The possibility for miracles

It was September when I moved into the little apartment upstairs at my mother's house. Her husband is a quiet and reserved guy, an electrical engineer who builds circuit boards by day and reads electrical engineering magazines at night. We share an intellectual curiosity and can talk about things that my mother is not interested in. He pores over my National Geographic magazines and we swap podcasts and talk about the latest scientific discoveries.

The election was really heating up in September as Palin has just been thrown into the ring. Every night at dinner, my mom and I would compare notes on what stupid thing Palin had said that day or what incredible thing was going on in the Obama campaign. Her husband reacted to our conversations but didn't comment, which is not unlike him. I wasn't sure that he was on our side and got the sense that my mother even, didn't know who he had voted for. An early voter, he'd already sent in his ballot but as a registered Republican our mailbox continued to receive propaganda from McCain campaign and the NRA (even though there are no guns in our house). It went on like this for months.

After the election, in a casual conversation about Obama, my mom's husband finally broke the silence and remarked on something my mother said about Obama being so smart and precise with his words. "That's why I voted for him," he said, "because he's a nerd and it's about time we had a nerd in the White House." It's not just that he's intelligent, although that by itself is a major coup for intelligent people everywhere. It isn't only that he's incredibly well spoken, weaving together powerful imagery and wise quotes from leaders past with inspiration and ideas that will rebuild our country. What makes Obama stand out is that he is intellectually curious. He doesn't make decisions based on a personal feeling, religion or party politics. As President of the United States, he will pursue the ideals that our country was founded on with the zeal of a scientist on the verge of discovery. He'll consult experts, examine all the facts and surround himself with the best and the brightest to make the decisions that will shape our future.

During the process of appointing his cabinet, I rejoiced in each nomination reacting with "yes" "right on" and "of course." The assault on reason (at least in the White House) has finally subsided. Many nominees are more qualified than their predecessor and in some case more qualified than all of their predecessors. Many are people who are leaders in their field and are already running labs or schools districts or organizations in that capacity like Dr. Steven Chu for Energy Secretary, Eric Shinseki for Veteran Affairs Secretary, James L. Jones for National Security Advisor, Arne Duncan for Education Secretary and Tom Daschle for Health and Human Services Secretary.

My father, an insufferable sexist, had infuriated me after the election by positing that Obama won because he's "young and handsome" just like Kennedy and that's what "the women" want. I reminded him that women alone didn't get Obama into office and his theory didn't explain Eisenhower, Reagan or Bush Sr. Months before, my dad he said that Obama was capable of doing as much for this country as FDR, but now his inner cynic was trying to tell him that he was just a hot guy who duped the ladies.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with one of the couples living next door, a four-tour-Afghanistan Army Ranger veteran and his 8-month pregnant wife. They had been out shopping for a couch and remarked on how difficult it was to get help anywhere. No one working at the shops cares about the customer, they said. I agreed, having just been to Radio Shack where I waited patiently for my receipt while the boy at the counter watched a TV show on a screen behind me. I said these people were lucky to have jobs and maybe Obama will inspire people to get to work. The vet said he was a pretty political person but had voted "the other way" and was still in the 12-step grieving process. He said people whom he's met said they voted for Obama because he's black and they wanted to make history and he thought that was ridiculous. True, I said, "but these are the same people who voted for Bush because they thought he'd be fun to have a beer with." Ha, ha, the Vet laughed, "That guy IS a partier!"

But when I told him about how Obama had revamped the White House site with a blog and weekly video address to the nation, that he's going to post all legislation that he signs five days in advance to allow for comments from us, and that he wants to hear what we want him to do in office -- opening up forums on topics like health care -- I got his attention. I then told him that Michelle Obama plans to focus on helping veteran's transition back into their lives after returning from war, a cause she has already devoted years to. "I didn't know that," he said, "wow, I'll have to check that out."

