A WORLD OF OUR OWN MAKING

"WHEN WE QUARREL WITH SOMEONE, the worst thing we can do is to avoid that person. We are trying to avoid an image in our own mind, which cannot be done. The mind takes some exaggerated impressions, memories, hopes, and insecurities, draws a quick caricature like one of those sidewalk cartoonists, and then turns up its nose. The person in question should retort, 'That's not me; that's your caricature of me. If you don't like it, you don't like your own mind.'

"To heal our relationships, we have to move closer to people we do not like, learn to work with them without friction. When we do this, we are remaking the images in our mind—which means we are literally remaking the world in which we live."

Eknath Easwaran
"Turning Enemies Into Friends"
Reprinted with permission from
SojoMail, Sojourners e-mail magazine
www.sojo.net
May 23, 2002

Neighbors gather to affirm community life

"THERE'S NO SUBSTITUTE FOR PUBLIC LIFE, especially in a pluralistic democracy. It's where strangers meet on common ground—in public schools, festivals, playgrounds and parks—and experience community....

"Just a couple of months ago, a 20-year-old man apparently tried to rob a 69-year-old man who was jogging through [a] Memphis park. In the struggle, both men stabbed and killed each other. Last month, a 10-year-old boy was shot and killed on a Memphis playground as he tried to avoid gunfire by hiding behind a tree.

"It was that tragedy that inspired Kathy Irwin to throw her arms around the public life in her neighborhood.

"She talked to her neighbors.... Old Binghamton has become one of the city's most diverse neighborhoods.

"[And on a recent] Sunday evening, friends, neighbors and strangers gathered next to the playground in Binghamton Park.

"Folks were there from neighborhood churches such as Everett United Methodist, Blessed Sacrament Catholic, Merton Avenue Baptist and First Baptist. Folks were there from neighborhood ministries such as Christ Community Medical Clinic, Caritas Community and Service Over Self.

"Folks were there from across the street, around the corner and blocks away.

" 'We're here to make a witness,' said the Rev. Jeff Irwin, pastor of Everett United Methodist Church. 'We care about this neighborhood and this park, and we want it to be a safe place, a place where people of all races and cultures can live and play together.' "

David Waters
"Neighbors confront darkness together"
May 22, 2002
Knox Studio Web site

Retired bishop talks about spiritual healing

"HEALING IS AN OFTEN-NEGLECTED MINISTRY of the Christian church, according to Bishop William J. Cox, who will present a three-day seminar on the subject in Tulsa....

"[Retired since 1988 as assistant bishop of the Oklahoma Episcopal Diocese] Cox believes interest in the healing ministry is growing in mainline churches, some of which are beginning to have public healing services.

" 'Churches are supposed to be therapeutic communities,' he said, 'offering opportunities for people to achieve wholeness. We're so beautifully created by God that all aspects of life are affected by other aspects. Spiritually sick people can become emotionally sick and physically sick.'

"Spiritual healing begins with reconciliation, he said. 'We've discovered the most dramatic (physical) healings result when people are reconciled with God and with others. It's just amazing. I've seen people instantly healed,' he said."

Bill Sherman
"A Spiritually Healing Touch"
Tulsa World
May 11, 2002

EDUCATORS URGED TO WALK THEIR TALK

"STUDIED SHOW THAT 80 PERCENT OF KIDS enter school feeling good about themselves. By the fifth grade, that percentage has dropped to 20 percent and by twelfth grade it is only 5 percent.... More than gang violence, the day-to-day peer violence of put-downs, bullying, and constant humiliation is what drives our kids to bring guns to school, to commit suicide, and to raise children of their own in the same culture of humiliation that they experienced.

"The Torah teaches 'v'shinantam l'vanecha, and you shall teach your children.' The hope and dream of a new world based on love, compassion, and kindness depends on what we teach our children. The time has come to make serious changes in our education system. We must realize that test scores, grades, and book knowledge are not the sole criteria for evaluating our schools' progress. Instead, we must encourage our schools to help kids be kind to one another by actively interfering in moments when kids are being teased; by modeling good behavior—which means, in part, speaking to kids with respect and compassion; and by insisting that our educators and school boards work to exemplify the values which they hope to pass on to our kids."

Joshua Levine Grater
"Teaching Kindness"
Reprinted from Tikkun: A Bimonthly Jewish Critique of Politics, Culture, and Society
May/June 2002
www.tikkun.org

Research indicates school shooters feel bullied

"MOST SCHOOL SHOOTERS felt bullied or threatened by someone else just before they went on a rampage, a study by the Secret Service finds, with virtually all shooters having difficulties coping with a relationship or a falling-out among peers.

"In a training manual to be distributed to school and law-enforcement personnel, the agency that protects the President said schools should pay more attention to students' social problems, listen to their complaints, urge classmates to report problems and watch out for depressed, suicidal teenagers if they want to head off school shootings like the one at Columbine High School in 1999....

"Investigations of school shootings since 1974 found that students who came to school with a plan to kill did not just 'snap.' They warned classmates, aired their grievances and left other clues....

"In more than two-thirds of cases, the attackers said they felt persecuted, bullied, threatened, attacked or even injured by others just before the shootings. Many either threatened to commit suicide or actually tried it."

"Study: Most School Shootings Preventable"
Associated Press
May 1, 2002

©Scripps Howard News Service