May
2006
May 1: A Day To Remember Why We Are
As I walked in the sun down the line of march yesterday, I finally managed to ask one of the many Spanish-speaking people with me what was being shouted (I had the syllables, but not the meaning). Her English was not very good, and my Spanish was much worse, but we finally got it (and you probably already know what it is): Un pueblo unido jamas serra vencido. I’ve chanted the same thing in English, many times: A people united will never be defeated.
The march yesterday took my breath away, yet again. There are times when I truly am proud to be an American, and it is not when I am watching the President gesticulate about money and bombs on a little electronic screen. There are times when it seems so clear that what we are, what we want to be, is this: people of a hundred nations, living peacefully together, sitting on the grass, walking in the sun, learning one another’s language in fits and starts. Laughing at one another, admiring one another, being proud that the children are there, being proud at the bravery of our companions. Being proud that such brave and beautiful people are eager to walk with us.
To listen to the debate about immigration, you would think that none of this matters; that all that matters is who makes money off immigration, or who is economically injured by it. So few people seem to advance the very simple notion that if fair labor laws were fully legislated and enforced in the United States (or, can you imagine? in NAFTA members) the playing field between immigrant and non-immigrant labor would be quite level. Pouring some of our excess resources into developing the economies of our neighbor nations, rather than keeping their people far afield as reservoirs of cheap labor, is derided as the pipe dream of idealists rather than as a practical and moral solution.
Why is this? Why can we ask questions about the most important things in life only in terms of money? Why is it that the deep joy and challenge that comes of being part of a true world community goes unmeasured, unvalued, and unnoticed, if it can’t be quantified in dollars?
Jesus is very clear on this one thing: you can’t serve both God and money. Yet all our thinking, the very questions that can be asked in our nation’s public policy debates and the reasons that can be given for pursuing one course over another, are based only on wealth, its accumulation, ways in which particular individuals can hold on to as much of it as they can grab. Isn’t it necessary to begin breaking out of this iron cage? to be able to ask questions, and give answers, that can be based in other things? In valuing community, in valuing beauty and spirit, in valuing what can be shared in order to have a world where everyone has some time to sit on the grass in the sunlight, and to walk with their children down the street.
At some point, we need to stop using the language of money to create meaningful and moral public policy. We need to start using the language of justice, and of the Spirit — unabashedly different in structure and goals than the language of narrow self-interest, of the accumulation of wealth, of nationalism and of protectionism. In the end, if we are working towards the community that we truly want to be, we will need to pay attention to one of the signs that marchers proudly held as they walked down the street yesterday: God Created the World Without Borders.
Economic justice is not unlimited accumulation of wealth. We can’t have both. A community that values an individual human being for what and who they are is not a community that defines a person as producer or consumer. One is the kingdom of God; one is the kingdom of money. Which are we going to choose to be, as a people and as a nation?
I had the blessing, once again, of finding the Korean drummers in the crowd of thousands, dancing, drumming, clanging their cymbals, and chanting together with the hundreds pressing in, for four miles, “Si, se puede!” Yes, it can be done; yes, we are able; yes, the power is here. I believe we can do it; we can remember why we are a community, where the power truly lies; but we need, every day, to choose to do it. To choose to ask the questions, to be present, and to take the risk.
Because I appreciated knowing that it was Peter who wrote “Starting from Zero” I immediately scrolled to the bottom of the “Day to Remember …” piece to find out who wrote it. Is there a reason — one way or another — to sign or not sign your posts?
Claire
Hi Claire — I wrote that particular piece. Sometimes my name will appear and sometimes not — it depends on whether I’ve most recently logged in as the web administrator or as myself.
Thanks for reading!
Jenn