While many people have been writing off Obama's popularity as a fan reaction to a novel candidate, other people were quietly rooting for the guy with the big brain to make it to the White House. On Marketplace yesterday a critic of Obama, David Frum author of "Comeback: Conservatism That Can Win Again," said he thought his stimulus plan is bad but acknowledged that the problem Obama brings up is real and no one on his side of the fence has offered a solution. "We said the Bush economy was the greatest story never told. We dismissed those who disagreed as 'whiners.'" But in reality, wages are stagnant and health care costs are rising to "devour potential wage increases." To me, that is what makes Obama so exceptional. Like a scientist, he talks about issues plainly and factually. He wants to fix what's broken and is willing to consider the best solution. He knows the power of collaboration and utilizes the latest technology to open up his administration to anyone with a good idea. You disagree with his ideas? Fine, let's hear yours.

And so it begins, the most exciting presidency in fifty years. Obama is awakening the American public from our cynical slumber, imploring us to believe once again that we can do anything. Not by saying that he'll be a better president than those who came before him but by asking us to believe in ourselves, instead of a politician. Yesterday, I watched a video about the Youth Ball where a young woman said, "I hope he doesn't disappoint us and not turn out to be this god." But our disillusionment comes from a misplaced belief that once we vote in our leaders, our job is done. A feeling that we are entitled to be taken care of by our government that is, like a parent, in charge of our well-being and has no right to be questioned. This is not a parent-child relationship; this is a government of the people, by the people.

Obama said yesterday in a statement, "On this Inauguration Day, we are reminded that we are heirs to over two centuries of American democracy, and that this legacy is not simply a birthright -- it is a glorious burden. Now it falls to us to come together as a people to carry it forward once more." It's a stroke of genius. It's not a matter of whether he'll disappoint us; it's a matter of whether we'll disappoint each other. Obama is already, every day, making miracles. He makes it easy for me to reach out to my neighbor, a person I'm friendly with but have opposing political views from, and invite him to participate in his government.

I vividly remember watching Obama's nomination speech. I drank down every word like the thirstiest person in the world. For the first time in eight years, someone that the world was listening to was speaking the truth about the challenges that our country and our generation face. I nodded and said "that's right" out loud like I was in a Baptist church. My inner skeptic tried, a few times, to caution me against too much enthusiasm but it didn't work. He has returned the presidency to what it is meant to be, a leadership position and we are the people he's leading. We are the people that are going to perform the miracles. He is the leader that will inspire a generation to think differently about its government and its role in the world than any before. There's a photo gallery of the people that will work in the White House and I'm struck by how youthful the group is and how few are career politicians. I feel that these people are as enthused as I am about the future and also believe in the possibility for miracles.

Talking about an evolution

I’ve been thinking about religion lately, mulling it over for the last year or so. When I saw Bill Maher’s film Religulous on Saturday it inspired me to finally write about it. I enjoyed the film and while I think it was a bit unfocused and incomplete, it brings up an excellent point. Bill Maher makes a case that religion is an outmoded social structure based on myth and superstition that we can no longer afford. Al Gore says in his book The Assault on Reason: "We are currently faced with the urgent task of accelerating our own psychological, emotional, intellectual and spiritual evolution in order to see over the internal walls that may have served some useful purpose ages ago but are now merely obstacles that prevent us from securing the new path we must take." Eckhart Tolle, in A New Earth, says we must “evolve or die.” Watching, in Religulous, the way people defend their creation myths to the point of insisting that man lived with dinosaurs and refusing to believe the same myths had been repeated in civilizations for over 50,000 years before the Bible was written, makes me wonder if many wouldn’t rather die.

Religion, as a means of government, is an archaic idea that has been replaced by every advanced nation in the world with reason, law and social responsibility. Religion, as the quest for meaning, is not archaic – human beings will seek the answers to how we got here and what our purpose is for as long as we are in this world – but religion no longer satisfies the quest for these answers. Eckhart Tolle is one of the most popular new age writers of our time and while he frequently quotes Jesus in the book, he is clearly promoting an agnostic philosophy. The dictionary defines an agnostic as “one who believes it impossible to know anything about God or about the creation of the universe and refrains from commitment to any religious doctrine.” I love the use of the word ‘refrain’ here. It suggests that precisely because the desire to know about our origins is so strong, we may be tempted to accept easy answers as truth. Tolle cleverly uses the quotes of Jesus to illustrate that he and other spiritual leaders were ahead of their time, teaching a Zen philosophy, and because they were not understood have been misinterpreted and their words misused to further the careers of religious leaders. He no doubt also knows that many Christians are searching for answers beyond their religion and will find comfort in the references to Jesus.

