Bringing Distant Ones Close
A Spiritual Approach
How might I connect with the water in Nigeria, Alberta, Costa Rica, Australia? How can I come to understand that this water may well come into my own body?
We learn from many spiritual teachings that all beings are in interrelation with each other. We are, as Martin Luther King said (in 1963 from the Birmingham jail) in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny.
Looking at religion, we find ideas that cause people to consider the wider implication of their actions.
There's the concept of karma: simply put, of cause and effect. If I commit harm to another being, I will eventually have to taste that bitter fruit, whether coming from them or someone else, in this life or another. The concept of sin is similar. I may get away with something now, but in the long term, God will punish me for it.
Connected with karma, dharma teaches me to do good for the sake of spiritual upliftment. For myself and others. It’s not just in dharma: this sense of acting a good way for its own sake can be found in spiritual paths throughout the world.
I might approach this in a ceremonial way, bringing cups of water into my sensory space and saying, ‘This is the water of the south. This is the water of the east, of the north, of the west. I am of them, and they are of me.’ I might travel by mind to lands affected by resource extraction, travel there and witness their struggles, then consider this when I decide whether or not to get in a car or an airplane.
Technology
What are other ways we might bring distant places nearby? There are apps that tell me how much pollution I'm responsible for, and there could be apps that tell me the consequences of my buying this kind of lemon, which comes from 20 miles away, compared to this kind of lemon which comes from 200 miles away, or a thousand. They could tell me who my phone battery is harming. Tt could be mandatory that on every new car there’s a label, like descriptions on cigarette packages, listing that product’s consequences to people, place and creatures.
Stories
Story is another way that we might bring distant beings close. By hearing the stories of refugees in other lands, of those living on islands subsumed by rising sea levels, or of those in the north who cannot hunt as they used to. To hear those stories and imagine myself in their lives, including them in my sense of self and place.
Stories bring empathy. So much so that author Lynne Hunt figures that the the modern novel is the basis of the human rights movement.
That’s quite something. By sitting and deciphering symbols on a page, wide swaths of people learned to enter into the minds of others. Often these ‘readers’ came to know characters even better than their families, for fictional minds are transparent. This art form, and the empathy it allows, may have kindled the kinship required to declare that all people have worth.
This Green Globe is the Best Dressed in the Ball
It wasn't that long ago we first saw photographs of the earth taken from space. That moment was part of a big shift for us, shifting towards a larger awareness: from first and second ethics to the third.
And perhaps from here there could be fourth, considering not just our own planet, but other planets, other beings out there ,with whom we are in relation, and to whom we are of consequence. In karate, students are taught to punch through their target; by widening our perspective to other planets, we may take good care of our own. By widening into deep time, we may act well in the times we’re in.
May we include within my sense of self and place this whole beautiful green, blue, brown, cloudy, watery globe, upon whom we are spinning through space.
Story Prompts
Consider something you've bought recently. See if you can trace down where the parts of that thing came from: where it was sourced, who helped create it. See if you can find some of the story behind it.
Consider work that you do regularly, and a tool that you often use, like a computer. If you can't find specifically where each of the components came from, can you take a guess? Can you learn about some of them, and in so doing learn about the place they came from? You might learn some stories from that place, and come to consider it part of your backyard, part of your responsibility.
I'll do the same.
In Closing, I’ll share a poem.
Questionnaire, by Wendell Berry
-How much poison are you willing to eat for the success of the free market and global trade? Please name your preferred poisons. For the sake of goodness.
-How much evil are you willing to do? Fill in the following blanks with the names of your favorite evils and acts of hatred.
-What sacrifices are you prepared to make for culture and civilization? Please list the monuments, shrines, and works of art that you would most willingly destroy.
-In the name of patriotism and the flag. How much of our beloved land are you willing to desecrate?
-List in the following spaces the mountains, rivers, towns, and farms you could most readily do without.
-State briefly the ideas, ideals or hopes, the energy sources, the kinds of security, for which you would kill a child. Name, please, the children whom you would be most willing to kill.
A Third Ethics Part 2: Evolving a Worldview to Encompass the World We Impact