i had a dream. part iv [aka pressing on]

also known as the story which won’t go away [which may be a lesson in itself as evidenced by the 8 million views the Kony2012 video got followed by the sound of crickets a week later when everyone had moved on to the next exciting thing… that it is not good enough to get amped for the cause one week and then not follow through which we are really trying to do as are a lot of other really hardcore people and groups, which has been so exciting to see.]

received a link in my email this morning from Erica who said that we made it into the press so if you want to read more about the homeless feedng prohibition scenario and a summary of the meeting, check this out…

i had a dream. part iii [aka stalker in the gym]

so apparently the story continues…

gunning it in Planet Fitness aka ‘the gym’ with my gym bunny, sorry buddy, Coe and i finish my marathon on the treadmill and move across to the cycling machine…

forgot my ipod at home and so had to resort to watching all the subtitled tvs at once while trying to figure out what is going on in the very badly scripted unsubtitled ‘Angel’ which is always showing during our morning gym visits [4 episodes ago they were guarding Angel’s new born baby and now he looks 17 and somewhere in between there Angel was buried under water for a couple of months or apparently 16 years or something…] and so cycle, cycle, cycle when suddenly this guy starts walking intentionally towards me…

i tried to cycle away before i realised where i was but it got to the awkward part of really realising that he is definitely walking towards me and i am trying to figure out how i possibly could have done something wrong while cycling at my pace in the gym [“Please workout a little slower, sir, you’re making out-of-shape people feel bad” – hm, probably not.]

so he walks up to me and says, “Sorry to bother you but did you testify yesterday?”

and i replied that i did.

he responded with, “I’m from the mayor’s office and i just wanted to thank you for what you said.”

so i thanked him for thanking me and asked his name and he said “Ben” and that’s pretty much where my story ends, although i may have cycled faster for the next two minutes til Ben walked far enough away, so Ben would think i was a great worker outerer.

i had a dream. part ii. [blooper reel]

so today felt fun and significant and powerful and great to be a part of…

at the same time, it wasn’t without some stand out moments, some powerful, others whattheflippy and still others just plain hm.

one of my early fun moments was seeing the deaf signer get subbed out… yup, they had a backup signer… i realised later in the meeting that the two were constantly interchanging so it was probably pre-planned but it was fun thinking that the one had been pulled for not being up to it.

coinciding with that was the Jim Carrey speedreading bill reader guy who was also fun to watch cos he stepped up to the front mic [the one i started heading to before i was redirected] and read at a gazillion miles an hour and i was like, huh? really struggling to keep up. but as the meeting progressed we figured out that as a council member said that they had a bill to share, he would receive it and read from the front. but just read at a speed of knots. and it was after his first speed read that deaf lady signer was subbed which made me think it was cos she couldn’t keep up. [but those two ladies were champions!]

then a teacher from a charter school stood up and gave a great speech and then handed over to a bunch of her students who did an amazing job and got a standing ovation afterwards – the highlights were when they held up a sandwich to demonstrate what they give out to homeless people and the whole kit [blanket, shirt, pats, underwear, toothpaste] and then for me when the ten year old black kid referred to the homeless people as “our brethren” [wot a legend!]

but maybe the highlight of the blooper reel part of the proceedings were when this elderly black dude got up and started singing a gospel song about feeding the homeless and suddenly i listen and hear backing music [saw him outside carrying his boom box after] and he went to klap the high note whitney-style but the mic couldn’t handle his power and so it was feeding back… so three verses and chorus of gospel ‘looking after the least of these’ song and no-one else really knowing what to do and so just letting him go for it – it was ‘Pop Idols’ meets ‘Save the Homeless’ and i was hoping the president would make some joke about ‘we’ll see you in Vegas’ or ‘you got yourself a golden ticket’ or something…

another great day in city hall…

to continue to part iii involving the stalker in the gym… click here.

i had a dream. part i

so today a bunch of us from the Simple Way joined a bunch of other people from groups like Chosen 300, Philly Restart, Food not Bombs, some churches and other organisations and concerned people, and attended the city council public hearing to speak specifically into the proposed ban that Mayor Nutter had made on public feeding of the homeless a few weeks ago.

we had phoned in this week to make sure that we could each get a spot to speak and share two to three minutes of why we think said ban is unethical and immoral and heading to the meeting i had not really planned mine. as we walked into the room and i got the lady at the door to cross off Valerie’s name [because she was at home, sick in bed with a hectic cough and flu] i noticed that my name was now top of the sheet and started hoping that this was sheet 2 of 3 or 27 of 30 or something like that.

