Photo R. Meshar

Mothers’ Day greetings, wishes and blessings to all those who are mothers or have mothered others in their lives. Those who have cared for our physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being are many and today we acknowledge them.

Interestingly, counter to our cultural understanding, today is also an acknowledgment that no one is “self-made.” Rather our relationships with many others have helped to form who we are. Those who have been generous, kind and caring towards us have helped to bring out the best of who we are.

Today we give thanks for kind, caring and generous nurturers everywhere.

Why isn’t Blue Cross promoting healthy hummus instead of mayo? Or frozen vegie-fruit smoothies instead of ice cream junk food?

Because Blue Cross is in bed with big food corporations and the $$$ that mailing coupons for these corporations produces. Further, as a healthy person I don’t generate much income for health insurance companies (healthy people have lower premiums), health care services, or the drug industry. To increase their profit margins it is much better for me to be chronically sick, taking diabetes, blood pressure or cholesterol medications – ideally for the rest of my life.

How best to do this? Promote bad health, of course! Junk food coupons – here we come! Worse, I’m paying the cost for this unethical marketing with my insurance premiums.

Don’t assume your health insurance or health care providers are even remotely interested in maintaining your good health. Always ask, “Who benefits?”

You may also like Lunch To Go and Mango Delight.

What does systemic racism look like? Continue reading to find out.

Overt legal efforts to limit voting are underway by the Republican party along with a denial of the higher than whites black turnout voting rate -

Summary: The Republican Party is thus more officially racist than it was in Nixon’s day. Back then, at least they had Jackie Robinson and Sammy Davis Jr. And at least, back then, the Republican Party did these things in code, and not via the law. It was not so brazen as to think it could on the one hand be waging efforts in half the states to keep black people from voting and on the other be improving its “outreach.” The black vote will dip a bit when Obama retires, but as long as Republicans insist on these tactics, they will be doing more than they know to keep turnout high and keep hope alive.

Reality: state tracking demonstrates that voter fraud is so small as to be almost statistically invisible. However, requiring photo ID eliminates the possibility to vote for most of the weakest among us; the working poor, indigent, homeless. Not surprisingly these groups are primarily people of color – those made poor by racist policies just like this.

Click all the voter suppression efforts currently on offer across the country to see just how bigots work to incorporate racism systemically into our legal system.

You can’t be neutral. Either those of us who are over privileged work to make voting a possibility for everyone or, by our inaction, we actively demonstrate that we believe in oligarchy – government by elites, the over privileged few.

You may also like Unfair By Design and Excluding Others Comes Home to Roost.

Instead Apple issues bonds thereby keeping billions off-shore where it won’t be taxed. In this way Apple externalizes the real cost of running their business onto individual taxpayers and communities – keeping bigger bonuses for Apple executives and bigger dividends for stock holders.

Tax evasion corporate-style.

All too often we worry about welfare programs for those made poor (of which the entire  program for low income individuals is relatively small) but prefer to remain oblivious to undeserved MASSIVE CORPORATE WELFARE worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

As consumers, we are morally culpable if we choose to do nothing. One can not be neutral. Either we demand that Apple, and all corporations, pay their fair share of taxes for the privilege of using our infrastructure and resources or, in doing nothing, we actively demonstrate our belief that corporate shareholders and executives deserve to take steal wealth from us, our families and communities.

Read the entire Associated Press article here.

You may also like Wealth Inequality – Meet the Reality and Women and Children are Made Poor – By Men.

Photo BenefitsOfYogaNow.com

Many readers come to this blog by googling this very question. Well if you’ve been watching the news recently you’ve seen exactly where most of our clothes come from; they come from unsafe sweatshops just like the clothing factory that collapsed in Bangladesh killing murdering hundreds of workers.

Why murdering? Because factory owners and the Western retailers (barely mentioned in the article) knew the factory was unsafe – yet the decision was made that higher corporate profits for American retailers are more important than other people’s lives.

This is what American terrorism looks like. Everyday.

As consumers, we are morally culpable if we choose to do nothing. One can not be neutral. Either we actively work to demand fair wages and safe working conditions for the products we buy or, in doing nothing, we actively demonstrate our belief that human life has no value.

Where do your clothes come from?

You may also like Where Do Our Clothes Come From? and Women’s Apparel Industry is Asleep.

Photo IBTimes.com

So it’s official – Obama’s budget proposal balances the Federal Budget by taking more money from Social Security than from the richest elites. Read the full NakedCapitalism post here. I emailed my congressional representative today and you should too. Here’s what I wrote:

 I WILL WORK to see that Franken is NOT re-elected if he supports ANY Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid cuts. 

