Je ne suis pas...

(Originally journaled January 14, 2015)

I want to write poetry again.

Maybe it's the appropriate way to express how I'm feeling about this whole "Charlie Hebdo" thing. The thing is: "Je ne suis pas Charlie!" The reactions--millions marching for the cause (while no one even pays any attention to other simultaneous massacres--way worse ones--like that in Nigeria by Boko Haram... because they're "just black people" maybe?) is really so "secular" at heart. So much of it is all about "my human right" of "free speech."

But just look at where our "human rights" and our "me-centeredness" has got us in this world. It all runs so smack-dab in the face of the Jesus, God, Spirit rule of "Love the Lord Your God, and love your neighbor as yourself." (And when people dare to point out the hypocrisies of the whole situation--and there are many--they are slammed for being non-PC or too religious or whatever...)

Of course, part of the "me-ness" of secularism is the inbuilt intolerance for any way of thinking that is not the way "I" think--despite secularism's proclamations about creating a tolerant society. Tolerant, that is, for anything that doesn't personally annoy me, or challenge or threaten my individual way of thinking. Good grief. And of course, Jesus' way "threatens the empire," as yesterday's Common Prayer quote points out.

I am certainly not in favor of radical, fundamentalist approaches of any stripes--religious, scientific, educational, political, or any other "institutional" radicalism, be it left or right or any other extreme that is willing to cause pain and oppression and even death to further its agenda.

However, there is a fine line in issues like "free speech" or any other "freedom." At what point does "my freedom" begin to impinge on others, to the point at which I am demanding they lose their freedom, to the point at which, in my zealousness, I am oppressing others myself through my "free" demands and reactions, denying them the same kinds of rights and freedoms I demand for myself, in order to gain and maintain those I wish for myself.

Jesus told us we must "deny" ourselves in order to live his way--the way that seeks to love and honor and respect and help others--and no wonder this is a "way" that so many hate...because it does demand self-denial of the "extremisms"--the "radical religious fundamentalist approach" of personal goals and demands, no matter how rational and "humanly right and free" they may appear on the surface.

Enough for now.