Category Archives: politics

Without Love, We Have Nothing

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When I first woke up this morning I was feeling scared and beyond hope for our world. Doomed, you know? And then something happened – something changed in my thoughts. I’m sitting here, trying to trace back what caused the change, and I’m not sure, exactly.

Maybe it was learning in the first post I saw on Facebook this morning that a friend who’s been trying for years to get pregnant just learned she was expecting. Or maybe I started thinking about how my friend, Janie, and her husband, showed up at my doorstep last night with cookies. Or maybe I was thinking about my little granddaughter in Australia. But I suddenly felt Love touching my shoulder and smiling at me, and the hymn “Tender Mercies” came into my thoughts.

I found Lisa Redfern’s version of the song on Youtube, and I’ve been listening to it. So beautiful. So pure.

I feel like the sun is rising in my thoughts – like light is rising over the hills and filling the dark places in my inner landscape. I’m feeling hope.

As long as we can feel love, there’s hope. I know this maybe sounds naive and simplistic – but I know there’s power in Love. I know Love is the only real thing. And as long as we can hang onto it, and live in it, we have everything that really matters. Without love, we have nothing. We can “win wars” and have gazillions of dollars – but without Love, we have nothing.

Actually – that sounds a lot like I Corinthians 13, doesn’t it? “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.”

And “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

“Love never fails.”

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

Let’s keep hope. Let’s keep faith. But let’s especially keep love.

***

I awake each morn to a brand new day,
Singing Hallelujah! as I go on my way,
For my heart is fixed on this one guarantee,
The Love that is All holds me tenderly.

Tender mercies, oh, tender mercies,
Tender mercies are holding me.
Tender mercies, oh, tender mercies,
Tender mercies are holding me.

I can walk in Love through the valley of fear,
Singing Hallelujah! when hope is deferred,
The desert of my longings can’t fulfill,
But Love fills all need and bids want be still.

So no matter the need and no matter the threat,
I’m secure in Your love, no fear, no regret.
Can there be a sweeter comfort, a grace more secure,
Than the thought that your Love is lovingly here?
– Susan Mack

Love the Hell Out of the World

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My dear Humoristian hooligans,

Today may you love the hell out of the world. May you open the floodgates of Love and let Love water the weary hearts athirst for kindness and caring. May you refuse to allow fear and hate to steal your hope and courage. May the bigots, bullies, and busybodies be transformed by your open hearts and good will to all. May the stodgy, stuffy, and stingy be transformed by your irrepressible joy. May you bring laughter to those in sorry need of a good laugh, and hope to those ascared of the future.

Go out there and work your magic, my friends!

Karen

Aren’t We Beyond This Now?

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I went to a movie today at the local theater. Saw the same movie previews I saw a couple weeks ago at the same theater. And I realized something had changed in me in the last two weeks. Two weeks ago when I saw the trailer for Napoleon I was thinking this looked like a movie I wanted to see – great acting, interesting time in history, yada yada.

But today when I saw the same preview, I found myself reacting differently. As cannons were booming and bloody body parts were flying and a tyrant was crowning himself monarch, I found myself feeling… I guess “repulsed” would be the best word. I found myself asking, “Aren’t we beyond this now? Aren’t we done with this, yet? Why are we still making these movies about these egomaniacal men and glorifying the wars they mongered?”

I’m so done with it.

I think at some point in the last couple of weeks I reached some kind of mental and emotional tipping point. Our world cannot go on as it’s been going on. Things are going to have to change if humanity is going to survive.

War is not the answer.

“Bloodshed, war, and oppression belong to the darker ages, and shall be relegated to oblivion.”
– Mary Baker Eddy


I’m Siding with Love

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podcast link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/karen-molenaar-terrell/episodes/Im-Siding-with-Love-e2fofg1

I’m siding with peace
not just the kind where wars cease
but the kind where we work together
to make the world a BETTER
place

I’m siding with compassion
I’m not just siding with whatever faction is in fashion
but I’m siding with the Source of kindness
that underlies what blesses
ALL of humanity

I’m siding with Love –
below, around, above –
the only lasting power, always here,
bigger than hate, bigger than fear.

-Karen Molenaar Terrell
(Photo by Karen Molenaar Terrell.)

