Moment of Oneness, August 16, 2022

Reading: Practice for a World at Risk by Joan Halifax

As I witness all that is happening today—armed conflict in the heart of Europe,

global pandemic, rising authoritarianism, impending climate catastrophe,

and all of life’s other sufferings and injustices—I am acutely aware,

as you probably are, that our world is at risk.

We might ask: How can we meet this reality of suffering and violence?

What is the task ahead of us to meet confusion, delusion, and violence in our time, in our country, in our lives?

How do we realize peace transformation? (Joan Halifax)

Song: The Great Peace March by Holly Near

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RldareONLU

Ancient eyes are watching in the night
The stars come out to guide the way
The sun still shines despite the clouds
And the dawn is dusk is dawn is dusk is day

Farmers rise and dream to feed the world
The world awakes to feed the heart
Hearts beat while a thousand flags are waving
And the farmer sees a dream has played a part

[Chorus]
We will have peace, we will because we must
We must because we cherish life
And believe it or not, as daring as it may seem
It is not an empty dream
To walk in a powerful path
Neither the first nor the last great peace march
Life is a great and mighty march
Forever for love and for life on the great peace march.

Are you black like night or red like clay
Are you gold like sun or brown like earth
Grey like mist or white like moon
My love for you is the reason for my birth

Peace can start with just one heart
From a small step to leaps and bounds
A walk becomes a race for time
And a brave child calls out from the crowd

[Chorus]
We will have peace, we will because we must
We must because we cherish life
And believe it or not, as daring as it may seem
It is not an empty dream
To walk in a powerful path
Neither the first nor the last great peace march
Life is a great and mighty march
Forever for love and for life on the great peace march
Forever for love and for life
I'm on the great peace march.

Silent Meditation: be aware, remember, seek peace

Legacy (1970 at Kent University)

You know the photo: the one of
the young woman with a scarf &
dark hair, crouching over what
used to be a student

screaming why

hands plunging into the low atmosphere
as if she can grab her god’s shoulders &
shake him for letting this happen.
But you don’t know the man in plaid

over her left shoulder. You don’t know
his class had been dismissed early to
participate in democracy. He is too far
away & indistinct for you to see the

thick glasses, the mustache he still
wears fifty years later. You don’t know
that a decade after the National Guard
almost shot him, too, he would become

my father. Daffodils remain silent, but
not complicit: they’re still suffering shock.
Flowers planted in gun barrels, tear gas
tossed back at uniforms. Shoots

of yellow flowers from my baptism
poke through early May soil. (Megan Neville)

Response: Long for peace, Act for peace

March For Peace by Frank Leto