TOTALLY look hot in flowers!

Or so I say when it serves my purposes. My wife and mother-in-law, probably won't confirm this statement, but I believe this has less to do with disagreement about my native heat and more to do with avoiding any encouragement of my tendency to do anything for a laugh.

So, along those lines, I ask you to take a moment and really appreciate the beauty of the swim cap to the left. Honestly, I love this cap and I want it! If someone gets me this cap, I'll happily wear it while I give them lap-swimming lessons at the public pool. Admittedly, this is not a normal form of recreation for a 260 pound man with a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, but then again I've never had run of the mill aspirations in life.

I suppose I tend to be a bit over the top. The truth is I will say almost anything...do almost anything for a good laugh and I do NOT embarrass easily. My greatest weakness is perhaps guilt. For example, my mother-in-law often accuses me of making fun of her and often I will relent at this point feeling guilty for my sport. The problem is that I haven't been making fun of her...not personally anyway, in reality, I just want to laugh and any topic will do...people shouldn't take these things so seriously!

Most recently, I've taken to squealing with delight and hollering “Nanna” when my wife’s mom arrives at the same location I happen to be. Invariably, my adorable little six year old joins me in running wildly towards her for an embrace. The perplexing thing is that despite my unbridled affection, she isn’t thrilled. Seriously people, how many women can you name whose son-in-law not only likes them but enthusiastically hugs them at almost every opportunity? I can't think of any besides my mother-in-law, the lucky lady!

I suppose it might strike her as a bit odd that I hug her with both arms and one leg, see picture to the right for an example, but hey we're all family right? Shouldn't she have acclimated to this level of passion by now? Why deny our love? My problem here is that most of my family simply doesn't see things the same as I do. My wife has said that if I hug her mom like that in public, she'll walk away, pretending not to know me and my mother-in-law has threatened to take Tae Kwon Do, so she can learn to keep me at bay.

To be honest, I'd love for her to take Tae Kwon Do. I think she'd enjoy it and frankly, I have persisted in and developed the tradition of greeting her with a one-leg hug, partially in hopes that she'll make good on her threat.

But beyond all of that, there is simply the principle of this matter. Is not today's world too devoid of love and affection? Don't we see too much partisan bickering at the capitol (any capitol...you choose!) Isn't our age marked by the detached youth yearning to escape their worried but misguided parents? Shouldn't we all make haste to change course and create a more loving and more tolerant world? I think so, which is why I leg-hug my son's Nanna.

People may think me crazy, but it is people like me who change the world, so I ask every American, Canadian and German. Every Saudi, every Korean, every person around the globe to take a moment today and show those around you how much you love them. Use your leg and your arms. Lets dub the next decade the hugging decade. Are you with me? Then go leg-hug someone!

Sept 11 - Lessons We Might Learn

--by Mike Adams

A few weeks back, I was contacted by a member of the forum committee from the Unitarian Church of Los Alamos, who asked if I might be willing to speak at the forum on the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks in New York and Washington DC. Because I have thought and read a great deal about those events over the past ten years ,and because I have a higher estimation in my own abilities than perhaps is justified, I agreed to speak with hardly a tinge of reluctance.

A short while later, I began to wonder if I actually had anything worth saying on this topic. I wondered if anything I could say hadn’t already been printed on a bumper sticker.
Momentarily, I was stricken with panic. Why oh why had I agreed to talk on Sept. 11. Then, I remembered that anything I've ever said that was worth hearing didn't coalesce in the confines of my own mind, but rather it grew organically nurtured and fertilized by the various discussions and debates I had participated in.

So I intentionally began discussing 9/11 with my friends and family. I asked for people's thoughts regarding the attacks, their opinions about the world’s reaction, their initial impressions directly after the attacks and their impressions now with ten years having passed. I wanted to discover what others thought about our general discussions surrounding 9/11, what they thought the US seems to have learned and more importantly what they feel we have failed to learn.

This article and my talk to the UU Church of Los Alamos are in part the culmination of those discussions, but more importantly, I hope that this text can act as a catalyst for a thoughtful examination of the tragedy that began ten years ago half a world away. Anything concerning 9/11 is fraught with deep and powerful emotion, strong opinions and positional statements. Often our points of view are rooted in emotion, and they stubbornly persist. I think that as a country, we would do well to all take up an attitude of self-examination and try to employ a bit of humility when discussing our national attitudes and our international role in today's world.

First, I think a review of the Sept. 11 time line and events is in order:

Between the hours of 5:45 and 7:15 am, nineteen hijackers passed through gate security at Logan Airport, Newark International Airport and Washington Dulles Airport. It is believed that all of them carried box cutters or other concealed weapons and, while eight of them were randomly screened and two were even flagged as suspicious, none were prevented from boarding their intended flights.

At 8:19 that morning, Betty Ong and Amy Sweeney, flight attendants on American flight #11 contacted ground personnel alerting them to the hijacking. Somehow, Sweeny and Ong maintained contact with flight crews through the duration of their flight, providing useful information for the subsequent FBI investigation.

