DECLARATION of HUMANITY
by Michael Brownlee
eostrust@mindspring.com
October 11, 2001
Since the shocking events of September 11, and the cascade of reactions and
responses that have followed, people everywhere have been asking, "What can I
do? How can I possibly make a difference in this complex and volatile
situation?"
Perhaps what we can do - as a beginning - is to join together on behalf of
humanity in a simple Declaration:
* We shall peacefully and lovingly bring to an end human want, violence, war,
hatred, crime, hunger, poverty, disease, and inequitable distribution of
prosperity.
* We shall accept responsibility for the evolution of life and consciousness
on our planet.
* We shall restore, protect, and nurture Earth's ecosystems.
* We shall meet our material and energy requirements without diminishing
natural or human resources.
* We shall heal our hearts, our minds, and our bodies - individually and
collectively.
* We shall heal our relationships with one another, with the Earth, and with
the Cosmos.
* We shall be one united people, the sovereign people of Earth.
* We shall live in harmony with one another and with all other species of
intelligent life that we encounter.
* We shall learn to balance within ourselves the material and the spiritual
realms.
* We shall consciously evolve as a species, continually enhancing our
intelligence, our creativity, our ethics, our compassion, our love, our
wisdom, and our Knowledge.
* We shall successfully pass through our current evolutionary threshold and
those that await us in the future.
* We shall vigorously protect, defend, and nurture the sovereignty and
freedom of our people and our world.
* We shall respect, honor, and support the sovereignty and freedom of all
sentient species we encounter.
* We shall responsibly venture beyond our home planet.
* We shall be conscientious participants in and generous contributors to the
Greater Community of the Universe.
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THE INNER TRUTH
by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Riverside Church, New York City, April 4th, 1967
"A time comes when silence is betrayal. Even when pressed by the demands of
inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's
policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without
great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's
own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand
seem as perplexing as they often do in the case of dreadful conflict, we are
always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty. But we must move on."
"Some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have
found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must
speak. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited
vision, but we must speak. For we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the
darkness that seems so close around us."
"We are called to speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for the victims of
our nation, for those it calls "enemy," for no document from human hands can
make these humans any less our brothers. I think of them, too, because it is
clear to me that there will be no meaningful solution until some attempt is
made to know them and hear their broken cries."
"I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world
revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We
must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a
person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and
property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant
triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of
being conquered."
"A true revolution of values will lay hand on the world order and say of war,
"This way of settling differences is not just." A nation that continues year
and year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social
uplift is approaching spiritual death."
"America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead
the way in this revolution of values. There is nothing except a tragic death
wish to prevent us from reordering our priorities over the pursuit of war."
"This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond
one's tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an
all-embracing and unconditional love for all mankind. We can no longer afford
to worship the God of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. The oceans
of history are made turbulent by the ever-rising tides of hate. History is
cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursed this
self-defeating path of hate."
"We still have a choice today: nonviolent coexistence or violent
coannihilation. We must move past indecision to action. If we do not act, we
shall surely be dragged down the long, dark, and shameful corridors of time
reserved for those who posses power without compassion, might without
morality, and strength without sight."
"Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves in the long and bitter,
but beautiful struggle for a new world. If we will but make the right choice,
we will be able to speed up the day, all over America and all over the world,
when justice will roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty
stream." "May our country, on the brink of war, take to heart the final
refrain of "America, the Beautiful": "America! America! God mend thine ev'ry
flaw, Confirm thy soul in self-control, Thy liberty in law."
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EARTH MANIFESTO for the HUMAN FAMILY
author unknown
Remember:
We are at the dawn of the 21st century. And we are the human family, dwellers
upon Mother Earth, a cosmic dancer spinning thru galactic space...
Autumn 2001.
This is the traditional time of harvest in the fields. This is also the time
to look at the fruits of our human history and assess, in full honesty, our
ways of tending the Earth Garden and of living together as a kin family.
ARE we going to repeat, like zombies, the destructive old patterns of
hatred, revenge, greed and exploitation of each other ? -these instinctual
reactions of the reptilian brain that have brought us, for grim eons, a
quasi-permament state of warfare and sorrow ...
ARE we going to let our proud animalistic ego continuously leading our
individual and collective lives ? -stubbornly sitting on our puny territories
& possessions and viciously kicking around to defend and aggrandize them ?
OR, are we going to be bold conscious beings, enacting the love of Life ?
-courageous new pioneers daring to break away from millenia of past
programming and finally standing up as free beings, set upon deciding a
constructive course of collective history...
HOW ABOUT launching a 21st century where our deep & intimate dreams can
be given a chance: happiness, peace, respect for Life, beauty, creativity,
truth & spirit of celebration...
HOW ABOUT acting as free people: women & men & children of all races and
colors and religions and cultures holding hands together and co-creating NOW
the Earth mandala Garden ?
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