11.02.2006

i am continually inspired and excited by the stories of those living in a different way... why do we think we need to always go and evangelize and change the poor and the indigenous... perhaps it is they that understand God's Kingdom and we who need to sit and listen as they teach us what it is to be the church. the desire to be a collective, to take care of one another, to treat one another with equality and inclusivity, learning from the worldviews of one another, and to share the little they have with others who are in need... why can we not follow this real example? they are living proof that the church can stand together, can live in a new way without heirarchical systems and oppression, striving not for individual independence and competition, but instead for interdependence and cooperation. their vision sets my heart to dreaming and longing to live differently, yet i also must take caution against romanticizing their lives, for it is also a hard way to live and has cost many of them their lives in standing non-violently against oppression and injustice.
the following is from a book written by a colleague in my organization: Las Abejas: Pacifist Resistance and Syncretic Identities in a Globalizing Chiapas, by Marco Tavanti

The image of the bees makes them all members of the organization equal as "workers for the kingdom of justice, love and peace." ...Like bees, they work as a collective movement. And like the little insects that fly around a variety of flowers, their religious worldview is inclusive of Catholic, Presbyterian and Mayan traditionalist identities. They explain the choice of their name in this way:

We called ourselves Las Abejas because we are a multitude able to mobilize together... Like the bees we want to build our houses together, to collectively work and enjoy the fruit of our work. We want to produce 'honey' but also to share with anyone who needs it. We are all together like the bees, in the same house, and we walk with our Queen, which is the Kingdom of God. We know that, like the little bees, the work is slow but the result is sure because it is collective.
Some other members identify their iconigraphic image of the bees with their political intent and active resistance against the government:
The bee is a very small insect that is able to move a sleeping cow when it pricks. Our struggle is like a bee that pricks, this is our resistance, but it's non-violent. We do this because we need to defend who we are... we need to live as people."

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