Wangari Maathai - Planting for the Future

A delightful program from Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett

From the program INTRO:
A riveting Kenyan environmentalist and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Wangari Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement — a grassroots organization that empowers African women to improve their lives and conserve the environment through planting trees. She knows what many in the West have forgotten — that ecological crises are often the hidden root causes of war. Maathai speaks about the global balance of human and natural resources, and she shares her thoughts on where God resides.

My NOTE:
Wangari Maathai's wisdom is not only shot through and through with humility yet it is resoundingly realistic. I love that she built her vision on simple small steps although in front of her were the multitudes of the suffering and little-by-little she and her followers actually made infinite pathways to life for many women - and thereby toward men and children as well. These pathways are practical yet also spiritual on countless levels. The trees and the vision continues to multiply in Africa and around the world! She was way ahead of her time with the shimmering word and metaphor: GREEN. Her story reminds me of the beautiful little book: -The Man Who Planted Trees- .

The JOY I felt last night from Ms. Maathai and Krista via this program - while I fixed egg rolls for my family - has come into this new day with me. I want to carry this wisdom and gladness with me whenever I possibly can -the rest of my week - the rest of my life.

Here is the link to the program Speaking of Faith in general...
here

Be sure also to catch the last program - as well - if you haven't already - "The Ecstatic Faith of Rumi - an equally shimmering, fertile program with so many seeds for our spiritual, community and global visions...

Connie, OneHeart blogger
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I want to end this post with a quote from a hero of mine. I found this today after during the night reading a paper by a Hindu scholar/friend who wrote on Hindu/Christian connections in a work entitled: "Pain is inevitable - Suffering is optional." Although I can't quite yet completely get my mind and experience around this statement - I do accept that on one deep mystical level - this is true.

Anyway, here's the quote..."When restraint and courtesy are added to strength the latter becomes irresistible."
- Mahatma Gandhi, 1931

Ms. Maathai didn't speak about Gandhi or Hinduism. Neither did she mention either restraint or courtesy. Yet, there was an ample dose of both in her clear yet simple answers to Krista's interesting questions. She spoke with such lovely courtesy toward people of other lands, cultures, religions. Her reprimands were clear yet gentle - thus certainly more powerful. She demonstrated - as well - courtesy, restraint and gratitude - with those who had either blessed or failed her (or both) and other women in her past. She was humble and charitable as well even with those who had stood in her way.

She was able to pull from her former teachers plenty of inspiration and was kind with what was missing. She even spoke with restraint of her own ample achievements. She spoke with such courtesy of others who may have carried her vision even further.

And does this following statement make sense to you - as it does to me? I felt that she spoke of history and the future with restraint and courtesy as well...Perhaps this is because - even with her stature - she recognized her part in the whole - with neither false humility nor with grandiosity?

Let me venture to say that in the face of unbearable suffering and pain all around us - we - who are not currently in an unmanageable whirlwind - may do better if we could and would incorporate a few of Ms. Maathai's principles wherever possible.