Bulletin # 25 January 2006

FUNDAMENTALISM AND THE SOUL

Pluto in Sagittarius

By Ann Kreilkamp

The Orion Nebula (M42). Photo by Dick High This is another fireball caused by a star's explosion. It can be seen with the naked eye. It is what appears to be the middle star in the sword hanging from Orion's belt. This is especially interesting because when the star exploded, it did so in a cloud of gas. Its shock wave apparently compressed the gas so much that it created maybe 200 brand new stars, which shine brightly in the center of the nebula. Astronomers recently discovered a number of smaller objects in among the new stars. They seem to be free-floating objects bigger than Jupiter but too small to be a star. There may also be smaller Jupiter sized planets floating around there too. To me, the most interesting thing is that the death of a star often causes the birth of many new stars.

…as our sense of connection to nature, to human community, and even to our own bodies recedes, our psychological and spiritual unease increases. The stable ground for what makes us feel real and alive disintegrates; on a gut level we feel less secure. Naturally then, in an attempt to feel safe, we band together with those who agree with us.

Because we tend to identify with our answers rather than dwelling within the original, childlike awe that inspired our questions, those answers feel so important that they separate us entirely from those with whom we disagree. Indeed, our beliefs feel like a stockade that imprisons us and keeps “The Other” out. We may even judge “Them” as not just wrong, but bad or even “evil.”

In the final years of the 20th century, we learned to call this fixation on a particular set of beliefs “fundamentalism” and smugly assumed that fundamentalism applied only to The Other’s rigid point of view. Yet many of us now begin to sense our own fundamentalist tendencies. This new current in the zeitgeist shows up in recent films. Spielburg’s “Munich” portrays Israelis and Palestinians as equally inflexible. “Brokeback Mountain” shows the hidden, heartbreaking reality beneath stereotypes.

I ask myself, how many times have I pre-judged a stranger based on some little clue in manner, dress or behavior that, if I were mindful in that moment, would cue me in to my own unrecognized and unprocessed stuff? And how many times, on further reflection, have I had to admit that I was just plain wrong? When I do wake up to my harsh judgments, my arrogance astonishes me, as does the unconscious, prolific, projective power of the imagination.

Indeed, if we, as a species, do intend to continue to dwell upon this planet we each need to consciously release our identification with our own beliefs, no matter how “true” and “right” we think them! For both our stereotypes and judgments are based on belief. To extricate ourselves from stereotype and judgment will fundamentally restructure the ways our minds work.