I'm struggling at the moment with a couple of concepts.
The first and most uppermost in my mind right now is the concept of the utter and final desecration of our Earth by Western Civilization.
The first and most uppermost in my mind right now is the concept of the utter and final desecration of our Earth by Western Civilization.
I'm not sure why I just awarded those capitals.
Everywhere I look I see evidence of the big corporates and the governments of the world (yes indeed, including my own) pillaging the irreplaceable contents of the world, exploiting indigenous peoples of the world, and basically murdering the world. I see good evidence, too, to place this immoral looting on the mindset of the people of said Western Civilization (see, I did it again). That is, on the upbringing, schooling and enculturation of each of us born into this abusive, exploitative, selfish society. And yes, that includes myself.
There is such a pervasive inability to see beyond tomorrow's bank balance in almost every one of these folk that I admit I have started to despair. Even those Pagans whose outlook is far more Earth-friendly than the average Christian have startled me at times with an inability or an unwillingness to grasp the essential fact of our planet's demise.
I'm God, yes.
I'm a bloody wrathful God right now.
Watching a short documentary on telly (made in this county) explaining and extolling the virtues of Buddhism cast me into a further turmoil.
I love some of the Buddhist precepts - universal compassion, Big Mind, the essential deity of all things - but I couldn't help feeling, watching this program, that many Buddhists are running away.
They seem to have found a bolt hole in the disturbed fabric of Being Human on Earth which consists of finding and exploring the universe within, and to hell (not in so many words of course, and with fine-sounding sops in soundbytes) with the exterior.
Hey , Buddhists- stop running away! You don't have the Christian excuse (despicable as it is) of the Earth being here solely for our domination, and its upcoming End as a reason to celebrate.
Compassion, you say, extends to the very rocks and trees, never mind the fish and fowl who feed us. They're dying, to the tune of 200 species a day, you twits. Where is your compassion? More to the point, does it do a damn bit of good?
And here I come to the crux of my own terrible frustration.
I love being able to sit zazen before my altar, emptying my mind of all and just bask in the suchness of it all. I adore practising Bodhichitta, cycling and recycling love outward from my heart toward all creation.
But raising a purely Pagan sacred circle, I become aware of the elementals, those souls of our material being. I converse with Pied Crows and communicate with Coltsfoot. And each of these is directly threatened- dying, poisoned or standing on the brink of not-being for all time - by the direct actions of myself and the culture which raised me.
Getting angry may be the necessary first step. But by Gods I have to find some way to accommodate this anger.
Doing something concrete-something a bit more than a spot of guerrilla gardening and railing against civilisation- now seems to me the only way out.
I hear you, Sister. I think the answer may be: yes. Yes, we need to sit zazen and yes we need to act boldly and seriously and magically and mundanely to save Earth and, yes, if she's dying, then we need to do what witches in the end times are called to do: witness her death, mourn her, send her gently to the Summerlands. That's not easy work nor fun, but it may, I think more and more often, what witches are here (in the sense that here=now) for.
ReplyDeleteWestern Civilization is nothing more than the Roman Empire reborn in America and posing as christians. And spreading their sickness all around the world.
ReplyDeleteWhere is Goddess? I don't see much signs of her in my country, all the female parts of Goddess here are working, shopping and building their empires.
They drive me nuts and when I judge them and get on them they call me a misogynist.
Damn right I don't like what they are, I want to love them but they won't let me because they are so needy and greedy.
I'm a bloody wrathful God right now.
I'm one pissed off spirit.
I love some of the Buddhist precepts - universal compassion, Big Mind, the essential deity of all things - but I couldn't help feeling, watching this program, that many Buddhists are running away.
I've posted about Buddhists before, that religion is bat shit crazy. They want peace but they also want their personal spaces perfect and picture perfect.
Well, this isn't a perfect world and I settle on a lot less than perfect here. In fact I don't need perfect and perfection at all.
And neither does my neighbor, Helen. Her kitchen hasn't been painted since 1966 and needs it, and I would love to paint it but she won't let me.
She gets upset every time I bring it up, like this evening. She is happy with her little home she moved into in 1946.
And she has helped many people here while living simply, poor, and basic over her 85 years. Not many wise, loving and wonderful women like Helen on this planet.
Best woman and neighbor I have ever known. And I compare all available women to her and they stack up against her so I remain living alone.
I've decided to be okay with that because they wouldn't make a pimple on Helen's butt.
As for America, they got big, spread their sickness to other countries and they also got that sickness, greed.
But America is going to topple and all I have to say about that is good.
Just because this body lives here it doesn't mean I have to believe in America, it's just where this body was born.
I won't find my spiritual partner (goddess) here but I've decided to accept that and live the rest of my life in spiritual retreats alone.
In other words, if you will allow me to say so, fuck the women around here, they are too self centered.
I was wondering if I was ever going to stumble across a fellow pagan as pissed off at the Human race as I am. A major plague or near extinction right now would be just what Gaia needs right now. No, I am not a big fan of mass death and destruction, but we are a cancer that must either be controled, or outright cured, if this planet and the rest of it's inhabitants are to survive as an rare and beautiful ecosystem spinning through the vast vacuum of space.
ReplyDeleteLike your blog, by the way.....grin.
This post may be over a year old, and I may (or may not) have stumbled upon it completely accidentally, but I still feel compelled to offer comment.
ReplyDeleteI do not believe that quietly hoping for change while lamenting the damage already done is going to solve anything. Nor do I believe that the extinction of the human species will bring about the restoration of the natural balance.
The only certainty is that no individual being has the power to overcome this obstacle because the obstacle is humankind as a whole. It would require every one of us (myself included) to make a drastic change in behavior and attitude toward our existence and how we relate to the Earth and its many other inhabitants. Only then can we truly transcend our selfish, materialistic, and destructive nature.
I apologize if I seem a bit preachy, but I too am pained, enraged, disgusted, and ultimately saddened by our arrogance and ignorance.
This became precisely what I was seeking! Thanks!
ReplyDelete