For those to whom Much is Given Much is Required: Philanthropic Travel
"The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited by the obvious realities. We need men who can dream of things that never were."
"One person can make a difference and every person should try."
"Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men."
"Things do not happen. Things are made to happen."
"Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality."
"Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other."
"There are risks and costs to a program of action, but they are far less than the long-range risks and costs of comfortable inaction."
"Children are the world's most valuable resource and its best hope for the future."
"All of us do not have equal talent, but all of us should have an equal opportunity to develop our talents."
-John F. Kennedy
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Heart and Soul: Philanthropic Travel
Photo: Burning Man 2006 by Brad Templeton
Seeing an image of the planet Earth taken from space inspires awe in many of us, since we can clearly see the connectedness of all of us who live upon this planet.
We have created imaginary boundaries, sectioning ourselves into countries and states, forgetting that in reality we are all living together, breathing the same air, drinking from the same water, eating food grown from the same earth.
We share everything on this planet, whether we are conscious of it or not, with other people, and those people are our brothers and sisters. Keeping a photograph or painting of the planet Earth in a prominent place in our homes can be a positive way to remember our interconnectedness.
Meditating on the fact that any sense of separation we have from one another is truly an illusion, we will naturally begin to make more conscious choices in our daily lives. The simple act of preparing food, or determining how to dispose of our refuse, or how our energy choices impact our world, can be done with the consciousness that whatever we do will affect all our brothers and sisters, no matter how far away they live, as well as the planet herself.
When we foster this kind of awareness in ourselves out of a feeling of awe, it becomes easier to be conscious than to fall back into old habits of thinking of ourselves as separate.When we contemplate the earth in her wholeness, we attune ourselves to the truth of the bigger picture, which is the Earth, and all of us, every one of us, living on her body. We are connected to one another in the most intimate way, because we literally share our living space.
As more people become aware of the reality of our interdependency, things will shift in a positive direction, and much of the discord that we see now will give way to a more cooperative, loving conscious. This is happening already, so as our consciousness grows, we can join with the many other minds working to live in the spirit of togetherness.
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Paradigm Alert: Preserving Sacred Places
Mt. Shasta, California. Around the world there are thousands of places regarded as sacred. Some are still carefully guarded by indigenous people and are sites of secret ceremony and prayer. Some are national shrines known to millions. These holy sites emanate a magnetic force that draws people from far away, though the journey is frequently made only in the imagination.
Often sacred sites are embroiled in conflicts over preservation, resource development or tourism. Their histories are long and complex; they embody the tenacity of ancient cultures and preserve vast areas of biodiversity. To learn about some well known, and some lesser known, of the Earth's sacred places visit -The Sacred Land Film Project.
Exquisite Safaris Philanthropic Travel wishes to thank Toby McLeod for his efforts to raise awareness of these important issues and the following insights..
We applaud the United Nations' passage of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and congratulate the many, many indigenous elders and activists who collaborated over decades to enshrine these fundamental human rights in international law. However, in the spirit of dialogue and debate we offer these thoughts on the removal of the words "sacred places" from the document, in final negotiations behind closed doors as the declaration moved toward the General Assembly in 2006.
Throughout the 1990s, as indigenous people around the world worked to build support for the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, sacred places were explicitly mentioned. In 1994, the draft stated (bold text for emphasis):
PART III Article 12
Indigenous peoples have the right to practice and revitalize their cultural traditions and customs. This includes the right to maintain, protect and develop the past, present and future manifestations of their cultures, such as archaeological and historical sites, artifacts, designs, ceremonies, technologies and visual and performing arts and literature, as well as the right to the restitution of cultural, intellectual, religious and spiritual property taken without their free and informed consent or in violation of their laws, traditions and customs.
Article 13
Indigenous peoples have the right to manifest, practice, develop and teach their spiritual and religious traditions, customs and ceremonies; the right to maintain, protect, and have access in privacy to their religious and cultural sites; the right to the use and control of ceremonial objects; and the right to the repatriation of human remains. States shall take effective measures, in conjunction with the indigenous peoples concerned, to ensure that indigenous sacred places, including burial sites, be preserved, respected and protected.
In the 2006-7 version that was approved this week by the General Assembly (with adjusted Article numbering in which the old Article 12 became 11 and 13 became 12), this very important language was changed:
PART III Article 11
1. Indigenous peoples have the right to practice and revitalize their cultural traditions and customs. This includes the right to maintain, protect and develop the past, present and future manifestations of their cultures, such as archaeological and historical sites, artifacts, designs, ceremonies, technologies and visual and performing arts and literature.
