On Art, Faith and Justice

“Justice is love on legs spilling over into the public sphere.” – Cornel West

To write without ceasing is the continuous undercurrent of my life. The text may take many forms – in my body, on trees that have been sacrificed to be born again for what one can only hope is a sacred purpose.

Some times there are long stretches between words, phrases, stanzas, paragraphs, chapters. The windows of this market, gallery, meeting place papered over. Remodeling, will reopen soon.

And I amass black type in great piles, images in smooth curves and harsh angles, bringing us sacred messages. Rumi said love is the way the great mystery tells us what’s important. Art is the way we tell each other.

The sacred is what’s possible when we all have what we need to show up in purpose and to return to it when we are drawn off center. I am a call to the sacred in everyone.

None of us have lived in the world we are creating, this is all faith-based work this speculative fiction. These stories are our stories. These stories are love. Treat them tenderly.

If you see what springs forth from this in the library down the street, in your minds eye, in the eye of your neighbor on the train…you have seen a bit of justice – a bit of love in public.

Thank you Stewart for the request that I post this.

 

Big Philanthropy’s Role in Higher Education – The Chronicle Review – The Chronicle of Higher Education

Since the time I time I taught at Ida B. Wells high school in San Francisco, I have been interested in and connected with, both closely and loosely at different points, eduction reform.  I understand the crucial roles that arts and science and math and physical education and reading play in learning and development.  I am pro-data and pro-accountability.  AND I have long been leery of the rally call to data-driven this and data-driven that especially since those seeking and calling for the data most often have a very limited idea of what data looks like and which data are meaningful when it comes to developing healthy, well-adjusted, critical-thinking young people.

I’m glad to see that Stanley N. Katz director of the Center for Arts and Cultural Policy Studies at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School is talking about the connection between philanthropy and policy in his article “Big Philanthropy’s Role in Higher Education” on the The Chronicle of Higher Education site.  We need more conversation and most of all more transparency about the relationship and what responsible philanthropy means in a democratic and pluralistic society if we really are interested in quality public education for all.