‘Now is a time to take greater personal and collective responsibility.’ Photo: by James Wiseman on Unsplash
The world in love’s image: Southern Africa’s Richard Gush Lecture by Marie Odendaal
‘Let us all plan and work for the revolution we desire.’
Our present and future lives, and that of our fellow inhabitants, depend on planet earth – a speck in the galaxy, one among an estimated two trillion galaxies or more. We are part of an an infinite, continually-expanding and ever-evolving cosmos. We humans too are evolving: works in progress, in continual transformation. We’re both creative and social beings, relational, interdependent, growing through and into love.
Many African cultures have the idea that a person is a person through other people. ‘Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu’. In Zulu and Xhosa this is called ‘ubuntu’; in Sesotho, ‘botho’; in Shona, ‘unhu’. The psychologist Nhlanhla Mkhize says the ethic of ubuntu is ‘a call to action because an ethical being (…a being with moral sense) cannot look on the suffering of another and remain unaffected’.
Who do we want to become? We make choices about that in and through relationship with others, who shape us as we also shape them. Through our choices we, like the 1976 school children of Soweto, try to create the world we want. Our choices shape the world. I think this process continues after we die through our relationships, work and adventures – the times when we risk pushing beyond our comfort zones and challenging ourselves with the impossible. Love is the legacy we’ve received. Let that be the legacy we also leave for others.
Where’s God in all this? The conventional Christian stories I heard as a child were told as truth and never problematised. Now, absolutes don’t fit for me. Rather, I seek God as a powerful idea created by people to explain our origins and the mysteries of life. Most cultures have a God idea, though its forms and names may change with time. The Zulu people’s original name for the supreme being was ‘Mvelangqangi’, meaning ‘the first to appear’. Christian missionaries and translators recast it to ‘Nkulunkulu’, ‘the great great one’. I now see God as the life forces of creative energy and love in people and other life forms. In everything that exists. This is a spiritual rather than a religious idea. This creative energy is in each of us. It’s our hunger to do work, to make things, to fix what’s wrong, to create beauty. It feeds our imagination. It makes me feel more alive, more passionate about living, and more connected.
The capacity and hunger for love is in each of us. It hurts when we see others suffer. Love enables our empathy, makes us want to take away pain and its causes. It’s our desire to be kind. Love feeds our struggle for a world of justice, fairness, truth and human dignity. I want these two life forces to be expressed as fully as possible, through me, you, and all people, for our greater well-being, and to realise our true human potential. Did God create the universe? I don’t know. To me, what I believe now matters less than how I live. Life has taught me to value open-mindedness above ideological conviction – it fits better with ubuntu.
Let me here offer for reflection Advice 28 from Living Adventurously (Central and Southern Africa’s book of Quaker faith and practice). It talks of moments of change in life. Now is such a time.
‘In trying to decide what direction to take, at moments of change in life, seek advice from trusted sources and your conscience. Wait for the right time to undertake or relinquish responsibilities without fear, pride or guilt. Embrace the task with loving enthusiasm.’
We face three global pandemics: the coronavirus, human violence, and planetary warming. These crises threaten our lives. They also reveal just how deadly the inequalities and injustices of our human-created systems and structures are. At worst they kill, at least they sicken us – physically, emotionally, spiritually. The poorest are worst affected. Advice 28 offers a way to breathe spiritually and practically. This is individual and also collective advice for Friends. Now is a time to take greater personal and collective responsibility than ever to work for change. With loving enthusiasm and political will we can remake our fundamental relationships with each other and the planet. That is our larger task, made up of many smaller tasks.
Crises create opportunities, and reveal human resourcefulness. Covid-19 has produced tremendous creativity, global cooperation and collaboration, and greater scientific capabilities. It’s shown us the power of love through the dedication and sacrifice of health care workers. These are examples of George Fox’s vision of an infinite ocean of light and love flowing over the ocean of darkness. Our Quaker ancestors have lived out Fox’s vision, often in very dark times. They’ve helped to abolish slavery, saved Jewish children from the holocaust, and birthed gender equality. Margaret Hope Bacon’s book Mothers of Feminism: The story of Quaker women in America starts with these words: ‘On July 13 1848, five women sat around a mahogany tea table and planned a revolution’. That revolution has spread widely, and the social change it started continues and deepens. Our binary idea of gender and sexual identity is becoming more fluid, moving towards understanding William Penn’s insight that in souls there is no sex. Spiritually there’s no difference between people, regardless of gender and sexual preference.
Quakers have started movements and organisations that outlast them, and continue to change the world: the Alternatives to Violence Project (AVP), Amnesty International, Greenpeace, Oxfam, Friends Peace Teams to name but some. Quakers are doing this today, too. Recently I attended a virtual memorial service for David Zarembka. Some Friends will know that David, with his wife Gladys Kamonya, in collaboration with Kenyan peacemakers, established the African Great Lakes Initiative (AGLI). David apparently never talked politics but had the attitude ‘Here’s a problem, what can we do about it?’ AGLI works across countries historically ruptured by colonialism, ethnic genocide and conflict. It works to empower people to handle interpersonal conflict non-violently. It does this through AVP workshops and by other means. AGLI also focuses on trauma healing through a complementary program, Healing and Rebuilding our Communities (HIROC). Participants I met were mostly widows who lost their farms and livelihoods in a land dispute going back to colonial times. They were IDPs – internally displaced persons – living in poverty among strangers. HIROC couldn’t give them their land back, but sharing their stories helped the healing process they needed to rebuild their lives and recover a sense of community.
David and Gladys died within days of each other from Covid-related complications. David’s children, and the peace facilitators who worked with him, have practical plans to carry forward their legacy. Projects started by Friends in various Local Meetings include River Rescue in the Eastern Cape, and the Philakade care home for people with disabilities in KwaZulu-Natal. Let us all plan and work for the revolution we desire. Guidance, direction and discernment may come to us from many sources: our consciences, the stillness and sharing of our Meetings, teachers and mentors, Quaker writings and other literature, art and music – and sometimes through dreaming. As Margaret Mead is said to have assured us: ‘Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world: indeed it is the only thing that ever has.’
The full lecture can be seen at https://youtu.be/Sn6UwE523p8.
Comments
A brilliant article. Draws together so many threads and issues in a eloquently and in a short space.
By cel.peter90@gmail.com on 30th September 2021 - 9:43
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