[Oe List ...] {Spam?} Re: Notes on George Walters' spin on Order Beginnings

Fri Jul 13 13:48:12 EDT 2007

I add my best wishes and regards to all who gather, on behalf of,  
this Sunday at Abbey North.  How I'd love to be there too!
Yes, we are still people of the question, as one of our colleagues  
said a few years back.
Thanks Janice, for taking notes on George's terrific TMJ.
Grace & Peace, Ellen Howie
On Jul 13, 2007, at 11:40 AM, Janice Ulangca wrote:

> Colleagues - Yesterday I visited for the first time and registered  
> on the Repository.  It's at http://twiki.wedgeblade.net   It lets  
> you do amazing things - after some practice, which I need.
>
> On the Repository, I listened to George Walters' spin at the  
> Springboard Gathering in Denver in April.  It took awhile to  
> download, tho I have broadband (Road Runner) cable access - maybe  
> 5? minutes.  I was so impressed (and addressed) that I listened  
> again and took notes.  What he said really nails some things about  
> the transition and re-envisioning the future that's going on now -  
> so I thought I'd pass along the notes. If I got something wrong,  
> George (or anyone else who was there), correction is welcome.   
> Visit the Repository to see his board image and hear the whole talk.
>
> Beginning Sunday there will be another Springboard Gathering at  
> Abbey North, the John Patterson home near Toronto.  I wish them  
> Godspeed, and look forward to hearing about their work.
>
> Janice Ulangca
>
> -------------
> Order Beginnings
> Notes from a talk by George Walters
> Denver, CO April, 2007
>
> (George begins by saying that this is a talk for those with some  
> history,
> though others are welcome to listen.  Janice understood this as "I'm
> not gonna try to de-jargonize this or try to make it plain for the  
> whole
> world - it's tricky enough to talk about all this without that  
> translation!")
>
> Re Care, Courage, Creativity:
> Care has to do with the Indicative (Janice says "which I understand  
> as 'what's really there', as opposed to 'what I wish were there' ".)
> Courage  is Nothing to lose, or Audaciousness (Janice adds "as an  
> operating style")
> Creativity  has to do with the Imperative - it's the flip side of  
> the Indicative.  The Imperative requires corporateness and  
> discipline if creativity is to be molded into something effective -  
> if forms are to make it real.
>
> Illumination is required, to deal with the contradiction.  What  
> illumination is about is exposing the Indicative so that the  
> Imperative can arise.
>
> We have the being-ness - we don't have to create it.  What we don't  
> know is the shape it needs to take. I thought about calling it New  
> Order, New Guild - but decided to call it the New Thingamajig -  
> because we don't know what it will be.
>
> MARKS OF THE NEW THINGAMAJIG (TMJ)
> - It's got to be Global.
> - Covenanted.
> - It's like a Guild - but more of a Virtual Community.
> - There will be a Common Vision - an over-arching and driving  
> awareness
>   of what we're all about.  The last image like this that captured  
> me was
>   de Chardin's "Our task is to build the earth."  But that image is  
> too small -
>   we have to include the whole universe.
>   Only as we're able to align what we're about, with what the  
> universe is
>   about - with what we used to call "The activity of God" is about  
> - with
>   what the endlessness of the creative process is about - (will we  
> have
>   a vision big enough).  This includes the indellible fact that we  
> would all
>   like to forget:  that we all will pass away.
> - This TMJ needs a framework. Perhaps it will look like a retreat  
> center.
>   I never liked the idea of "retreating" - but this would be  
> "retreat in order
>   to attack".  A way to reframe - refocus -   re-think-through - so  
> we're
>   able to answer the next big question coming up, in order to charge
>   the next windmill effectively.
> - This TMJ has to have strategic focus - can't just be shotgun stuff.
>   Though there may be a shotgun aspect to it at times - fire and see
>   who screams because one of the pellets hit them.
> - This TMJ sings New Songs and has New Poetry, but hasn't forgotten
>   the Old Songs and Old Poetry.  It's constantly creating new  
> rationales,
>   but it hasn't forgotten Plato and Aristotle or the great fathers  
> of the church.
>   It has roots and tentacles.
> - It has some kind of corporate office when it gathers.  (Maybe),  
> "Well,
>   here we are.  What do you think we should do?"  (George asks for a
>   response from the group, and they say together:  "We don't know -  
> what
>   do YOU think?")  In a time of a kind of question-mark - that's a  
> damned
>   good little corporate office.
> - What we DO know is that this TMJ is not about ready, shoot, aim.
>   We've learned to manipulate contradictions, proposals, (methods)
>   and we've gotten so good at it that we can make them come out
>   any way we want.  We've got to get beyond that - and that's gonna
>   take work.  I suspect it's gonna take a lot of silence.
> - Its members have a locally-grounded personal practice.
> - Its members are grounded in action at the local level, addressing
>   real human contradictions.
> - These will be people that understand that this ranges from your
>   parakete to the universe.  You don't leave your parakete out, you
>   just put it in context.
>
> So what's the next 30 years?  I don't have a clue.
>
>
> **************************
> Janice Ulangca
> 3413 Stratford Drive
> Vestal, NY  13850
> 607-797-4595
> aulangca at stny.rr.com
> ***************************
>
>
>
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