Who does the poet serve?
The poet serves poetry,
Whose form is the beloved,
Who asks not blood but love.
Voting for one of two capitalist candidates once every
1,460 days, while it will have some kind of impact on the lives of people, certainly
has proven to have little consequence on elevating the common good —and of
late, not even close in terms of leading dynamic global issues that continue to
create a huge divide in wealth and the current “ecocidal evil in power”. Howard Zinn in “Election Madness” (2008) recognizes
the almost futility of voting in this era without deeper impacting endeavors to
shake the foundations of the electorate.
The election frenzy . . . seizes the
country every four years because we have all been brought up to believe that voting
is crucial in determining our destiny, that the most important act a citizen
can engage in is to go to the polls and choose one of the two mediocrities who
have already been chosen for us. . . Would I support one candidate against
another? Yes, for two minutes—the amount of time it takes to pull the lever
down in the voting booth. . . But before and after those two minutes, our time,
our energy, should be spent in educating, agitating, organizing our fellow
citizens in the workplace, in the neighborhood, in the schools. Our objective
should be to build, painstakingly, patiently but energetically, a movement
that, when it reaches a certain critical mass, would shake whoever is in the
White House, into changing national policy on matters of war and social
justice.[2]
 |
| The first ever televised presidential debate in 1960 between Democrat presidential candidate Sen. John F. Kennedy and Republican presidential candidate Vice President Richard M. Nixon. |
Why continue to delude ourselves thinking the political
processes in Washington can really make a difference in the current ecocidal
urgency, the upswing of racism, the growth of economic divide. What literally actualizes change is every
day, fed up people rising up out of their complacency, recognizing they are being screwed, finding ways out of
silence, developing connections—networks and engaging with others and their
communities for a more common good. In the words and spirit of Martin Luther
King,
These are the bright years of emergence; though they are
painful ones, they cannot be avoided. . . In these trying circumstances, the black
revolution is much more than a struggle for the rights of Negroes. It is
forcing America to face all its interrelated flaws—racism, poverty, militarism,
and materialism. It is exposing the evils that are rooted deeply in the whole
structure of our society. It reveals systemic rather than superficial flaws and
suggests that radical reconstruction of society itself is the real issue to be
faced.[3]
A deeply rooted, interrelated flaw in the American psyche is
a myth of the Presidency. I cannot
conceive today how one individual and his or her administration can make much
difference in my life of hopes and dreams, unless he or she has become for me a
high priest of sorts in what could and has been tagged an "American civil
religion." All the talk of faith with individuals running for the
presidency informs this cultural notion and a clearly vibrant fight to keep it
alive, which is a pattern of the collective capacity for self-delusion.
It needs to be argued that history has proven too many times
that nationalism and religion do not mix well; for there becomes a strong
tendency of religious influence on a national level or movement to produce a
greater likelihood for discrimination and human rights violations. As Stjepan
Gabriel Mestrovic argues, civil religious notions actually smack the genuine
face of true religion. "Civil religion is neither bona fide religion nor
ordinary patriotism, but a new alloy formed by blending religion with
nationalism. If civil religions were bona fide religions then one would expect
to find a soft side to them, teaching love of neighbor and upholding peace and
compassion. But this is not the case."[4]
An observation over time has led me to an understanding that
the religious right for the most part can only take on complex issues in
simplistic terms. They need concrete, black and white solutions. There is
little room for civil dialogue and an ear for even a basic literary exegesis of
their religious texts. Add to this, they possess only a kind of simpleton,
literal interpretation of the Constitution and miss the implications of it
dynamic spirit. They are descendents of sola
scriptura, the Protestant doctrine (heresy perhaps?) that holds the
Christian Scripture as sole infallible rule of faith and practice. Unfortunately
and lamentably, this notion over time has evolved into ideological formations
through the creation of a democratic society that produced citizens that
believed they could read religious text without moral guidance and spiritual
formation (what is profoundly called discipleship), hence fundamentalism and
large swaths of old guard and entrepreneurial evangelicals feel it’s part of
their call to restore America to its rightful God.
