"Involvement is its own reward," my therapist Gary used to say, back when I thought psychotherapy could help me. If that's true, I've wondered for the past few decades why young people weren't involved in political activism. "What happened to the '60s?" my friends would say. "We stopped the Vietnam War. We started the women's movement. Where are the kids now? Why aren't they doing anything?"Yeah, I would think, we did all that 40 years ago. And then we started worrying about our careers, or we got high, or both. We got into punk rock and loft jazz, or raising a family, or spiritual practice. But then Reagan was elected and everything started really going downhill.
Reagan and his allies tore up the unions, starting with the air traffic controllers; and they began a planned program of overspending on defense so that much less money would be available for the social safety net, education, and infrastructure. This has culminated today in self-righteous blather by Reagan's political descendents about the deficit and the need for austerity. That's coming from people whose idea of austerity is driving a Lexus SUV that gets good gas mileage.
Now, like a spontaneous wildfire, the Occupy Wall Street movement, along with its manifestations in cities around the country and the world, has started getting a lot of young and old people involved. I don't believe, as some insist, that the movement needs to come up with a set agenda. They can afford to hang out and see what develops. They are living in the moment, but unlike the hippies who created the first mass movement of hanging out, they don't appear to be drifting into drugs, violence, or indifference. Indeed, the very amorphous quality that some commentators are sounding so perplexed and even derisive about may be their greatest strength. It's reminiscent of an old spiritual principle, which the Christian existentialist Gabriel Marcel referred to as being "available" (disponible was the French term he used). Marcel meant leaving oneself open for the whisperings of the spirit, rather than following a strict agenda, religious or otherwise.
My dear friend, the late Ron Roth loved the Aramaic term for prayer, slotha, which means, "to set a trap." As Ron used to say, "When you pray, you have to keep your heart open, and set a trap to catch the mind of God." Ron had left the priesthood and then the Catholic church because his bishop didn't want him holding healing services in his Illinois parish. Ron wondered how it could not be Christian to do what Jesus did and heal the sick. He believed that instead of asking God for things, we ought to leave ourselves open to hear what God wants from us.
I'm not suggesting that the irrepressible potpourri of activists encamped on Wall Street and elsewhere are being led by conscious spiritual principles. I do think they are intuitively remaining open to possibility, and waiting for things to take shape. That's a lot more challenging than following a set plan, and in a sense it is an inspiration to all of us.
Meanwhile, the naysayers continue to be outraged. One reader wrote in support of a conservative commentator in the New York Times, "These are not the happy hippie college kids who demonstrated when I was a carefree co-ed. I believe these to be largely hired hands who will happily create mayhem on behalf of some people with very ugly agendas indeed."
To which another reader responded. "This is exactly what they said about those happy hippies the first time around."
I really enjoyed this entry of yours!
IF we stay open to a change without demanding how it is going to look we keep ourselves more open to God's energy..........God's solution.
I'm going to keep Ron Roth quote," to set a trap to catch the mind of God."
Thanks, Michelle