Spring Cleaning – Make Room for the New

Written by Joan Flanagan

Comedian George Carlin said, “That’s all your house is: a place to keep your stuff. If you didn’t have so much stuff, you wouldn’t need a house. You could just walk around all the time.”

And Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker movement said, “We must turn the other cheek, give up our cloak, go a second mile.” She was a paragon of nonviolent civil disobedience and voluntary poverty.

But how does voluntary poverty work for most of us in America who are smothered with stuff? If you want to feel freer, have more time to change the world, and get closer to your spiritual self, dump your stuff. This is the time for… Read more

International

Swine Flu: The Immigrant Blame Game Continues

Written by Stephen Piggott

As the worldwide hysteria over swine flu continues, the amount of needless attacks on immigrants continues to escalate. They are fueled by none other than the media, especially right-winged radio show hosts. Mexican officials have just announced that the country will basically shut down for the next 5 days in an effort to stop the spread of the disease. The shutdown will cost hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars, to an already crippled economy. Anti-immigrant voices however are not concerned in the least about the state of the Mexican economy and are much more concerned about making this a border security issue, even though there is much more evidence that tourists are bringing… Read more

Reflections (May 1st, 2007)

Written by Guest Blogger

By Jacquelyn Mahendra

Stroller-striped red and white reflections
Flicker fabulous, half-formed melody
Of a movement, so
This is the sound
Of a hundred thousand feet
Beating pavement

They invoke unknown protections
In the four cardinal directions, with me, here
Standing almost still in the thick of it

I, neither truly onlooker, nor activist,
Nor cameraman, I pan
To the beautiful brown babies
Flapping red-blue flags
Still knowing—well at least here is to hoping—
That you can’t argue
With a child’s smile

That, yes, we are all still flesh
And cartilage deep down- we,
Who move from excrement
To relevant,… Read more