and the sacred land of India
be able to transmute the negative energy,
the suffering, anger and madness
of the recent terrorist attacks
into positive energy
of equanimity, compassion, justice
and freedom from wrong views.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
and the sacred land of India
be able to transmute the negative energy,
the suffering, anger and madness
of the recent terrorist attacks
into positive energy
of equanimity, compassion, justice
and freedom from wrong views.
Monday, November 24, 2008
Imagine :-(
I dedicate this song to the memory of the 26 children who died of starvation in Haiti the week after the Christians and Mormons spent millions conducting their campaign of defamation against gay families in California. Those millions of dollars could have not only fed those children, but even educated them and prepared them to become the future doctors, teachers, scientists and business owners of their society, and thus escape the cycle of misery in which they were in.
Imagine a world without hunger ... and without religions that spread bigotry!
Sunday, November 23, 2008
“Remember, Jesus would rather constantly shame gays than let orphans have a family“
— Steven Colbert
— Steven Colbert
Saturday, November 22, 2008
A Buddhist Thanksgiving Contemplation
We are approaching a national holiday, the Day of Thanksgiving, which is dedicated to being thankful. Those of us that are involved in the Buddhist tradition these days do not have a personal, single Deity to thank but in the Mahayana Buddhist tradition there is the notion of Amida Buddha, the Buddha of infinite light and compassion, whose compassionate work is the cause for the salvation of countless beings.
I've asked myself how Buddhism can claim to be non-theistic and yet in the middle of the most popular Buddhist tradition in East Asia, there is a belief which is essentially salvific and theistic. Amida, in the scriptures, is a person by whose vow beings are saved. At first, I did not trust the salvific aspect of Buddhism because it just seemed like a better explained version of Christian salvific beliefs. However, in reading about Amida Buddha from Mahayana sources, his realm of reality is not one of a personal God but of infinite light and life, and the work of his compassion is seen as undescribable. It is and radiates everywhere, all at once. One is perplexed. This is because the work of Amida's compassion is not personal but transpersonal.
One of my last contemplations on the issue illuminated my understanding of Amida quite a bit. I had a dream about this last night, and would like to share with my readers some of the thoughts that are visiting me at this time of thankfulness.
It's easy in life to see when people do bad things, to notice the things that irk us, the traffic jams, the homophobia and bigotry of certain groups, the abuse of animals and other such portions of reality that we label as negative, destructive or harmful.
The Mahayana school, however, points us in the direction of seeing the works of compassion everywhere: this is also part of reality. This does not mean that there is no suffering or iniquity. But Buddhism is all about paying attention and acquiring awareness, and we are told specifically to take notice, to pay attention, to the works of compassion that are happening everywhere, always. More than half of our karmic entanglements are (hopefully) of the good kind of karma, that is they are causes which generate happiness as their effect.
When we take refuge in the Three Jewels in Buddhism, one of them is Sangha, the community and universal brotherhood of beings who seek liberation, including all the boddhisattvas. We place ourselves in the hands and at the mercy of countless beings, and so it is only appropriate to become aware of the benefits that are derived from such refuge taking.
There are many beings in the flesh who have made vows of compassion, not just Buddhist but in other religions, who are living boddhisattvas. There are countless beings whose mercy we have benefited from, most of them nameless. They are not all in the spirit world, in fact most of them are or were here on Earth. They are not even what we would label holy persons, so that there is no need to even believe in the existence of millions of Buddhas and Boddhisattvas in the ten directions in order to observe their compassion at work.
The Buddha is one, and many of the spiritual teachers and even secular writers whose books I've enjoyed rendered very important service to humanity. Off the top of my head, I can think of a Chilean New Age writer Enrique Barrios, whose books changed my life and eliminated vast amounts of unnecessary suffering by reeducating me about many things. When I studied Buddhism at first many of the teachings sounded familiar, and searching in my memory I became aware of the vastly important foundation of knowledge that Barrios' books had become in my personal and spiritual formation. I never met him personally, and yet I owe him a huge debt of gratitude.
