{"id":326,"date":"2011-01-17T17:46:09","date_gmt":"2011-01-18T01:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/?p=326"},"modified":"2011-01-28T18:30:56","modified_gmt":"2011-01-29T02:30:56","slug":"martin-luther-king-jr-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/2011\/01\/17\/martin-luther-king-jr-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin Luther King, Jr. Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

First the sound, then the sight of a sea of people appeared over the crest of the hill on East Colfax Ave. The surreal sight of an empty artery through the city was suddenly replaced by tens of thousands of like-intended people marading[ 1 ]<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/a><\/sup> <\/strong><\/span>past the gold leaf doom of the State Capitol <\/span><\/a>to come together in Civic Park. This now annual trek honors one of our nation\u2019s martyred heroes – a person seeking peace (right relations<\/a>) through non-violence.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

As we seek to understand how to create a sustainable planet Earth involving right relations, we can\u2019t help but make the following observations on this national holiday honoring the life of a heroic American, Dr. Martin Luther King<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>His life is a sub-story consistent with the greater Universe Story.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The\u00a0COSMIC Martin<\/h3>\n

Near the middle of one of the billions of galaxies called Milky Way, is a star system called the Solar System, and on one of its orbiting planets there emerged<\/span><\/a> an evolving process called Life from which even \u2018something more\u2019 sprang forth called consciousness. Then in the year 13,700,001,929 (aka CE 1929), there arose an uncommon expression of consciousness known as Martin.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Martin was a\u00a0\u2018something more\u2019 created from \u2018nothing but\u2019 atoms rooted in the soil of Atlanta, GA \u2013 a ‘something more’ that became even more when endowed with a consciousness acquired from relationships within the social construct called American \u2013 itself an evolved creation of human consciousness in the form of a new democratic social order born some 153 years earlier.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Martin was able to remain intimately connected to this evolving miracle of Life, yet peer out above it and view it from a unique eye \u2013 an eye that had felt the pain of violence, had experienced the sting of disrespect, and had suffered the oppression of the Universe\u2019s heretofore callous creations of social orders.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The history of world civilizations represents human attempts to evolve to the next level of cooperative complexity. Recorded history suggests humans have been forming social orders (systems) for at least 10,000 years. Even today, we continue to struggle to find a sustainable human social order involving higher order cooperation for our niche we call planet Earth. We are now urgently looking for a civil society consistent with the universe\u2019s infinite quest for cooperative complexity. A civil society (social order) is \u2018something more\u2019 from \u2018nothing but\u2019 a group of individual humans living together cooperatively. A sustainable planet is \u2018something more\u2019 from \u2018nothing but\u2019 all living species in right relationship.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAll I’m saying is simply this, that all life is interrelated, that somehow we’re caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly\u2026 I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. You can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0[ 2 ]<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/sup>\u00a0<\/strong>Sermons and speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr.<\/span>
\n<\/em><\/span>\u00a0<\/p>\n

Whether the consciousness called Martin intended the phrase \u201call life\u201d to include all members of the family tree of life (i.e. non-human members as well) is not known, but this poetic excerpt conveys an awareness of our connectedness with the whole \u2013 an interrelated dependence that today is also given voice by the language of science. As Martin understood 40 years ago, a cohabitating planet cannot radiate its brilliance unless all members are what they ought to be \u2013 living together in right relationship. Suppression and exploitation of even the smallest among us diminishes the consciousness of our whole.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The consciousness called Martin also provided suggestions for those who sense they are not in right relationship:\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Since being in India, I am more convinced than ever before that the method of nonviolent resistance is the most potent weapon available to oppressed people in their struggle for justice and human dignity. In a real sense, Mahatma Gandhi embodied in his life certain universal principles that are inherent in the moral structure of the universe, and these principles are as inescapable as the law of gravitation.”<\/strong>\u00a0[ 3 ]<\/span><\/strong><\/sup><\/a><\/em>\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0Radio address made during his final evening in India by Martin Luther King<\/em>\u00a0<\/p>\n

We can easily translate this 40 year old message into today\u2019s understanding of the Universe Story:
\n“\u2026for those living beings with free will and consciousness <\/span>the method of nonviolent resistance is the most potent weapon available to the oppressed \u2026 in their struggle for right relationship<\/span> ( i.e. justice and \u2026 dignity and respect<\/span>). \u2026 Mahatma Gandhi embodied in his life certain universal principles that are inherent in the \u2026 evolving<\/span> structure of the universe, and these principles are as inescapable as the law of gravitation.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

In this context, nonviolent resistance\u00a0suggests using one\u2019s range of free will to be uncooperative if relationships within a social construct are not right. Performing one\u2019s \u201cjob\u201d as an integral part of a larger cause is a noble endeavor, but only if one\u2019s effort is rewarded with dignity and respect \u2013 by right relationship. When right relationships are not embedded in the social order, the Kings, the Gandhis, the Thoreau\u2019s and the Universe itself suggest that we simply exercise what free will we can muster and respond with conscious resistance rather than continue to cooperate in the absence of right relationship. Better yet is when we use our consciousness to tinker with the human construct allowing it to evolve into right relationship.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

More on the consciousness called Martin in a later post\u2026.. \u2003\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0<\/a>[1] Marade is a term used to denote the combination of a purposeful march and a celebratory parade
\n\u00a0<\/a>[2] King Came Preaching: The Pulpit Power of Dr. Martin Luther King JR.<\/em>, by Mervyn A. Warren & Gardner C. Taylor, InterVarsity Press, 2008, ISBN 083083253X<\/a>, pg 174
\n<\/a>[3] The Papers of Martin Luther King <\/em>by King, Jr., Martin Luther; Clayborne Carson; Peter Holloran; Ralph Luker; Penny A. Russell (1992). University of California Press. pp. 135\u2013136. ISBN 0520079507.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

First the sound, then the sight of a sea of people appeared over the crest of the hill on East Colfax Ave. The surreal sight of an empty artery through the city was suddenly replaced by tens of thousands of like-intended people marading[ 1 ] past the gold leaf doom of the State Capitol to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-326","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-relationship-to-nature","category-evolving-peace"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=326"}],"version-history":[{"count":37,"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":393,"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326\/revisions\/393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nowforourturn.org\/CosmicReflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}