Posted by giveawayboy on June 07, 2002 at 08:44:56:
In Reply to: Re: John, I will answer your post in detail later today..... posted by john on June 07, 2002 at 06:32:33:
: I understand your view and I like it...mostly. The only thing that confuses me is how you can equate the mythological idyllic world you describe below with the entirely estranged and disconnected world that exists 20 feet from your window. When I look outside I don't see flowing plains and great swamps, and people living in freedom and whole. I see cars and streets and traffic noise and people working all of their lives at miserable jobs to make money that they are told they need so they can buy the things they are told they want. I see pollution and fragmented, wounded segments of nature that exist only because it wasn't cost effective to remove them. I see countless animals dead on the street killed by the same people who are rushing home to watch them Animal Planet. I see greed and ignorance. I see manipulation on every level. To my frame of experience, your vision is pure fantasy.
: I think this is one of the greatest points on which we fundamentally differ. You have an amazing ability to see the slightest bit of good and magnify it into a wonderful vision. I on the other hand see that same good and cannot escape the context in which it is being squashed. Truthfully, it may be nice to see like you do, but I have never been able to. Now i would certainly love to live in your world, but it just doesn't exist currently... not here in this lifestyle anyway. I am confident that it could exist, and probably does somewhere, but not here, not in this filthy mismanaged city. I see only pain and destruction with glimmers of hope attached to dreams of escaping it.
You are hitting the nail on the head w your observations. The idyllic, mythological world is a far cry more noble looking than the world we have here and now, the world with oil spills, with litter, with nudie bars on every corner, etc. This is not the same. No, the vast expanses have been carved and served to the multitudes of uncaring, unknowing people who have forgotten how to walk on mother earth with each step being a prayer of gratitude, etc. But still, here is the world into which the Light enters and mysteriously communes. Here is the dwelling place of Emmanuel. The only way we can see it transformed is by committing to it on some level. It might be the very death of us. I still don't know how it all will work out. But your viewpoint is terribly important to those who for whatever reason have been lulled to sleep. You are more like John the Baptist or Elijah. You are the one pointing one finger at Heaven and one at Earth. Seeing that they don't match up you express that reality in a very strong way. Then there are others, whose strengths can blend w yours who see it redemptively. They see incredible hope where it seems that all hope has already vanished. I remember once driving by USF and suddenly it was like a veil was lifted and I could see a huge vast wilderness, and althought my eyes were convincing me that there was nothing there but concrete and glass, I knew that on some level of reality there was a huge wildness sitting right on the same spot. It was almost like the feeling I would imagine upon seeing a leprechaun. Infact, I do believe in leprechauns and faeries somehow. I think that we need to retrain our eyes and hearts to see nature and myth all around us. It might take time to reenchant the world, or to simply reacquaint ourselves w its ongoing enchantment. I think the main thing is to allow ourselves that time. Also, I think the more we encourage that type of reflection and then encourage community action based on that, we will see changes. Once again I will offer my Curitiba example: