Out of darkness, light.

By now, many of you know the term “Army Of Good,” I use it to describe the thousands of people who read my blog and share my idea of doing good rather than living in hatred and argument. They are people who have generously support embattled farmers, endangered carriage horses, refugee children and immigrants, sick animals and the elderly.  They have put their money where their mouths are.

The Army Of Good idea began as a premise, and has become something much larger.

I have to be honest and give credit for the idea where it belongs. I am not a Christian, but I am an admirer and faithful student of Jesus Christ, who urged his followers to be in the world, but not of the world.

Simply, he meant that being in the world was necessary if we are to do good and be a light in the spiritual darkness that surrounds us. But we are not of it, we do not have to embrace the values we do not share, or reject. We are free to take our joy in good rather than evil.

This idea became the template for my own choice about how to live in so unsettling and divided a time. I was not going to be drawn into the whirlwind forming around me, I would steady myself by this idea of doing good, as often as I could, and with whatever help I could. I wanted to be in the world, but not of that world.

How to do it?

I could not have imagined how many people embraced this message and idea, and have enlisted. We are a might army now, we are undefeated and getting stronger by the day. The number of vulnerable people who you have helped grows by the day.

The elections of November, 2016, changed the world around me, and it changed my world.  Yours also, I suspect.

All around me, people were arguing, lamenting, raging. And were getting frightened.

The rise of information technology meant there was no escaping this whirlwind, it was in the air, in our pockets, in our ears, in front of us all of the time.  Nerves were fraying and still are, it all seemed so endless and destructive.

For me, that was nothing but a barren desert, I do not belong on the left or the right, there was nothing for me in that hellish land of argument and justification and paranoia and fear that has overtaken the capital.

Suddenly, our civic operating system, which had worked to varying degrees for more than 200 years, seems broken. Social media have become a transmitter of rage and falsehoods on all sides.  Much of what I have always believed is under relentless assault.

How was I to live in this new world, and stay grounded and creative? I am not interested in arguing about Donald Trump or denigrating his followers. I have no desire to post angry messages on Facebook or Twitter.

I choose to promote connection and community, not resented and fury. Politics holds nothing for me, yet it shapes so much of my life and well-being.

The idea of an Army of Good – the perfect vehicle for being in the world, not of the world –  hit me sometime in January.

This idea came to me one morning as I was writing on the blog:  why not just do good, and not argue about what is good? This sentence struck a deep nerve among my readers.

This was alien territory for me, my blog had been dedicated for a decade to the story of my farm, my life with animals and my own efforts to evolve as a human being. In recent years, it has also become the story of my love for and life with Maria. I have no wish to drop those elements of my writing life.

But I can’t just sit still and pretend the world is not changing or that people are not worried, even frightened.

I decided to focus on causes I was drawn to, and wished to explore. The refugees and immigrants came to mind.

So did the residents of an assisted care facility in my town where Red and I had begun to do some therapy work. I had come to know and love these people and saw how ignored and marginalized they were.  What if the wider world reached into their lives and reminded them that there are good people in the world, and that they were loved, and that we could help them obtain the small and inexpensive things that made such a big difference in their lives on the edge of life?

I had already experimented with the growing power of my blog, which I have also seen as a potential force for good. We had raised money for our farrier, who underwent double knee surgery; for a farmer named Joshua Rockwood, who had been unjustly persecuted by police and animal rights activists, and for the Round House Cafe, which seemed to stay in our town and preserve an embattled sense of community here.

The blog raised nearly $200,000 for these different causes, and I was beginning to see that one of my dreams was coming true – the blog was not just making noise, it was already doing good. And without argument or hatred. It was the right time for good people to emerge and be felt and heard.

I also supported several crowd sourcing programs to raise money for troubled farmers for sick horses and animals. People wanted to help, they thank me every day for inviting them to help.

In addition, I stepped beyond my own boundaries, a healthy thing for a writer.

I wrote for several years recently about  the fight of the New York Carriage Horses to remain in New York, and I believe the stories I wrote and the people who read my blog helped to shape the debate about the horses that ended with the horses remaining in New York.

Along with many others,  I waged a war for facts and truth, and truth won. Truth matters. Good matters. In the Army, our hearts have not turned to stone.

Earlier this year, I contacted an immigrant support group in Albany, New York,  and was asked to help newly arriving immigrants buy fans and blankets and soccer balls and strollers and school supplies and curtains and pots and pans and silver. We did. Through an Amazon gift page we raised tens of thousands of dollars and filled up the group’s warehouse with things the new immigrants badly needed.

In March, I raised the idea of helping the residents in the Mansion, a Medicaid assisted care facility in my town. Red and I had visited many assisted care and dementia facilities, but I wondered what might happened if we visited one several times a week and really got to know the residents and their needs, and also take their pictures. I wanted to bring them to life, they are so forgotten.

I also mentioned that the residents of the Mansion Assisted Care Facility would probably love to get mail, and was astonished when thousands of letters came pouring in from all over the country, from every state in the country, sending messages of all kinds, along with flowers, candy, puzzles, books and CD’s, gift baskets for holidays. I wrote in March it seemed were forming an Army Of Good. The Mansion bulletin boards and bedside tables are filled with letters and postcards and collages and drawings.

Connie, a knitter and fiber artist, has made scores of caps, mittens, sweaters and blankets for sick children and Mansion residents with the yarn the Army has sent her. She just got an air conditioner from the Army so she will have enough oxygen to breathe when the temperatures rise.

The AOG is an odd  kind of army, we don’t know one another or speak to one another, and we are all kinds of people, with all kinds of political views. I have never met or even communicated with most of you, I have only the vaguest idea who you are and where  you are. Yet we seem so in sync if feels like family.

We share a common passion for doing good rather than arguing. We have transformed the Mansion, buying them a new van, air conditioners, computer printers, art supplies, a boombox, paintings for the walls, cookies and cake for their holidays, cakes and cookies, yarn and puzzles.

In addition, and after four months of searching, I have found a refugee and support called RISSE, it is in Albany, and met a remarkable young teacher named Ahmad Abdulla Mohammed (a/k/a) Ali. He has welcomed me into the world of the immigrants and refugees, now under siege across America. And he guides me as to who needs help and what for.

The Army Of Good was ready to march again. We bought 90 art and creativity kits for the refugee students, a trip to the Great Escape Adventure Park in July; soccer shirts for the soccer team, we are sponsoring birthday parties and Saturday summer outings for the refugee children.  Soon, we will be helping the poorest students pay for their day care and hopefully, help RISSE maintain its desperately needed programs for refugees and immigrants..

For me, the idea for the refugees is the same as the idea for the Mansion residents: to give people faces and identities, rather than simply make them political slogans and positions to be exploited. I want to show who they really are.

I am careful and thoughtful about what I support, and so far, the Army has come through every time.

I believe idea has helped me stay grounded and peaceful during this difficult time. I believe it helps the members of the army as well to do the same. I think Christ had a good idea, among other good ideas. We must live in the world, there is no running from.

The light of conscience shows us the laws of life.

You have already done a tremendous amount of good, and I wanted  you to know that.

Being in the Army of Good does not make me or you a saint, nor does it even mean that I am good. But I know I can do good, we can do good. We already are.  As the world sometimes darkens, we bring light.

I believe it is the path to a better way to live and be. It will help me live in this world without surrendering to it.