Last October, I snapped this pic of Bono going by on the moving catwalk under the claw in Vancouver. He’s reaching toward the Edge who is coming toward him on the other catwalk; another ceiling in another chapel.

As U2 stands down while Bono recovers from back surgery I sit here reading The DATA Report 2010 remembering Bono’s Ted Prize wish which helped catalyze ONE and DATA. When the G20 spend a billion on security; when BP loses a billion in value and spends a billion in recovery; when billions of people don’t get access to what a billion have… it’s time for a surgery of ideologies!

If Bono ever ended up in a wheelchair, I’d listen to him all the more. I’d even walk beside him and wash his feet if need be. These days, as his body mends, I’ll continue praying for him. As the world continues to turn, we stand guard together on certain lines — on the verge of slippery slopes where mountains of propaganda predicate massive agendas controlling, coercing, and dehumanizing billions of people.

Laws and boundaries don’t make people free. Laws and boundaries don’t quell corruption either. It’s a choice to be free. It’s a choice to be righteous. Can you be free to do what is right in a refugee camp? Can you be free in a prison? Can you be free without a penny? Can you be free to run the World Bank while obliterating disease and disequilibrium?

From Clairvaux Manifesto (page 302),

May abbeys of prayer and work become warm and nurturing environments; even beautiful. These places will be homes full of love and tranquility; the earth and its inhabitants will soak up every drop. As we continue to dream about building abbeys of prayer and work full of stone, wood, light, and curves, may people’s hearts, souls, and minds be lifted toward greater expectations of what could be prayed over, built upon, and loved into this good earth. Why do you think so many weddings still take place on abbey grounds?

May grape vines; fruit, nut, coffee, and olive groves; flowers; grains; and multitudes of children burst to life around fortress abbeys of prayer and work. May they be full of faith, hope, and love in the midst of the dust clouds of refugee camps, slums, quiet valleys, mountain tops, river banks, and wide open plains where many streets still have no name.

Positioning easel, prepping canvas, and mixing paint, don’t cast pearls to swine; truth to liars; knowledge to thieves; hospitals to murderers; schools to idiots; or abbeys of prayer and work to emperors entitled to thrones. Stay a hopeless romantic who loves the smell of freshly baked bread and crackling midnight fires under bright stars and crescent moon, while children dance around with full bellies and hopeful futures, joining Bob Marley as he sings, “Have pity on those whose chances grow thinner.”

No line on the horizon; allez en paix.

As One, Make Poverty History
As One, Build Abbeys of Prayer and Work
As One, Proclaim Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount
As One, Meet the Millennium Development Goals
As One, Provide Circles of Quiet within the clamor of evil

An African Prayer for Peace
Lead us from death to Life, from falsehood to Truth
Lead us from despair to Love, from war to Peace
Lead us from hate to Hope, from fear to Trust
Let Peace fill our hearts, our land, our world