{"id":5539,"date":"2018-03-29T20:51:25","date_gmt":"2018-03-30T00:51:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/?p=5539"},"modified":"2018-10-09T17:00:02","modified_gmt":"2018-10-09T21:00:02","slug":"365167-kinder-lent-wk-5-solidarity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/365167-kinder-lent-wk-5-solidarity\/","title":{"rendered":"365+#167: Kinder Lent-Wk 5: Solidarity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Kindness can mean many things \u2013 giving people stuff, helping folks, saying kind words, not saying or thinking mean things about people, protecting the environment, and praying for people. On that last one \u2013 praying \u2013 I haven\u2019t written much because it seemed like a throw away phrase. Something you say when someone dies and there\u2019s no action to take. Well, it\u2019s time to mention prayer.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-rosary.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-5545\" src=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-rosary.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"76\" height=\"75\" \/><\/a>PRAYER:<\/strong> You can never have too many rosaries \u2013 or can you? I realized that I could only say one rosary at a time and our household had several so we agreed to give two extra ones away. But it wasn\u2019t so easy. I planned to walk to a neighborhood second hand religious goods store and give them the rosaries. Unfortunately it had gone out of business. I ended up taking them to our parish school. Done.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-Contra-dresses.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-5542\" src=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-Contra-dresses.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"112\" height=\"187\" \/><\/a>ACTS OF KINDNESS: <\/strong>Then I went on to more direct acts of kindness:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Donated 2 dresses and shoes to our contra dance dress swap last weekend,<\/li>\n<li>Made applesauce and scones for community meals<\/li>\n<li>Gave a Kroger gift card to someone in the checkout lane at the Kroger grocery.<\/li>\n<li>Danced with a couple people who didn\u2019t have partners at our dance<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>KIND SPEECH &amp; THOUGHTS:<\/strong> But I\u2019m still trying to speak more kindly like:<br \/>\n1. Giving compliments<br \/>\n2. Refraining from making a criticism about a person behind their back<br \/>\n3. Going beyond gossip to not even thinking negatively about another<br \/>\n4. Trying to understand why people evoke a critical reaction in me<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-tape.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-5546\" src=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-tape.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"84\" height=\"83\" \/><\/a>I\u2019ve done pretty well with #1 and am getting better at catching myself with #2. To help me I decided to put tape over my mouth for two days to remind myself to be mindful of my words every time I spoke. Don\u2019t worry, I took it off and put it on my hand when I was in public.<\/p>\n<p><strong>LOVING AN ENEMY:<\/strong> But trying to really \u201clove my enemies\u201d when they seem to me to be harming others and our country through their political office or votes \u2013 now that\u2019s a challenge. I lay a lot of blame on lack of media literacy. As an educated person I believe I read and listen to accurate news. But\u2026 it occurred to me that others probably think their news sources are accurate and mine are not. I decided to test my bias. For several days now I\u2019ve been watching a variety of Fox News programs and comparing them to my preferred news sources \u2013 NPR and the NYT. I wanted to see if biased news was as readily apparent to me as I presumed it would be.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-Fox-News-logo.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-5544 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-Fox-News-logo.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"115\" height=\"109\" \/><\/a>The results were mixed. Some Fox News was pretty straight news. An interview with the Saudi Foreign minister seemed rational. I didn\u2019t agree with everything but I could see how a reasonable listener could accept it as honest news. But then there were the news commentators like Hannity, Levin, and Ingraham. Surely their over the top sarcasm and exaggeration would be seen through by a thoughtful person. Of course on the other side are the left leaning comedians like Colbert, Oliver, and Meyers. I like them, but hey, they\u2019re comedians. Should a news show be held to a higher standard because people assume it\u2019s factual? I leave that for you to ponder.<\/p>\n<p><strong>SOLIDARITY:<\/strong> As I reviewed this week, however, I realized that I\u2019m trying to be kind to those who live in my bubble or who are public figures. What about those millions of people who live with real poverty, hunger, or violence. How can I be kind to them? That brings me back to prayer. I wanted to put my prayer into action, I am not about to move to Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Mali, Kenya, or North Korea and try to be a missionary (though I\u2019ve been to each of these countries \u2013 well, N. Korea if you count the DMZ). But I could try to be in solidarity with those who suffer much more intensely than I do. I decided to make 3 minor sacrifices to unite myself with those who don\u2019t have a choice.<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-empty-plate.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-5543\" src=\"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Days-365167-empty-plate.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"127\" height=\"120\" \/><\/a>I skipped lunch for two days and plan to eat nothing on Good Friday. I won\u2019t starve but I wanted to feel the hunger.<\/li>\n<li>I decided to walk to the pharmacy to pick up a Rx. I could have driven but I wanted to remember that not everyone has a car or easy access to medical care.<\/li>\n<li>Last Saturday I participated in our local\u00a0<em>March For Our Lives<\/em>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>None of these actions will change the world \u2013 but they will change me. Each time I feel the hunger, get in my car, take a pill, phone my congressman, I will remember those who don\u2019t have a choice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kindness can mean many things \u2013 giving people stuff, helping folks, saying kind words, not saying or thinking mean things about people, protecting the environment, and praying for people. On that last one \u2013 praying \u2013 I haven\u2019t written much because it seemed like a throw away phrase. Something you say when someone dies and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[30,26,17],"class_list":["post-5539","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-being-kind","tag-faith","tag-food","tag-musings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5539","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5539"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5539\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5571,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5539\/revisions\/5571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5539"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5539"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5539"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}