Now What?!

So, the SCOTUS has made its considered decision - a split decision like most expected. However, many seemed to think that the Supreme Court would overturn the legislation. Practically though, there was really no way to stop what had already been put into motion. I believe this to be the great benefit of the ACA - not that it is good legislation (it's not) but that it got many folks moving and creating. If you look around now three years later, look at some of the innovation that is being developed in response to parts of the bill. The big question remains...now what?! The cost to fund the ACA is enormous and the relative benefits of many parts are unclear. The SCOTUS left open the possibility for States to not expand Medicaid, thus to not necessarily take care of all those who desperately need care. It is quite likely, however, given human nature that the States will opt for Federal dollars to help their systems. Will we finally have a floor where no one is without coverage? What will "the powers that be" do? Will they honor their better natures and the spirit of the legislation and find new and inventive ways to distribute the wealth and the health? Hard to know - easy to be cynical about human nature and about the political process. Maybe, just maybe, we have the ability to overcome ourselves and make the right decisions. Time for everyone to get involved and advocate for better health care for all. SCOTUS has cleared the way - now what - now it's time for us. Peace for the journey, Dan

Conflicting Interests

There's an old saw that goes, "Conflict of interest? It doesn't conflict with my interests!" We are in an age where this is painfully brought home almost every day. Whether it is in conversation with my teenagers, in the news cycle, at church (or any other institution), in our government, or with our poitical candidates, the supremacy of the individual over the group is rampant. This week (possibly today) we will hear the results of the deliberations of the SCOTUS on the Affordable Care Act. Now, this is not by any stretch of the imagination a good piece of legislation overall, it can serve as a template for moving forward. Conflicting interests and viewpoints on the high court might well "throw the baby out with the bath water". How do we manage the needs of the many instead of the few? How do we get to a point where the least, the last and the lost are cared for in a way that distributes our resources justly? How long will it be until there is true collaboration and compromise on the monumental tasks that are in front of us as a people? As long as we're focused on raising money for the next campaign, on doing nothing that alienates us from a Lobby, on what is easy and expedient rather than what is difficult and long-term and right, nothing will change. My conversation with my 18 year old just now about the need to change his worldview from one of procrastination and passive-aggressiveness to one of positivity and taking control is illustrative of the larger malaise in our culture today. There will always be conflicting interests and ideals - differing worldviews and ideas about a way forward. No one has a clear picture of the future or of the way forward. This is why we need to work together - this is how the U.S. has moved forward in the past. All of us seeing the big picture and using our individual wisdom to inform a collective wisdom is how we can solve the issues our individuality has created. Once again, faith communities show us the way to form and maintain right relationships. It is counter cultural and thus effective. Peace for the journey, Dan

Integrity

Integrity is the state of being whole or undivided. So much of our world nowadays is exactly the opposite of this. Think about it for a moment and you'll see that this is true. Many people in the U.S. are so focused on themselves and on their getting ahead that they become alienated from all others - they become fractionated and dis-integrated. Thus, our search for health, wellness and wholeness becomes a search for integrity. How can we become integrated again? Integrated with one another and fully connected to a narrative much larger and wiser than ourselves? I was speaking with my Pastor the other day and he asked me what I thought about the section in Matthew that talks about people being salt and light. I gave him my answer and I said that I was struck that the term "salt of the earth" had fallen from our lexicon. Tim (my pastor) said, "I'm wondering if there is an equivalent phrase in today's world that reflects the sentiment of 'salt of the earth'?" We couldn't come up with anything. It's instructive, I think, that our culture has strayed so far away from the sacred and its positive influence on our lives, that we don't even know what's missing! thus we become dis-integrated. Re-integrating ourselves will be a long and intentional process. It will require guides and accountability. It will also require that we begin to see things differently and to desire to develop integrity. When we do, we will also recapture purpose and meaning in our lives - something that we've also misplaced along the journey. This weekend, take a good long look at your life. To what are you integrated and how is that integration affecting your worldview? Seeking integrity in your life will lead to the wholeness that we all seek (whether we realize this or not). Peace for the journey, Dan

