tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53772414059355768522024-03-12T21:33:12.253-07:00God and Other Big StuffIs there a God? What is the meaning of life? Why is the sky blue? How come all my socks are lonely? Everyone needs a good question to chew on.Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.comBlogger85125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-47702098124064709622021-12-27T10:48:00.000-08:002021-12-27T10:48:14.676-08:00Disappearing and Re-emerging During the Pandemic<p>You would think that the pandemic, this time of pause, introspection, pulling inward, would result in more blog posts by me. I am honestly surprised by the complete halt to my blogging during this time. </p><p>Certainly, there was no halt at all to my introspection. My self-care routine after the initial shut-down in March of 2020 included journaling both morning and evening, reading and writing poetry every day, plus yoga, daily walks, and reading texts of a spiritual and thought-provoking nature (Martin Buber and Parker Palmer were two of my favorites). My morning routine seemed to grow and expand with each passing day. I suppose it's no surprise I needed to up the ante on my self-care. As a teacher, there was a special brand of grief and loss to the shut-down and the shift to online learning. As the spouse of someone at high-risk, I interacted daily with a high level of anxiety.</p><p>Perhaps the very nature of the pandemic shut-down demanded so much drawing inward that there was nothing left for me to put out into the world. Now, as I engage in my annual ritual of re-reading my journals from the past year, I am acutely conscious of the perspective shift I have undergone. I knew I was experiencing this shift - knew it intellectually - but now I see how deep it went. And I am grateful. But those bone-deep changes require, and stem from, intensive inward pulling.</p><p>I've been a bit sick of hearing about the "gifts" of the pandemic shut-down. Perhaps I felt there was no need to add my voice to the mix. Maybe I didn't see the point in continuing to throw my verbal messages-in-a-bottle out into the ocean. In the end, though, I think the most compelling reason for my silence is this: I couldn't bear to spend one more moment of my life interacting with a computer screen.</p><p>As a teacher, my entire world shifted online. That daily heart-break left me spent and screen-depleted. I constantly craved interactions with nature and the 3D world. I desperately missed in-person meditation sits, walking the (now-defunct) labyrinth at Cerimon House, paddling with my dragon boat team, having coffee with friends, and, above all, sharing space with a classroom full of noisy kids and their magical energizing and exhausting presence.</p><p>Today, halfway through winter break of our return to in-person learning, I find myself emerging, blinking, wondering, reflecting. The first 4 months of this year were a tidal wave of personal and work challenges, combined with daily infusions of that blessed kid-energy. The world is still swimming in a global soup of apocalyptic catastrophe. And I'm still standing. Maybe it's time to re-engage.</p>Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-58611957350900469672019-12-08T13:38:00.001-08:002019-12-08T13:41:06.278-08:00"Double-Consciousness": Terms to Know if Teaching While White<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. " -W.E.B. DuBois</blockquote>
<br />
I was reading an article in <i>The New York Times</i> today about a trend in the entertainment world called BlackOut Performances, in which stage productions or film screenings are reserved for an all-black audience. The article spoke about how, for performers and audience members, this experience offered a space where it was safe to react without the added layer of awareness of white observers of one's reaction. The article referenced the term "double-consciousness," coined by W.E.B. Dubois in his work THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLK (quoted above).<br />
<br />
As a white teacher with students of color, this quote, this concept, resonated. I have noticed often that my students who are African-American, or have some African-American background, frequently seem hyper-conscious of whether other kids are looking at them, talking about them, etc. They often ask to work in the hallway or in another private space, away from the eyes of the rest of the class. They often seem to have a heightened level of self-consciousness, which turns to defensive anger with a seeming rapidity that I and my white colleagues sometimes find mystifying and frustrating.<br />
<br />
My white colleagues and I forget, because we can. We forget the exhausting waters these students swim in every moment of the school day, waters polluted by micro-agressions and steeped in hundreds of years of history that none of us can escape. The students swim with heightened awareness, with double-consciousness. When they seem to suddenly snap, it's only under a constant tension pulled taut that I fail to see, a cumulative effect that finally strains and breaks. When they ask to work in the hallway, or they pull up the hood of their sweatshirt or pull down the brim of their baseball cap, I have to remember, they just need a break. They need a chance to let their guard down just a little bit, to breathe for a moment, to stop watching themselves with double-eyes.<br />
<br />
If you, like me, are "teaching while white," take some time to notice this behavior in action. Try reframing it. See what happens.<br />
<br />
DuBois' words were written over 100 years ago.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-10298852963303100002019-07-26T09:37:00.000-07:002019-07-26T09:37:08.493-07:00Applauding the SacredA few weeks ago, I went to a candlelight vigil to protest ICE and the horrific conditions in the detention centers on the border in Texas. The vigil opened with a sacred dance from indigenous cultures, I believe from Mexico and South America. The people engaging in the dance ranged in age from very young children to older folks. Complex patterns of drumming drove the dance, complex patterns of movement wove around a circle and addressed the four directions. There was sage, I think, being burned. There were chants and vocalizations. This was a powerful act of sacred protest - no introduction, no explanation - fierce, strong, beautiful, claiming the space and declaring "We are here. This is our fight."<br />
<br />
All around the circle of this plaza where this dance was happening, people had gathered with signs and candles and their hearts' desires to say "Enough," to present the opposition by people of faith to the horrors happening under the guise of Law. This is the ultimate struggle at the heart of the New Testament - Love protesting the spiritual bankruptcies and hypocrisies of a world made subservient to Law.<br />
<br />
The people gathered in the plaza were many races, but appeared majority white. We were bearing witness to this sacred indigenous dance that was enacted by people of color. And at each pause or climactic moment of the dance, the watchers would break into applause. Every time it happened, I felt a momentary disconnect, an abrupt shove outside the sacred, a rupture redefining the experience into one of performers and audience, with all the vast ripples of underlying meaning that can contain, especially when the dancers are indigenous and the audience is white and applause feels like an expression of approval.<br />
<br />
At every burst of applause, I was conflicted. Was the applause an expression of appreciation? Yes. That was the intent. But somehow, it changed the experience. I found myself wishing we, the watchers, could simply bear witness without inserting ourselves, and our collection of values, into this sacred act that did not inherently belong to us.<br />
<br />
I have met this internal struggle before on a smaller scale in church after someone sings. In that setting, the singer is up front and the watchers are ranged in rows before them - even more like a performance than the circular structure of the dance at the vigil. In a church, I am at least somewhat within my own culture realm, so the conflict is muted, but it's still there. Is this performance or sacred act or both? If it is both, what is the meaning of our applause?<br />
<br />
Maybe it's my background in theater that confuses me. But theater itself was born from sacred rituals. Could not the applause simply be a way for the watchers to participate in the sacred act? How did applause become so entangled with external validation and approval? Sometimes an audience throws money, too. Sometimes the performers are seeking money. Somewhere along the way, we humans, at least in Western culture, have conflated the sacred and the material, the communal act of prayerful creative expression and the individualistic act of ego, material gratification, or simple entertainment.<br />
