Page 13 - C.A.L.L. #31 - Spring 2009

KALEIDOSCOPE

Some years ago the German "Zegg" community concocted what they called a "Future
Generation Reader". Some of the captions in the index are inspiring and intriguing by
themselves, such as "Concepts are needed, so you can leave them again", or "Utopia of the
genders love" and "How to create a craving for the future". Last but not least "I never went
to school!" and "Plant a tree even when the world was due to disappear tomorrow"! From
the editorial of the Reader, by Teresa Heidegger, I chose the following passage:

"How can we envision a sustainable future? Most important, as I have found out by now, is
not to see your dreams come true - but rather to go on dreaming persistently. We shall beget
grandchildren, and they are going to have children of their own. The world is going to carry on,
and their ways will be different from our wishes. With or without realizing it, we make daily
decisions about this” (Gioconda Belli).

I would like to comment on the meaning of communities, but not with the intent that all
human beings should come to live in them. Actually I would like to point out that we already
live in community - meaning in a world in which each and everything is connected and the
deeds of the one has an impact on others. To live communally would mean a spiritual switch
of paradigm. It relates to the inner attitude, which is created by this feeling of connections:
Cooperation instead of Competition, Understanding instead of Condemning. Mutual respect
and consideration. In short, it means to apply this communal way of thinking, feeling and
acting to all areas of life, including our social moves.

The Students of the Bruderhof's "Maple Ridge High School" have begun publishing a cute,
charming little newsletter, called "The BeeHive", brimming with zest and joy, but at the
same time full of faith and concern. Here comes a report by Travis Glanzer about an exercise
in survival - not the media kind, but some real reality - from October 2008:

24 Hours Alone

I was alone with savage coyotes drooling behind every tree and
owls hooting. I huddled next to the fire for warmth. It was
around 30°F and freezing cold. The wind whipped through the
branches of the big oak above me. I felt safe underneath its huge
trunk which was planted firmly in the soil. The leaves slowly
floated down and covered the rugged rocky ground beneath. I
looked at my watch; it was 9:00pm, and I decided to go to sleep.
Crawling into my sleeping bag I fell into a fitful sleep. Once I
woke with a start to find that it was drizzling. The time was 3:00
in the morning. I fell asleep again and woke to see the sun rising
over the tree tops. I had survived the night! This over-night
adventure was for a biology assignment. We were experiencing what it was like to stay in the
woods for twenty-four hours.
-Travis Glanzer, 14

Most intentional communes have a healthy dislike for party politics and try to stay away from
them, but the truth is that they constitute a political factor by their very existence. The Israeli
Kibbutz Movement in its various forms and reforms, used to be the backbone of three
different "Labour Parties" and was deeply involved in the creation of the Jewish State, its
Parliament and its Government. It also was a crucial element in the formation of the Trade
Union, the Jewish Agency, the Hagana (defence force) and the Palmach. The Jewish National
Funds (Keren Kayemet and Keren Hayesod) who gave the land and the machines for settling
the most faraway and isolated regions, the Water Authority and many other functions were
all created for and by the Kibbutz Movements.

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