Conditions for clarity

This blip is full of links because something has just happened that’s like light passing through many facets of a prism, creating a beautiful spectrum of color and clarity through withered branches. You may click on the links or not, as time and interest allows, but if you only have time for one link, scroll down and look at the four-minute trailer for Fierce Light at the end of this. 

On the last day of 2014 I met with an activist I’ve known since the Occupy Portland encampment of 2011. He’s involved with Don’t Shoot Portland, a grassroots movement to eradicate poverty and respond to racism. 

He wondered if I could offer meditation instruction to activists in Don’t Shoot Portland. He had seen a video about the peaceful blockade of militarized police training by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship in Oakland and was inspired by it.

I agreed immediately, and then I learned that there is a branch of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship in Portland, and that one of the people prominent in that video about the action in Oakland was in fact the contact person for BPF in Portland. 

Yesterday I met with her. She has been the local contact person for BPF these past thirteen years, and her hope for this year was that someone would appear with the energy to move the work forward into more political activism. She asked me to become the contact person for the organization, and I accepted with enthusiasm.

Ruthie, herself formerly houseless but committed to the struggle for economic and social justice, hearing about the plan for cooperation between Don’t Shoot and BPF, sent me the trailer for a powerful documentary called Fierce Light, with statements by John Lewis, Van Jones, Alice Walker, Joanna Macy, Bishop Tutu, Starhawk, Thich Nhat Hanh, and other politically engaged spiritual leaders. Last night I watched that documentary. Standing up for justice, for equality, that’s the direction. Articulating what we are FOR, that’s the work ahead. Kindness, that’s the work of this moment. 

I’ve found clarity. I have what feels like the right place to put my public energy. My thanks to Ruthie, Gange, Enji, Sue, Jamil, Teressa, Velcrow Ripper, Occupy Portland, my local sangha, and all the beautiful people in that documentary. Here goes.