<br />
In the end, it seems to me that the intent of the artists - dancers, singers, performers - is paramount, as is the context of the act. If it is a sacred act, like the dance at the vigil, presented in a context of prayerful protest, like that was, with a distinct cultural link, then perhaps those of us watching should merely have borne witness. But when we didn't, I suppose our applause could simply be considered as our efforts to participate, to add our energy to the sacred act and give it power in the only way we knew how.<br />
<br />
Or maybe our applause function, as in the epilogues of many Shakespeare's plays, as a means to free the performers from their sacred trance, to enable them to remain grounded in the physical realm as they reach to touch the divine - an act of anchoring, a kind of protection, a recognition that artistic expression takes the artist into another realm, and they require a lifeline to connect them to the physical realm if they are to return.Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-56167975595654322592018-09-02T07:14:00.000-07:002018-09-02T07:14:13.231-07:00A Teacher's Prayer: SeptemberMay I be present to the grace that surrounds me.<br />
May I honor the unique identity of each child<br />
and the hidden world behind each face.<br />
May I pause when I must<br />
and laugh when I can.<br />
May I put connection ahead of curriculum.<br />
May I trust myself, and my students.<br />
May I engage in the process with a loving, caring heart<br />
and then let go.Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-69906737753629776172018-08-07T18:58:00.000-07:002018-08-07T18:58:45.481-07:00The Gods of Pigeon-Holes, from DUST TRACKS ON THE ROAD: An Autobiography, by Zora Neale Hurston"Grown people know<br />
that they do not always know<br />
the why of things,<br />
<br />
and even if they think they know,<br />
they do not know<br />
where and how<br />
they got the proof.<br />
<br />
Hence the irritation they show<br />
when children keep on demanding to know<br />
if a thing is so<br />
and how the grown folks<br />
got the proof of it.<br />
<br />
It is so troublesome because<br />
it is disturbing<br />
to the pigeon-hole way of life.<br />
It is upsetting because<br />
until the elders are pushed<br />
for an answer,<br />
they have never looked to see<br />
if it was so<br />
nor how they came by<br />
what passes for proof<br />
to their acceptances<br />
of certain things<br />
as true<br />
<br />
So,<br />
if telling their questioning young<br />
to run off and play<br />
does not suffice for an answer<br />
a good slapping of the child's bottom<br />
is held to be proof<br />
positive<br />
for anything<br />
from spelling Constantinople<br />
to why the sea is salt.<br />
<br />
It was told<br />
to the old folks<br />
and that had been<br />
enough for them<br />
or put it in<br />
Negro idiom<br />
nobody didn't tell 'em<br />
but they heard.<br />
<br />
So<br />
<br />
there must be something wrong<br />
with a child that questions<br />
the gods of the pigeon-holes"<br />
<br />
-Zora Neale Hurston, from Dust Tracks On the Road<br />
(line breaks and stanza breaks added by me)Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-3259268609955937022018-06-28T10:05:00.002-07:002018-06-28T10:05:54.302-07:00Betrayed by Words: The New Tower of BabelI used to have a passionate faith in words - reading them, writing them, speaking them. I consumed words with a fire born of the belief that they carried meaning, the power to change and grow, an illuminating vision of humanity, the pieces of some truth greater than ourselves that could help us make meaning in this complicated world.<br />
<br />
I still want to believe that, but lately I feel as if I've lost my faith in words. They have become monstrous, meaningless things that screech in the darkness, a vast infestation of noxious weeds, where the rare examples that enlighten or further conversation are choked out by the clanging cymbals, the noisy trumpets, the sounding gongs, the empty and preening pronouncements. You can't count on them. They hide the truth and create divisions instead of connections.<br />
<br />
Perhaps words have always been slippery things. But the cacophony has become deafening in this digital age. The internet is the new Tower of Babel.Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-69454733824073893302018-05-28T10:44:00.002-07:002018-05-28T10:44:30.249-07:00Lessons from a 30th College Reunion<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This past weekend, I attended the <b>30th reunion</b> of my graduating class from <b>Amherst College</b>. It's the first time I'd been back on campus in almost 30 years. I am still processing this remarkable, beautiful, complicated experience. Here are a few lessons I have drawn from it so far:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>You are not alone. Whatever your hidden struggles, someone, somewhere, has also struggled that way and survived and can help, and someone, somewhere, is struggling like you.</li>
<li>Change for the better can, does, and will happen.</li>
<li>You affect the people around you in ways you do not realize.</li>
<li>Authentic conversation is rich fertile soil for growth of the soul, growth of the individual, growth of institutions.</li>
<li>Self-consciousness gets in the way of so many good things, and causes so much harm. Act in spite of it. </li>
<li>People often grow into their best selves over time.</li>
<li>Do not let fear and insecurity keep you from exploring new things, talking to new people, moving beyond your comfort zone and your immediate social group.</li>
<li>Listen. Learn. Ask questions. Not just in school but throughout life.</li>
<li>There are thousands of interconnecting threads in this world. Look for them. Notice them. Celebrate them. Learn from them. And when you cannot see them, remember they are still there. They are just invisible to you right now. </li>
<li>I am still the person I have spent my whole life becoming.</li>
</ul>
Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-44077445296041161382018-03-25T10:12:00.000-07:002018-05-28T10:58:05.194-07:00Reflections on the March for Our Lives 2018Yesterday, I attended the March for Our Lives here in Portland. My emotions were all over the map, as they have been for the past month and a half.<br />
<br />
I feel inspired by the power and strength of the young people who have taken something awful and transformed it into action. I feel a kind of shame that we adults could not do this for them after Sandy Hook, which feels like just yesterday but was really six years ago. I feel proud that the people of our country are remembering what it means to care about something. I feel heartbroken that we would need to march about this thing. I feel enraged at the notion that school, my second home as a teacher, is being twisted and transformed by the threat to bring in guns as some insane way to keep us safe.<br />
<br />
I feel enraged and sick to my stomach when people refer to schools as a "soft target" that needs to be "hardened." I know that in this context "soft" is code for "weak" and "hard" is code
for "strong" and I reject that conflation as perversely misguided. The place where our children go to learn and grow, the place where we nurture them and nourish their young minds and hearts, should be soft, gentle, welcoming. I reject a world where kindness and openness are "weak," where strength
only comes from a weapon, and where safety is only found in fear. We are all "soft targets" against a gun. The laws need to harden, not the schools, not our hearts. <br />
<br />
In the aftermath of the 2016 Election, I wrote a poem for the nation's young people, for my students and former students. After marching yesterday, I came upon that poem in some of my papers. And I rejoiced. I know they didn't read it - my blog doesn't get that many hits - but they have lived it and I want to dance for them. So, in honor of the incredible, inspiring young people who made yesterday happen, who have mobilized power from horror, here it is again:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<u>Wolves and Sheep</u><br />
<br />
“Tend my sheep,” the master said.<br />
They called him teacher too.<br />
Are you sheep, dear ones?<br />
In times like these, you should be<br />
WOLVES -<br />
fierce and strong, pack at your back,<br />
teeth bared and ready to attack.<br />
<br />
Rage in the temples if you must, dear ones<br />
for we have let you down.<br />
There is a time to every purpose<br />
and this is no time <br />
