Traveling and communing on the SW border

Dear friends,

I have been traveling with my wonderful Seattle Peace Chorus on the SW border for the last week. We are a little over half way through this heart breaking and heart warming experience.

We have witnessed the incredible strength, persistence, and power of our beloved sibling immigrants who have risked their lives fleeing violence and poverty mostly due to years of the capitalist and colonialist foreign policies of our government.

These people are kind, compassionate, incredibly hard working, and intelligent. They, like most immigrants, would add deep richness to our country but in a horribly ironic, tragic travesty of inhumanity that is in fact a violation of international laws, not to mention a sin against our fellow humans, we place more and more barriers in their way as they attempt to navigate our absurd immigration process.

Imagine traveling 8 months from central America while pregnant with 3 young children because you feared for your life. Arriving finally at the border to be stopped by the border patrol before you entered the U.S., told to leave and come back later even to be able to apply for asylum.

Now you are stuck in a dangerous Mexican town with no where to go, wandering the streets with your small children. If you are lucky, a good person finds you and gives you shelter until you’re allowed to finally go through and apply for asylum.

This is only the beginning. With the new policy you are now sent back to Mexico to wait for your Credible Fear Interview (against international law).

Finally you are able to have your interview, an entirely arbitrary decision is made by an ICE administrator. Best case, they are in a good mood and you have managed to learn enough to present your case (it must be in English regardless of your language) and you are given an A number and taken to the hielera (cooler) kept 30 degrees colder than outside, often separate from your children whom you can hear screaming from their cooler nearby. There are no beds, just concrete benches and flimsy aluminum blankets. You may be left there 7-9 days.

Then they move you the the Perrera (dog pound) a caged box in the detention center meant to hold 6 people but filled with as many as 30 other immigrant families again all concrete, to await your immigration trial before a judge.

This can last weeks before you finally have your time before the overworked judges. Again, their ruling is entirely arbitrary – not based on precedent, but on the whim of the judge.

If you are granted asylum (and btw your children are tried separately) you are sent to detention – jailed for no reason, some are separate from your children.

Because these are for profit prisons and are required to keep their 39,000 beds full you may spend months in this prison environment.

When you are released (you must have obtained a sponsor who sends you a ticket) ICE loads you in a bus and drops off at the airport or the bus station. You may have no food, money, or any idea what to do next. In our local Tacoma detention center they just send them out the gate with no transportation!

Again, if you are lucky there are some of the amazing volunteers there that we’ve met who help you find your way, give you food, directions, and a backpack of supplies and toys.

You’re finally in your country with family or friends but you still have to report regularly to ICE and may well (again arbitrarily) be wearing an ankle bracelet tracking device.

Hold this image in your hearts. We are treating these gentle, sweet human family like criminals and in the name of corporate profit treating them like animals against all human compassion.

Here is a poem I found:

This is what was bequeathed us:
This earth the beloved left
And, leaving,
Left to us. No other world
But this one:
Willows and the river
And the factory
With its black smokestacks. No other shore, only this bank
On which the living gather. No meaning but what we find here.
No purpose but what we make. That, and the beloved’s clear instructions:
Turn me into song; sing me awake. ~ Gregory Orr ~

Sufi Saturday February 2

Beloveds, Everyone is welcome to this gathering of HEART in community

with friends and experienced travelers of the path guided by

Akbar, Hamid, Sheikh Mansur, Wakil, Zarifah and myself.

Pianist Daneshmand will accompany the Zikr.

In addition to our practice, throughout 2019 we will prepare to host the Ruhaniat Jamiat Khas,

the annual meeting of representatives of our lineage from throughout the world.

Over 120 guests are expected; we anticipate an open-to-all evening program in Seattle.

Love & MORE LOVE, Murshida Khadija

Sufi Ruhaniat Int’l Sufi Saturday & Zikr    Saturday February 2, 2019

”Traveling the Path of Love, in Love, to Love…”

2:30–6 pm • SUFI PRACTICE

Practice • Dances of Universal Peace • Meditation

Teachings • Sohbet • Healing Service

6 pm • POTLUCK      7 pm • ZIKR & TURNING

Lake City, WA • INFORMATION (206) 850-2111 • halway@comcast.net

2844 NE 117th Street, Seattle, WA 98115 • Park on street, walk down

Ruhaniat SUFI SATURDAYS are usually offered on first Saturdays:

More 2019: March 2 • April 6 • May 4 • June 1 • July 6 • August 3

September 7 • October 5 • November 9(2nd Saturday)  December 7

Seattle Peace Chorus Trip to the SW

Dear friends,

As I’ve mentioned before – our choir, the Seattle Peace Chorus is heading to the Southwest tomorrow to share the beauty of music with our friends who are working with immigrants and with the immigrants themselves.

We will also be assisting with some of the work while we are down there – and we are donating money that we have raised through the following gofundme page to two of the non-profits that are doing such important work on the border.

Please hold us in your prayers and thoughts.

Again, with the travel and work we’ll be doing, these blog postings may come less often – but I hold you all in my heart and meditations.

If you’d like to help out financially, your donation would be deeply appreciated:

https://www.gofundme.com/spc-music-crosses-borders-tour

Honoring Mary Oliver

When Death Comes 

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse 

to buy me, and snaps his purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox; 

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades, 

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering;
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness? 

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility, 

and I think of each life as a flower, as common 
as a field daisy, and as singular, 

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth
tending as all music does, toward silence, 

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth. 

When it’s over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was a bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. 

When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened
or full of argument. 

I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.