Twenty seven minutes later, at 8:46, flight 11 slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, killing hundreds of people in the building and everyone on board the plane. Stunned witnesses to the attack, turned their video cameras towards the North Tower. Meanwhile New York’s Police and Fire Departments mobilized in less than a minute, and arrived quickly on the scene.

Thirteen minutes later, flight 175 was approaching the World Trade Center when one crew member and several passengers contacted authorities and loved ones, alerting them to the status of their flight.

At 9:02, three minutes after contact from flight 175 was made, Port Authority Announced an evacuation of the South Tower but only one minute after the announcement, flight 175 entered a dive and impacted the South Tower, killing everyone on board and several hundred in the building.

Thirteen minutes after the crash of flight 175, Renee Mays, a flight attendant on Flight 77 called her mother, reporting that her plane had been hijacked. She asked her mother, Nancy, to alert American Airlines to the situation. Meanwhile, a passenger, Barbara Olson, reached her husband, who informed her of the World Trade Center attacks. Fifty one minutes after the first crash in New York, at 9:37 am, flight 77 crashed into the Western side of the Pentagon, killing 184 people in total.

Twenty minutes after the pentagon attack, at 9:57, thirteen people on flight #93 contacted loved ones and authorities. The passengers were informed that three hijacked planes had already been crashed into the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. It is believed that the passengers of flight #93 held a vote and chose to try and forcibly take back their plane. Six minutes later, at 10:03 am, only 20 minutes from Washington DC, as the passengers of flight 93 battled with the hijackers, the plane entered a dive and crashed in a field in Somerset County, PA. All forty passengers were killed.

Even ten years after the fact, reviewing these events is emotionally painful. I simultaneously feel sad, angry, compassionate, vengeful and empathetic. To this day, I am confused emotionally by this tragedy.

When I awoke on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, it was to news reports confirming the collapse of the twin towers in Manhattan. The reports had infiltrated my barely conscious mind and snapped me into an alert state. I thought the news report had to be a dream, but a quick surf through the cable news channels informed me that the tragedy was real and that I had awoken into a different world.

My first thought was for people I had known while living in Manhattan. I had worked at the foreign news desk of the Wall Street Journal in the World Financial Center. I had known people who worked in the World Trade Center and that morning, I worried about their fate.

Next, my worry gave way to rage and disbelief. How could anyone have such an incredible lack of judgment? Didn't they know what would happen? Why would they intentionally stir up a hornet’s nest? That morning, I gave serious thought to enlisting in the armed services, so that I could exact my own personal vengeance against the perpetrators of this attack.

It wasn't until a day or two had passed that I began to worry about what our national reaction might be. I began to worry about who would get hurt and who would suffer. Would innocent people be forced to withstand a storm of terror and personal loss in order to satisfy our need for vengeance. What onslaught would be unleashed in response to the misguided actions of nineteen hijackers?

I became increasingly worried that the US would fail to have a measured response and that we would instead exact a toll against a foreign population that was completely disproportionate to the damage we had suffered.

At the time, I could not have imagined the sheer magnitude of US reaction that would ensue. I would never have guessed at the devastating consequences that would result from our vendetta. Ten years ago, my worry extended to the residents and survivors in New York and Washington; I worried for families half way around the world who might get caught in the cross fire. But I couldn’t imagine my country trashing a balanced budget, incurring the largest debt in US history, invading two countries and waging the two longest wars in our national history, resulting in more than a million deaths. I didn’t think we would recklessly shove our economy off a cliff dragging much of the world along for the ride. I wouldn’t have thought we might strap the next generation with a mountain of debt that they didn’t approve and for which they have no culpability.

According to ex CIA Officer and al Quaeda expert, Michael Scheuer, the bin Laden movement was aimed, not at killing or conquering Americans, not even at “reforming” our politics, but rather, al Quaeda wanted the US to go bankrupt thus reducing our worldwide influence and in particular, our influence in Muslim countries.

It gives me pause to consider that bin Laden’s primary goal may have been to incite the US into creating it’s own economic Armageddon; that he didn’t aim to foment a global Muslim uprising against the West, that al Quaeda didn’t actually plan to lead the Muslim world in a great war against Western powers. But rather that the goal was to spur the US into an exaggerated, sustained and costly military reaction, which would ruin our economy. Could it now be said that maybe he succeeded and that the primary weapon he used was our own national hubris?

I think the jury is still out on that question, but the question is worthy of contemplation. In the Time Magazine article, “bin Laden’s great mistake: What Osama Never Understood About the American Spirit”, journalist Romesh Ratnesar, contends that the US economy is far more robust that what bin Laden had thought. He points out that we attract the best and brightest from around the world. He cites statistics showing that in 2005 one in four high tech start-ups were launched by immigrants and that in 2009 immigrants with advanced degrees were three times as likely as native-born Americans to file for patents. Ratnesar writes, “What bin Laden never understood is that, whatever the body blows suffered over the past decade, American society retained its capacity to renew itself.”

