Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Approaching the Spiritual Death of our Nation--But NOT THERE YET!
In a recent post on Alternet.org, Norman Solomon reminds us of a comment made by Martin Luther King Jr. in 1967, which is all the more pointed today:
"A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death."
According to Solomon's calculations, when all the ancillary programs are factored in, our nation spends something like $2 billion a day on the military. The official figure just for the war in Iraq is $10 billion a month. These are numbers it's hard to wrap our minds around. $10 billion? That's $100 million dollars times 10. Every month.
And our "programs of social uplift" are being chipped away at little by little, insidiously--witness the pathetic spectacle of Medicare Part D drug coverage, otherwise known as the harassment of the elderly poor.
Solomon reminds us of Dr. King's observation in a column about hunger: he quotes news stories that tell us that "Poor nutrition contributes to the deaths of some 5.6 million children every year," and that "one in four children under age 5, including 146 million children in the developing world, is underweight."
Millions of children are dying every year from starvation, diarrhea, and other perfectly preventable diseases that could be easily remedied if the developed world were focused on the well-being of the global community, rather than on maintaining its stranglehold on trade and commerce through the injudicious and very expensive use of force.
And no, this wouldn't have to lead to over-population that would hurt us all. As so many studies have shown, in a healthy, educated society, the birth rates go down. If people's first and second babies can be expected to survive into adulthood, the necessity of having that fourth and fifth child disappears. If women are able to work and participate in the political life of their communities, they are more likely to use contraception.
And no matter what conservatives say, preventing an unwanted pregnancy by using contraception is far better than letting children suffer and die needlessly by the millions, every year, as is currently the case.
Are we "approaching spiritual death" as a nation, as a global society? I'd have to say yes. But we're not there yet--if we were, it would be impossible for me to be writing this today. There is still plenty of room and plenty of time to turn this ship around, and there are many people working very hard to do so.
This weekend there will be a huge spiritual activism conference in Washington D.C. organized by Rabbi Michael Lerner of Tikkun and many other spiritual progressives. Rabbi Lerner's "Spiritual Covenant with America" will be presented to the U.S. Congress. This remarkable document should be read--indeed, studied--by everyone who is serious about reviving the suffering patient that is our country.
The principles laid out in the covenant are not new, but they are radical and profound. "Institutions, corporations, legislation, social practices, our health care system, our education system, our legal system, our social policies" should be judged "not only by how much money or power they generate, but also by how much love and compassion, kindness and generosity, ethical and ecological sensitivity, and by how much they nurture within us our capacity to respond to other human beings as embodiments of the sacred and to respond to the universe with gratitude, awe and wonder at the grandeur of all that is."
The covenant lays out specific ways to begin to approach these lofty goals, with "talking points" for discussing the issues with liberals, conservatives, Congresspeople, journalists, friends and family.
The scope of the conference this weekend gives me hope that we can turn this ship around, and bring our country's actions back into alignment with spiritual values that make sense. Millions of children today, and millions of those as yet unborn, are counting on us to create a human society that they can join with pride. We can't let them down!