By example, one
of several major factors that shaped the behavior of the Christian Churches
during the Nazi reign in Germany was the historical role of the Churches in
creating or sustaining “Christendom” (Western European culture since the era of
Roman Emperor Constantine), i.e., its advocacy of a Christian culture. In
particular the German Evangelical Church (largest Protestant church in Germany)
allegiance to the concept of Christendom was linked to a strong nationalism symbolized
by German Protestantism’s ‘Throne and Alter’ alliance with state authority.[5]
Today we have the
motto, ‘God and Country’ which has its confluence with the notion of American exceptionalism. While the numbers are decreasing,
Life Way Research reported 53% of Americans agree that “God has a special
relationship with the USA.”[6] And so it’s EASY
for someone like a Donald Trump to seem
and sound like a god-send when all
you are listening for are ear-tickling biblical sound-bites. This rang true Obama
on a unique level.
As a former evangelical and someone who has sustained
serious intellectual honesty in the pursuit of becoming more fully human, I continue
to see the need, e.g. of moral guidance and spiritual formation that leads individuals
and communities to live out what it means to be a citizen in such perilous times. The very meaning or mean good of “citizen” is one connected
and engaged with one’s community for the common good (of the people, by the
people, for the people).[7] Its excess then would be having control or
overrule by way of administration, wealth and military or self interest or gain—sound
familiar?[8]
Conversely, its deficiency is disengagement:
privatization, individualization, isolation, being complicit and by consequence
marginalized oppression.[9] The
latter in this continuum is the behavioral of the masses while the former may well
be characterized as hegemonic norms that feed the American script and hold them
in blind abeyance and an illusion that promises to us safe and happy.[10]
In a personal effort to not lose heart, being highly self-governed,
recognizing the need to have and sustain a counter script or narrative and to
attain an inner voice that nurtures healthy resistance of the entertaining
mechanisms that obscure and silence the surrounding harsh realities, I see more
clearly the need to intentionally seek out local grass roots movements, voices
and communities where people flesh out the peaceable, humble, uncompromisingly
nonviolent traditions that while having perhaps their foundation in religious
traditions (or not), they remain genuinely
and more fully humanly capable of civil dialogue, resistant against the current
complacencies, corruptions and oppressions, and thus practice radical
hospitality vs. the triumphalistic, militant, God-and-country Christianity of
American theocracy that have retreated into fantasies embraced by those who
prefer turning a blind eye. [11]
Hence, the work of a more genuine citizen is to manage our ambivalence--liberals, progressives, and conservatives alike--in generative ways in order to concede
relinquishment of a failing script/narrative that continues to disappoint us and
leave us empty. Managing our way means identifying and aligning ourselves
with networks, organizations, communities that embrace new, alternative scripts/narratives
that name and evoke the ambivalence, and “carve out a protected space for those
who question and challenge national myths.”[12] They
should possess energy to speak freely and with boldness; by implication a range
of speech practice, not only freedom of speech, but the obligation to speak the
truth for the common good, even at personal risk.[13]
Change up your intake. Read, listen, contemplate/think with your
mind (Geist); import the wisdom of prophets,
poets, writers, philosophers, musicians, theologians, sages of history and
perhaps a tradition or community versus the dominant scripts or myths
peddled by popular media, Hollywood, politicians, military, sports,
advertisers, big business. Seeks out and participate with others to work toward
a vision of human flourishing (human centered) while differentiating what
misses the mark (illusions both personal and societal).
It may sound elementary, but distinguish your wants from yours needs; i.e. simplify your life, seek to do with less—less
nationalism, less consumption of goods that pollute and destroy the air, water
and atmosphere, and the mind; less head-in-the-sand naiveté with respect to the
conventional forces that dumb down the larger society (das Man) with its dominant scripts and narratives that feed racism,
poverty, militarism, and materialism.
If we are to be citizens of the world, we will need to develop
practices that acknowledge being-in-the-world that require more than mere
survival or das Man (quiet conformity
to the conventional world). Personally and collectively we need conscious ways of existence in society that are aware that the masses follow
a failed dominate script that promotes an illusion of safety, health and
happiness; and pursue and practice ways of moving through (not stepping
away from) tensions where there is a complex array of easy-to-get-to thin practices,
answers and ideals on one side, while on the other, profound, thick sources of
questions and insights that invite persistent souls toward the way of becoming
more fully human (eudemonia).[14]
Nationalism has always and continues to be scary. Citizenship
envisions a future that puts humanity first. Some growing organizations that provide
examples of progressive citizenship movement are below.
 |
| Sahne Claiborne |
See list of
environmental justice movements at SocialMovement
and Culture
Global movements:
See “20 Activists Who Are Changing America” and
organizations of growing activism on economic, social, and environmental justice
issues.
