"Season of Blood"

Four birds dropped from the sky,
And the twin brothers fell.
The eagle was wounded to the heart,
And the air stank with the dark stench of death.

Stunned Silence.
Fear. Anger. Hatred.
Retribution.

Holy War: Profane Peace.
Comfortless Caves: Contemplation. Conviction.

Traitors to the Nation.
Traitors to humanity.
A torrent of tears
in a Season of Blood.

Suicide bombers
to defeat the Undefeatable.
Fear. Bigotry. Retaliation!
No Peace! And no Justice.

Mothers cry,
And their children can't play together...
In peace.

Being Human

We like to differentiate ourselves from our animal brothers. But there really isn't that much difference between us. We share the same chemical composition as all other life on the planet. And we even share much of the same DNA with them as well, sharing more and more as we get closer in the evolutionary chain. Our behaviour is likewise very similar. Many times we accuse one another of "acting like animals". And there is a reason for that.
For we carry within us the baggage of millenia of evolution. The instincts and emotions which enabled our ancestor-creatures to survive are very much a part of us today. But in our modern world we are often held back in our development by what I like to call "evolutionary holdovers'' -- that is, survival instincts which are more of a hindrance than a help to us today.
We want peace and prosperity for ourselves and perhaps for all people. Yet we are constantly held back by strong emotions which rule our lives. And perhaps the strongest of these is fear.
Fear is an emotion and an instinct based on protection from things which may prove to be a threat. Fear responds to things which we know are a threat, things which we believe are a threat, and things which we don't know about. We can be afraid of people, animals, issues... even beliefs! And fear is an emotion that is easy to feed. Once fed, it grows first into anger, then hatred.
And strong fear requires a strong response from us: we can either fight against the thing which frightens us, or we can run away from it: fight or flight. Fear divides us one from another and helps build the world of mistrust and war in which we live.
So often fear is fueled by misunderstanding. We may believe the wrong things about other people, or perhaps we simply do not know anything about them, and so we fear them. As with all evolutionary holdovers fear is often irrational.

Now, we have seen how passions such as fear make us like our animal brothers. But just what is it that distinguishes us from them?
Many people would argue that it is our ability to communicate that makes us human. Yet, as anyone who lives with a pet knows, animals also communicate. Often their communication is through what we call "body language". But many times it may also be verbal. Animals have no trouble making their wishes and moods known!
Some may also argue that it is our ability to make and use tools that is the key to our difference. Yet, animals also use tools. I remember watching a nature special with an ape using a stick to ensnare some delicious locusts in a tree stump. Clearly a tool.
Is it our ability to build communities? We only need to look at the ants for that answer. For they are some of the most auspicious builders in nature.
Finally, we come to the argument that we are sentient. And that I can neither prove nor disprove, for sentience is not a concept we can measure. But there is a thing which I believe is key to the development of our thinking abilities.
It is clear that we think about things. More than think: we wonder. Our animal brothers are content to live life as it is handed to them. They react to the world as it changes around them. They respond to the stimuli of life. They do not make decisions about things as they happen, they simply respond to them.
Yet we act on our world. We do things because we want to, not because circumstances force us to do them.
And I believe the key to all this is our ability to ask questions. For this ability breeds the opportunity to not simply accept things as they are, but to try to understand them. We seek meaning. We seek understanding. And we base our actions on the answers we discover, whether they are correct or not. Questions unlock a whole world of possibilities for us that our animal brothers simply do not have.
Our questions tend to fall into six general categories. I call these the Six Great Questions. They are taught to us as early as grade school. They are: Who, What, Where, When, How, and Why. These questions help us to define the world in which we live and our place within it.
And for each Great Question we create a discipline: a method for answering the Question. Disciplines are like tool kits: they contain many tools we use to explore the Great Questions. And when we begin to ask more specific questions, we may change the tools in our tool kits in order to ask those particular questions.
Now, the disciplines for each Great Question fall into general categories of study. And we know these well.
For the "Who" Question, we use the Biography Discipline. We study our family trees; our family histories. We study the lives of our friends and people in our communities. And we learn all we can about the famous people who have shaped our world. For, their lives touch our lives. And they help to define just "who" we are.
The "What" Question is answered through the Discipline of Philosophy. We seek to understand the nature of reality. And many times we get more questions than answers. But the questions help us to define our personal philosophies of life, and help us to explore the nature of being human.
We use Cartography to understand the "Where" Question. We map everything. We map our living room to figure out where to put the sofa. We map our neighborhood to locate the nearest grocery store. We map our cities, our states, our countries, our world. And we map the stars! We need to understand where everything is in relation to where everything else is. And by locating ourselves we know which things will influence our lives.
Likewise, we map events with the answer to the "When" Question. This is the tool we call History or Time. We look at the past and how it influences where we are today and where we are going in the future. And we are swept along in time, just as if it were the currents of a great river. We have some control over where we end up, but the general currents sweep us in certain directions. And we believe by seeing where they've led us before we can control where they will lead us in the future.
The How Question is perhaps the Question we are the best at answering. This is the realm of science. We try to understand how things are put together and how they work. We have created many different toolkits to answer the many different questions we have in this area. We have physics and astronomy. We have chemistry and geology. We have biology and medicine. And we have even created sciences to help us understand things we've created. We have such things as astronautics and computer science for these.
Our final Question is the Why Question. And here is where Religion fits in. Religion is the process of trying to find meaning to the universe around us and our place within it. It is an attempt by us to understand the order of things.
As with any of the Great Questions, the discipline we use to understand it vary. That is to say, there are many approaches to it. And often, these are shaped by our own experiences: by our environment, those we encounter, and the changing circumstances in our changing world.

