[Oe List ...] Prayers for Japan

Mon Mar 14 08:59:12 CDT 2011

This is the deep question of our time.

Thomas Berry asked if we would choose the technozoic or the ecozoic. Ecozoic
means house or community of life, and moving toward the ecozoic means asking
the profound question of what sustains life, seeking the profound knowledge
and doing the profound acts related to the same. Choose life.

Herman

  _____  

From: oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net [mailto:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf
Of W. J.
Sent: Monday, March 14, 2011 2:54 AM
To: Order Ecumenical Community
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] Prayers for Japan

Jaime, as one whose family had a lot to do with putting Fat Man and Little
Boy over Japan, I am totally stunned to observe that Mother Nature just
decided to take out a bunch of nukes--which were, of course, designed to be
safe in an earthquake zone. So the very smart Japanese nuclear engineers
thought. And we believed them.

Maybe it's time to reconsider human technological folly in a much broader
context--the imperiled survival of life itself--rather than just doing any
and everything we can to maintain our current and growing consumption of
energy resources at enormous risk to the planet.

Marshall

  _____  

From: Jaime R Vergara <svesjaime at aol.com>
To: oe at wedgeblade.net
Sent: Sat, March 12, 2011 10:57:48 PM
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] Prayers for Japan

Isobel,

I just kidded my Canuck neighbor here in the campus of Shenyang Aerospace
University (Mukden, Manchuria to old timers) that if the five reactors do a
meltdown, I am headed for Australia.  Then I remembered that in planet
Eaarth, we all live downwind!

I muse in our local paper, at least, once a week, usually on Mondays.  I
added this one for Tuesday

ZEN CALMNESS

Channel NewsAsia out of Singapore, along with CCTV 9 of Beijing, is
following the unfolding crisis in Japan after the 8.9 Richter scale tremor,
the strongest quake ever to shake the nation, and the subsequent tsunami
that sent ten-meter high waves ten kilometers inland in Honshu, leaving the
tarmac of the Sendai International Airport under water, a local hospital
still standing as the only refuge for some 300 persons in an area of total
collapsed structures, and ten thousand people from one village still
remaining unaccounted for.  The predictable aftershocks add damage and
discomfort, but it is the threat of the nuclear meltdown of five reactors
that is sending chills down everyone's spine.

Not unlike humankind's previous relationship to "flat earth," which we now
know to be spherical, and calling the experience of sundown as "sunset" when
the earth actually turns, we never really consider land mass as floating
tectonic plates on magma, but to appreciate how strong the earthquake was in
Japan, the whole archipelago moved by a couple of meters and the axis of the
planet itself shifted by a few centimeters!

Zen Japan is showing a remarkable face of solid calmness.  News reports
portray a nation intentionally going through the motions of a rehearsed
drill in the midst of the surprising destruction that trails the wake of
this disaster.  The vaunted train system, one of the most sophisticated
rails in the world that connects Kagoshima in south Kyushu to Wakkanai of
north Hokkaido, shut down momentarily, along with its metro systems, at
least, in the urban centers of Honshu.  People undaunted, bought bicycles
and pedaled home, while some just trudged and walked in the cold.

We had a major life turn to make in 2002, and we took a week retreat late
January before the cherry blossoms, took the train from Narita to Sapporo in
Hokkaido on the eastern corridor through Sendai, and returning on the
western route through Akita and Niigata to West Tokyo.  The cultivated and
manicured countryside was a scene to behold, the tidiness of the trains and
orderliness of its people, a welcomed respite from the hustle of crowd and
mass humanity. 

Though signs of juvenile vandalism through graffiti were evident in metro
structures, and the surprising sight of homeless tents on blighted display
outside the Shinjuku municipal center, the orderly Japan of our previous
acquaintance, of nature both physical and societal disciplined into the
level of art on terrain and population, was still very much and unmistakably
alive!  Majestic Mt. Fuji reigned as Hokusai's rowers navigate the towering
waves off Kanagawa in my sea of tranquility!

It is with deep appreciation that I recall that solitary week almost a
decade ago, but as I watch today the deluge of painful unraveling that
characterizes the land of the rising sun, only the sound of silence is
appropriate to express our profound sorrow of the innocent suffering
unleashed.

A people's tragedy, however, has awakened humanity's empathy.  Though its
economy is one where its GNP far exceeds its GDP, showing barely any
economic growth though ascending into international eminence, it has shown
an economic arrangement where the concern for humanness matters.  Wrangling
in the Diet notwithstanding, Japan projected a country with a human face.