for sheep. Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-2004187611085737152017-12-26T10:01:00.000-08:002017-12-26T10:01:17.442-08:00"We are all one question..." An Excerpt from MADNESS, RACK AND HONEY by Mary Ruefle"We are all one question, and the best answer seems to be love - a connection between things. This arcane bit of knowledge is respoken every day into the ears of readers of great books, and also appears to perpetually slip under a carpet, utterly forgotten. In one sense, reading is a great waste of time. In another sense, it is a great extension of time, a way for one person to live a thousand and one lives in a single life span, to watch the great impersonal universe at work again and again, to watch the great personal psyche spar with it, to suffer affliction and weakness and injury, to die and watch those you love die, until the very dizziness of it all becomes a source of compassion for ourselves, and for the language which we alone created, without which the letter that slipped under the door could never have been written, or, once in a thousand lives - is that too much to ask? - retrieved, and read. Did I mention supreme joy? That is why I read: I want everything to be okay. That's why I read when I was a lonely kid and that's why I read now that I'm a scared adult. It's a sincere desire, but a sincere desire always complicates things - the universe has a peculiar reaction to our sincere desires. Still, I believe the planet on the table, even when wounded and imperfect, fragmented and deprived is worthy of being called whole. Our minds and the universe - what else is there? ... In our marginal existence, what else is there but this voice within us, this great weirdness we are always leaning forward to listen to?"<br />
<br />
- from "Someone Reading a Book," in MADNESS, RACK AND HONEY, by Mary RuefleCynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-82529431596464114242017-01-29T12:39:00.004-08:002017-01-29T12:39:54.418-08:00ResistanceI cannot fathom how anyone who believes in the Christ of the New Testament cannot see that they must resist the actions of the new administration. God calls us to welcome those in need. How can we turn our backs on refugees?<br />
<br />
<span class="rendered_qtext"><b>Matthew 25:31-40</b></span><br />
<blockquote>
31
When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels
with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:32 And before
him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from
another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats:33 And he shall
set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.<br /><br /><br />34
Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed
of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation
of the world:<br /><br />35 For I was an hungry, and you gave me meat: I
was thirsty, and you gave me drink: I was a stranger, and you took me in:
36 Naked, and you clothed me: I was sick, and you visited me: I was in
prison, and you came unto me.<br /><br /><br />37 Then shall the righteous
answer him, saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry, and fed you? or
thirsty, and gave you drink?38 When did we see you a stranger, and took you in? or naked, and clothed you?39 Or when did we see you sick, or in
prison, and came to you?<br /><br /><br />40 And the King shall answer
and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as you have done it
unto one of the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me.</blockquote>
Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-51550198760975377122017-01-01T18:42:00.001-08:002017-01-01T18:43:02.963-08:00Burying My YouthI recently came upon this quote from George Elliot while reading Alix Shulman's book <i>Drinking the Rain</i>: "When I buried my youth, I immediately felt 20 years younger." Having turned 50 this year, the quote resonated for me and I found myself asking, "What does it mean to bury your youth?"<br />
<br />
Now, I'm not one to get overly dramatic about celebrity deaths. We all die eventually. However, as I was contemplating what it meant to bury my youth, and what it meant to turn 50, Prince died. And I had a reaction. And I tried to suss out what my reaction meant. It wasn't a tearful reaction, but it was palpable. This musical icon of sexual awakening from my teen and young adult years had died. Then I thought back to a moment earlier this year when I saw the new Star Wars movie and they killed off Han Solo. There, too, I had a reaction, one that seemed a bit larger than the moment might warrant. In the case of Han Solo I sobbed. I felt as if a part of my teenage self had been skewered by a light sabre, too. The death scene felt right, as it should be, but it was devastating in a strange way that I couldn't quite explain and that seemed silly when I tried to put it into words.<br />
<br />
So when Prince died, while I didn't sob or really get particularly tearful, I did feel a compelling desire to mark the moment, dramatically. I blasted his music and felt it had to be blasted, not just listened to, and the windows of my car had to be rolled down to send the notes spiraling up into the world. I felt I had to wear purple and paisley. I wanted to post lyrics from his songs on my Facebook. Some part of me watched all this and said, "WTF, McGean?"<br />
<br />
Is this part of burying my youth? This step by step process of watching idols die and thereby being reminded that none of us are immortal? When those icons of my youth die, it seems some piece of that youthful self goes, too. "What?" she says, suddenly looking up from her high school dances or her spins around the roller rink or her anguished diary entries or endless phone calls with friends or late night college conversations, "What do you mean, dead? Those people don't die, because I don't die. I am now. I am here. Forever."<br />
<br />
In fairness, that self had her wake-up call many times over - first when a friend drowned while I was in high school, then in wave after wave of shock and grief during the AIDS epidemic. You'd think she'd have learned this lesson. And yet, she still seems surprised. Back then, she was outraged. Now, she seems to blink, startled, and look about like a small animal that finds itself in the midst of a shopping mall under construction when mere days earlier, it was a nesting ground. "Umm, why is everybody leaving?" she asks, as if she's at some dorm party. "Where are they going? Should I go, too?"She is puzzled, intrigued, confused, and fading. She's fuzzy around the edges. She's lost her relevance but she doesn't realize it. And yet, she still wants to give me things. She wants me to hold on to the parts that matter. She suddenly realizes she has to leave me legacies, she has to make a case for the things she wants me to keep because she's going away and can't be their custodian anymore.<br />
<br />
This past summer, I decided to fully embrace the burial of my youth, to take a proactive stance. I remade my home office, where I do most of my writing, by replacing the futon couch, one of the first pieces of "furniture" I had ever owned as an independent young adult, with a magnificent purple love-seat. I rearranged the furniture. I massively decluttered, taking a great many things to Good Will, including many of those talismans of youth that no longer belonged in my life or world. I had several old sculptures I had made but never fired, pieces I had preserved in the safe, dry world of my home over twenty years and multiple moves, including one nude of a former boyfriend and lover. I chose a couple to keep, pieces that still truly spoke to me. The rest I placed in carefully chosen empty pots in my garden, knowing that Portland's rainy season would slowly and organically wear down the unfired clay, which it did, gradually transforming the pieces into shapeless lumps, and that process felt right.<br />
<br />
I went through piles and piles and piles of papers and files - well more than twenty-years worth. It was an emotionally wrenching and exhausting task that is not yet finished but allowed me to free up space, physically and psychologically. I went through my bookshelves and gave away piles of books and carefully curated those I held onto. I took things off the walls and hung new things, putting the old art into storage or giving it away. I took photos of a few things I wanted to remember, while letting go of the physical objects themselves. This herculean effort had the complete support of my beloved husband, who helped me find new things and held my hand and gave me hugs as I trudged through the most draining parts of the effort.<br />
<br />
When all was said and done (at least, done for now), I had created a
soul space that felt so inviting, so warm, so energizing, so healthy, so
