Stranger in an Empty Chair

                                                     "Girl in Green Chair" by Michael Carson



While reality hums and reverberates with a melody entranced in a state of constant flux, I find myself in a place that seems to make the world stand still. Just one single harmony can be heard in my surroundings which seem insulated from the world's dull roar outside these four walls. So is my concentration that it matters little what else is happening in life's periphery. The current demanding needs of the man I care for are the only concerns that rise into view.

Simple things matter the most in his world. Not only having something to eat but having something to eat that he can chew. Not only having something to drink but having something to drink in a container that isn't too full and easy to spill. It is important for him to enjoy his customary daily glass of fresh squeezed orange juice that accompanies his pills and perhaps just as much needed is the hug I give him when coming and leaving. Sometimes the only human contact he gets for the entire day.

He asks me if I can see her.

"Who?" I inquire.

"The stranger in the chair. Its a woman with brown hair to her shoulders. She's looking at me." He answers, his eyes getting larger as he is apparently surprised at the sight behind me.

I turn around and see what I expected to see. An empty chair. I assure him that it is just him and I in the room. That what he is seeing is not there. "Bill, close your eyes and take a deep breath." I wait for him to do so. " Tell yourself that she isn't real. Bill, you have an infection that is causing you to see things that aren't there." I don't know what else to say. I have no training in dealing with anything like this and he doesn't as well. We are just two souls caught up together in quite the quandary.

I place my hand on his and he squeezes it. He is frightened and I can't blame him for that. I would be too. He tells me that early that morning there were two men that were behind him yelling. They were throwing balled up socks at him and one even hit him with a shoe. To him, it had felt so real.

Two days before we had went to the doctor's with one another. The visit was a spontaneous one and had arisen right after he had confided to me that he was seeing things. He had been for awhile but was afraid that if he had told someone they would have immediately put him in the hospital and would have thought he was crazy. He wasn't sure what he was seeing, if it was in his head or maybe even ghosts or something. I told him I was so glad he shared this with me and that I was certain there was a natural and physical explanation to what he was experiencing. He was on new medication, maybe that was it. Regardless, he couldn't be helped if we didn't seek help and things would undoubtedly get worse if we didn't.  I immediately cancelled the appointment I had after him and took him to his doctor's.

I was relieved we had went as when we were there we were informed that he had a raging urinary tract infection and that that could very well explain his hallucinations as well as the lack of appetite and nausea he had been experiencing. Then the doctor dropped the bomb.

"Since he has been seeing things and is just going to be starting antibiotics we are afraid the infection might have gotten into his blood. Since he lives alone he is going to have to go to the hospital."

I looked over at Bill and saw a mask of shock and dread spread over his visage. I knew that his greatest fear was to be hospitalized. Sometimes its hard to get out of the hospital when you go in at his age, especially when certain close family members were eager to have you in there and stay in there. Not out of concern but out of greed.

Not hesitating I jumped in. "What if someone stayed the night with him?"

The doctor looked at me. "Well, then he could go home."

I had turned to Bill, "I could stay with you tonight...That's if you wouldn't mind." Relief visibly expressed itself on his features, his shoulders loosening and a smile forming on his face. "Of course I wouldn't mind!"

"Great. " I turned to the doctor. "I will stay with him tonight. I'll make sure he's taken care of."

The doctor smiled. I think she was just as delighted as we were that he was going to be going home, having had known him for years herself. As I was driving him back to his house I thought about how I was to explain this to my husband and kids. After dropping him off I raced back home to collect my things; a change of clothes, my pjs and toiletries and my Gita for reading after he went to bed that night. I explained the situation to my husband who unfortunately was less than understanding but had little choice as having had already promised the doctor I would stay with Bill I had no intentions of breaking such an agreement. My kids, however, were excited to spend the night over my parents which made my sudden departure from our Friday night routine a little easier.

That night  I placed a home cooked meal before Bill while we settled down to watch , "Some Like It Hot" with Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe. I smiled. I was happy to see him happy. Sitting comfortably in his favorite chair with good warm food and content with the anticipation of viewing one of his favorite movies in the company of another. I cringed at the thought of him lying in some sterile hospital bed with strangers all around being woken up at all hours, disoriented and feeling alone.

