Tag: justice

Life isn’t (un)fair…

On By Justin AlmeidaIn Life2 Comments

universe-hd-photo95-JPGA long time ago I stopped believing in a fair universe. From everything I’ve observed, life is a mix of intentionality, chance and inevitability. I have a small amount of agency; I work hard and pay my taxes and volunteer all of which come with their own rewards. But for the most part, life is just as likely to kick me in the balls as it is to let me win the lottery. Nature has no sense of justice outside of its laws of cause and effect. It is up to me to create fairness from an otherwise apathetic life.

When I believed God was in charge of everything, I had mantras like “it’s all part of God’s plan” or “God doesn’t give us more than we can handle” to fall back on whenever undeservedly bad things happened to good people. (let’s be honest, bad people deserve it, right?) Eventually they all became platitudes. Because as more curses and blessings stacked up, most of which without any catalyst, God’s plan began to look like trying to read tea leaves and God had a funny sense of what people could handle vs. what they should have to handle. In the end I was forced to reject the notion of a just God because a just God wouldn’t stand idly by in the face of so much injustice.

free-willNot just the kind of injustice that people intentionally cause; not crime or war or corporate greed or any of the millions of ways we dehumanize each other. I’m talking about the stupid everyday injustice, like car accidents and slipping on a patch of ice and breaking your leg. Accidents with horrible consequences. The butterfly effect of causality that reaps human life. I can’t even buy into the “free will” answer: God doesn’t intervene because he loves our free will more than he loves starving children. It’s bullshit, because that’s not love or justice, that’s an excuse. Therefore, I was left with either rejecting my preconceptions about God or believing in a lie.

Recently, my father-in-law passed away. While he was not perfect, he lived a good and clean life. He didn’t smoke. He drank less than occasionally. He was a runner. He attended church, was married more than 30 years and was an overall good man. He was diagnosed with throat cancer, which spread to his brain and eventually to the rest of his body. The doctors originally gave him 6 months to live. He fought for over 4 years until May 11th, 2015. There it is; blessings and curses all wrapped up in a whole ball of intentionality, chance and inevitability. If a just God did exist, this wouldn’t have happened.

BristleconeThe ironic part is I wish I still believed in a just God because right now I could really use something to blame. I want to look God in the eye and say “You are wrong! You did this! This is your fault and how dare you proclaim love and justice and mercy and compassion when you let good men suffer and die!” I am angry because Andy didn’t deserve to die. Not this way; not like this. He deserved better from his God than he received. There are millions of other people in the world who are more deserving than he was to die of cancer. This is a horrible statement but right now I feel horrible and selfish and hurt and confused and broken. And tired.

Right now I am just. So. Tired. Because what is the point? Why should I work so hard for ideals that go against the very fabric of the universe? Why should I care? In a just universe I’d be able to look at my son and tell him that life will be kind. But right now all I can tell him is that he will never know his grandfather; that he was robbed of having a good man in his life because life isn’t fair.

Life just is.

It is a hard lesson and I’m left with one lonely realization; if there is going to be justice in this world then I’m going to have to be the one making it happen. It’s up to me to create justice where it doesn’t exist. Because that is what I want to do. The responsibility has been passed from God to me and it’s a heavy load. 11238228_10153338843751934_1951030714927036305_nFortunately I know a whole lot of other people who are working to lighten that load. I know miracle workers on the margins of society who squeeze justice from life like blood from stone and I want to be just as strong and powerful and tireless as them. And maybe if I can just keep trying, keep believing in love and justice, I can make my father-in-law’s death mean something.

Because I think that’s what he would have wanted. And it’s what I want. Rest in love Andy. I’ll keep working on the justice.

Why I go to church…

On By Justin AlmeidaIn Life, Religion9 Comments

collapse-michael-ceraWorking at a peace and justice non-profit is an emotional double-edged sword plowshare. It is emotionally fulfilling to have a small part in making the world a better place. It is emotionally crippling because every day I am confronted with the injustice and inhumanity of human trafficking, war, ecological destruction, greed and corrupt power. Compassion fatigue is real; I can only watch/read/research so much before the pictures/videos/stories become numbers/statistics/calculations instead of real people.

