Categoria: English

Are we but a cancer cell to be eliminated?

Leonardo Boff3 Comentários

There are those who deny the Shoah (the Holocaust – the elimination of millions of Jews in Nazi concentration camps) and there are those who deny that the Earth is undergoing climate change. The first are held in contempt by the whole of humanity, the second, who until recently smiled cynically, now see their convictions being refuted, day by day, by undeniable facts. They can only continue by coercing some scientists into refusing to divulge all they know, as various and serious alternative media have exposed. It is the maddening form of reason that seeks to accumulate wealth at all costs.

Recently, we have seen extreme events of the greatest gravity: hurricanes Katrina and Sandy in the United States, terrible typhoons in Pakistan and Bangladesh, the tsunami of South East Asia, the earthquake and resulting tsunami in Japan that dangerously damaged the nuclear plants of Fukushima, and few days ago, the devastating typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines that has left behind thousands of victims.

It is now known that the temperature of the tropical Pacific, where the major typhoons are born, normally was below 19.2° C. These maritime waters had warmed up to 25°C by 1976 and since 1997/1998, have reached 30°C. The result is great evaporation. The extreme events occurred at 26°C and above. With the warming, typhoons appear more frequently and with winds of higher velocity. In 1951 they were of 240 km/h; between 1960-1980 they rose to 275 km/h; in 2006, they reached 306 km/h and in 2013 they had risen to a terrifying 380 km/h.

In recent months, four official reports from organisms linked to the UNO carried a strong alert on the grave consequences of the accelerating global warming. It has been proven, with 90% certainty, that global warming is provoked by irresponsible human activity, and the industrialized countries.

This was confirmed in September by the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change, IPPC, comprised of more than a thousand scientists; and also by the United Nations Program for the Environment, PNUMA.  Then the International Report of the State of the Oceans decried the increased acidity which causes the oceans to absorb less CO2, and finally, on November 13, it was affirmed by the World Meteorological Organization in Geneva.  They unanimously confirm, not that we are headed towards global warming, but that we already are within global warming. If at the beginning of the industrial revolution the concentration of CO2 was of 280 ppm (parts per million), by 1990 it had risen to 350 ppm, and now it has reached 450 ppm. This year the news has been that in some parts of the planet, the 2°C barrier that could bring about irreversible damage to other living beings has already been breached.

A few weeks ago, Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the Convention of the UN on Climate Change, during a collective interview, shed tears as she decried that countries are doing almost nothing to adapt to and mitigate global warming.  In the 19th Climate Summit, in Warsaw, held from the 11th to the 22nd of November, Yeb Sano, of the Philippines, cried before the representatives of 190 countries as he recounted the horrors of the typhoon that had devastated his country, and affected his own family. Most of the delegates could not contain their own tears. But to many those were crocodile tears. The representatives already carried in their briefcases their instructions, previously prepared by their governments, and the great powers in many ways make any consensus difficult. There are also those who hold power in the world, the owners of the coal mines, many stockholders of oil or iron and steel companies, driven by carbon, of industries of assembly and others. They all want things to remain as they are. That is the worst that can occur, because then the path towards the abyss becomes more direct and fatal. Why is there such irrational opposition?

Let’s go directly to the central question: we owe this ecological chaos to our form of production, which devastates nature and feeds the culture of unlimited consumerism. Either we change our paradigm of relating to the Earth, and her natural goods and services, or we will hurtle headlong towards an encounter with disaster. The current paradigm embraces the following logic: how much can I earn, with the least investment possible, in the shortest period of time, through technological innovation and the greatest competitive capacity? Production is geared to pure and simple consumption, that generates accumulation, which is the main objective. The devastation of nature and the impoverishment of the eco-system this involves are mere externalities (they do not enter into the managerial accounting). Since the neo-liberal economy is strictly competitive and not cooperative, a war of markets, everyone against everyone else, is established. The price is paid by humans (social injustice) and by nature, (ecological injustice).

However, the Earth can no longer tolerate this total war against her. She needs a year and a half to recoup what we take from her in one year. Global warming is the fever, warning that the Earth is ill, gravely ill.

Either we begin to realize that we are part of nature, so that we may respect her as we respect ourselves, transitioning from a paradigm of conquest and domination to one of caring and coexistence, and restrain production, in respect for the natural rhythms and within the limits of each eco-system; or we must prepare for the bitter lessons Mother Earth will give us. And this does not exclude the possibility that she will no longer accept us, and will free herself from us as we free ourselves from a cancer cell. The Earth can continue, littered with corpses, but without us. May God not allow such a tragic destiny.