While Ratnesar discusses our strengths, he stresses that we cannot afford complacency, and I wholeheartedly agree. The facts at present are these, our public education system is on the verge of collapse. Our federal and increasingly our local governments are paralyzed with partisan bickering and ineptitude. Our debt is titanic, our credit downgraded and our citizens demoralized. While it is true that our culture and our economy received an infusion of vitality from the immigrant talent we’ve attracted, we flirt with disaster if we continue to allow xenophobic politicians to gain clout and power in Washington. We are ensuring our downfall if we continue to let partisan politicians grind their axes on the foundations of our school system legislating ill-conceived “oversight” and designing education without the input of knowledgeable experts in education or people who understand child development and learning. We cannot continue to blame our teachers and educators for the failure of our culture to instill a love of learning in the next generation or to place a high value on acquiring an education.

The fact that our country has attracted multitudes of talented and industrious immigrants, is heartening, and it gives us a little bit of breathing room, but it is troubling that so little innovation is home grown. That our country is failing to produce entrepreneurs and designers, requiring that we be able to attract external innovators to feed our success.

With regards to whether bin Laden has accomplished his goals, I believe the jury is out, because I think we will either deliver his victory or deny his success. Our choices in terms of how we invest in our country and in our future will determine our answer to that question. Our answer to bin Laden will be formed from our priorities, from our ability to coalesce into a unified nation from our willingness to confront unpredictable challenges while maintaining our values. I think think our answer will be determined by the questions we are willing to ask.

For example, many of my liberally minded friends and acquaintances have said things like “peace is the answer” or “give peace a chance”, but what does that actually mean? Are those statement truly meaningful in terms of foreign policy? Are they practical? Are they useful? Do they provide a basis for governance or do they look profound on a bumper sticker? Please don’t misunderstand, I’m not against peace. My question goes to whether the world we live in is truly that simple or are things much more complex than any thirty second sound bite?

Are we truly informed about important issues? Are we willing to consider contrary information, particularly concerning issues that we ardently defend or zealously attack?

Has our country had an intelligent conversation about any important topic in the past year or even the past decade?

I don’t think so...do you? I have to ask why haven’t we? What is preventing us? More importantly, what, if anything, have we done to promote a responsible conversation about energy, education, international policy, or our economy?

Do we collectively think primarily in bumper sticker phrases or do our opinions carry the weight of having been questioned and considered with care? I don’t mean other people either, I mean myself and anyone who is reading this article.

When we vote for public officials, are we voting for someone who will govern effectively or are we voting for someone who expresses our outrage and who will inflict that outrage on the opposition?

Which kind of candidate will more likely herald the change that our country craves and that our children need? We are the ones who elect our leaders, so the choices are ours.

I believe we are at a cross-roads in American ...AND world history. I believe the decisions we make will carry monumental consequences for generations to come. The choices are ours but the outcomes are weighty and unknowable. Sometimes I think that our decisions may carry greater import than any that have been made in the past century, if not longer.

So I ask you...
Are we giving those decisions the attention they deserve?
Do we truly recognize the gravity of our choices and are we being appropriately thoughtful and cautious?

One of the people I spoke with in preparation for today’s talk said that one lesson she hopes we have learned is to teach our youth about what happened on September 11, to arm the next generation with the needed resources to avoid future tragedies of a similar nature.

I therefore asked several youth about September 11th. I asked what they know of the events and possible motives for those attacks and I found to my dismay that we have definitely not passed on that information. None of the youth I talked with, including my own, were knowledgeable about the 9/11 attacks, or their possible motives.

At first I was surprised until I remembered that many Americans still believe Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden collaborated. There is widespread belief that our invasion of Iraq was legitimately tied to the attacks of September 11. I guess It shouldn’t be a surprise that we haven’t taught our children about these events when it is clear that even our adult public is widely ignorant to the facts.

It seems we have a long road ahead and very little of our journey will be easy. I think that neither my country, nor even my congregation has honestly engaged in the most difficult and confronting questions that will allow us to resoundingly deny bin Laden his victory.

We don’t seem to know what we stand for and we have difficulty finding unity even in service of our shared values. A microcosm of the USA, my UU congregation can spend hours and weeks debating the merits of having the word “church” as part of our name meanwhile we can’t generate half a dozen interested people to support a weekly interfaith service at the Capitol building in Santa Fe supporting marriage equality during the legislative session.

We have staked out our positions regarding how Sunday services should look and feel. We have hardened our opinions as to whether our message should be secular or spiritual. We are ardent about how to conduct services for all ages and we have largely abandoned them due to disagreement. We have lost long time members, we have hurt friends, we have alienated each other and we have moved on having formulated our reasons, excuses and explanations.

We have failed to be in dialogue and we have failed to listen to each other when we needed to most. We have failed to recognize and honor the commitments that others express, when their proposals seem disagreeable to us? In short, we have failed to do enough. We have failed to manifest our values at large in today’s world.

I know I am at risk of making my self unpopular now, but I think it would be unforgivable and deeply hypocritical for me to imply that I and my community have done or are currently doing what is needed in today’s world.

In reality, I believe we haven’t and we aren’t! We aren’t doing enough to reclaim our democracy and install responsible leaders. We aren’t doing enough to right the wrongs that our nation’s foreign policy has wrought. We aren’t doing enough to ensure that people the world over have access to food, medical care, education and hope. We aren’t doing enough to ensure that members of our community feel they are important when they disagree with the direction we choose.