When it was finally time for me to go upstairs I made sure he was situated in bed and made my way to the room I would be sleeping in. I was in his former bedroom he used to sleep in before they put a bed down in his living for him for easier access. Pulling the covers back I slipped in with my japa mala and Gita turning on the small light on the table by the bed. Watching the moon outside the window I began to chant. Growing restless and wanting to maintain some concentration I flipped through pictures in my Gita of Krishna as I chanted his names. Finally, fatigue took over and I lay down and fell asleep.

I was awoken at 5 am by shouting. I ran downstairs and saw the door to the entryway was open. Swiftly moving to its entrance I saw Bill, with the front door open, shouting. I ran to him, putting my hands on his arm and guided him away from the door, closing and locking it. He doesn't walk well, having Parkinson's, and it took some effort to help him back up the stairs and into bed. I was glad when he finally closed his eyes, with his covers warmly over him, and settled back down. This experience increased my worry towards his situation. Its one thing seeing things that aren't there from the safety of your own bed, it's another thing entirely to get up and act on what you see, putting yourself at risk of falling down stairs.

Well, here I am now. Things are uncertain for Bill but I am hopeful that his condition will improve. No matter what happens, though, there is a place in my heart where my love blossoms for this man who I find endearing. I plan on staying by his side as much as is possible through this chapter in his life. 

Thoughts? I'd love to hear them. Please consider leaving them in the comments section. Thank you.

Contemplation: A Catalyst for Compassion

Courtesy of Google Images

Reaching deep within, observing the slow unfolding of  ego's heavy and awkward garbs that cling fast to Self's inner light, I burrow deeper beneath layers of my consciousness, towards the center. Flooding my sense of awareness is the realization that there is truly no beginning or ending to God. There is no place where He is not. No heart where the spark of His light does not dwell.  He is All. God is in everything and everything is in God. Acts 17:28  "For in him we move and have our being."

Meditation creates within me an increasing empathy for both humans and non humans.  Integrating it into my spiritual disciplines has brought out the light within me that allows the deepest recesses of my consciousness to unfold like a flower, opening up in a capacity of love, compassion and awe for all that is around me that I had never experienced before. I am starting to see God in everyone and feel I am beginning to relate to these words from spiritual leader and writer Eknath Easwaran:

"Whenever you look into another person's eyes, remember that you are looking into a city where the Lord dwells- and remember always that our arms and hands were given to us for others' rescue, not for their ruin."

In some of the dialogue I've had with others there have been individuals from the Christian perspective that bring up the criticism that meditation is a selfish pursuit. That it is focused too much on dwelling on one's self, on one's own personal encounter with God while leaving the rest of the world out of the equation. The argument is that meditation keeps us from actively manifesting the will of God out to others in the world.  I can't help but view this argument as a substantial misconception towards the practice of meditation and one in which history points very clearly to the contrary.  For some of the world's greatest contributors towards peace and the service of others have also been some of the world's greatest mystics. A mystic is one who seeks to encounter God experientially through means of contemplation and meditation.

 Thomas Merton, Mother Teresa, Teresa of Avila, St. Francis of Assissi...and the list goes on and on...all emphasized charity and acts of service to compliment contemplation. In fact, as I mentioned from my personal experience,  moments in meditation often spur on the sense of interconnectedness and a deep feeling of empathy and compassion for others. This is a common experience for one who meditates. From a Christian perspective,  we are "filled with God" to overflowing so that His love, His compassion, His Kingdom, might overflow through us into the world, through acts of service and love.

St. Teresa of Avila, one of the world's greatest Christian mystics, was also an active advocate of service towards others. She sought to inspire people to spread Christ's love and compassion throughout the world. She didn't see it as an option but a calling for all of those in the body of Christ.

You Are Christ's Hands

"Christ has no body now on earth but yours,
no hands but yours,
no feet but yours,
Yours are the eyes through which is to look out
Christ's compassion to the world;
Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good;
Yours are the hands with which he is to bless men now."

