Posted on 23 January 2009 by Will O' in Politics
Obama is “that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of relating and connecting and engaging with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a very high order, and they speak not just to reason or emotion, but to the soul.” — Mark Morford, Is Obama an enlightened being?
It appears that a sort of balancing agent occasionally steps in to tweak the evolution of the human species. Some people call that balancing agent God, some call it Gaia, the living breathing planet we all inhabit. Whatever you call it, as the planet and its occupants hurtle toward 21 December 2012, said by the Mayans to represent the end of history, we may be faced with a choice between light and darkness. That is, the transformation into a more evolved species or an atavistic return to primordial savagery.
The destruction route fits well with the blinkered worldview of the conservative mindset. Historically, conservatives have been humanity’s greatest impedance to evolution. They frighten easily because their accumulated assets and possessions — ultimately all that matters to them — are threatened whenever any change — always perceived as a threat — is at hand. They relish the status quo to the point of starting wars to preserve it.
It was not so much the Jews who killed Christ, as the Conservative Jews. Jesus Christ represented a threat to their status quo. Extrapolate this to every event and evolutionary moment in history. Who persecuted Galileo? Who shot Yitzhak Rabin? Who shot Martin Luther King? Conservatives who could not bear their transformative messages.
The overwhelming feeling of hope around the world at Obama’s presidency is neither naïve nor foolish nor stupid. It derives from the nascent desire of every human being to be free of petty small-mindedness, to open their hearts to others, to stop hating.
Contrast this hope with the feelings of anger and despair at the divisive and selfish solutions of frightened conservative governments of the past. Solutions which decree that “me and mine (family, nation) are all that matters, and to hell with everyone else.”
But in reality, we’re all in this together. And deep down we know this.
Obama is no messiah; that is a fanciful notion of the religious. Throughout history the religious have persecuted the spiritual, turning those natural yearnings for grace and compassion into “my God vs your God.”
But Obama may well be enlightened, or on the path to enlightenment, even if he doesn’t know it or even care about such a lofty ideal. He appears to be an American version of the Dalai Lama, without the arcane trappings. He emanates light; so vastly different to the darkness spread by George W. Bush, and all those like him.
If the Conservatives don’t murder him — always their final solution — then Barack Obama might be the global leader who begins to sow the seeds of humanity’s emergence from the darkness of the old history into the light of a new history — a kind of second coming, after all — where fear as the prime motivator is replaced by love. Or, to be less goopy, by always remembering to put ourselves in the shoes of others.
Unless, of course, we are all spiritual criminals sentenced to life without parole on this prison planet for crimes committed on a higher plane.
Note: This post was half written when I went to lunch and came across the following letter in The Age, published today, 23 January. I don’t know if the writer meant to alert folks to Mark Morford’s great article, written last June, but thanks anyway. I love the cluelessly arrogant hubris of the final line, which is another way of saying, “this is all I can see, so this is all there is”:
Psst: He’s not the Messiah
Many people, especially many Americans, appear to have expectations regarding President Obama that have no connection with rationality. One US commentator gushed that Mr Obama was “that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health-care plans … but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of relating and connecting and engaging with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve.”
Obama won’t be able to match the fantasies he appears to have inspired in many. — Henk Verhoeven, NSW
The ones that really irritate me are Andrew Bolt and his kind- the hardcore righties who call themselves “conservatives” in order to make themselves sound moderate or centrist. Because Obama is left of them (which is easy when they are so far right), they must discredit him at every opportunity. Ditto Kevin Rudd.
Check out this by Leunig: Little picture, big picture. His usual tour de force, this time on the rationalisation of cruelty by the misanthropists who rule the world.
Excellant piece, but please note that the “Henk Verhoeven” you quote is a radical, right-wing catholic who makes the Pope and Mel Gibson look like raging leftist atheists.
Whilst I heartily agree with some of your words, Henk Verhoeven is a rightist nut case who published his views regularly in the CourierMail and had the audacity to say the Catholic Church was as poor as door-mouses.
Always fun to quote the right wing ratbags, especially when they inadvertently alert folks to articles such as Morford’s. I did point to Henk’s hubris, non?
Hi Will O’, yes, point taken. You did point out his hubris, quite correctly.
Willa Cartwright, engaging in ad hominem attacks may be a sign of being without valid and logical arguments. Also, you should take another look at words such as “radical”, “right-wing”, “leftist atheists”, “rightist nut case”, “hubris” and “right-wing ratbags”. Perhaps you have a deep-seated problem with religion, which could explain why you, inappropriately, drag that subject into topics that have absolutely no connection with it. I also recommend you look up the meaning of “hubris”.
Henk! How are you? Doing vanity searches on yourself, are you? You really are a self centred little-boy. Must be hard finding out it’s not all about you. Although this one must have stuck side-ways in your craw.
Really Henk, with a history like yours you really should have learned to either do your or shut-up.
You are a right-wing, religious nut case. Face-it, you’re hyper-conversative, and totally out of touch.
P.S. IF you want to teach people how to use words and phrase, at least understand them yourself. Especially before you open your mouth.