I don’t mean that we aren’t doing a lot...because we are! Some among us are undoubtedly fatigued and wore out, some are disheartened and others are overcome with the sheer magnitude of all that there is to accomplish.

I don’t pretend that our path is easy or that our values will naturally propagate. Unlike other church communities, we lack the assurance that God is on our side, because many of us don’t believe in God.

I think it is hard to accept that despite all we have done, despite the labor and the passion we have invested, despite our commitment, our belief and all that we have accomplished. Our deeds are still not enough. Despite all we have given, our nation and our world continue to hurtle down a destructive and perilous path that we oppose, so obviously we haven’t yet done enough.

I am not implying that each of us must take an additional full time job serving our values. But we should each examine where we have been ineffective and where we have failed to lend support when we maybe should have. We might consider which areas of personal growth we have avoided because the challenge seems too great and perhaps the payoff is directed primarily at others. We might ask in a serious manner, why we haven’t coalesced into a congregational force for positive change? Have we really engaged in the tough questions, the ones that make us squirm, the ones that we don’t like to answer because we see that we haven’t even begun to stretch ourselves and realize our full capacities.

Many might wonder why I bring all of this up? What could I hope to accomplish? The answer is that despite my being an atheist, I actually believe in miracles. Not miracles of divine intervention, but rather miracles of human triumph. I believe that people are miraculous and confounding all at once.

I believe that given the opportunity, many of my fellow citizens and my community will embrace a worthy challenge. I anxiously chose these topics for discussion, because I have a high estimation of my fellow citizens and my fellow UUs. I think we are exactly the sorts of people who can and will engage in the toughest questions. I think we are the people to take up these challenges and provide the kind of leadership that is needed today. I don’t anticipate acquiring a broad level of unpopularity from this message, because I think most will understand I am not hurling insults but rather calling on every one's innate greatness. The list of shortcomings I covered earlier are normal in any group, they are typical of how collections of people function. I pointed them out, because I think UUs and others in my community are extraordinary and I think we could set a new tone for our broader community and possibly our world. The fact is that Unitarian Universalists have been at the leading edge of many important social upheavals in the past century and I see no reason that we should stop displaying that quality of leadership now.

Sales Phone Calls: H8 em...no I Love em!

--by Mike Adams

I was just reading a link my wife sent to The Bloggess, which made me laugh and reminded me of how I respond to marketing calls. I love marketing calls, I'll always take them when I have the chance. I'll listen for a while and at my first opportunity, I'll derail the sales pitch and try to steer it in a direction like this:

Me (stereotypical used car sales voice):
Have you ever tried the U CAN SELL ANYTHING method for these types of calls?

Caller:
uhhh...no, I'm calling to find out if you have any interest in a six month subscription to (some magazine I could care less about)

Me:
Right, but have you closed this deal yet...that's the most important question...in fact, in sales, that's always the most important question. So, I ask you...have you closed this deal yet?

Caller:
Are you asking me...no, I haven't...what!?

Me:
Exactly my point, do you realize that if you were using my patented U CAN SELL ANYTHING method, you could probably have closed this deal and already be calling someone else. You could probably double your sales in no time. Have you heard of this new powerhouse method of sales?

Caller:
Uhhhh...Sir, do you think you might be interested in a six month subscription of (some idiotic magazine that I couldn't give a crap about) for 1/4 the cost of what you would pay at the news rack?

Me:
Now you are getting my point aren't you. The answer is that I might be interested in it if you were selling it to me effectively...not only might I be interested in it, the question you'd be asking is how many subscriptions do I want to buy? One for my spouse, for my parents, etc... So let me ask you again, have you heard of my patented U CAN SELL ANYTHING program? You should go check out my web sit www.sellanything2anyone.crap before you make one more call, you'll be thanking me on your next pay check!

Caller:
Well, I'm gonna have to get going now, you have a nice day ok...bye! (click)

I hang up the phone feeling satisfied with myself and entertained for my efforts.

Morality & Spiritual Atheism

--by Mike Adams

It was the late fall of 1998 and I was seeing disturbing coverage of tragic and vile events in another state. I became aware of a sensation advancing from my abdomen at an alarming rate infiltrating every outpost of my nervous system imbuing me with a ferocity that I truly feared. News reports drifted from the television across the room inundating my senses, leaving me in a deluge of deep shame for humanity. I understood on a personal level for perhaps the first time in my adult life how one could without compunction, deny the humanity of another, ontologically, relegating them to the category of barely human refuse...a waste of food and oxygen. I was seeing detailed reports of how Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson had picked up Matthew Shepard at the Fireside Lounge in Laramie, Wyoming. I learned how they had tortured Matthew, tied him to the bumper of their vehicle, dragged him behind the vehicle on a dirt road, tied him to a wooden fence and left him there to die alone. This was disturbing enough on its own, but I was unprepared for the vile disgust I felt for Rev. Fred Phelps and his followers, who arrived at Matthew Sheppard's funeral with signs and banners declaring, "Matt Shepard rots in Hell", "AIDS Kills Fags Dead" and "God Hates Fags".