right for me now that I want to hang out there all the time. It has become a place of creative renewal, a place for healthy reflection and centering, a place of safety and of comfort against new storms. Without ever having made a resolution to do this, I managed to create something externally that met a deep and urgent internal need. I buried my youth and gave it a proper send-off, and in the process, as Elliot implied, I found myself lightened and reinvigorated.Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-80832451666841156042016-05-29T10:39:00.002-07:002016-05-29T10:39:58.753-07:00Love Thy Enemy on the Campaign TrailI've been reading BODY BROKEN, by Robert Benson, and, in a chapter that contemplated the phrase "Love your enemy," I found myself thinking about the presidential campaign. First, I thought about the need for all of us to remove the vitriol from our political discourse. But then I went further.<br />
<br />
Bernie Sanders is not my enemy, though I support Hillary Clinton. Even if those who support Sanders push me the wrong way, I can stomach the notion of loving them, perhaps in the abstract, perhaps as a vague sort of tolerance or forgiveness, or an open-ness to the value of their ideas and the value of differing opinions in driving the ship of state. Right-wing Republicans are not my enemy, though I strongly disagree with most of their positions. But Donald Trump?<br />
<br />
And so I find myself squarely faced with the ultimate challenge. Can I love such a one? I cannot tolerate him. I cannot stand him. I hate him. I hate what he says and how he says it. I hate what he stands for and who he is and all he represents. I do, indeed, see him as an enemy to the things I cherish and believe in as an American. I see him as one who is dangerous and must be stopped. And here Christ tells me I'm supposed to love him. What does that even look like?Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-50871585024667332472016-01-30T12:51:00.000-08:002016-01-30T12:51:51.392-08:00Beauty, Imperfection and the Divine<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXujzqEebYSGfZXVfzD2IdL7c106yEkqYbDh5X7nrFS-8eRqBdS0b2ZdzWDEnvNXdPlequb8h5sNBb9UBZbfH6Rj2ClVYi1fG8EO4Vi91Yupq2SXcrq1erHeeq5oP8l7rZrJ6CTdjtvdg/s1600/20151119_123710.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXujzqEebYSGfZXVfzD2IdL7c106yEkqYbDh5X7nrFS-8eRqBdS0b2ZdzWDEnvNXdPlequb8h5sNBb9UBZbfH6Rj2ClVYi1fG8EO4Vi91Yupq2SXcrq1erHeeq5oP8l7rZrJ6CTdjtvdg/s320/20151119_123710.jpg" width="320" /></a><b>Complexity</b> can feel like <b>chaos</b>. It requires <b>imperfection</b>. Human beings are complex. Therefore, we are also awash in chaos and imperfection. We can strive for lofty goals, but we have to <b>embrace our flaws</b> and the certainty that we will stumble from time to time - more often than not. We need to find beauty in the stumbles. We need to find beauty in the complexity. Perhaps they are the same thing. Maybe imperfection is complexity, and complexity is beauty. Life, the world, and humanity are not unblemished models of <b>perfection</b>. They are beautiful, flawed riots of complexity.<br />
<br />
Striving for perfection has its own kind of beauty. Once in a while, we glimpse perfection, and those glimpses deserve appreciation. Their rarity lends them a special kind of beauty - our brush with the unattainable <b>divine</b>. They remind us what is possible.<br />
<br />
Just as we appreciate a variety of flowers in the garden, so we can embrace and celebrate many forms of beauty - the fleeting beauty of perfection, the gorgeous lopsided-ness of imperfection, and the struggle and dance between the two. Each has its own kind of beauty, defined and judged on its own terms, as each of us should be.<br />
<br />Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-7319157493260285712016-01-01T13:45:00.000-08:002016-01-01T13:45:36.275-08:00What MattersI've been thinking about what matters. Easy to lose sight of. <br />
<br />
What matters? What really matters, from day to day and moment to moment over the long, or short, arc of a life time? What matters beyond that arc?<br />
<br />
There is a passage in the TAO TE CHING that says "The master does nothing and leaves nothing undone." I have often struggled with that. But perhaps the "nothing" is a recognition of what does and does not matter, a sense of perspective about the million and one little nothings that we think we must do, that indeed we do, and the million and one "nothings" that matter, in strange ways we can't even fathom. The things that the world calls "nothing" may be the ones that matter most. The things we fret over and stew about and do may, in the grand scheme, be utterly insignificant.<br />
<br />
Let your spiritual eye zoom back. Climb to the top of a great overlook and take in the panoramic view of life. What is the nothing that you do? What nothing can you leave undone? <br />
<br />
What matters? <br />
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Wishing you, as I do for myself, perspective in the New Year<br />
. Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-9892097774652321832015-12-20T09:47:00.001-08:002015-12-20T09:47:30.798-08:00The Spirits of All Three<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Scrooge at one of our performances of Dickens' story</td></tr>
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At the end of Dickens' A CHRISTMAS CAROL, <b>Scrooge</b> vows, <b>"I will live in the past, present and the future. The spirits of all three shall strive within me."</b> I'm not sure I ever truly thought about what this meant until last night. We had our annual Christmas Carol party and reading, a tradition for more than 20 years in our home. During the party, our small house is stuffed with guests who join together in reading a one-hour scripted version of Dickens' story. The party functions as a merry rehearsal of sorts for when we perform it at local residential care facilities. A few hours before this year's party, my husband and I attended a Memorial Service. At the party, we heard about the death of a friend. And all through the evening, memories of past parties and past performances were layered over every moment.<br />
<br />
<b>The spirit of Christmas Past</b> - friends and loved ones no longer with us, the children who were Tiny Tims and have now gone off to college, the years we did 14 performances, the years snow prevented even one, the era of performing the story at the local AIDS hospice until one day it was no longer necessary, and so many more. Every phrase I've just written is connected like a fine gold filament to a deep, rich, true story woven into my heart - some joyful, some wrenching, and I wouldn't trade a single one.<br />
<br />
<b>The spirit of Christmas Present </b>- embodied in every friend who came to celebrate with us last night, new faces and familiar faces, the laughter and conversation and food and drink, the preparations, the last lingering musings late into the night, even the clean-up - as well as the many moments of human connection this week with my students at school, my colleagues, my friends and family near and far. Again - not all of it happy, but all of it so real and true and enriching in the best sense of the word.<br />
<br />
<b>The spirit of Christmas Future</b> - the knowledge of mortality, which becomes ever more real with each passing year, as friends and family shuffle off this mortal coil. Scrooge's redemption doesn't mean he won't die. We all die. Dickens' Christmas Future is frightening, yes, and yet Scrooge says he will live with that spirit, too, and it is that spirit, that awareness of how "any spirit working kindly in its little sphere will find its mortal life too short," that ultimately brings about Scrooge's fullest change of heart and his commitment to a different path.<br />
<br />
We are here on this earth for but a blink of the divine eye. Most of us don't consciously carry that knowledge of impending mortality with us all the time. It's too much too bear. It must be tempered by the spirits of Past and Present. But it must be somewhere in our minds and hearts, for it drives us, too. It drives us to remember what truly matters. What legacy do we wish to leave? How do we wish to be remembered? How shall we live while we are here? Will we connect with our fellow human beings? Will we honor and cherish what we learn from our past, embrace our present regardless of our circumstances, and be cognizant of our future?<br />
<br />
Scrooge doesn't say the spirits of all three will co-exist peacefully, mind you. He says they will <b>strive</b> within him. Miriam Webster defines strive as "struggle in opposition" or "endeavor." I think "struggle in opposition" fits here. The three spirits contend with one another, and out of that struggle comes a potent energy for good. It's very much in keeping with the Christianity I know and love, a religion born out of struggle, a religion in which sorrow and joy, death and rebirth, God and man commingle. It is Jacob wrestling with the angel.<br />
