Inclusion & Exclusion
I was watching a very emotional installment of Meet the Press the other day and something has been bothering me about it for the last two days, and I just realized why.

No, it wasn't with the President of Jefferson Parrish, though I strongly feel and send compassion towards him. It had to do with some comments by the former mayor of New Orleans who was among a panel of guests. They were talking about the refugee situation in the city, and he stopped them, asking them to please not refer to them as "refugees" but as "citizens" or "Americans." Not wanting to lump us in with them - the millions of other displaced persons around the globe. While his intention was positive, I'm sure, it points to something that is at the core of our national issues.

There is nothing inherently negative or demeaning in the word "refugee." That only comes from the intention, and conotation that we have given to it as a nation, as a people, and as a global community. We think of the poor, we think of the disenfranchised, we think of the helpless, and yes the hopeless. We think of the powerless and those that have no voice. We don't want to be them, ever. Isn't it impossible in this country?

Not calling them refugees has two inherent long range problems that will not only hurt them, but us as well. First of all, refusing to call them what they are has the effect of separating them - and us - from the others who are suffering in the world, and in this country. At a time that could be drawing us together in compassion with the rest of the world, and increasing our understanding as to the nature and effects of our own policies, blindness, and environmental degradation, we are cutting ourselves from that global heart, and that global - and human - REALITY. We are once again not like "them." Inadvertently, the former mayor, an African-American, uttered one of the most ancient racist statements of all time.

Another aspect of this idea lies in the treatment those effected by the hurricane can and will receive. If you don't think that renaming something has an effect on such things, you don't know our government or global system very well. For instance, as soon as Bush declared the city a "state of emergency" money then became available. Nothing changed about the situation except the conceptual and literal framework that it was being put in. Imagine the similar consequences for people! Utter the right words and Open Sesame!, utter the wrong words and waste away in the Astrodome.

"Refugee" carries a lot more emotional and accurate weight than "displaced person" (sounds like they lost their car in the Walmart parking lot). Refugee has an immediacy, as in right now, as in thousands screaming for salvation at the Convention Center. Displaced person has the immediacy of sitting in a doctor's office waiting room.

We've done this before with people we've wounded - as George Carlin so astutely pointed out with how veterans were given less and less treatment for the emotional and psychological scars of war as what they were going through was described as "shell shock," to "post tramatic stress syndome." One is immediate, the other just somehow isn't. The people of the South don't need a lot of debating going on right now. They need immediate action.

I also find the images of those preaching and yelling on New Orleans street corners, comparing the city with Sodom and Gemorrah, very sad. Are we really so lost in the past? Lost in fear? People really do still believe in the Devil, in retribution, that if you don't read the right texts you're going to burn in hell. I find not only those words sad, but also the fact that there is so much more available and true for us, and that some people cannot see this. It's like the rich person who feels poor - who can't feel, expereince, or celebrate and share thier good fortune.

I went to Boise last Friday to Spirit at Work Books & Beyond, which was hosting a Weekend in Tibet. The Ven. Robina Courtin gave a two hour talk and she was so amazing. People asked her for a buddhist interpretation of the situation in New Orleans, and she did not shy away from the idea of karma, and how being there, in that wonderful comfortable space was the result of generating good karma. Being in this chair right now, expereincing some allergies, some discomfort, but a lot of light and love. We all have stuff to work on, and we all can use the things around us to help us bear witness to our own lives more clearly.

Truth and Compassion - words and emotions. So very very important in all that we do. If the eyes are the gateway to our soul, our mouths are the spokespeople for our hearts.

In honor of the refugees of the south, I open my heart, my home, and my resources to sharing and alleviating thier suffering. May their path be clear and may they find joy in thier new lives. I call upon Her daily in their name, and I also am riding my bike as much as possible rather than driving to not fuel the fires anymore than necessary.

In Service,
Angela

They Didn?t Know They Could Walk Away
Now Playing: Reflections on Hurricane Katrina
There have been a lot of things about the Hurricane crisis in New Orleans that have been overwhelming, heart breaking, and unbelievable. My reactions, emotions, and feelings have run the gamut, as I’m sure they have with everyone else. I have had some surprising insights that have come up that have shocked me, however, and in discussing some of the events with others I have had cause to look at the situation and players with new and more compassionate eyes.