2. States shall provide redress through effective mechanisms, which may include restitution, developed in conjunction with indigenous peoples, with respect to their cultural, intellectual, religious and spiritual property taken without their free, prior and informed consent or in violation of their laws, traditions and customs.
Article 12
1. Indigenous peoples have the right to manifest, practice, develop and teach their spiritual and religious traditions, customs and ceremonies; the right to maintain, protect, and have access in privacy to their religious and cultural sites; the right to the use and control of their ceremonial objects; and the right to the repatriation of their human remains.
2. States shall seek to enable the access and/or repatriation of ceremonial objects and human remains in their possession through fair, transparent and effective mechanisms developed in conjunction with indigenous peoples concerned.
Our attempts to discover why the words "sacred places" were removed in what appears to have been a small committee meeting in 2006 have so far failed to bear fruit. States probably objected to a fearful concept that seems to threaten economic development and private property rights, and a committee of indigenous negotiators may have compromised to undercut resistance as a promised vote by the General Assembly finally was approaching. The Declaration was tabled and did not come to a vote in November 2006, and thus the compromise may not have been necessary. It is definitely unfortunate. Including the specific mention of "sacred places" would have been a huge, historic step forward -indeed for twenty years the draft declaration included the requirement that states cooperate with indigenous people to ensure respect for and protection of sacred places. This language reflected a consensus built and sustained over many years.
We are left with "archaeological and historical sites" and "religious and cultural sites" - terms that governments and modern societies do not understand in the indigenous context and hence usually reduce to human built structures, places where there is archaeological evidence, material sites related to the human past. This omission can effectively and conveniently eliminate sacred natural sites, where an undisturbed geophysical formation is understood to be sacred, imbued with power and spirit, experienced on a level beyond the physical - a mountain, a spring, a tree or grove, a lake, a river, a rock - "sacred places." Perhaps it is arrogant for humans to try to enshrine "rights" to sacred places, when the proper relationship is one of voluntary, deeply felt "responsibility." But in an instrument of international policy, sacred places could have used explicit protection.
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The Peace Prayer: Thomas Jefferson
"Peace is our passion. I have ever cherished the same spirit with all nations, from a consciousness that peace, prosperity, liberty, and morals, have an intimate connection.
From the moment which sealed our peace and independence, our nation has wisely pursued the paths of peace and justice. Peace and justice should be the polar stars of the American societies. The happiness of mankind is best promised by the useful pursuits of peace.
Our desire is to pursue ourselves the path of peace as the only one leading surely to prosperity. Go on in doing with your pen what in other times was done with the sword; show that reformation is more practicable by operation on the mind than on the body of man.
Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy. I believe that through all America there has been but a single sentiment on the subject of peace and war, which was in favor of the former. I abhor war and view it as the greatest scourge of mankind.If nations go to war for every degree of injury, there would never be peace on earth. We think that peaceable means may be derived of keeping nations in the path of justice towards us, by making justice
I love peace, and am anxious that we should give the world still another useful lesson, by showing them other modes of punishing than by war, which is as much a punishment to the punisher as to the sufferer.
their interest, and injuries to reach on themselves. We have, therefore, remained in peace, suffering frequent injuries, but, on the whole, multiplying, improving, prospering beyond all example.
Peace has been our principle, peace is our interest, and peace has saved to the world this only plant of free and rational government now existing in it. My hope is in peace.
Thanks be to God that Napoleon, the tiger who reveled so long in the blood and spoils of Europe is at length, like another Prometheus, chained to his rock, where the vulture of remorse for his crimes will be preying on his vitals and in like manner without consuming them. Having been, like him, entrusted with the happiness of my country, I feel the blessing of resembling him in no other point. I have not caused the death of five or ten millions of human beings, the devastation of other countries, the depopulation of my own, the exhaustion of all its resources, the destruction of its liberties, nor its foreign subjugation. All this he has done to render more illustrious the atrocities perpetrated for illustrating himself and his family with plundered diadems and scepters.
On the contrary, I have the consolation to reflect that during the period of my administration not a drop of blood of a single fellow citizen was shed by the sword of war or of the law, and that after cherishing for eight years their peace and prosperity I laid down their trust of my own accord and in the midst of their blessings and opportunities to continue in it. It will be a true testimony of my principles and persuasion that the state of peace is that which most improves the manners and morals, the prosperity and happiness of mankind; and although I dare not promise myself that it can be perpetually maintained, yet if, by the inculcation of reason or religion, the perversity of our nature can be so far corrected as sometimes to prevent the necessity, either supposed or real, of an appeal to the blinder scourges of war, murder and devastation, the benevolent endeavors of the friends of peace will not be entirely without remuneration.
