So here is a brief query for your morning reflection. After the 2014 elections it is clear we are in for more changes with our elected officials. We do not yet know what the new world of 2015 will look like, but we do know some Americans love to spend millions on political ads that smear the reputations of political candidates, and they do not have to have any semblance of reality to them. I have a feeling we are in for a whole new onslaught of name calling and political stalemate in days ahead – seems like the new norm for politics.
But what if we had a new world order that looked like this vision from a friend: “the introverts and intuitives are more prized than warriors and kings; the artists and poets, prophets and seers are now guiding the culture.” Wow, the image is mind-blowing! What if poets, artists, and spiritual guides led our world: what would that mean?
My sense is that there is not one America but several. For one thing there is the world of white America and a very different world for all people of color (eg. a survey result just came out showing that 44% of the time an African American with identical credentials to a white American will be turned down for an apartment in New Orleans). The male world still seems to rule in that females with identical credentials will be paid at least 20% less for identical jobs: two worlds, (and those numbers get worse for people of color).
Into such a mess as we have created came a revolutionary figure, Jesus of Nazareth, calling us to a new world order. He said this is God’s world, and in God’s kingdom the very people who are frequently excluded are the ones Jesus wants to hang out with. So how would things change around your part of the world if the poetic sensibility, creative artistry, and compassionate inclusivity of Jesus of Nazareth actually became the new world order? Or maybe even more to the point, how will my own inner world order be turned upside down this day if I let the poet/artist/Lover lead me?
For more reflections like this see Monks in the World: Seeking God in a Frantic Culture.
A Contemplative Path 