Come to Starz Film Center in this coming week to see a movie about inner city youth. Attend opening night and hear Terrance Roberts of Prodigal Son.

Pressure Cooker
USA, 2008, 99 Minute Running Time
Genre/Subjects: African-American, Documentary, Educational, Social Issues
Language: English

Exclusive Engagement plays July 31 - August 6
Opening Night Premiere, 7:15pm Friday, July 31st featuring panel discussion with some of Denver's most prominent voices on behalf of at-risk youth
In partnership with Colorado Youth at Risk, Prodigal Son Inc., and Urban Peak

35mm presentation - Pressure Cooker profiles the lives of three high school seniors from Northeast Philadelphia, each with unique hardships but with the shared goal of winning scholarships to the country's best culinary schools. Their unlikely hero is irreverent Culinary Arts teacher Wilma Stephenson. A legend in the school system, Mrs. Stephenson's hilariously blunt boot-camp method of teaching Culinary Arts is validated by years of scholarship success. Against the backdrop of the row homes of working-class Philadelphia, she has helped countless students reach the top culinary schools in the country. And under her fierce direction, the usual distractions of high school are swept aside as Erica, Dudley and Fatoumata prepare to achieve beyond what anyone else expects from them.

For more info and tickets, http://www.denverfilm.org/filmcenter/detail.aspx?id=22137

NATIONAL LABOR ISSUES
New York City Employees Struggle Against Mayor’s Privatization Efforts
DC 37’s Radio and Subway Ad Campaign Slams Bloomberg’s Layoff Plans

Mayor Pays Billions to Private Contractors
By Annette Walker

Lillian Roberts, Executive Director of New York City’s largest municipal employee union, District Council 37 (AFSCME/AFL-CIO), has launched radio and subway ads criticizing Mayor Bloomberg’s plan to lay off thousands of city workers. Roberts says the mayor spends billions of municipal dollars on private contractors and outside consultants.

“Mayor Bloomberg wants to cut over 12,000 positions and pay $9 billion to private contractors to do jobs that city workers do more reliably and more cost-effectively,” said Roberts. “That’s not only wasteful, but it’s harmful to our kids, our families and to our communities,” she continued.

The ads began appearing on all New York city subway lines May 18 and one week later they began to air on radio stations such as 1010 WINS-AM, WBLS-FM, WRKS-FM, and Spanish-language WADO-FM. The ads inform New Yorkers that the city currently awards 18,000 private contracts to individuals who are not held to the same standard as public employees.

The ads inform New Yorkers that the city currently awards 18,000 contracts to private firms and individuals who are not held to the same standard as public employees. The ads say, “Private contractors don’t undergo background checks. Private contractors don’t take tests to show they’re qualified to do the work. Many don’t even pay workers a living wage or provide health care benefits. Some don’t even pay their share of state or city taxes.”

The subway and radio ads are part of an ongoing DC 37 campaign that began with the release of a report entitled, “Massive Waste at a Time of Need”, which revealed a “shadow government of private contractors that employs a parallel work force of more than 100,000”.

Roberts criticized Mayor Bloomberg’s plans to layoff thousands of city workers. “This is totally unnecessary,” she said. “The money is there. We’ve proven that with the report we just released, which examined 10 contracts in eights city agencies, and identifies about $130 million in savings the city can realize by cutting down on outside contracts with over-paid consultants and over-priced contractors. And that is just the tip of the iceberg,” she continued.

Roberts also insists the city’s proposed layoffs will “inevitably lead to larger long-term human and economic costs” and “go against everything President Barack Obama is trying to do for the working people of this country. While the president is creating jobs, the city will destroy jobs and undermine his recession recovery plan.

The quality of life for New Yorkers is being threatened by laying off employees who work in over 1,000 job titles – everything from Accountants and actuaries to Zookeepers. They all help this city run. As a result of these cuts, hospital clinics will close and neglected illnesses will get worse. Reports of child abuse and neglect are rising and these layoffs will cripple programs created to prevent that. No responsible government can in good conscience cut vital services and layoff loyal, hardworking employees while there are realistic alternatives. And the alternatives are there!

