Categoria: Idiomas

The Longest Journey: to our own heart

Leonardo Boff4 Comentários

C. G. Jung,  the great expert of the meanderings of the human psyche, observed: the journey to our own center, to our own heart, can be longer and more dangerous than a trip to the Moon.  Our inner being is inhabited by angels and demons; tendencies that can lead to madness and death, and energies that are conducive of ecstasy and communion with the Whole.

There is a question that has never been resolved among students of the human condition: what is the base structure of the human being? There are many schools of thought, but it would be beside the point to enumerate them all now.

Getting directly to the point, I would say it is not reason, as is commonly held. Reason does not erupt, it is not the first to appear.  Reason refers to more primitive dimensions of our human reality, those which nourish and permeate all its expressions. Kantian pure reason is an illusion. Reason always comes impregnated with emotion, passion and interest. To know is always to enter in an interested and affective communion with the object of knowledge.

More than ideas and visions of the world, passions, strong feelings, and germinal experiences are what move us and cause us to act.  They lift us, make us face danger, and even risk our own lives.

The basis seems to be cordial, sensible and emotional intelligence. Its biological roots are the most ancestral, linked to the emergence of life, 3.8 billion years ago, when the first bacteria burst onto the evolutionary scene and began to interact chemically with the environment in order to subsist. This process deepened, millions of years ago, when the limbic brain of mammals appeared; the brain which is the root of caring, tenderness, affection and love for the young, gestated in the bosom of this new species of animals to which we humans also belong. In us, it has reached the self conscious and intelligent phase. All of us are linked to this first tradition.

Western thought, logic-centric and anthropocentric, put affection under suspicion, with the pretext that it harmed the objectivity of knowledge.  It led to excess, namely, rationalism, that produced in some sectors of culture a kind of lobotomy, this is, a total insensitivity in the face of human suffering, the suffering of other beings and of Mother Earth. Pope Francis, in Lampedusa, in front of African immigrants, criticized the globalization of insensitivity, that is incapable of feeling compassion and of crying.

But it could be said that, starting with European romanticism (with Herder, Goethe and others), the sensible intelligence began to make a comeback. Romanticism is more than a literary school; it is a manner of perceiving the world, our belonging to nature, and the integration of human beings into the great chain of life (Löwy and Sayre, Rebelión y melancolía, Vozes, 28-50).

In current times, affection, feelings and passion (pathos) have been gaining centrality. This step is now imperative, because with just reason (logos) we cannot confront the grave crises that life, humanity and the Earth are experiencing. Intellectual reason needs to be united with emotional intelligence, without which we could not build an integrated social reality with a human face. The heart of the heart cannot be reached without passing through affection and love.

Among many other important data, it is worth, however, noting one, for its relevance and for the great tradition it enjoys: it is the structure of desire that defines the human psyche. Starting with Aristotle, passing through Saint Augustine and the Medievals, such as Saint Bonaventure (he calls Saint Francis vir desideriorum, a man of desires), through Schleiermacher and Max Scheler in modern times, and culminating with Sigmund Freud, Ernst Bloch and Rene Girard most recently, all affirm the centrality of desire.

Desire is not just any other impulse. It is a motor that energizes and sets all psychic life in motion. It functions as a principle, so well expressed by philosopher Ernst Bloch as the hope principle. By its nature, desire is infinite and confers an infinite character on the human species.

Desire makes existence dramatic and, sometimes, tragic. When it is fulfilled, it provides an unparalleled happiness. But on the other hand, it produces a grave disillusionment when the human being identifies a finite reality as the infinitely desired object. It can be a beloved person, an always desired profession, a property, a tour around the world or a new model of cellular phone.

Before long, those desired realities seem illusory, and only aggravate the inner emptiness, which is as great as the greatness of God. How can one emerge from this impasse, which tries to equate the infinite desire with the finite nature of reality, and wanders from one object to another, without ever finding repose? The human being must seriously ask this question:  What is the true and hidden object of our desire? I dare to answer: it is the Being and not the entity, the Whole and not the part; it is the Infinite and not the finite.

After much pilgrimage, the human being is led to undergo the cor inquietum experience of Saint Augustine, the tireless man of desire and untiring pilgrim of the Infinite. In his autobiography, Confessions, Saint Augustine declares with moving sentiment:

Late I loved You, oh Beauty always old and always new.  Late I loved You.  You touched me and I burn in the desire of Your peace. My cor inquietum will not rest until in You it reposes  (book X, n.27).

Here we have described the trajectory of the desire that searches for and finds its hidden object, always desired, in dreams and vigils. Only the infinite befits the infinite desire of the human being. Only then does the journey to the heart end, and the sabbath of human and Divine rest begin.

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

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.
****************************************************************

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.