<br />
Long live the power of struggle! May the spirits of past, present and future strive within all of us to drive our best selves and illuminate all that it means to be human. Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-69334961308277717332015-11-30T19:26:00.002-08:002015-11-30T19:26:59.017-08:00A Prayer Trade<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnghZSnqQzwnfwCEwBmXXy0N2m-S6qtdkhrimbHuRCumlNNxlnLkoHRZUcyXIGEeqk2QqhoOphSowQjIxvVD4kYn9SXG0h3zaKW3P3or5dH1XPswx1qdPthK0Qjbev5wroxOk8RVzZ2v8/s1600/20150724_085913.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnghZSnqQzwnfwCEwBmXXy0N2m-S6qtdkhrimbHuRCumlNNxlnLkoHRZUcyXIGEeqk2QqhoOphSowQjIxvVD4kYn9SXG0h3zaKW3P3or5dH1XPswx1qdPthK0Qjbev5wroxOk8RVzZ2v8/s320/20150724_085913.jpg" width="180" /></a>As I drove home today, I thought about selfish and unselfish prayer - namely my own. During the dark season of the year, I am prone to struggle with dark thoughts, and to say a few prayers for deliverance, that somehow God will lift me up enough to keep going. I have very few external reasons for my darkness. It travels inside me, to paraphrase Milton. But internal darkness is just as much cause to turn to prayer as external. Normally, I don't think of those prayers as selfish. It's not selfish to ask for help when you need it.<br />
<br />
However, as I drove home today and listened to the news on the radio, I wanted to take back those prayers for my own small self and invest them instead in combatting the darkness of the world. Climate change, terrorism, violence, war. Our planet, our world - the huge, overwhelming darknesses we face, those things I feel so limited and powerless to change. If carrying my own darkness and wading through it could somehow mean there was extra prayer energy to fight those huge, terrifying crises that plague our world, I would gladly take up the burden. Given a choice, I choose the world over me. I'm one person, a blip on this earth. But this earth is, can be, beautiful on a grand and ageless scale, if only we human beings could just stop screwing it up.<br />
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Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-48275558192156283882015-10-18T10:31:00.000-07:002015-10-18T10:31:16.586-07:00Politically Biblical, Biblically Political<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My well-worn Bible</td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">During <b>campaign season</b>, many <b>candidates</b> and <b>political parties</b> embody the worst of the <b>hypocrites</b> and <b>pharisees</b> of the New Testament, trumpeting their religious beliefs to the heavens, announcing their prayerful attitudes, claiming positions on behalf of God as if they were prophets and messiahs, when all the while they are driven by their ambition. God's positions are infinitely more complex than they acknowledge. When will we humans understand that <b>we are not God's mouthpieces</b>, we are not capable of full understanding in this life, that now we <b>see through a mirror darkly</b>?</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">On the other hand, <b>the Bible does get political</b>. The classic, New Testament case is "<b>Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and render unto God what is God's.</b>" That one's about <b>taxes</b>, but it also seems to be speaking about the <b>intersection of faith and civic responsibility</b>. Both must be honored. Civic responsibility for us today includes being <b>informed voters of conscience</b>.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"> </span>I'm particularly hesitant about referencing the <b>Old Testament</b>, since a central message of the New Testament is that the old covenant is replaced by the new covenant. However, the Old Testament, because it focuses so much on the <b>law</b>, has an inherent tendency to intersect with politics, which is about the lawmakers. M</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">any people are fond of pointing quite selectively to the Old Testament to support some of their <b>right-wing beliefs</b></span>. So I thought it might be worth looking at a handful of current issues through that lens.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">Thinking about the question of <b>minimum wage</b>, and also, perhaps, of <b>undocumented workers</b>? Here's what Deuteronomy 24:14-15 has to say: "Do not take advantage of a hired man who is poor and needy, whether he is a brother Israelite or an alien living in one of your towns. Pay him his wages each day before sunset, because he is poor and counting on it." These days, paychecks tend to go out every two to four weeks, not every day at sunset. That's the <b>letter of the law</b>. But the <b>spirit of this law</b> is clear. Pay laborers what they deserve, no matter who they are. They are counting on it.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">What about the<b> issue of immigration</b>? Here's what Leviticus 19:33-34 has to say: "When an alien lives with you in your land, do not mistreat him. The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt." Now, we weren't all aliens in Egypt, but trace your ancestry back far enough and somewhere along the way, your family were the aliens in a new community - a new land, a new tribe, a new state, a new neighborhood, a new country. Remember that. Show <b>empathy</b> first.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">Those who want to cite the Old Testament with priority should be aware of its entirety. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">However, those who claim to be Christians need to prioritize the <b>New Testament</b>. And in the New Testament, Jesus makes it clear again and again what His priorities are. When they ask Him, "<b>What is the greatest commandment in the law?" He replies, without parable or hesitation or obfuscation of any kind, "Love the Lord your God with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." (Matthew 22:36-40)</b> I don't think you can get much clearer than that as a litmus test for any political choice you make.These two come first. Everything else hinges on them.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">If you must <b>mix politics and faith</b>, which a voter of faith is no doubt compelled to do in making their choices, then for a Christian, these are the verses that matter and these are the questions to ask. Does my position come from a love of God? Does my position come from a love of neighbor? Does my position come from a love of self (because that second commandment only works if you love yourself; hate yourself and you hate your neighbor)? And, by the way, it doesn't say "Love thy neighbor if they share your political views." So, we <b>left-wing</b> folks have to factor love into the mix when we hate the words and vitriol that our neighbor spouts. That means we choose not to respond with vitriol. Our political discourse must also come from love. That's a tough one.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">The other tough part, I think, the part where things get muddy and tangled and divisive, and always have, all the way back to ancient times, is that first commandment. <b>What does it mean to love God with all your soul and mind?</b> What does that look like in the world of politics? Those folks who start digging into the Old Testament do so perhaps because they believe that is how you love God. but if all those other commandments were made at the service of these two, then loving God transcends the notion of following a set of rules and regulations.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">Jesus has something to say about this, too, in Matthew. "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men's faces." And later, "You give a tenth of your spices ... but <b>you have neglected the more important matters of the law - justice, mercy and faithfulness.</b>" </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 16px;">Even
as I'm writing this, I'm aware of the danger of <b>quoting chapter and
verse</b>. The Bible is a complicated, multi-layered text. If you really
try, you can use it to say almost anything, selectively. Search your hearts. This much is clear: Place love first. Mercy, justice, faithfulness, and all the rest of your actions must stem from the root of love. Even in politics.</span></span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span>Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-5412489720923634612015-06-29T22:58:00.000-07:002015-06-29T22:58:25.544-07:00Value the Moment, Honor the History, Understand the Journey<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