Free translation from the Spanish sent by
Melina Alfaro, cybermelinaalfaro@bandalibre.com,
done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU

The importance of spirituality to health

Leonardo Boff1 comentário

As a general rule, health workers have all been trained in the modern scientific paradigm that draws a complete separation between mind and body, and between human beings and nature. Thus many specialties have been created that have been very beneficial for diagnosing illnesses and also for developing the means of curing them.

Having given credit where credit is due, we cannot forget, however, that the holistic vision has been lost: the human being within a wider concept of society, of nature and of the cosmic energies; illness as a rupture of that totality, and the cure as its reintegration.

There is in us a dimension responsible for cultivating that totality, one that looks to the Structuring axis of our lives: namely, the spiritual dimension. Spirituality comes from spirit; it is the cultivation of what is proper for the spirit, its capacity to project a unifying vision, to relate with everything, to connect and reconnect all things with each other and with the Original Source of all beings.

If the spirit is relationship and life, its opposite is not matter and body, but death, as the absence of relationships. In this sense, spirituality is every attitude and activity that favors the expansion of life, the conscious relationship, open communion, profound subjectivity and transcendence as a form of being, always open to new experiences and new knowledge.

Neurobiologists and scholars of the brain have identified the biologic basis of spirituality; it is found in the frontal lobe of the brain. They discovered empirically that when global contexts are captured, or a meaningful experience of the totality is produced, or when final realities charged with meaning are approached in an existential manner (rather than as objects of study), and attitudes of adoration, devotion and respect are produced, there is always an acceleration of the periodic vibrations of the neurons in that lobe. They call this phenomenon the «God point» in the brain, or the appearance of the «mystical mind»  (Zohar, SQ: Inteligencia Espiritual, 2004). It is like an inner organ, through which the presence of the Ineffable is captured within reality.

This fact constitutes an evolutionary advance of the human being who, as a human–spiritual being, perceives the Fontal Reality sustaining all things, realizing with surprise that it is possible to dialogue and seek an intimate communion with her.  This possibility dignifies the human, because it spiritualizes and leads one to a higher level of perceiving the Link that connects and reconnects all things. The human feels a part of that Whole.

This «God point» is revealed through intangible values such as greater compassion, more solidarity, and a deeper sense of respect and dignity. To awaken this «God point», to remove the ashes with which an excessively rationalist and materialistic culture covered it, is to allow that spirituality to flourish in people’s lives.

In fact, spirituality does not consist of thinking about God, but of feeling God, through that inner organ, and experiencing God’s presence and action from the heart. We perceive God as the enthusiasm (in Greek enthusiasm means to have a god within), that transports and heals us, gives us the will to live, and is continuously creating meaningful existence.

What importance should we give this spiritual dimension in caring for health and illness? Spirituality has a healing force of its own. It is not something magic and esoteric. It is about using the energies that characterize the spiritual dimension, which is as valid as intelligence, libido, power, and affection for other human dimensions. These energies are highly positive, such as to love life, to open up to others, to establish bonds of fraternity and solidarity, to be capable of forgiveness, mercy, and indignation, when facing the injustices of this world, as Pope Francis exemplarily does.

Besides recognizing the great value of the known therapies, there is still a supplément d’âme, as the French would say, a complement to what already exists, that strengthens and enriches it with factors arising from other sources of healing. The established model of medicine does not have, of course, a monopoly on diagnosis and healing. This is where spirituality opens a path.

In the first place, spirituality strengthens in the person the confidence in the regenerative energies of life, in the competence of the physician, in the diligent caring of the nurses. We know from the profound and transpersonal psychology the therapeutic value of confidence in the normal course of life. Confidence means basically to say: life has meaning, it is worth living, has an internal energy that nourishes it, it is beautiful. This confidence pertains to a spiritual vision of the world.

Spirituality carries the conviction that the reality we experience is more than what analysis tells us. We can have access to reality though the inner senses, by intuition and the secret paths of the cordial reason. It can be seen that there is an underlying order to the sensible order, as Nobel laureate, David Bohm, the great quantum physicist, a favorite disciple of Einstein, always maintained.

This underlying order responds to the visible orders and can always bring us surprises. Often physicians themselves are surprised by the rapid healing of some patients, or how conditions normally considered to be irreversible, turn around and wind up being cured. Deep down, it is to believe that the invisible and imponderable are part of the visible and foreseeable.

Also to the spiritual world pertains the unquenchable hope that life does not end with death, but that it is transformed through it. Our dreams of returning to normal life unleash positive energies that contribute to regaining health.

