Liturgies

Thursday, November 27th 2014

LISTENING CAN CHANGE THE WORLD

By Terry Fitzpatrick

Here we are a week out from the G20.

We are told that it cost the Australian public $500 million dollars to host the G20 Summit in Brisbane. Wow.

And we didn’t even get to see our Prime Minister Tony Abbott SHIRTFRONT the Russian president Viadimir Putin

SO WAS IT REALLY WORTH IT?

It was wonderful to see the G20 agenda completely overrun by the discussion on CLIMATE CHANGE.

The prior announcement at APEC by the US and CHINA to place a TARGET on Emission reductions will require a whole new way of doing business. It will change the way we invest in Coal to investing more in renewables.

It is here some say we saw Barack Obama SHIRTFRONT Tony Abbott.

SO IT WAS WORTH IT

But overall I think there has been a big sigh of relief that it is all over.

For the Federal and State governments and local authorities all the fears of terrorist attacks, international embarrassments, all the planning,  checking and rechecking, is over.

It was an amazing feat hosting so many leaders from numerous countries in the one area.

I did not realize there was such a plethora other summits happening at the same time. C20s B20s Q20s some said saw some Glen 20s and had some 4 and 20s ( apologies to MAD AS HELL) ,  to mention a few, almost the entire alphabet followed by a 20.

I attended some the People’s Summit held locally in West End.

I was delighted to hear stories of people from Brazil, Chile, Russia, who stood up to big Corporations who attempted to push them around and the Corporations failed because of the people’s ability to fight for themselves and their new found resilience in attempting to do so. There were people who spoke of their island homes being submerged by rising sea levels as a result of Climate Change. Direct evidence, if any more was needed, that Climate change is real.

I am not sure that many of the local businesses who were told that they would benefit enormously with all the official contingents from various parts of the world flying in were that happy with the G20. They missed out on benefiting because of the increased security and police presence, lockdowns and street closures, media fuelled fears of violence, it is any wonder so many left town for the weekend.

I love the cartoon from Sean Leahy where one guard turns to another guard on top of a well fortressed castle with a big sign on the side G20 SUMMIT with no one for miles around he says, …”tell me again how this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to encourage tourism?...

We had our own Summit in a Valley.

As I drove my car into the Log Cabin Retreat Centre in the heart of the Numinbah Valley people had arrived and were still arriving on the Friday afternoon, I was intoxicated by the beauty of the mountains that cradled the centre. Everything was glowing and green, clear and crisp from the two previous days of rain. The whole place had a special feel. Familiar faces greeted me. People were relaxing in the cool afternoon sun sitting around chatting ,drinking (discreetly of course)

Kids were playing, tents were being erected, and people were preparing for the evening meal. It was so good to be here .And I felt like this for the entire weekend. It was a very special time to be together.

For me the theme of listening was central.

It was evident from the first moments of watching people sitting around listening laughing and enjoying one another’s company.

Many of the workshops carried this as a theme.

Carolyn Vincent’s workshop was on really listening to one another by using a three pronged technique of

1. Listening in quiet mindfulness

2. Looping. To feed back what you are hearing

3. Dipping . sharing with the one you are listening to, experiences which connected with your life experience as you listened.

Donna and Brad Davies on introducing our meditation walk encouraged us to really listen to our surroundings, the environment we find ourselves. Donna invited us to allow it  to speak to us, to let ourselves be drawn to something in the forest, a tree , a shrub, a rock, whatever and spend time listening to it. Let it to speak to you in your silence, she said.

Brian O’Raileigh invited us to listen to our own stories, and to see in them something of the hero’s journey that Joseph Campbell spent so much of his life researching, writing and speaking about. To listen and recognise how life again and again calls us to go deeper to overcome life’s challenges, the negative voices, to listen within, to discover the life in all its fullness that Jesus had spoken about.

Oriana invited us to listen to the music and how its moves our bodies into freedom and life.

If we allow ourselves to be moved.

Penny invited us to listen to our breath, to still ourselves, and for it to bring us into the present moment.

In the listening we were getting to know ourselves better, our environment and one another.

In really listening we reconnected with all three.

Amidst the laugher, dancing and singing, the meditating, swimming and praying we were encountering the sacred in a very special way. A weekend of renewing relationships with self, family, community and the environment.

It is being in right relationship with  these entities which make life so rich and worthwhile.

Recently I spent 6 days in National  training with the Queensland Community Alliance.

This is a  grassroots movement which has sprung up in Australia in the last four years where value- based communities are learning to better organise in order to achieve their objectives for better communities and a healthier world, based on the values of love and Justice.

About 20 people mainly from Queensland and New South Wales gathered on the hill at the Bardon Mercy Centre. Living 6 days in this old convent reminded me of my days in the seminary. And as we gathered for the opening session in one of the many rooms there were people from the various unions, community and environmental groups, various churches with one priest with collar and a nun in a habit. It was then in this old convent that I thought I had  stepped back in time. I was beginning to wonder after the first session if I had much in common with the majority in the room. How could we be forming an Alliance and would I really want to form an Alliance?

But as the week progressed and we heard and listened deeply to one another’s stories, our hopes and passions, fears and disappointments, in sharing what motivated us and made us tick ,barriers gradually disintegrated.

Our understandings and techniques regarding how we dealt with Power, and how we exercised it and negotiated with it were challenged. We learnt how to better organise and form alliances to achieve the objectives we so much long for.

The object was to get beyond the differences and work with what we hold in common, which is much more than we may have originally thought. As Tony Nicholson the CEO of the Brotherhood of St Lawrence shared at the Micah projects AGM, forming Alliances for small value- based community groups is no longer an option to be ignored if they want to survive and achieve the outcomes they so desire for their communities.

As a way of illustrating the importance of forming Alliances I would like to draw attention to

a delightful movie out at the moment from the UK called Pride.

Pride is based on a true story, set in 1984 when Margaret Thatcher wanted to close 20 coal Pit mines in England and Wales ,  so the miners walked out on mass in protest. It was one of the most tragic strikes in British history. Pride is about a group of gay and lesbian Londoners who decide to help the miners.

The movie begins when the irrepressible Mark( Ben Schnetzer) walks out his door in London one sunny day in June 1984 en route to the Gay Pride march, after watching Margaret Thatcher bleating about the miners on TV. By the time he reaches the march he has decided that that gays and miners have the SAME ENEMIES, both groups are oppressed by the government and tabloid press, so they should be friends. Then he starts his support group calling themselves Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners or LGSM and immediately hits the streets with buckets, collecting money.

They drive off into the Welsh valley to hand over the money they’ve raised.

Paddy Considine is the welcoming local union rep but the only smiling face in the village

Everyone else thinks they are from MARS or HELL. The ice is hard on the faces of the men at the Workers Men Club, but it soon cracks when one of the London crowd realises one of the workers has never joined his wife on the dance floor. Welsh miners don’t dance, but gay London boys can teach them. And they teach them in style much to the amusement of everyone in the Club. The ice is broken and thus begins an unlikely life long relationship between the Gay and Lesbian and Union Movements in the UK.

We can achieve things on our own but so much more can be achieved when we can drop our differences or at lease hold them lightly and work together. And it is so much more fun.

Taking the time to really listen to one another’s stories and hold them with compassion and care can be transformative. As the 6 Non Aboriginal people on the amazing documentary on SBS during the week, Called FIRST CONTACT, found out in a profound way. The exchanging of stories where people take the time to listen with openness can transform our world one story at a time.

I love that Rumi quote and I will finish with it,

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and right doing

There is a field

I’ll meet you there

When the soul lies down on that grass

The world is too full to talk.”