Greed Kills!!!

A. Unabashed Pacifist:

Peace without humility and war without pride – both are laughable ideas.

B. Unabashed Christian:

Holy One,

It does not come easily, thinking of you as Goddess as well as God. I accept the logic of divinity encompassing female as well as male. Our sacred text says we humans were created in the divine image that is male and female. I like knowing that you demonstrate “female” as well as “male” characteristics. However, the male-biased teachings have dominated in my life, despite having been exposed to ideas about Goddess and the Sacred Feminine. I guess I am seeking understanding, your patient understanding as I take faltering steps to increase my sensitivity to this reality and incorporate it more fully in my prayer and in my thinking. I am your servant.
Amen

C. Un-quoting Jesus:

“I just needed to get away from you for a while, Mom.”

[Something He didn’t say when as a boy He stayed behind at the Temple. Even if that could be hinted in the “I must be about my Father’s business.”]

D. Blog: Greed Kills!!!

In the current frightening economy and in some of my recent reading of history and biographies, I have reached a heightened awareness of how deadly greed is.

Sure, I had heard about it as one of the deadly sins. I had understood that to mean that if I pursued a path of greed, it will mean the personal destruction of my soul/spirit, taking me away from life’s true pleasures in human community. I had only a limited idea of how it could be detrimental to society, as well.

What strikes me now with lightning clarity is that greed truly kills, on a scale far beyond what I had previously imagined. The greed of some kills millions of others, while it often enriches those whose greed can manipulate economic and political systems. Bernie Madoff has caused multiple suicides. Manufacturers and traders who gain great wealth by dealing in weaponry, in my mind, enable atrocities, yet their role in terrorism and genocide goes hardly noticed. I have finally noticed: greed kills people, kills communities, kills societies, kills even nations.

Speed kills, too, of course. Both kinds. But greed is much more deadly.