A personal blog by a graying (mostly Anglo with light African-American roots) gay left leaning liberal progressive married college-educated Buddhist Baha'i BBC/NPR-listening Professor Emeritus now following the Dharma in Minas Gerais, Brasil.
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Via JMG: Marriage Support Hits Record High
ABC News reports:
Support for gay marriage reached a new high in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll, marking a dramatic change in public attitudes on the subject across the past decade. Fifty-eight percent of Americans now say it should be legal for gay and lesbian couples to wed. That number has grown sharply in ABC News/Washington Post polls, from a low of 32 percent in a 2004 survey of registered voters, advancing to a narrow majority for the first time only two years ago, and now up again to a significant majority for the first time.The survey breakdown is here.
Labels: ABC, marriage equality, polls, WaPo
Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:
Daily Buddhist Wisdom | |||
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Via Tricycle Daily Dharma
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 20, 2013
Skillful Desire
The
notion of a skillful desire may sound strange, but a mature mind
intuitively pursues the desires it sees as skillful and drops those it
perceives as not. Basic in everyone is the desire for happiness. Every
other desire is a strategy for attaining that happiness.
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- Thanissaro Bhikkhu, "Pushing the Limits"
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 19, 2013
The Haven of Meditation
Meditation
is a haven away from the ubiquitous world of self-improvement. It's not
just that there's no such thing as 'bad' meditation, but there's no
such thing as 'good' meditation either. It is what it is.
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- Barry Evans, "The Myth of the Experienced Meditator"
Monday, March 18, 2013
Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 18, 2013
Breaking the Chain of Suffering
Our
suffering was not caused by our parents or grandparents. It was merely
passed down. We are social animals. We grow through modeling. We teach
what we have learned. We act as we have been acted upon. A person who is
not loving has not experienced love. It is not his fault. Realizing
this gives rise to forgiveness. And in Chan we vow that suffering will
stop with us. We will not pass it down.
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- Guo Jun, "A Special Transmission"
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 17, 2013
Our Capacity for Joy
Joy
is not something we have to manufacture. It is already in us when we
come into the world. We need only release the layers of contraction and
fear that keep us from it.
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- James Baraz, “Lighten Up!”
Read the entire article in the Wisdom Collection through March 18th, 2013
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Location
Saturday, March 16, 2013
Via Tricycle Daily Dharma
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 16, 2013
Being Grateful for our Mistakes
It’s only our mistakes that bring us to the place where we should have been all along.
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- Pico Iyer, "My Bad"
Friday, March 15, 2013
JMG Photo Of The Day :
NBC News reports on today's tribal wedding in Michigan:
Dexter McNamara, chairman of the 4,600-member Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians in northern Michigan, wed Tim LaCroix, 53, and Gene Barfield, 60, of Boyne City. After McNamara read the couple's vows and led the ceremony in English, a member of the tribe followed and conducted a tribal ceremony in their language. "How could the world be better? How could the world be better? … I'm just full of joy and happiness and I love my husband," Barfield said. "We’re so unbelievably grateful to the tribe and so full of respect for their position in this.”The couple met 30 years ago when they were stationed at Orlando's Naval Training Center.
UNRELATED: My family briefly lived on that base when we first moved to Orlando. I learned to drive on the deserted access road around the base parade grounds, the one place my mother knew I wouldn't crash into other cars. Not long after that, I was dropping swabbies off at the front gate after meeting them at the Parliament House. Good times.
Labels: gay weddings, LGBT History, Michigan, Native Americans
Via JMG: More Gay Sniping In Venezuela
"If I were gay I'd take ownership of it with pride
and shout it to the four winds and I would have no problem loving whoever I had to love
with my heart. Because the worst homophobe is one who is
gay and discriminates against his own.
It's similar to a foreman in a slave-owner's farm. A black traitor who
whips an African man's back. That's the worst homophobe: He who denies
his identity and discriminates against his equals. We introduced a
constitutional amendment to acknowledge their existence and the supreme
respect the nation has towards our sexually diverse brothers and sisters
- and our opponents and the right called for a vote against that
amendment." - Interim Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, firing back at homophobia charges
by opposition candidate Henrique Capriles by again hinting that
Capriles is gay. At the link, Andres Duque points out that Capriles did
not oppose the above-cited amendment. The election is April 14th.
RELATED: Maduro also claims that Hugo Chavez is now "face-to-face with Christ" and therefore influenced the selection of a South American pope.
Reposted from Joe
RELATED: Maduro also claims that Hugo Chavez is now "face-to-face with Christ" and therefore influenced the selection of a South American pope.
Labels: 2013 elections, Henrique Capriles, Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela
Via Gay Politics Report
- New pope blamed devil for marriage equality push
Pope Francis, elected this week to lead the Roman Catholic Church, once forcefully opposed legislation allowing same-sex couples to marry in his native Argentina, saying the effort was "a move by the father of lies," a biblical reference to the devil. The new pope also once called adoption by gays "discrimination" against children. In 2003, however, then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio said the church should speak with "respect" and "understanding" toward individuals when discussing its teachings on sexuality. LGBT advocates have called on the Church under Francis to tone down its anti-gay rhetoric, which they said harshened under Pope Benedict XVI. The Huffington Post (3/13), The Washington Post/The Fix blog (3/14)
Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:
Daily Buddhist Wisdom | |||
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Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 15, 2013
Keep Your Balance
Just
as a person mired in quicksand cannot help another until he has himself
reached firm ground, our ability to help others depends chiefly on
keeping our own balance.
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- Andrew Olendzki, "Keep Your Balance"
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:
Daily Buddhist Wisdom | |||
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Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 14, 2013
Recognizing Yourself in Others
Compassion
is not condescension, but a leveling of the playing field, a
recognition of yourself in others and an acceptance that their stress is
your stress, that their happiness is your own. The gulf between us all
is imaginary, born of insecurity and fear.
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- Stephen Schettini, "What to Expect When You're Reflecting"
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Via JMG: Bad News For Southern Baptists
Right Wing Watch reports that a survey just done by the polling arm of the Southern Baptists Convention shows broad support for LGBT rights across multiple issues. LifeWay Research, however, is focusing on the minority of respondents who believe that businesses should be able to turn away gay people.
“Clearly, Americans believe the prerogative exists for individuals such as clergy or photographers to deny services for same-sex marriage,” said Ed Stetzer, president of LifeWay Research. “However, the level of agreement changes with scenarios that could be interpreted as more basic rights such as housing and employment.” Consistent in all scenarios of the survey, men are more likely than women to agree these individuals should have the right to refuse services, rental agreements or employment -- as are Americans calling themselves “born-again, evangelical or fundamentalist Christian.”Hit the second link for the full survey results.
Labels: LGBT rights, religion, Southern Baptists Convention, surveys
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Saturday, March 9, 2013
Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:
Tricycle Daily Dharma March 9, 2013
What Emotions Reveal
When
we meditate with the idea of getting rid of our emotions, we are
actually empowering the very forces that we seek to escape. On the other
hand, when we can use the arising of emotion to examine our underlying
sense of identification, we tap the transformative potential of
sublimation.
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- Mark Epstein, "Shattering the Ridgepole"
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
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