I hope we shall prove how much happier for man the Quaker policy is, and that the life of the feeder, is better that that of the fighter. I wish that all nations may recover and retain their independence; that those which are overgrown may not advance beyond safe measures of power, that a salutary balance may be ever maintained among nations, and that our peace, commerce, and friendship, may be sought and cultivated by all. My hope of preserving peace for our country is not founded in the greater principles of non-resistance under every wrong, but in the belief that a just and friendly conduct on our part will produce justice and friendship from others.
We, I hope, shall be permitted to run the race of peace. To preserve and secure peace has been the constant aim of my administration. Twenty years of peace, and the prosperity so visibly flowing from it, have but strengthened our attachment to it, and the blessings it brings, and we do not despair of being always a peaceable nation.
I pray for peace, as best for all the world, best for us, and best for me, who have already lived to see three wars. That peace, safety, and concord may be long enjoyed by our fellow-citizens is the most ardent wish of my heart, and if I can be instrumental in procuring or preserving them, I shall think I have not lived in vain. Heaven bless you, and guard you under all circumstances; give you smooth waters, gentle breezes, and clear skies, hushing all its elements into peace.
Lord, now lettest thou they servant depart in peace."
-Thomas Jefferson 3rd President of the United States of America
Excerpted from the book Light and Liberty: Reflections on the Pursuit of Happiness by Eric Peterson, and brought to our attention by Anne Creter, New Jersey Co-state Coordinator, Campaign for a U.S. Department of Peace and Nonviolence.
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The Myth of Clean Coal & The Reality of Mountain Top Removal: MTR
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Exquisite Safaris Philanthropic Travel announces Americans helping Americans Philanthropic Travel: Leaving the Mines Behind Empowering Appalachia: May 31 to June 7, 2009
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Clean Coal: Never was there an oxymoron more insidious, or more dangerous to our public health. Invoked as often by the Democratic presidential candidates as by the Republicans and by liberals and conservatives alike, this slogan has blindsided any meaningful progress toward a sustainable energy policy.
"Above ground, millions of acres across 36 states have been dynamited, torn and churned into bits by strip mining in the last 150 years. More than 60 percent of all coal mined in the United States today, in fact, comes from strip mines.-Jeff Biggers Washington Post Jeff Biggers is the author of "The United States of Appalachia: How Southern Mountaineers Brought Independence, Culture and Enlightenment to America."
In the "United States of Coal," Appalachia has become the poster child for strip mining's worst deprivations, which come in the form of mountaintop removal. An estimated 750,000 to 1 million acres of hardwood forests, a thousand miles of waterways and more than 470 mountains and their surrounding communities -an area the size of Delaware -have been erased from the southeastern mountain range in the last two decades. Thousands of tons of explosives -the equivalent of several Hiroshima atomic bombs -are set off in Appalachian communities every year."
The Myth of Clean Coal
The coal industry and its allies are spending more than $60 million to promote the notion that coal is clean. But so far, "clean coal" is little more than an advertising slogan. You have to hand it to the folks at R&R Partners. They're the clever advertising agency that made its name luring legions of suckers to Las Vegas with an ad campaign built on the slogan "What happens here, stays here." But R&R has now topped itself with its current ad campaign pairing two of the least compatible words in the English language: "Clean Coal."
"Clean" is not a word that normally leaps to mind for a commodity some spoilsports associate with unsafe mines, mountaintop removal, acid rain, black lung, lung cancer, asthma, mercury contamination, and, of course, global warming. And yet the phrase "clean coal" now routinely turns up in political discourse, almost as if it were a reality.The ads created by R&R tout coal as "an American resource." In one Vegas-inflected version, Kool and the Gang sing "Ya-HOO!" as an electric wire gets plugged into a lump of coal and the narrator intones: "It's the fuel that powers our way of life." ("Celebrate good times, come on!") A second ad predicts a future in which coal will generate power "with even lower emissions, including the capture and storage of CO2. It's a big challenge, but we've made a commitment, a commitment to clean."