The intensity of my ire was concerning, I had been sober for only three years and in AA, we learn to deal with resentment immediately, so I began asking my ambiguous higher power for relief from my anger...for some measure of serenity. During the previous three years, my relationship with a Higher Power, my spiritual life and my continued sobriety had been paramount in my life, indeed my precarious grip on sobriety and possibly on life absolutely depended on my spiritual wellbeing. For three years, I had taken regular moral inventories, directly amended the harms I had caused and constantly engaged in a search to enlarge my spiritual life. The result of those actions was a sense of worth and of spiritual strength.

I could, therefor, not understand how people claiming to serve God could act in a vile, hateful and callous manner like Phelps and his followers. The very basis of my spiritual practice strictly precluded me from similar actions. I couldn't even afford to entertain extreme emotions of disgust towards Phelps or Matthew's killers. For me that kind of disgust verges on hatred, which can undermine the kind spiritual strength that I had developed. My understanding of God's will for humanity had me strenuously participate in service to others, I worked to increase my compassion and to carry my good news to any who needed and wanted it
Under the circumstances, I wanted to make a difference, but I couldn't imagine what to do about Matthew Sheppard. I couldn't imagine what would allow me to comfort his friends and family or to seek justice on his behalf. Having no ideas for direct action, I resolved to work for the realization of a world, where no one would be subjected to the callous and evil treatment that Matthew had endured.

Around this time, I received word that a friend of mine was sick and that hospice had been called. A few years earlier, I had taken a job as a caregiver for mentally and physically disabled adults in a group home. Despite limitations imposed by their varied disabilities, the residents were like everyone else, in that they could be simultaneously inspiring and irritating, gentle and vindictive, in short ordinary people, whom I grew to love over the course of a few years. I had started a new line of work but when I heard that my favorite resident, a quadriplegic man had suffered a resurgence of cancer, that it was inoperable and he wouldn't be with us much longer, I rearranged my schedule to ensure that I could visit him regularly during the last weeks of his life. One night, after he slipped into a coma, I sat at his bedside with two other people and as John took his last breath, I held his hand. I reflected that despite his having suffered much in life, he had been fortunate to be surrounded by people who loved him as he walked that last length of life's path. It was a privilege to be there as the last glimmer of his human life flickered and extinguished. The power of that moment is inexorable, the surprise was how it reminded me of Dennis Sheppard's words to McKinney and Henderson at their sentencing trial in court:

By the end of the beating, his body was just trying to survive. You left him out there by himself, but he wasn't alone. There were his lifelong friends with him—friends that he had grown up with. You're probably wondering who these friends were. First, he had the beautiful night sky with the same stars and moon that we used to look at through a telescope. Then, he had the daylight and the sun to shine on him one more time—one more cool, wonderful autumn day in Wyoming. His last day alive in Wyoming. His last day alive in the state that he always proudly called home. And through it all he was breathing in for the last time the smell of Wyoming sagebrush and the scent of pine trees from the snowy range. He heard the wind—the ever-present Wyoming wind—for the last time. He had one more friend with him. One he grew to know through his time in Sunday school and as an acolyte at St. Mark's in Casper as well as through his visits to St. Matthew's in Laramie. He had God.

I feel better knowing he wasn't alone.

Sometimes through tragedy, people find grace. We can never be sure exactly where it comes from, but those moments of grace are what interest me today. They may be found in the face of overwhelming tragedy, in the tender good night ritual a parent has with a young child or the incredible charity that follows a natural disaster. Whatever the source, there is a deep reservoir of peace and generosity inside most people and when that reservoir runs free, it can inspire all who are touched to acts of generosity, compassion and grace. Some attribute this bent toward unconditional love to the shapeless hand of God inspiring the human will, others suggest that we access a sort of universal consciousness or over soul but the explanation which makes most sense to me is that human grace and compassion our an integral part of our genetic coding. That when our ancestors faced extinction roughly one hundred thousand years ago, they were forced to pull together and make communal organizations in a way that had never been done before.

Our ancestors then developed the ability to make long term plans, which would unfold over the course of several years, they developed complex communication and abstract thought. They learned to place greater importance on communal welfare than individual ambition. Those who served selfish ambition were likely ostracized and unable to procreate. After several generations, humanity's ancestors had developed a genetic predisposition towards social cohesion, giving genesis to our modern notion of morality.

On it's most basic level, that morality resonates deeply with most people and many of us yearn for a world where human relations are ruled by basic moral values which preclude killing, stealing, lying and which encourage charity and community spirit. In my experience, fundamental moral values are necessary for a vibrant spiritual life. It is true that among varied religious theologies, there are numerous disputes about specific articles of morality, for example many religions denounce homosexuality as evil, while others, like ours believe discrimination is the actual sin.