Becoming Us

Funny how an idea starts...a word or a phrase or a chance encounter. Something connects and resonates and creates a path to an idea. Often I'm sitting in front of a blank blog screen on Mondays and Thursdays waiting for just such an encounter. Today's post comes from a conversation with my soon-to-be High School graduate and from Gary Gunderson's most recent blog post. In both cases the gist of the communication was about focusing on the singular or individual rather than on the communal. My son, in response to my comment aobut going out and exercising by himself said, "No one goes out to exercise without an I-Pod or somenone to go with!" Gary's post was talking about our scientific mindset that focuses on "its" like cancer or viral diseases and not on population issues that determine our lives - and the likelihood of people taking the "cures" that science develops. People nowadays are individually focused and seemingly convinced that if it works for them then it must be ok. However, life is lived in community and in population - no person is an island. It is the antithesis of Ayn Rand's world where people discover "I". In our world we have to once again discover how to become "we" or "us"; and put "I" in its proper balance. Connecting to people holds the answer to integrating science and life. A lot of talk and ink have been generated touting the necessity of technology transfer, but no one seems able to actually get this done. We don't know who we are and what we are doing in our lives. However, our faith communities do know how we are living in community with each other, and the things that are important in our lives. Faith communities are all about learning how to live in community - in right relationship - with each other. Possibilities Journey Inc believes (as do others such as the Congregational Health Network in Memphis) that linking science and medicine with life is the key to becoming a healthier and more whole "us". This week, take a look at your life and your connections. Which ones add to your health and wholeness and which of them contribute to your focus only on "you"? Maximize the us in your life and you'll find yourself growing more healthy. Peace for the journey, Dan

Country Wisdom

My "wood guy" lives about 60 miles away in part of central Virginia. He's a sort that you can find just about anywhere in the South, a do-it-yourselfer with a very practical head and very little formal education. He was driving a forklift at 15 and paving roads, driving dump trucks, etc. Now he's a ways past 60 with bad joints, Type I diabetes and I found out today, just suffered a heart attack. He spent a couple of weeks worth of time at one community hospital and one large university teaching hospital. He was profoundly disturbed by the degree of "education" of the people taking care of him, but the lack of practicality. "They just didn't get the fact that I wasn't gonna pay for the $190/bottle of insulin nor prick my fingers 6 times a day every day." He also threw the hospital folks out of his room at night so that he could actually get some sleep! The good news is that some really fine utilization review person or social worker actually got him signed up for Medicaid finally. I'd been talking to him about it for years (I've known him for about 18 years) but he didn't want "no government hand out thank you very much". Once he realized that he can better care for himself on his limited income, Medicaid became a real blessing. He's now going to see someone about the diabetes-induced nerve damage to his fingers and toes and the diabetes-induced loss of vision. I'm hoping he can get tuned up and be bringing me wood, hunting stories and wisdom for many years to come. What struck me most about the conversation today (they last a mimnimum of 45 minutes) was his take on how poorly run hospitals are from the practical end of things. Nobody asked him how the changes they (the docs) were proposing fit into his life. Since they were trained at a world-class hospital and university, certainly he would see the need to follow their every utterance. To my country friend, most of what they said was impractical from the standpoint of tolerance or cost (usually both). He didn't agree that these professionals knew more about his body and health than he did. I'd have paid good money to be a fly on the wall to see the looks on their collective faces as he told them where they could get off. ;-) Wisdom comes in many forms and it doesn't come exclusively from university training and advanced degrees. My friend has an advanced degree in life and in survival. He proved once again that learning from the university of life often trumps all other forms of wisdom. Something to consider as we grapple with how to revise our currently broken healthcre system. Maybe we should just employ my friend as a consultant - he's have some very practical wisdom to share. Peace for the journey, Dan

Free Will

Yesterday's sermon was built around Genesis 3 - the story of the "fall" of Adam and Eve. Those of you who are familiar with this story know that YHWH created the garden and put man and woman there to live. YHWH told the man that he could have anything he wanted except the fruit of one tree - the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. YHWH told Adam that if he did eat it "he would surely die". You know the rest of the story...serpent, twisted words, choices, shame and blame, eviction for all human kind from Eden. Adam and Eve didn't die physically, but their relationship with YHWH surely did. It was the beginning of the use of our free will to sin (to move out of relationship with YHWH) and we've kept on going ever since. One of the fundamental theological questions therefore is, why did YHWH give humans the ability to choose? Knowing that we were made in the image of YHWH, but were not actually YHWH, wouldn't it have been safer and simpler to command us what to do? the answer is yes, it would have made things a whole lot easier for YHWH, however, YHWH seems to not have wanted automatons - YHWH wanted companions, friends and lovers. Commanding us to love YHWH would have created resentment and would not have allowed true and open relationship (love) to develop. Free will is the cornerstone of the ability to truly love and to be in right relationship with YHWH and with each other (the two great commandments). Free will also allows us not to believe in YHWH or anything but our own intellect (thank you Descartes) and abilities - and this is what has caused all the issues that we're currently struggling against in the world. It's all about choices, as a dear friend of mine loves to say. There are choices that lift us and others up, and choices that burden and enslave us and the world. There are choices to live more in tune with YHWH and each other, and choices that move us farther away. Choices for a healthier, less broken and more well life, and choices that further destroy our bodies. Though we are so intelligent we are not wise...Jesus the Christ said it from the cross, "Forgive them Father for they know not what they do." We are like perpetual teenagers looking for freedom and independence without responsibility or consequence or insight. Indeed, when we forget to spend time with YHWH, we follow our own idols and gods and we "surely die" to all that can give meaning. This week, take a look at your choices. Evaluate them in light of any sacred text and see how they stack up. I challenge you to make one choice, one act of free will that will move you closer to YHWH and to each other. Peace for the journey, Dan

