Part 1

“I see and admire your manner of living…In short you can do almost what you choose. You whites possess the power of subduing almost every animal to your use. You are surrounded by slaves. Every thing about you is in chains and you are slaves yourselves. I fear that if I should exchange my pursuits for your, I too should become a slave (Jensen, 259) .”
We live in a post-modern world, a world which bows down and pays tribute without question to oppressive regimens and unholy dictators (Obama). Violence is divinely sanctioned and encouraged in the land of slavery and bones (The USA). Oceans expire while we pray.
Appalachian peoples, indigenous blacks, and others tribal peoples are painted as ill-bred, dumb, lesser then human peoples. This is the land of Empire. This is life. This is your world, a world where the divine is separated from humanity by brick buildings known as churches and a wooden cross with a tortured peasant suffocating upon it .
We live in a world where we are encouraged to stay deeply rooted in our miserable lifestyles. We live in a world where we are encouraged to stay aggressive, to submit to the capitalist model…and to never fight back. What ever you do, do not fight back…do not resist as industrial civilization kills off your land base. Remember my friend, as I cannot stress this enough, do not ever fight back, even as you die or the world around is dying…please don’t fight back… for fighting back is only acceptable when it comes from the top and is directed toward those at the bottom.
Neither you nor I are free beings, if you think are, you are being duped my friend. The radical activist David Edwards once wrote, “There is no greater obstacle to freedom then the assumption that it has already been attained.” Your mind is and will continue to be colinialized by powers that preach “DEMOCRACY IS FREEDOM”. Allusions are and always shall be the most impenetrable prisons.
Life is tough, it is dreadful, however that is life and Jesus, he suffered just like we did and he was rewarded in the end, so shall I! This way of thinking is deeply ingrained into our minds. Suffering is the definition of humanity.
We need to wake the fuck up.

East of Eden.

We are living East of Eden.
200,000 gallons of oil per day are being pumped into the ocean; this is what life is like East of Eden.
Human beings are being treated like Lepers in Arizona; this is what life is like East of Eden.
When Christians are at the forefront of oppression towards alien, migrant, undocumented workers, Christians who are supposedly Exiles, who follow an Alien, Undocumented, Migrant Messiah, this is what life is like East of Eden.
We are a people who view the world through the eyes of white privileged men, Aristotle, Aquinas, Plato, and Augustine, instead of through the fathers and mothers of our faith, Ruth, Ester, Mary, Amos, Micah, and Jesus. We see the world through the eyes of conquers and the oppressors instead of through the eyes of those who desire to go back to Eden.
I am fed up.
I am fucking tired.
I am sick and tired of listening to men at church talk about funding colonializing missionaries to reach the people who have not even heard of Jesus…
I am sick of the salmon dying…I am sick of drowning polar bears…. I am sick of buildings…I am sick of airplanes…I am sick of being sick…I am sick of sitting with teenage girls that are addicted to pills…I am sick of life East of Eden.
My sickness is making me wake up…I am angry, I have a holy, a holy prophetic anger against this system, against the narrative that is dominating life in the Empire…
We are in exile, just as our ancestors were, we must as they did work for the radical and all-encompassing vision found in the words of Isaiah, Joel, and Hosea. It is time we like our tribal ancestors begin to resist…it is time we believe…
I want us to now relax and reflect on some readings of scripture. I do not want us to view the words as a far off promise, this is not how our ancestors viewed them, they viewed them as possibly happening in the hear and now. …after this I would like to discuss our experiences…what can we do to get this to take place.

as of late

I have been reading a lot of good material as of late, especially “Against Civilization” which is a collection of essays written by Anarchists. I especially enjoy John Landau’s writing; it is very inspiring and stirs something within.
I am incredibly excited about the way in which followers of Jesus are beginning to read the biblical text as a hole, reading it through the eyes of the oppressed instead of through the eyes of Plato. It is wild, tribal, text that is rooted in liberation, radicalism, and resistance. For so long now it has been used as a weapon or a form of control, opium for the people.
I wrecked my mountain bike really hard last night, nailed a tree and got ripped right off my bike…I think my elbow is dislocated or something, I still cant really sense anything in my fingers. However, other then the wreck I had a great ride. I am really starting to get used to my bike. I rode Barb Wire all the way and I had already climbed Grouse, or whatever it is called without stopping. It is all about rhythm. I have also been getting some good trail run in, I had been super sick for about a week and a half, starting to come out of it.

In the company of prophets.

Today I am anticipating the arrival of my new Trail Running Shoes. I abhor the fact that through the evolution of civilization my feet have become weak, I talk a bit about this with my friend Keegan…humanity was never meant for rubber soles or for anything rubber.
I read a poem about anger, it was written by a Native American. Anger is a good thing, prophetic anger is needed, if you are not angry at the state of society then you are a slave to the fucking system which continues to colonialize your mind. You, as do I, come from the earth and will return to it. I do not need a King or a Democracy to dictate the way I live. I need to listen to the trees more or watch the clouds as the early Israelites did before David fucked up everything with his pursuit of military power and dictatorship.
I was at Great Seal yesterday on top of a ridge looking down upon Chillicothe. I thought of the prophets that used to walk these hills, Logan Elm and Tecumseh, I become filled with a rage, a rage that I am sure does not even come close to the rage they felt when the white men rapped and killed their land base, family, and culture. My skin, my kin’s blood stains this land, my tradition has farmed the shit out of the land around here, so much so that the rivers are not filled with mud, that the run off is suicidal….just so we can buy bull shit food from enormous grocery stores filled with shit. This friend is not life. I am rambling.

Bleeding Sky

The sky was screaming this morning while I ran. It literally seemed to be bleeding, it was overwhelming. It is moments such as this that the Kin/dom of G-d breaks through the muck and mire of civilization. It is moments like this that the toils of industrialization seem to crumble to the way side, G-d is screaming out that splendor can still be discovered.
The rest of the world was asleep, shutting of his or her alarm clock, attempting to put off the day. Put off the only thing that they have…time.
Resist the clock, smash it if you have time, we are slaves to time. Neither you nor I have to be. We were never meant to be.

johniv

a new day

I am slowly working my way back into shape. I desire to be able to exist, not to be a drone or a fat fuck who sits on the couch.
Monday I ran in the morning around town and in the afternoon I biked with Rich and Keegan at Great Seal. It was a beautiful ride, Keegan smashed me.
The trees were dancing, in rhythm with the wind. The divine was present; it reminded me of Elijah in the cave-refusing to come out to anything other then the sound of nothingness as G-d is in the nothingness of this world.
I spent the weekend in the church listening to white men spew rhetoric about the distance of G-d, I become sick of lies. Prophets, such as Amos, Micah, Jesus of Nazareth, these radicals were subversive. They were critical of the system, a system which attempted to convince the masses that the divine was far off...the divine is in all things they would scream!!!!
I take peace in this.
I take peace in simple living.
I take peace in anarchy.
I take peace in Christ.
I take peace in watching the system crumble.
I take peace in watching my garden grow.
I take peace in watching my wife laugh at the way in which most are enslaved to Bridge Street.
I take peace in know that one day Bridge Street and Easton Mall will crumble to the ground and be replaced by wild flowers and coyote shit.
I hope I live to see it.

JohnIV