Homecoming

November 2, 2011

            I arrived home from Occupy Wall Street exhausted but exhilarated.  I was delighted to find that our fledgling Occupy Nevada County was organizing new working groups and expanding its outreach into the community.  I rested for a day or so, then got to work, writing, attending meetings, demonstrating, organizing, and speaking publicly about my time in New York. 

            A high point was a “Move to Amend” public gathering on November 9 that I had organized before I left, focused on amending the constitution to abolish corporate personhood and overturn the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which allows unlimited corporate funds to flow into election campaigns.  The gathering was co-sponsored by several local groups, coordinated with national groups, and held simultaneously with over 200 similar gatherings around the country.  The campaign is ongoing (see movetoamend.org.)  A great short film about this issue is “Citizens United vs. the FEC” (at www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5kHACjrdEY).

            So now, it’s back to balance, to continuing those practices that enable me to stay grounded and follow the leading of the Spirit moment by moment.  It’s challenging, with family commitments and holidays coming, deadlines for articles, and a seemingly endless array of opportunities to contribute to the growing momentum of the movement for radical political, social, and economic change. 

            Many of us have been working on various social and environmental issues for years, making connections between issues (just follow the money), but only to see the overall situation getting worse and worse.  But now, it’s as if a “Great Awakening” is taking place, with people waking up to the extremity of our situation.  The Occupy Wall Street movement has flipped a switch, turned on the light, awakened people not only to the insanity and destructiveness of the current system, but also to the “power of the people” to change the conversation and to rise up together to call for justice.  I am immersing myself in this movement, offering what I can and learning what I can.  This is no time to sit on the sidelines—there is too much at stake, by every measure.  And at last there is an energetic, grassroots, hope-filled movement made up of autonomous groups in various locales rising up spontaneously around the world.

            Working to build a strong local Occupy movement is not as exciting or dramatic as a two-week immersion experience in New York, but it seems necessary, fulfilling, and real.  What great new friends I am making.  Some I have known before, some I have not, but we are mutually engaged in community building and organizing through direct democracy in new ways. 

            I find the Occupy movement to be filled with inspiration and hope for global transformation.  I see God working through this movement in our time.  Surely the Love that brought the Universe into existence is pulling for us, drawing us into a future that is peaceful, just, and sustainable, where mutual caring replaces greed and exploitation, where global cooperation replaces systems of domination and violence, where protection of ecosystems and species replaces the degradation of the natural world.  May it be so, and may I be so fortunate as to participate in its coming.