One thing that has shocked me is that I am actually feeling compassion for George Bush (which is a very big deal for me given the fact that I am one of his most strident critics). Like all things, this outcome has been in development for a long time. The lack of effective response by the government is not simply a function of the war in Iraq, the Bush administration, or anyone in power right now, though these are all on-going contributing factors (as is the role each and every one of us has played in the past). We, as in this country, have had a long history of treating refugees and victims as the people in New Orleans are being treated right now. The only surprising thing should really be – why are we so shocked? Clinton was in office during the Albanian crisis, when hundreds of thousands of people were fleeing to Macedonia, being held in “no man’s land” between countries for weeks on end, finally shipped to some forgotten location (do you remember where? I don’t.) Going farther back, and running the political spectrum of leadership, is the situation in Israel with the refugee Palestinians, many of whom have been born, raised, and died in refugee camps. Regardless of how we feel about them politically, as human beings we have not taken care of our own. And, taking care of our own is not a modern day concept only to be employed by the so called developed and enlightened. Neanderthal and Cro-Magnum and other hominids took care of their own sick, dying, elderly, and handicapped populations before we even “civilized” ourselves. This is not a new concept.

Compassion arises in me for Bush who is at the crossroads of two very strong forces – being at the wrong place at the wrong time – when the inevitable becomes manifest – and he and the system that has been creating situation such as these since before the Civil War finds itself utterly incapable of taking any kind of responsibility or effective response. To watch a man, a system, and yes, a people, confronted with the reality of their self-imposed limits is overwhelmingly sad. To be put to the test and to realize that we do not have what it takes, and to know that we could be so much more, is even sadder.

Another shocking idea that has come out of all of this is my own judgment of the people who have been at ground zero for this past week. My first question was the distancing refrain – Why did they live there in the first place? My second question then fell along the lines of blaming– Why didn’t they leave? In both cases, the answer lies partly in the fact that they did not have the economic power to leave, and/or they misjudged the situation. Neither are reasons to condemn a mass of people. The third question that came up was in response to those at the Convention Center – Why didn’t they simply walk out if no one was coming with help?! This one troubled me greatly. I would look at the screen and see people angrily crying for help, other people trapped by materialism, and a people demanding what they felt was owed them. Why didn’t they just leave? No one made Katrina come. Yes, systems broke down, but these systems were being run by human beings. The anger you express now has a history all of its own, encompasses more than you think, and is not as easily resolved as being “saved,” as the continuing anger of the refugees clearly demonstrates.

While discussing this with a friend of mine who is also a New Thought minister, she challenged my thinking. She reminded me that while this thought might be obvious to me (which it wasn’t, in fact it didn’t occur to me until day four) that many involved in this crisis didn’t know that they could leave, that such an idea of self-empowerment was not in their vocabulary. And, and, when they did start to walk out, barricades were put up so they couldn’t leave. This, of all the things that have happened in the last week, has saddened me most of all. They didn’t know they could leave, and by the time they realized they could, it was too late. How many of us, in so many areas of our lives, feel trapped and angry and hopeless and experience lack and pain and suffering, and feel that there is no way out – from debt to mortgages to loneliness to dead end jobs to boredom to addiction to feelings of dissatisfaction, anxiety, and depression? How relieved do we feel (or dismayed if we don’t want to take responsibility) when we find out that our salvation lies in our own selves, in our own minds, in our own will to effect positive change in our lives.

For many of us, being told the answer truly lies inside ourselves is so out of sync with what we have been taught to seem like an idea from another world, a stroke of genius, or too good to be true. We didn’t know that we could walk away until someone shares this truth with us. Some of us were told this while growing up, some of us weren’t. Some of us may go our whole lives thinking that the answer lies somewhere in the ever distant horizon. Some of us aren’t even aware of a question or seeking an answer has our suffering become so institutionalized, so bred into our very genes. They didn’t know they could walk away. The greatest help we could have given them the first two days was to broadcast to them to get the hell out of there and go north, that anything was better than standing around and waiting for people to save you.

We can give them shelter, we can give them clothing, we can give them medical care, and we can flat out just give them money, but that is not going to solve their problems. That will take make them well dressed refugees rather than just poor refugees. What they need, from the president on down to the man on the roof who won’t let go of his chimney, are open hearts, and people willing to embrace every one of the players. What they need is a break, and to be heard. What they need is the permission and space to be human - not Teflon leaders, not lightning rods, not “the poor,” not judged, not condemned, not left to rot in the abandoned wilderness of the American soul.

In every single situation there exists the opportunity for positive or negative outcome. How can we help them through this– and not just their bodies – but their minds, their psyches, their spiritual selves? What can we learn from this situation – here in our living rooms in paradise? Don’t tell me that you can’t legislate that or plan for it or address issues such as these. I’ve read the Constitution, and it’s all in there.

Are we to be a country that is run into the ground by its own fighting and disconnect, or are we to be a country that comes together as a family? What we are willing to do is going to become apparent in the next few months and years, reflected in the eyes of Katrina’s children.