The conditions around my birth are also an example of how we are the result of the random kindness and compassion of faceless beings. When I was born, I was late. I didn't want to come out of my mother's womb :) I was born almost two months late and my skin was purplish. I'm told I looked like a raisin and weighted only four pounds. They had to put me in an incubator and give me blood transfusions because my blood was too thick.
When this took place, everyone took mercy of my mother and family and myself, and people in the family and neighborhood immediately donated blood. I don't know who did, I don't know their names, but the time that I was given to live on this planetary realm is the result of their compassion. I would not be here if it wasn't for all those faceless givers who donated their lifeforce, their blood. I would have lived for several days, and then died, and no one would have known that I ever existed as I exist today. We are all sustained in numerous ways by the compassion of others, and we've also sustained others with our own kindness.
All kinds of living entities benefit from the random compassionate acts of humans. We do not realize what huge difference we can make by becoming vegetarians: when one makes the revolutionary decision to not eat meat, one is alleviating the unnecessary suffering of thousands of living entities.
I think back to the days when cars were invented. Before cars and trucks existed, beasts of burden were enslaved everywhere on Earth by humans and performed numerous tasks for our benefit. Humans also labored much harder than we do today with the technology that is available. Many of the people who financed and influenced the invention and use of vehicles in the previous century were vegans, Buddhists, Hindus and others who were generally concerned for the welfare of living entities that were embodied as animals. They saw the vast amount of human and animal suffering that could be eliminated by using cars instead of living entities to perform certain tasks.
We can choose to see all of this as a practical advancement for our collective planetary existence, but we can also choose to see the work of compassion that Mahayanists attribute to Amida Buddha, the very personification of compassion whose highest expression are the teachings of Buddhism on the elimination of misery. We have sustained each other countless times for ages, alleviating each other's suffering. There have been millions of compassionate hands at work throughout creation, time and time again, working to alleviate suffering and we just haven't been even aware of them for the most part. If we ponder this, we will find example after example of this field of compassion and interbeing that we are all woven into.
Buddha teaches that we are co-creators of our reality on this planetary realm. We are the ones who choose our reality in our minds at every step, every moment. His teachings specifically deal with the problem of suffering, so it is from this perspective that he applied the importance of ownership of what we call reality. That is, the purpose of Buddhism is to create a land of happy beings and to eliminate the suffering of all sentient beings, beginning with ourselves. All of his teachings he used for this noble purpose.
We can choose to observe reality as painful or blissful. We can choose to see compassion or iniquity, but when we observe and are aware of compassion and its works, we are happy and thankful, and so this is the more skillful and intelligent way to construct our reality. Some studies of happy people suggest that people who have a habit of being thankful are generally happier and that thankfulness is essential to happiness and even health.
When we observe the compassion of countless beings at work we also feel that we are living in a safer place, where we can trust others and others can trust us. We overcome the survival, fear-based mind and enter the mind that is free, safe and happy. We feel at ease.
May all beings be happy.
May all beings be happy.
May all beings be happy.
Namo Amida Butsu.
I've asked myself how Buddhism can claim to be non-theistic and yet in the middle of the most popular Buddhist tradition in East Asia, there is a belief which is essentially salvific and theistic. Amida, in the scriptures, is a person by whose vow beings are saved. At first, I did not trust the salvific aspect of Buddhism because it just seemed like a better explained version of Christian salvific beliefs. However, in reading about Amida Buddha from Mahayana sources, his realm of reality is not one of a personal God but of infinite light and life, and the work of his compassion is seen as undescribable. It is and radiates everywhere, all at once. One is perplexed. This is because the work of Amida's compassion is not personal but transpersonal.
