Yesterday I got up after nine am! But, I felt well rested and had been busy the evening before. Since it was ten percent discount day at Safeway’s, I made my way there right away after breakfast. I needed to replenish the bread, jams, cookies, milk before I could have a decent lunch! After that first round I went back for more at about three pm to get the other half, such as potatoes, margarine and some meats.

I needed to replenish the bread, jams, cookies, milk before I could have a decent lunch!

Each shopping trip has to have a value of plus 35$ in order to qualify for the ten percent discount, so I keep a running total in my head as I go around the aisles. This time the two trips added up to about ninety dollars with that discount applied, while about eighty dollars sufficed a year ago.

Last night after supper, I managed to get some sorting done and discovered a folder with prints of my daily writings, as well as of my presentation notes on the ‘Deep Narrative’ series, all among old bills and credit card statements!

I presume that this was one of those boxes where I’d dumped a bunch of stuff into, while clearing a desk top and then just left it in that box! Now I have more stuff on my dining table to sort through! It is hard to get ahead in this game, but I know I’m making progress when I look at the cleared floor space and the clean patches of carpet and nicely aligned books on the selves.
Time [9:17am[]to call John in order to arrange for a coffee time; no dice, left a message.

During my sorting adventure I make discoveries, one is a collector’s special by [inter]- National Geographic on the Maya, a welcome find in support of my upcoming talk. A second treasure was a “Harper’s” of May 2005, which had two articles on the Christian Right made in the USA.

The second article titled “Feeling the Hate etc.” by Chris Hedges gave me some food for thought. The author describes only without commenting, yet making clear the narrow and vehement opinions that were held by the people he meets as he makes his way through the annual convention of the National religious Broadcasters association in Anaheim.

So, I started asking some questions when I combined the two articles.

The article kept my interest, because on the one hand you could dismiss the narrow minded views as unrealistic and prejudicial, but on the other I asked my self: “Why is this happening?” These people represent a sentiment held by a large group of the public and not just in the US alone.

From a sociological viewpoint you could class this phenomenon as a cult, giving legitimacy to its existence and ask questions about it. I am no sociologist, but I have studied religions, followed social movements in the news and read widely in history, psychology and human culture.

So, I started asking some questions when I combined the two articles. In the first - “Inside America’s [sic] most powerful mega church” its author Jeff Sharlet describes the relating events and interviews in and around that mega church community in Colorado Springs.

First there is the fact that these people have a fundamentalist outlook on life, which is much centered on the ‘American Way’. I have concluded based on my reported interests that fundamentalism is a framework of experience that is highly simplified and therefore facilitates easy choice making for its practitioners. In addition is also provides clear lines of action and strong motivation.

It is in the application of the held believes that the necessary adjustments have to be made at the beginning of a long experiential adaptation process that involves changes in views and values. In that manner a long experiential journey towards a more tolerant view of that which was initially recognised, but rejected in a defensive attitude.

In 1492 Columbus discovered the ‘New World’, in 2001 the ‘New World’ discovered the whole world.

Symbolically we see a gathering in the most safe place in the USA, the Norad command centre and Air force Academy, both near or in Colorado Springs. This is 2005, as a movement it started earlier and aimed at holding back the perceived threat of Islam, which materialised at home soil in 2001 September 11. A clear and present danger and force as well. Totally unexpected.

This I observe here as part of my own experience also, that from then on my own perspective about being in this ‘New World’ isolated from the rest, was shattered. I made a tongue in cheek saying about this as follows: “In 1492 Columbus discovered the ‘New World’, in 2001 the ‘New World’ discovered the whole world.”

I have observed that most people keep an horizon of daily life that is close to home. This is efficient in many ways, because why worry about things that are out of your effective reach and/or interest. There is also resistance to having to deal with such far away events and they are held off.

Then, when this fence is breeched the first reaction is fear, because we are now confronted with the unknown. This unknown was in part self created because we did not want to spend the time and energy to get acquainted. Now that we have a breech in our fence of interest, we feel threatened as well and under attack since our defences have proven in adequate.

This scenario and its reactive force could have been prevented if we had invested in some proactive measures. These we would have acquainted us with the stranger on the other side of our fence and probably also her or his fence on the other side of that fence!

Live and learn the saying goes. The Harper’s article pair “Soldiers of Christ” reports - in my view - the first stages of this adapting process to a new, but unwanted world view that includes strangers and enemy aliens from far away that are now close by.
<10:28am~