Please Share: A Lenten Fast For The Nation's Healing

My friend Daryl Byler, director of EMU's Center for Justice and Peacebuilding, is proposing a fast--for a meal, a day, several days, or even longer--during the season of Lent beginning tomorrow, March 1, accompanied by writing letters of concern. Please help spread the word.

Healing Justice Fast

What? A 40-day water and juice fast, respectfully calling upon President Trump to work collaboratively with diverse political, business, educational and religious leaders for healing of the deep divisions and disparities in the United States.

Why? To be deeply centered at a time of national turmoil, recognizing the spiritual dimensions of these divisions and inequalities – the insidious influence of what the biblical writers describe as the “principalities and powers” (Eph. 3:10).

When? Ash Wednesday to Palm Sunday (40 days)

Snapshot:  The recent presidential election laid bare the ugly fissures that are ripping the nation apart.  Far from our stated national vision “out of many, one” (E Pluribus Unum), we are rapidly losing the ability to see the humanity in those from a different political party, economic class, racial group, sexual orientation, or immigrant status than our own. Systemic injustices are rooted in a hierarchy of human value and civil discourse across differences has become a rare commodity.

Between Ash Wednesday and Palm Sunday, as God enables, I plan to engage in a water and juice fast, each day sending an open letter to President Trump, calling on him to act collaboratively with other national leaders for healing justice.  The letters will be rooted in the Daily Office texts from President Trump’s Presbyterian faith tradition. 

While the divisions and disparities in the country existed long before President Trump took office, he bears unique responsibility in his very public role for setting a positive tone and leading by example. Still, all of us -- from the most progressive to the most conservative –- are responsible to take concrete steps to heal the national divisions and work for justice for all.

President Trump campaigned on the slogan “Make America Great Again!”  What would it look like to be a great nation?  The biblical prophets defined greatness as learning to act justly, love kindness and walk humbly.  Jesus spoke of greatness as learning to serve the needs of others --feeding the hungry (including our enemies), visiting the sick and imprisoned, and welcoming the stranger. 

Many other religious traditions share these same values.

My daily letters will be posted at https://healingjusticefast.wordpress.com/   I invite others to join me in this time of prayer and fasting – for a meal, a day, several days or even longer – and to take practical steps, however large or small, toward healing justice.

-J. Daryl Byler      

26 February 2017

Re-membering Our Life Stories

http://www.genopro.com/genogram/templates/

"How will our children know who they are if they don't know where they came from?" 

-unknown

I remember once hearing a story on NPR of a someone using a table saw who accidentally cut off one of his fingers. The severed body part flew off into the corner of his shop among scraps of wood, sawdust and other debris. After he managed to stop the bleeding he and his family looked frantically for the missing member of his body so they could take it with them to the hospital to have it reattached.

Remembering is something like that. Sometimes an important part of us becomes lost, for some reason becomes dis-membered. Perhaps our parents or others have intentionally hidden some part of our family’s story from us, kept it a secret. Or maybe we’ve just plain forgotten certain things from failing to review parts of our story. Or maybe we have willfully cut off some painful part of our past we simply don’t want to deal with, or some relationship we no longer want to be a part of.

But cutting ourselves off from parts of our past can be like losing a body part, a member of ourselves. In re-membering we are re-attaching, e-connecting, so that healing and growth can take place.

I often recommend that my clients construct a genogram, a kind of ancestral chart that locates the key players in their ongoing family story. This becomes like a playlist of characters in their drama, men and women who have all in some way impacted who they are, not only genetically, but through their influence on their family narrative, for better or for worse.

The more we can learn about the stories of all of these fascinating characters, the better we can know and understand ourselves, and the better choices we can make about consciously selecting what parts of the story we want to celebrate--and pass on--and what parts we want to remember as reminders of valuable lessons to be learned.

Far better to embrace the story, to own it as it really is, than to seek to distance ourselves from it and thus give it ever more power to impact us in ways we may not even realize.

