Global Centrum                                                                  T­377­JAS
Chicago                                                                         10­10­75



TO DEAL WITH THE WHOLE
TO CARE FOR THE WHOLE
TO HOPE IN THE WHOLE


I really have two introductions tonight. The first one is that we are in a time of resurgence, resurgence in the sense that we are beyond naiveté, idealism or cynicism. The time of resurgence is now. At this moment it is going on. Ours is the task to create the future. We may not understand what that would be, but Chardin's words come back to me: "Ours is the task to build the earth." The strategy for living in this kind of world with this task is the three campaigns: that of Global Social Demonstration, Global Community Forum or Town Meeting, and Intra-Global Movement. These particular strategies are to release people from a lost vision and a lost hope into the resurgence that is actually present in order that they may create the future.

Now we cannot talk about these strategies or, indeed, about resurgence or our task, without the profundities underlying them. Wherever we go, all of these strategies must touch the profound or else we lapse into just doing good things. Resurgence does not allow us to lapse. Resurgence is pushing us into the comprehensive world, wherever we are. If you and I go along and try to play at being isolated individuals or even an isolated world, an energy crisis comes up and suddenly shows us the interrelatedness of the whole world and makes us comprehensive whether we want to be comprehensive or not. The only way to deal with that issue is to respond to it comprehensively. In other words, that is the world we live in. We have no other way to go except to be comprehensive, and the profundity of consciousness is shoved into the depth. We see that there is a way to deal with the whole, there is a way to care for the whole, and there is a way to hope in the whole. That is my first introduction.

My second introduction...is James Bishop...

(James Bishop) I should tell you about the Community Forum Canada that I went to in Montreal. It was in French. It was absurd to go to a meeting in French when I had not spoken any French since I was in high school, but I found out I could make out pretty well most of the time except in some of the workshops. Then at about 4:00 in the afternoon I went to the registration desk and I said, "Avons nous dans cette 'ecole un telephone, s'il vous plats?" And they said "I haven't seen one on this floor but try upstairs." It was really a fine fine meeting. For those people, who were from a rundown, rather old, back section of Montreal, the address of the social process triangles and the methods of building the future was something amazing.

One of the sponsor dynamics was the local Catholic Church. It was the weekend of their 30th anniversary. They had a list of the curées since 1675 on the wall along with the CFC decor. We thought that you would like to hear about the song written in French: there are four stanzas about the tradition and the olden days, and then three verses about nowadays. The name of the song is called "Le Joyeux Promeneur" and one verse was that they needed a shopping center near at hand end that river pollution is a problem. A year and a half ago they paid thousands of dollars to survey the parish. On Sunday the orchestrator said "How come we spent all this time and money last year to learn all that about the problem and we didn't even get a song?" The song really seemed to be the event of the day. I literally saw two or three men my age or older whose eyes were moistened to the point of tears during that song. What the last line of the chorus says is "I'm beginning to love you," and somebody said on Sunday, "I'm only just finding out that I love to live here." They sang the song again in the 300th anniversary Mass of the Catholic Church on Tuesday. The orchestrator said that he has begun to work with a group of city officials and citizens of the community, which is the first time that that has ever happened. It was a great event, and I recommend that you come to a Town Meeting (and one that you can really understand.)

(Joseph Slicker) There is a way to deal with the whole, and Town Meeting, CFC or Community Forum around the world, is the awakenment into that relationship. Town Meeting is "awakenment." Town `Meeting or CFC is an event; it is a happening. It is not getting better knowledge although that may take place, it is not a social reformulation project. You are not trying at this particular moment to do anything but have a happening in the midst of people's lives. It is a happening in the depth of the spirit. You and I wonder if we can make any difference to the world. Are we just a monkey on a string, being pulled by this accident or that happening, or is it actually possible to enter in and create our destiny? In the midst of these questions, the Town Meeting is a transformation. It is unlimited acknowledgment that one can live before the comprehensive, can deal with the whole, and can genuinely respond to the whole. Global Community Forum is a method, not content, but a method that produces a happening.

Let's look at the challenges section of the morning. Years ago when we first began asking people about problems and issues in 5th City, one woman talked about nothing but the broken glass out on her sidewalk. What are the issues in 5th City? Broken glass. What are the depth problems under the issues? Broken glass. That was the only way she could talk about it. So you knew that you not only had to take account of that but also had to devise some way by which that could be put into a comprehensive whole. Now on the other side of a number of years of work, including the Social Process Triangles, the challenges are put in such a way that the issues become comprehensive before those social process triangles and the future of the challenges is actually challenging us. Something great happens to the participants no matter where they start.

