Last night I awoke, meditated, and realized that I would need to speak up a lot over the weeks and months ahead. We cannot stay silent. It’s like when I had to leave my church in South Carolina. Within a few weeks, the preacher stood on stage and said “Marriage is between a man and a woman. Any questions?” and I received an email from a woman I sat next to (and considered a friend) saying that no one could be a Christian and vote for Obama. I had to leave then and there, because to stand on stage with the band at that point was to say I agreed with these small-minded views. So I left.

I never spoke out fully while in SC. I felt I was more there to get to know others than to share my own views. I had seen conservative people as “those people” up to that point, and I wanted that to change. Change it did. I discovered similarities I wouldn’t have imagined. The mom I shared the most in common with when it came to parenting is a conservative Christian. I love her and am honored to call her my friend.

But now this world asks more of me than to walk away from prejudice, more than to embrace others as potential friends.

Now this world asks me to speak now about the light. Or we will forever all lose the ability to coexist on Earth, and that would be a very sad way to “forever hold our peace.”

I believe all life is sacred, and that nature itself is a vast intelligence and one aspect of God. I believe that every element of life, from other species to fungi to bacteria, should have its needs met in balance. I believe that as humans, we are unique in the sense that we reason, and that we fuse spirit with nature. But just as we have free will about whether or not to will God’s will and live in alignment with love (or veer far away from God’s light) we also have a choice about whether we’ll destroy our planet or turn to nature’s intelligence as a partner to co-create a future that works for all.

Nature is trying to connect with us. You know all those videos that go viral that show how much more intelligent each species is than we ever thought possible? It’s because they are. It’s because matter matters. Nature is intelligence. Our bodies and this sacred Earth, if we listen, can show us how to live in balance. The time for us to dominate nature is over—unless we all want to die. The fact that we can dominate nature is proven…we’ve nearly driven humanity to the brink of extinction with this attitude. It is a moral dead end. The male is NOT dominant over the female. White men are equal, and not a spec more significant than any other creed or color of human. I feel that we humans are special, have a special role to play, are in fact a culmination of evolution—yet none of these special powers matter a whit if we use our power as force to control or dominate and destroy. The future of the world is literally in our hands.

I believe that we all thrive when our basic needs are met. I believe that our solutions moving forward should come from asking questions like: “Honoring the whole, what is the best solution that works for all?” I don’t buy into the scarcity model where we all fight for shrinking resources. That doesn’t mean I don’t think its madness to reproduce as if overpopulation weren’t real. It means that I believe that when and if we honestly begin to all work for the good of all, that miracles and magic are possible that can create an abundance we never imagined. Why? Because both God and Nature are willing to work with any human willing to serve the greater good and who is humble enough to ask for guidance from intelligences wiser than ourselves.

I also believe we are smarter together. It’s not only bees in colonies that dance in an intelligence far greater than any single bee. We, too, can grow beyond anything we thought possible when coordinate and cooperate for the good of all life, not only human lives, but this vast amazing miracle of a living breathing ball of life and light on Earth.

The possibilities inspire me. They are vast. We are capable of so much more than we imagine. Yet it’s a choice, a choice each of us make individually but that also we must make together, and it’s whether to soar or plunge into the abyss.

I know, know from deep experience, that we must love our enemies. I know, know, that action taken in hate breeds more of the same—and that’s true whether or not one begins with good intentions. The time of individual responsibility is now. It’s the one thing each of us can do, to walk in the light, to do our best by our neighbor and this planet each and every waking minute. And we must speak our values and share them. We cannot remain silent. To stay quiet is to stand on the stage quietly while the preacher says some but not all of us deserve to marry who we love. If you do that, you agree. And so, dear brave fellow humans, with love let us bow to light and to love beyond ourselves and pray to embody the wisdom needed to steer us all from the darkness towards the light.

Amen!

Elijah and Christopher play together October 2016 in Central Park.

P.S. I really miss singing with the church band. I’m counting on a new music coming from us all together, and I look forward to playing with my new band mates,  with my beloved in the light, Christopher Macor,  including anyone who would join in song, in writing, in action, in grace, in play, in dance, in cooking and loving and good deeds and doing each thing—paying a bill, planting a flower—as though this world were steeped in love. Because it is.

Thank you.

~Sara