HARD TIME VIRGINIA Volume 2, Number 2

Virginia Public Radio photo

Deaths In Virginia Prisons

According to the 12/7/16 THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT suicide is the third largest cause of death among inmates in DOC custody, accounting for 32 deaths in the decade of 2004-2014, exceeded only by deaths resulting from cancer and from heart failure. 

Board of Corrections To Get Funding to Investigate Jail Deaths
The tragic death of mentally handicapped Jamychael Mitchell in the Hampton Roads Regional Jail 8 months ago has resulted in an action by the General Assemblyto budget $100,000 to investigate such incidents. according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

Head of Maryland RAPP Meets With Harrisonburg Group

Tomiko Shine, with the Baltimore-based chapter of RAPP (Release for Aging Persons in Prison) met with some 60 concerned citizens in Harrisonburg February 9 to discuss ways of bringing about parole and geriatric release for deserving inmates. With her was Earl Nelson, who shared his personal experience of spending 48 years behind bars. Carla Peterson of Virginia CURE was also present to share her concerns.

     This was followed by showing a recently produced documentary by producer Wynonah Hogan on issues associated with overcrowding in our local jails.

Huge Bill For An Emergency Trip To The ER

An inmate in one of Virginia's prisons reports he received inadequate care for a case of heart failure that became serious last September. In January, partly as a result of this, he was rushed to a nearby hospital in an emergency vehicle with a life threatening heart attack. There he had a stint put in his heart and was returned to prison, only to later receive a bill from the ambulance service $1700 for his ride to the ER.

Blind Poet Denied Parole for the 30th Time

Minor Junior Smith, affectionately known as "Smitty", age 70, has been legally blind since an incident in which he was abused by his stepmother at the age of five.

     Incarcerated since 1971, Mr. Smith has been parole eligible for over 30 consecutive years. Yet in spite of his being a model prisoner and considered one of Buckingham Correctional Center's finest cafeteria workers, he is still being denied discretionary or geriatric parole release year after year.

     During his many years of incarceration, he reports having been emotionally, physically and sexually abused. In addition to writing poems about his past life and his prison experiences, he has published a biography entitled "Abused".

     Mr. Smith is proficient in Braille, and is in need of a Braille Writer and a table computer with 16 or 18 point fonts. So far he has been denied these accommodations.

"Prison Unit Four"  - by Minor Junior Smith

Neither Tom nor I knew that we were headed for Prison Unit Four.

The elderly jailer escorted us to Long-Chain Charlie from our cell door.

The young, tall convict hand-cuffed to me had a five-year bit.

Captain Gray exclaimed, "If there is any hell raised, then I will do it!"

Already, I knew about Tom's "Born To Raise Hell" tattoo on his arm.

I was expecting hard labor, having been raised on more than one farm.

Before arriving at the Penitentiary, I perceived us using shovels and picks.

Beside its administration office, we were issued numbers 91345 and 91346.

Just a few inmates were on the prison yard because of an on-going riot.

In the spring of 1968, we moped along near the Captain rather quiet.

Down in B-Basement, we received basic necessities, including a change of clothes.

Over our heads, we could hear breaking glass above the large cells in rows.

We were well sanitized in new prison garb once we had over-showered.

We soon learned that tear-gas had some unruly inmates over-powered.

In the hospital, we were given necessary shots and physicals despite the riot.

In the receiving unit, we were fed skimpy meals and usually remained quiet.

Sufficient meals or lack of exercise in the cell was not the only thing lacking.

So, one day, when Captain Young yelled out: "91345 and 91346," we got started packing.

There was a wired tail-gate beneath the camper he loaded us in.

Tom unlocked his hand-cuff and escaped by using a re-fill from a pen.

Convicts refusing to work received 15-days in jail on just bread and water.

In ditches, I was labeled "Blind Johnny" as the season grew hotter.

My new glasses from South Hill had lenses as thin as a window pane.

I didn't mind the hard labor, and we did not have to work out in the rain.

After a few seasons of ditch-digging, my gang returned to camp once more.

While headed for a shower, I saw five new offenders at Captain Young's door.

