SERMONS FOR COYOTES

LOTHAR GRAUDINS

It was a fine Sunday morning in the Spring of the year. The desert was alive with new
creatures, beings who were experiencing unspoilt consciousness of the world around
them. A soft warm breeze carried the pungent smell of sagebrush. In the foreground the
grasses were bright green from the frequent winter rains.The sky was brilliant blue with
long white clouds hanging motionless above the hills. There was a sense of
freshness...of novelty. In the far distance was but one trailer perched on a hillside, with
brightly colored laundry gently moving in the air. It felt good to be alive...so many
possibilities. Some of you are probably skeptical about a project of preaching to wild
coyotes. After all, even most people today are too distracted to really listen to what is
being said to them. But I was encouraged to try. Many years ago a German artist named
Joseph Beuys attempted to communicate with another species. He entitled the
performance piece How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare. You can imagine what a
challenge that posed! I tried to listen in and learn his technique as he cradled a lifeless
rabbit in his arms. Unfortunately, the artist's voice was muffled and hard to understand.
Furthermore, since the animal was quite dead, responses were lacking. But I was
inspired by Beuys's efforts and learned not to allow common logic to rule my actions.
This was one reason why I chose to become a psychologist. People who come to you for
help are often dead (symbolically speaking) and if you're going to rouse them from their
societal stupor, you need all the help you can get.

I stood behind a large rock and waited for the coyotes to arrive. As the animals gathered
before me, I reviewed my notes and avoided eye contact with my visitors. The larger and
more aggressive ones were reluctant to approach my stone pulpit for fear that I might be
hiding a weapon. As time passed, a few brave ones dared to circle around behind me. I
was careful not to turn around and I can tell you dear reader, the hair on the back of my
neck bristled and chills ran down my spine. I was, at moments, frozen with fear. It was a
matter of trust and of taking a risk: a very common theme to much of our existence. I
cleared my throat, startling a few of the nearby animals. Fixing my eyes just above the
pack, I began speaking with a slow and even rhythm.

Good morning my furry friends and survivors. You're obviously aware of the hideous
war currently waged by cattlemen and pseudo cowboys to kill you at every opportunity.
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Pseudo cowboys are little more than pretentious dressers who are, as we say, long on the
hat and short on the cattle. Real cowboys stink of sweat, have wrinkled skin that looks
like leather and a surly disposition. As far as the cattlemen, I must say, in all honesty,
that I would probably take a few shots at you myself if I owned such animals. You
understand, this is an issue of economic survival. After all, men kill each other for the
same reasons and a coyote is low on the evolutionary scale as seen by many of our
citizens. This is not to say that it has always been that way or that it ought remain so.
Your close cousin, the wolf, was actually revered by the native tribes of Indians that
once lived in these deserts. It's not that Indians didn't slaughter animals like yourselves,
but rather that it was customarily done for their own survival and always with a
consciousness of what this act was about. They saw you as a gift from the Great Spirit
and gave thanks for the privilege of hunting you. This is in contradistinction to those
ignoramuses who have no idea of the relationship between themselves and all living
creatures. How many clues do you need? The earth has shrunk as a result of the moon
landing. Rabid environmentalists are everywhere. The structure of DNA is well known.
But news travels slow in Nevada. There are still too many who like to knock off a few
coyotes for the sheer thrill of killing something that moves. How much fun can you
have!? Look Dad... oooh yuk, it's bleeding from its mouth and still kicking... The
Auschwitz of Coyote existence is the airplane roundup where dozens are slaughtered
just in case they might be a problem. A curious resemblance to slaughtering Iraqis when
the enemy was known to originate in Afghanistan. For many human beings, the recent
confusion by the administration was very scary. For a moment, I feared that Bush
considered attacking France or Germany (just in case they might be a problem.) Frogs
and Krauts, after all, have not always enjoyed a positive image. And the Japanese, well,
we all know their history. But give them a break for making such fine cameras and
feeding us sushi. On the other hand, if this Toyota thing gets out of hand, we'll round
them up and once again put them in camps.

At this point in my sermon, the coyotes were more relaxed. Like many congregations of
people, they didn't much understand what I was saying nor did they care. Some were
yawning uncontrollably, finishing off with a faint yelp. Others were sitting and sniffing
the air. Once in a while one peed, which gained the immediate interest of his friends.
The youngest ones were off in the distance under the watchful eye of parents.

Don't be disheartened, my furry friends. Living in fear is a universal condition. For

humans, it's much the same around the globe. At this exact moment while I'm speaking
to you, millions are in fear for their lives. Some are being annihilated by sophisticated
military aircraft, others are being slaughtered the old fashioned way: hacked up with
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swords and knives, with a volley of gunfire just to break the monotony. Large groups of
terrified women are clutching their children, screaming in agony as they are being raped
and murdered. In addition, there is rampant disease and tormenting hunger. And so it is,
every year, that millions of humans die this way. But aside of this kind of fear of rather
horrid conditions, humans are subject to a special fear, called anxiety. It arises because
humans anticipate what might happen to them. It is the difference between the present
moment and the unfolding future. It is an abiding character of human existence, this
phenomenon of anxiety and we all attempt to come to terms with it.

I may have imagined it, but this last sentence seemed to elicit a round of yawning from
my reluctant congregation. Some were asleep in the warm sun and, judging by their
flinching legs, were far away on an exciting hunt. A few had left from apparent
disinterest. However, like any preacher with an urgent message, I was undaunted. The
words must be spoken.