The public can read the report at DC 37’s website – www.dc37.net. The subway and radio ads urge New Yorkers to use the website to send e-mails to the Mayor and their City Council members to “Cut Private Contractors, Not Public Services.”

THE GLOBAL VILLAGE

The Global Village presents analysis of political, economic and social issues at home and abroad. It will deconstruct and demystify some commonly-held assumptions including inaccuracies put forward by the established media and when necessary will "speak truth to power.”

Annette Walker is a writer, radio producer and educator. She worked in the Peace Corps in the Dominican Republic as a teacher-trainer and traveled throughout the Caribbean including Cuba. She has been a lecturer in the City University of New York, Aurora Community College and Metropolitan State College.

In the spirit of pragmatism, I offer the following prose poem:

WHAT IS COMMON SENSE?

Common sense means paying attention to the obvious. This is not as
easy as it sounds. We all have vivid imaginations, and we tend to get
lost in our fantasies.

When fantasy replaces common sense, life becomes farcical and even
tragic. Life is a series of ordinary events that follow the laws of
logic and probability. These ordinary events are indifferent to our
fantasies and require the careful, accurate navigation of common sense.

I learned the lesson of common sense as a third-year medical student.
I was doing an internal medicine rotation at a Veterans Affairs (VA)
hospital and working with interns, residents, and attending physicians.

One day, on morning rounds, we examined a patient with a black tongue.
The intern assigned to that patient had researched all the causes of a
black tongue and was eager to demonstrate his new knowledge. As the
intern started to lecture us, the attending physician interrupted him
and asked the patient if he uses black cough drops. The patient
smiled, opened the drawer of his night table, and took out a package
of Smith Brothers black cough drops.

The intern's face turned red, and we all laughed. The intern was so
focused on being a doctor, that he forgot to ask his patient an
obvious question. It's been thirty-five years since I was a third-year
medical student, but I still have a vivid memory of that day and that
lesson: use common sense and pay attention to the obvious.

My thirty years of medical practice have taught me the lesson of
common sense again and again. Eventually, I realized that society in
general, and modern medicine in particular, lack common sense. This is
why societal and medical problems are rarely solved. Let's apply
common sense to healthcare.

Hugh Mann

http://organicMD.org
http://www.organicmd.org/commonsense.html
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/eletters/331/7531/1495#140629
http://www.nzma.org.nz/journal/119-1241/2162/

Dr. George R. Tiller and the Truth About America in Wichita, Kansas

David Bartsrow of the New York Times has written a stirring account of the life and guts of a leader in civil rights for women’s rights. No one is immune from the prosecution for the unjustified slaying of an advocate for women’s rights as individual citizens. The cold blooded, calculated destruction of a life is an indictment of our way of life.

For thirty years the militants, like any fanatics have waged a crusade against a person who fulfilled a promise to restorative justice for the rights and privileges of a persecuted minority of our people. Whether you agree with the tactics of the militants or the practices of Dr. Tiller is not the issue America faces.

What we face is a hard, brutal reality, that violence is condoned as it was in the Crusades against anyone who lived in the path of the destructive onslaught? All beings are in the way who opposes the violence and all those who perpetrated the violence are responsible. Dr. Tiller was brutally murdered in the same way that Harris and Klebold assaulted innocent victims of what has been described as terrorism. The question which arises here is when and if it is possible for this opportunistic violence to end? Does America want to find solutions to problems or simply disregard the sanctity of human life and live in hatred of anyone or anything that is different?

Witchita, like any place of terror has become a symbol of violence. No one has benefitted from the slaying and no one is without blood on their hands. We have each tortured and corrupted the values of the innocent. We have each created a place which is unsafe and immoral.

What we are called to accomplish here to change the climate of hatred is to have an eternal moratorium of violence both within our hearts and in our interactions with every being on earth. We must live in peace as citizens of the earth without prejudice and malice or perish. This reality is the only way in which we can restore the transcendent worth of life. We can never raise our voices, or act with ruthless carelessness again. Dr. Tiller is a symbol of courage and conviction and he must be valued and raised to a place of honor as a citizen of freedom and inalienable rights of those who protect the oppressed.

We must never forget that there are people in our world who are models to emulate in their choice to act for human worth, dignity and the preservation of the spirit.