One of my last contemplations on the issue illuminated my understanding of Amida quite a bit. I had a dream about this last night, and would like to share with my readers some of the thoughts that are visiting me at this time of thankfulness.
It's easy in life to see when people do bad things, to notice the things that irk us, the traffic jams, the homophobia and bigotry of certain groups, the abuse of animals and other such portions of reality that we label as negative, destructive or harmful.
The Mahayana school, however, points us in the direction of seeing the works of compassion everywhere: this is also part of reality. This does not mean that there is no suffering or iniquity. But Buddhism is all about paying attention and acquiring awareness, and we are told specifically to take notice, to pay attention, to the works of compassion that are happening everywhere, always. More than half of our karmic entanglements are (hopefully) of the good kind of karma, that is they are causes which generate happiness as their effect.
When we take refuge in the Three Jewels in Buddhism, one of them is Sangha, the community and universal brotherhood of beings who seek liberation, including all the boddhisattvas. We place ourselves in the hands and at the mercy of countless beings, and so it is only appropriate to become aware of the benefits that are derived from such refuge taking.
There are many beings in the flesh who have made vows of compassion, not just Buddhist but in other religions, who are living boddhisattvas. There are countless beings whose mercy we have benefited from, most of them nameless. They are not all in the spirit world, in fact most of them are or were here on Earth. They are not even what we would label holy persons, so that there is no need to even believe in the existence of millions of Buddhas and Boddhisattvas in the ten directions in order to observe their compassion at work.
The Buddha is one, and many of the spiritual teachers and even secular writers whose books I've enjoyed rendered very important service to humanity. Off the top of my head, I can think of a Chilean New Age writer Enrique Barrios, whose books changed my life and eliminated vast amounts of unnecessary suffering by reeducating me about many things. When I studied Buddhism at first many of the teachings sounded familiar, and searching in my memory I became aware of the vastly important foundation of knowledge that Barrios' books had become in my personal and spiritual formation. I never met him personally, and yet I owe him a huge debt of gratitude.
The conditions around my birth are also an example of how we are the result of the random kindness and compassion of faceless beings. When I was born, I was late. I didn't want to come out of my mother's womb :) I was born almost two months late and my skin was purplish. I'm told I looked like a raisin and weighted only four pounds. They had to put me in an incubator and give me blood transfusions because my blood was too thick.
When this took place, everyone took mercy of my mother and family and myself, and people in the family and neighborhood immediately donated blood. I don't know who did, I don't know their names, but the time that I was given to live on this planetary realm is the result of their compassion. I would not be here if it wasn't for all those faceless givers who donated their lifeforce, their blood. I would have lived for several days, and then died, and no one would have known that I ever existed as I exist today. We are all sustained in numerous ways by the compassion of others, and we've also sustained others with our own kindness.
All kinds of living entities benefit from the random compassionate acts of humans. We do not realize what huge difference we can make by becoming vegetarians: when one makes the revolutionary decision to not eat meat, one is alleviating the unnecessary suffering of thousands of living entities.
I think back to the days when cars were invented. Before cars and trucks existed, beasts of burden were enslaved everywhere on Earth by humans and performed numerous tasks for our benefit. Humans also labored much harder than we do today with the technology that is available. Many of the people who financed and influenced the invention and use of vehicles in the previous century were vegans, Buddhists, Hindus and others who were generally concerned for the welfare of living entities that were embodied as animals. They saw the vast amount of human and animal suffering that could be eliminated by using cars instead of living entities to perform certain tasks.
We can choose to see all of this as a practical advancement for our collective planetary existence, but we can also choose to see the work of compassion that Mahayanists attribute to Amida Buddha, the very personification of compassion whose highest expression are the teachings of Buddhism on the elimination of misery. We have sustained each other countless times for ages, alleviating each other's suffering. There have been millions of compassionate hands at work throughout creation, time and time again, working to alleviate suffering and we just haven't been even aware of them for the most part. If we ponder this, we will find example after example of this field of compassion and interbeing that we are all woven into.