In the interlude you pick up that happening of the comprehensiveness coming into focus around the way they articulate their issues. The interlude is an act of some kind; sometimes it is a band marching through or a combo, or something that brings all sorts of delight into that situation (regardless of whether the alderman speaks or not.) If the insides of you could talk at that moment, they would say something like this: "Look what we did"' We have looked at the issues tearing our lives but we have held them before the comprehensive, and we have been genuinely dealing with them; maybe for the first time this community and we as individuals have been dealing with what is actually facing us in its totality.

Then we move into proposals in the afternoon. Out of those issues comes a vision of being intensely engaged in the midst of meeting the challenges that are comprehensively grounded in this particular locality. Here again they respond to what is impinging upon them in the total, the comprehensive.

Then comes the big dramatic event at the end of the day: the story, the song, the slogan, that are spoken, sung, and specified at the end of the plenary, which brings it all together. That is the climax. At that point you can say the happening has taken place, and it is the happening that you are after. Some of you old revolutionaries might look over their challenges and proposals and say "I could do a better job if I had been doing that," or some new workshop leader who has worked and worked and worked -­you would say missed the point here and there. Or perhaps the MC muddled through something. Now mind you, all of that should not take place, but that is beside the point if the happening takes place. In the final plenary they celebrate who they are and the future they have participated in creating. In other words, they are living effectively for one day. They are living authentically the happening that has taken place in their lives.

Global Community Forum, though, is not just an isolated experience of the individual. It is an experience of the community, however it is represented, and that is the reason for the 5000 across the continent. For one percent of the population systematically throughout the continent, a new practical vision is unveiled that is actually coming into being in the midst of the people's lives. It alters the very social fabric of the nation, because that kind of increase in consciousness furthers the resurgence already going on in our lives. This is the kind of national happening that you will be after both in the Untied States and Canada. But that in itself would not be sufficient, for GCF is a revolutionary strategy for the world. You have awakenment procedures which you can articulate in language everyone knows. You can talk to local man no matter where he is and that allows all people to participate in this awakenment process. This means that you and I are deciding to trust the vision of local man, not of just one person here or another person there, but the consensus of local people around the globe. And do you know, this is the first time in the history of mankind that that has ever happened or has the possibility of happening.

That is the kind of happening that  is present today. Today resurgence is pressing the need for grassroots consensus, forcing it upon us. All that is needed now is the opportunity and the method. The method is there in the Town Meeting, and the opportunity is waiting on us to decide. These methods and opportunities allow people to decide their own destiny in relationship to the whole globe and show that there is a way for people to deal with the whole  --  unlimited acknowledgment and global social demonstration.

I was in a party of people invited to visit in a home in Europe several months ago. There were several people present from large multi­national corporations. They were discussing the role of multi­nation corporations and their relationship to the society of which they are a part. The vice president of one multi­national corporation was being pressed by the others about that issue. Suddenly he burst out and said, "Well, you have to look after number one anyway." It was the wrong thing to say in that social setting and it was completely out of place with the way the conversation was going. There was a very embarrassing silence while no one knew quite what to do and I thought I would risk a little bit so I said, "I don't believe that." Well, there was still more silence. Finally his wife said, "Well, thank you." That released the conversation again. They began to talk about the shift in corporations, about the shift in themselves, at least from their fathers, and about their passion for what was going on, for the social fabric of our world, and what was happening in the midst of the multinational corporations and their responsibilities for society as a whole. There is a way to care for the world, to exercise that kind of universal care that was bubbling up out of them, and it is global social demonstration as a worldwide sign of human development, carried out on the local level in every time zone around the world. Again, this is the first time in the history of mankind that this kind of thing could take place. Social demonstrations being held in various cultures around the world become an unmistakable sign that global renewal is possible on the local level.