Sgt. James Crowley Did Behave “Stupidly”
By Helen L. Burleson, Doctor of Public Administration

I happen to be a fan of police officers based on my personal experiences with them. I have taken to the extreme the motto, that they “serve and protect.”
Once when I lived in Washington, D C, a wasp flew into my car. I stopped right in the center of traffic and beckoned to the policeman directing traffic to come get the wasp out of my car to avoid losing control of the car causing a multiple car accident that could have resulted in a fatality to someone. Later, when there was an invasion of the poisonous and deadly, brown recluse spider, I called a policeman into my home in Chicago to kill the spider for fear the spider might bite my infant son. As a young teacher in the City of Chicago, and an evening graduate student at Northwestern University, I again called upon the police to protect me. Parking my car behind my home on the west side of Chicago, two men came through the passageway between our building and the one next door holding a gun. Frightened for my life, after I was safe in my home, I called the police to report it. The police offered and did have a squad to meet me at the entrance to the alley behind my home each night when I returned home. My next positive experience was when my teen-aged son violated curfew in Olympia Fields, a small upscale Illinois village, with only two Black families in residence at that time. My son had gone to spend the night with a classmate in another village only to realize that his getting up early Sunday morning would disturb that family. We were a medical family and rounds had to be made before going to church on Sundays, thus the reason for my son’s late night departure.
Here’s where the story gets interesting. My son was stopped by the Olympia Fields police. He was told he was violating curfew. When asked why he was out so late and where he lived, he was believed when he gave his address though he had no identification with him. The police officer simply told him not to violate curfew again and to hurry home. Knowing that there have been very different and negative outcomes when young Black males are stopped by police, I called the OFPD the next day, asked to speak to the police chief and complimented him on the training given to the force and commended the officer for his gentlemanlike behavior. I also told him that because I would have called to complain had my son been disrespected, it was only fair that I call to compliment sensitive and caring police work.
Because the police demonstrated effective, efficient and sensitive training, I vowed and gave the police department an annual treat every year at Christmas time, until at age 78 when I became unemployed and was financially unable to continue the practice.
I have gone into great detail to explain why I am such a fan of good police work. Unfortunately, my experience is not typical of so many of my Black brothers and sisters.
First of all, policemen have more discretionary power than almost everyone in American society, including the President of the United States. At a police action, the officer can assume the role of judge, jury and executioner when he shoots and kills someone. In too many instances, the policeman is exonerated and given the benefit of the doubt. All policemen, like the rest of the population, are not honest. Most are. The few rogue cops give the occupation a bad name. Rogue cops use their drop guns to justify self defense. Rogue cops also plant dime bags of drugs at a scene to justify a drug arrest.
Now, let’s look at Sgt. James Crowley, not only did he behave “stupidly,” he apparently also seemed to take on some of the characteristics of an unfulfilled person seeking vengeance because it was averred that he was called a racist. It seems to me that only a racist is deeply angered by being so identified. Those who are not racist, simply ignore the charge as being unfounded. Failure to read one’s Miranda rights, if this is true, is a violation of the law. Refusing to give one’s name and badge number, may not be a crime but it violates ethics. A citizen has the right to ask for and get that information.
Now we learn that Sgt. Crowley is a diversity trainer recommended for this position by a Black person. This compounds the problem. Obviously, the training is either incomplete or ineffective. Such training should include the cultural differences and mores of ethnic groups. In the Black community, when one is frustrated and exasperated, one resorts to a common practice which is referred to as “signifying,” “playing the dozens,” and using a term, “yo mama.” Had Sgt. Crowley been adequately trained he would have known what he was being subjected to and would not have bitten the bait. Sgt. Crowley was armed and had a badge to hide behind. Professor Gates was defenseless and vulnerable; he had no way to defend himself other than to play the dozens. Further, Dr. Gates had crossed the International Date Line, crossed time zones and may have been suffering from jet lag. Returning home from China and not finding everything the way they should be was another cause for frustration. Of course, Sgt. Crowley had no way to know these details, but a wise officer properly trained in diversity would have tried to diffuse the situation, thus de-esclating and bringing the level of tension down.
Further, in listening to Sgt. Crowley, he stated that he was alone and indicated that he felt threatened. Confucius says one picture is worth a thousand words. According to the picture, when Professor Gates stepped out onto the porch there were at least 2 other officers present, one of whom was Black. Yes, he was alone with Professor Gates when he was in the professor’s home where he was given proof of the address on the driver’s license and that Dr. Gates was affiliated with Harvard; that should have ended the situation.