Tolle says that we are in the midst of the great awakening and spends most of the book explaining that in order to evolve, humans will have to free themselves from the grip of the ego. To do it, we must become aware of the insanity of the ego and its control over our thoughts and actions. By being aware, we become present and no longer operate unconsciously. He describes how the ego, when it feels that threatened, grows in power and become increasingly insane. This is what I think is happening now. The religious institutions of the world, fueled by ego, are severely threatened by their declining relevancy in our global culture and are reacting in a fanatical way to survive. Bill Maher says in the film that 16% of Americans do not subscribe to a religious doctrine, the largest percentage in the history of one of the most religious nations on earth.

‘Unconscious’ is how Tolle describes the unenlightened. They are not bad or stupid or inferior, they simply have not yet awakened the part of themselves that is their true being. They are living through the mind and the ego. Unconscious might also be how Maher would describe faith – often referred to as “blind faith.” Religulous humorously demonstrates the absurdity of the “truths” accepted by followers, truths that not only vary from church to church but also contradict truths by other religions. The most frightening thing about faith is that it cannot be questioned without terse rigidity and suspicion. Maher says, once the word faith is spoken, conversation stops. I read, in one article about the film, that Americans would rather vote for a Jew, a black, a woman or a homosexual than an atheist. For all the prejudice in the world, Americans find a person without belief in the talking snake, the virgin birth and the second coming of the messiah, as anathema. Is it because people without “faith” are not likely to take anything at face value? Is because they question everything? Is it because it is assumed that their lack of belief in God means they a lack of belief in anything?

Atheist comes from the Greek word áthe, which means godless. The dictionary defines atheist as “a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a deity or divine beings” but defines godless as “wicked, evil and sinful.” How can anyone believe that a person who doesn’t believe in god is wicked? Both of my parents are atheist yet they went to church growing up. Their mothers were fairly devout as women of that generation tended to be. Half of the kids became atheists and the other half, became born again so I grew up in the conflict of religion as my father said it was stupid and my aunts told us we were going to hell. They tried to save my brother and me by leaving bibles in our rooms whenever they came to visit.

But despite the lack of god in our lives, we were raised in a very strict and moral way. There was no drinking, no swearing, no lying and no smoking in our house. We couldn’t watch television, eat junk food or have friends spend the night in our rooms. We lived on a steady diet of exercise, studying and health food. I have always been hardworking, honest and fair. My born-again relatives, on the other hand, were petty and judgmental, they home schooled their kids and restricted contact to only their church congregation, they lied and swindled money from my grandparents and fought amongst themselves about who was most worthy of their charity. They always appeared to me to be the worst kind of people, the kind that preach good but aren’t themselves.

It wasn’t difficult to see the hypocrisy of religion then and it isn’t difficult to see it now. Our President says God told him to run for office and has often used this religious calling to justify his actions which include an unprovoked invasion of a country (that some liken to a holy war and that has left more dead than the ruthless dictator we overthrew), unlawful detention (and alleged torture) of hundreds of innocent people and the erosion of civil liberties promised to us by our intentionally non-religious government. This President who claims to use God and religion as his guiding force is on track to become the least popular president in our history. Odd considering his devout beliefs!

It is easy to understand how 2,000 years ago a belief in god might have been requisite to establishing a set of rules but it seems to me an ancient idea that a person who doesn’t believe in god has no moral code! Religion has never succeeded in getting everyone to agree on a moral code. Nor has it ever succeeded in keeping people from committing sin. So it can be argued that it isn’t an effective method of social control, advancement or enlightenment at all. In addition, governments such as ours were crafted with a level of insight and lucidity not shown in any organized religion. Our founders specifically designed a government based on reason that protects the welfare of people by establishing universal beliefs that determined laws of fairness. As Bill Maher so aptly asks in the film, “Do we really need religion to tell us not to kill people?”