Its virtues of simple elegance on cuisine and decor, lifestyle and
landscape, custom and technology, its thrust towards moderation on all
things in its post-WWII demeanor, has endeared it in many parts of the
world; though it was saddled with the cruel memories of Nanjing, the stigma
of a Pearl Harbor, it also lived the mushroom cloud brunt of the Little Boy
and Fat Man over the skies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  In both cities, the
suicide cliffs of Saipan and Tinian are not unknown.  

Japan's Emperor heeded the winds of change violently exploded on the
southern skies, and terminated hostilities; the nation took this nuclear
kamikaze and domesticated it for peaceful use.  Now, the ice and the fire,
the heat and the water, Mother Nature's yin-yang elemental force comes
calling again on Nippon's door again.

Presbyter and poet Ellie Stock wrote the following not too long ago:
What do I call what calls from the deeps,
that pulses through stars and quickens heart's beat,
that surges through waves and cleanses with fire,
emerges from dust and breathes soul's desire?
What do I name what mocks human pride,
that bends the tree of life, sustaining being's tide?

It is with Zen calmness that we join Japan and the rest of the world in
daring to give a name to that which emerges from the deeps, whether from the
bowels of the earth, or from the deep abyss of the battered human soul.

The world joins that call of the deeps as its K9s head for Tokyo to locate
survivors.  There is solidarity afoot in a world already grieved by the
Gaddafis and the Tehrar Squares.  But the ebb and flow of global
reconciliation fills the air, and I, in my archaic season of Lent, smell the
scent of transformation, in faith, hope and love.  With T.S. Elliot and Zen
calmness, I sing: 
Quick now, here, now, always--
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well...

j'aime la vie

-----Original Message-----
From: Isobel and Jim Bishop <isobeljimbish at optusnet.com.au>
To: Order Ecumenical Community <oe at wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Sun, Mar 13, 2011 12:25 pm
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] Prayers for Japan

Thank you Jeanette for posting this.  

This morning, our Church community offered us the opportunity to light a
candle for the peoples of Japan- and I made a prayer for Wayne, Shizuyo and
their family.

We appreciate  very much being kept in touch so promptly, Jeanette, and Joan
and Tracey.  

Thank you all  so much.

In peace and love,

Isobel Bishop.

On 13/03/2011, at 12:26 PM, Jeanette Stanfield wrote:

I heard from Shizuyo today.  She and three ICA  staff were in the office
when earthquake hit.  They ran out into the street and are fine.  

Office had some decor and other things came off the walls but they cleaned
it up very quickly.  

Jeanette

On 2011-03-12, at 7:24 PM, Janet Sanders wrote:

I'm at a loss for word in expressing my grief over what is happening in
Japan.  Wayne, Shizuyo, family and colleagues--know the planet is with you
in our prayers and blessings.  Jan

----- Original Message ----- 

From:  <mailto:jfknutson at aol.com> jfknutson at aol.com 

To:  <mailto:oe at wedgeblade.net> oe at wedgeblade.net 

Sent: Friday, March 11, 2011 10:37 AM

Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] Prayers for Japan

Wayne Ellsworth and his wife Shizuyo Sato have an office in Tokyo along with
Japanese staff, along with many commited colleagues from our work there.
After living there for over 15 years I cannot imagine what they are
experiencing.  Pray without ceasing.  Joan Knutson

-----Original Message-----
From: Tracy Longacre < <mailto:tel at telphoto.com> tel at telphoto.com>
To: 'Order Ecumenical Community' < <mailto:oe at wedgeblade.net>
oe at wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Fri, Mar 11, 2011 5:20 am
Subject: [Oe List ...] Prayers for Japan

Fervent prayers for those in Japan after the massive (8.9!) earthquake and
tsunami.

Do we have news of colleagues there? Has the tsunami affected other places
(Taiwan? Australia?)

   Tracy E. Longacre

   from Ottawa

   +1 (415) 944-0158

   SKYPE: tlongacre

   Blog:  <http://tlongacre.wordpress.com/> http://tlongacre.wordpress.com

   Run Blog:   <http://revruns.blogspot.com/> http://revruns.blogspot.com

   Photos:  <http://www.flickr.com/photos/tlongacre/>
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tlongacre/

   Want to receive monthly updates on me and my work? send an e-mail to:
<mailto:telupdates-subscribe at topica.com> telupdates-subscribe at topica.com

"You don't have to take God to anyone.  God is already with everyone.  So,
rather than taking the approach that you need to take the truth out to
people who need it, adopt the approach that you need to go find the truth
that others have and you are missing.  Go be evangelized."
<http://owlrainfeathers.blogspot.com/> owlrainfeathers.blogspot.com

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