A major force, however, is the faith of feeling oneself in the palm of the hand of God. To confidently turn one’s self to His will, to sincerely wish to be cured, but also to serenely accept if He calls us to Himself: this is the presence of spiritual energy. We do not die, God comes seeking us, to take us where we have always belonged, to His home, to live together with Him. Such spiritual convictions act as the springs of the waters of life, generators of healing and of life’s potency.  It is the fruit of spirituality.

Free translation from the Spanish sent by
Melina Alfaro, alfaro_melina@yahoo.com.ar,
done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.
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Recycling solid materials and people

Leonardo Boff3 Comentários

In Brasilia, Brazil, the 12th Festival of Garbage and Citizenship: Recycling for a Better World was celebrated from October 28th to 30th. There were more than one thousand collectors of recyclable materials taken from city garbage dumps, who had come from all corners of the country. I could participate emotionally, because for many years I have accompanied those who recycle materials taken from the great garbage dump of Petropolis.

Seeing the multitude that filled an immense room, embracing and meeting each other for the first time or finding each other again, happy and festive, in simple clothing, the great majority Afro-descendants, I asked myself: Who are they? Where do the come from? And it seemed that I could listen to an inner voice, like the one in the book of the Apocalypse, chapter 7,13 that said: “These are those who come from the great tribulation”, the survivors of the hard struggle for life, honored because, valiant and victorious, they often confront arduous struggles alone, to earn sustenance for their families and themselves.

In Brazil there are between eight hundred thousand and one million men and women who recycle recyclable solid materials. The increased consumption produces many recyclable residues of all types, organics and solids, such as cardboard, plastics, aluminum and glass. It is estimated that each Brazilian produces one kilogram of garbage every day, especially in the urban centers. According to the IBGE of 2008, 50% of municipalities (5507) have open space garbage dumps. There, thousands of persons, from children to the elderly, gather and select what they can, including food. That activity is extremely dangerous, because many infectious-contagious diseases can be contracted. I have seen people competing with pigs and vultures, in scenes of great inhumanity.  They are the result of the society of consumerism and waste, that has not learned to live by the four “rs”: reduce, refuse, repair and recycle.

The worst inhumanity is not being garbage recyclers and to have to live on what others throw away, but the stigma attached to these workers, who are often considered beggars and vagabonds.

At first they were totally invisible. Nobody looked at them, nor were given the slightest consideration. Later on, with the growth of their awareness, they introduced themselves as workers, who, by collecting thousands of kilograms of garbage, performed an important function: keeping the cities clean and preventing street flooding. Finally, they started organizing themselves into cooperatives and associations, and saw themselves as citizens and agents of social and environmental transformation. They gained visibility and recognition. From June 4th to 6th, 2001, they realized in Brasilia the 1st National Congress of Women and Men Recyclers, with the participation of 1600 persons. There was launched The Letter from Brasilia, where they established their identity and asserted important rights.

There was a noteworthy March in Brasilia in 2006, of 1200 people, who occupied the Square of the Three Powers, demanding their rights and public policies respecting their labors. These were won in 2009 with the Cataforte Program, that was funded on July 31, 2013, with 200 million reales set aside for the work of collecting recyclable materials, with large storehouses and transport trucks. Such measures, along with pressure on governmental entities, are in large part due to the personal interest of the Minister of the General Secretary of the Presidency, Gilberto Carvalho, who always supported the recyclers’ cause. In Brasilia, on October 30, 2013, on the occasion of the 12th Garbage and Citizenship Festival, in his name and in the name of President Dilma Rousseff, he renewed the commitment to strengthening the recyclers’ cooperatives and associations that had been and would be formed.

The 4th Festival, which took place from September 5th to 9th, 2005, was well noted, with the presence of President Lula and Danielle Mitterand, the widow of the deceased French President. The emphasis was on their basic human rights, and providing the necessary resources for the decent and secure gathering and selecting of the garbage.  An electric vehicle for recyclers, which could transport up to three tons of material for eight hours a day, was introduced there by the Itaipu Binational.

The great struggle of these workers is to keep the large enterprises, that have discovered that gathering garbage is a highly profitable business, from colluding with the public authorities to take over the services the recyclers offer, thus robbing them of their sustenance and sending them back into insecurity. The enterprises can only legitimize themselves by integrating the recyclers, without taking away the values that characterize them, such as solidarian coexistence and the bonds that come from the common belonging they have developed.

Yes, they come from the great Brazilian tribulation. They recycle not only solid materials, but people, to the extent that together they build their autonomy, rescue their dignity, and insert themselves into society as true “prophets of ecology,” and as citizens who think, debate their problems, decide their common struggles and make themselves indispensable within the type of society we have created. They deserve respect, appreciation and our full support.

Free translation from the Spanish sent by
Melina Alfaro, alfaro_melina@yahoo.com.ar,
done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.

