One of civilization’s most beautiful ideas – the Sanctuary – is fading. I want to bring it to this blog.
“The unexamined life is not worth living” is a famous dictum Socrates taught his students, and I was taught it in the fifth grade in my public school.
Plato taught us to be kind, for everyone we meet is fighting a harder battle. Every heart sings a song, incomplete until another heart whispers back. The same grumpy teacher taught me this in the same inferior school.
This morning, Big Butt on Tik Tok showed his million followers how to fart louder. BigB Suzy taught a class in dancing naked in the shower. She had only half a million followers. This is where students go to learn.
We are what we fear. We fear immigrants, illegal or not. They are the other.
Today, what our kids and adults are learning is different: everybody is stealing from you, plotting to take your jobs, eager to rape or murder you and your family, and soak up all the money you ought to have for hourself. The other is the enemy.
I have nothing against new technology; I use it to post this essay, but it’s interesting to point out that I was taught about honesty and honor and the need to help people experiencing poverty in a run-down public school in Providence Rhole Island, where the students were immigrants and the children of laborers.
In school, I learned that a liar is the worst kind of human being and that it is a sin to ignore the poor. I also learned to help people who are less fortunate than me. I want to honor those lessons by focusing this blog on the idea of Sanctuary, which is now being banned or threatened in America.
The idea of the Sanctuary Blog is not to run or hide from what is happening; it’s just the opposite – we all see what is happening – but to acknowledge the fear and confusion and offer a small escape – a sanctuary blog, if you will.
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I’m moving to make my blog a sanctuary blog (the Cambridge Food Pantry is a sanctuary in my mind). This morning, I decided to discuss the idea of the Sanctuary Blog and how blogs have affected human history.
Today, the term, like so many other terms, has been politicized and is being used to hunt down people, threaten cities and mayors, frighten people, steal our jobs, rape women, and teach us that it is an evil term that will cause us harm and our society.
Any teacher will tell you that schools are no longer places to learn about Plato or Socrates’s best ideas for humanity. They have become benign holding areas seeking to control technology that is running amok and is now and in its present form uncontrollable.
The idea of Sanctuary—first recorded in the Old Testament—is one of human development’s oldest and most beautiful ideas. How sad that politicians in our time are falsely and unnecessarily debasing it. To me, sanctuary is a sacred term, and exploiting it is blasphemy in my faith. People have always used the Sanctuary as a safe and blessed refuge in a roiling world. Now, it’s being used differently.
The sanctuary was born as a religious idea and evolved into a spiritual one. Anyone is always welcome.
Thousands of years ago, the term referred to a safe place for someone or something being chased or hunted. It was initially used to mean a place where illegal immigrants found refuge and safety in a local church. Many immigrants were looking to hide in the world as they are now.
The chapel became a sanctuary for refugees before and after the death of Christ.
Two weeks ago, the U.S. Government said sanctuary cities or churches or temples could no longer offer sanctuary to illegal immigrants. The government says it will refuse federal aid to cities that provide “sanctuaries” to unlawful immigrants and even temporary escape from the federal police. The word is now synonymous with lawlessness.
That means there are no places left in America where immigrants, criminals or not, can take refuge from government police or anyone else.
I’ve always loved this idea; it is one of the best human creations, representing the best human ideals.
I was born Jewish and lived among immigrants who were subjected to severe persecution, and when they spoke English, they often spoke of “mikdash,” the Hebrew word for sanctuary. I frequently heard them say it was time for the “sanctuary” when they went to pray.
The Hebrew word for “sanctuary” is mikdash, which comes from the root word kaddish, meaning “to be set apart as sacred.” A mikdash is a “set apart space” or a “holy place” that represents something treasured—a place of beauty and worship, a refuge, a place of rest, or a holy place where God is present. Jews, like Christians, also still refer to their temples as “sanctuaries.”
Other societies – all of the most enlighted ones- embraced the Sanctuary idea, and sanctuaries were cherished.
When illegal immigrants overran the border, it became one of the most critical issues in the Presidential Election last year and four years earlier. That makes sense to me – borders are essential – but they chose to take the Sanctuary idea with it.
The idea of banning or banishing sanctuaries is popular among voters. Billions of federal dollars are now being spent to eliminate them and force them out of the country. Most Americans approve
Sanctuaries have long been seen as refuges from the abuse of power. For Jews, they were places to find God and pray. For other cultures, they are places of peace and beauty.