The fact that Sgt. Crowley went into a home alone when there was the possibility of “two Black men” who could have been armed and dangerous, is an example of poor police judgment, in other words, S T U P I D I T Y.
Let’s face it, Sgt. Crowley allowed his emotions to run away with him and to me he appeared to want to teach the “highly educated” professor a lesson by showing who really had the superior power in the situation. In order words, I can imagine that he thought no matter how educated you are, you had the nerve to call me a racist and talked about my mother. Step outside. Why? He had learned all he needed to know when he was inside the home. It appears to me the resulting arrest was the satisfaction that would make the Sergeant’s bruised ego feel whole.
Let’s all be rational. Let’s all put emotion aside. This situation calls for objective logic, not personal or subjective reacting.
I feel that Sgt. Crowley should be required to take additional courses in diversity because he does not have the temperament to serve the public effectively and efficiently. Crowley tarnishes the name and reputation of policemen everywhere; and this is why Black people especially disrespect the police and fear that their abuse of power can result in false imprisonment and even death. This is not something that White people, in general, have to fear, thus they do not understand the disparity.
I am in favor of elevating the status of police work to the level of professionalism with much better training in behavioral psychology and better pay in order to attract the brightest and the best because of the discretionary authority and power which they hold.
We do need an honest dialogue about racial profiling because it does exist in America. It is insidious, incendiary and inhumane. The President of the United States does not need to apologize to anyone for calling a spade a spade.
We need to move on. Get over it. Our country has too many serious problems with the economy, with wars, with both a failing education and a failing health system, and with providing equal justice under the law for all of her citizens. Let’s stop yakking and jaw boning and take care of our serious business. “We have miles to go before we sleep.”

