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I am often stunned into silence by the yawning gap between what Jesus taught and what power hungry Christians teach ABOUT Jesus.

In a recent Fox News episode on immigration, J.D. Vance invoked the medieval notion of “ordo amoris” to justify anti-immigrant policies. “Ordo amoris” isn’t something Jesus taught. It is Saint Augustine’s notion that there is certain order to love. For Augustine, love moves in orderly concentric circles from smaller allegiances to greater. Vance summarized the notion as follows:

“You love your family and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country, and then after that, you can focus [on] and prioritize the rest of the world. A lot of the far left has completely inverted that.”

It certainly seems logical to place one’s religion within the concentric circles of family, then community, then the world, The problem with that approach is that universal love suffocates when placed in those smaller containers.

If I look at my enemy from behind my patriotic defenses I may never reach past my smaller loves. If I love my neighbors within the capitalist system I may never see their true worth. If I love truth within sectarian Christianity I may never reach the radical love to which Jesus called his followers.

If Jesus wanted universal love to fit within the concentric circles of lesser loves, then why did he teach his followers to seek first the kingdom of heaven? Why did he say, “If any come to me and do not hate their own fathers and mothers and spouses and children and siblings, yes, and even their own lives, they cannot be my disciples.” (Luke 14:26-30). Clearly Jesus is exaggerating here, but he is just as clearly calling us beyond our lesser loves to one that is greater.

In fact, Jesus said his true family was those who do the will of heaven:

“Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” (Matthew 12:48-50)

Jesus obviously wasn’t speaking literally when he said to “hate” our family.” It seems to me was trying to awaken our inner vision so that we could see past our lesser loves to the tie that binds us all together. What sense does it make to call God “our parent” if we cannot recognize the immigrant as our human family? There are no boundary lines on universal love.

In fact, the best “Anti-Christ” I can think of is the jewel bedecked American loving white Jesus sitting on a throne of power in stained glass windows of churches across this nation.

When we pray for God to bless our nation instead of asking our nation to serve the common good we have rejected the call to the universal love that might actually heal our world. Jesus turned the “order of love” on its head. We must love our friends and family WITHIN a greater love that seeks justice for us all.

The biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah was not about homosexuality. Originally, the tale was a warning about cruel leaders whose lack of compassion led those towns to their chaotic destruction.

Both Ezekiel and Isaiah explain the lesson of Sodom and Gomorrah. Neither prophet even mention homosexuality. Ezekiel says:

“This is what your sister Sodom has done wrong. She and her daughters were proud that they had plenty of food and had peace and security. They didn’t help the poor and the needy.” (Ezekiel 16:49)

Isaiah condemns the showboat religiosity of his nation even while they mistreat the vulnerable:

“And when you spread forth your hands in prayer, I will hide my eyes from you; yea, when you make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood. Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.” (Isaiah 1:15-17)

Amazing isn’t it that so many have taken a story condemning mistreatment of the vulnerable, and used it to persecute the vulnerable?

If we understand the story of Sodom and Gomorrah as a warning for our own day, we must realize the “sodomites” of our own day are not the drag queens, but the moralizing clergy who have used religion to take over our political processes;

-Not the wandering immigrants, but the entrenched patriots whose ethics begin and end at their own border;

-Not the poor, but the billionaires who hoard wealth that should be shared fairly with all; -Not those who believe in diversity, equity and inclusion, but those who see themselves as the model for all humankind and assume the right to dominate others, supposedly for their own good.

Buddha instructed his disciples to “be a lamp unto yourself,” and to “work out your own liberation with diligence. Likewise, Jesus taught that the truth he was teaching would make us free. But how do we get our souls free in a time such as this? It seems to me freedom must be born at different levels:

First, we must get free of what other people think of us.In other words, we must learn the difference between our character, and our reputation. It is a very helpless feeling when someone calls us names or attacks our reputation.

It is empowering to identify ourselves with what we can control (our character) and detach from the mirages other people project upon us. Ironically, to be to be the servant of all requires enormous independence. To serve our highest value we must disregard the barking of disingenuous critics.

Then, we must separate the idea of what happens to us from who we are. This next step can be hard because it seems logical to be happy when good things happen and to be sad when bad things happen. Identifying what is happening to us is understandable, but is a foundation of sand. Not identifying with circumstances like success or failure brings tremendous stability into our lives.

