Green Oasis

I listened this morning to an NPR segment discussing Playing For Change a project featuring the music of Bob Marley and the Wailers, such as Don’t Worry, rendered by musicians around the world. These musicians never met each other. Instead, they played and sung the songs while listening to the music of the others.

In a bit of synchronicity, I watched I Am Legend last night, which revolves in its way around Marley’s music and philosophy of One Love. Marley tried to inject his message into the consciousness of the people who heard his music to cure hatred. In the movie, the protagonist recounts how two days after Marley was gunned down by men trying to stop the One Love Peace concert, he got on stage to sing anyway. When asked why, he explained that the “people that are trying to make the world worse never take a day off, why should [he]? Light up the darkness.”

I may not share Bob Marley’s trust in a God, but that’s a trivial difference between us. It shouldn’t get in the way. We share something more important. Dale McGowan defines a humanist as “somebody who thinks that people should all take care of each other, and whether there is a god or there isn’t, we should spend our time making this life and this world better.” We can all rally around our shared humanity.

So let’s get out there and stir it up.

A message of peace from Iran’s president:

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in a message congratulated Pope Benedict XVI, leader of Catholics throughout the world and followers of Jesus Christ on Christmas.

The full text of the message is as follows: “In the Name of God the Compassionate, the Merciful I congratulate Your Excellency and followers of the the prophet [i.e. Jesus] on birth anniversary of Jesus Christ, messenger of kindness, peace and friendship, as well as the new Gregorian year.”

“Today humanity is tired of war, bloodshed, tension, discrimination and deception. Current challenges and incidents have distanced humanity from its originality and trapped it in a deceptive mirage, which cannot be solved except by returning to God and further attention to divine messengers’ teachings.

“I hope that human being will be blessed with God’s graces and a world full of beauties will be established.

“Such significant issues will not be possible except through unity among the monotheists and paving the ways for reappearance of Imam Mahdi (May God hasten his reappearance).

“I wish blessings, happiness and health for the Pope and world Christians.”

It has been a month since I swore off Mormon-themed blogs for a month, so I guess I can go back if I want. I don’t want.

It has been a positive change in my life for at least two reasons. The first is that I have a lot more time to do other, more important things. I avoided reading at least 367 blog posts. I’m positive that I would have enjoyed many of those posts. Still, I enjoyed the free time that I had instead of reading them. A lot of my blog-reading is pure procrastination. Avoiding reading these blogs gave me less opportunity to put off things I would like to do. (It’s ironic that I would put off things I would like to do, n’est-ce pas?)

The second reason is that I’ve found greater peace of mind. The less often I’m reminded of how annoying and dangerous Mormonism is, the more I’m able to change things that are more within my control. Being constantly outraged wears me down over time like water torture. It threatens to make me see Mormons and other religious folk as flat, two-dimensional characters in a farce. That’s far from the truth. I owe my first loyalty to the truth.

So I’ll be releasing a select one or two blogs from quarantine, but I am hereby reclaiming a little more of my time and head-space from Mormonism.

Madonna’s Love Profusion just popped up on my playlist. I discovered that the balance between despair for knowing the truth clearly without illusion and the soft, loving gratitude to life portrayed in this song reflects a part of my unnamed mind state.

Some of my recent posts have been rather angry and bitter. This isn’t an apology because I feel justified in my anger, but I recognize that it’s not healthy to center my life around that anger. It was disturbing my peace.

I compare my bitterness and anger to the birthing pangs required to bring a new person into the world. To confuse the metaphor, it’s like when you’re a teenager and you start asserting your individuality as separate from your parents. This individuation sometimes manifests itself as anger, but this anger is part of the natural order of things. It helps us to create our individuality by breaking with the old. The same with leaving Mormonism.

Some of those of us who leave Mormonism go through an angry period that helps us leave Mormonism behind. Some of the bitterness that you saw on my blog recently was only temporary. On the other hand, I foresee many parts of Mormonism angering me for a very long time. Maybe I will see Mormonism with a more temperate attitude in the future, but to refuse to be angry about the bad things in Mormonism would only delay my maturation as a post-Mormon person.

I just hope that I don’t get obsessed and intoxicated with my anger. I hope that Mormonism (the bad parts of it anyway) can play an increasingly insignificant part in my life.