A Day For Sweeping Up The Heart--And Celebrating A Harvest

Gathering up some squash, green beans,
sweet corn and tomatoes.

The Bustle in a House

The Morning after Death

Is solemnest of industries

Enacted upon Earth--

The sweeping up the Heart

And putting Love away

We shall not use again

Until Eternity.

- Emily Dickenson, #1078

We just got word this morning that a favorite brother-in-law, Allan Shirk, 79, died this morning at 4:25 at a hospice care facility in Mt. Joy, Pennsylvania. It was just two months ago that he was diagnosed with a very aggressive form of cancer, so we were ill prepared for having him leave us so soon. His wife Ruth Ann, and daughters Melissa and Beverly, along with their husbands and children will miss him terribly, as will all of his many friends and loved ones.

This was also a morning for harvesting some of our sweet corn and other produce from our garden, some to freeze for later use and some to go into a big kettle of homemade stew to likewise savor and "put away" for winter use.  I was reminded that it was mere months ago that all of this abundance began from a handful of seeds buried in the soil, a kind of metaphor for new life emerging in a truly miraculous and amazing way.

"The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body."

I Corinthians 15:42-44 (NIV)

David Augsburger's Eight Binding Myths And Alternative Freeing Truths

Augsburger, a well known and widely read author and speaker,
is a professor emeritus at Fuller Theological Seminary.

With the author's permission I am posting the following handout I've found helpful in counseling couples and families. Professor David Augsburger taught pastoral counseling courses at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart, Indiana, where I attended while on a year's sabbatical leave from Zion Mennonite Church and Eastern Mennonite High School. (AMBS is now Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary).

Having grown up in an exceedingly nice, excessively cautious and conflict-avoiding family, I especially resonated with the first four of the following myths, and have benefited from their corresponding truths.

Binding Myth 1: NICENESS IS NECESSARY. Sweet polite tact is the basis for family harmony, so tensions must be temperate, frustrations forgotten. Each must manipulate to get what is wanted without open disagreement or frank request.

Freeing Truth: GENUINENESS ENABLES GROWTH. A balance of caring for others and candor with others invites growth; loving and leveling with others excites health; genuineness and gentleness given in wholeness stimulate depth in life.

Binding Myth 2: DIFFERENCES ARE DANGEROUS. Variations in thinking, feeling and behaving are seen as a threat rather than as a resource for growth. Disagreement is seen as disrespect or lack of love.

Freeing Truth: DIVERSITY IS DESIRABLE. The natural variety in viewpoints, diversity in preferences and uniqueness of persons are to be prized, enhanced and appreciated.

Binding Myth 3: COMMENTS ARE CRITICISMS. The personal implications of any message cannot be ignored. Even compliments are covert demands, blame is present in all criticisms, distance and defensiveness are needed at all times. One is always on trial, and must be forever on guard.

Freeing Truth; COMMUNICATION IS INVITATION. The power of invitation frees us from reacting to rather than responding to each other. Invitation ends shaming and blaming processes and invites one's full responsibility.

Binding Myth 4: ANGER IS ATTACK. All anger is seen as a personal attack. So denied or hidden anger clouds communication, confuses intentions, distorts responses and deadens person to their own excitement for growth.

Freeing Truth: ANGER IS AROUSAL. Anger is an open expression of aroused aliveness and an attempt at real contact. Constructive anger seeks to break through barriers to restructure a relationship more justly.

Binding Myth 5: SADNESS IS WEAKNESS. Open, vulnerable expressions of sadness, tears, loneliness and grief is seen as breaking down since it opens one to rejection or ridicule by another. So hide warm feelings, keep armor closed.

Freeing Truth: TENDERNESS IS STRENGTH. Warm tenderness brings us together. The better you understand my real feelings, the more you will like me. One need not be strong, adequate and coping efficiently at all times to be loved.

Binding Myth 6: LOVE IS CONTROL.  Love is used as a means to gain loyalty, to obligate another to obey, to shape behavior toward a lover's goals. "If you love me, do, think, feel, act as I prescribe." This produces low self-esteem since love is radically conditioned. 

Freeing Truth: LOVE SETS FREE. The more I love you, the more I set you free. Love is given simply because and only because I am and you are. This builds core self-esteem as love is received without conditions.

