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We're all social distancing these days, and it's unclear when exactly that will end. But Billy Barr has been doing this for almost 50 years. He's the only full-time resident of Gothic, Colorado, USA
Billy Barr, pictured, is the only year-round resident in the former silver mining town of Gothic, Colorado. He moved there in the fall of 1973 after he graduated from Rutgers University.-Photo: Daily Mail
Gothic Ghost Town
Gothic was supported by the Silver mines in the area and a post office between 1879 and 1896. At one time, there were 200 buildings. The area of Gothic and surrounding areas had a combined population of 1000. President Grant visited Gothic in 1880, and Horace Tabor backed financially the Elk Mountain Bonanza newspaper. After 1914, Gothic became a ghost town, except for Billy Barr, it’s only full-time resident, since 1973.-Photo:OutThereColorado
‘Tips From Someone With Nearly 50 Years Of Social Distancing Experience.’*
"I'm the mayor and chief of police," he said. "I hold elections every year, but I don't tell anybody when they are, so it works out really well."
He lives in an abandoned silver mine at nearly 10,000 feet in altitude in the Rocky Mountains. "The snow's going sideways, it's swirling," Billy Barr said of the local weather.
Barr has tips on social distancing, but he's the first to say they may well be entirely useless.
"When I first got here, it was a relief for me to be on my own, but that's not necessarily what a healthy person does — isolate themself," he said. "I mean, I'm good at it and I do it because I like it, but what works for me, it works for me. It quite conceivably wouldn't work for anybody else."
While Barr has been called a hermit, he doesn't consider himself one. He occasionally interacts with skiers who pass through, he talks to his sister on the phone, and he works for the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory nearby, which gets flooded with scientists in the summer.
When Billy first moved to Gothic, he lived in an 8x10ft mining shack, pictured above. He lived there for eight years until he built himself an actual house in 1980, pictured below. His house is powered by solar panels and even has a greenhouse and a movie room.
Photos: Daily Mail
But the man has been living alone in a cabin in the mountains for many years, and in the winter months, he can go many days without seeing a soul. So staying home during the COVID-19 outbreak?
"Yeah, I mean this is no change for me," he said. "I come into winter with almost all my food already in."
So, without further ado, here are five recommendations for the Billy Barr method of social distancing.
Billy on one of his daily hikes.-Photo: Daily Mail
How to survive isolation and social distancing: Lessons from Billy
- Keep track of something.
Each day, Barr tracks the weather for a number of groups including the Colorado Avalanche Information Center. He started measuring snow levels in the 1970s, mostly because he was bored.
"Everything depends on the weather," said Barr, who has skied through that "sideways" and "swirling" snow to talk on the phone from the laboratory. "It controlled what I did and so I would write it all down."
He would also write down when he saw an animal.
"With the birds, especially the ones that arrive in the spring, it was exciting," he said. "It was like, 'Oh my goodness, it's sunrise and I can hear robins.' "
Turns out, monitoring things that were important to his daily life had real value. As The Atlantic has written and the documentary The Snow Guardian has shown, his records have informed dozens of studies on climate change.
In the era of COVID-19, he suggests tracking what you can — or can't — find at the grocery store. Or, better yet, participating in some citizen science, like a project called CoCoRaHS that tracks rainfall across the country.
"I would definitely recommend people doing that," he said. "You get a little rain gauge, put it outside and you're part of a network where there's thousands of other people doing the same thing as you, the same time of the day as you're doing it. It's very interesting."
- Keep a routine.
Barr starts early. He wakes up around 3:30 a.m. or 4 a.m., and stays in bed until about 5 a.m.
"Up until a week or two ago, I would listen to the news every morning so that I could start every day either totally depressed or furious. That's always a good way to start the day," he said.
"Now with the whole COVID and with politics and stuff," he said he just can't anymore. So, he listens to old-time radio instead.
Then it's time to clear the snow off his solar panels and file weather reports to a bunch of different agencies. The rest of the day involves work and chores interspersed with skiing.
"I kind of follow a set time schedule," said Barr. "Sometimes I forget what day it is, but I know what time it is."
Most importantly, he said, is leaving a reward for the end of the day. He'll read, knit something, watch a movie and then watch a game of cricket.
"It's pretty much the same day after day. Most of it I enjoy," he said.
Notably absent from his daily routine: keeping a personal journal. He said he used to, for about a decade or so, but then he went back and read it. "And it was so boring. It's like, 'OK enough already. Let me go watch some paint dry.' "
- Celebrate the stuff that matters, rather than the stuff you're supposed to celebrate.