~ Mary Oliver ~ 

(New and Selected Poems, Volume I)

Aramaic Sesshin – Woodinville DUP – Sunday

From our dear brother Murad Phil:

This coming Sunday, January 20, 7 pm, I will be offering an evening
focused on the first lines of the Aramaic Lord’s Prayer in a format similar
to what has been described as a “Sufi Sesshin”. That is, we will alternate
between dance and meditation and other practices focused on the opening
lines of Yeshua’s (or Jesus’) great prayer in Aramaic, his own native
tongue.

I’ve been finding strength, peace and a reminder of my true nature
in this prayer that has been a source of solace and refreshment in the face
of the divisive social and political developments in which we are living.
Perhaps you also will find nourishment for your soul and Being by steeping
in the opening lines of Yeshua’s prayer and by invoking the presence of
Christ consciousness.

Please join me in launching the first Woodinville dance evening of 2019!

Woodinville Unitarian Universalist Church
19020 NE Woodinville Duvall Rd, Woodinville, WA 98077

Beautiful and Wise Poetry of Mary Oliver

Sunrise 

You can
die for it —
an idea,
or the world. People 

have done so,
brilliantly,
letting
their small bodies be bound 

to the stake,
creating
an unforgettable
fury of light. But 

this morning,
climbing the familiar hills
in the familiar
fabric of dawn, I thought 

of China,
and India
and Europe, and I thought
how the sun 

blazes
for everyone just
so joyfully
as it rises 

under the lashes
of my own eyes, and I thought
I am so many!
What is my name? 

What is the name
of the deep breath I would take
over and over
for all of us? Call it 

whatever you want, it is
happiness, it is another one
of the ways to enter
fire

~ Mary Oliver ~ 

(New and Selected Poems, Volume I)

Wednesday Dances of Univeral Peace – Murshid Sam Urs Celebration

From our Sister Hayra:

Beloveds,
Tuesday is the 48th anniversary of Murshid Sam’s passing.*

On Wednesday, we will have the enlivening opportunity to share a small sampling from the original body of Dances of Universal Peace, along with dances radiating light.
Let’s invite that blessing stream together!

Wednesday, January 16, 2019
7:30 – 9 PM
Keystone Congregational Church
5019 Keystone Place North
Seattle, WA 98103

Bismillah!
Murad and Hayra

PS Thanks to Jahnavi for drumming for us on this special occasion.

*In Sufi tradition the death of a master is called “Urs”, which translates “wedding day”. A realized being may be more completely reunited with the great Oneness when giving up the body. This is cause for celebration!

Mirroring practice

Sometimes the most difficult thing to recognize is ourselves in the mirror of those around us, especially in those we find most challenging. This wonderful practice from Fr. Richard Rohr’s blog helps us consider these challenges and find ways to recognize ourselves in the mirrors that surround us.

Practice: Mirroring

Over the past year we’ve covered a lot of ground. We’ve looked for God’s image and likeness in many forms and places, perhaps some that surprised you: the natural world, human bodies and sexuality, poetry (from the Psalms to rap), justice, economics, politics (yes, spirituality includes politics), other faith traditions, even suffering and death.

Where do you find it hardest to recognize the divine image? Will you trust that this person or being is indwelled by God—who is Love? Because of wounding or ego’s resistance, they may not be actively saying “yes” to and growing in Love’s likeness. Yet they still have inherent dignity and are infinitely lovable. It takes practice to see what we’re not accustomed to seeing. I find it helpful to connect with the loving Source within myself and then expand that awareness to others. This is a contemplative practice.

Take some time to rest in God’s presence. Allow God’s loving, compassionate gaze to soften your heart. Notice any sensations in your body, if you feel tension or resistance, warmth or release. Send loving attention to each of those places. If you feel pain or sorrow, know that God is intimately present with suffering. You are not broken or damaged. As James Finley often says, “You are not what has happened to you. Only Love has the final word in who you are.”

Draw upon this Love in yourself. Be filled to overflowing with Love. Gradually turn your gaze outward, picturing people you know and strangers you’ve never met, faces around the world. Imagine Love gazing back at you from their eyes. Return their gazes with Love. God—who is Love—is with and in each of you.

Whidbey Zikr – January 13

Whidbey Island Zikr Circle
Sunday January 13th
Unity of Whidbey
5671 Crawford Rd
Langley Wa
Community Potluck 6:00
Circle of Remembrance 7:30
more information 425 788 1617

From our Brother Hassan:

Beloveds,

Please join us for our monthly circle of remembrance.   On this evening we’ll be especially remembering the many contributions Laurie Julian made to our circle.   She passed this week after a brief but intense struggle with brain cancer.   Remembrances of and for Laurie are on her Caring Bridge site.

Below is excerpted from her long time partner Corinne.   It captures her essence beautifully.

Much Love
Hassan

A Dance with Life

Journal entry by Corrine Bayley — Jan 7, 2019

Laurie Julian had a joyful dance with life — and a brief dance with brain cancer. She has left us peacefully, turning fully into the Light. Her 60th birthday would have been August 16, 2019.  Her mother Elizabeth always said that Laurie was born with one foot in another plane; part of her was always with the angels. She was and is surely one of their tribe. She told me during her illness that her greatest joy was the privilege of opening a portal to see the divine essence in people — and to let them see it in themselves. As a friend said on this site: You shine your light so brightly on those you meet that it makes everyone feel seen and deeply cherished. We have all felt that, and I am beyond grateful for having felt it for 30 years.  We will miss her generous sharing of music, joy, compassion, love, zest for life, and deep spirituality. Each of us carries something of what we loved in her, and we each have our own gifts. Let’s help each other share them even more brightly than before. The world can’t afford to lose any amount of light or love.