The day after the recent <b>Supreme Court</b> ruling on <b>gay marriage</b>, I was in Salem, Oregon, for a dragon boat race. My team was warming up on a brick-covered picnic area. I leaned over for a stretch and found myself face to face with the inscribed brick you see pictured here.</div>
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I stopped. The park around me seemed to inhale and hold its own breath. Five words and a few numbers sent me falling through a telescoping tunnel of history, and I wondered, Would everyone see in these letters and numbers what I saw? Because what I saw was an epitaph, a love-letter, a hidden grief. I saw one man with a full name, one without. I saw a date of death in 1991. I saw <b>AIDS</b>, and all the loss and secrecy and grief and politics hidden within it. I saw a time in history when the idea of <b>gay marriage</b> wasn't even part of the conversation, when the hope was for recognition, for the right to acceptance, for safety and community and belonging and love without a death sentence attached to it. I saw another time where a marginalized group was insisting, in the face of bigotry, that their <b>lives mattered</b>. And then, with the mental roar of a jet engine, I fast-forwarded to now, and the significance of the Supreme Court ruling, and the celebrations throughout the country, and a <b>Facebook</b> image posted that afternoon of a friend, a survivor of that terrible era of AIDS, standing, holding hands and saying vows with his partner. These two images - the brick in the park and the photo from Facebook, melded into one and I saw the journey writ large across my mind, overwhelming in its significance.</div>
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I blinked and stood up and looked at the circle of people around me who continued about their business. And I went about my business, too, but my heart held the journey - then, and now, and everything in between. I couldn't let it go.</div>
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As I thought about that moment and its meaning, and as I tried to explain it to the people around me, I found words inadequate. I stood at a strange <b>crossroads of past, present, and future</b>. </div>
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The day before, I'd been at a high school graduation party and heard a group of young people talking so openly and casually about <b>sexual orientation</b>. It was no big deal who was what. They are the future. Do they know the past? Do they understand the journey that led to this moment? The whole journey? Do I?</div>
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There is an incredible young adult book that speaks with exquisite eloquence about this particular convergence of past, present and future. It's by <b>David Levithan</b> and it's called <a href="http://davidlevithan.com/two-boys-kissing-2/">TWO BOYS KISSING</a>. Read it. </div>
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That moment looking at the brick in the park resonated beyond the journey of <b>gay rights and LGBT history</b> for me. As I age, my relationship to time - to the past, present and future - changes. When I was very young, I lived mostly in the present. Soon, my attention shifted to the future. Who would I be when I grew up? What college would I go to? What would I do after college? Where would I live? Would I get married? Would I have children? The future - always the future. But now that I've rounded the corner of <b>middle age</b>, the past - its value and meaning - occupy a growing portion of my attention. </div>
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Friends, contemporaries, face terminal illness or sudden death from heart disease. Children marry and start families. Parents struggle with the challenges of aging. Technology leaves me in the dust. The world around me becomes increasingly different. My neighborhood is changing. I see city blocks with buildings razed, and I find myself asking "<b>What used to be there?</b>" </div>
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That question looms in my mind. What used to be there? Memory, <b>communal memory</b> - that's what <b>history</b> really is and remembering history is more than being "condemned to repeat it." We need to hold and preserve our communal memories in order to understand ourselves, to appreciate our present and to grapple with our future. It is frighteningly easy for that memory to disintegrate like old silk and crumble into nothing. When that memory includes part of your own story, the thought that it will evaporate is heartbreaking and terrifying and infuriating all at once.</div>
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We have a responsibility to record the journeys. For some, it is through writing. For others, through film or the visual arts or music. For some, the responsibility lies not in the telling, but in the asking and the listening and the learning. And the noticing - stopping and noticing a small group of words and numbers on a brick on the ground in a park by a river, and registering their significance.</div>
<br />Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-5429153313686880152015-06-19T11:34:00.000-07:002015-06-19T11:36:26.664-07:00AgainThe <b>news</b> is filled with <b>violence and hate</b>. Again. And I find myself thinking of the <b>Great Flood</b>, when God was so fed up with human beings, He just wiped us all out. But even then, He couldn't quite bring Himself to give up entirely. He could have. He could have gotten ridden of every last one of us and created a brand new race. He didn't. That's called hope.<br />
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The question is, can we as human beings carry that same hope into our world? Can we face the worst of ourselves, in honesty, and not give up that hope? Can we seek out the good and nurture it? Can we embrace the small, daily fight against our worst side, the small daily nourishing of our best? Can we, moment by moment, build on that hope and live up to it?<br />
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Can we?Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-26720390942874162762015-03-22T17:06:00.001-07:002015-03-22T17:07:24.501-07:00The Tao of Teaching Revisited<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">(From notes I posted on Facebook about 7 years ago whose ideas I return to time and again.)</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Lao Tzu says </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">be "careful as someone crossing an iced-over stream.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Alert as a warrior in enemy territory.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Courteous as a guest.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Fluid as melting ice.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Shapable as a block of wood.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Receptive as a valley.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Clear as a glass of water.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /><br />Do you have the patience to wait<br />till your mud settles and the water is clear?"<br /><br />I want to be careful with my students, </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">since they are young and vulnerable. I want to be alert </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">to all that is happening in my classroom at any moment. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">I want to be courteous, </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">always using the language of respect. I want to be fluid, </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">prepared to change as the day and needs of my students change </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">- deliberately, not wildly. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Shapable as a block of wood ... I want to be willing to change, but not without purpose. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Receptive as a valley - I want to create a place where young growth can thrive. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;">Clear as a glass of water, that learning travels through me and I don't muddy it up or get in the way. The patience to wait til the mud settles - The perfect description of waiting for students to come to attention.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #141823; line-height: 20px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Lao Tzu says<br />"What is rooted is easy to nourish.<br />What is recent is easy to correct.<br />What is brittle is easy to break.<br />What is small is easy to scatter."