Omitting theological controversies, there are spiritual and moral principles common to most beliefs, which can, if nourished, blossom into a vibrant sense of spiritual wellbeing. My spiritual exploration began in 1995, with my joining AA, since then, I have attended several churches or retreats, studied and debated various theologies and philosophies and I have visited numerous locations thought to be holy or powerful. I experienced an unexpected twist in 2008, when my wife's cousin, who is also sober, asked if I had heard about the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster or "FSM". Since I hadn't, she sent me a web link and a note saying she thought I would find FSM entertaining. I read Bobby Henderson's open letter to the Kansas City School Board, which opens by applauding the school board's decision to split science class time in half. One half dedicated the theory of evolution, the other half used to teach intelligent design. Henderson indicates this is a good start but points out that there may be numerous intelligent design theories, and asks that equal class time be given to the theory that a Flying Spaghetti Monster, who controls both matter and time created the universe. Henderson creatively employs creationist arguments to support his FSM theory and ultimately claims that "Flying Spaghetti Monsterism" must be taught by someone wearing pirate regalia. Henderson provides a chart illustrating an inverse relationship between the population of pirates and global temperatures over the past 200 years, proving FSM's anger at the decline in pirate populations and demonstrating FSM's preference for pirates above others.

After reading Henderson's letter, I quickly joined online FSM forums, where I found FSM "followers" or "Pastafarians" to be intelligent, witty and refreshing. Periodically, an evangelizing Christian would join an FSM forum looking for Christian converts at which point, they would be engaged in lively and amusing debates. If the missionary persisted, Pastafarians would gently chide them, resulting in occasional complaints, which Pastafarians would respond to by asking what they expected when they sought Christian converts on a forum of atheists who claim membership a religion called "Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster" and who often post in Pirate Dialect?

The Pastafarian's disarming wit and indisputable logic converted me, I rejected the notion of a supreme being, particularly one which is interested in humanity. My loss of faith in God was disquieting, I worried about my sobriety, about my spiritual condition and about my morality. I tried for a short while to regain faith and forget the argument that if there had been any supreme being who wanted us to live a certain way, it would have left very clear and unmistakable instructions, leaving us no doubt and no basis for argument, controversy or misunderstanding. But without those divine instructions, I could no longer believe in God. My concern was that without God, morality lacks any basis in universal divine wisdom and it seemed that morality must therefor, be entirely subjective.

To my relief, as time continued her relentless march, I never lost my moral values. To the contrary, I realized that with no universal reward or justice, the choices we make about how to live, how to treat each other and how we care for this planet are of greater importance now than I had previously thought. Without God...when there is only us, with our genetic predisposition towards morality, with the suffering we experience, with the suffering we cause and with the suffering we are willing to tolerate, we become the sole source of evil. We are the masterminds, perpetrators and teachers of ill deed...We also have the power to end evil.

So while grace may indeed be something we plug into, I don't believe we plug into any ethereal over soul or receive any divine inspiration. Rather, I think we recognize and embrace an innate, genetic inclination towards moral behavior. We access a fundamental building block, which links us not only to the whole of humanity, but to all life on this planet. Our genetic code contains a wondrous history, chronicling life on this planet, linking us to the evolutionary miracle that continues to unfold. Our very building blocks are a tether to the interdependent web of existence. Far from endangering my spiritual quest or moral life, atheism illustrated to me the immediate necessity of living well. It made paramount the effort to create a just and compassionate world, to employ spiritual principles, to try my best to do right by my fellow travelers as I traverse the labyrinth of life's path.

I can no longer afford to be mollified by any promise that someday marriage equality will be realized, that it is inevitable and that now isn't the right time to push...there are too many loving souls who's rights are being denied right now, whose short, and precious lives are in a sense being sacrificed to quiet the chorus of bigotry.

I can no longer relax with complete contentment knowing that the sphere of my relations and loved ones are cared for, when I know that millions in my extended human family are being forced into economic, sexual or religious slavery. That they are chained to drudgery and made to cede a significant measure of their one fragile and precarious life to serve the remorseless avarice of others.

Faced with what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called the fierce urgency of now, I can not be truly at peace when I know that throngs of brothers and sisters, parents and grandparents, children and infants live in terror every day. That they are ravaged with the invisible emotional scars of wars and conflicts that they never invited and over which they have no control.

We all have one life...one delicate, precarious and precious life. We get to decide how we will use that life, what we will serve with that life, who we will touch with that life. This congregation's mission statement ends with the words "Living our seven principles, we bring justice and compassion to our congregation, to our community, to our world. We are a beacon of Hope!"

That is a mighty declaration! It is inspiring and worthy of our efforts. Let us stand together, journey together and work together in service of animating that mission with breath and soul. Let us be that beacon of hope lighting the way...creating a world, where Matthew Shepard could have lived a long and happy life, meeting his end in the same manner as my friend in the group home, surrounded by loved ones and embraced by community. Let us stand strong on our values in the face of dissent and hold high the shining torches of our Unitarian and Universalist legacies. Let us do this for ourselves and for our posterity. Let us have courage, strength and wisdom! Let us be kind yet firm. Let it be so!

Tara's Credo Statement

I asked my wife to post this piece, which she wrote...I hope you enjoy it!
--Mike

What follows is the credo statement I have worked up today after participating in Building Your Own Theology, a class offered at our church (Unitarian Church of Los Alamos) where we explored our beliefs about ethics, reality, human nature and the sacred, plumbing our religious history for what we have learned, rejected, what we choose to keep, where we are now.