Today the world is racked with cynicism and victimization. Although we know that cynicism is not a way of life, we do not know how to break the bondage of the victimization that is about us. If we took 5th City alone, that would be enough would it not? No, for people could say around the world that 5th City is a fluke because it lies in the midst of a wealthy nation, the most wealthy nation in the world, and is probably being given money under the table to try to sustain it in some way. It is easy for the rest of the world to imagine such things. But if there is one somewhere like Majuro, well, the Trust Territory's been held down for over a hundred years; or in a place like Oombulgurri where people have been held down for several hundred years; or JeJu Do where people have not even been out of the feudal era but just a few years; or Taj Gunj where...When you can do that in every nation, every kind of culture, then people cannot make that kind of cynical remark. The only way that you and I can break the hold of "You can't do it" is to do it. That is why demonstration is the only method today that can adequately deal with the turned­in­ness of the cynicism and the victimization images.

The function of Social Demonstration is total human development. That reflects inclusive analysis of the total situation before the comprehensive. It is a cultural recovery whereby people's heritage can be picked up and shoved into the future, people's heritage in the US as well as the Aboriginals in Oombulgurri. Social Demonstration is also an invitation to that body of people as an autonomous cultural body to participate effectively in the postmodern world and the civilizing process that is taking place now. They can have the genuine possibility to participate. This is specific tactics: social tactics, economic tactics to begin to recreate the situation. The question first of all is not what needs to be done, but can you bring it about? Then, what needs to be done will take place. And there is a way to care for the world. People cannot deal with the world unless they care for the world, and people cannot care for the world unless they can deal with the world. So Global Community Forum is awakening people and releasing them to participate in social demonstration.

In Majuro where the social demonstration process is going on, they have, over the past few months, held Town Meetings in every atoll in the Marshall Islands, even including Bikini and Eniwetak which are too hot to go onto, so the people  have had to come off of them to have their Town Meeting. Every atoll. That kind of thing has to go on so that the social demonstration project can come off in all of the Marshall Islands as well as in Majuro. Social Demonstration gives them a genuine way to exercise their vocation that is awakened in them by the Town Meeting that took place.

The third great campaign is the Intra­Global Movement. We hold under that primal community, all that we call the Global Order, both symbolic and movemental, the training and spiritual prowess, the work in the metro cadre, the Guardians, etc. What that is saying is that there is a way to hope in the whole.

The Guardians are a symbol of this. People may see that they can deal with the world, that there is unlimited acknowledgment of that relationship in their lives, and they may exercise care for the whole, but unless there is a further burst of consciousness, they cannot see that there is a way to hope in the whole, a way to have unconditional expectations. Guardians, for me, are at the heart of the cadre dynamic. They represent the interface between the Movement and the world. Therefore, their further profundity of consciousness gives them hope in the world. It is not a hope that would disintegrate, with the passing of hopes here and there, for it is based on unconditional expectations. Finally, those who hope in the world are the only ones who can sustain themselves in dealing with the world and in caring for the world. What it means to deal with the world and care for the world finally can be done only when profound consciousness is grasped and one can hope for the world.

It has become apparent that you Guardians here in North America have depth counterparts in nations around the world. Maybe that is one of the reasons we have always been reluctant to call the Global Guardians to meet here. People would think you were organizing something called Guardians from the base of North America. The Guardian movement has to come up out of the local situation where they are at the interface of the movement and the world. There you have a guardian dynamic. That is taking place; that time is at hand around the world.

Joe Mathews called yesterday and said something like "Go ahead and send Guardians from North America on the consults, more than we thought at the beginning, because they can absorb them, they can take them. The Guardian dynamic is utterly crucial to what is going on in the global dimension." In other words, the greatness of the role of Guardian cannot be overestimated. What finally makes the consult happen is the guardian role of the outside, objective expertise. They are spirit people standing with the local looking at that situation and attempting to recreate it in the midst of the total. It is almost unbelieveable what has happened since the last Guardians' meeting. Just after the Guardians' meeting, we began a global trek to spot places and talk with the Movement around the globe about places where the social demonstration project could be put on. The trek came up with these eight demonstrations to be done this first year, out of the 24 demonstrations over a three­year period, so that you have an explosion in every time zone. There will be 24 of them around the globe at the end of three years.