Perhaps the most challenging level of liberation is getting free from the tyranny of our hopes and fears. Life teaches us that our hopes do not necessarily lead to happiness, nor does getting what we fear necessarily lead unhappiness. Like a loving parent listens to the hopes and fears of a frightened child so must we learn to listen to our own emotions with transformative compassion.

It is love that transforms our fear into courage, our selfishness into justice, our desire into discipline and our confusion into wisdom.

Life teach us that what we want does not necessarily make us happy and what we fear does not necessarily make us unhappy. We live on a kind of roulette wheel of fate so it does not make sense to stake our peace of mind on any one spin of the wheel.

Is there is a freedom that the world does not give and cannot take away? To find such freedom we must stop identifying with our reputation, with our fate and with what we imagine would make us happy or sad. Freedom means being who we really are.

The mother bear is invincible not because she hates her enemy, but because she loves her young.

A mother bear protecting its young is a wonderful symbol of healthy lifelong activism.

We can become so reactive to lies and cruelty that we get lost in the fog of conflict.

We can become so triggered by the cruelty and stupidity around us that we lose our own authentic voices. We can sink to name calling and ridicule and not even realize we are playing someone else’s childish game.

The mother bear is a reminder that, far from being a weakness, compassion is the fountainhead of an activist’s fierce power.

When you feel powerless and helpless, do not focus upon those you fear and resent. Focus on those the loves who need your clarity and power. You will soon feel your courage returning.

A mother bear reminds us that our power does not come from fear or hatred but from an invincible love that has grown fierce to protect its own.

The essence of religion, for me, has never been holding on to an idea of God. The heart of religion, for me, has always been a sense of profound reverence and gratitude before the gift of being itself.

I will admit, when I was a child, I ached for a magical being to reveal itself to me. I searched and prayed for someone to step forward out of the background and make life enough, to make ME enough.

Over the years I realized that a silent sense of grateful reverence and a sense of interconnectedness with all being was all the religion I needed.

I do not believe the gift can be given by religion, but I do believe religion can be a way of sharing it. I see no contradiction in participating in traditional religion so long as we remember that the gift we are celebrating is within every one of us and beyond any of us.

I no longer try to reduce the transcendent source of being to objective existence. To paraphrase Martha Beck, I no longer fixate on things I can touch and now care about the stuff that can touch each of us in the heart of our common being.

It is understandable that many of us become overwhelmed when we consider the sufferings of the world. It is understandable to assume we aren’t taking the suffering of others seriously unless we are unhappy ourselves.

Our being unhappy doesn’t necessarily bring happiness to others. Without inner peace we can easily become triggered in ways that actually make it harder to be of service to the people who need it. I believe we serve the world better if we come from a place of inner peace and compassion.

In the same way inner peace without activism can be hard to distinguish from mere numbness. “Turning things over to God” can be very hard to distinguish from mere apathy. Inner peace is not numbness to the sufferings of the world but a deep harmony that allows us to feel the pain of others without becoming overwhelmed.

If we consider our hearts to be sacred temples where compassion reigns, they can become candles bringing light into the darkest of times. Inner peace and social justice activism go together as the inhalation and exhalation of a balanced heart. It is important to work for a better world, but never underestimate the gift of a well tended heart.

Source of our common being, you have called us through the prophets of every great religion to a higher love- a love that treats all of your children with compassion and justice.

Give us that higher love.

May our personal affections grow until we can feel the fearful heartbeats of immigrant mothers cradling infants in flimsy and dangerous crafts seeking to escape even greater dangers back in their homelands.

Melt the stony heart of this nation until we can feel the bewilderment of those fleeing the results of our own exploitative foreign policies- who come to our border believing we are the land of the free- only to end up in privately run detention camps that draw profit even from the worst of human suffering.

We pray for those crowded onto buses and used as pawns in cruel political stunts intended to stir up anti-immigrant hatred. Shatter the walls of our closed minds and hearts with images of the unmarked graves of beautiful human beings who perished crossing dangerous terrain in their desperate pursuit of safety, freedom and dignity.

May this nation open its arms to the displaced members of our human family. May we realize the hypocrisy in calling yesterday’s refugees “pilgrims” and today’s refugees “illegals.” May we realize when we reject the sojourner as our sibling we reject our common parent as well.

May this nation leave our wretched throne of hoarded wealth, and learn to embrace our entire human family. May we learn to share this planet fairly with all. Common parent of us all, save us from the ghettoes of sect, class or nation.

Give us a higher love.

I vow not to let anything that happens this day rob me of my wisdom and inner peace. I will not let any accident of fortune define me, nor deter me from my duty to my human family and to the web of life.