The credo is supposed to be a statement of my beliefs about the nature of humanity, Ultimate Reality/God, the relationship between these and then the ethics and necessities this lends to my life.

I believe that to be human is to constantly encounter Paradox.

The consciousness that I have developed as I gained the ability to produce language tells me that I am separate and whole unto myself, with unique thoughts, perspectives and traits. In fact, my individuality is what makes me who I am—the uniquely valued wife of my husband, daughter of my parents, mother to my three boys. Yet, at the same time, I am just one iteration of an evolving Universe fully beyond my understanding. My bones, skin and brain are particles of stardust that have existed since the moment Existence ever was, and will take another form after me, time and time again. I will someday exist as matter that no one will recognize, in memories of others that tell only part or half the truth of my story. No matter who I am or was at the end of my days, one day I will surely be part of everything, something unrecognizable.

As part of the fundamental toolbox of my humanity, I can create ideals of justice and compassion out of the thin air of imagination and declaration. I can nurture, heal, transform, give meaning, lend comfort. And, inescapably, I will hurt, self-deceive, and participate in systems that bring death and suffering to fellow humans, fellow animals. My instinct to personally survive, to garner resources, to bring the world as it is into accordance with the world as I need to see it, sometimes wins out over the possibility of Beauty or Compassion or Wisdom, no matter how dear I hold these ideals. I think that we are unwise when we place unwarranted faith in human nature to be anything other than as it is, but I find in the compassion and understanding that I can have for that nature, a peace with the world and a way to practice love.

I think human beings create a concept of God to allow them to connect in some way with that part of themselves that is an expression of what is possible and beautiful, that part of ourselves in which we can quietly find peace and acceptance, that part of our DNA that reacts with love and recognition to all other living things. I do not think that there is a God that is sentient, in any sense larger than that the concept encompasses the sentience of those creatures who happen to have it. I do not think that there exists a God that has a plan of any kind, that the Universe is travelling in a predictable direction, or that inherent fairness from a source larger than humanity will win the day. While thinking these things may lend comfort to me, and has in the past, I find that wrestling with the task that a masterless Universe presents me with makes me a better person, a person who cannot just sigh to myself in the face of suffering that “God simply has a plan that we don’t understand” and turn away, but am called upon to lend a hand or face the consequences of my inaction.

The ethical creed that arises for me out of my understanding of humanity and Ultimate Reality makes it necessary for me to question everything, to be wary of any and all absolutes that I am offered. I can offer Wisdom in the form of my unique point of view, and so I try to. I can bring Compassion and so I actively strive to bring compassion to my relations with other people and creatures. I can create reality with the words I speak and so I conduct myself with Integrity to whatever extent I can muster. In a world that can prove no absolute truth of any kind, where our understandings of the machinations of nature are a moving target, where absolute ethics exist only in the form of societal agreements fortified by the imperative that we survive as social creatures, I still find Beauty to be everywhere and human beings most beautiful of all. I see this as the unconditional love that a family has for all of its members. The world and human beings are deeply flawed and imperfect and I love them because they are mine and I live with them. I know no better way to live here than to love the world, just as it is, as it seems, as it spins out its meaningless, gorgeous threads that make up the tapestry of history, and in which we all find our own pattern there to see.

I will end with the thoughts of Ysaye Barnwell of Sweet Honey in the Rock, who has written in her beautiful song, “We Are”:

For each child that’s born a

“A morning star rises

And sings to the universe

Who we are.

We are our grandmother’s prayers.

We are our grandfather’s dreamings.

We are the breath of our ancestors.

We are the spirit of God.

We are Mothers of Courage

Fathers of time

Daughters of dust

Sons of great vision.

We are

Sisters of Mercy

Brothers of love

Lovers of life and

The builders of nations.

We are

Seekers of truth

Keepers of faith

Makers of peace and

The wisdom of ages.”

Holiday Reflections from 2010

--by Mike Adams

This holiday season, like almost any other, came with interpersonal challenges, personal upsets and relational cathartic discussions culminating in mutual understanding and a sense of familial affinity.

My in-laws are gone from my home and this season represents the end to an era.  My mother-in-law will be moving to the town we live in this summer, she will rent an apartment, navigate with GPS, bring added support to my family in terms of child care and add to our dynamic of sarcastic humor.  While this is a happy transition, it represents an end to our family being able to visit Northern California and stay with her for several weeks.  Our vacations will henceforth be shorter and more expensive.

This past year has been entirely transitional, my youngest began kindergarten, my eldest began middle school, my supervisor, a personal friend and mentor, died in a plane crash in May and another close friend and mentor from California just died only days before Christmas.

I could make lots of meaning out of these events but in the end, there is nothing more than what I take away from them.  They are truly irrelevant in the grand scheme of existence.  I love my little kindergartner and he fills my life with meaning but is also completely anonymous outside of the micro-sphere of those who know him.  I will miss my mentors/friends and the latter mentioned above will have a permanent impact on what I do in the world.  It was from him that I learned to articulate myself clearly and communicate deliberately.  