<br /><br />Many students are not rooted, or their roots are weak, grown in harsh soil and rough conditions. It is not easy to nourish their spirits. How can they take in lessons o<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">f community and trust, let alone lessons about math and reading, when they are not rooted?<br /><br />But they are young, and therein lies the hope. The older a child gets, the harder it is to correct their learning and help them find the right path in life. What is recent is easy to correct. What has been their whole lives may be harder to correct.<br /><br />What makes something brittle? If a child hasn't had what they need, their spirit may well be brittle, their feelings may be brittle. They are vulnerable, more vulnerable than I sometimes remember in the heat of the moment. They break easily, and that is not a good thing.<br /><br />Children are like tiny plants or seeds. So much potential, but to grow, they need tenderness and careful attention. What is small is easy to scatter. But perhaps scattering is not what they need. </span></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">"The Master views the parts with compassion<br />because he understands the whole."<br /><br />The wise teacher views all the parts of a child's personality with compassion, all their quirks and challenging behaviors, because she understands the whole child, the big picture.<br /><br />"The Master allows things to happen.<br />She shapes events as they come."<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /><br />The wise teacher is flexible and allows for teachable moments. She takes advantage of unexpected and organic learning opportunities.<br /><br />"She steps out of the way<br />and lets the Tao speak for itself."<br /><br />There's nothing I can add.</span></span></div>
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<!-- Blogger automated replacement: "https://images-blogger-opensocial.googleusercontent.com/gadgets/proxy?url=http%3A%2F%2F4.bp.blogspot.com%2F-gOD2tJgP4ks%2FVMB5q2JfrbI%2FAAAAAAAAIMI%2FAS1ciY2ItVI%2Fs1600%2F20150109_121109.jpg&container=blogger&gadget=a&rewriteMime=image%2F*" with "https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-gOD2tJgP4ks/VMB5q2JfrbI/AAAAAAAAIMI/AS1ciY2ItVI/s1600/20150109_121109.jpg" -->Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-32933475702385373692014-12-25T14:52:00.000-08:002014-12-25T14:52:29.642-08:00"I am a mortal, and liable to fall."<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Scrooge and Christmas Past, in performance</td></tr>
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When in <b>Dickens</b>' classic <b>Ebenezer Scrooge</b> is visited by the first of the three spirits, the <b>Ghost of Christmas past</b>, and the spirit beckons him toward the window, he is reluctant. "<b>I am a mortal, and liable to fall</b>," he says. And the spirit responds "Bear but a touch of my hand and you shall be upheld in more than this." I've always focused on the spirit's response, but this Christmas season, I've found myself noticing Scrooge's words and their wider meaning.<br />
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Like Scrooge, I am a mortal, and liable to fall. We all are, all the way back to <b>Genesis</b>. We humans are liable to fall. In fact, you might argue that it's what we do best. It's part of what separates us from angels and from God in fully divine form. We are so liable to fall that, in the days of the <b>Old Testament</b>, we made it a regular point to make offerings and sacrifices to God to make up for all our falling. And somewhere along the way, God decided enough was enough. We were so liable to fall that we really needed something much more powerful to bridge the eternal gap between the infallible divine and ourselves. Hence, Jesus.<br />
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When the angels fall, they get a full-fledged and eternal punishment. We humans are given ways to make up for all our screw-ups. Why? Maybe it's because since God created us, he's pretty aware of our essential nature, and part of our essential nature is that we're liable to fall. The point of interest is how we respond, and how God responds, when we fall. He knows it's in our nature, and so he's prepared to forgive.<br />
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If only we could accept our essential nature more in the same spirit that God does. If only we could stop trying to be perfect on our own and accept that we are neither God nor angels nor demons. We are mortals, liable to fall, and the power lies in reaching out for the divine hand, in whatever form it is extended to us.<br />
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<br />Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-47796632362648628802014-11-24T09:19:00.002-08:002014-11-24T21:13:18.759-08:00A Sacred Responsibility: Grieving a Class PetNearly six years ago, I began a remarkable new phase in my <b>teaching journey</b>. My <b>students</b> made it happen. They decided they wanted to earn a <b>class pet</b>. They could have chosen all sorts of deluxe, self-indulgent things - pizza and ice cream and movie parties and so on - but they chose the care of a living thing as their ultimate reward and celebration. And I said yes.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sarge, the year we got him</td></tr>
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I will never forget that class, and one young man in particular who persuaded me and the rest of the class to undertake this momentous new project. I will never forget bringing home our <b>guinea pig</b>, Sarge, from the <b>Oregon Humane Society</b>, where he had been brought by animal control after being found abandoned outdoors. I will never forget his first day as a member of our classroom, or the days leading up to that day, in which we prepared our room and ourselves for his arrival. I will never forget the transformation that would come over some students when they sat and held him quietly during their recess time, and a gentleness and calm would settle in them that never did during the rest of the day. Sarge changed our class community, and my teaching, forever.<br />
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A class pet brings a great deal of laughter and a special kind of bond into the room. But I knew from the very first that it also brought a heavier, <b>sacred responsibility</b>. Sooner or later,<b> all living things die</b>. Getting a class pet means accepting that fact and accepting the responsibility for <b>helping students grieve</b>.<br />
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This fall, I faced that final, sacred responsibility in my classroom. Sarge passed away at home after a sudden turn in his health. It's taken me a while to finish this post, to take the time to reflect on the experience. Sacred truly is the word for it. Taking the time to <b>find the words to talk to my students about death, and about grief,</b> the special kind of sadness we feel when we lose someone or something dear to us. As hard as it was, I would not trade that experience, that honor, for all the world.<br />
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When you explain something to children, it forces you to make sense of it in new ways for yourself. I have plenty of experience with grief, even very recent. It is a sadness different from other kinds of sadness, a special kind of sadness. That's why it has a special name. And the way we deal with that sadness has a special name, too. Grieving.<br />
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<b>Everyone grieves in different ways</b>, a fact that was abundantly clear in my classroom the day I told them Sarge had died. There were tears and questions and blank looks. There was a great wave of desire to talk about other deaths, other times of grief. I told my students that everyone grieves differently, and that one person might grieve in different ways throughout the day. Some people want to talk about it or cry; some people want to take their minds off it. Some people want to be with friends; some people want to be alone. I told my students <b>there is no wrong way to grieve, as long as you don't hurt anyone else or yourself</b>. Saying those words made them real to me in a new and powerful way, so much so that I repeated them again, slowly, to let them sink in for myself, too. I wish we could all hear those words again in our moments of grief, to smooth the rough patches that rub against one another when we grieve with our family or friends.<br />
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I put out blocks and clay and paper and markers and watercolor and other art materials, and we spent some time just being together - building, creating, or sitting quietly. Some kids got very silly and goofy. Some needed to talk and cry.<br />
