LOVE

Posted on August 6, 2013 by Tom Bolton

Joyful Love

leftovers

leftovers (Photo credit: Muffet)

I do love leftovers, this I confess,
But let my love shared not be leftovers,
Except when they are new—
The leftovers I love when seen fresh each time.
Make my love for God
New and fresh each day,
Shared as the finest each day.
I share this best with the world around us,
Shared as the freshest, but
Loved as I love my favorite leftovers.
Can anyone else know I love leftovers,
Fresh each time I eye them anew?
There was a new book too, on Monday,
New and brilliant,
And then that was first—the thing that I loved!
On Tuesday, then, new friends found, and
Old friends, newly learned,
These became the things I loved so much!
My family delighted me Wednesday,
And Thursday amazed me,
And my family was what I loved most.
My house, so fine, I loved it too.
Look, Look, how greatly loved I know I am!
From this place, let me pour out great love.
In great joy,
My love is for my Lord first,
Fresh, new.

© Tom Bolton, 31 July 2013, Milwaukee, on the Riverwalk

1 John 3:18

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Bread for the World’s Leadership and Teamwork Essay

Posted on August 4, 2013 by Tom Bolton

Leadership and Teamwork Essay: The US Role in Development

The western front of the United States Capitol...

The third essay in the series, Development Works, is about US leadership in the area of global development. The US has long been a super power, and this essay explores how creating, strengthening, and sustaining global partnerships for development can help the United States make a wider, deeper, and more long-term impact on a problem most Americans care about: global hunger and extreme poverty.

Here are the key points in the third essay:

Strengthening global partnerships for development can help
the United States make a deeper impact on hunger and extreme
poverty around the world. These issues require collective action;
no one country has enough power or resources to solve the
problem.

Multilateral cooperation enables the global community to
pool resources, share knowledge of what is working well, and
identify and fill funding gaps in the most promising programs. In
international development, the whole is greater than the sum of
its parts.

U.S. leadership is essential to global action on food security—
it persuades others to act. A 2009 U.S. proposal to invest
significantly more resources in agriculture won support from
donors in the “Group of 8” (G-8) developed nations, who
committed to providing $22 billion to improve agricultural
productivity over three years. In contrast, when the United States
reduced its support for agricultural development in the late 1980s,
the efforts of most other developed countries waned as well.

Here are a few more important tidbits:

Since 2008, when sudden steep increases in the cost of
basic foods resulted in tens of millions of newly hungry
people, the G-8 has focused on enabling developing countries
to build food security. In May 2012, just before the United States hosted the most recent G-8 summit, President Obama gave the first speech on global hunger ever given by an American president while in office. He announced a new partnership to speed efforts to end hunger and improve child nutrition, particularly in the 1,000-day “window of opportunity” between pregnancy and a child’s second birthday.

The “donor-led” model of development has important disadvantages.  Development programs may be less effective, since they were often not part of a  well-thought-out plan and the people who were supposed to benefit were rarely
consulted. The governments of developing countries missed opportunities to develop the skills and experience needed
to reach their national development goals independently. In addition, governments had to devote significant staff time and resources to fulfilling the varied requirements of a host of donors. Two examples of this: Vietnam received 752 missions from donors in 2007, while a study in Tanzania found that some
district health officials spent 25 working days each quarter (100 working days every year) writing reports for donors—time that could have been spent delivering services.
The “aid recipient” approach is being replaced with more collaborative forms of development assistance, often called the “countryled” approach. Since the goal of development assistance is ultimately to help countries reach the point where they no longer need outside assistance, country-led programs make perfect sense. When countries are in charge of their own development plans, they can also take advantage of opportunities to work with emerging economies and other
developing countries toward development goals.

