September 24, 2017

The Bible tells us that Jesus said that the two most important commandments are to love the Lord, our God, with all our heart and soul and mind and strength, and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.  While Jesus clearly meant there is one Lord, one God, Jesus left to each person's heart and soul and mind and strength the development of his or her understanding of, and relationship with, God.
Also left to us are several big questions: Who is our neighbor?
What does it mean – what sentiment and what actions are needed - to love our neighbor as ourselves? 
What basis is there to think that Jesus meant to limit “our neighbor” to those who share our beliefs, who love us back, and who wish us no harm?

September 10, 2017

Dear God, we humans respond to victims of hurricanes, earthquakes and other natural disasters with love - with compassion, generosity, effective assistance, and cooperation.

Help us find in our hearts, and to apply, the same love, compassion, generosity and cooperation to recognize and aid victims, including society as a whole, of storms of our own making - wars, racism, and political and social conflicts of all kinds.  Help us to see and to do what we can do to mitigate such conflicts, to bring them to just and peaceful ends, and, whenever possible, to avoid them.

September 3, 2017

Today, and particularly every human interaction today, is the latest and best opportunity to continue humanity’s multi-millennia exploration of that Source, that Spirit, of love, wisdom and power which is beyond our conscious ken, and yet within each person’s spiritual reach.

An exercise for the study of inner biases.

An exercise perhaps best done with eyes closed.
Suppose someone bumps into me.  Or perhaps I am not looking where I'm going: suppose, without seeing him or her, I bump into someone.  Just a bump: no injury, pain, or loss of balance and nothing from which haste or any other attribute of the other could be surmised.  Suppose I know nothing about the other person: not race, gender, age, mood, appearance, social status, height, weight or anything else except that we bumped?  What is my reaction?  
Does my reaction change after I learn his or her race?  
Gender? 
Age? 
Appearance?  Does my reaction change based on whether the person is well-dressed and good looking?  Disheveled?  Dirty?  Ugly or disfigured?
Apparent mood or manner?  Suppose the person is grumpy?  Hostile?  Apologetic - or not?  Sad?  Cheerful? 
Does my reaction change after I learn the other person's reaction to the bump?  What reaction of the other person triggers what reaction in me?What other imagined attributes trigger changes in my reaction to the person?
What are the changes in my reaction, compared to my imagined reaction when I knew nothing about the other person?  Where in my psyche or experience do those reactions come from?  
Do my reactions serve me - including by pointing areas of needed growth?

Conversing to learn, not impress.

Each person has many gifts, interests, opinions.  Each person can teach me many things, sometimes directly, by news or instruction; sometimes indirectly, by what I can infer from his or her experiences and views.  If, in conversation and in relationship, I seek to discover those gifts, interests, and opinions; if I seek to learn from the person I'm with; I never lack for topics of conversation.  Bonus: being interested in the other, and particularly in learning from him or her, usually makes me seem more interesting than when I am passive, let alone when I seek to reinforce my perception of my importance.

Fear is a poor substitute for a reason.

Fear, particularly fear of regret, is a poor substitute for a reason for a decision.