First, and least important, I do have some things to say -- of some value, I believe -- that will come in subsequent installments. This doesn't feel like the best moment to present them. Even so, when I do present them, they will fall far short of a "remedy." But I think they can, in your words, at least help to "lead us in a different [better] direction."
But second, and more important, the nature of the patterns of brokenness in the human system is such that healing must take place in a whole multiplicity of ways, just as multi-dimensionally as the way brokenness has permeated the human world over the millennia. That is both the bad news and the good news.
It is good news in that everyone has the opportunity to find ways to heal brokenness that fit their needs and abilities, and that can all add up to making progress at all levels more possible. A lot of things need to be healed along the way to enable people to choose the right course, even if that course could be identified.
It is bad in that if one hopes that there is no simple formula to get us from here to there. The journey will be like how to get from one mountain to another mountain: one can see the overall direction one must go, but nonetheless, figuring out where to put one's foot next is always going to be its own challenge.
So, even for the long journey, the challenge at any given time involves dealing with the complex and diverse components of the current situation. For the "next steps," then, it is important to be able to read the immediate dynamics of the battle between the forces of brokenness and wholeness.
As I have understood the dynamics of our times, the most urgent task for securing our long-term future has been to take power away from the force of brokenness that has taken over the Republican Party in our times, and to awaken and fortify the only other major part of the American political system (Liberal America, and its political expression in the Democratic Party) that could turn it back.
As one looks at the consequences of the failure to reverse that adverse shift in the balance of power in America between the force of wholeness and the force of brokenness -- leading now to having someone like Donald Trump serving as President of the United States -- it is clear that waging THAT BATTLE effectively was the paramount requirement in these times if the world was to proceed in a better, and not a worse direction.
And if one looks at the record of what I've been saying about that battle for the past 13 years, and the "specific steps" I've called for. pretty much all of it stands up well looking back. A lot of what needs to be said about moving the world in a better direction needs to address that immediate level, on the smaller scale than the grand sweep of human history.
But I will present some ideas about the route to a more whole world at the larger level-- i.e. looking at those two "mountains" as they're to be seen in a satellite image.
It should also be noted that to deal effectively with the immediate battle, it is profoundly important that we bring to it a larger vision-- that we see the force of brokenness, that we have a grasp of the terrain that makes up the battlefield, and that we engage that battle with the passion that comes from the love the the sacred.
All of that will be in what is to come here. But none of it will provide any simple map from here to the Promised Land.
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Margee Fabyanske:
Andy, I have been reading through your book (Parable of the Tribes) and my notes from 1984, when it was first published, and your words ring true in so many ways, even today. It's truly your "magnum opus"!
In your last paragraph, p. 336, you say, "The challenge facing us is . . . to discover a harmonizing integration between the sacred energies we bring with us from our Source and the indispensable tools we have developed on our journey." That resonates with me in a highly spiritual and uplifting, hopeful way. Yet, now, in your last writing #5, you say: "We are not inherently fundamentally flawed creatures portrayed on the pages of human history. Rather, what we see in history are creatures struggling to cope with an impossible situation."
I think that one of man's greatest insecurities is our fear of failure. The fact is, no one is perfect. Yet, many people measure themselves and others against impossibly high standards. The result is guilt, anger, depression, pessimism, and disappointment. But when we can overcome our fears and understand that life is not a series of successes but rather, a series of challenges to overcome, both outside of us and within, then we are able to accept ourselves and others even when we are less than perfect. Acceptance and forgiveness is necessary to get along with our enemies. Acceptance and forgiveness allows us to change our relationships and help us to meet the challenge of being human.
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