Barr has mostly ditched holidays and birthdays, but he does celebrate Jan. 17, when sunrise goes back to what it was on the solstice.
"To me, that's a big deal because I get up so early in the morning that the lighter it gets, earlier, makes my day a lot easier," he said.
He also celebrates when he gets back from skiing 8 miles each way into the town of Crested Butte for supplies.
"Town can be kind of stressful," he said. "So I save my favorite movies and I save my favorite meals and I save things to do so when I ski back from town and I'm home, it's like, 'Woohoo!' Big party time."
- Embrace the grumpiness.
Sometimes, Barr said, it's kind of satisfying to be grumpy about something.
"I do get sick and tired of snow, but I like kidding about it. I live in an area where people live for snow, but I'm not that carried away with it, so I like being grumpy about it," Barr said. "You get older and you start saying 'OK, I'm not going to necessarily be pleasant when I don't feel pleasant.' "
These days, Barr is feeling especially unpleasant.
"Ironically, I have been in contact with one person in the last nine days. That was eight days ago," he said.
And then the guy got sick.
"I don't know what he has, but for the last week, I've been sitting around wondering If I'm going to get it," Barr said. (Another week has passed since this interview.)
Which brings us to his final tip...
- Use movies as a mood adjuster.
"If I'm really stressed I might watch an animated movie, something cute and funny that takes my mind off it. If I'm depressed, I can reverse that," he said.
"My tastes are reasonably fluff-oriented," he said. Movies like Pandemic or The Shining? Hard pass. "The Princess Bride is my pretty much favorite movie. I like Hugh Grant stuff, like Love Actually, Notting Hill."
He also recommends Bollywood movies like Om Shanti Om, Bride and Prejudice and English Vinglish.
"They're colorful. They're pretty, there's good music and stuff," he said. "I have a list of favorites that I'll only watch under certain circumstances. I save them for that."
Here are the 357 movies at the top of his list.
About 20 years ago, Barr added a movie room into his cabin. It has a projector, carpeted walls, and three chairs.
"I have a nice chair for me and I have two other chairs with the idea that I'd invite people up," he said. "And I never do."
*This story told to Rae Ellen Bichell was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUER in Salt Lake City, KUNR in Nevada, the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West in Montana, and KRCC and KUNC in Colorado. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Continue and explore a bit more on similar themes
Crisis or no crisis: These are some of my recommendations for a better life and a better world. Carpe Diem!
Time to reflect…
Every move you make, every breath you take leaves its mark on our world
Photo:EOCA's Spring 2020 Newsletter
The Art of Living a Happier life: Solitude- The Most Important Skill Nobody Taught You
In a world of constant distraction seek solitude to attain contentment
In Praise of John Clare: The Great Poet who Loved Nature …
On the 250th Birthday of William Wordsworth Let Nature be our Wisest Teacher
The beauty of living simply: the forgotten wisdom of William Morris
Simpler life and simpler times: A Journey in Life
In Praise of Frugality: Materialism is a Killer …
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This is why debt relief should be the answer to this coronavirus crisis
Yesterday I was watching the daily Coronavirus briefing from Downing Street and I could not believe my ears...
Breaking News: NHS has £13,400,000,000 debt written off to help coronavirus battle
Health Secretary Matt Hancock said:
‘As we tackle this crisis, nobody in our health service should be distracted by their hospital’s past finances.
Today’s £13.4 billion debt write off will wipe the slate clean and allow NHS hospitals to plan for the future and invest in vital services.’-Photo:Metro UK
These are the words that I thought I would never hear to be uttered by any minister in any government idolising ‘free market’ economy.
But there you have it, he said it, and I heard it!
As he was talking, things were flashing in my head! I began to think deeply, recalling that a few years back, myself and two other fellow ‘Recovered’ economists, GCGI Senior Ambassadors, had written something on ‘Debt Forgiveness’, which in the light of Mr. Hancock’s announcement, I thought that piece must be opened up again, read and get the recognition that it justifiably deserves.
So I began the search and in the GCGI archives I found it. I couldn't believe what I was reading: A fantastic recommendation for anytime, but profoundly significant for NOW, the Cornovaruis crisis ridden world.
Please join me, read it with me and then share it with the world.
