Beyond Empire... Life.
Healing Conversations - Reflections Series
Dear Friends, in these times when empire seems to loom so large, we can draw strength from remembering we are part of something larger and more enduring—the wholeness of Life itself.
History teaches us that empires fall. They are inherently unstable, and their own excesses of extraction, division, and over-consumption eventually lead to their demise. Mahatma Gandhi is reported to have said: “When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fail. Think of it—always.” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. declared he had no doubt that Jim Crow segregation would die, the only question was how expensive segregationists would make the funeral.
For many years I took comfort in this. Yet I have to wonder now, given the vast historic scope of our dysfunction as a human species, and the millennia of our obscene cruelty toward one another and all creation. I have to wonder, given the widespread rise of fascism and the extremity of environmental destruction. Yes, individual tyrants and empires may fall, but does “the way of truth and love” always win out? In the long arc of time, beyond our reckoning, perhaps. Certainly, that is my prayer. But it will depend on more than social restructuring; it will require a spiritual awakening and a return to right relationship with Nature and all lifekind. Without this shift in consciousness, any progress we make toward a just and harmonious world cannot endure.
In his book Death Blossoms: Reflections from a Prisoner of Conscience, Mumia Abu-Jamal asks, “Where is the religion of Life? A religion that sets forth all the living as sacred? . . . A religion that reveres all life as valuable in itself; that sees Earth as an extension of self, and if wounded, as an injury to self. We need a religion that recognizes the interdependence of [humankind] and this world; which sees that the atmosphere surrounding our globe is the same air we breathe, and part and parcel of our lungs—that Earth’s water is no different from the saliva in our mouths.”
Mystic consciousness, the consciousness of oneness, is the awareness of belonging to something greater—not just as an intellectual belief, but a visceral relationship with the Divine in its every expression. In this context the ruthless territorialism of individual, corporate, or national empire-building is unconscionable, and every act of oppression or cruelty, a sacrilege. The mystic’s primary allegiance is not bound by country, religion or culture, or even individualized selfhood, but is to the kin-dom of Life itself.
The mystic ethos carries a rigorous ethical mandate. If all life is one, then there is no other, no “them” separate from some constructed exclusive “us.” There is no race or class or nation, no river or blade of grass, that is not part of the Sacred and ultimately, in the mystic’s expanded vision, not part of self. Within this paradigm any act of violence, oppression, or exploitation is perpetrated against the whole. The motivation to work for social justice and transformation, then, is based not only on conscience or altruism, but on a compelling love and reverence for the Divine.
The mystic worldview recontextualizes our sense of belonging: we recognize the universe as home and all its expressions our kin. The unity of each individual with all-that-is makes everything part of “self” in a profound and literal way. This consciousness of oneness has the potential to shift not only how we conceive of our location in the cosmos, but how we behave toward everything and everyone. Such a relationship can engender a feeling of empowerment, and of responsibility to the whole.
Tapping into the mystic frequency, we connect with a huge energy of alliance. Our elders the trees, the mountains, the birds, the mycelium, the whales, the Earth herself, all operate from the remembrance of oneness. This is the majority consciousness on the planet! As far as I can tell, it’s only humans who have lost our way, and not even all of us. When I see it like this, it no longer feels like quite such an impossible task to turn the tide—we are in league with all of Life.
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This post is adapted from my forthcoming book, Soul Medicine for a Fractured World: Healing, Justice, and the Path of Wholeness (Orbis Books, Dec. 2025).
Photo by IPICS_SA Chikane on Unsplash
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Wow, just wow! Thank you Rev.