St. Augustine of Hippo viewed both the spiritual discipline of meditation and service towards others as essential in the life of a Christian.  "No man has a right to lead such a life of contemplation as to forget in his own ease the service due his neighbor; nor has any man a right to be so immersed in active life as to neglect the contemplation of God."

        

If ever, in these modern times, one was to give proof of contemplation's role in being a catalyst for the involvement of  charitable pursuits and social justice, it would be through the Quakers, one of the most contemplative sects branching off from Christianity.  Quaker meetings, or services, are held in complete contemplative meditative silence. This relatively small religious organization has allowed the impressions of universal empathy and compassion that they have received deep within them through meditation to become catalysts for helping make this world a better place.

Quakers formed the backbone of the Underground Railroad during the Civil War,  risking life and limb to bring thousands of slaves to freedom. Quakers, like Susan B. Anthony, rose their voices against the oppression of women in the women's suffrage movement which lead to the confirmation of women's rights in this country. They have worked hard for prison reform and have time and time again stood as  conscientious objectors towards war, advocating peace,  realizing that violence only breeds more violence.  Far from hiding themselves from the world and being driven by a sense of narcissistic ego to dwell upon their individual selves and merely pursue states of spiritual ecstasy, Quakers have plunged boldly into some of the darkest corners of society unabashedly allowing light to blossom.

Eknath Easwaran, in his book Original Goodness, brings up the truth that we cannot bring effective change towards peace, social justice and the cessation of the suffering of others without bringing change within ourselves first. When we do begin, through the means of meditation, to lose our selfish desires and attachments towards superficial and earthly things we begin to put others first more and more, not because we feel we have to, but because we truly feel led to. And love begets love. When we experience more love within ourselves and express it outwards, others catch quite readily onto it, becoming inspired themselves. Love and positivity are contagious.

" As our desire to draw closer to the Lord within us deepens, it draws self-centered desires into it like tributaries into a great river. The power of that love swells until it becomes cataclysmic; we begin to inspire other people through the transformation we have wrought in ourselves." ~Eknath Easwaran

It is my belief that contrary to some of the criticisms towards contemplative prayer and meditation, in that they keep the believer from manifesting God's Kingdom out to the world, that these practices actually lead the believer into experiential contact with the Kingdom within, creating a reaction in which the impulses to love and perform acts of love are irresistible. Mystics from all traditions, like Gandhi and Mother Theresa have all mentioned that love and service begin at home. Easwaran furthers that in the quote above by pointing to the truth that it ultimately begins within ourselves and spreads outwards.  Meditation is a beautiful and transforming tool to help prepare and aid us in acts of charity and service.

Thoughts? I'd love to hear them! Please leave them in the Comments section. Thank you!

Seeds and Soil: Is your Heart Ready?

"Every moment and every event of every man's life on earth plants something in his soul. For just as the wind carries thousands of winged seeds, so each moment brings with it germs of spiritual vitality that come to rest imperceptibly in the minds and wills of men. Most of these unnumbered seeds perish and are lost, because men are not prepared to receive them: for such seeds as those cannot spring up anywhere except in the good soil of freedom, spontaneity and love."

                                 ~ Thomas Merton, Seeds of Contemplation

Is your heart fertile to receive the seeds that God sends to you? What kind of soil do the seeds that rain down upon our souls find? Soil that is frozen and difficult to penetrate? Soil that is overridden with weeds that threaten to choke any sign of new growth? Or soil carefully managed with mindful devotion and love, clear of weeds, nourished by the eternal waters of God and expectantly prepared for a garden of amazing diversity and beauty to blossom upon it's fertile landscape? 

Heavenly Father,

We thank you for your great mercy and grace. We pray that you help clear our hearts of distractions, illusions and attachments as we open them up to you.  Help make them wide and empty spaces so that your love might flood through them, washing them with your eternal waters, making the soil of our souls pure and rich and ready to receive the seeds that you shower upon us every moment. May we take those seeds and let them bear fruit within our hearts so that we might bring you great glory. Nourishing them with the manna of Scripture and with our prayers and praises lifted high towards you like incense rising to your throne.  