Breaking the Chains of Debt: Lessons from Ancient Wisdom for Today’s Coronavirus Crisis
Overcome Fear and Embrace Hope
Photo:resilience.org
Promised Land Revisited: Forgive our debts as we forgive our debtors
By
My Guest Bloggers Steve Szeghi, Jamshid Damooei and I
(First published on 16 June 2012)
Photo:PLI
'The global economy is in crises, whilst stuck in a consumer debt trap. Consumers and businesses, not to mention local and national governments, are in the dregs of a balance sheet recession. Without increased government spending to mitigate the demand crisis, there’s little chance the economy will jump start on its own.
Whilst we can turn to the trusted Keynesian spending model to fix a balance sheet recession and get consumer spending to kick back in; there is also the old biblical idea of a jubilee - a national cancellation of private debts. We believe forgiveness is the best present we can give ourselves, as it will set us all free.
Contained in what many Christians refer to as the ‘Our Father’ or ‘Lord’s Prayer’, are the following words in some interpretations, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive of debtors”. The words imply that since we owe much to God, that we should stand ready and willing to forgive what others owe to us, and to stand ready to do that every day as the prayer also says, “give us this day our daily bread”. What has happened to the concept of forgiveness of debt? Much of the developing world is saddled with debt service payments that take such a large and substantial portion of GDP that not only is development imperiled, but life itself for a multitude of people in the country is imperiled. While occasionally for many decades now there has been talk of debt forgiveness, little has changed.
From Ireland, to Portugal, to Greece, to Spain, to Italy, throughout Europe and elsewhere there is one sovereign debt crisis after another. Debt forgiveness while spoken about is seldom significant enough to make a difference. In the United States as a result of the financial crisis of 08-09, huge financial institutions were rescued, in some sense forgiven, but there has been little to no relief for the individual homeowner, just as there is little to no relief for individuals who borrow be it in micro credit markets or by more conventional means throughout the world
The global financial and economic system is structured, and it is ever increasingly the case, to resist forgiveness of debt. Creditors bristle at the mere suggestion. The notion of debt forgiveness rankles their inmost being at its very core. But yet we cannot help but to think of the words, “forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” In coming to grips with the problems of growing inequality, poverty, continuing financial instability, and stagnant economies, debt forgiveness stands out as a requisite part of the solution. A system that refuses to forgive debt is a system that is essentially siding with creditors, bailing out their bad choices, at the peril of the stability of the system itself, in addition to exacerbating inequality, perpetuating poverty, and stalling the engine of economic progress.
Forgiveness of debt was an essential ingredient of the political economy of the Ancient Hebrews. All debts of fellow Hebrews were to be forgiven in the Sabbatical Year (which occurred every seven years). In addition all slaves who were ‘kinsmen”, were to be set free in the Sabbatical Year. Forgiveness of debt was an essential part of Hebrew society. Debt forgiveness was structured into the system which in turn allowed for social cohesion and unity. Not only were the Ancient Hebrews required to forgive debts in the Sabbatical Year they were required to lend freely even as the sabbatical year grew closer. “Be on guard lest, entertaining the mean thought that the seventh year, the year of relaxation is near, you grudge help to your needy kinsman and give him nothing: else he will cry to the Lord against you and you will be held guilty.” Deuteronomy 15, v 9
Jesus of Nazareth extended this wisdom of the Torah. For Jesus, all human beings, Hebrew and non-Hebrew alike were kinsmen. So for Jesus the tradition of the Torah was extended to all. In addition Jesus instructed those who followed him to lend freely to all, fellow Hebrew or not. His teaching was to be willing to forgive every day, every year, and to lend freely without any care as to whether or not the one you were lending to could pay you back. For Jesus then, every year becomes the Sabbatical Year. In Ancient Israel it is forbidden to charge interest, such was called usury, and in the Christian Middle Ages throughout Europe usury was considered one of the seven deadly sins. Yet here is Jesus of Nazareth not just forbidding the taking of interest but also teaching not to even expect repayment of principal. (Luke chpt 6)
Now we live in a time when interest is charged freely without even any maximum caps (For example it is estimated that a typical annual interest rates (APRs) of between 650% to around 4000% and more is charged by the “Payday” loan companies). We live at a time when an increasing number of people cannot have their debts forgiven, not ever, because they fall in a particular demographic or income category. In the United States today under the new Bankruptcy law passed in the latter years of the George W. Bush Administration, so long as a person makes the average or above income in their state, bankruptcy is increasingly impossible to declare, in the sense of having one’s debts permanently discharged or forgiven. We live in a time when an ever increasing share of total debt, has been placed in a non-forgivable or non-dischargeable category. These types of debts include student loans in the United States, as well as micro-credit loans in many countries.