People

In truth, we are no different than our animal cousins, yet we still try to view creation without ourselves. We talk about how nature works, labelling our own actions as "unnatural" -- and yet, we are a part of that natural order. We try to understand how animals interact amongst themselves if humans are not around, and we remove ourselves from the equation. We call ourselves human, as if this title somehow negates the "animal" nature we share; as though we are somehow alien to the natural world in which we find ourselves.
In fact, one of the most distinguishing factors about us is that we prefer to distinguish ourselves from our world. We speak of "natural" and "unnatural" actions, as though anything we do could be unnatural. And so we deny our connection to the world; our evolutionary heritage. Instead, we pretend that we are something much nobler.
For so long in our dominant culture we have denied our animal nature. Instead, we describe our animal behavior using words such as "sin". We fail to understand that being animal is an essential part of being human.

Welcome To The Human Condition

Welcome to humanity! Welcome to the race of thinkers and dreamers. Welcome to that group of living beings who pride themselves as being the highest species on the planet Earth.
Welcome also to millions of years of evolutionary baggage which threatens to destroy our race, and many of our animal and plant brothers. Welcome to the legacy of survival instincts which we've never learned to live with in our enlightened mindset. Welcome to fear, denial, and greed. Welcome to excessive pride and apathy. And welcome to the glass walls we build between ourselves in our increasingly smaller glass house we call home.
We carry within us the ability to be great thinkers and doers. And in our genes we still retain the programming to be feelers and reactors. We are the rational human and the irrational beast: the angel and the devil, constantly at war.
And in the midst of all this we live in a world of great riches, for the fortunate, and terrible atrocities for the not-so-fortunate. We have the resources to feed, house, and clothe everyone on the planet, if we would choose. Yet, we continue to squabble over the limited resources of our home world in so many wars.
We kill our brothers and don't even think of them as our brothers. We kill for land. We kill for oil. We kill for food. We kill for belief. We preach that killing is wrong, and we kill those who disagree with us. And we take such satisfaction in each candle of life that we snuff out.
We have been sent teachers to teach us how we should live: spiritual teachers who can help us understand ourselves better and perhaps make a better world for ourselves and our children. We have recorded their words for many, many generations. And we can still read their words today.
Yet their sayings have fallen on deaf ears. For our world is still divided by belief, by class, by color, by everything we can find to disagree about. Our spiritual teachers have taught unity. And all we have learned is division. Clearly, we have not listened.
Or perhaps we have simply not understood.