Over the past days, I have continually had to confront the fact that at some point, someone will lower my remains into the ground and throw dirt on my face or scatter my ashes in the forest.  People will probably cry and my children will hopefully remember me fondly…but life will continue, and if society remembers me at all it will likely be as a statistic and ultimately I'll be forgotten altogether.

My life's meaning is no more than a transitory creative process, composed of things like what I, embrace and exemplify in my actions and words as I trudge life's path.  That meaning is what I've been contemplating over recent days.  Not in terms of a New Year's resolution, but rather in terms of a mission statement.

I've been examining moral values I hold and how I attempt to balance conflicting values.  I've been considering what I want my life to serve, how far I want to try and reach in my efforts to realize those values in today's world.

One difficulty is that even at 39 years of age, having accomplished very little in life, I still think that perhaps I can save the world.  Despite having a track record of zero on transformative change outside of myself and a few loved ones, I still think (hope maybe a better word) that I could affect some monumental shift in human activity.  Basically, I'm vain!  I'm incredibly arrogant!  If someone had the misjudgment to put me in a room with Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and the Dhali Lama, I would start talking as if I really had something big to offer them.  The crazy thing is that I would truly expect them to listen…carefully.  It's just the way I am and I haven't effectively changed it yet.  To some it is an endearing trait and to others (mostly other really arrogant people) it is deeply annoying.

But I don't care if I'm arrogant, I won't let that stand in the way of my life having a meaning and I won't let it stand in the way of what I care about.

I care about people!  I love people…almost all of them! I am amazed by people, by our ability to be perfectly compassionate despite ourselves.  By our ability to perform amazing miracles of forgiveness for example the Lancaster Amish community's response to the school massacre in 2006.  I'm constantly inspired by our ability to rise from the depths of utter selfishness and be great…to redeem ourselves.

I don't subscribe to the beautiful Shakespearean quote of, "What a piece of work is man, how noble in reason…" To the contrary, I really think that people are all crazy.  Not completely crazy…we do have logic and we practice religion or spirituality and we have ideals.  But I think mostly we stumble through life taking actions and trying to avoid consequences.  In the moment after we act, we often pause to figure out how our actions are consistent with our logic or our religion or our values.  Don't misunderstand, I don't believe we always act that way, we do occasionally act deliberately, but I do believe that generally, we are deluded into thinking that we act with intention to a far greater degree than is actually the case.

The beauty of humanity lies in our ability to occasionally transcend this inherently messy and sometimes bloody process of stumbling through life.  That despite ourselves and our own shortcomings, we aspire to realize in this world beautiful ideals...more than two hundred years ago, we formed a nation with its genesis containing these words: We hold these truths to be self evident…that all men (people) are created equal, they we are endowed by our creator (in my belief evolution) with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed….

I suppose that if I have anything to offer at this moment, it would be a pleading that we all stop for a moment (perhaps several moments…maybe on a regular basis) and consider our individual and collective positions.  That we examine our actions and rather than looking for how our actions are consistent with our values, we look for how those same actions contradict our values.  That we hold in our minds and hearts the horror and ugliness of humanity while simultaneously praising the beauty of being human.  We aren't unlike those "Founding Fathers," who drafted our Declaration of Independence, who proclaimed the equality of all men while institutionalizing slavery.  We are as a species self contradicting and our beauty comes from our occasional ability to stand tall and recognize our hypocrisy, to bravely acknowledge our despicableness and change course.

Happy Holidays Everyone…especially to those of you who follow my blog, all zero of you!  ;-)

Don't be fooled by Latinos for Reform! It's not Latino at all!

--by Mike Adams

Don’t be fooled! Latinos for Reform is not on the side of Latinos. A decision to not vote will not send any message to congress except that the Latino voter block is undependable! Anti-immigration special interests groups have funded a new advertisement campaign targeted at US Hispanic voters. The Ad urges US Latinos to sit this election cycle out as a means of sending a strong message to Democrats in congress. The reality is that by not voting, Hispanics will give power to the very political interests, which have been thwarting Democrat’s attempts at immigration reform…the same interests which are backing this year’s efforts to suppress Hispanic votes in the US.

This advertisement from a 527 group is so cynical, extreme and misleading that Univision refuses to air it despite the loss of advertising revenue from the anti-Immigrant group.

Please understand, Latinos for Reform is not a grass-roots Latino immigration reform group…in fact, if it has any Latino members or contributors, they are a handful. This group was started by and is driven by a far right conservative Republican, whose party has repeatedly undermined immigration reform and whose goal is to stop immigration reform, along with other urgently needed reforms.

All Latinos, please get out to the polls and vote! It is imperative…this year Latinos should indeed send a loud message to legislators…but send the message to those legislators, who despise Hispanic voter participation and who oppose immigration reform. The message should be that Latinos vote, Latinos work hard, Latinos will not be fooled by misleading ads designed to undermine Latino interests, Latinos are here to stay and Latino Immigrants deserve respectful and humane treatment.

See the NY Times Opinion Piece on this topic