In the United States for example, those with more than a million dollars in debt are allowed to play by the older more generous bankruptcy rules. So millionaires and corporations are still generously forgiven, and through other means as well, in addition to bankruptcy court. Corporations, and the individuals who run them and benefit the most from them, routinely escape responsibility, but middle class and poor students trying to get through college, there is little to no debt forgiveness for them. The financial system that we have across the globe, a system that resists debt forgiveness, has no caps on interest rates, and no limits on wealth, is unsound on a moral level, and is also unsound on an economic level. The poor countries of the world are mired in debt and need forgiveness. First we experienced the housing bubble. The remedies for that crisis amounted to little or no relief for actual homeowners, and so the effects of that crisis continue to linger. Now we have the sovereign debt crisis of the European countries coupled with the debt burdens of the developing world. Next will come, either the student loan bubble or the credit card bubble, both of which are securitized just as was the case with home mortgages and both will cause just as much damage and instability as the housing crisis. It is time to wipe the slate clean and start fresh and new.
Significant debt forgiveness is clearly called for. But in addition we need a structured and systematic means of forgiveness for debt such as was the case for the people of Ancient Israel. It cannot merely be something that is trotted out on an ad hoc basis to respond to a lingering crisis and its aftermath. It has to be a regular part of the social contract. We need a structured means to limit the accumulation of wealth just as the Ancient Hebrews had with their Jubilee Year. Such means to limit wealth should include both a wealth and an inheritance tax of significant magnitude. While it is likely too ambitious to insist upon interest free lending, caps on interest rates are clearly called for, and in consideration of social justice discounted rates for the poor to provide for their means of support are crucial.
We think creating a clean slate is the only way we can really move forward that does not replicate the past. In looking at Forgiveness on a collective level, we were reminded of this Ancient process of both the Sabbatical Year (the Seventh year) and the Jubilee Year (seven times the Seventh Year). The Jubilee is the Sabbatical of the Sabbatical years. Every Sabbatical year, debt is completely forgiven and the slaves may return home as freed men and women. In the Jubilee Year, not only were debts forgiven and slaves returned home, but all land was to be returned to its original owners. (Leviticus 25) The Jubilee Year functioned as a structural means of redistribution to limit wealth – as most wealth consisted of land at that time in history, so that in the words of Isaiah the rich would not join field to field and leave no room for the poor.
Forgiveness is about release of past wrongs and hatreds. It is the healing of old wounds held deep in the social and personal fabric of our collective and personal bodies. The energy and time wasted in servicing debt is blocking the life force teeming up from the hearts of those who choose to see a new earth.
In theological terms, as a time of Grace, the Jubilee Year provided an opportunity to stop, to listen and to consider. It was an opportunity to enact forgiveness. It marked an occasion—what theologians call a kairos moment— A God-given moment of destiny not to be shied away from but seized with decisiveness; the floodtide of opportunity and demand in which the unseen waters of the future surge down to the present. It’s the alignment of natural and supernatural forces creating an environment for an opening to occur; a time when heaven and earth align with one another in a spiritual sense; a time when heaven touches earth in a way that will never be forgotten, the Promised Land once again.’
Steve Szeghi PhD (ECON), Professor of Economics, Wilmington College, Wilmington, Ohio, USA
Jamshid Damooei PhD (ECON), Professor of Economics, California Lutheran University, USA
Kamran Mofid PhD (Econ), Founder, Globalisation for the Common Good Initiative (GCGI), UK
Read the original article here
Healing Our world after Coronavirus
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Time to reflect…
Every move you make, every breath you take leaves its mark on our world
Crisis after Crisis
The remarkable characteristic of our chaotic and crisis riddled world today is their deepening and continuity
Crisis after Crisis: Financial Crisis. Credit and Banking Crisis. Environmental and Ecological Crisis. Biodiversity Crisis. Epidemic and Pandemic Crisis. Housing Crisis. Health and Well-being Crisis. Education Crisis. Spiritual and Moral Crisis. Trust and Trusting Crisis. Indifference Crisis. Fake, Fake News and Faking Crisis. Reality Crisis. Populism and Fascism Crisis,...all of them leading ours to be a generalized "time of crisis."
