Choose Love.

I was driving in the north suburbs on Thursday after a rather satisfying voice-over session, en route to the Chicago Botanical Garden for a long walk through the trees, when suddenly I remembered something rather vexing.  I hadn't thought of it in years, but suddenly, the flood of memories sparked a tidal wave of emotion, causing me to enter into prayerful contemplation once I did reach my walking destination.  You see, while driving through Highland Park, IL, I recalled (seemingly out of nowhere) that nearby, many years ago, a disturbed woman (whose name I've decided to not repeat, lest give dark energies more of a toehold) opened fire on elementary school children, killing several innocents.


Yesterday morning, while getting ready for a busy day of working out, visiting Dad, and beginning a steady stream of Christmas-making activities, I was met with the news of the killings in Newtown, CT.  A disturbed man opened fire on elementry school children, killing several innocents.  The similarities between the two events were chilling.  Did I somehow have a precognitive hit while driving through the northern Chicago suburbs?  Was I tapping into a rivlet of mass consciousness already rippling with sadness from the Oregon shooting of the day before?

After careful reflection, this is what I believe:

2012 is the end of the world.  Truly.  But we have the choice to choose what world is ending.  Is it a world of safety and love and security and people helping people that must end?  Or, can we put an end to suffering, to senseless murder, to a society who's growing in carelessness and a lack of caring for life?

2012 is a tipping point.  Anyone with eyes in their head or a functioning brain in their cranium can see it.  When I saw President Obama during his press conference yesterday about the shootings, when he became overwhelmed with grief, unable to continue speaking for several moments, something in me shifted.  We have a leader who may, just may, be able to begin turning more of us toward compassion and care, rather than conflict and a sense of entitlement.  Our country - and, indeed, the world -- is at a crisis point where we simply cannot afford the luxury of complacency anymore.

If we view the shootings in Newtown as just another symptom of unsafe, ineffective gun laws, lack of sufficient mental health care, or just another cog in the wheel of hate and fear that's running rampant through the world -- and leave it at that --  we are allowing darkness to preside.

If we look at this tragedy for even a moment and become desensitized by what we see, darkness has won.

Allow the waxing of light to win.  Pray for peace.  Call your congresspeople and demand stricter gun laws, better mental health care.  Write to our Presdeint and tell him that, in that moment of humaness, of frailty and realness that he displayed, you saw him in his full capacity as a leader and you wish for him to continue to be transparent about his feelings on this matter, affecting real change on gun policy in this country.

Pray for the Love to prevail, for God and goodness to win.  For the end of the dark world and the triumph of the light.  Because that is the only answer.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPdbkkWx--0