Myth: The United States provides more than its fair share of development assistance.  Reality: Multilateral programs are supported financially by a variety of donors. For example, the
L’Aquila global agriculture initiative includes not only pledges of $3.5 billion over three years from the United States and $3 billion each from Germany and Japan, but also $2 billion from the Netherlands (population 16.7 million) and $1 billion from Canada (population 34.7 million).
The United States saves millions of lives every year with programs like child immunizations, PEPFAR, and food aid. There is no doubt that our efforts make a big difference. But the amount the United States gives per person is less than average for donors and far less than Scandinavian countries. Preliminary data for 2011 indicate that Sweden and Denmark devoted
more than 1 percent of their national incomes to development assistance. The U.K. gave 0.56 percent, the average for 23 donor countries was 0.46 percent, and the United States was near the bottom of the list at 0.2 percent.

Myth: U.S. leadership on development assistance isn’t really essential.
Reality: U.S. leadership leverages additional funding from other donors. Recently, USAID administrator Dr. Rajiv Shah told members of Congress that the agency is increasing its contributions to the Global Fund for AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria “to make sure that we’re investing in those multilateral
vehicles that allow us to leverage our dollars with the dollars of other donors and generate $2 or $3 or $4 of investment for very $1 we put in.”
Conversely, U.S. withdrawal from development initiatives sends a signal that often leads to a decrease in support from other onors as well. For example, when the United States cut back on its support for agricultural development at the end of the 1980s, the efforts of most other developed countries waned as well.
Agriculture remained a relatively neglected area until as recently as 2008, when the global food price crisis and other factors, such as new information on the damage caused by early childhood malnutrition, brought leaders’ attention back to the necessity of improving farming if we are to reduce hunger.

I am very thankful for the educational materials and the leadership pf Bread for the World.

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Hunger and Poverty Among Latino Immigrant Children

Posted on August 4, 2013 by Tom Bolton

Hunger and Poverty Among Latino Immigrant Children

Bread for the World created a wonderful series of reports in 2012 under the umbrella name Development Works.  I posted a link to the first paper last week.  The third paper, which is linked at the top of this post, is called Hunger and Poverty Among Latino Immigrant Children.  In it, the organization notes, “The size and youthfulness of this community give it great potential to make significant contributions to the economic and social future of our country. But we need to find solutions to the problems threatening the well-being of Latino children, including barriers to accessing safety-net programs that could improve their nutrition and health and help compensate for some of the remaining difficulties. ”

I recommend the entire paper to you, but here is a snapshot of some key points:

In 2000, Latinos became the largest ethnic minority in the United States. Today, 16.3 percent of the U.S. population is Latino—more than 50 million people. The growing Latino presence is increasingly evident in schools, communities, and workplaces.  Moreover, more than half of the U.S. population growth since 2000 has been among Latinos, due partly to immigration and partly to a higher birthrate. Thus, a higher percentage of U.S. children than of the total U.S. population is Latino: 22 percent. This percentage is xpected to increase because the Latino population is younger than the U.S. average.

Children who are U.S. citizens but have at least one parent who is an immigrant are now the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. population.  In the United States, children are more likely than adults to live in families that struggle to put food on the table—nearly one in every four children in the United States, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). Latino children are even more likely to be at risk of hunger. In 2009, the last full year for which we have data, nearly 35 percent lived in such families.

Poverty rates increased for all U.S. racial and ethnic groups during the recession, but people of color experience more poverty. The latest available data, from 2009, show that more than one in four Latinos lived below the poverty line.

While the children of Latino immigrants face significant obstacles, some safety-net programs and other resources are available to help maintain their health and well-being.

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Pilgrimage

Posted on August 1, 2013 by Tom Bolton

Cover of "Thoughts In Solitude"

Cover of Thoughts In Solitude

I shared another blog with this prayer by Thomas Merton earlier this year.  But isn’t this great?

“My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.”

― Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude

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Ah, the Shaggy Man

Posted on August 1, 2013 by Tom Bolton

The Shaggy Man of Oz

After I finished reading The Road to Oz, by L Frank Baum, I started contemplating on Wednesday that I would like to play the Shaggy Man, in a little theatre presentation of the Road to Oz.  This was after I wrote my short posting yesterday, On the Road to OZ.   I enjoyed the Shaggy Man a good deal, but he was revealed in my mind slowly, and I didn’t really “get” the full character until after I had “encountered” him a few times. As I was looking back over the book some during lunch on Wednesday, I realized that just as it took me many encounters to get fully acquainted with many of the “campers” I have grown to know, so it is with many of the characters in our real and literary worlds.