Theology By and From the Perspective of Women

Leonardo Boff5 Comentários

Pope Francis has said that we need a more profound theology of women and their mission in the world and in the Church. That is true, but he cannot ignore that there is already a wide theological literature of the highest quality, done by women from the perspective of women, that has enormously enriched our experience of God. I myself have intensely explored the theme, and ended up writing two books: The Maternal Face of God, (1989) and Feminine-Masculine (2010), this latter one in collaboration with feminist Rosemarie Muraro. Among so many in the present, I decided to bring attention to two great women  theologians of the past, who were truly innovative: Saint Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) and Saint Juliana of Norwich (1342-1416).

Saint Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179), considered perhaps the first feminist within the Church, was an extraordinary and genial woman, not only for her times, but for all times. She was a Benedictine nun and mistress (abbess) of her Rupertsberg of Bingen convent on the river Rhine, a prophet (profetessa germanica), mystic, theologian, passionate preacher, composer, poet, naturalist, informal physician, playwright and German writer.

It is a mystery to her biographers and scholars how this woman could have accomplished all that in the narrow and machista medieval world. In every field she touched she displayed excellence and enormous creativity.  Her books are numerous, on mysticism, poetry, the natural sciences, and music. The most important, which is read even today, is Scivias Domini, (Know the Paths of the Lord).

Hildegard was above all a woman endowed with divine visions. In an autobiographical text she says: “When I was forty two and seven moths old, the heavens opened up and a blinding light of exceptional brightness flowed into my brain. And then it seared my heart and chest like a flame which did not burn, but warmed … and suddenly I understood the meaning of what was set forth in the books, that is, in the Psalms, the Gospels, and the other Catholic books of the Old and New Testament ” (see the complete text in Wikipedia, Hildegard of Bingen, with an excellent commentary and bibliography).

It is surprising that she had such knowledge of cosmology, medicinal plants, the physics of the bodies and the history of humanity. Theology speaks of the «infuse science» as a gift of the Holy Spirit. Hildegard was distinguished by such a gift.

She developed a curiously holistic vision, always connecting the human being with nature and the cosmos. In this context she speaks of the Holy Spirit as the energy that gives viriditas to all things. Viriditas comes from “verde”, green.  It means the greenness and freshness that characterizes all things penetrated by the Holy Spirit. Sometimes she speaks of the «immeasurable sweetness of the Holy Spirit, who with His grace embraces all creatures»  (Flanagan, Hildegard of Bingen, 1998, 53). Hildegard developed a humanizing image of God because He rules the universe «with might and mildness» (mit Macht und Milde) accompanying all beings with His caring hand and His loving gaze (cf. Fierro, N., Hildegard of Bingen and her vision of the Feminine, 1994, 187).

Hildegard was especially known for the medicinal methods she developed, which are still followed in Austria and Germany by some physicians. She reveals a surprising knowledge of the human body and of which active principles of the medicinal herbs are appropriate for different illnesses. Her canonization was ratified by Benedict XVI in 2012.

Another notable woman was Juliana of Norwich, in England (1342-1416). Little is known about her life, whether she was a woman religious or a lay widow. The truth is that she lived secluded, in a walled enclosure of the Church of Saint Julian. When she was 30 years old she had a grave illness that almost caused her death. At one point, for five hours she had visions of Jesus Christ. She immediately wrote a summary of her visions. And twenty years later, after having contemplated the meaning of these visions, she wrote a longer and definitive version, Revelations of Divine Love (Revelaciones del Amor Divino, London, 1952).  It is the first known text written in English by a woman.

Her revelations are surprising because they are filled with an indomitable optimism, born of the love of God. She speaks of love as happiness and compassion. She does not accept, as was a popular belief at the time, and still is among some groups, that illnesses are punishments from God. For Juliana, illness and pestilence are opportunities to know God.

Juliana sees sin as a kind of learning tool, through which God demands that we know ourselves, and seek his mercy.  She says more:  beyond of what we call hell lies a greater reality, always victorious, which is the love of God.

Because Jesus is merciful and our beloved mother is compassionate. God Himself is the merciful Father and Mother of infinite goodness (Revelations, 119).

Only a woman could use such language of love and compassion, and call God the Mother of infinite goodness.  Thus we see once again how important the feminine voice is for a non-patriarchal, and therefore more complete conception of God and of the Spirit that flows through all life and the universe.

Many other women could be mentioned here, such as Saint Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Simone Weil (1909-1943), Madeleine Delbrel (1904-1964), Mother Teresa, and among us now, Ivone Gebara and Maria Clara Bingemer, who thought and think of faith from a woman’s perspective.  And they continue to enrich us.

Free translation from the Spanish by
Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.