My symptoms include bypassing petitions instead of filling them out; deleting email action-alerts instead of reading them; turning the radio station from KUOW to KEXP when a challenging story comes on; binging on Netflix instead of keeping up with current events. If I let the fatigue persist it would be easy to just give up. Heck, sometimes giving up looks pretty damn attractive. It would be much easier to just give in and become just another consumer who doesn’t give a f*#k about anybody but myself. But I don’t want to be this person. I choose to fight the good fight. Therefore, I go to church.

giphyWhen I announced I was becoming a Unitarian Universalist, some of my atheist friends questioned why I just didn’t give up on religion all together. They all have very good reasons; as an institution religion has been as much a problem of the world as a solution to the world’s problems. Why would an atheist or agnostic attend a church service? Those are places for believers. My answer is simple: To stay a sane, healthy man of peace, I need religion.

Religion provides me with a community, sanctuary and covenant that is focused on peacemaking. It reminds me that I am not alone in working to build a more just world. It cures my compassion fatigue because it restores my faith in people. When peace and justice work becomes too heavy, it is my church that lightens the load. In a space filled with atheists, believers, agnostics, questioners and religious refugees, our attendance shouts to the universe: “We will continue the work! We will not give up! We crave peace!”

rocky-training-oIn order to do the work I do, to continue to read the stories, watch the videos, and look at the pictures; to keep on filling out the petitions, contacting the representatives, and raising awareness; I have to feel like I’m not alone. And every Sunday, along with other justice-seekers, it is in singing our doxology that I am spiritually renewed to keep on fighting the good fight:

“From all that dwell below the skies,
let songs of hope and faith arise!
Let peace, goodwill on earth be sung
through every land, by every tongue.”

May it be so. Amen.

Walking the pro-(choice/life) line…

On By Justin AlmeidaIn Life5 Comments
It just makes for a bigger headache...
It just makes for a bigger headache…

I can tell it’s around the anniversary of Roe v Wade by the amount of pro-whatever debates I hear on the radio. Which is a good thing. We need to continue to struggle with issues of life and death in the U.S. I just wish it were a bit more intelligent. Usually it’s one person pulling the Jesus card and the other person pulling the “I do what I want” card. It’s another example of the polarization of our politics and how unwilling we are to just listen to another point of view. Then there are people like myself who are both pro-life and pro-choice.

It's all about the dignity of life... right?
It’s all about the dignity of life… right?

I’m pro-life because I believe in the inherent worth and dignity of every human person and I believe as a society we should respect the miracle and preciousness of ALL life. Which is why I have a problem with 99% of the pro-life camp. They’re really not about life; they’re about birth. My impression is that the pro-life camp just wants babies to be born but could care less about how they end up. Once the kid pops out, pro-lifers wash their hands of the issue and call it another day at the office. There is little mention about the quality of life for the child. What if it’s born into an abusive household? Or horribly handicapped and deformed because of drugs and/or alcoholism? What about issues of poverty, nutrition and education?

Yeah... about that...
Yeah… about that…

These are all LIFE issues. If people want to call themselves pro-life, then it’s all or nothing. You’re going to have to care about and share in the responsibility for every man, woman and child. If you’re pro-life, you better be working to address issues like economic disparity, education, workplace inequality, racism, food deserts and access to medical care that make life hard for the 50 million Americans in poverty. If you’re one of those assholes who scream about babies being slaughtered but tell your representative to cut welfare, you are doing it wrong.

One, of many, reasons...
One, of many, reasons…

I’m pro-choice because I believe if we’re going to live in a free, democratic country than we have the responsibility to provide access to safe and quality health care to ALL our citizens. It’s an issue of justice which includes women who need to have an abortion. Because let’s be honest, nobody WANTS to have an abortion. It’s not something a woman looks forward to with her morning coffee. It’s a damned hard decision that will have repercussions and ramifications for the rest of a person’s life. This is why it’s up to the individual woman, and not the state, to choose. It’s the kind of life decision where judgment and necessity exist ONLY within the person making it.

How is that iPod I helped make working for ya?
How’re you enjoying that iPod I helped make?

“But if you’re pro-life, how can you support murdering babies?” You know what, I don’t support murdering babies. Just like I don’t support children dying of starvation; yet I still have a full three-square meals a day. You can’t make abortion illegal because it kills babies and not outlaw obesity at the same time. We are ALL complicit in abortion, just like we are with child slaves mining the minerals to go in our electronics and the impoverished hands that make our clothing. We’re ALL part of the problem.

stckr-Better-futureI am NOT pro-abortion. I don’t think anybody is. However, I believe its legality is necessary for freedom, health and quality of life. But just because it’s necessary doesn’t mean I can’t work to make it an uncommon practice. Abortion will always be a part of human society and it’s not a single action removed from all the other issues of our time. To address it, I have to continue to work hard to build a better society that furthers the arc of history as it bends towards justice. Abortion isn’t about pro-life/choice. It’s about pro-justice.