One of my contemplations (Goals? Fantasies?  Retirement Plans?) is to participate in some amateur theater after I retire.  (Maybe this is one of my okp’s (Off-Kilter Projects) that I wrote about a few weeks ago.  It may keep my brain exercised.)  I know it is good to be off-kilter at least some of the time.

I felt an affinity for the Shaggy man from the start, and he kept calling out to me as I read the book.

Here are some passages from Chapter 19 that I contemplated at lunch on Wednesday:

The shaggy man stood in the great hall, his shaggy hat in his hands, wondering what would become of him.  He had never been a guest in a fine palace before; perhaps he had never been a guest anywhere.  In the big, cold, outside world people did not invite shaggy men to their homes, and this shaggy man of ours had slept more in hay-lofts and stables than in comfortable rooms.  When the others left the great hall he eyed the splendidly dressed servants of the Princess Ozma as if he expected to be ordered out; but one of them bowed before him as respectfully as if he had been a prince, and said:

“Permit me, sir, to conduct you to your apartments.”

The shaggy man drew a long breath and took courage.

“Very well,” he answered.  “I’m ready.”

This reminded me of several of the guests that I have grown to know well, and to love, during my service at the Divine Intervention ministry.  It reminded me of some learning in a Bible study on “home” in 2011.  Until the end, I had never recognized the Shaggy Man as a homeless man.  I saw him only as a wise and good man.  Over time, that is how I came to see a good many other men these past few years.

“Be good enough to enter, sir, and make yourself at home in the rooms our Royal Ozma has ordered prepared for you.  Whatever you see is for you to use and enjoy, as if your own.  The Princess dines at seven, and I shall be here in time to lead you to the drawing-room, where you will be privileged to meet the lovely Ruler of Oz.  Is there any command, in the meantime, with which you desire to honor me?”

“No,” said the shaggy man; “but I’m much obliged.”

He entered the room and shut the door, and for a time stood in bewilderment, admiring the grandeur before him.

I think back to my youth and my young adult-hood and I know that feeling.  I have seen that bewilderment anew these past few years.

For a time the shaggy man gazed upon all this luxury with silent amazement.  Then he decided, being wise in his way, to take advantage of his good fortune.  He removed his shaggy boots and his shaggy clothing, and bathed in the pool with rare enjoyment.  After he had dried himself with the soft towels he went into the dressing-room and took fresh linen from the drawers and put it on, finding that everything fitted him exactly.  He examined the contents of the closets and selected an elegant suit of clothing.  Strangely enough, everything about it was shaggy, although so new and beautiful, and he sighed with contentment to realize that he could now be finely dressed and still be the shaggy man.  His coat was of rose-colored velvet, trimmed with shags and bobtails, with buttons of blood-red rubies and golden shags around the edges.  His vest was a shaggy satin of a delicate cream color, and his knee-breeches of rose velvet trimmed like the coat. Shaggy creamy stockings of silk, and shaggy slippers of rose leather with ruby buckles, completed his costume, and when he was thus attired the shaggy man looked at himself in a long mirror with great admiration.

I have seen these moments too!

Later, in chapter 20,

Now the shaggy man appeared, and so startling was his appearance, all clad in shaggy new raiment, that Dorothy cried “Oh!” and clasped her hands impulsively as she examined her friend with pleased eyes.

“He’s still shaggy, all right,” remarked Button-Bright; and Ozma nodded brightly because she had meant the shaggy man to remain shaggy when she provided his new clothes for him.

Dorothy led him toward the throne, as he was shy in such fine company, and presented him gracefully to the Princess, saying:

“This, your Highness, is my friend, the shaggy man, who owns the Love Magnet.”

There is then a confession, and, I think, some wonderful observations about love and feelings of being loved:

“You are welcome to Oz,” said the girl Ruler, in gracious accents. “But tell me, sir, where did you get the Love Magnet which you say you own?”

