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Lost and found
Aaron White describes being lost as a powerful opportunity to find our way.
When you are lost, nothing else matters in the whole word. It raises the stakes, forces necessary questions in our lives, and demands our attention. Being lost can, sometimes, be a great blessing. Being lost can force us to pay attention to our lives. It can build our capacity for self-love and care. Being lost can ask us what and who are most worthy of our trust. And if we are lost, it asks us where we want to be and where joy and meaning are for us. Blessings, for sure. (Possibility Conspiracy, 5.25.19)
Joanna Fontaine Crawford writes that healthy boundaries are not about self-protection.
On the face of it, it’s a pretty radical notion. Because the messages we hear all the time are about the need to have boundaries for one’s protection. We need to feel safe, the logic goes, so we need to establish and maintain boundaries.
You know what the critical error is in that logic?
It means we’re giving the power over our feelings to someone else. . . . Learning to see boundaries not as self-protection, but as self-definition, is a way of stepping forward into becoming a stronger, more mature person, committed to an ethic of personal responsibility. (Boots and Blessings, 5.28.19)
When the hard decision is ours
At a rally protesting abortion bans, Sarah Gibb Millspaugh reminds those listening of a surprising fact: most people of faith in this country are pro-choice.
We are pro-choice because our morality compels us so.
Mine starts here: Life is sacred. Your life is sacred. . . . The lives of the children and families waiting to cross that border [point south] are sacred. The lives of the people in Iran and Venezuela, Israel/Palestine, and Yemen are sacred.
The lives of the person, or the couple, facing a difficult reproductive decision: their lives are sacred. And because their lives are sacred, we are called to do all we can to protect their life and their well-being. The lives of the born. The lives of the living. . . . We owe it to them to uphold their rights, their dignity, and their own responsibility to guide their lives. (Facebook, 5.25.19)
Liz James contrasts the agency given to an organ donor and that given to women who are pregnant.
You can say no for any reason and at any point in the process . . . no matter how human or good or kind the person who will die as a result of your decision might be. So strong is your right to say no that we will not use your body to save the lives of multiple deserving people EVEN AFTER YOU ARE DEAD unless you specify otherwise.
Abortion is not about whether a fetus is a person. People who receive kidneys, lungs, livers, bone marrow, and blood are all people.
And yet, the decision rests with the donor, because it’s their damn body. (Facebook, 5.25.19)
Heather Petit offers a prayer for hard decisions.
When the hard decision is ours
And there is no other right way
May we find courage to move forward (Facebook, 5.29.19)
Building and tearing down
Kim Hampton has been thinking about institutions painstakingly built to support black people.
HBCUs and the Black Church are sustained out of love. It is a love born out of struggle and defined by hope. . . . I think of BLUU . . . the same way. Born out of struggle, defined by hope. Sustained out of love. And, hopefully, where Black UUs and UU-adjacent people can see the diversity of the African diaspora reflected in its fullness and wholeness.
I’m writing this as my six-month-old cousin sleeps about three feet from where I’m typing. And I can’t help but be grateful for the love of those who established those HBCUs and Black churches all those years ago. Places that, when the time comes, can offer the baby a place where they can be fully themselves. (East of Midnight, 5.28.19)
Doug Muder traces the ways in which Trump has eroded our confidence in the checks and balances of our government.
If Trump would refuse to accept removal from office, what would the armed forces do? My firm belief is that they would back the law rather than the removed president. But let’s hope we never need to find out. (The Weekly Sift, 5.27.19)