The modern world grows smaller every day. For the first time in human history we can reach out to people everywhere on the planet. We can visit them. We can send them telegraphs, or speak to them on the phone. And we can share ideas in a moment through the Internet. Communication has become an essential part of who we are.
Yet we are still troubled by what we learn through our exchange of ideas. Many of us are descended from those who lived in more isolated parts of the world at one time. We carry the beliefs they shaped of the world they saw. And today we believe that our beliefs are the only "true" ones. Yet, our neighbors have different views shaped by their ancestors' knowledge of the world as well, and they belief their beliefs are "true". And so we are left with a quandary. For many times our beliefs are at odds with those of our neighbors. We need some way to cut through all this mess and make some sense of our world.

I propose that we can learn from the beliefs of our ancestors: all our ancestors. I believe that their beliefs are short-sighted because they are formed from the limited view what our ancestors saw of the world. Yet, I believe there is valuable insight to be gained from each view of the world. I believe we can discover the world through the many eyes of the many faiths we come from.
And perhaps our future history will be a bit more complete, and a bit less bloody.

Human Nature

What an odd world we live in! People isolate themselves. When a stranger speaks to us, we see this friendly act as something strange and unexpected. People set space barriers around themselves -- a distance no one should invade. Paranoia rules. People fear a curious glance, a gentle touch, a helping hand. There is no room for compassion -- no reward for the meek!
Even in their music, people no longer listen to things which move their spirits. Instead, they listen to anything with a heavy beat -- anything, so long as it lets them feel something.
They are so wrapped up in anger. They spend their lives spending their lives. They can't see beyond themselves. And yet they wonder why they are so unhappy.
Selfish concern and lip service to the charitable. Life out of balance. Lack of love. Lack of compassion. Lack of connection. They live their lives without purpose. When they give, they give as little as possible. And they expect to receive back so much more.
They are full of evolutionary hold-overs. They work like animals to deprive the weak, or the poor. They are driven to get more by genetic promises of survival.
They scurry about like squirrels -- frantically getting more things in an attempt to fill the void within. But they reach the ends of their lives unfulfilled. Their quest for more is like a bottomless pail -- no matter how much it is filled it is still empty. Their thirst goes un-quenched. And they wonder why their lives seem so pointless.
They hide in such small, safe places -- always looking for an escape. They don't seem to realize that the escape lies within them. Nothing outside can fill the empty place inside them. Deep within them is a purpose -- a meaning for their meaningless lives. And peace is there as well.
Survival is no longer difficult. We have the resources to feed, house, and clothe everyone. Compassion is a human virtue. We have the ability to leap beyond our genetic programming. We can escape our evolutionary heritage.
It can be as simple as reaching out. Showing concern for others. Giving a little change to those who have none. Helping the old woman with her groceries. Giving the gift of time. Even simply listening to those who need a gentle ear.
Must we carry the heart of the world upon our shoulders? Must we cry for the miserable? Must we have courage for the down-trodden?

People these days are so obsessed with living longer -- preserving their bodies -- as the quality of life escapes them. They work on living longer -- as if quantity of life is more important than quality. And when they die they pump their bodies with preservatives so that their bodies, at least, will continue on . . .
But they miss the point of living entirely. They try to occupy their time with distractions when they should be concentrating on living.. When they die they should instead have their bodies cremated and their ashes scattered as fertilizer -- death becoming new life.
The purpose of life is to live it -- to find our function in the greater whole and to fulfill it. And when we no longer require our bodies we should give them up for new life. This obsession with the body must cease -- once we have left this life, caring for the body is like so much window-dressing. When we no longer need our body we should allow it to be recycled by other life. This is life after death -- something continues, whether or not it is our soul. The Web of Life must be protected and nurtured, and if we take our bodies out of it, we risk upsetting the entire Web!