Presentation/Readings for the Friends of the Seguin Public Library event,
Community Meeting Room-Seguin Public Library, 10 am-12 noon, September 8, 2018
paul bain martin
PEACE?/Positively Ethical Applied Community Ecology? … Sunday, Labor Day Weekend. I very much appreciated the community’s “coming together” (but those gathered were mostly Mexican-Americans) at the Seguin-Guadalupe County Coliseum & grounds for the Our Lady of Guadalupe Bazaar. … (By the way, in my St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, Devine, Texas back in the 1950s/60s, “community” was brown Spanish speakers on the left side of the center aisle and whites on the right. … ¡Por eso hablo español tan mal!)
PEACE?/Positively Ethical Applied Community Ecology? … Saturday, Labor Day Weekend. I very much appreciated the community’s “coming together” (but those gathered were mostly Anglos) at the Seguin ISD High School for the wonderful play, “Will’s War”, dealing with social consciousness. … (“Will’s War” reminded me of once when I was a young kid in the 1950s, my uncle Bernard Kneuper tried to speak in German to his sister/my Mom, that–with some reason–our Martin patriarch asserted, “No German will be spoken in this home!” (My Dad’s beloved, handsome, and athletic brother Bain–who tried to avoid going into the Army and the War–had been killed in Germany, February 25th,1945, … and not long after having been drafted. … And durn, I wish I could’ve learned German from my Mom and her family.)
(Long pause0
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One of G.T. Miller’s Fifty-nine “Principles for Understanding and Sustaining the Earth”*
An Ecological Community Ethic of Reciprocity/Cry for PEACE*
Miller (1990) Resource Conservation and Management & in http://www.paulpeaceparables.com/2018/05/31/reminders-for-living-sustainably-for-inside-the-cover-of-the-little-book-on-applied-ecology-peace-games-we-play/
“Love thy species and other species today and into the future as thyself. (Principle of species love and protection)”
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“The War Prayer
Mark Twain
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism …; in the churches the pastors preached devotion to flag and country, and invoked the God of Battles beseeching His aid in our good cause in outpourings of fervid eloquence which moved every listener.
…
Then home from the war, bronzed heroes, welcomed, adored, submerged in golden seas of glory! … The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament was read; the first prayer was said … :
God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest,
Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy sword!
Then came the “long” prayer. … The burden of its supplication was, that an ever-merciful and benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers, and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in the day of battle and the hour of peril, … make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory —
…
(But to the surprise of all, an old & wise elder then spoke.) ‘Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth into battle — be Thou near them! … O Lord our God, help us tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended in the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames in summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it —
For our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimmage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet!
We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.’
(After a pause.) ‘Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits.’
—
It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.”
(Long pause)
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Enrolada*
pbm
(Jan 2007)
Depression and Pinchot-wired parents taught us to conserve.
2007 Chosen People-fundamentalist preachers impel us to grab and rule the all that WE MOST CERTAINLY deserve.
Humility, frugality used to be preached in the churches.
America First!!! War!! Estados Unidos sempre precisa ganhar! … And the ship of state lurches.
Donald Trump, Warren Buffett, Bill Gates. The power reigns.
Others squalid in big city/rural remains.
So green! So green! A new gas-electric hybrid auto and a muito verde LEED home built for only 200,000 times what half the individuals in the world make in a year.
“Organicissimo!! Organicissimo!!” With this certified pesticide-free apple sent from New Zealand for our fresh fruit Texas party of Christmas cheer.
…
Cars cause super-problems; we rush for more.
9-11! Pres says rush for the store.
…
Hot outside? Turn on the arcondicionados! Keep eating more gas-, oil-, coal-fueled potatoes.
Global warming (Climate change)? Highly recommend moving from Barbados.
The Chosen few of the world possess Capital and are Landed,
While the Third World is kwashiorkor- stranded.
7 billion Homo sapiens—Number ONE!!!
Other top trophic species? You’re certainly done!
…
Come to our High Schools and Universities and learn to change the world faster.
No matter this “serves” to make the Natural ecosphere much less of a laster.
Mold those young uns into businessmen, corporate lawyers, sports physicians, oil field geologists.
But “Heaven forbid” an environmentalist or world-renowned ecologist!
… (Pause)
War. Basic/Airborne Ranger/Green Beret Special Forces training–into fit muscled/artificial “Army of One”- MEN (and woMEN). Uniforms, weapons, order, brass gives us meaning.
Could we all do a chaotic Peace Corps thing –and rather than destroy do just cleaning?
… (Pause)
……………………
I’m confused!!!!
Or too much BS infused?
…”
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*Brazilian Portuguese for: “all balled up”, or “all messed up”.
(Long pause)
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Miller (1990) “Love thy species and other species today and into the future as thyself. (Principle of species love and protection)”
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Ekla Chalo Re
Rabindranath Tagore
(who greatly influenced Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi)
If they answer not to your call … walk alone
If they are afraid and cower mutely facing the wall,
O thou unlucky one, open your mind and speak out alone.
If they turn away, and desert you when crossing the wilderness,
O thou unlucky one, trample the thorns under thy tread, and along the blood-lined track travel alone.
If they shut doors and do not hold up the light when the night is troubled with storm,
O thou unlucky one, with the thunder flame of pain ignite your own heart, and let it burn alone.
www.inditales.com
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My props will be books (Resource Conservation, Why War Is Never a Good Idea, O Homen Indio Sobrevivente, Karankawa County, Earth Keepers, Swiat Polskiej Przyrody), shells, rags, an apple, a potato, and several drawings for the developing little book on applied ecology.
7S’s / VV->^^
pbm