A friend of mine says that I’m not an atheist because atheists are certain that there is no mystery to the universe, no grand design, just a swirling mass of matter bumping into each other. Each of the major religions are also certain that their story is the right one and their way is the right way, making their followers equally rigid in their view of others. This is what makes religion so dangerous in today’s global culture. Religious followers have made it their purpose to judge others and decide who is deserving and who is not, who is sinful and who is not and who is good and who is not. There simply isn’t room on this planet for this kind of nonsense, for fighting over creation myths, gods, messiahs, promised lands, second comings, Armageddons and end times. Maher says his belief is “I don’t know!” but Tolle describes it more like “We couldn’t possibly know.” I wonder why we need to know. Clearly, the creation of the universe and everything in it is beyond our comprehension. We can't even comprehend what we don't know! Enlightenment, then, comes by becoming aware of the temptation to accept a limited truth and instead gain a greater acceptance of the unknown, become more patient with things we don’t understand and learn to appreciate the miracle of life as it manifests within us and around us at every moment.

The evolution has already begun. There are over a million organizations dedicated to positive change, fueled by believers, atheists, agnostics and seekers alike. Some religious leaders are breaking from the establishment to speak out against war, stand up for the welfare of animals and advocate for a better relationship with nature. Scientists and activists are starting to talk about the need for a spiritual aspect of the green movement and in the quest for human and animal rights. In online profiles, included in the list of religions that you could be is the choice “spiritual,” a broad term that says, “I don’t subscribe to a religious doctrine but I am on an individual quest for meaning.” I think the term will soon be broadened to also imply a desire to live in greater harmony with the environment and a need for peace.

The film, The 11th Hour, compares what is happening to our environment as a reflection of what is going on inside us. We have lost our connection to nature and have caused others and ourselves great suffering as a result. But nature is not just leaves and grass and the birds we sometimes get a glimpse of, nature is life. We are life. The life force, what people call god, manifests through all of us as a single being. To choke the life out of other living creatures, no matter how small, is to be truly unconscious and disconnected from the collective miracle of life. My mom just told me a story about her friend’s neighbor who bought the house next door and ripped out all the plants. The yard had been beautifully landscaped but was now just an expanse of dirt in the front. After about a year, my mom’s friend knocked on his neighbor’s door to find out what “his plan” was for it. The neighbor replied, “Nothing. My wife doesn’t like plants.”

When I was growing up, I attended many different churches with friends and relatives. I got to sample quite a few and as an adult found myself curious enough to keep going whenever an opportunity would arise. I went to Tibetan Buddhist services with a boyfriend, Catholic services with my dad and his second wife (I know, bizarre!), and when in D.C. as a college student, went to the oldest Baptist church there. Each time I remember thinking that what was being said was fairly unremarkable, but what was amazing was the energy in the room. Hundreds of people together, shaking hands and meeting their neighbor, bowing their head in silent contemplation, giving their full attention to another person. These were remarkable and uncommon experiences in my life. The other outlet for this kind of community gathering, the town hall, Al Gore says we've lost. Now instead of people getting together to discuss issues, the direction of our world is communicated to us as a one-way conversation. The first time I went to yoga, I recognized that a class contained the incredibly powerful elements of church, which I think explains the rapidly growing popularity of yoga. In each class I’ve taken in more than ten years of practice, the teacher asks us to be thankful for the privilege of being able to do yoga and for a full hour and a half we mindfully turn our attention inward.

The evolution of religion has taken us from god-fearing people who believed god was angry or happy with us based on the weather. We made ritual killings and other sacrifices to appease the gods. Later, that type of religion was considered barbaric. At another point in time, there were special priests who said that only they could speak to god and they would translate for us. Later, we came to regard that type of religion as elitist and a way to control the people. The Jews suggested that people could speak directly to god, that we didn’t need priests, and they were banished for it. Now, people gather in churches or pray in groups or home alone, believing that god is listening. Bill Maher says, isn’t it ridiculous to think there’s a guy somewhere listening to all of us murmur about our lives?

