Ghosting God, Ghosting Self
Day 38
“Hear the word, people of Israel; God is angry with the inhabitants fo the land because there is no truth, no kindness, no knowledge of God in the land.”(Hosea 4:1). I am quoting this verse today because, again, it is a great descriptor of where we are at, as a country, as human beings. Since the “days of yore”, the bastardization of “truth, kindness, knowing God” has been the achilles heel of humanity. While we don’t know how bad this bastardization was in the times of Hosea, the rest of the prophets, Jesus, it seems from the writings we have, today’s reality is not a new one. People have, from the beginning of time, tried to hide from the truth, from the consequences of their actions, blame another for their actions(thank you Josef Goebbels, Stephen Miller, Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu, etc). “When will we ever learn” asks Pete Seeger in his 1955 song “Where have all the Flowers gone?”
Imagine this, some 71 years ago, when there was no ‘war’ raging, Seeger had the foresight, the spiritual vision to ask the question that we the people are still running away from. The midterm elections are the latest measuring stick of whether we are going to respond to the call of God, the call of Hosea, the call of “when will ever learn” or continue to run and hide, ala Adam and Eve. The assault on “truth, kindness, knowledge of God” has been going on for a long time, since the founding fathers, in their desperate need to keep the South in the newly formed United States, agreed that Black people were to be counted as 3/5’s of a person! WHAT THE FUCK!! These ‘good christian white men’ from the South and the North could put their hand on the Bible and do this? This is an example of “no knowledge of God in the land”. That, after the Civil War and the 14th Amendment the “carpet baggers” took over the South, the haters, the racists came back into power and the Klan, the Jim Crow era took over, negating the gains from the Civil war, by those other ‘fine christian white men’ is another example of “no knowledge of God in the land”.
Yet, in both of these examples, these liars, these charlatans, went to their priest’s, their ministers, etc to get ‘permission’ or at least a ‘pass’ to do these reprehensible deeds and the fucking clergy gave it to them, in the Name of Christ!! How low can we go- pretty far down, we the people both then and now are refusing to have “knowledge of God” in our land and foolishly, recklessly believe the fate of all others who tore apart the 3rd Commandment, won’t happen to us! Talk about hubris, stupidity, being blinded by the gold we seek and the toys we believe fervently will fix us!
Our country was founded on the principle of “religious freedom”, that fought one another for the dignity of all human beings, we still have not reckoned with the truth that women are also equally dignified and worthy, that Black and Brown people deserve the same rights, dignities as everyone else, that Jews are not to be continually hated. In order to shy away from our purposeful “not have knowledge of God” some of we the people are rewriting the story of our birth, the difficult growing pains of a new nation that wrestled with one another to find the next right action to take. That we are being HIJACKED by the Unchristian nationalists, the white supremacists, the descendants of the Klan, the followers of the fascists like Coughlin, Lindbergh, Ford, et al is INSANE! Yet, here we are. The question that should be searing our the foreskins of our hearts is: AD MATAI, for how long will we the people continue to run away from and hide from God, the “knowledge of God” that is within us?
Be it at the Bridge Club, the golf course, at home, with friends, this is the question that haunts me, gives me indigestion, a bad conscience: Am I “knowing God” in this moment, am I bringing God into this experience? I am, at times, oblivious to both the question and diving into my “knowledge of God” so I can better deal with the experience I am in. Each of these times has proved to be disastrous for me and those around me!! Yet, it still happens and today’s reminder from Hosea is what will help me stay aware of God being right here with me, whispering into my ears through my soul/gut what the next right action to take is and then I have to listen!! OY, what an order!! And, I know it is doable because for the past 39 years, little by little, I have increased my “knowledge of God” and, as a friend of mine and I were saying-“You can’t get here(where we are today) from our beginnings:)
ACTION STEPS:
Do a daily inventory, for 3-7 days, of when you are activating and living in your “knowledge of God” and when you are activating and living in your “Not Knowledge of God”
How are you, in your progressiveness, conservatism, denying the validity, the dignity, the worth, the uniqueness of another because, ‘they ain’t like me, they ain’t my people’?
What is your response to Pete Seeger’s question: Have you learned?
GOD BLESS, STOP GHOSTING GOD, GHOSTING SELF, rabbi mark