May we bring you all glory, honor and praise.

In the name of Jesus,

Amen.

The American Church : A Hypocrisy?

"The American Church, simply stated, is the wealthiest community of Christians in the history of Christendom. The total income of church goers is 5.2 trillion. It would take a little over 1% of the income of American Christians to lift the poorest one billion people in the world out of extreme poverty. 

...The bottom line is that the commitment that American Christians, the wealthiest Christians in all history, are making to the world is just about 2 percent of 2 percent ... actually about 5 ten-thousandths of our income."

                             ~  (Richard Stearns, President of World Vision)

When I read these startling statistics I couldn't help but be saddened. A small part of me, however,  wasn't too surprised. This just shows a major flaw in the organized churches spread across our nation. Something is horribly wrong about our focus that we have lost sight of one of the main points of the gospel. God calls us to be compassionate towards the poor, the suffering, the broken hearted. Jesus preached love and compassion towards the margins of society not only through his words but by his actions.

One of the words that are flung towards Christians a lot is the word hypocrisy. Wikepedia defines "hypocrisy" as follows: Hypocrisy is the state of pretending to have beliefs, opinions, virtues, feelings, qualities, or standards that one does not actually have. Hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie.

Let's see what Jesus tells us, as Christians, how we should follow him:

"Jesus answered, If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.'" Matthew 19:21

"But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind." Luke 14:13

"When Jesus heard this, he said to him, You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.'" Luke 18:22

Here are some other verses in the Scripture that reveal to us what our attitudes should be towards those who are less fortunate than ourselves:

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." James 1:27

If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth." 1 John 3:17-18

"Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, 'Here's a good seat for you,' but say to the poor man, 'You stand there' or 'Sit on the floor by my feet,' have you not discriminated among yourselves and becomes judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom He promised those who love Him? But you have insulted the poor. Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court?" James 2:2-6

Deuteronomy 15:7 "If there is a poor man among your brothers in any of the towns of the land that the LORD your God is giving you, do not be hardhearted or tightfisted toward your poor brother." 

"He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing." Deuteronomy 10:18

"There will always be poor people in the land. Therefore I command you to be openhanded toward your brothers and toward the poor and needy in your land." Deuteronomy 15:11

Given the statistics shared by the President of World Vision, the verses in scripture above and the definition of "hypocrite", how do our churches  measure up?  Are we living by the standards God has places on us? To have an emphasis on compassion, for our hearts (and wallets) to serve the poor, not only through our prayers, but with our hands as well? Does our given state reveal us to be hypocrites? Well, I'll let you answer that question for yourself...

I am the last person to say that I have everything figured out and that I'm walking the straight and narrow path. Could I give more? Yes! Should I give more? Yes! Should we all give more? Yes! Most of us...

There are some in our country that are giving their all. They live in intentional communities infested with crime that are designed specifically to aid the poor, sharing all they make with the homeless...those people should serve as our inspiration! Below is a short clip about a book that helped open my eyes and readjust my focus on what it means to follow Christ. It's by Shane Claiborne: Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical.  Since reading this book I've made some personal changes-I began volunteering and donating at a local soup kitchen and am looking into more opportunities to get involved. It has truly inspired me to look more in depth into how Jesus taught us to live. I still have a long way to go...but I guess the point is in just starting to make a change...we all can start, in little ways, to help advance the Kingdom of God!

It's funny what reading the New Testament and coming along with Jesus as he ministered to people can do when, by reading such accounts, the Spirit whispers to our hearts, prompting us to walk on that same path! Can you imagine what the world would look like if all of us Christians across our nation had the desire and actually applied that desire to live like Jesus? To follow the standards our God places on us? It would be a revolution...a turning point away from suffering and towards healing for the world.

When we've finally inhaled our last breath and our heart ceases to beat no more we will not only be held accountable for the actions we did but also by the actions we didn't do.