“Access Equality”

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“I am not trying to relieve others by putting a burden on you; but since you have plenty at this time, it is only fair that you should help those who are in need. Then, when you are in need and they have plenty, they will help you. In this way both are treated equally.”
– II Corinthians 8:13-14 (Good News translation)

Let’s call it “access equality.” Let’s say “access equality” looks like this:

Everyone puts a portion of their money into a community pot to pay for the things and services that an average person couldn’t pay for alone – things that the community needs to function and prosper, and things individuals need to stay alive: roads, bridges, highways, fire departments, police departments, tools and personnel for military defense, schools and teachers, hospitals and doctors and health care, etc.

Let’s say that the people who have more money contribute more to the pot, and the people who have less money contribute less. In other words – if you’re Stephen Schwartzman who created the investment group Blackstone and you’re making $253,000,000 a year (by investing other people’s money) or Mary Barra (CEO of General Motors) who makes $28,979,570 a year doing whatever it is CEOs do, you put more into the pot than the General Motors auto worker making $60,000 a year.

Let’s say that as part of this “Access Equality” system we all understand that even if we, individually, don’t have need at the moment of a fireperson or a police officer or a trip to the doctor, others in our community do and that our world/community/family functions best when everyone has access to the basic things and services they need to stay alive.

Let’s say that our collective goal as a nation is to help one another, rather than to compete to see who can acquire the most wealth.

Wouldn’t that be a good thing?

First Review for *Looking Forward*!

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Looking Forward: More Adventures of the Madcap Christian Scientist has its first review on Goodreads! I’m sitting here, all teary-eyed and grateful for the kindness in this review.

Maryjmetz writes:

“Karen Molenaar Terrell’s latest, Looking Forward, is another pretty darned inspiring and comforting book. It covers the period between 2014 and 2023 so, as she herself notes, an eventful period in every way: the death of both her parents, a world-wide pandemic, a certain President and his followers. The individual pieces were written as events happened so Karen doesn’t necessarily know how things are going to turn out any more than the reader does, but she generally manages to convey her expectation that things will be okay. More to the point, she acts in such a way as to somehow make things turn out okay. Without being preachy in any way, she shares her belief – no, models her belief—that Love is in ultimate control, while her own day-to-day actions make the world better: buying shoes for someone in need, teaching at an alternative high school, treating the other candidates with respect when running for her local school board, or just appreciating the beauty that exists everywhere.

“What I love about Karen’s writing is how genuine and truthful she always is; she isn’t some starry-eyed innocent who believes everything she is told nor is she ever full of herself for being so clever (but when you read about all the stuff she teaches at that alternative high school you recognize there’s not much she doesn’t know or can’t do). She acknowledges her own doubts and her own failings, but seemingly never lets that stop her from doing what she thinks is right. Her positive outlook, a result in part of her Christian Scientist beliefs, never feels forced and so she somehow manages to make me feel more positive and hopeful when I read her, though I don’t share her faith and, in general, tend towards pessimism.

“I wish I. could do the spirit of the book justice with this write-up, but I’m not the writer that Karen is.”

Ode to the Debt Ceiling

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(A friend suggested this be read in Gene Wilder’s voice as Willy Wonka.)

And so we have the debt ceiling
and I have a sinking feeling
that when politicians are dealing
with our economy keeling
they aren’t concerned with healing
or egos humbly kneeling
or layers of corruption peeling
or deal-sealing
or politically yielding
to stop our economy from reeling

In fact, “they” don’t seem to be concerned with “us”
at all

-Karen Molenaar Terrell

A Prayer for the Economy

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Feel the strength and power of God, Truth. Feel the nurturing and comforting of God, Love. Father-Mother Soul fills all space. God is limitless, infinite Good. God is the only Mind – the infinite intelligence and wisdom directing all the expressions of Life.

God’s children are reflections, expressions, manifestations, ideas of the one Mind. God’s children were made by Love, exist for Love, reflect only Love. There isn’t the teensiest tiniest part of God’s creation that is unlike the Creator. All we can be is what Love made us to be.

