Today

"It is easy to go with the flow, go with the current. But it is oftentimes hard to stand up against a group of people who you may be close with or stand up for something that may not be popular, but it's the right thing to do." ~ State Rep. John Kriesel (R) MN in his speech to his fellow Minnesota lawmakers against a bill that would define marriage as only being between 1 man and 1 woman.

After the stroke I experienced a few weeks ago, an at first subtle and since rapidly speeded up thing has emerged and is emerging within me. Emerged is not the correct word for it was always there. I have however, increasingly begun to see that this thing has become far more pronounced in me since the stroke and in fact has become to feel very, very urgent. What is this thing? This thing is the desire to speak the truth of that which is within me and that is the increasingly strengthened voice of the Sacred Activist inside of me. It is a voice that seems to have been fully awakened in a most intense and beautiful way.

I have found, like Rep. John Kriesel, I now have an absolute sense of urgency to speak out about things that may not be popular, that may clearly place me at odds with people I am close to, people I love deeply, communities I feel a deep connection to and have felt supported by for decades--- things that may make me persona non grata across a populated landscape of people and causes.

There is so much hate, injustice, prejudice and mean spiritedness in this world. And while I understand that every man and woman on the planet is, in a very clear sense, my brother, my sister, a part of me---I am finding that I must now speak out and speak out loudly against many people who are my sisters and brothers in a much deeper sense, more stridently than I ever have before. I must speak out loudly against the racism and sense of entitlement within certain ranks and elements of the LGBT community. I must speak out loudly against the bigotry and ignorance within certain segments of the feminist and radical feminist community. I must speak out loudly against the hate, scapegoating and insensitivity within The African American community especially within "The Black Church." I must speak out loudly against the mysogyny, entitlment, arrogance and downright insanity found in almost all communities and expressions of religion and spirituality on the planet. I must speak about the bigotry, greed, racism and superiority that has always been present in this country but which has now become inextricably woven into the very fabric of every single aspect of American culture and life.

I have close friends who are fervent members of The Republican political party here in America. I have close friends who are strong and dedicated members of The American Tea Party. I have friends and teachers who are radical feminists. I have friends and collegues who are leaders in The Black Church, The Gay Rights Movement, the activist community, etc. Some of these people are harbingers of hate and desctruction by the separatist, evil and counterproductive rhetoric they allow to spew from their mouths...everyday or almost everyday. Before, I made a secret vow not to call these people out on their ignorance in respect for the love and friendship we shared. That bond is still there. The vow however, is not. There are people I have been friends with for over 30 years where the frienship has been severed on their end within the last weeks because I have chosen to speak out against things they believed were sacred cows both within their personal philosophy and within our shared friendship. I have been defriended by dozens of people on facebook within the last weeks because I have chosen to showcase pictures of the beloved Master Teacher, Jesus Christ of Nazareth, in forms that could be interpreted as this teacher being gay or being sympathetic to the homosexual experience or to this teacher being in a female form that could be viewed as being "suductive" or to being in a male form that could be viewed as being "homoerotic."

For years I have kept much of this to myself. I have refused to post items on my facebook wall that confronted the racism and hatred that is rampant, I believe, within The Republican Party and The American Tea Party, for example, because I did not want to offend my friends who were themselves members of these entities. I understand the sensitivity and politeness that encouraged such actions on my part and I respect them as well to this day. However, with my new consciousness, I find such actions now make me complicit, an accessory to the crimes, if you will, that are occurring all around me. There are times, I have discovered, when silence is indeed not very golden at all and in fact as the slogan in the earliest days of our awareness of that which has now come to be known as "the AIDS pandemic" ----SILENCE = DEATH sometimes. Hallelujah!

Throughout this transformation process all the way to whatever evolutionary path it may express, I know I will be able to separate the actors from the actions to a reasonable extent. I am able to do this because I know we all just want to be loved and ultimately free and that however, all of us have a hell of a way of expressing those beautiful objectives, living those truths at least some of the time. Also, as the great Maya Angelou has often said, "when we know better, we do better." So I know the hatred and violence that exists in the world and around me is a result of individual and collective ignorance in the deepest sense of that word. And I too am a part of that ignorance, of course. So my speaking out must necessarily be tempered with expressions of deep humility, lest I simply become a part of the problem without more powerfully being a part of the solution. I have learned many things from my beloved teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh. One of those things is that transformation and healing are real things that are constantly occurring in real time every moment of our lives. With this knowledge and awareness I know I will be able to walk in beauty, walk in peace and walk in and speak my truths simultaneously.

And So It Is!
©RAVEN/SAGE MAHOSADHA