“In God We Trust” Biennial 2010: En un Teatro Cerca
By Randle Loeb

“In Good We Trust,” is the coined phrase of the Denver Biennial of the Americas 2010. Bruce Mau is the Creative Director of the Denver Biennial of the Americas and he announced that seven themes will resonate throughout the first of many biennial celebrations next year. Leaders in their respective industries will be drawn to Denver during the years ahead to establish a posh think tank and performance venue for research in the fields of energy, technology, economy, environment, habitat, education and health.
One of the featured participants will be Gunter Pauli who is developing 100 technologies for providing 100 million sustainable jobs. The idea is to, “replace something with nothing.” Glenn Kaino will be offering micro philanthropy and how partners of industry and the private sector of the economy can sustain the next generation. There will be three to four billion new children in the world, which means that half the world will be rebuilt. Jamie Lerner will be offering the “portable street.” The purpose of this technology is for the dangerous and unstable places throughout the world to have a business location that has low investment to create. Enrique Norten will explore water technology that sustains the planet. Seven billion people will require that the mechanics of energy be sustainable. Mexico City, Mexico is dropping at a rate of ten centimeters annually. The new technologies will leave the aquifers alone. When we consider the car and the highway as molesting the environment we must see that the highway is a ribbon on fire. Energy and economy must be mutually connected. Avory Lovins at the Rocky Mountain Institute will be working on the future construction of one block at a time. Imbedded in this is how to provide greater wealth to more people. “Takingitglobally,” will examine how we pay for the benefits of health care using innovative means to challenge past assumptions of service. Emilio Mendez has created in Guatemala, after thirty years of civil war a program entitled, “Guateamala.” They are working on building a culture of life through listening and rising out of the depths of despair to challenge the next generation of citizens.
Mr. Brau referred the Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring,” and the message of austerity. He ardently claimed that the message of the text forty years ago was out dated. There is no reason to live in a world of sacrifice and to abandon the gains of the automobile and technology. Instead we must learn to live with the advances and accommodate the changes necessary to sustain the teeming population. The works of these industrialists of the new era will be, “sexy, beautiful, thrilling and provide new equations for living.”
Martha Delgado will tackle the issue of education in the modern world. 20 million people living in Mexico City require a climate of action. We will learn about multiple intelligences and incentives for women in poor nations to develop their micro businesses and learn to sustain their families while traveling to places to earn money and send back the resources to develop the infrastructure of the emerging nations. Dr. Sally Hamilton from the Korbel School of International Studies of the University of Denver spoke of the role of women as the principle person immigrating to earn a living and send back this vital currency. The construct calls for the head of household to do what many men have done previously. The women are interested in returning home and are the ones who must thrive so that their families can be sustained. This enterprise is tied directly to the existence of Western Union in all but three countries in the world. Luella Chavez d’Angelo is the President of the Western Union Foundation spoke of the leadership of women in the world.
The issues of poverty and social justice played a central role in the round table on what will take place at this seven week event that has already been inaugurated. The Organization of the American States is considering the admission of Cuba as the thirty-fifth county to be a member. Examining the plight of Honduras, the diplomats discussed the role of steadfast defense of democracy and countering coups because they impede the safe and peaceful development of the emerging nations. President Obama stated in Trinidad, Tobago that, “we are all equals in Latin America. We are not here to choose the presidents of other countries.” What we must forge are partnerships throughout the world to solve economic injustice and disparity of wealth.
Federico Pena stated that women have always been on the forefront of benefitting the economic potential of the world. He emphasized that the labor, social interest and potential of new high value markets afforded by their remittances bolstered their local economies. This was a theme that echoed everywhere in the biennial plans for 2010. In Chile, since the dictators have ended their terror poverty has been reduced forty percent to less than ten percent in the last thirty years. In Mexico the numbers of refuges from other nations have always poured into their nation offering a place for their homeland to engage people throughout the world. The new world diplomacy is driven from the bottom up. In the Americas more oil is traded than in the Middle East for U.S. consumption. There is a larger exchange of goods and services in Latin America than with China. Brazil long ago became an ethanol producing nation, completely self sufficient from oil. Mexico is creating one of the great centers of solar panels and wind turbines with 167 turbines. As energy consumption grows and the demands for increased support for technology to solve the new world’s problems the focus will be on the creative dependency of these emerging nations and their industries.
The dynamic presentation of educational initiatives in the small school in Salvador, Brazil is offering “Drumming into the future.” In the creative economy students learn to create video, music, art and overcome the obstacles of poverty.
Brau states that technology is the reason that we have thrived. The global population for Mr. Brau is sustainable. Julio Ottino, a professor from Northwestern University is training engineers to use the other half of their brains. Barb Groth created the Big Buddha Baba emphasizing the importance of playing and laughter. The students today will have a chance to interact in real time with the world. Interactive engagement in real time defines technology as the culture of tomorrow.
Mr. Brau concluded that Goethe said, “What you can do, or dream, you can do now.” Genius, living and circumstances are crucibles of change and having a healthy tolerance for ambiguity.

Buckminster Fuller wrote: “If success or failure of this planet and of human beings depended on how I am and what I do ………………How would I be? What would I do?

In THE YEAR 1909 life was simpler.
Here are some statistics in 1909:

The average life span was forty-seven years.

14 percent of the homes had a bathtub.

8 percent of the homes had a telephone.

There were 8,000 cars and 144 miles of paved roads.

The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.

The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower.

The average wage was .22 an hour.

The average worker made between $200 and $400 per year.

An accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year,
A dentist $2,500 per year, a veterinarian between $1,500 and $4,000 per year, and a mechanical engineer about $5,000 per year.

More than 95 percent of all births took place at home.

90 percent of the doctors had no college education.

Physicians attended medical schools, many of which
were condemned in the press and the government as being 'substandard. '

Sugar cost four cents a pound.

Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen.

Coffee was fifteen cents a pound.

Most women washed their hair once a month, and used
Borax or egg yolks for shampoo.
Canada passed a law that prohibited poor people from
Entering into their country for any reason.

Five leading causes of death were:
1. Pneumonia and influenza
2. Tuberculosis
3. Diarrhea
4. Heart disease
5. Stroke

The American flag had 45 stars.

The population of Las Vegas, Nevada was thirty people.

Crossword puzzles, canned beer, and ice tea
were not yet manufactured.

There was no Mother's Day or Father's Day.

Two out of every ten adults could not read or write.

