Positive Universe Abstracts

WWII  The White Rose* Excerpt  Engaged Buddhism-Christianity List   Sophie Scholl, White Rose, Nazi Resistance “There is no one to dry the tears of the mothers”

Time Has Come to Not Only be Anti-Lies, Anti-War but to be Ever so Engaged as Well in Sustaining Life, Living Peace, Engaging our Children in These Practices. Being Community… ========= ======== ========== ========== ======== I want to start with this engaged Buddhism-Christian list because these are the two faiths from which I am gaining the most these days–which I practice from the most core level.

This is my first such list.  I never before today tho’t I’d be telling anyone to watch things day-by-day before coming home from being far away. I did so today for the first time, after seeing what’s going on in Congress this week, hearing about the WMD testing going on in Alaska also today. And the sudden awareness of ever so much power being slyly grabbed by our present administration right and left. And so much more.  I told my loved one what I did only after hours of prayer and reflection last night because of course, I want our dear ones home. And of course, I don’t want to alarm without good reason to do so.  Today, that alarm is needed.

Yet not with fearful orange & red codes but with great peace & strength. We will need one another more than ever before.

Times are not at all secure in the most basic ways & are less predictable than maybe ever since WWII.

So, I am making much more decisive choices than ever before in my life.  One plan I have is to have a “Gathering” in my town–for the sake of community between faiths, cultures, ages in support of the voiceless, in support of one another’s spiritual disciplines and peace efforts. Particularly, this will provide a degree of common ground, human rights & spiritual education and other often missing support for children who are so separated by our churches and our economically-organized communities. I will deliberately set it for Sunday when most go to church. We will start with once a month only–maybe keep it that way?

Maybe here in this little list community–we might hear what each other is doing that is better paving a way for a more peaceful, more equitable world.

(I may not be able to handle a yahoogroups list but merely emailing the entire list until it gets too big–encouraging each of us to email one another or the entire group. Let me know if for any reason you want to be put on a blind copy list & I will try–with no promises.)

I for one would love to know how to get out of the entanglement with the web of the powers that be in our daily lives that have instigated or succombed to the military-industrial complex’s iron hold over our money & energy. Sometimes there is not enough money to get out or two parents in a household may not be quite at the same place.

Well that’s enough from me. Does any of this touch a resonant chord?

Since I am an eager while slow engaged Buddhist/and someone who wants to get back to the Sermon on the Mt & the best of the mystical while socially-engaged-Christ-following traditions, let me share something with you from something from certain all too few Christians during WWII under Hitler.

The following is from  The Fourth Leaflet one of The Leaflets of The White Rose:

There is an ancient maxim that we repeat to our children: “He who won’t listen will have to feel.” But a wise child will not burn his fingers the second time on a hot stove…On all sides one hears among Hitler’s opponents…exclamations of despair…

…apparent success has been purchased at the most horrible expense of human life…

Neither Hitler or Goebbels can have counted the dead. It is the time of the harvest, and the reaper cuts into the ripe grain with wide strokes. Mourning takes up her abode in the country cottages, and there is no one to dry the tears of the mothers. Yet Hitler feeds with lies those people whose most precious belongings he has stolen and whom he has driven to a meaningless death…

There is more for later, that’s enough for now.

thanks for doing and being peace (and showing us how) Connie

Connie L. Nash Writer, Human Rights Activist and Student Consistent Life Ethic (as a strong ideal) Abolition of the Death Penalty Facilitator/Networker/Disseminator of Unseen Reports

                  *die Weisse Rose

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