As I glanced in his direction, the big hoss gave me a friendly nod.

Within two years, Woodrow Brown and I would have a transporting job.

Out in the ditches and in leisures, I hung around Woodrow Brown.

Every Sunday morning, we attended church service, and nobody put us down.

After what I had done in Charlottesville, I had no real plans of my own.

Therefore, both Woodrow and I claimed Columbia, South Carolina as our home.

Then, one day in a ditch with him, spots before my eyes began to appear.

I balked on Captain Buchanan, but Captain Young, I began to suddenly fear.

Woodrow heard me complaining, grabbed my shovel and threw it up on the bank.

Recalling a mule Captain Young had jailed, I loafed to the water tank.

He had shot only a stalled tractor; I had been warned by several guys.

Between then and quitting time, I wondered what he might do about my eyes.

The next morning in South Hill, the doctor's hypothesis was high blood.

His good guess did not give me a vacation from the rocks and mud.

Captain Young and a trustee found me another job digging post holes.

Of course, at night, Wood and a few guys played different roles.

Inside of two weeks, I still saw spots, not expecting any real harm. 
However, Captain Young and the trustee took me to the State Prison Farm.

Media: 'The Enemy Of The American People'?

I find this graphic by the Pew Research Center (Washington Post, October 21, 2014) helpful. 

We hear a lot about a liberal bias in the press these days, as though media were a monolithic entity in which publishers collaborated and conspired to promote a progressive agenda and to bring down the current administration.

What the above graphic by the Pew Research Center shows is that media outlets are perceived by readers and listeners as representing a wide range of points of view. Pew's work is based not on an analysis of content, but on the actual news sources chosen by people based on their own stated ideological bent. 

I for one am grateful for our having a full range of points of view expressed through our (so far) free press. To say they are "the enemy of the American people" is far from the case. Rather, imperfect as they may be, they represent a major safeguard against our falling prey to tyranny and oppression. 

It is not by accident that the First Amendment of the Constitution enshrines both our freedom of expression and the freedom to live out our faith according to our own conscience and beliefs. My immigrant ancestors came to this land largely because of this promise.

May it ever remain so.

Help "Guns Into Plowshares" Find A New Home

Washington Post (photo by John Kelly)

I still remember how impressed I was seeing the gigantic "Guns Into Plowshares" project artist and sculptor Esther Augsburger and her son Michael were creating outside Kreiders Machine Shop just west of town.

Upon completion, this massive four-ton piece--with handguns welded all over it that had been confiscated by DC police--was moved to the grounds of the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, DC, where it was officially dedicated in 1997. Some time later, due to some renovations being done at the facility, it was temporarily put in storage and then set up at a less desirable location at the police department's evidence control building in the southeast part of the city.

The Metropolitan Police Department later expressed an interest in having the piece moved back to its original location, but that property is now up for sale, and the MPD is gifting the sculpture back to its creator.

On Tuesday, March 7, there will be a meeting at VMRC's Village Hall at 7 p.m. in which you are invited to bring your suggestions and questions for Esther Augsburger regarding the history and the future of the Guns Into Plowshares project.

Please come in honor of a work that needs to become ever more visible in a time like this.

Here's a link to more information: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/16/AR2011011604146.html

No Conditions For Loving, But Many For Living

David Augsburger, one of my family studies teachers years ago, makes a helpful distinction between 'conditions for loving' and 'conditions for living'. 

As followers of Jesus we are commanded to respect, love and care for everyone unconditionally, even our enemies, but there may be many 'conditions for living' that define our relationships with others, whether in a friendship or in some other partnership as parents or spouses.

We may need to set reasonable and clear limits, for example, as to the amount of time or money we have to give to others. And to make clear what kinds of behaviors we are willing, or unwilling, to tolerate. If these reasonable and clear conditions are not respected, the relationship itself may need to be redefined. Others can then choose whether they value that enough to observe necessary agreements and agreed on boundaries.