Cowardice

I was reading some devotions and other material as I do every morning. Father Richard Rohr's "On the Threshold of Transformation" had a devotion for today that talked about the need for true mentors - for someone who can show us the way. As I turn 50, I'm struck by how few mentors there are as we live our lives as adults. People who can model true courage of conviction and show us all a way to be in right relationship with each other. We are surrounded by cowardice, by people who make decisions based on how it affects their individual lives and not on how it affects the larger community. One only has to spend a moment in any news cycle to see that this is so. Life in post-secular (or post-modern) America is truly anti-Kantian, that is, the needs of the one outweigh the needs of the many. If I can get ahead of you by doing something, then it is ok for me to do it. It's no wonder then that we have a dearth of social programming, that budgets for safety-net program are being slashed while "pork" is at an all time high. There's no ability to compromise in decision making at the local, regional or national levels of society. Everything is polarized and politicized and there are few who are brave enough to consider the narrow way. We've created idols out of everyday things and have thus lost the path to an encounter with the sacred. Rohr says (in the same devotional) in essence that Scripture and other sacred texts are not an end in themselves, rather they serve to point us beyond the words to the "hard facts of reality, life itself, and from there to authentic encounters with God." When we lose the narrative of the sacred in our lives, then there is nothing to point us beyond ourselves and our individual lives. There's nothing to give us the courage of our convictions - because we have no convictions - everything is negotiable. In other words, if we don't stand for something we'll fall for anything! Cowardice is easy, courage is difficult and challenging and ultimately the only way out of our current dilemma. This weekend, spend some time with the sacred texts - doesn't matter which one(s). Discover how those great G-d inspired writings contain large truths and consolation for our world today (and for you as an individual). Discover again how to become courageous through the experience of the leaders and mentors of the past. Peace for the journey, Dan

Mythology vs. Pathology

Interesting concept brought forth by Father Richard Rohr in his book of daily devotions for men called, "On the Threshold of Transformation". He posits on Day 14 that "when we don't mythologize, we pathologize". What he's really talking about here is the problems that occur when humans look only to themselves for answers to the unanswerable. He goes on to say that, "...We lost our ability to appreciate myth around the time of the Enlightenment. Nature, religion, mystery, and ritual all became passe..." So we as a race became "enlightened" by rationalism, science and the scientific method and in the process created a huge idol to worship. Science has given us many things such as creature comforts, improved longevity and health, longer work days, more stress, devotion to media input, etc. Rationalism has sought to understand and control everything - even the truly mysterious and uncontrollable. How many of you took the time to look up and marvel at the "super moons" during the last month? How about the beauty of Spring? The marvel of the rain or the power of the storm? Most I suspect kept your heads down, noses to the grindstone - cursing the pollen and the damp and the inconvenience. Because we really don't have any patience for inconvenience nowadays, do we?! We're so used to living in a controlled environment that any little deviation is seen as a major issue. What happened to our resilience and our ability to make do with what we have? That's our global pathology , isn't it?! Once something is amiss, we see things as wrong or absurd or broken. Nothing can move on until we've righted the wrong, corrected the absurd and fixed the broken...and then we believe we'll be happy and content...but we're not. When we lose our sense of place in the world and universe - when we become bigger than we really are, that's when the lack of mythology really shows. We lose our humility and become as gods, able to give and take with impunity. Then it's also every god for him or herself. A veritable battle of the Titans occurs and this time it's not just a religious tale - it's our post-secular worldview and our life. Recapturing a sense of the sacred is therefore tantamount to preserving us as a species for without the sacred there is no reason to fight for the world that we live in. Our pathology will then finish us off. This week, work to rediscover mythology and the sense of the sacred in your life. Look up at the Super Moon tonight until you feel small and insignificant again. Hike into the forest or wilderness far enough to lose the sounds of the world - feel the thrill of being just a little bit lost. Renew your relationship with a sacred text or ritual. In this way, you can treat your pathology and become healthier and more whole. It will take time and intention, but I know you can do it! Peace for the journey, Dan