<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" http-equiv=Content-Type><BASE
href="file://C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Stationery\">
<STYLE>BODY {
BACKGROUND-POSITION: left top; BACKGROUND-REPEAT: no-repeat; COLOR: #800080; FONT-FAMILY: Papyrus; FONT-SIZE: 10pt
}
</STYLE>
<META content="MSHTML 5.00.2614.3500" name=GENERATOR>
<META content="MSHTML 5.00.2614.3500" name=GENERATOR>
<META content="MSHTML 5.00.2614.3500" name=GENERATOR>
<META content="MSHTML 5.00.2919.6307" name=GENERATOR></HEAD>
<BODY bgColor=#ffffff>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000 face=Arial>I agree with your observation Julie. I
had forgotten that about Scott Peck - a great author. Ken Wilber also does a
good job summarizing the perspectives of many others - from around the world -
on stages of spiritual development. (<U>A Theory of Everything</U> is a good
place to start.) The worldview/ place of spirit from which we are used to
responding will no longer serve. It is too small. And yet to move forward, we
need to honour both the wisdom and the limitations of that perspective. And to
do that with force but without anger or violence - no small
challenge!</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000 face=Arial>Thanks</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000 face=Arial>Meg Salter</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000 face=Arial>MegaSpace Consulting<BR>416/486-6660<BR><A
href="mailto:meg.salter@sympatico.ca">meg.salter@sympatico.ca</A><BR><A
href="http://www.megaspaceconsulting.com">www.megaspaceconsulting.com</A><BR></FONT></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px">
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A href="mailto:jsmith@mosquitonet.com" title=jsmith@mosquitonet.com>Julie
Smith</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A
href="mailto:OSLIST@LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU"
title=OSLIST@LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU>OSLIST@LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Friday, October 05, 2001 2:29
PM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> another peel of the onion</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>Greetings All,</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>The organization I work with sponsored a public forum this week
concerning recent world events. The purpose was to enter into a dialogue
about what happened and what our response should be. I found myself
silenced by the way in which the panel and the audience defined the
issues. (This was not an OST event.) We focused most of our two
hours on the distinction between war and crime, leaving us with the options of
retaliation and punishment for response. Afterward, I learned that
those present with different views felt this level of discussion was a
necessary precondition to moving to the discussion they would like to
have. For that reason, many of us chose silence at that first community
meeting.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>As I was silently sitting and watching and thinking, I found myself
thinking of all these events in a new way. In some ways, it helped me
think about the discussion we are having on this list from a different
perspective. For that reason, I want to share my thoughts with
you. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Several years ago I happened upon the book <U>A Different Drum</U> by M.
Scott Peck. That book is memorable to me because it introduced me
to the concept of stages of spiritual development. My recollection
of those stages as described by Peck is this:</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Stage 1 is the stage of chaos. People at this stage don't have
rules to guide their lives or behavior. Life is chaotic and
uncertain. Survival depends on taking from the world what is required to
maintain life. When we decide there must be a different and better way,
we move to Stage 2. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Stage 2 is the stage of rules. The yearning for those just emerging
from Stage 1 is for order and certainty. The natural place to find
order and certainty is in rules. Some people find meaningful rules in
prison or in the military. Others find meaningful rules in religious
orders. The common characteristic is a seeking for rules by which
life can be ordered and understood. This makes perfect sense when the
only available alternative is a return to chaos. After a time, however,
rules become unsatisfying. We learn that rules are shells empty of
meaning. The strict application of rules often violates our sense of
humanity. Rules too often hurt someone. Many see that even
religious rules hurt. As disillusion with rules matures, we move to
Stage 3.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Stage 3 is the stage of skepticism. The skeptic rejects the rules
of religious orders and most anything that cannot be verified in the physical
world. Skeptics often embrace science as a meaningful way to understand
the world. Most skeptics shudder at the words God, religion, and
spirituality because they view all those words as embracing concepts they find
naive and immature. They have a hard time believing anyone still thinks
that way anymore. And yet...... over time skeptics find people they
respect and like who use these words passionately, and they find they have
moments when they wonder what other meanings the world might have. Some
begin moving toward Stage 4.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Stage 4 is the stage of the mystic. The mystic embraces the essence
of religion and spirituality. Unlike the religious fundamentalist who
might talk in terms of rules, the mystic will most often talk in terms of
principles. Love and all of its manifestations is the principle common
to all mystics I am aware of. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>So...... as I was sitting with my community talking about war and crime
and retaliation and punishment, trying to absorb the deeper meaning the
conversation had for so many in the room, it suddenly occurred to me that this
was a conversation the Skeptic was having with itself. And
moving just a bit deeper, I realized that much of the strength of the
United States lies in its many skeptics. The scientific achievements of
our many skeptics has created a world undreamed of even a century ago.
As a culture, I think we are probably predominantly skeptics. Our
primary collective identity, I think, is that of the skeptic.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>And then...... I saw how sheltered we all have been. We have had
the opportunity to maintain ourselves as a people in the stage of skepticism
because for the most part we have not been challenged to respond to gripping
tragedy in our own backyard. We have perhaps been guilty of acts
of Omission (not seeing the pain in other's lives, not responding to what we
did see, isolating ourselves from others much less physically fortunate than
ourselves, maintaining a willingness to be a "have" in the world of "haves"
and "have-nots"), but we have not had so many times when we were faced with
Comission of harm to others. (I know in some ways that statement rings
false, but in some ways it also rings true.)</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I began to wonder whether another way to see all of this is as a
challenge to the Skeptic. Maybe the ante just got upped. Maybe the
old question was whether the skeptic can maintain that place (that stage of
development) when not faced with the hard life and death questions. When
the hardest moral and ethical questions have to do with our professions, not
with who will live and who will die. When we never have to face
ourselves and ask, "for what am I willing to kill?" And under what
authority? </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>So the new question to the skeptic is exactly that: when is killing
justified, and under what authority? When are we justified in
committing or supporting the deliberate destruction of another
being? Now that we are facing the prospect of massive killing in
all directions, do we need to rethink our ideas about killing?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I think the framing of the question of what is happening as "is it war or
is it a crime" is an attempt to understand what is happening within a
construct that cannot hold the question. The framing is too narrow,
incomplete. And that is why we all keep talking. We know
there is something happening here we haven't quite grasped yet. And we
know it is important. I'm beginning to wonder whether as a people we are
being forced to move off our place of skepticism. Are we being forced to
move backward to the place of rules or forward to the place of the
mystic? Or is it something else that is going on?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I feel that all that I have said here is incomplete, and that I'm simply
scratching at a surface I don't understand. The value to me in giving it
to all of you is that if there is dialogue, all of our understanding might
deepen.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Julie</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>