Buddha teaches that we are co-creators of our reality on this planetary realm. We are the ones who choose our reality in our minds at every step, every moment. His teachings specifically deal with the problem of suffering, so it is from this perspective that he applied the importance of ownership of what we call reality. That is, the purpose of Buddhism is to create a land of happy beings and to eliminate the suffering of all sentient beings, beginning with ourselves. All of his teachings he used for this noble purpose.
We can choose to observe reality as painful or blissful. We can choose to see compassion or iniquity, but when we observe and are aware of compassion and its works, we are happy and thankful, and so this is the more skillful and intelligent way to construct our reality. Some studies of happy people suggest that people who have a habit of being thankful are generally happier and that thankfulness is essential to happiness and even health.
When we observe the compassion of countless beings at work we also feel that we are living in a safer place, where we can trust others and others can trust us. We overcome the survival, fear-based mind and enter the mind that is free, safe and happy. We feel at ease.
May all beings be happy.
May all beings be happy.
May all beings be happy.
Namo Amida Butsu.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Call for a Boycott of Mormon Businesses
As I read a Newsweek editor's essay entitled How Getting Married Made Me An Activist, it occured to me that it is illegal for a non-profit organization with tax exempt 501c3 status to get involved in politics and that it would therefore be appropriate for the Mormon Church to lose its tax exemption, since they decided to get involved in the politics of gay marriage in California, where only 2% of the population follow their absurd religion.
By the way, just as a side note: the Book of Mormon teaches that when people do bad things their skin tone turns dark and when they do good things their skin tone turns white. Their religion fully endorses the Mark of Cain doctrine, which affords Black people an inferior status. This doctrine was used by the Catholic Church in places like Brasil during slavery, to produce a theology that legitimized the domination of blacks by the white race. Here are some quotes on race from the Book of Mormon:
“...wherefore, as they were white, and exceeding fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a SKIN OF BLACKNESS to come upon them.” - 2 Nephi 5:21
“And the skins of the Lamanites were DARK, according to the mark which was set upon their fathers, which WAS A CURSE upon them because of their transgression...” - Alma 3:6
“...for this people shall be scattered, and shall become a DARK, a filthy, and a loathsome people, beyond the description of that which ever hath been amongst us...” - Mormon 5:15
The Book of Mormon (which you can read for yourself, from Mormon sources, here, however, predicts that the Indians will repent of their sins and become white:
“...and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a WHITE AND DELIGHTSOME PEOPLE.” - 2 Nephi 30:6
According to the realmormonhistory.com website where I found these quotes, "the word "WHITE" was changed to "PURE" in later editions of the Book of Mormon". Blacks were not even allowed into the priesthood until the late 70's.
Mormonism also originally embraced poligamy, but then abolished it under pressure from the government. Joseph Smith, the founder/inventor of Mormonism, headed a poligamous family with numerous wives and concubines.
And so Mormonism is not, in any way, a sophisticated ethical philosophy. It has a long history of racism and bigotry and it is an ideology that promotes inequality. It shouldn't come as a surprise that they want to take away gay and lesbian citizens' right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness", and every person of reason should denounce Mormonism as a false, bigoted religious doctrine.
In the great progressive tradition of non-violent resistance which was championed and shown to be efficient by both Ghandi and MLK, it was shown that non-violent resistance was efficient if it was intelligently organized. In all these cases, boycotts were used as the main and most efficient tool by the resistance movements.
For centuries, churches have enjoyed a privileged tax status as non-profit organizations, even when they have been bastions of cultural, racist and homophobic bigotry and hatred.
Racketeers like the so-called 'Jesus Christ man', a Puerto Rican who lives in Florida and claims to be Our Lord and Savior, have effectively used religion as a very lucrative enterprise. His followers earn huge profits via legitimate side businesses and then claim those profits as 'donations' to his ministry on their taxes. His church claims to be God's government on Earth, and it is: in effect, they are paying taxes to their God, not the bona-fide secular government.