Binding Myth 7: LOGIC IS THE LAST WORD. All debate must be perfectly reasonable. Feelings must have a rational justification before they may be expressed. Spontaneity is limited, impulsive responses are compulsively edited, intuitions are discounted, feelings belittled. 

Freeing Truth: WHOLENESS IS THE REAL GOAL. Insight and intuition, thought and feeling, fact and human are all equally valued. I am not right, nor are you wrong. Our views are personal and partial with different degrees of truth. Not perfection, but completeness is the goal of growth.

Binding Myth 8: FAILURE IS FINAL. Perfection is an obvious minimum requirement, anything beyond this is proof of your worth and gratitude to parents/God/ideal self. Bad performance is evidence of being a bad person. To fail is to be a failure, so play it safe at all times.

FreeingTruth: GRACE GIVES US THE FREEDOM TO FAIL. Freedom to choose is freedom to fail. An act of failing does not make one a failure. The risk of living is a risk worth taking, living fully includes using ones quota of possible mistakes.

Critical Race Theory--How Should We Respond?

 

A part of our problem is not being able to agree on what Critical Race Theory really is, what it means and how we should respond to it. But it clearly isn't going away.

In the academic and scientific community a theory isn't a set of indisputable conclusions, but a framework for questions that invite further study and research. 

As I understand it, one of the primary hypotheses of CRT is that racism isn't simply a matter of individuals deliberately choosing to be racist or biased but that racial disparities are perpetuated by systemic factors embedded in our cultural and legal systems. In lay terms it means racism continues to inflict harm by our just seeing, doing and believing what we've come to see as just normal and what pretty much everyone else is seeing, doing and believing.

And what many Americans believe is that racism is behind us and that we've finally achieved "liberty and justice for all." Therefore we should stop talking about race altogether and just move on.

But if CRT is a framework for research and inquiry into such assumptions, here are some of the questions for which we might seek more definitive answers.

1. Did race have any bearing on those in power originally choosing who was, and who was not, shackled and shipped abroad in inhumane slave ships? And how are descendants of that forced migration still affected?

2. Did race have anything to do with who was forced to do grueling work at no pay for generations in this country, and how has that impacted the descendants of such a slavery-based society?

3. Did race play any part in determining who enjoyed full civil rights, equal educational opportunities and full participation in the economic and political life in the US during the past centuries? And are there still lingering effects of these past discriminations? 

4. How did race and skin color determine who, and whose lives and property, became targets in the 1921 Tulsa destruction and massacre, and who were victims of multiple lynchings and other crimes before and after that terrible event? What reparations are owed the descendants of such travesties?

5. If racism is something we can simply relegate to past history, and if we can now consider ourselves so colorblind that we can just move on and leave the past behind us, how many of us white Americans would now be ready to change places with people of color in our nation?  

Feel free to add your own comments or questions.

Are We Experiencing Drought Or Aridification?

Lake Powell on the Colorado River, the second largest manmade reservoir in the US, is the most important water source in the West, and is dependent on runoff from a diminishing quantity of snow melt each year.

A report published by the National Academy of Science last year, authored by Jonathan Overpeck and Bradley Udall, offers a grim picture of how global warming is creating a permanent change in water levels and the rate of precipitation in the western part of the US as well as elsewhere around the globe. This is not just a result of sporadic weather cycles but appears to be an irreversible trend that will endanger ever more trees and other vegetation worldwide, drastically reduce agricultural production, contribute to increased wildfires and and other unnatural disasters and cause critical water shortages for large populations of people.

When our daughter lived and worked in Tucson for several years, she became aware of the fact that this large and growing city relies on water from an underground source that is being depleted at a sobering rate, and the city has no viable alternative source of this absolutely essential resource. While Tucson is more intentional about water conservation than western cities like Phoenix and Las Vegas, it has not yet come up with a plan for providing for its long term water needs.

What I find disheartening is the lack of any sense of urgency among citizens and lawmakers to reduce the use of carbon fuels that contribute to the problem and to work at ways of at least delaying the inevitable aridification that is taking place. I'm beginning to wonder if human beings simply lack the capacity to curb their appetites for what is cheap, comfortable and convenient in the short term for the sake a sustainable and survivable future for themselves and for their children and grandchildren. 