The shaggy man grew red and looked downcast, as he answered in a low voice:

“I stole it, your Majesty.”

“Oh, Shaggy Man!” cried Dorothy.  “How dreadful!  And you told me the Eskimo gave you the Love Magnet.”

He shuffled first on one foot and then on the other, much embarrassed.

“I told you a falsehood, Dorothy,” he said; “but now, having bathed in the Truth Pond, I must tell nothing but the truth.”

“Why did you steal it?” asked Ozma, gently.

“Because no one loved me, or cared for me,” said the shaggy man, “and I wanted to be loved a great deal.  It was owned by a girl in Butterfield who was loved too much, so that the young men quarreled over her, which made her unhappy.  After I had stolen the Magnet from her, only one young man continued to love the girl, and she married him and regained her happiness.”

“Are you sorry you stole it?” asked the Princess.

“No, your Highness; I’m glad,” he answered; “for it has pleased me to be loved, and if Dorothy had not cared for me I could not have accompanied her to this beautiful Land of Oz, or met its kind-hearted Ruler.  Now that I’m here, I hope to remain, and to become one of your Majesty’s most faithful subjects.”

“But in Oz we are loved for ourselves alone, and for our kindness to one another, and for our good deeds,” she said.

I love this simple resolution in a children’s book:

“All my people love the Wizard, too,” announced the Princess, laughing; “so we will hang the Love Magnet over the gates of the Emerald City, that whoever shall enter or leave the gates may be loved and loving.”

“That is a good idea,” said the shaggy man; “I agree to it most willingly.”

I think I shall look for a “love magnet” to put in the doorway–perhaps in several doorways, so that all who enter may know they are loved and are loving.

I do want to play the Shaggy Man.  Perhaps I may write an adaptation of the book some time!

No more OZ for a few weeks, my friends!

Back to poetry next Tuesday.  And it is about LOVE.

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On the Road to OZ

Posted on July 31, 2013 by Tom Bolton

Cover of The Road to Oz by L. Frank Baum. Desi...

Cover of The Road to Oz by L. Frank Baum. Designed by artist John R. Neill. Now out of copyright. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I just finished book 5 of the Baum OZ books:  The Road to OZ.  I liked this children’s book quite a good bit.  By the time he wrote this, I think Baum was writing the stories and characters he wanted to write, and returning to OZ only because the market demanded it. Still, I love his creativity.  I’ll never forget the Scoodlers!

Here are some quotes that I enjoyed:

“Where do you expect to get to?” asked Dorothy.

“I’m like Button-Bright. I don’t know,” answered the shaggy man, with a laugh. “But I’ve learned from long experience that every road leads somewhere, or there wouldn’t be any road; so it’s likely that if we travel long enough, my dear, we will come to some place or another in the end.

What place it will be we can’t even guess at this moment, but we’re sure to find out when we get there.”

“Why, yes,” said Dorothy; “that seems reas’n’ble, Shaggy Man.”

——————————————————————

“What’s sov’rin, and what’s c’u’nity?” inquired Button-Bright.

“Don’t ask so many questions, little boy.”

“Why?”

“Ah, why indeed?” exclaimed the captain, looking at Button-Bright admiringly.

“If you don’t ask questions you will learn nothing. True enough. I was wrong. You’re a very clever little boy, come to think of it—very clever indeed. But now, friends, please come with me, for it is my duty to escort you at once to the royal palace.”

——————————————————————————————

I loved the introduction to Johnny Dooit.  I read it while I was donating blood, and the idea really charmed me.  I particularly appreciated that the Shaggy man looked in the water (presumably seeing his reflection) and then felt his anxiety wash away and could sleep.

Long after the others were asleep, however, the shaggy man sat in the starlight by the spring, gazing thoughtfully into its bubbling waters. Suddenly he smiled and nodded to himself as if he had found a good thought, after which he, too, laid himself down under a tree and was soon lost in slumber. ………

“Don’t be too sure of that, my dear,” spoke the shaggy man, a smile on his donkey face. “I may not be able to do magic myself, but I can call to us a powerful friend who loves me because I own the Love Magnet, and this friend surely will be able to help us.”