People like Jerry Falwell made a lucrative career in the so-called 'non profit' sector by saying things like: "AIDS is the wrath of a just God against homosexuals. To oppose it would be like an Israelite jumping in the Red Sea to save one of Pharoah's chariotters."
And then there's the Catholic Church which has spent more than two billion dollars (at last count) in legal fees and under-the-table bribes to silence the victims of sexual abuse, money which was "earned" via their tax exemption privilege.
Is it right that organizations which not only render no tangible service to society, but are instead producing iniquity, generating a huge amount of unnecessary suffering and promoting bigotry, should enjoy a privileged tax status?
According to this article on the Utah Boycott, The church had said in a separate statement after Tuesday's vote that "no one on any side of the question should be vilified, intimidated, harassed or subject to erroneous information."
:) What nerve they have!
Another blogger called for the boycott of all Mormon owned businesses who tithe to the Mormon Church. He says:
I recommend we boycott Marriott Hotels, owned by the Mormon Marriott family, and so devout that every Marriott hotel has a Book of Mormon in the drawer, along with a bible. In today's depressed travel market, there are plenty of competitors to Marriott and plenty of people can avoid it if they want.
Also boycott Doug Manchester's hotels. http://www.boycottmanchesterhotels.com/
By the way, just as a side note: the Book of Mormon teaches that when people do bad things their skin tone turns dark and when they do good things their skin tone turns white. Their religion fully endorses the Mark of Cain doctrine, which affords Black people an inferior status. This doctrine was used by the Catholic Church in places like Brasil during slavery, to produce a theology that legitimized the domination of blacks by the white race. Here are some quotes on race from the Book of Mormon:
“...wherefore, as they were white, and exceeding fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a SKIN OF BLACKNESS to come upon them.” - 2 Nephi 5:21
“And the skins of the Lamanites were DARK, according to the mark which was set upon their fathers, which WAS A CURSE upon them because of their transgression...” - Alma 3:6
“...for this people shall be scattered, and shall become a DARK, a filthy, and a loathsome people, beyond the description of that which ever hath been amongst us...” - Mormon 5:15
The Book of Mormon (which you can read for yourself, from Mormon sources, here, however, predicts that the Indians will repent of their sins and become white:
“...and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a WHITE AND DELIGHTSOME PEOPLE.” - 2 Nephi 30:6
According to the realmormonhistory.com website where I found these quotes, "the word "WHITE" was changed to "PURE" in later editions of the Book of Mormon". Blacks were not even allowed into the priesthood until the late 70's.
Mormonism also originally embraced poligamy, but then abolished it under pressure from the government. Joseph Smith, the founder/inventor of Mormonism, headed a poligamous family with numerous wives and concubines.
And so Mormonism is not, in any way, a sophisticated ethical philosophy. It has a long history of racism and bigotry and it is an ideology that promotes inequality. It shouldn't come as a surprise that they want to take away gay and lesbian citizens' right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness", and every person of reason should denounce Mormonism as a false, bigoted religious doctrine.
In the great progressive tradition of non-violent resistance which was championed and shown to be efficient by both Ghandi and MLK, it was shown that non-violent resistance was efficient if it was intelligently organized. In all these cases, boycotts were used as the main and most efficient tool by the resistance movements.
For centuries, churches have enjoyed a privileged tax status as non-profit organizations, even when they have been bastions of cultural, racist and homophobic bigotry and hatred.
Racketeers like the so-called 'Jesus Christ man', a Puerto Rican who lives in Florida and claims to be Our Lord and Savior, have effectively used religion as a very lucrative enterprise. His followers earn huge profits via legitimate side businesses and then claim those profits as 'donations' to his ministry on their taxes. His church claims to be God's government on Earth, and it is: in effect, they are paying taxes to their God, not the bona-fide secular government.
