Tonight I posted a remembrance by Ronald Rolhieser, a writer and Oblate priest, about our common friend Lorenzo Rosebaugh called Losing a Prophet. His article reminded me of a quote from another deceased friend, Philip Berrigan who said:
“The poor tell us who we are,
The prophets tell us who we could be,
So we hide the poor,
And kill the prophets.”

Lorenzo died in a senseless act of violence, as Marna’s cousin and many other residents of Milwaukee and other US cities did the last few days, and as seven American soldiers in Afghanistan and an unknown amount of persons around the world did today. All this senseless violence that we daily face, in my opinion, is due to seeking wealth, power and glory. It is not natural or the way of Jesus, St. Ignatius or Mahatma Gandhi.

The poor do tell us who we are, and when we ignore or hide the poor, as we often do, we lose the sense of who we are. The prophets, by word and example, tell us who we can be and we ignore or marginalize them.

Tonight I worked with Dawn in the DMZ community garden. With just a little watering and weeding the garden looks better. The DMZ garden is in a very poor and forgotten neighborhood of the city, but every time we work in the garden neighbors stop by to say hello, ask us what we are doing, or help us out in the garden. Seeing the ‘greens’ growing gives all of us a sense of hope. If healthy plants can grow from this one of many vacant lots on the block, what else is possible? Growing a garden in the central city is antidote to senseless violence of the city.

If we invaded countries like Iraq and Afghanistan not to kill but to plant gardens, would the people of the country try to kill us back or work with us in the gardens? I know planting gardens is only a metaphor as an antidote for senseless violence, but it does point to another way of creating peace.

Robert McNamara, the Secretary of Defense in 60’s who directed the senseless war in Vietnam that killed so many Americans and Vietnamese died today. In more recent years he came to admit what a great mistake the Vietnam War was and to apologize for his role in all this death and destruction. His avowed hope was that we could learn from our tragic mistakes and not repeat them.

Many know the causes of violence in the city — unemployment, lack of good education, poor health conditions, loss of family life, terrible poverty, and availability of handguns — but instead of dealing with the causes we treat the symptoms, with more police, more prisons and more marginalizing of the poor.

Today I did a little work on the Products of the India of Mahatma Gandhi web page, posting a picture of a banner given to me with the word Sarvodaya. Sarvodaya is world created by Gandhi that means “welfare of all”. It is close to the phrase “common good” we use in the West. Sarvodaya is the name of the products produced by the followers of the way of Gandhi that we are trying to market in the USA. The products in themselves are useful, like a Khadi (hand spun, hand woven) shirt. However, they are also symbols of a way of life that promotes local products and development, sustainability, nonviolence and “welfare of all.”

Lorenzo Rosebaugh, like Philip Berrigan, a Catholic Worker, and Mahatma Gandhi lived with the poor as one with them. In being truly who they were they were prophets who we killed. Losing a prophet should give us pause and drive us out to the garden with the poor to discover who we are.

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