Montana novelist and river walker David James Duncan points out that the world’s people do not need religious or economic fundamentalists or to save them; we need us for our salvation, and us stands for this huge, growing crazy-quilt assemblage of global humanity that is willing to stand up to the raw, cancerous insults that come from the mouths, guns, checkbooks, and policies of ideologues. According to Duncan, there is a movement afoot in the world that is not merely trying to prevent wrongs but actively seeks to love this world. Compassion and love of others are at the heart of all religions, and at the heart of this movement. “When small things are done with love it’s not a flawed you or me who does them: it’s love. I have no faith in any political party, left, right, or centrist. I have boundless faith in love. In keeping with this faith, the only spiritually responsible way I know to be a citizen, artist, or activist in these strange times is by giving little or no thought to ‘great things’ such as saving the planet, achieving world peace, or stopping neocon greed. Great things tend to be undoable things. Whereas small things, lovingly done, are always within our reach.” Some people think the movement is defined by what it is against, but the language of the movement is about keeping the conversation going, because ideas that inform it never end: growth without inequality, wealth without plunder, work without exploitation, a future without fear.

– from Blessed Unrest