WHAT’S IT WORTH TO YA?

BEST OF (TENT) SHOW SERMONETTE:
DR. OMED ASKS: WHAT’S IT WORTH TO YA?

Everyone, whether they realize it or not, has a set of core beliefs—Core beliefs about Life, the Universe, and Everything: How we came to be (since this is all about us); by way of a creator, a God or gods, made by the Maker of all things, or by a series of random events occurring over a vast span of time (just happened). We have core beliefs about our place in the universe (all about us): Central, at the Right Hand of God; or insignificant, less than, infinitely less than, a flyspeck. What’s it all about? Does Life have meaning? Does existence exist? Even if you sincerely state you don’t believe in anything, you believe that. Personally, I’m coming to believe that we’re all a figment of our Collective Imagination. I know morals don’t exist, but I’m filibustering the Collective about that one.

Core beliefs: Right, wrong. What is a good work? What is a crime? Do you believe in true love; love at first sight; the love of God? Or do you subscribe to the idea that you should love the one you’re with? But I didn’t climb onto my bully blog-o-pulpit to ask you what you believe, essay due on Monday. What I want to know right now is what it’s worth to ya.

To a suicide bomber, his belief is worth his life; your life, the lives of a whole lot of other people, and the maiming, wounding, post traumatic disorder, and grief of even more people.

To President Bush, his belief is worth waging an illegal war, killing tens of thousands of people, converting the constitutional democracy of which he is the chief steward into a proto-fascist state, accelerating the ecocide of the whole planet, and, well, that’ll do to go on.

So. What’s it worth to ya, your cherished or unconsidered belief?

Is it worth your life, or somebody else’s?

Is it worth everything you own, or spare change in the collection plate on Sunday?

Is it worth striking, perhaps without warning, someone who fundamentally opposes you and your belief, or is it worth turning the other cheek?

Is it worth a leg? An eye? Big toe? Yours or someone else’s?

Is it worth taking the risk of arrest engaging in an act of civil disobedience?

Is it worth going to jail?Losing your job?

Putting your family at risk because of the consequences of the above?

Is it worth going in harm’s way in a foreign land and killing people you never met and who never did you any harm?

Is it worth being killed in a foreign land by someone who never met you?

Is it worth getting up in the morning?

Is it worth expressing your honest opinion to any one other than your close friends?

Is it worth one thin dime?

This is not a rhetorical exercise. I really want to know. It’s important. Because I am having to make this decision on what I shall do on a daily basis, in this present crisis, this slow motion catastrophe of the first half of the 21st century, and whether I and those I love can afford the consequences when I take action in accordance with my beliefs. I now believe it is possible that I may live long enough to see, and I say this with absolutely no irony whatsoever, the end of civilization as we know it. Living as I do in Red America, behind the Fox Curtain, every time I see an SUV with a “W” sticker go by, every time a co-worker regurgitates a tidbit of Rush, I want to strike back at the Evil Empire, tho’ the only weapons I have at my disposal are my big mouth, my art, and an aging mortal body. I want to act. I can’t always do that. I have to ask myself, “What’s it worth to ya?”

I await with bated breath (You don’t have to breath in the blog-o-sphere.) your comments and emails.

(Originally published in Dr. Omed's Tent Show Revival 7.14.05)