Only 6 percent of all Americans had graduated from high school.
Marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available over the counter at the local corner drugstores.

Pharmacists reported that,
'Heroin clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach and bowels, and is a perfect guardian of health.'

There were 230 reported murders in the country.

What will life be like in another 100 years?

On The Space Between the Stars

At last she paused and allowed a gasp to escape from her mouth feeling the trembling sense of the inside of her lips, her gums, the waving cilia that lined her nostrils, and along the septum of the inner canal of the bridge between the linings of the airways
she gave rise to another breath and another and in each a chorus of waves of air surveyed the topography of the sacks of alveoli that bordered the transfer of gas to blood, bearing at first the red corpuscles and then the white abounding the hemisphere of the left and right parietal lobes.
No one noticed the space that lay in between the tissues and the air that circulated beneath the skin and along the trachea or the sentinels of the dark recesses of the pulmonary airways.
There is always this silent distance between all substance and surrounding all form that disappears in tunnels that stretch from here to infinity.
There is nothing without the space between; nothing else is in this or any realm beyond conscious breath.
Even shooting stars obey space and distance of the infinite wonder of being. Nothing else matters.

An Ash Tree Simply Cared For in the Urban Jungle

Predators abound in the city. Neglected by asphalt and concrete and the heat that decimates the big leaf deciduous forest, unforgiving this ash tree was suffering for two decades.
Who knows how this sapling ever survived on the edge of a parking lot and a thicket of ailanthus that brushed against the boughs of the spindly trunk and reached out their tenacious capillary roots in the ground around the fragile ash?
Nothing but hearty grasses, mallow, dandelions, convolvulus and crab grass flourished.
Beneath this tree mayhem was stirring.

Children in the Shelter assaulted the bark, the branches, and trunk breaking off limbs, which were left to ooze and weather this abuse. Many others came and ignored the spindly branches, pulling off leaves, hacking them, and never giving the roots a thirsty drink.
This stalwart survivor proved that everyone was wrong when they wished finally to chop down the ash. The tree shook its boughs in the wind and gave off the thousands of seeds annually, plodding on through the dark nights and sweltering days of both summer and winter.

Now this tree has a girth of ten inches and it is forty feet tall. The canopy that it offers provides ample shade and sustenance to many organisms far below. In winter snow is piled up to nourish the roots throughout the cold and the scalding sun cannot reach the trunk. The gaping wounds of the lower trunk and the hewn main branches are beginning to recede as the tree puts forth large, round, bright green obviated leaves,; learning to adapt to the mulch and nutrients that are placed lovingly at the base of the tree.
Everyday the tree is nourished and watched, stroked and loved with care and tenderness. The tree has responded. It stands tall and massive in the backdrop of the steps, providing a landscape of green and succulent seed clusters, like a giant palm.

We are much the same as a tree that has been neglected.
The idea of mental illness is a curse and a blessing. Nathaniel Ayers of the story of Paul Lopez, “The Soloist,” condemns the writer for making him something that he is not; a cripple. Paul Lopez learns that it is a great gift and honor to know Nathaniel and for him to call Paul his friend.
He must learn this painfully, because like most people we want to help and we think that by understanding the construct of the Diagnostic Mental Disorder Book that we understand the person.

In 1995 I was working for Rottin’ ReLeaf, an organic gardening business founded to provide organic control of weeds and best practices of soil fertility and composting. My business partner and I worked under contract for Denver Urban Gardens and established the Gove Demonstration Compost site. I was maintaining the site when I received a call from a childhood friend that my youngest child, Leila was in a fatal car accident in Philadelphia on the main thoroughfare, Broad Street.

Leila was rushed to Hahnemann Hospital after having been removed from the vehicle by the paramedics and taken to surgery. For several agonizing weeks she stood in the balance between life and death. Almost daily a different part of her vital organs, her back, her face, jaw, hips and legs, intestines, liver, lungs and brain was under duress.
That she graduated on time from Bodine School of International Affairs was a miracle.

When I heard the news I was under treatment at Jefferson Mental Health Center for bi-polar disorder. I had been taking lithium, which I threw away subsequently. I flew on a midnight flight through O’Hare Airport to Philadelphia, and a long time friend rushed me to the bed side of my daughter where I sat for a week.