The earth is the Lord's, but humanity is responsible for its care and preservation.

HARD TIME VIRGINIA Vol. 6, No. 2

2021 Parole Release Numbers Remain Disappointing  

    Since Governor Northam directed the Parole Board to prioritize their review of Fishback vs. Commonwealth cases (where juries had not been informed that parole had been abolished when they recommended a sentence), many old law parole eligible offenders' cases were pushed to the back of the line. This and the recent controversy regarding the Board's decision in the Vincent Martin case appears to have contributed to the reduction in the number of releases granted.   

   So the January to May geriatric and general parole release numbers were only 56 for regular parole, 18 for geriatric release, and 15 with dual eligibility.

   Meanwhile, with the COVID epidemic appearing to be under control in Virginia prisons, the DOC is no longer releasing prisoners early for those medical reasons as of July 1.

One State Is Offering Free Phone Service To Prisoners

   Connecticut Governor Lamont recently signed a bill that makes all phone, video and email communication free, saving families $14 million each year and helping them stay connected to their loved ones, something that is vital to improving reentry outcomes. Connecticut is following the lead of jurisdictions like New York City, San Diego, Los Angeles and San Fransisco, and some other state legislatures are considering similar measures, though Virginia doesn't appear to be among them--at least not yet.

Rising Summer Temperatures Create Health Risks For Prisoners

   An estimated 25% of prisoners in Virginia are in crowded warehouse-like facilities with no air conditioning, which is true of 18 prisons in all. Lack of available funding is always cited as the reason, but increased medical costs and greater unrest resulting from severe heat are causing concern among many lawmakers and prison officials.

   Some prisons have been reported to offer extra ice packs and cold water to help alleviate the stress, but elevated temperatures can make living conditions almost unbearable, and getting a normal night's sleep can be a serious problem. And once room temperatures become greater than normal body temperature, more fans can actually make the stress on the heart worse, resulting in heat strokes and heart attacks that can prove to be fatal. 

Mandated Sex Offender Programs Can Be Costly And Stressful

   There have been numerous complaints by persons required to take part in prolonged sex therapy treatments that are made conditions of their probation and parole. Attendees are sometimes subject to the questionable use of polygraph tests that supposedly help therapists determine whether to certify that an individual has successfully completed the program. 

   Meanwhile, one group member I know was recently notified that the cost of required attendance at bi-weekly group meetings would increase from $25 to $35 per session, and that once he was in Aftercare, the fee would be $55 per hour-long group session.

   Failure to comply (and pay) can result in participants being held in violation of probation.

Prisoners Lament Poor Quality Meals, Small Portions

   The VADOC currently spends an estimated $2.26 to $2.55 per prisoner per day on food, or about $.75 to $.85 per meal, according to one source.

   Prisoners and their families frequently complain that meals must be supplemented with canteen purchases in order to avoid having to go to bed hungry. Prisoners who can't afford commissary items often beg or "borrow" from others or work for food, as in doing odd and end jobs like doing someone's laundry, providing sexual favors, cleaning their cells, etc. Some owe their minimal state paychecks to the prisoner run store, which may charge prisoners from 1 item for 2 in return or 2 items for 3. It is believed that this does benefit prison staff and helps reduce theft. 

   Prison commissaries are stocked with overpriced junk food items like cakes, candies, cookies, chips, sodas, but offer very few healthy, nutritional choices and virtually no fruits or vegetables. Meanwhile, prison diets include a disproportionate amount of potatoes, rice, spaghetti or other pastas, along with breads, cakes and biscuits or rolls. These carbs quickly turn into sugar and result in increased feelings of hunger.

   Food service is just one of many areas in which the VADOC is attempting to save money, but the health costs can be staggering, as prison diets contribute to increased risk for diabetes, heart disease and many other chronic health conditions.

HARD TIME Editor Is Moving 

   At the end of July my wife and I will move to Virginia Mennonite Retirement Community's Park Village, where my address will be Harvey Yoder, 1540 Hawthorne Drive, Harrisonburg, VA 22802. I will continue serving as an unsalaried pastor of our house church congregation and work part time as a professional counselor.