After giving TRILLIONS (not billions)from the public purse in reduced overnight Fed funds rates and tax breaks to banks and the rich (since the 90′s), Obama has DONE NOTHING to claw back the TRILLIONS in corporate welfare handed out in the financial meltdown. 

We have seen clearly that handing money to the rich has NOT created jobs – rather millions of jobs have been lost. A strong middle class creates demand and jobs. 

Wake up!! Give a trillion (or two?) to support basic needs for our most vulnerable – women, children, elderly and the disabled. This  would then be a country I would want to live in.

Email your congressional representatives today. Don’t let Obama or congress balance the budget on the backs of seniors. Demand that massive corporate welfare be stopped in order to balance the budget.

Photo R. Meshar

Not too long ago my friend L contacted our parish to let them know that she was interested in forming a new small Christian community. But life being what it is, there were other priorities at the parish and as time went by it became clear that things might not happen within the time frame she had in mind. Rather than become irritated, annoyed, or continue to repeat her request (i.e. nag), she contacted some people she thought might be interested then hosted our first meeting. A wonderful group came together. Through her own initiative, she created a supportive group of people with similar values – a group that she wanted to be part of.

This is the challenge of Christianity. This is what we see in the model of Jesus. Jesus never demanded that the religious authorities of his day change to his way of thinking. Neither did he nag them to do things differently. Rather, he created a community of women and men who shared his values and lived out of those values.

When Jesus was confronted by those in authority he stated his values or offered a parable to shock others into a new way of thinking. Everyone was invited to join in – but not pressured or coerced into doing so. Even when his family confronted him – demanding he come with them and accept their way of viewing the world (a patriarchal, tribal worldview), Jesus responded by radically changing their definition of family – “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers? These people here with me now are my family!” (Mark 3). Then he went about his life, not expecting or demanding that his genetic family see things his way or change.

Neither did Jesus spend much time with family or religious authorities who didn’t share his values. After all, the best way to resist patriarchy and tribalism is simply not to participate in it. In moving toward a better, healthier way of living, one naturally moves away from ways that are harmful or toxic.

The same path is open to each of us too. We can continue to bemoan the fact that families, corporations, hierarchies or institutions fail to share our values. We can expend much energy pressuring or demanding them to change – or we can simply start living in a different way. We can change. Like my friend L, we can live into a new reality and invite others to join us.

Resurrection: Walk out of the tomb. Walk into a new reality.

“We do not think ourselves into new ways of living, we live ourselves into new ways of thinking.” 
Richard Rohr

You may also like Authentic Living, Nostalgia or Reality? and Resisting Patriarchy.

Photo: AptTherapy Grab and Go

Maybe you’re looking for ways to make lunch more interesting. Or maybe you’d like to be able to pack a quick picnic in the evening. If so, here’s a post from Apartment Therapy’s The Kitchen – Grab and Go lunch using canning jars.

Canning jars don’t leak, clean up in the dishwasher and they allow you to cook or bake safely in a microwave – without the lid of course.

The article lists five fun and unexpected ideas for lunch: layered salad, miso soup, chili with cornbread that bakes in the jar, vegie sticks in hummus and a crustless quiche – 3 ways from the blog Krista and Jess. Check it out, then try it out!

You may also like Picnic in a Jar, Walking Chicken BBQ and Salad in a Jar.

Photo R. Meshar

If I’m not able to freely choose that which contributes to my health and wholeness – whether it be healthy, mutual relationships, nutritious food or enriching activities – then I’m not truly free because something or someone else enslaves me. That enslavement, addiction or distraction impoverishes me because it keeps me from being able to choose freely for those things which will keep me healthy and sustain my life.

Justice begins within.

Likewise, read “Exceptional upward mobility in the United States is a myth.” Check the results of this new study from the University of Michigan here.

Lest you believe the often repeated – but false – meme “But the rich create jobs,” let me remind you that the rich have been subsidized with lowered income and capital gains tax rates since the mid-nineties and jobs have not been created. In fact, in subsidizing the rich with billions in government welfare (lowered income tax rates) millions of people have become unemployed.

The truth is that the rich do not create jobs. Merely having money does not cause one to start up a business. Rather, it is demand that motivates new business start-ups. Demand for goods and services creates jobs. A strong middle class, therefore, stimulates demand and in doing so creates jobs.

You may also be surprised to know that small business owners are the largest employers of our economy – not big corporations. Helping the middle class helps them expand and create jobs.

If you want a healthy, job-creating economy, support tax policies that provide basic necessities for those who are vulnerable (mostly women and children) and strengthen our middle class. Eliminate massive government welfare for the rich and corporations inherent in income and capital gains tax subsidies.

How to do this? You may also like Eliminate Capital Gains Tax Subsidy and Time to Tax Wall Street.