I will not waste this day obsessively wishing I had lived in better times. I will not dwell on my past mistakes. I will not become so obsessed by fighting evil that I forget true justice is love that has grown to include everyone.

I will be a faithful candle in this time of midnight. When there is no light around me, I will be that light. I will strive to treat every ignorant word as an opportunity to teach, every unfortunate event as a chance to learn, and every happy moment as an opportunity to be grateful.

I will remember that rest and self care are essential for giving my best gift to others. I will offer my gift, however small, and do my best not to fret about that which is beyond my control. I will not turn the gift of serving my human family into a dreary burden.

And, should I break any part of my vow, as I inevitably will, I will not give the last word to remorse or shame. Time and time again I will return to my path with wisdom, peace and joy.

Being an activist in Austin you get to meet some truly remarkable people. One of them, Cecile Richards, passed away this week. (Fittingly, she died on MLK Day.)

Cecile had a burning passion on behalf of anyone born outside the hierarchy of white, male, theocratic power. It was such an honor to drive with Cecile to do presentations in the early days of her brainchild, the Texas Freedom Network.

It was obvious Cecile had little interest in fame, power or money. She wanted to make peoples’ lives better, and she was willing to get into trouble to that end. I love the story about how Cecile as a teen had to change schools because she had protested the Viet Nam War. Cecile knew that those on the outside of systems of vested wealth and power need to struggle for their rights and that decent people need to join them in that struggle.

As I understood her, the original purpose of the Texas Freedom Network was to protect the children of Texas from religious propaganda. The purpose of the organization was not partisan, but its insistence on UNIVERSAL human right placed them in conflict with those who would scapegoat other Texans for political gain. Every year since then TFN has widened the circe of people it protects. Cecile’s passion for justice lives on in that wonderful organization.

Cecile then moved on to lead Planned Parenthood in Washington. She would still come down to Texas when local activists needed her voice, but now the whole nation would witness her passion for a nation that respects the moral agency of women.

Cecile’s memory will go along side Ann Richards, her mom, and Sarah Weddington, her friend. She will also be honored with Texas’ other wonderful “steel magnolias” who would not kneel before the patriarchy and who have given us the torch of hope for our own times.

Cecile Richards will be sorely missed, but I can’t think of anyone who planted more seeds and prepared more people to carry on the work of making the world a better place. Cecile died on the day of Trump’s inauguration, but we do not have to guess how she would have responded to the rhetoric of that day. Cecile’s lifelong activism was a testament to a code of nobility that so many of my heroes and sheroes share:

Life isn’t about winning, it is about being of service.

Government shouldn’t be about control, but empowerment.

Bi-partisanship isn’t meeting injustice half way. It means living and dying by the principles that would make this a fair world for everyone.

No one should have to wait another minute to claim their full rights as human beings.

But Cecile always said it better, so let’s give her the last word in today’s post:

“This is your life. It is the only one you get, so no excuses and no do-overs. If you make a mistake or fail at something, you learn from it, you get over it, and you move on. Your job is to be the very best person you can be, and to never settle for anything less.”

In 2016, Donald Trump said, “The country wasn’t based on executive orders. Right now, Obama goes around signing executive orders. He can’t even get along with the Democrats, and he goes around signing all these executive orders. It’s a basic disaster. You can’t do it.”

As we all know, the first thing Trump did was unleash a tsunami of executive orders that will begin his scheduled four year assault on women’s rights, desperately needed environmental protections, and the capacity of our democracy to place any limits on corporate greed.

This day belongs to the rich and unaccountable but they lack any ethical DNA for a sustainable future. Trump is tying America’s future to non-renewable energy sources which will give a time date to what he is calling our “greatness.” These self seeking oligarchs will destroy the American Empire just as British oligarchs destroyed England’s empire by tying its future to coal power because that’s what made THEM rich.

Do not despair. What we are seeing is the painful sundown of old systems of hoarded wealth and power. Old systems of colonialism, patriarchy, sectarian theocracy and unregulated capitalism are dying.

Oligarchs are cashing in their chips because at some level they realize a new day is coming. Eventually, this current devastation may very well become the birth of an age based on the values of human happiness and environmental sustainability. This is not a pipe dream, this is our only alternative to disaster.

Until then, remember a confederacy of bullies will eventually be torn apart simply for its lack of principle. Remember that those who build their empire on lies will eventually be destroyed by truth. And, in Lin Yutang’s words: “When small personalities begin to cast big shadows, it means that the sun is about to set”.