At the summer research assembly more was done towards the launching of the 8 consults over this year. Two consults have already been held: Oombulgurri in Australia and JeJu Do, the island south of Korea. They took place with depth participation by guardians: Australian guardians and Korean Guardians with a sprinkling of global guardians from outside  their boundaries. Active preparation is going on in the remaining six. By active preparation I mean miracles going on every day. For example, in Kawangware, on the edge of Nairobi, they have talked with town people, and the town people got excited but they did not leave it there. The old elder went downtown and got the Member of Parliament who is in charge of 7 districts of which Kawangware is one, to set up a meeting there. At the meeting they collected money from the people who looked like they would not have a penny among them, for lunch for those people that came out there. These people offered to put on a project, to fund it, to back it and made available housing in that area for people to come in and live. These miracles are beginning to take place so that you have a fertile going­on-ness for the consult when it is ready.

In the area of Global Community Forum, Town Meeting, Community Forum Canada, there is the miracle of Foray 21­6. The whole continent geared up since the last Guardians' Meeting here and the summer Research Assembly, and after two weeks of preparation and three weeks on the road during that Foray in August, they had visited almost 1400 towns and communities around the continent. A miracle happened. They broke the back of the first year's goal of visiting for Town Meetings and CF's around the continent. Wherever they went, they were received. This summer we were all having such a difficult time deciding to do Town Meeting. We would say "Resurgence is not taking place. You cannot do it this way (meaning you cannot do it any way)." That is what the foray was trying to break loose. We went out visiting with our hand over our faces, and asked, "You wouldn't like to have a Town Meeting, would you?" and the guy said "Yes. Where have you been?" That kind of response was overwhelming. In fact, in one metro they said "The world is waiting for Town Meeting. That was their slogan. That actually depicted what was taking place.

Vocation is pouring out of your lives. I would say that a sign that that is going to be common all around the continent in a few months. That kind of expectation and possibility and reaping of the benefits within is going to be happening. A success like this, as you can well image, radically altered the image of Town Meeting's possibilities. The plan was for l000 this year and that is launched. The next challenge is 4000.

That is what is before us and the major contradiction seems to be very simple. One is quality. We have to set these meetings up and we have to conduct them so they will come off, because they will have people from all other little towns around. They have sponsors and authorization figures attending this Town Meeting. So if this one comes off, it is not just one coming off. It is 5, 10 or  maybe a whole state coming off. Quality is the key. Another key is catalytic sponsorship of the Town Meeting, if this is a snowball as it must for 1% of the population to be involved. We are already beginning to see snowballing taking place. What would it mean for one meeting to sire five, five to sire 25, 25 to sire 500 and so forth?

This Guardian's Meeting is dealing with the three strategies: Global Social Demonstration, Global Community Forum and Intra­Global Movement. One of the area priors was commenting that we have gone into the new year with very solid strategies. The decision of the three campaigns released us for heightened intensification, heightened emphasis, and a self-conscious bracketing of other strategies while we pour ourselves into these three. It is hard­headed, practical and profoundly grounded. At the end of this weekend, we hope to have the opportunity of concrete assignments and roles for every one to participate in before the next Guardian Meeting.

I would say that there is a new kind of decision before us, especially the Guardians. It is not something we whomped up, or thought about. It just happened. You remember what happened here last year at this particular meeting, the kind of exuberance and expectation that was reported to you out of the Majuro consult? You guardians had participated directly. I do not know how many of you there were, maybe 30, 50 or a hundred, but many more of you participated indirectly with those 30 or 50 or 100. What was going on here was a radical shift: that the Guardian had moved from waiting to be asked to participate in a movement, to taking full responsibility, along with all the rest of the staff, for whatever programatic activity or strategic thrust the Movement was making. This has come out of the turn to the world, obviously, for it puts you guardians in a different position. That is what happened last year with the Majuro reports direct engagement. The same thing happened last April. What you saw happening last year with the Majuro consult, now with the Town Meeting ­ CFC, is direct engagement that explodes in the midst of what is going on. I tend to forget the things that we did at the last meeting, but I shall never forget what happened to us. It is almost like, whereas before I have been asked to do something for the Movement, now I am part of the Movement, just like doing something for myself or my colleague. Now it is direct impingement on the world.

The Guardians find themselves now on the front lines meeting the happening that is taking place in the midst of the world. So you, as Guardians, are in a brand new role. You already have great insight into that role and you have participated in its newness. But by virtue of that newness, all of us, especially you as Guardians, have a decision on your hands about grasping our future. I would like to say "Yes, there is a way to deal with the whole, there is a way to care for the whole, and there is hope in the whole." And the Guardians can be a key sign to the world of that possibility for all mankind.

­­Joseph A. Slicker