People like Jerry Falwell made a lucrative career in the so-called 'non profit' sector by saying things like: "AIDS is the wrath of a just God against homosexuals. To oppose it would be like an Israelite jumping in the Red Sea to save one of Pharoah's chariotters."
And then there's the Catholic Church which has spent more than two billion dollars (at last count) in legal fees and under-the-table bribes to silence the victims of sexual abuse, money which was "earned" via their tax exemption privilege.
Is it right that organizations which not only render no tangible service to society, but are instead producing iniquity, generating a huge amount of unnecessary suffering and promoting bigotry, should enjoy a privileged tax status?
According to this article on the Utah Boycott, The church had said in a separate statement after Tuesday's vote that "no one on any side of the question should be vilified, intimidated, harassed or subject to erroneous information."
:) What nerve they have!
Another blogger called for the boycott of all Mormon owned businesses who tithe to the Mormon Church. He says:
I recommend we boycott Marriott Hotels, owned by the Mormon Marriott family, and so devout that every Marriott hotel has a Book of Mormon in the drawer, along with a bible. In today's depressed travel market, there are plenty of competitors to Marriott and plenty of people can avoid it if they want.
Also boycott Doug Manchester's hotels. http://www.boycottmanchesterhotels.com/
Friday, November 14, 2008
The false Ahimsa prophet
The Catholic Church is continuing its longstanding tradition of rendering unto Caesar what is God's, even if Caesar is a fascist. Once again a priest claims that because Obama and his party support abortion, he will not be handing out wafers to Obama supporters and will deny them communion.
Furthermore, scare tactics are being used where according to his parish, believers are 'risking their immortal souls' if they eat the wafer without first repenting from casting their Obama vote. As you may know, in the Catholic tradition dissent is not allowed. It is not, and has never been, a democratic tradition but a hierarchy and believers have never been allowed to disagree with their superiors.
The main question that arises in my head has to do with the notion of ahimsa. In the Buddhist and Hindu traditions ahimsa means non-violence, and it means that we should not harm living beings. According to religious ethics based on ahimsa, one should refrain from generating suffering to all living entities, both human and animal, born or unborn.
Which brings me to the problem of Republicans as a model for ahimsa or non-violence. It seems to me that by claiming to be pro-life, not only are Republicans trying to attract religious voters but they're also trying to add an air of nobility and dignity to their homophobic, misogynistic, violent, militarized worldview and ideology.
Those who did not vote for Obama would have been voting for a party that generated a war with lies. In that war 600,000 Iraqi civilians (at last count) and thousands of American and coalition soldiers have perished. Are THEIR lives not sacred as well?
The Republican party is responsible for a war that did not have the people's support, where weapons of mass destruction were never found, and where there is no exit strategy.
Many of its wealthiest constituents have profited tremendously from the militarization of our government in the last seven years or so.
And so, it seems strange that this priest and his constituency feel that because life is sacred, we should allow unwanted children to be born into this world ... only so that we can later send them to war. It seems dissonant with the values of non-violence that people like myself cherish.
If the anti-abortionists want to claim that they are pro-life, they must be ready to also claim that they are anti-war. Otherwise, they cannot truly say that they are pro-life.
Furthermore, the United States is a society where the vast majority of citizens eat meat on a daily basis. The meat industry is not only cruel, it is also irresponsible and a huge threat to the environment. The WorldWatch Institute, one of the largest and most important environmentalist organizations on the planet, has acknowledged that raising animals for consumption is more harmful to the environment than any other thing that we are doing, including the cars that we drive. 33 % of the fertile land on Earth is used to raise food for livestock. In other words, if everyone becomes a vegetarian we can literally save the planet (and eliminate famine!).