Eight years earlier the relationship with her mother dissipated into a dead silence from which nothing ever changed. Reluctantly, I moved here to begin my life again, which had been shattered. Now here again, in this familiar situation, I found no solace in the comfort of my wife and the life that I had left behind. I retreated and when I returned slowly and steadily lost my home and my will to live.

Over the course of several episodes in 2000 and 2001 I attempted suicide, succeeding the final time were it not for the will of a fellow colleague of the Denver Homeless Voice, who implored the manager to open the door of my apartment in Anchor I of the St. Francis Center at 1205 Washington St. I was taken to Presbyterian – St Luke’s Hospital on the advent of 9/11 in a coma. How I came to these straits is irrelevant in this context; what matters, is what took place next. When the planes flew into the buildings and the world was in stunned silence I was contemplating the irony that all of these families had been affected by the disaster and no one wished to lose their life, and here I was, as I have often, begging for a reprieve from the pain of being. I remarked at the time, “that there is a problem with this resolute decision to die,” and I will freely tell you, that not a day goes by that the feelings of doubt stir in me and I struggle to rise above the din of ending my life.
There is nothing that I would do to die anymore, because my purpose and motivation are clearer. I have learned to stare at the inevitable and regard the fate of living as a test of endurance. I am a survivor. What this means literally is that there has been a paradigm shift away from regarding the inevitable outcome of life as a threat and staying put being more clearly focused on the privilege of drawing a conscious breath.

We are all alike, like the white ash, that we each sustain deep wounds. We are susceptible of shattering under the weight of neglect and bear the scars of many losses. The world is a place of great conflict and disharmony.

Life is at best precarious and will never be predictable and yet, all being is interconnected. Examining the ash with eyes wide open one sees that the tree is more than its name. In looking at the tree we can see that the name does not make the tree vital nor for that matter any person.

At last she paused and allowed a gasp to escape from her mouth feeling the trembling sense of the inside of her lips, her gums, the waving cilia that lined her nostrils and along the septum of the inner canal of the bridge between the linings of the airways she gave rise to another breath and another, and in each a chorus of waves of air surveyed the topography of the sacks of alveoli that bordered the transfer of gas to blood, bearing at first the red corpuscles and then the white,
abounding the hemisphere of the left and right parietal lobes.

No one noticed the space that lay in between the tissues and the air that circulated beneath the skin, and along the trachea or the sentinels of the dark recesses of the pulmonary airways.

There is always this silent distance between all substance and surrounding all form that disappears in tunnels that stretch from here to infinity. There is nothing without the space between; nothing else is in this or any realm beyond conscious breath. Even shooting stars obey space and distance of the infinite wonder of being. Nothing else matters.

Space surrounds us and fills us. The space is more than the form and substance. The space that we live in is a breathing organism. This sermon is more than the words. The space that surrounds us gives us our meaning and makes these words sustainable. This process carries us beyond listening and understanding to being. We are living in this moment here and this is the only reality of form and function. The truth is that the names which we have of everything are a description which transcends being.
The truth is that we all belong here. We are here in this light and this space. We are all here for good or bad sharing these experiences in this sphere.
We all belong sharing the frailties and short comings of living in sacred trust.

In Gheel, in Belgium and in programs here in this nation there is a spirit of care and concern for the person with developmental and personal hardship to covenant together as a community to care for the individual by taking him or her in to one’s home.
For centuries this has been taking place; for centuries sharing these bonds. It is called life sharing. When a family member dies who is a caretaker, another family member fulfills the role as a family throughout the person’s lifetime.

Citizen Advocacy has long established trust with the neighbor to fulfill a common purpose of sustaining life and ensuring that all beings are protected and cherished. When a person agrees to care for that person the community coalition preserves the integrity, worth and dignity of everyone.
Such a model exists in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, where I once lived in a house at 236 Hall Street. The model of caring for each other in community is ancient. The most basic of all communities, the clan, begins and follows this primordial social construct.

For those who wish: examine www.communitycoalition.org; look up Gheel; explore the construct of Citizen Advocacy; learn about life sharing and Camphill Villages. Listen to the space that surrounds us and these words in order to uncover the common good.