- Guy Standing: “Collective action remains the best way of renewing the march towards the great trinity of liberty, equality, and solidarity.” – Guy Standing Continue reading
solidarity
Second Transformation
Paraphrased from Theodore Wiesner
“We come to experience poverty and oppression not only as an individual problem but also as a structural one. Poverty is the result not so much of the lack of talent or drive of individuals as it is of conscious political and economic policies.
One Voice
By Roger Kamenetz
One voice in bitterness, one voice in joy.
One voice explaining, one voice complaining.
One voice in the ecstasy of having not.
This makes five. Continue reading
Unity of All Life
May the winds, the oceans, the herbs, and night and days, the mother earth, the father heaven, all vegetation, the sun, be all sweet to us.
Let us follow the path of goodness for all times, like the sun and the moon moving eternally in the sky. Continue reading
Solidarity 101
Activity: Invite participants to share initial thoughts on what solidarity is/means/looks like. How can we live it out if we don’t know what it means or what it looks like?
Experiencing Pity
Begin with an example of poverty/suffering.
Discuss:
- What thoughts come to mind on the idea of pity? Is it a positive or negative to pity someone?
- Does pity motivate your service? If someone were to accuse you of serving out of pity, how would you respond?
- Have you seen/heard pity expressed at your service site? How have you addressed this? Continue reading
You Did it to Me
“For I was hungry and you gave me food; I was thirsty and you gave me drink; I was a stranger and you made me welcome; naked and you clothed me; sick and you visited me; in prison and you came to see me. . . . I tell you solemnly, in so far as you did this to one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did it to me.” -Matthew 25:35-40 (Christian scripture)
Love the Whole World
“Love the whole world as if it were yourself; then you will truly care for all things.” -Tao-te-ching 13:4 (Classical Chinese text)
That is Me
By Guy Farmer
Blissfully easy,
Categorizing a
Human being as
Defective, lazy,
Unworthy of care,
Compassion.
Cruel exercise,
Rendering a person
Featureless,
Expendable,
Trash decomposing
In a gutter.
Crucial shift
From apathy, scorn
To compassion,
Understanding,
That is me
But for chance.
Incarnation
By Sr. Simone Campbell
Let gratitude be the beat of our heart,
pounding Baghdad rhythms, circulating
memories, meaning of the journey.
Let resolve flow in our veins,
fueled by Basra’s destitution, risking
reflective action in a fifteen-second world.
Let compassion be our hands,
reaching to be with each other, all others
to touch, hold heal this fractured world.
Let wisdom be our feet,
bringing us to the crying need
to friends or foe to share this body’s blood.
Let love be our eyes,
that we might see the beauty, see the dream
lurking in the shadows of despair and dread.
Let community be our body warmth,
radiating Arab energy to welcome in the foreign
stranger—even the ones who wage this war.
Let us remember on drear distant days,
we are a promised Christmas joy
we live as one this tragic gifted life—
We are the Body of God!
Sr. Simone Campbell, SSS is a Catholic sister, lawyer, and lobbyist known as an outspoken advocate for social justice. This poem was written after she visited Iraq soon before the U.S. invasion.