[1] Gregory Orr, How Beautiful the Beloved. Copper Canyon Press, 2009, 51.
[2]
http://progressive.org/magazine/election-madness/
[3] “A Testament of Hope,” 1969
[4] Quoted by Gerald A. Parsons,
"From nationalism to internationalism: civil religion and the festival of
Saint Catherine of Siena" in Journal of Church and State, September
22, 2004.
[5] Rittner, Smith, Steinfeldt, The Holocaust and the Christian World:
Reflections on the Past Challenges for the Future (NY: Continuum, 2000),
55-58.
[6] Ed Stetzer, “God and Country: Americans' Views
of God's 'Relationship' with the U.S, Christianity
Today (July 3, 2015)
http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2015/july/god-and-country-new-research-on-americans-views-of-country.html
[7] One way to consider movement from a
complacent, oppressed citizenry to an engaged people seeking to regain or
resurging of their humanity is a pedagogy that promotes nonviolent, peaceable
rebellion that demands change while attempting to affirm human beings as the
subjects of decisions, restorers of humanity. Influencers of humanization worth
reading are available to all of us, such as Paulo Freire, Ivan Illich, Chris Hedges,
Bill
McKibben,
Parker Palmer, Wendall Berry, Shane Claiborne to name a few. I higher recommend
a regime of listening to On Being with
Krista Tippett (podcast). https://onbeing.org/
[8] E.g.,
excessive rule of oligarchy (the rule of a few who are distinguished by
royalty, wealth, family ties, education, corporate, religious or military
control), more specifically, a plutocracy (ruled or controlled by the small
minority of the wealthiest citizens). The deficit extreme might well be defined
as the disengaged person, private, isolation the services as a dualistic realm
of leisure to work.
[9]
E.g., 1] a purely ‘private life’ or ‘home life’ as a means to an end, “a
luxurious establishment, or to accumulate wealth for its own sake by trade.
There is the well known argument of the social phenomena that occurred with the
rise of the television resulting in a decline in social capital and civic
engagement in Robert Putnam’s “The Strange Disappearance of Civic America” in Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of
American Community (2000). Putman showed a decline in people’s connections
with the life of their communities, not just with the political processes due
to various suspects yet with main culprit being the television which is
associated with low social capital (the technological "individualizing"
of our leisure time via television, Internet and eventually virtual reality apparatus.) An
antidote to this is identifying “third places” where one can engage with people
in one’s community outside of work and home. This could well fit the complaint
and gradual uprising of the masses against the slavery, Wall Street and banking
industry that has sought its wealth in ways that have not contributed to the
chief good of the nation at large. 2] The exclusive attention paid to military
excellence, the industrial military complex that deteriorate profound aspects
of human community and can never arrive at peaceful solutions that benefit the
community at large evolutionarily.
[10] See Walter Brueggemann’s 19
Theses: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/paperbacktheology/2014/04/walter-brueggemanns-19-thesis-revisited-a-clarification-from-brueggemann-himself.html.
Brueggemann posits the need for a “steady, patient, intentional articulation of
an alternative [counter] script” that replaces the dominant script which feeds
the masses and has infiltrated the everyday evangelical. This dominant script
is the of therapeutic, technological, consumerist militarism that permeates
every dimension of our common life.
[11] See A Faith Not Worth Fighting For. https://gentlecynic.blogspot.com/2012/09/collection-of-essays-answers.html;
and Chris Hedges, “How to Think” https://www.truthdig.com/articles/how-to-think/
[12] Chris Hedges, “How to Think”, TruthDig. http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/how_to_think_20120709
[13] Parrhesia, the act of truth telling
is at the heart of the life of ancient cynic. Parrhesia in its
nominal form is translated (from Latin) "free speech". In ancient
Greek its meanings conveys the meaning “to speak freely", "to speak
boldly", or "boldness." (Liddell and Scott, A Greek-English
Lexicon). See Michel Foucault, The
Courage of the Truth (The Government of Self and Others II) LECTURES AT
THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
[14] Probably
the ideal translated as “happiness” the Preamble to the Declaration of
Independence; Heidegger’s “authenticity”; Maslow’s developmental realm of “self-actualization; Aristotle
argued that eudaimonia is realized in virtuous (differentiated) living while having
purposeful, authentic engagement with others and society.
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