At a time of profound crises there must be an opportunity for new vision, new understanding and new thinking. There is a desperate need for new practical ways of relating in an increasingly interdependent global community: a time to re-introduce spirituality, ethics, civility, kindness, humanity and the common good into the debate on globalisation, economics, politics, business, education, international relation and much more.
Surely the time is now to rise and challenge the falsehood and the inhumanity of the ideology that since the early 1980s has cheated and humiliated us by monetising all aspects of our lives, and has stopped us from knowing what it means to be human:
I am a Transformed and Reformed Economist: My Journey and My Story
‘From 1980 onwards, for the next twenty years, I taught economics in universities, enthusiastically demonstrating how economic theories provided answers to problems of all sorts. I got quite carried away by the beauty, the sophisticated elegance, of complicated mathematical models and theories. But gradually I started to have an empty feeling.
‘I began to ask fundamental questions of myself. Why did I never talk to my students about compassion, dignity, comradeship, solidarity, happiness, spirituality – about the meaning of life? We never debated the biggest questions. Who are we? Where have we come from? Where are we going to?
‘I told them to create wealth, but I did not tell them for what reason. I told them about scarcity and competition, but not about abundance and co-operation. I told them about free trade, but not about fair trade; about GNP – Gross National Product – but not about GNH – Gross National Happiness. I told them about profit maximisation and cost minimisation, about the highest returns to the shareholders, but not about social consciousness, accountability to the community, sustainability and respect for creation and the creator. I did not tell them that, without humanity, economics is a house of cards built on shifting sands.
‘These conflicts caused me much frustration and alienation, leading to heartache and despair. I needed to rediscover myself and real-life economics. After a proud twenty-year or so academic career, I became a student all over again. I would study theology, philosophy and ethics, disciplines nobody had taught me when I was a student of economics and I did not teach my own students when I became a teacher of economics.
‘It was at this difficult time that I came to understand that I needed to bring spirituality, compassion, ethics and morality back into economics itself, to make this dismal science once again relevant to and concerned with the common good.’- Excerpts from my comments on a Financial Times editorial
See also: My lecture at London School of Economics
Calling all academic economists: What are you teaching your students?
A Businessman and an Economist in Dialogue for the Common Good
The Broken Economic, Social, Spiritual Model
(First published as an email to the GCGI members in May 2011)
Photo:edie.net
“Do you remember that Margaret Thatcher, the so-called Iron Lady!! She told the Brits that she was going to put the “Great” back into the “Great” Britain. Do you remember? Then, she told us this can only happen if we accept and implement the “Washington Consensus”, the so-called dreaded neo-liberalism. She told us that there was no alternative. She told us we will all prosper and develop more fairly and equitably. She won election after elections. Everything was privatised, deregulated, self-regulated. Industry, manufacturing, (the real economy) was destroyed. Instead, the banks and the bankers were encouraged to rule the world. The economists with no principles and values were “bought” and the business schools, such as Harvard and Columbia were showered with money to act as “Cheerleaders” for the dreaded neoliberalism (see the Inside Job for evidence). Communities were dis-mantled and dis-organised. We were told that there is nothing as a society and community. We are all in it just for ourselves, we were told. Destructive competition at the expense of life-enhancing cooperation, collaboration and dialogue was greatly prompted. We were told to say no to love, kindness, generosity, sympathy and empathy and say yes to selfishness, individualism and narcissism, as these values will fire the engine of capitalism and wealth creation! In short, the hell with the common good, we were encouraged to believe.
We were brained-washed. Our other Prime Ministers repeated her nonsense and have carried on her footsteps. It is now over 30 years since the neo-liberalism experiment in Britain. Are we any “Greater” than we were in 1979? Are we any fairer or more equitable? The country is nearly bankrupt, with public and private debt at unprecedented levels, with greatest levels of poverty and wealth disparity ever. The house of neo-liberal capitalism is now at its nadir of decadence.”
You see, all those interested in life’s bigger picture, have been saying the same, over and over. The neo-liberals are not in touch with humanity. They will prostitute all in the interest of profit maximization, cost minimization, highest return to the shareholders, and the biggest and juiciest bonuses for the CEOs and their lackeys.”
The Age of Perpetual Crises and Coronavirus Pandemic
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‘When all of this is over, the world won’t be the same.’
But, the Challenge Is: How to Make the World a Better Place?
Times of upheaval are always times of radical change. Some believe that the current global crisis, the Coronavirus pandemic, is a once-in-a-generation chance to remake society and build a better future. Others fear it may only make existing injustices worse.
