Recent events in the world being what they are today

8/21

Short time in the office today. Catching a bus to visit son Dan in Philadelphia.

My friend from the Revolutionary Communists calls. Breathless. Has to see me. I tell him I’ve only got a short time. He tells me he’s hopping on the subway and be right there. And sure enough, he soon arrives.

They’ve been planning a big event for Labor Day at West-Park. Part of the BA Everywhere campaign. But now, Recent events in the world being what they are today…they haven’t had time or energy to focus on BA Everywhere. Maybe they need to just hold an old fashioned picnic in Morningside Park. Could West-Park be a fall back in case of rain? I assure him that’s not a problem.

He wants to talk about recent events in the world. The Eric Garner choke hold death on Staten Island. Eclipsed by the events in Ferguson. The seeming open season on black male youth. The relentless seige of Gaza. ISIS/ISIL... It all seems  interconnected. like a world aflame. (…high water everywhere…) He hands me a copy of the Revolution newspaper… The bold print cries out an agenda for October:

WE SAY NO MORE!

A Call for a Month of Resistance to Mass Incarceration, Police Terror, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation!

(Meanwhile, the Presbyterian Church USA is calling for Calm. And prayer. In response to that call my son Micah writes from Berlin seriously?)

I tell him why I’m going to Philadelphia and we talk about being parents awhile.

I continue to be fascinated, intrigued, puzzled by these folks. The common decency. Sincerity. Diligence. Commitment. It’s the devotion to BA, or precious leader, as the paper calls him in neoMaospeak that throws me.  Much of the analysis, well, pretty much there. But is this septuagenarian really the one to lead the worldwide revolution? 

I do find them easier to relate to than say, the youthful  Falun Gong or Korean Good News evangelists that visit periodically.

I think it was Walter Breuggeman who said that the opposite of faith is not doubt. It’s certainty.

And so, beyond a call to calm and prayer, what do we have to offer in response to recent event in the world being what they are today?