A Week To Remember

This is a potent week, with below zero temperatures here in the mts., and deep cold around other parts of the country. The very cold temperature really demands my attention in every moment that I am walking out on the land. Even the dogs find long walks not as much fun even though they wear “fur coats”.

It’s a week to pay close attention to the fire, as we do our best to keep the house warm enough to avoid freezing pipes, and other discomforts that can come about. So my awareness is keenly focused on the fire and on keeping our water, liquid.

This week is also potent considering the significant events contained therein: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday and the Inauguration.

As imperfect and human as he was, Dr. King embodied true leadership and genius. Recently, my husband found a speech given by Dr. King, on April 4, 1967, at Riverside Church in NYC. Its title was: “Beyond Vietnam: Breaking the Silence”. Dr. King spoke at that time to a gathering of the group, Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam. This group had made a statement previously, containing the following words: “A time comes when silence is betrayal.”

When he considered those words, Dr. King says he was in agreement with the sentiment. He had found that the time had indeed come for him to break the silence if he was to keep his integrity intact.

Here is the speech: http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45a/058.html Go to the link and read it. It is very long, but there is NOTHING in this speech, long as it is, that does NOT apply to our current misadventure in Iraq. I have to ask myself today after spending the day yesterday contemplating Dr. King’s words and ideas, if we have perhaps reached this same “fulcrum” moment again, this time regarding the Iraq war.

Mr. Bush wants us to accept that the moment of accountability has passed and that his so-called "election victory" proves it; that the American people have ratified the war and policies contained therein. But I won't give up my right to ask the hard questions of myself and I encourage others to reject these easy answers Mr. Bush would like us to accept. Look within for your own answers, as Dr. King did.

"A time comes when silence is betrayal."

Is this the moment when we MUST take responsibility for what we know? Could it be true that this is the moment when we have to admit that we know enough to know better than to remain silent- in the face of all the obfuscation, ever-changing reasoning, outright lies, and half-truths promoted by the media on behalf of the administration and accepted by fellow citizens as good (?) reasons to lay waste a country full of communities like our own; communities made up of elders like our own grandparents, families like our own, children like our own?

Has the time finally come to reject silence and its' insidious, implicit acceptance of America’s National Might reducing Iraq to so much rubble, swept away by EQUAL tyranny to any committed by Saddam Hussein, and stamped with the prideful: “Made in the USA” label? Lest righteousness overtake honesty, we must admit: Americans, some of whom serve the current administration, installed Saddam Hussein, a petty dictator. See: http://www.subliminalnews.com/archives/000019.php

My husband found a stream of the aforementioned and above-linked lesser-known King speech last night online at an alternative radio station website. I was grateful to hear the recording of Dr. King delivering this speech. I hope you will take some time today or whenever you have the chance, to read it at the link I provided. Feel free to take breaks to really allow the words to percolate and infuse your day and being with their meaning.

Thanks for reading this and the speech. I have actually posted the link here before (see “Down by the Riverside”), but find that this speech becomes more and more relevant, the deeper this administration takes the US into the abyss of war, possibly without end, for profit. Yes, there IS a time, when silence becomes betrayal and (I add) complicity.

Ironically, Mr. Bush made a speech praising Dr. King and his work. See here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/01/20050117-2.html
Yes, Mr. Bush spoke well of Dr. King, and spoke with conviction about Civil Rights, and yet claimed his recent so-called election victory having disenfranchised hundreds of thousands of Americans- many of color- AGAIN!

Empty words, Mr. Bush.

Let’s remember too, that the cost of the upcoming Inaugural “doings” could have fed many, sheltered many who are homeless, cold and hungry this winter, here in the most wealthy country on Earth.

For shame, Mr. Bush.

“A time comes when silence is betrayal.”

Whom does the silence betray? American troops and their families, our children, and ourselves.

May we each find the true and courageous leader within ourselves and (continue to) speak out at every opportunity, because from where I sit, it doesn't look as though we have much more to lose...except our integrity, the future, and any chance for peace on the planet.