We’re certainly getting closer to the truth but I say, isn’t it time for another evolution? One in which we finally turn our focus inward and stop talking to an external god. Let us be released from the bondage of our collective insanity and recognize the life force in all of us. We are part of a whole that is much bigger than ourselves. We’re like the blood cells in a body sitting around trying to figure out how we got there and what we’re supposed to be doing. I'm not saying we should stop seeking answers but it seems to me that science, not religion, is doing that. And for everything that scientists say they have found an answer to, hundreds more things are revealed that they don't understand. The mystery only grows with exploration. That applies to our bodies and our brains as much as our planet and our universe. We’re trying to figure out what makes the universe tick instead of simply being a part of it. We’re busy launching wars and choking the life out of on various other parts of the whole because we don’t understand ourselves. Clearly, the answers are not out there, they’re in here.

Learnin' 'bout bizness

My head is spinning from the crazy headlines in the paper yesterday, not just words on the screen but actual insanity in the world. There may or may not be a presidential debate, the government just seized WaMu in the biggest bank seizure in our history, the longest-running senator in the senate (from Alaska of course!) is being prosecuted for accepting $188,000 in home renovations as a gift, the U.S. troops and Pakistan are shooting at each other, the settlers in the West Bank have decided to crank up the violence, North Korea has basically put itself back at the top of the terrorist list (in an apparent attempt to get some f'ing attention around here), and Sarah Palin has managed to make herself look ten times more clueless this week than she was last week. And yet, the thing that horrified me the most was an article about a school program, in California of all places (god help us) where teenagers get to make ads for milk.

In a time when our country is fighting a war in two countries, our economy hovers on collapse, civil liberties are being curiously erased under our noses and we're two months away from one of the most critical presidential votes in decades, our kids are being taught "business" by learning how to sell milk to each other. Goodby, the ad agency behind this stroke of genius, will undoubtedly still collect their multimillion dollar fee while the kids do their work for free. The justification for this hideous waste of the student's time is that they're learning about business even though ad people are notoriously clueless in business matters. One teacher reports that her kids were "surprised to find that the executives they met this week are in the business world but 'had no business degrees.'" The "business world"? What is that, the place where people have jobs?

The milk board doesn't have any qualms about describing what they get out of the deal. They want more teenagers to drink milk and why not use our schools as a medium to disseminate product propoganda? The executive director explains that “They are a mysterious demographic and we want to reach them with an authentic voice in an authentic way.” And teach them about business, right?

Al Gore says in his book The Assault on Reason that since the prevalence of television over reading and the radio, in this country, the national debate has ceased to exist (although is arguably on the rise via the Internet). Communication now happens in one direction, from those who have millions of dollars to the rest of us, through the television. Watching on average over four hours a day of TV, Americans are stimulating the part of the brain that experiences instead of the part that processes, evalauates and interacts. Images flashing on the TV have a cumulative effect similar to brainwashing. Eckhart Tolle says when people watch TV they're still thinking but they're thinking the thoughts of the television. In Wall-e, we saw a futuristic version of people so focused on watching a world that didn't exist that they became obsolete. At the same time, the trend in advertising is for brands to be more interactive. The article calls it a move "from a top-down lecture into a two-way conversation." So the discourse about issues like war and economics and international relations is being replaced by 30-second ads while brands are managing to create conversations about their products?

In the film, The 11th Hour, a study is referenced that found college kids could identify 1,000 corporate logos but could not name 10 plants or animals native to their area. The film's interviewees all seem to agree on one seemingly radical idea. In a recent evaluation, it was determined that the earth provides goods and services worth $35 trillion a year, yet the combined economies of the world produced only half that at $18 trillion in 2006. That means the earth is twice as valuable to us as our economies and yet, every policy decision we make is to benefit the economy, not the earth. Even if it were possible to exist without nature or replace nature with technology, it would still cost us more than we have. Here's another radical idea. Wouldn't we be better off teaching our kids about how our planet works than blurring the lines between learning and selling, education and consumerism?