this meeting had the vibe of principal’s office plus. official courtroom type setup with all the important people [president in the big chair, and council front row of the floor] inside and the plebs [us] outside the official floor part and so i decided that having notes might help a bit and fortunately managed to jot some stuff down.

turns out i was going to be first in terms of people voicing an opinion on this particular agenda item, but fortunately there were a number of other items happening before us like people being added to the council, someone retiring and some sisterhood of the delta beta gamma something something [i was about to speak, may not have concentrated completely at this point]

and then the president explained the rules and how you get two minutes when the green light is on and then the light changes to orange to tell you you have thirty seconds left to go [my own personal academy awards show, oh and everyone else’s there too] and then you must please stop when you’re done… and then they called out “Valerie Anderson” [fail, name crossing lady at door, fail!] and called it again [and Janell called out “she’s sick!” in the most dignified of ways…

then it was my turn and being first i started walking the wrong way [towards the front middle] until i was pointed to the back and rushed along to get there and suddenly i was at this podium with this mic and green not yet flashing light and two minutes of speaking to do…

“I have a dream…”

well, technically that’s not how my speech went, altho i think i freaked out Janell enough with all my impressions from Jim Carrey to Southern American Foxworthy style to Tom Cruise Jerry Mcguiring it and and and at the coffee shop beforehand… and it was possibly the most adrenalin filled pressure speech in my life in front of 200 or so official looking people and despite not sticking entirely to my notes [anyone remember an alleged 51 minute wedding speech i made with no notes] i nailed everything i wanted to say [the green light starting half way thru my speech and not even hitting orange probly helped] and it was when i was doing the long walk to freed… um back to my seat with the whole room clapping and people giving me the thumbs up and shaking my hand, that i thort maybe i didn’t completely drop the ball on this one.

i spoke about how the proposed ban affected our religious freedom and the mandate, not choice, that Jesus gave us to feed the hungry [clothe the naked, visit the sick and those in prison] and finished by reading the end of that sheep/goats parable in Matthew 25… and it was a powerful moment.

followed by a whole number of powerful moments. the story continues as they didn’t take a vote on it and after a LOT of people had spoken and shared [and sung – ai, see part ii] they said that they got the point and will take it further next week.

so my speech probly won’t go down in the annals of history as a quotable human rights speech, and i am bummed tbV wasn’t there to witness it and provide a kick butt one of her own, but i felt a little bit of ‘i had a dream’ as i sat down [i guess my talk at Newsong 2004 compares in personal intensity – first time i did starfish on the beach ii] and look forward to the next time i get to speak up on a matter of supreme importance.

in bonus news i am absolutely relieved i didn’t refer to the mayor publically as mayor ‘Nutjob’ as may have happened in a couple of my mock practice speeches.

to continue to part ii and the blooper reel… click here.

the health board, the picnic and A BUNCH OF NUTTERS. [guest starring valerie luthor king jnr] part III

[let me disclaim this post and say that nothing mentioned here is official ‘The Simple Way’ stance on these issues but rather my personal reflections and experiences]

OUTSIDE

i arrived at the health board meeting venue just as Monkman [aka Aaron Condon, my housemate] did and we did what all activists do to get ready for a protest – we played a round or two of new addictive card game golf and i totally dominated… but then people started arriving and chatting to us and so we put the game away [he hardly had to force me] and got chatting to some people…

fairly soon after that the occupy philly people arrived and started setting up tables and the first sign i saw someone from their group holding up was one which read “Nutter is the Antichrist” – now I’ve read the book a few times and I’m not sure if that is true…

my big problem with that is that you have immediately thrown your integrity as a reasonably protesting group out of the window and so it actually made me quite angry and not amped to be connected or associated with them at all – other signs like ‘Greedy Pigs’ or ‘Feed the poor, stupid’ and even ‘Nutter vs Homeless’ were less blatantly ridiculous but i am not sure how helpful they are either…

when the police arrived and this guy Jessie who was serving food [and would later feature in the Valerie Luthor King Jnr speech] turned around and shouted “No Donuts” that really made me change my opinion about Occupy Philly and think these guys are people we want to be in close partnership… no wait, REALLY? Did you really just say that? Not a statement/act that is going to make anyone want to listen to any of us with any kind of seriousness and just really not helpful as people trying to give the impression that they have anything valid to say.