Matthew 25:31-40

  ³¹ “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. ³² All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. ³³ He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
   ³⁴ “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. ³⁵ For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, ³⁶ I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
   ³⁷ “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? ³⁸ When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? ³⁹ When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
   ⁴⁰ “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

What are your thoughts on the statistics and verses shared in this post? Why do you think America's churches are failing so miserably in the area of giving to and serving the poor? Can you think of any possible solutions? What can you do, personally, to live more like Christ in this area?

Heavenly Father,

We thank you for the abundant spiritual and physical blessings you've rained down on us. May you help our hearts open up to the gospel and may your Spirit guide us, urge us, draw us towards being more and more like Jesus. Help give us the courage to be bold and fearlessly go into the world's darkest corners so that we may shine the light that you've given us in our hearts and vanguish darkness, giving hope to the hopeless, peace to the troubled and tormented. We aren't perfect, that's for sure, but help us begin, step by step, to walk more and more like Jesus. May we be a people of prayer and action as we seek to bring you glory and manifest your Kingdom here on earth.

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.

Reflections of Compassion

When we meditate, we enter the mind of Christ by entering into meditative states of awareness of all that we hold in common as human beings. We sit, silent and still, and learn the intimate texture of thoughts, feelings, memories, and bodily sensations that all of us as human beings experience. In doing so we drop down into levels of oneness with others that transcends the differences between us. I am not you. But if I have intimately tasted my own aloneness, my own experience of thoughts arising and passing through my mind, my own breathing-then I already have in my intimate awareness of myself an intimate awareness of you.

This knowledge is not that of the words written on the pages of my mind, rather, it is a knowledge of the human experience of the mind itself. The experience is not simply my personal feelings about this or that. It is rather the intimate understanding of the texture of my own heart as feelings play across its surface, flow through it, and alter its state from one moment to the next. Grounded in this self-knowledge, I am grounded in awareness of oneness with you at a level that precedes and transcends the differences between us. I know you with an empathatic, heartfelt knowledge of what it means to be a human being.

It takes time, but little by little we enter the social dimensions of the mind of Christ in awakening to how perfectly one we are with everyone living and dead. As this awareness slowly seeps in, we are able to grow, day by day into a more patient, gracious recognition and acceptance of and gratitude for others. Little by little the graciousness of Christ’s emphatic mind of oneness with others is translated into a thousand little shifts in the way we think about people, our attitudes toward them, and the way in which we actually treat them day by day.

As we learn to see ourselves through the eyes of Christlike compassion we start to see others through the eyes of Christlike compassion as well. In learning to be compassionate towards ourselves as precious in our frailty, we learn to be compassionate toward others as precious in their frailty.”
                                          ~ James Finley, Christian Meditation, p. 96



I've come to believe that compassion is a crucial component in glorifying God and bringing glimpses of His Kingdom to the world.  Jesus lived with great compassion-healing, preaching, teaching and extending himself out to the margins of society where many wouldn't dare to go. To be instruments of His peace and love it's essential as we grow with God to reflect Christ's compassion to others. As important and central as that is in our mission towards service to others, I think sometimes it's often overlooked to invoke that same compassion we extend to others to ourselves as well. It seems that sometimes we are more willing to forgive others and less willing to forgive ourselves. When we harbor guilt, feelings of unworthiness, etc. against ourselves that can only serve as a stumbling block in our mission to help others.

We become imprisoned by our own illusions about ourselves instead of being liberated from them. God offers us full liberation and redemption from our sins! As Christians, I feel it's important to take hold of the offer God holds out in His hands and allow Him to break the chains that bind us from serving Him more fully and living a more joy-filled and productive life. In fact, it should be one of our prerogatives! God wants us to find pleasure in Him, joy in Him. How can we find joy in God if we are trapped by our own prisons we have built around our hearts?