“Who is your friend?” asked Dorothy.

“Johnny Dooit.”

“What can Johnny do?”

“Anything,” answered the shaggy man, with confidence.

“Ask him to come,” she exclaimed, eagerly.

The shaggy man took the Love Magnet from his pocket and unwrapped the paper that surrounded it. Holding the charm in the palm of his hand he looked at it steadily and said these words:

“Dear Johnny Dooit, come to me.
I need you bad as bad can be.”

“Well, here I am,” said a cheery little voice; “but you shouldn’t say you need me bad, ’cause I’m always, ALWAYS, good.”

A little later we hear Johnny’s wonderful little song.  I may want to memorize this:

Johnny Dooit moved quickly now—so quickly that they were astonished at the work he was able to accomplish. He had in his chest a tool for everything he wanted to do, and these must have been magic tools because they did their work so fast and so well.

The man hummed a little song as he worked, and Dorothy tried to listen to it. She thought the words were something like these:

The only way to do a thing
Is do it when you can,
And do it cheerfully, and sing
And work and think and plan.
The only real unhappy one
Is he who dares to shirk;
The only really happy one
Is he who cares to work.

Whatever Johnny Dooit was singing he was certainly doing things, and they all stood by and watched him in amazement.

—————————————————————–

“Money! Money in Oz!” cried the Tin Woodman. “What a queer idea! Did you suppose we are so vulgar as to use money here?”

“Why not?” asked the shaggy man.

“If we used money to buy things with, instead of love and kindness and the desire to please one another, then we should be no better than the rest of the world,” declared the Tin Woodman. “Fortunately money is not known in the Land of Oz at all. We have no rich, and no poor; for what one wishes the others all try to give him, in order to make him happy, and no one in all Oz cares to have more than he can use.”

——————————————————————————————-

You could love the Tin Woodman because he had a fine nature, kindly and simple; but the machine man you could only admire without loving, since to love such a thing as he was as impossible as to love a sewing-machine or an automobile. Yet Tik-tok was popular with the people of Oz because he was so trustworthy, reliable and true; he was sure to do exactly what he was wound up to do, at all times and in all circumstances. Perhaps it is better to be a machine that does its duty than a flesh-and-blood person who will not, for a dead truth is better than a live falsehood.

I think there is wisdom in here.

English: the Shaggy Man from The Road to Oz

English: the Shaggy Man from The Road to Oz (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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Specks

Posted on July 30, 2013 by Tom Bolton

What a Speck

The Milwaukee Center on Milwaukee's RiverWalk

The Milwaukee Center on Milwaukee’s RiverWalk (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today, I saw sinners everywhere I wandered—
And I was out with a purpose!—
And I was astounded,
And I was thankful for who I am.
On the bus early in the morning, there were drunks,
And druggies, I’d say.
Thank God, I am clear-minded and ready at dawn.
I’m facing my true self, and I thank God:
I like what I see,
And I see so clearly.
I know my sins, but I see them clearly;
They are so small!
I see people frittering their time.
Piercings annoy me and I know they can’t be right.
These tattoos cannot be there for good, and what costs do they add to what worth?
Did you see that fight by the school?
That violence is crazy bad; I see children risked each day.
Wasted resources are all on display too.
Elders, left alone and dying alone, where is their respect?
So much hurt and so much lost, where are disciples serving?
All around me, folks are finding shortcomings.
I found mine long in the past.
I have skillfully examined my faults,
And I have weighted them well,
And I care not to judge.
This traffic jam up ahead: Why are so many people driving?
Can’t they car pool or bus it?
Look at that man’s gold watch! What could I buy with that?
I have excused myself over and over today.
Ah, ah, out speck!
Let me not be an excuse! Let me forget to judge instead.
Where have I been that so clearly I see,
And yet I cannot see all that is there? Is it in me?

© Tom Bolton, 24 July, 2013, Milwaukee, on the Grand Avenue

Contemplating Matthew 7:3—AGAIN!

“So why do you see the piece of sawdust in another believer’s eye and not notice the wooden beam in your own eye?”

OUCH.

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