INSIDE

then we got to go inside in groups of twenty to observe the meeting – i was in the second group and joined Val, Shane, Erica, Jamie Moffett, Sueihn and some others of our group were let in later, and was there for the start where they explained how the meeting was going to proceed and that there would not be commentary available to the public…

the health board reviewed the changes they had proposed to the previous 14 page document and as i mentioned before they all seemed pretty reasonable… they had just gotten started on reading through the ammended regulations based on that response document when one of the occupy people started their pre-planned interruption by shouting out “Mic Check” and then everyone in their group [somewhere between 20 and 40 people] repeats and then the person makes a series of statements [well scream-ments] and everyone repeats – things like “WE LISTENED TO YOU” “YOU’RE NOT LISTENING TO US” “YOU HAVEN’T GIVEN US A CHANCE TO SPEAK ON THESE THINGS” and so on… so completely disruptive and different ones of us [from the Simple Way and friends] had differing ideas as to how effective/right/reasonable any of it was [with some thinking not at all and others thinking up to a point] – one of the girls did a “Mic Check” and took a sandwich she had “made with her clean hands” that “she would eat” and put it on the table in front of Dr Schwartz, who was chairing the meeting, and invited him to eat it [he thanked her later for the sandwich altho i don’t think he ate it at the time]…

so that was all disruptive and completely disregarded the process that was happening up front [which was the intention] but it was a little later that it really started to cross lines – there was one particular guy in a green shirt who just got really louder and obnoxious – after declaring that he was a christian and that this process was very unchristian, he proceeded to call Dr Schwartz the antiChrist [so is it Schwartz or Nutter or are we talking antiChrists here?], swear at the board and spit [have heard at someone, have heard on ground] and then the group [who passed the Open Mic leadership from person to person] just became completely disruptive and the board eventually had to leave and continue the meeting elsewhere [with two occupy philly people present apparently, but not green shirt child]

and so the board left [having been really well composed through most of it and most of these are mediumly old ballies so good on them] and then Val went and approached the occupy group and made me so proud by speaking her mind in a controlled yet direct fashion and letting them know that by acting the way they did they took away her opportunity to hear the rest of the process – so they disempowered her, well us who actually were really wanting to know what was going on… and it’s hard to explain exactly how it all unfolded but she was really great and when donut-screaming Jessie tried to interrupt her the rest of the occupy group got on his case and shouted him down… [he eventually came to Val outside and apologised]

i went to green shirt guy and told him that the Jesus he said he represented was not the same Jesus i followed and while i was talking to him his friend kept on interrupting and not letting me speak and then called me an idiot [kinda made my point there, guy!] and he reminded me that Jesus threw over tables and told us to have swords which i’m not sure is a fully exegeted understanding of who Jesus is and the way He would have treated people in that meeting…

what was really cool was that before that all happened, during all the craziness, a couple of people linked to occupy [altho not necessarily directly from them] came over to us to see if we were okay [cos they sensed we were not happy with proceedings] and made an effort to talk and hear and dialogue and connect and a bunch of the occupy people [i think] came over to us and apologised [especially after Val spoke] and also thanked her for what she said, and we got to chat to a bunch of them outside and realised that we can’t blanket the whole group as a bunch of morons [which would have been easy to do because the few shouted loudly enuff to feel like they represented the many] because a lot of them are doing some really good things and have a lot of good to say and do and we can definitely pursue relationship with them…

so we have connected with some groups that do regular feeding and will look at building relationship and connection and hopefully together continuing to fight [non-violently and treating people with dignity and respect] for justice and to help those who are seen by many as ‘the least of these.’

[a new friend of ours Robert Martin who drove an hour to be with us wrote this blog on his experience and captured it well]

the health board, the PICNIC and a bunch of nutters. [guest starring valerie luthor king jnr] part II

[let me disclaim this post and say that nothing mentioned here is official ‘The Simple Way’ stance on these issues but rather my personal reflections and experiences]

so yesterday there was a public meeting for the board of health who were commenting on a 14 page document relating to the serving of food outside to homeless people… which is linked to a recent order brought in by the mayor of Philadelphia [the previously-ascertained unfortunately-named mayor Nutter] to specifically ban the serving of food to people in two specific parks [big touristy attraction places] ALTHO it was very clearly stated that this would not affect family picnics…

and this is where i go and say that my beautiful wife Valerie came up with the very brilliant idea of throwing a picnic outside the place where they were going to have the meeting, and then inviting anyone who was nearby [including the homeless] to join us for our family picnic [because after all they are our brothers and sisters] – even the name Philadelphia which comes from the greek word ‘Phileo’ meaning brotherly love…

so it was a symbolic gesture [would have been a form of civil disobedience had we done it in the actual parks where it is possibly going to be banned if that goes through as is, although that is a bit of a harder one for us to work as getting arrested, as romantic as the notion is when connected to reaching out to ‘the least of these’ can have serious consequences to visa bearing south africans] and it worked amazingly.