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We read a book called <b><u><i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lifetimes-Beautiful-Explain-Death-Children/dp/0553344021">Lifetimes: The Beautiful Way to Explain Death to Children</a></i></u></b>, which I highly recommend. We made a memory wall and cut out construction paper flowers with words describing Sarge. We hung it in the hallway to add to later, and allow others who had known Sarge to add their memories, too.<br />
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By lunchtime, the students started asking if we'd get another guinea pig. By the end of the day, they were craving fun and silliness, while I was exhausted. Their grief cycle was at once so familiar, and so different in its pace.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The beginning of the Sarge memory wall</td></tr>
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The experiencing of grieving together helped create a new kind of bond for this class, just as Sarge's arrival did for that first class. I will never forget this class, and this first experience of grieving with my students.<br />
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Shortly after Sarge died, my students rescued a tiny Pacific tree frog that was stranded and dehydrated in a corner of our classroom. That is a story for another blog post, but I mention it here, because the act of saving the life of a small living creature was a profoundly healing one, after grieving the death of another living creature.<br />
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This whole process not only brought home to me the <b>holiness of grief</b>, but also the <b>holiness of living things, great and small</b>, and the tremendous power they have to impact our lives. Sarge, a small furry guinea pig, changed me and my classroom forever.<br />
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<br />Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-3506951791356736412014-09-20T21:55:00.000-07:002014-09-20T21:55:47.450-07:00For Ourselves and Our Posterity<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This past week was <b>Constitution Day</b>, a day when we in the teaching profession are called upon to teach something about the Constitution to our charges, to honor the anniversary of its signing. There's something quite inspiring about unpacking the meaning of the <b>Preamble for third graders</b>, and it's been on my mind ever since.<br />
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<i>We the people, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity do ordain and establish this Constitution of the United States of America.</i></blockquote>
What does it mean? What are the values laid out as the foundation for this great experiment upon which the founders of our country were embarking with no certainty of how it would turn out? I can't help thinking about how much care must have gone into the choosing of every word.<br />
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1) A more perfect union: The best community we can be. Together. United.<br />
2) Justice: Law and fairness.<br />
3) Domestic tranquility: Peace at home.<br />
4) The common defense: protection from dangers, a shared sense of safety.<br />
5) The general welfare: health, happiness, and good things for everyone,<br />
6) The blessings of liberty: all the best that freedom gives us, secured, made sure not just for us, here and now, but for our children and our children's children - for our future.<br />
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As we set out to understand it in third grade, we asked the questions that were, essentially, the questions of the founding fathers: What kind of community do we want to be? How can we get there? So simple and so profound. I imagined this group of people laying out their vision with those same questions in their hearts, not knowing that over 220 years later, their words would carry such weight and meaning and history - not knowing, but perhaps hoping. Hoping. "For ourselves and our posterity."<br />
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Every generation since has endeavored, in their own way, through their own challenges and mis-steps, to live up to those ideals, stay true to that vision, and understand it and reinterpret it through the ever-changing lens of evolving customs and events, in the hope of safeguarding it for future generations. "<b>For ourselves and our posterity.</b>"<br />
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Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-7428617147968585482014-09-09T18:56:00.000-07:002014-09-09T18:56:14.238-07:00A Memory from The Secret Garden<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">"One of the strange things about living in the world is that it is only now and then one is quite sure one is going to live forever and ever and ever. One knows it sometimes when one gets up at the tender solemn dawn-time and goes out and stands out and throws one's head far back and looks up and up and watches the pale sky slowly changing and flushing and marvelous unknown things happening until the East almost makes one cry out and one's heart stands still at the strange unchanging majesty of the rising of the sun--which has been happening every morning for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. One knows it then for a moment or so. And one knows it sometimes when one stands by oneself in a wood at sunset and the mysterious deep gold stillness slanting through and under the branches seems to be saying slowly again and again something one cannot quite hear, however much one tries. Then sometimes the immense quiet of the dark blue at night with the millions of stars waiting and watching makes one sure; and sometimes a sound of far-off music makes it true; and sometimes a look in someone's eyes.” </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">-<b>Frances Hodgson Burnett, THE SECRET GARDEN</b></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">In memory of Ben</span></span>Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5377241405935576852.post-44400973579167985082014-08-29T19:00:00.001-07:002014-08-29T19:00:39.961-07:00Carrying Peace: A Prayer for the School Year<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The school year is about to start. Like many teachers, I sit today perched almost at the top of the first hill of a roller coaster, my stomach doing somersaults, my brain dizzy with anticipation and nerves. It's an amazing roller coaster, never the same ride twice, and I always come back for more. Still, it continues to feel like a roller coaster. This year, I want to try to change that in some small way. I want to <b>carry peace</b> with me throughout the day, throughout the year. I want to be able to find peace at a moment's notice when I need it most. I want to be ready to stop and breathe in the moment, to step back and see with clarity, and make decisions from a place of wisdom and grounded-ness. I want to see, truly see, the small beings whose day is entrusted to my care.<br />
coaster.<br />
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So, here's my <b>teacher's prayer for the school year</b>, a musical <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtJeI4Q9nBE">variant</a> of which I learned a lifetime ago and have cherished always:<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>The Prayer of Saint Francis</b></span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Where there is hatred, let me sow love;</span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Where there is injury, pardon;</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Where there is doubt, faith;</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Where there is despair, hope;</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Where there is darkness, light;</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Where there is sadness, joy.</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To be consoled as to console,</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To be understood as to understand,</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To be loved as to love;</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">For it is in giving that we receive;</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;</span> </blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is in dying to self that we are born to eternal life.</span></blockquote>
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Cynthia J. McGeanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00117497921942534828noreply@blogger.com0