Now we are in the Soup

Recently a friend told me the following significant truth about butterflies.  She said:  We tend to think that caterpillars crawl in their cocoons and then their little caterpillar eye’s turn into butterfly eyes and their little caterpillar necks turn into butterfly necks and they sprout some wings and then they are ready to go.  But that is not actually what happens.   What actually happens is that some butterfly DNA, called imaginal cells begin to emerge.  As they begin to emerge the caterpillars immune system kills them.   However, that is not enough to deter the butterfly to be.   The imaginal cells keep emerging at a rate that they cannot all be killed and they begin to recognize each other, and to bond together, and finally when there is still not that many the immune system is overwhelmed and gives up trying to kill them.   At that point he caterpillar body dissolves into a “nutrient soup”, a sort of gooey substance that is used as the raw material for building the new butterfly following the DNA map of the imaginal cells.

I suspect most of you know where I am going with this but for those of you who wonder why my Quaker Blog is suddenly talking about butterflies: I think the current situation in our country is the chrysalis for a new society  (either that are we have simply dissolved into a terrible mess!)   I think Donald is attempting to transform our previous country and I think our previous country was already dissolving in so many ways from so many problems.   I think that some of us have been holding a vision for a long time of a new society, one based in justice, equity and love.   Those of us carrying that vision are the imaginal cells.   As it appears to some that the country is descending into chaos or anarchy with record size demonstrations, and spontaneous airport demonstrations supported by spontaneous taxi strikes, and when government officials are resigning, disobeying and opening covert twitter accounts to still communicate the truth to the public…we are in the nutrient soup.   There are some days that simply seem like everything is being attacked and coming apart, and other days when there is feignt glimmer of what might be emerging.  But we can see the different movements rising up, noticing each other, sometimes banding together, sometimes simply gaining inspiration or encouragement from each other.

We are far from the end of this.  Some “cells” will be killed by the defending system of the old paradigm.  People have already been fired, black people have already been shot in the streets for a long time now, a woman at Standing Rock has lost most of her arm, and a man the sight in one eye, I pray none will die there, but it is possible.  The abrupt unplanned demolition of the Affordable Care Act may in fact lead to people’s death without health care, even as I write this activists are on trial for turning off the flow of tar Sands oil from Canada to the US, etc, etc.  But it is very, very important that we not become confused in the darkness and the struggle that it is the end rather than holding the vision of a butterfly becoming.

Which that would mean that first as a Society of Friends that has long held up its testimonies as the Truth as we currently know it, that it is really important that we give voice and witness to that future that we believe possible.   It is important that we continue to voice crazy ideas like “Ok if you are going to do away with ACA and you want everyone to have health care…then time for a single payer system.”   Or “Ok you want the greatest country on earth, then time for alternative energy so we can have cheap energy for business”.   Etc, etc.    it is also really important that we are able to articulate to our fellow activists, often full of despair from Trumps attempted roll backs, what non-violent revolution or social change really looks like.  (I highly recommend the reading of Towards a Living Revolution by George Lakey, or any of the things that Gene Sharp wrote.)  If you don't like the nutrient soup and are scared it is a failed butterfly, I encourage you to work harder for the New Society coming.  It is important that even as things appear to be desinigrating that we have Faith in the emergence of a butterfly.  In many ways this is like the Faith in resurrection at a moment that looked like the Savior God sent was dead.

I also think that part of what it means to be the imaginal cells is that as members of the Society of Friends we hold memories of struggles past that the general public has little or no memory or understanding of: for the vote for women, the civil rights struggle, the Anti-Vietnam War struggle, the anti-nuclear struggle, etc .  We must hold up the Light that explains how the struggle for change works, how it proceeds and how it succeeds!    It is not enough to simply say NO we don’t want a caterpillar, or NO we don’t want this goopy mess at our feet.   That cry NO does not create a butterfly.  Our jobs as imaginal cells is to be able to describe a sustainable earth, and a just society.   Not only to describe them but to do so in a way that is compelling and helps organize all available life forms towards that end!  And interestingly for me (see previous posts) butterfly's have always been a sign of the presence of God.  So maybe as we create this New Society we can also move closer to God.

Camo Eggs

Recently I was standing in the grocery store and I was drawn to a display that had plastic Easter Eggs for sale.  I was drawn to some one's that had been produced to look like Chocolate with frosting on it.  But then to my horror I discovered that next to it were packages of ....yes Camo Eggs.  I actually felt a little nauseous. I have unfortunately gotten use to that ever since the Iraq war started that people dress their little boys in cameo clothing.  (Really it was not common before that, but we have probably lost site of that in the mean time.)  And I have resigned myself for decades to some men walking around as if they are on a battle field.  I was pretty upset the first time I saw pink cameo outfits for girls (but after all we have to start preparing a certain number of girls to also serve in the all volunteer military!)

But for me the cameo eggs are over the line.  Whether you celebrate Easter as the resurrection of Christ or as a Pagan celebration of spring/new life/fertility....Easter is a celebration of life overcoming death.  It is a fun time for small children.  So the idea that someone would turn an egg, itself a symbol of new life, into a grenade like symbol of death and destruction is more perverse than I can really give words to!

We are living in times where that which is sacred is regularly under threat and frequently defiled.  From the pollution of earth air and water, to the unsustainable mining of every resource from oil, to nickel, to the destruction of our fundamental public support structures like the post office and the public schools.  It is important for us to name the sacred and to act in its defense.

It's not always clear what to do to defend the sacred.  Does it make any difference these words I type and post on a small blog?  Hard to say.  I just know I have to name the profane so that we do not begin to find it normal and unobjectionable.  The woman who cried over the dead Jesus did not do it to be effective.  They did it because they were heartbroken.  The resurrection was unexpected; the transformation that comes unbidden.  I have to focus very hard here on the idea of the egg breaking open to sweet candy insides, to the idea of resurrection that Life overcometh even that which looks like sure death, and the idea of reclaiming the sacred from that which is defiled.