I wish to be a voice of hope and optimism: This crisis can change our world for the better, should we have the wisdom to see the path
What kind of actions would it take for the optimists’ vision to materialise?
I am sure there are many answers to this timely question. Below are my offerings:
Ten Steps to a Better World and a Better Life
We, the people, all around the globe, are slowly realising that our planet, our lives, and more are in desperate need for new measures to evolve humanly, environmentally, economically and politically towards a more cooperative, peaceful and respectful sense of interdependency.
While the urgency is being felt on all levels, too many feel disempowered with the potential to spark a change, make a difference or even perceive an ounce of hope for the future.
The task isn’t small. Indeed, the task is so great that there is only one way to succeed, and that is, all of us, coming together in the spirit of the common good, to empower and enable each one of us to become self-directed, and active in defining this time in the world as opportunity for positive change and healing and for the true formation of a culture of peace by giving thanks, spreading joy, sharing love, seeing miracles, discovering goodness, embracing kindness, practicing patience, teaching tolerance, encouraging laughter, celebrating diversity, showing compassion, turning from hatred, practicing forgiveness, peacefully resolving conflicts, communicating non-violently, choosing happiness and enjoying life. Carpe Diem!
Neoliberalism's excesses belong in the dustbin of history. What's next is up to us
Photo:chinadaily.com
1- Throw away this single-minded ideology and replace it with a more balanced logic, laying the foundations for a better, more equitable world
Death and Destruction on Brothers’ Road to Serfdom
Neoliberalism destroys human potential and devastates values-led education
2- Replace the selfishness and hatred of neoliberalism with Kindness
Kindness to Heal the World- Kindness to Make the World Great Again
“In a world where you can be anything, be kind.”
What if Universities Taught KINDNESS?
3- Replace the hopelessness of neoliberalism with Hopefulness
Crisis after crisis and the crucial voices of hope
How to defeat hatred and fear: Don't Despair Walk On
4- Replace the delusional and destructive neoliberal education with inspirational values-led Education
The Value of Values: Values-led Education to Make the World Great Again
Brexit, Trump and the failure of our universities to pursue wisdom Details
To All Striking Academic Colleagues in Britain: Turn the Strike to a Force for the Common Good
The Journey to Sophia: Education for Wisdom
Detaching Nature from Economics is ‘Burning the Library of Life’
5- Replace the devastated neoliberal economy with Economy as if People Mattered
Is Neoliberal Economics and Economists 'The Biggest Fraud Ever Perpetrated on the World?'
My Economics and Business Educators’ Oath: My Promise to My Students
What might an Economy for the Common Good look like?
6- Throw away the fake neoliberal ‘teachers’ and let nature to be your wisest Teacher
On the 250th Birthday of William Wordsworth Let Nature be our Wisest Teacher
Why should we all become mother nature and sacred earth guardians
To Heal the World and People We Need to Save the Commons from Plunder
7- Throw away materialism and consumerism, ‘Black-Friday’ sales mentality, and opt for simplicity, simple living and be grateful for who you are, what you are and what you have
In Praise of Frugality: Materialism is a Killer
There is more in less: The Evolution of Simplicity
Simplicity: it’s our true guide to a better life
The beauty of living simply: the forgotten wisdom of William Morris
Black Friday, Brexit and Trumpian Values: Deadly forces taking over our world, controlling our minds
Thanksgiving vs. Black Friday: Where is the Gratitude?
Memento mori, Memento vivere and the Madness of Black Friday
In Praise of ‘Enoughness’ and 'Lagomist' Economy
8- Throw away hatred and desire for revenge Remember and Forgive: Forgiveness is the Greatest Gift You Can Give Yourself
Forgiveness and Reconciliation in Pursuit of the Global Common Good
Good Friday Agreement and the Spirit of Forgiveness and Reconciliation
9- Overcome Fear and Embrace Hope: Forgive our debts as we forgive our debtors
Coronavirus Crisis and Mounting Debt: Forgive our debts as we forgive our debtors
10- and finally, let us begin our Journey to Healing, and enjoy togetherness, family, friends and community. Ours should not be a caravan of despair, but the flame of love and hope
Walk with the wanderers
Sing and dance with the worshipers
Proclaim the memory of those who have taken their leave
Wrap the despairing and the broken in the arms of love and community
And hold the hands of all of us who have broken our vows and call us back—again and again—to the covenant and work of justice, humility, and steadfast faithfulness.
For this we are here together today. So, my friends, come, yet again; come let us be together.