we spread the word to our web of subversive friends and through facebook statuses [stati?] and other connections and arrived with picnic blankets and set up outside of the meeting place and invited people to join us – one guy drove an hour to come and be part of the fun and our friend cody made a coolbox full of ham sandwiches and had another one full of bottled water.

occupy philly set up some tables near us and also engaged in feeding the public and so it was free food and sharing happening all around – other groups that are involved in feeding the hungry and members of the public, including some homeless people joined us and we sat eating food, literally breaking bread together and having conversation about life, the universe and a bunch of related things.

one of the things shane spoke about, when i accompanied him to a conference in Canada recently, was how in many cases, the church has lost its imagination and this group open picnic was just something small, although hopefully also something huge in helping ignite that in peoples minds and kickstart their imaginations for future work and protest and creative solutioning that can and needs to be done.

so yay for my wife [the real yay for my wife comes in part III] for the idea and for running with it and getting so many other people involved and thank you to everyone who came and was a part of the fun and feast.

for the third part and the one where all the action happens and ‘the christian’ swears, spits and calls people the antichrist, click here…

the HEALTH BOARD, the picnic and a bunch of nutters. [guest starring valerie luthor king jnr] part I

[let me disclaim this post and say that nothing mentioned here is official ‘The Simple Way’ stance on these issues but rather my personal reflections and experiences]

so the situation is a little complex for those outside of the loop but in a nut shell, very simplistically as i see it, there are two issues [and you can see our well worded response, as The Simple Way, here.]:

the first was yesterday which was the health department passing some new regulation(s) related to serving food to people on the streets and the second was mayor Nutter of Philadelphia [actual name, somewhat unfortunate, unless you’re a nearby journalist or angry activist] advocating the banning of public feeding specifically in two places [which coincidentally just happen to be two major tourist spots as we head into tourist season, one of which is the site of a new museum which is about to open] [and by ‘coincidentally’ i mean ‘not coincidentally’]

now my beautiful wife Valerie was at the public meeting last week which was open to the public to receive comment on the health board stuff and it seems like that is where the mess happened because they only let 40 people in at a time and she waited 2 and a half hours and didn’t get in – so a lot of people clearly were not able to be heard the way they were expecting to.

but, as i understood it from the explanation given at the beginning of yesterday’s meeting, this meeting was public in terms of the public being able to sit in, but there was not space for comment from them – this was simply a board meeting where they looked over the proposed changes to the regulations based on public comment.

and [until the meeting was horribly interrupted and then pretty much shut down by the eloquence of the occupy philly members – see part III] from what i heard [realising that what they say and put into regulation and how those regulations are acted out can be two very different things] a lot of it made sense to me and seemed to be a really good thing.

the gist of the regulations are not about stopping outside feeding of people [as green shirt man shouted at one point] but rather trying to ensure that all food served to people on the streets of Philadelphia is prepared and served in a healthy fashion. there were one or two small things i wasn’t sure about in terms of what they shared, but for the most part it really seemed like they were doing what they could to make it easy enough and cost effective enough to serve food well to people on the streets.

for example, they are wanting one certified trained person to be there every time food is given out, but they are offering the training free of charge, at their venue or at the organisation/group’s venue that is giving out the food and even offered to train trainers so groups/organisations can train their own people. they asked for food to be prepared within four hours of being handed out. they backed off on the previous regulation which basically didn’t allow for someone to prepare food in their own kitchen and take it out. and some other stuff.

they worked through a 14 page document and i really didn’t hear any huge alarm bells in terms of things they were trying to pass that would make it specifically harder to serve food to the homeless and call me a traditionalist, but i don’t think it is the worst thing in the world to put things in place to try and make food given out regularly more safe and healthy for those receiving it.

as mentioned, the meeting was interrupted and so we never got to hear the end of it as the board [after putting up with a LOT of disturbance, some really rude and offensive, to me at least] left and continued somewhere else, which was a pity for those of us who were trying to hear what they were deciding upon.

for the part about the picnic, read here…