Well, they've made a commitment to advertising, anyway. The campaign has been paid for by Americans for Balanced Energy Choices, which bills itself as the voice of "over 150,000 community leaders from all across the country." Among those leaders, according to ABEC's website, are an environmental consultant, an interior designer, and a "complimentary healer." Other, arguably louder, voices in the group include the world's biggest mining company (BHP Billiton), the biggest U.S. coal mining company (Peabody Energy), the biggest publicly owned U.S. electric utility (Duke Energy), and the biggest U.S. railroad (Union Pacific). ABEC - whose domain name is licensed to the Center for Energy and Economic Development, a coal-industry group - merged with CEED on April 17 to form the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE).They're bankrolling the "Clean Coal" campaign to the tune of $35 million this year alone. That's a little less than the tobacco industry spent on a successful fight against anti-smoking legislation in 1998, and almost triple what health insurers paid for the "Harry and Louise" ads that helped kill health care reform in the early 1990s. In addition to the ads, the "Clean Coal" campaign has so far also sponsored two presidential election debates (where, critics noted, no questions about global warming or MOUNTAINTOP REMOVAL got asked.
-Richard Conniff, a 2007 Guggenheim Fellow, is at work on a book about the discovery of species. He is a National Magazine Award-winning writer, and his articles have appeared in Time, Smithsonian, The Atlantic, The New York Times Magazine, National Geographic, and other publications. A frequent commentator on NPR's Marketplace, Conniff is the author of six books, including The Natural History of the Rich: A Field Guide and Spineless Wonders: Strange Tales of the Invertebrate World.
Clean Coal is Mountain Top Removal, MTR is ECOCIDE.
In a world of rising energy prices, rising global temperatures, and rising sea levels, Americans are calling for clean and affordable energy. Yet under the influence of big energy companies, policy-makers are stubbornly clinging to the old, dirty fossil fuel technologies of the past. Along with global warming, mountaintop removal is an egregious example of the destructive impact of our addiction to coal.
"..the strip miners were not just destroying the environment, they were permanently impoverishing the region; there was no way that Appalachian communities could rebuild an economy from the barren moonscapes the strip industry left behind. "And," he told me, "they are doing it to break the unions."
Back then there were 114,000 unionized mine workers in West Virginia digging coal from tunnels and supporting the families and communities of Appalachia. Today, there are less than 11,000 miners in West Virginia taking the same amount of coal and only a fraction of them are unionized because the strip industry isn't.
Using these giant machines and 3,000 pounds of dynamite that the industry detonates in West Virginia daily -a Hiroshima bomb's worth of explosive power each week -King Coal is dismantling the ancient mountains and pristine streams of Appalachia. Mining companies blow off hundreds of feet from the tops of mountains to reach the thin seams of coal beneath. Colossal machines dump the mountaintops into adjacent valleys, destroying forests and communities and burying free-flowing mountain streams." -John F. Kennedy as told to Robert F. Kennedy
Did you know that they are blowing up our mountains RIGHT NOW? Though too many mountains and communities have been lost, there are many more that can still be saved, and their stories must be told.
Take Action:
Participate with ILoveMountains.org
What's your connection to Mountaintop Removal?
Write to Congress
Donate to IloveMountains.org
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Exquisite Safaris Philanthropic Travel announces Americans helping Americans Philanthropic Travel: Leaving the Mines Behind Empowering Appalachia: May 31 to June 7, 2009
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Your First Philanthropic Travel Experience
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Exquisite Safaris Philanthropic Travel has raised over 1 million dollars since 2008. 100% has been donated to high impact NGO's (non-governmental organizations) in destinations in the USA and around the world.
When we see a person in need, we may want to give them something as a way of helping them, but if we give without taking the time to see who they really are -honoring that most of all, our gift is nowhere near as powerful as it could be.
We may want to give a homeless person a sandwich, for example, but if we give it without also taking a moment to look the person in the eye, making authentic contact, we rob them of the experience of being human.
Being in a position of need leaves a lot of people feeling vulnerable and full of self-doubt.The greatest gift we can give is to meet people in need without judgment and with the awareness that we are not superior to them simply because we are not currently in their position.
It's important to be aware of our own tendency to give from a desire to feel good about ourselves, rather than from an acknowledgment of our connection to all people.
If we take the long view, we can see that we all began life in need of a lot of care and attention, and many of us end life in the same way.
Giving and receiving are companion energies that take turns throughout our lives, and we all get a chance to be on both sides of the exchange from time to time.Letting go of our self-importance allows us to see that, regardless of appearances, we are all givers and receivers.
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When we are in the position of the giver, we honor those we are helping when we remember the many people who have helped us.
Then we can look the person we are helping in the eye, aware that we are making contact with a human being who is our equal.
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