S Y D N E Y   G O O D W I L L   N E W S L E T T E R

PO Box 627, Caringbah NSW 1495
Tel: (02)9540 2391 Fax: (02) 9524 0025
www.sydneygoodwill.org.au

No 259 / November 2008

Dear Friends,

There’s a deep welling up of a desire for truth. It appears in the exploration of motives during election campaigns – such as we are witnessing in the USA. We see it also in the analysis of where economic management has fallen down. Both these areas of focus are windows into the whole planetary life – how the needs of all are known and served by a representative body politic; how the distribution of life resources is directed and what it reveals about our essential values and our very identity as a species. The truth behind outer appearances is becoming so potently present and human sensitivity so much more fine-tuned to it that it is more immediately discernable than ever before.

Despite our long love affair with glamour, image and illusion we have – as a species and after trying out a myriad of guises – found that none of our previous “identities” really fits our sense of being. We keep discovering that we, together with the other kingdoms and the world as a whole, are more than we ever thought. We are discovering that we are more than the sum of our parts, that we are one “whole”, and that the truth looks vastly different from that point of view – that it is only from outside the most expansive view or deeply from inside the smallest part that we can begin to really see the truths that underlie our universe.

At the same time there is a shift and a sharing of responsibility for the life of not only those nearest to us but of the entire living network of which we are a part. The US presidential election has drawn not only more voluntary involvement than ever before but has deeply concerned the rest of the world because we realise the interconnection of all the nations, all the peoples and all the kingdoms within the planet. The issues now are either life-sharing or life threatening – on a planetary scale.

When the astronauts first sent back pictures of our beautiful planet from the moon, we began to realise something of these truths. That dawning is still rippling through human consciousness. High points within the ongoing revelation include: the devastation of an exploding atom; the realisation of the global nature of climate change and the part of all species in the balance of our ecology; the shared effect of changes in the world economy. We are no longer blind to the essential truth of our oneness, a truth which rises like a brilliant Sun illuminating and enlightening all. In that light we realise that an exploding nuclear device, a failed economy, an endangered species, a drought is not a local concern but something which diminishes the whole. In the 17th Century John Donne wrote of this realisation in his Meditation XVII, Devotions upon Emergent Occasions:

"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee..."

We are indeed at the beginning of a great “Emergent Occasion”. We are discovering that the material world is as ephemeral as the imagination and that the forces that drive life’s expression all share the same reservoir of resources – finite within the “ring-pass-not” of our planetary home which exists by the grace of the universe of which it is a part. All past solutions, objectives and processes of operation are being overwhelmed and negated by the realisation that everything we do affects everything else – that we are agents of a great Whole. We are hearing the death knell of individual ambition, competition, exploitative authority and greed. We are in the birth throes of service, co-operation, consultation and self-sacrifice to the glory of the whole in which all things are sacred.

We are both affected by and affect the forces that drive our planetary life. These forces are part of a solar system (a system of the soul) which in turn is affected by its interrelation with the galaxy and a still greater centre around which our universe revolves. In a small corner of a recent Sunday paper the following article appeared:

“A small NASA spacecraft embarks on a two-year mission … to give scientists their first view of the happenings at the edge of the solar system. The Ibex probe, short for Interstellar Boundary Explorer, will study a chaotic region in space where the solar wind from the sun clashes with cold gases from interstellar space. The solar wind, a stream of charged particles spewing from the sun at 1 million miles (1.6 million kilometers) per hour, carves out a protective bubble around the solar system. This bubble known as the heliosphere shields against most dangerous cosmic radiation that would otherwise interfere with human spaceflight. Scientists recently discovered that the solar wind pressure is at its weakest level in 50 years, although the exact reason remains a mystery. Ibex could help confirm whether the heliosphere is shrinking. Observations from Ibex should help researchers in ‘unlocking the secrets of this important interaction between the sun and the galaxy,’ said David McComas of the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. …The probe carries two sensors that will collect information about the solar wind's mass and energy from all directions….”

As human consciousness reaches and fulfils its destiny within the “ring-pass-not” of the planet the next frontiers are opening into the solar system and beyond. At the same time the power of a single moment can bring potent transformation. In his book, Everything is Connected, Daniel Barenboim writes of the inspiring experiment of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra:

“Our intention … was to start a dialogue, to take a single step forward and to find common ground between estranged peoples. With excitement we witnessed what happened when an Arab musician shared a music stand with an Israeli musician, both trying to play the same note with the same dynamic, the same stroke of the bow, the same sound, the same expression. They were trying to do something together about which they were both passionate because, after all, indifference and music-making cannot coexist. …. The fundamental principle of the orchestra was quite simple: once the young musicians agreed on how to play even just one note together, they would not be able to look at each other in the same way again. …. The …Orchestra is, of course, unable to bring about peace. It can, however, create the conditions for understanding without which it is impossible even to speak of peace. People have often called this a wonderful example of tolerance, a term I dislike, because to tolerate something or somebody implies an underlying negativity. Goethe expressed this succinctly when he said: ‘To merely tolerate is to insult; true liberalism means acceptance’. True acceptance, I might add, means to acknowledge the difference and dignity of the other. In music, this is represented perfectly by counterpoint or polyphony. Acceptance of the freedom and individuality of the other is one of music's most important lessons.”

The following Rules for the Road provide a guide for the new civilisation entering through “emergent occasions”:

1. The Road is trodden in the full light of day, thrown upon the Path by Those Who know and lead. Naught can then be hidden, and at each turn upon that Road a man must face himself.
2. Upon the Road the hidden stands revealed. Each sees and knows the villainy of each. And yet there is, with that great revelation, no turning back, no spurning of each other, no shakiness upon the Road. The Road goes forward into day.
3. Upon that Road one wanders not alone. There is no rush, no hurry. And yet there is no time to lose. Each pilgrim, knowing this, presses his footsteps forward, and finds himself surrounded by his fellowmen. Some move ahead; he follows after. Some move behind; he sets the pace. He travels not alone.
4. Three things the Pilgrim must avoid. The wearing of a hood, a veil which hides his face from others; the carrying of a water pot which only holds enough for his own wants; the shouldering of a staff without a crook to hold.
5. Each Pilgrim on the Road must carry with him what he needs: a pot of fire, to warm his fellowmen; a lamp, to cast its rays upon his heart and show his fellowmen the nature of his hidden life; a purse of gold, which he scatters not upon the Road, but shares with others; a sealed vase, wherein he carries all his aspiration to cast before the feet of Him Who waits to greet him at the gate—a sealed vase.
6. The Pilgrim, as he walks upon the Road, must have the open ear, the giving hand, the silent tongue, the chastened heart, the golden voice, the rapid foot, and the open eye which sees the light. He knows he travels not alone.