The Greeks embraced the idea of sanctuaries as places to praise the gods. Sanctuaries featured key elements like altars for sacrifices and temples housing deity statues. These spaces also included treasuries, sacred groves, and oracles. They served religious, social, and political functions in Greek society.
Ancient sanctuaries were sacred spaces, often natural locations, such as groves or hills, set apart from the ordinary. They were vital to religious life and served religious, social, and political functions.
The Bible names six cities as refuge: Golan, Ramoth, and Bosor on the east side of the Jordan River and Kedesh, Shechem, and Hebron on the west side. After a failed coup, Adonijah sought refuge from the newly anointed Solomon by grasping the horns of a sacrificial altar.
The idea of the sanctuary – a sanctuary blog – appeals to me, and to my idea of the blog, a way of being useful at a challenging time..
I see it as a refuge for people tired of anger, hatred, and vengeful policies – and I would appreciate a place to go on the Internet that was not boiling with politics and the arguments and anxiety it causes.
Instead, the blog is becoming and can continue to become a place where people can peacefully express themselves, avoid insults and name calling and threats, and find some footing in a place sure to be controversial, distracting, and often fearful.
This blog will be a sanctuary from that form. It will include pictures of flowers, cats, dogs, sheep, landscapes, and reports of a meaningful life by my wife Maria and me (she has her blog, and I have mine). We have similar ideas about sanctuaries.
(We see museums as sanctuaries and our farm as well.)
I will continue my essays on the blog. Civilly and thoughtfully written people are welcome. I won’t respond to their writing nor allow others to answer. I don’t need to agree with everything posted, and I don’t need to agree with everything I write.
People of all kinds and political ideas are free to come here, but they must be respectful and civil. I tend to treat people as they treat me, so the rude and cruel people of the internet will not be welcome.
As the idea of the sanctuary sadly vanishes in America—it feels like a cruel ending—I’d love to keep the idea alive in my small way. Flowers are a sanctuary, as are farms, animals, and the wonder of the natural world.
If you feel drawn to this and can withstand a small world with no political agenda and no arguing and judgment, you are welcome to keep the blog idea alive in our spirits, hearts, and souls. This idea deserves to live.
Sanctuary is a concept I will work for every day. I’ve dedicated the last 6 years to helping asylum seekers in my border city live and be safe until the time they could legally cross into the US to pursue their asylum claim. Now the people have been stopped and those with appointments have been told no more crossing.
So we’ll try to create a sanctuary for them in Mexico where they will be safe and be able to think about what’s next for their lives.
Thank you for all that you do to create sanctuary.
Hi Jon, A colleague sent a Hopi prophecy. I understand that is rather well known but it is new to me. I find the content grounding in these turbulent times. Perhaps these words provide sanctuary.
This is The Hour…
“You have been telling the people that this is the Eleventh Hour.
Now you must go back and tell the people that this is the Hour.
And there are things to be considered:
Where are you living?
What are you doing?
What are your relationships? Are you in right relation?
Where is your water? Know your garden.
It is time to speak your Truth.
Create your community. Be good to each other.
And do not look outside yourself for the leader.
This could be a good time!
There is a river flowing now very fast.
It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid.
They will try to hold on to the shore.
They will feel they are being torn apart, and they will suffer greatly.
Know the river has its destination.
The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river
Keep our eyes open and our heads above the water.
See who is in there with you
And celebrate.
At this time in history we are to take nothing personally.
Least of all, ourselves.
For the moment that we do, our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.
The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves!
Banish the word “struggle” from your attitude and your vocabulary.
All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration.
We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”
The Elders / Oraibi, Arizona / Hopi Nation
This is just the kind of message. I hope will be coming to the blog and thank you very much. It’s quite beautiful and with your permission I’d like to reprint it.
Thank you, Jon for offering a sanctuary and thank you Steph , for sharing that Hopi message. The same message as Jon’s, just different words.
I don’t agree that the idea of sanctuaries is vanishing in this country. It’s just going more underground, as this country becomes more like the society Anne Frank experienced in her hidden sanctuary.
Now is the time to show what we’re made of.
As Rumi said, “The door is round and open.
Don’t go back to sleep. “