According to columnist Josy Latorre in an article written for the November issue of Natural Awakenings:
... more than 70 % of the grains and cereals that are harvested in the world are used to feed livestock ... half of the world's drinkable water is used by the meat industry. It takes 5,214 gallons of water to produce a pound of meat and only 24 gallons to produce a pound of potatoes.
The false 'pro-life' teachings of 'Reverend' Jay Scott Newman are incomplete. They lack a solid non-violence foundation and he cannot truly claim to be pro-life. Life is not truly sacred to those who consume meat and support war.
Furthermore, scare tactics are being used where according to his parish, believers are 'risking their immortal souls' if they eat the wafer without first repenting from casting their Obama vote. As you may know, in the Catholic tradition dissent is not allowed. It is not, and has never been, a democratic tradition but a hierarchy and believers have never been allowed to disagree with their superiors.
The main question that arises in my head has to do with the notion of ahimsa. In the Buddhist and Hindu traditions ahimsa means non-violence, and it means that we should not harm living beings. According to religious ethics based on ahimsa, one should refrain from generating suffering to all living entities, both human and animal, born or unborn.
Which brings me to the problem of Republicans as a model for ahimsa or non-violence. It seems to me that by claiming to be pro-life, not only are Republicans trying to attract religious voters but they're also trying to add an air of nobility and dignity to their homophobic, misogynistic, violent, militarized worldview and ideology.
Those who did not vote for Obama would have been voting for a party that generated a war with lies. In that war 600,000 Iraqi civilians (at last count) and thousands of American and coalition soldiers have perished. Are THEIR lives not sacred as well?
The Republican party is responsible for a war that did not have the people's support, where weapons of mass destruction were never found, and where there is no exit strategy.
Many of its wealthiest constituents have profited tremendously from the militarization of our government in the last seven years or so.
And so, it seems strange that this priest and his constituency feel that because life is sacred, we should allow unwanted children to be born into this world ... only so that we can later send them to war. It seems dissonant with the values of non-violence that people like myself cherish.
If the anti-abortionists want to claim that they are pro-life, they must be ready to also claim that they are anti-war. Otherwise, they cannot truly say that they are pro-life.
Furthermore, the United States is a society where the vast majority of citizens eat meat on a daily basis. The meat industry is not only cruel, it is also irresponsible and a huge threat to the environment. The WorldWatch Institute, one of the largest and most important environmentalist organizations on the planet, has acknowledged that raising animals for consumption is more harmful to the environment than any other thing that we are doing, including the cars that we drive. 33 % of the fertile land on Earth is used to raise food for livestock. In other words, if everyone becomes a vegetarian we can literally save the planet (and eliminate famine!).
According to columnist Josy Latorre in an article written for the November issue of Natural Awakenings:
... more than 70 % of the grains and cereals that are harvested in the world are used to feed livestock ... half of the world's drinkable water is used by the meat industry. It takes 5,214 gallons of water to produce a pound of meat and only 24 gallons to produce a pound of potatoes.
The false 'pro-life' teachings of 'Reverend' Jay Scott Newman are incomplete. They lack a solid non-violence foundation and he cannot truly claim to be pro-life. Life is not truly sacred to those who consume meat and support war.
Monday, November 10, 2008
RIP Miriam Makeba
On this day the voice of a great African performer has been silenced. I pray for her progress in the spirit world. Here is my favorite song by Miriam Makeba.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Obama wins!
By labeling anyone who cared about the working class and about the poor 'a socialist', the Republicans alienated the people who were concerned about losing their homes and the people who (like myself) lost our jobs in the midst of the Bush nightmare.
It does not take a socialist to care about the working class and the lack of jobs, or to care about the people who lost their homes and those who lost the chance to retire when they had hoped. It only takes a bit of compassion. Today I welcome change!
It does not take a socialist to care about the working class and the lack of jobs, or to care about the people who lost their homes and those who lost the chance to retire when they had hoped. It only takes a bit of compassion. Today I welcome change!
Saturday, November 1, 2008
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