God’s children are never outside of Love, Truth, Life, Mind, Soul. God’s children don’t have minds of their own that can cause harm or act out of greed, fear, ignorance, hate, anger, revenge. A mortal mind is no part of our real identity and no part of the reality of creation. Don’t claim any mind but the one Mind as your own.

The belief that we can ever lack anything, or have less than we need, or be dependent on any mind but God for our supply is a lie. Good is never-ending and without limits. Life supplies everything we need, always and in all places.

Nothing has the power to usurp God’s governing of Her own creation.

Life is endless good.

“Fear not, for Love is with you.”

Amen.

Honoring John “Peace Wizard” Bromet

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When I’d heard that my friend, John “Peace Wizard” Bromet, had passed, I immediately thought of the Friday noon vigils in front of the Skagit County Courthouse. John had been a faithful force at these vigils for decades. His passing was going to leave a huge hole there. Almost as soon as the thought came to me, I knew how I could honor John: I would go to the courthouse at noon and hold my “TRUTH JUSTICE KINDNESS” sign, and every time a car honked I would give a “high kick” like John had done.

When Friday came, it was rainy and gray outside. I wasn’t sure anyone else would show up at the courthouse, but I knew I needed to do this for John – even if I was the only one.

Of course, I should have known better. A little rain wasn’t going to stop John’s peacenik companions from showing up with their signs, as they’d been doing for years.

And yes, many high kicks were made. 🙂

– Karen Molenaar Terrell

Celebrating International Women’s Day!

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“This is woman’s hour, in all the good tendencies, charities, and reforms of to-day.”
– Mary Baker Eddy, Miscellaneous Writings, p 245

This month is Women’s History Month, and today is International Women’s Day. So I thought I’d use my blog to talk about women today – the concept of “womanhood”; my mom – one of the greatest women I’ve ever known; and the surge in support I’ve seen towards women’s equality.

In the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy writes: “Man and woman as coexistent and eternal with God forever reflect, in glorified quality, the infinite Father-Mother God… The ideal man corresponds to creation, to intelligence, and to Truth. The ideal woman corresponds to Life and to Love. In divine Science, we have not as much authority for considering God masculine, as we have for considering Him feminine, for Love imparts the clearest idea of Deity.” (p. 517)

My mother was a wonderful expression of God’s motherhood. She was born at the end of 1927 – just seven years after women got the right to vote in this country. There were certain expectations from society for women of her time, but she never accepted the limitations that society might have tried to foist on her: She ran on the women’s track team in college; graduated college with a four-year degree; worked outside the home; and proudly voted in every election – all things that women in some countries are still fighting for the right to do.

When Mom learned that I was planning to march in the 2017 Women’s March, Mom proudly conveyed this news to her friends in the assisted living place where she and Dad lived. One of her friends knitted a pink pussy hat for me, and I proudly wore that hat in the march. I’m so glad Mom got to see me in that pink hat before she died, a month later.

Women from all over the world participated in the 2017 Women’s March. It’s estimated that over five million people (of all genders) might have participated in the march in the United States. It’s estimated there were 6,000 people in the march that I walked in, in Bellingham, Washington. I can still remember the power I felt in the people around me that day, and the joy. People of every gender and race, both young and old, participated in the march that day – all coming together in support of women. That felt good. At the end of the march I thanked the police officers who had supported us, and said to one of the officers, “We did good, didn’t we?” He smiled and said, “Yes, you did!”

Today we’re seeing support for women’s equality everywhere – in Iran, where men and women fill the streets to protest the death of Mahsa Amini; in the United States, where people of every gender protest for the rights of women to have control over their own bodies; in the Green Wave movement in Latin America; and in those heroes who work to bring education to the girls of Afghanistan.

As manifestations of God, we will not be oppressed, and we will not allow the oppression of others.
-Karen Molenaar Terrell

“Learn to do good. Seek justice: help the oppressed; defend the orphan; plead for the widow.”
-Isaiah 1:17

“Lord, you listen to the desires of those who suffer. You steady their hearts; you listen closely to them, to establish justic for the orphan and the oppressed, so that people of the land will never again be terrified.”
-Psalms 10:17-18


“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one and the same in Christ Jesus.“
– Galatians 3:28

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.”
-Genesis 1:27

Here are some photos from the 2017 Women’s March…