I have been thinking about this a lot lately and I am posting here a little tidbit that I came across on the internet. I like that Dan Hamburg speaks from the point of having experienced a term in the U.S. Congress. His site tells of his journey of political activism from a young age through his serving as a U.S. Congressman. It also tells of his spiritual journey throughout all of his political activism and his life in general.

I know there are those who don't feel you can't mesh the two but I have always felt that you cannot have one and have it serve any useful purpose without the other. I am speaking ( as is Dan Hamburg ) of the collective and universal spirituality of humanity. Not in one particular religion or another. Meshing one's chosen religion with politics is a leathal mixture in my opinion because it closes ones mind to any different world view or God view which leads to division, dissent and war. It can be completely toxic for a nation as we see with the war now being waged between extreme fanatics of both the Islamic and Christian religions. Neither of which reflects the teachings of either religion or the majority of people that comprise those two religions.

Anyway, here are just some thoughts on the subject. I too have come to the conclusion that change and justice will not ever come from the government no matter who is serving at any given time in history.

The following are all quotes by Avatar Adi Da Samraj:

You must understand the time you are in. It is not like it was in the eighties,
seventies, sixties, or the fifties. This is a very, very dark and difficult time.
And people are being murdered by the thousands every week. The situation on earth must change or you and future generations are not even going to get a chance at God-Realization.



The true change that you must create is not principally in the "system" itself
(or in the parentlike world of competitive egos) but in the ordinary, daily associa-
tions between yourself and other human beings.



Once its negative and parentlike powers become obsolete through non-use,
[it] will be obliged to beome the simple instrument of the responsible agreements of the people.



It is a matter of converting the mind and the life and the entire human collective
to a right understanding of conditionally manifested reality (which is a great unity) and to a right (and truly religious, and truly Spiritual) submission to Ultimate Reality (Which Is One).



Love is the key to this necessary change. Love is self-surrendering, self-forgetting, and, ultimately, self-transcending participation in the Indivisible Oneness and Wholeness and Singleness That Is Real God, and Real Truth,
and Reality Itself.


And you know that all the major religions in the world teach this regarding love and oneness with the Ultimate Reality. Why do some then take this and distort it to serve their own needs of power and control?

These are the words of Dan Hamburg, political activist and former member of the U.S. Congress:

.."my two years in Washington also convinced me that the deep changes that the country, and the world, need will not come from government, at least not from the US government which happens to be by far the most powerful on earth. One reason, obvious to most everyone by now, is the fact that the government is increasingly subservient to the corporate and other large financial interests that fund it. That's why we don't have universal health care, a living wage, first-rate education, solar energy and many other things that would serve the public interest.

But perhaps an even more serious problem is the lack of a vision that encompasses the spiritual. There is a chaplain who opens each session with a non-denominational prayer, a rather rote exercise that gets about as much deep attention as the playing of the national anthem at ball games. I joined a group called the Faith and Politics Institute and met weekly with a small group of Democrats who were interested in the faith aspects of their legislative work. While these decent men (there were no women) were almost obsessed with doing good, they were mostly stuck in patterns of patriotism, morality, and the teachings of their various churches.

While many well-intentioned men and women serve in Washington, and in governments across the country, few seem to be willing to consider that our overall direction as a nation and a planet is destructive and even life-threatening. Nor do they begin to consider that we need a radical rethinking of what this human enterprise is really about at its most fundamental level. What is the purpose of human life? Are we basically homo economicus, whose main purpose is to produce and consume, fending off scarcity while attempting to maintain public morality? Or are we more than that — fundamentally spiritual beings living in the physical plane? What should be our relationship with the natural world? Is the natural world more than "resources" to feed the maw of industry and the greed of consumers? Or is the creation itself divinely inspired? What should be our relationship to God, Oneness, Reality, or whatever term best describes for each of us that which is sacred, real, true? Is it enough to put in your time at church or synagogue, or is there something really esoteric going on here, something that we need to consider at the deepest levels of our discriminative intellects and our hearts? "

"The human enterprise is a difficult one. Even those of us fortunate enough to be materially secure know that life is not easy. We may have times when "things are going well" and we feel rather satisfied. But there is always that fear lurking in our minds. Fear that our good fortune may end. Fear that something can always go wrong. Ultimately, fear that no matter how good we might feel in any particular moment, it is impermanent. Each of us will die.

These things are "built in" to our existence on this material plane. Other than a few Spiritual Adepts who can help guide us to a deeper consideration of the Divine, most of us cannot experience sustained bliss or even sustained peace of mind. But we can use politics to advance the great cause of human justice and thereby take a huge load off our minds and hearts, and allow ourselves the space for more creative, or deeper pursuits.

Spiritual leaders throughout history have taught that within the heart of every living being is the Divine. If this is true, then our most important work must be turning toward the Divine, toward "non-conditional Reality." The causes of global peace, human freedom, and human well-being depend on an individual and a collective movement in this direction. As the Spiritual Teacher Adi Da points out.

The new politics that grows out of this conversion will be radical in the best sense of the word. It will be a politics based upon intimate, cooperative association among human beings. It will be a politics based on the integrity of the individual, then extends outward to the community and even the State. It will be a politics that recognizes as its first priority spiritual realization rather material aggrandizement. It will be a politics based not on scarcity (fear) but on plenty (love). In the words of Adi Da Samraj."

Wow, I love this thought.

The new politics that grows out of this conversion will be radical in the best sense of the word. It will be a politics based upon intimate, cooperative association among human beings. It will be a politics based on the integrity of the individual, then extends outward to the community and even the State. It will be a politics that recognizes as its first priority spiritual realization rather material aggrandizement. It will be a politics based not on scarcity (fear) but on plenty (love). In the words of Adi Da Samraj."

Love and Peace Out, Connie