I love this passage from Finley because I can relate to so much that he says. Contemplative prayer, or Christian meditation,  has been an invaluable experience for me in so many different ways. To experience the unfolding of your consciousness, to see more clearly with objectivity your thoughts and realize them for what they are...oftentimes impermanent illusions built upon the shaky foundation of attachments and other impermanent illusions, is transforming. It allows one to enter into and experience a new diminsion of God's reality. When stillness of one's mind is acheived and all of one's desire stretches towards the depths of God and is then enveloped in union with His love and peace...one does not walk away unchanged! It is also a beautiful way to realize profoundly the interconnectedness that we have with all of life that surrounds us. To treasure it, for it is a manifestation of God's glory, it is His love breathed out.

Heavenly Father,

Thank you for bringing us safely into a new day. I pray that You guide our hearts to an ever deeper and fuller understanding of Your love, Your Grace, Your compassion. May You illuminate the areas in our lives where we need to come humbly before You in repentence and help us walk as free sons and daughters of God so that we might reflect Christ's compassion and love fully and boldly in all the corners of the world.

May we give You, and You alone, all glory, honor and praise.

In Jesus' precious name,

Amen.

Compassion for the Seemingly Insignificant

As  I was walking today I couldn't help but notice a worm who was engaged in straying down a perilous path to destruction. It wiggled on its terrain of apshalt towards the busy road where it was likely to be crushed. On a warmer and sunnier day I would say roasting would have been another alternative for the poor lowly creature. I was walking at such a good pace, the oxygen circulating through my body, my heart pumping. I felt so alive to be outside with the leaves caught up in the wind's fury, shimmering like schools of fish above, clinging to their branches. Some managed to be pulled free by nature's strong and relentless breath, their persistence succumbing to fate, spiraling downward in wild abandon, soon about to fulfill their role in the cyle of things. Impermanence. We all end up as dust in the end.

Well, I stopped and bent down picking up the delicate worm and tossed it gently into the woods beside me. Now, some of you might think me silly. For sure the worm fulfills a vital role in the environment, but more as a collective whole. This one worm would not be missed. There was perhaps no rational reason for sparing its life. (However one might ask the question, is mercy ever irrational no matter who it is directed towards?) But how could I just walk by something, a living creature, knowing it was on the road to death or suffering? I am a vegetarian and for ethical reasons. But even though a lot of vegetarians argue for the protection of sentient creatures, non-sentient ones are usually not too much of a concern. I would not consider a worm a sentient creature, at least in the sense that it has the capacity to suffer emotionally/mentally. I doubt if a worm feels fear,anxiety, sadness or has a memory. By contrast, cows undoubtedly do feel terror, anxiety and mental suffering when they head down the line to slaughter, hearing their brothers and sisters screaming in pain, smelling death in the air. But a worm?...

If anything, I truly believe that cultivating a sense of compassion towards even the most seemingly insignificant of creatures helps build one's foundation to extend a greater amount of compassion towards the obviously more significant. Can you imagine what would happen if everyone stopped to help the turtle stuck in the middle of the road? Or perhaps when finding a wounded animal if more people were apt to call a wildlife rehabilitator to aid the suffering creature? 

This is where a lot of my Judeo Christian counterparts in the past (and I said a lot, not all!) have scoffed, when I bring up these kinds of notions, and my Buddhist friends usually nod knowingly, though, some of them too, scoff as well.  But this doesn't have to be so! I believe we can all be on the same page here. Did God, according to Christian doctrine, not make us as guardians and caretakers over all the earth? Does that mean pass by the very creatures He has made with His handiwork with callous apathy just because they are lower than ourselves when it comes to their mental or emotional capacity? (How often have the welfare of humans that are less capable in their abilities to communicate efficiently and understand the world around them been neglected and abused in the view of society's downcast averted eyes?) They are still contributors-contributors fully engaged and participating in the network of life that is woven delicately together and if that network deteriorates that's when we start to have real problems...especially for ourselves!

So, I won't go on any further about this, perhaps I've gone on too long already, but I do want to suggest something. Next time you see a creature  headed towards an unsavory fate, perhaps you could consider sparing it that fate, knowing that even a small gesture of compassion adds just a little more peace to this world and perhaps helps us to open our hearts up more to experiencing a deeper sense of peace within ourselves. And couldn't we all use that?