As an example, if I am to engage in some business arrangement with another, I can insist that each party operate according to our contract, and not to make up arbitrary rules as we go along. I also have a right to expect that others engage in appropriate and respectful behaviors in the course of conducting business together. If those things don’t happen, I must still consistently demonstrate agape love toward them (perhaps tough love), but am not obligated to continue doing business with them.

Bottom line: While there are no conditions for unselfish loving, there may be many conditions for everyday living.

"It Was A Dark And Stormy Night"

source

After spending a blest afternoon with family after my brother Eli's funeral last Thursday, we experienced an unusual after-blessing later that night.

Just as we left our gathering I noted the indicator light on my dashboard telling me I had an under-inflated tire. Just what we need, I thought, as it was already dark, extremely cold and windy, and with a chill factor of who knows what. And we had over two hours of travel to get home.

So I dropped Alma Jean and our daughter Joanna off at the foyer of Hotel Floyd where Joanna's husband was to pick her up (after his evening meeting in Wake Forest) and asked the kind lady at the desk where I could check my tires. She suggested the Exxon station just down the street or the Floyd Express a few blocks further away.

So I bundled up and ventured out. When I went into the Exxon to get the quarters I needed to use the air pump the attendant kindly suggested the Floyd Express, where the air is free. Which turned out to be Blessing # 1.

In the back of the Express I found an air pump but one without a gauge, so I asked the pleasant truck driver next to it, who was filling his propane delivery truck with diesel fuel, if he had one I could borrow.

"You'll never believe this," he said with a big laugh, "but this is the third time I've been here that someone has asked me for a tire gauge. Looks like I'll just have to get myself one, that's for sure. I figure the good Lord has me here on this earth to help people, and that's what I like doing. But just let me look at your tires and I can pretty much tell you which one is low and I'll put some air in for you." Blessing #2.

Meanwhile he went on to tell me all about how he had a second job hauling rodeo bulls around the country and that he raised bulls of his own that he had to go home and feed that night. But he insisted he was in no hurry and that he was going to make sure I had the proper air in my tires before we got on the interstate. 

When I told him about our reason for being in Floyd he said, "Oh I know Eli! He's a good man, and I used to deliver propane to him! And is he related to Steve Yoder? He's another good man I deliver to at the mill." He was delighted to learn that Steve was Eli's son, and expressed his sincere condolences to our family. Blessing #3.

My angel unaware then came to the car, eyed the tires and proceeded to add air to the one he thought needed it. "You can tell by the shape and looks of the tire," he said reassuringly. "Now check and see whether the indicator light is still on."

Unfortunately it was. So he added air to the other front tire, while I held his portable light in the cold. The same result. "Well, let's go inside and see if they have a tire gauge," he said.

They did, a cheap one for $2.50, which I promptly bought and gave him. "Now you'll have the tire gauge people keep asking you for!" I said, glad to at least do that much for this kind man. Blessing # 4.

Turns out one of the rear ones was the one that was low, but he insisted on checking them all and seeing to it that each had 35 pounds of pressure (a good thing, since the front ones were by then at around 40). Final blessing.

So there's my angel story, another example of what I've begun to call "Mercy's Law", the one that counters Murphy's Law, which holds that if anything can go wrong it will go wrong.

I so wish I had written down this kind person's name, but my aging brain can no longer recall it. So if any of you down at Floyd run across a propane truck driver who likes to help people and who has a farm where he raises rodeo bulls and transports them on weekends and who has a wife and four children, let me know. I'd like to send him a thank you note and a blessing. And maybe warn him not to trust his new, cheap tire gauge too much, since I discovered when I had my tires re-checked that most of them were over-inflated--certainly not his fault :-)

So there's my latest angel story. I'm still thanking God that on a miserably cold and windy night Alma Jean could be spending some good time with Joanna while I was blessed with the generous help of a Good Samaritan who loved giving people a hand when they needed it.

2/16/17 P.S. I just learned from one of my Floyd relatives that my hero is Wally Galla, who delivers propane for Southwestern Virginia Gas Service Corporation.