OneLife Institute

Click HERE to download a full-color 6 page PDF of this issue of the newsletter.

Prayer always thrusts one
out into action sooner or later.
One of its main functions is to
induce one to think creatively;
it stretches the imagination;
it enables one to see things
and people not as they are
but as they might be.

 ~ Muriel Lester

This quote about prayer is also a fitting description of Transformative Visions - OneLife Institute's signature community arts event, held each spring during the Season for Nonviolence. Our artist-prophets invite us to stretch our imagination. To see past what is, to what might be. And to be moved into action. Indeed, I think creative expression is a powerful form of prayer, especially when it is engaged with sacred intent.

This special issue of the newsletter features a small sampling of artwork and poetry from Transformative Visions 2010. I hope you will be inspired to visit the "virtual" installation on our website to enjoy photos, quotes, links, and video from this year and past events. (There are separate pages for visual art, spoken word, and music for each year.) May you find your own vision of creative possibility expanded by these offerings!

SPECIAL NOTE:  ROVING RETREATS

Our Spirit Sound & Silence retreats will be on the move in 2010. Please make note of the changing venues for each date. April 24th will be our last gathering at Holy Redeemer Center this year. On August 7th we will meet at the beautiful campus of the United Lutheran Church on Fontaine Street (with a panoramic view of the Bay), and on Nov. 6th our retreat will be held at Preservation Park. All venues are in Oakland; addresses and other details are available on the retreats page of our website. We want to give plenty of notice so people will know where to find us. Please help get the word out!

SUPPORT GROUPS

Sustaining the Soul support groups continue to meet on the second Sunday (4-6PM) and fourth Monday (7-9PM) of each month. These facilitated groups are open to all, free of charge. Activists, caregivers, change makers, community healers, and others who work to lift up the folks are especially encouraged to attend. Help prevent burnout! We are grateful to our friends at the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights for providing meeting space. For more information visit the events page of our website. Upcoming dates include April 11 and 26, May 24, June 13 and 28. Please note there will be no group on Sunday May 9th (Mothers Day).

VOLUNTEER BRUNCH

We love our volunteers! And every year on Memorial Day we celebrate them with a special appreciation brunch. This year it will be held on Monday, May 31st. Past, present, and future volunteers are welcome! This is a wonderful opportunity to learn more about OneLife and find out how you can get involved in our work. The brunch is immediately followed by our quarterly visioning session, for those who wish to stay. We hope to see some of you there. (RSVP appreciated.) Special thanks to the Oakland Center for Spiritual Living for providing use of their facility at 5000 Clarewood Dr., Oakland.

On the Volunteers Welcome page of our web site you can read about some of the opportunities available. Short and longer-term projects in a variety of areas are possible, with both local and long-distance "virtual" options. If you have a particular skill, resource, or expertise that you'd be willing to share, please let us know. Thank you!

Spring blessings.

In peace and gratitude,
Liza

________________________________________________________________

Following the spoken word set, RHQ raised the roof with an hour of straight ahead "jazz in the moment" ending with audience members on their feet joyfully dancing and singing along. Visit the 2010 WORD and MUSIC pages of our website and our YouTube page for video clips of each spoken word performer and samples from RHQ. (You don't want to miss this!)

Eighteen visual artists working in a wide range of styles and media provided an aesthetic feast of works addressing issues related to spirituality, peacemaking, justice, healing, and possibility. The composite image (above) features a few of them. The Transformative ART 2010 page on our website has a photograph of each artist and their work, plus an excerpt from their artist's statement. Those photos link to their individual web pages (where available) to view more of each person's art.

We are forever grateful to all who made this event possible: the FAITHS program of the San Francisco Foundation for partial underwriting, Studio One and it's marvelous staff, Cristwell Muhammad our technical director, Production Logic audio, Yuma Euell videographer, our many fabulous volunteers and donors, Brazen Nectar catering (who donated their culinary talents), the magnificent artists and performers, and everyone who attended. Thank you!

~*~

The following prayer-poem served as our invocation for the day...

For All Beings
(c) Zenju Earthlyn Manuel

May all beings be cared for and loved
Be listened to, understood and acknowledged despite different views
Be accepted for who they are in this moment
Be afforded patience
Be allowed to live without fear of having their lives taken away
or their bodies violated
May all beings
Be well in its broadest sense
Be fed
Be clothed
Be treated as if their life is precious
Be held in the eyes of each other as family
May all beings
Be appreciated
Feel welcomed anywhere on the planet.
Be freed from acts of hatred and desperation
including war, poverty, slavery, and street crimes
Live on the planet, housed and protected from harm
Be given what is needed to live fully, without scarcity
Enjoy life, living without fear of one another
Be able to speak freely in a voice and mind of undeniable love
May all beings
Receive and share the gifts of life
Be given time to rest, be still, and experience silence.
May all beings
Be awake.

________________________________________________________________

Forty-three years ago, on April 4, 1967, Dr. King spoke these words in the pulpit of Riverside Church in New York City. Exactly one year later, to the day, he was gunned down on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. This year, Easter falls on April 4th, and it is also the sixth day of Passover. It's a powerful convergence. Both religious observances speak of hope, life, and liberation -- in the context of suffering and oppression. And wasn’t that King’s message as well, and his commitment? But empires (whether Egyptian, Roman, or American) do not relinquish their control easily, they fight with all they have to hold on.

There are times when I am hard-pressed to feel hopeful about the condition and direction of the world. I wonder how much more devastation there must be before the outworn systems will finally yield to the new world that Dr. King worked for and died for. Other days I feel it coming, remembering that tombs can be wombs, and wildernesses are the crucible where we become the people who are able to enter new lands of promise and liberation.

It's tempting to want to skip the tomb and go straight to the resurrection; to bypass the wilderness and hurry on to the promised land.  But  these  experiences of formation and transformation are essential, lest we try to enter the new world with the same consciousness that created the old one. Like Dorothy and company in the Wizard of Oz, it’s through the Journey that we discover and bring forth the qualities we need, only to find that they were within us the whole time.  Scarecrow's Wisdom. Tin Man's Love. Lion's Courage. And Dorothy's realization that we are never separate from our Source.

What are the qualities within you that are necessary for a new world to be born? How are you called to be part of this collective transformation? Who must you become on the wilderness journey?

I find it helpful in my own practice to shift the question from doing to Be-ing. What does it feel like when we re-member (to become aware again, and also to connect again -- re-integrate, re-embody) our truest self: that within us which was never born and will never die. That which is awake to our oneness with the Infinite Life, the Infinite Love. Aligning ourselves with this consciousness is the inner revolution that makes the transformation of unjust and oppressive social systems not only possible, but inevitable.

Let us imagine together what kind of world Love would create. In his April 4th speech, Dr. King called love the "supreme unifying principle of life... the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality." "Let us hope," he said, "that this spirit will become the order of the day."  Amen.

________________________________________________________________