As I have said to you, my special companions, anxiety is a kind of fear that is peculiar
to human beings. It should be openly recognized and talked about, rather than denied or
extinguished with drugs. After all, it is the single most important guide that humans have
as to where personal growth is possible. Life is infinitely simpler for you coyotes.
Largely driven by instincts and immediate needs, you follow inner promptings. Humans
also share in those but then, once satisfied, we're often privileged to consider creative
endeavors or embrace a mysterious thing called self-actualization. Of course, we
humans also have a choice at this point. Instead of embarking on a journey of adventure
and personal challenge (thereby facing our anxiety and fears), we can opt for wasting
our time with mundane activity and trivia. There are many choices: watching mindless
television, reading hopelessly stupid novels, engaging in daydreaming, or, a current
favorite escape, watching others being anxious and fearful. The computer has been a
boon to those who enjoy endless distractions. By no means is the above list exhaustive!
A higher class of escape awaits us. The crme de la crme is...(using my hands, I did a
quick drum roll on a rock at this point, frightening even the largest coyote )... yup,
religion. Now, I don't mean the kind where people find a reason to treat others with
kindness. Or, where some people genuinely help others... perhaps for that privilege of
avoiding the dreaded furnace of hell. The worse escape into religion is this sacharine
romanticism that someone is watching over you , a kind of institutional and shared
paranoia coupled with a mascarade of humility. This humility , if you take a close
look, is a kind of arrogance that allows one to wear a special pointed hat and propose to
rule the world. It's the kind of endeavor where money and power are never mentioned,
but more avidly pursued than by the most voracious Scrooge on Wall street.
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Such endeavors and distractions form a picture of the world where others are looking
after you and, even more damaging, promote the popular notion that you don't have to
take responsibility for your actions. Well, I'm here to tell you that you are accountable
for what you do (or don't do). Forget the fires of hell. Mistakes are not sins and you get
to try again (and again.). Since this is your only trip to the planet as well as your one
incarnation, do something with it. No one knows what you ought to do with your life,
least of all your parents or teachers. Embrace your life and live it on your terms. There
are no answers or secrets in the universe that could suddenly make life easy for you.
Become your own father or mother. Don't be a copycat forever. Not all traits or habits of
anyone are worth adopting. The most difficult task is to become a responsible adult who
lives in reasonable freedom. (All members of any tribe or family face concessions in
exchange for advantages.) The kind of responsibility I'm referring to is not a task or
burden imposed from the outside world. It simply means to carefully observe your
behavior and what consequences it has. It's a kind of compass. In this difficult world,
you want to know where you're headed. You want to ask yourself what part you played
in the last personal disaster. How could you possibly have averted it? Finally, become
your own hero or heroine. This is the essence of self-actualization. You don't need role-
models forever. Make your own choices, embrace the consequences. Allow anxiety and
fear...experience everything. You are part of the universe. And, perhaps most important,
there is no such thing as lasting meaning. You must constantly reinvent yourself.
Without that effort, life becomes dull and trite. If you allow for change, you will become
less afraid of it. Trust yourself to do what needs doing at some point in the future. At the
same time, remember you are not omnipotent. And despite all the inner voices of
misplaced guilt, it's OK to enjoy your life. If you need help, go for it. Blah, blah,
blah...blah, blah...blah, blah, blah.

Most of the coyotes had left. There was no particular reason for their departure, or for
that matter, their arrival in the first place. Of course, I began to wonder about what effect
I might have had on them. More to the point, does anyone understand what is being said
by someone else? Sometimes, I suppose, a certain word or group of words uttered by a
credible source, whatever that means, has some effect however fleeting and
impermanent. It's the limitation, one could propose, of all intellectual effort.

Humans are chronically lonely. It's not the kind of loneliness of a boring Sunday
afternoon or that occasional sense of abandonment when we're by ourselves. It reaches
far deeper than that. It is a loneliness that is an abiding part of our human existence.
There is no cure for this any more than there is a cure for aging. The idea that we can
effectively reach out to others with words is bogus. There is an illusion, I'll grant you,
that batting your lips really promotes closeness or communicates some reality that is
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truly shared. Like so much religious belief, it is a comfortable illusion and we may be
content to look no farther. But just for the hell of it, let's take another step.

The issue is presence, that is, the actual contact and meeting with another human being.
I'm not going to say that such a meeting eradicates all loneliness. It does not. On the
other hand, a real meeting seems to ease much of the pain of inherent separateness
between ourselves and others. It affirms our humanity. In the absence of such meeting or
in-the-flesh connection with others, we see the pathetic and ridiculous. We see the
Senator who secretly porks his bubblegum-chewing secretary, we see intelligent and
otherwise well-meaning priests seducing altar boys...we see socially impoverished and
isolated men go to prison. Now, dear friends, don't misunderstand my words. I'm not
saying that the presence of others works some kind of magic. It's absurd to draw such a
blanket conclusion. Existence remains a slippery slope, even under the most favorable of
circumstances. There are no guarantees or certainties we can cling to.What I am saying
is that in a surprising number of human tragedies or issues of personal suffering,
isolation is a key element. We need the presence of others not just to mitigate our
existential loneliless but to know who we are.

I can imagine your resistance to such an idea. Who wants to deal with the kind of crap
that many bring to the table? Some people, or so it seems, appear so twisted that nothing
even remotely imagined will help them. Words are empty and wasted. It's casting pearls
before the swine. Other are so imbued with their own bullshit, that not even a miracle of
some sort (if there was such a thing) could possibly make a difference. Besides, what if
some these misfits, perverts and idiots exerted an influence on you? Or, in more earthy
parlance, some of their shit in some manner rubbed off ? If not that, it's true that many
people are simply boring. Anyway...why bother?

The last question is rather tricky and I can't answer it for you. As for myself, I
occasionally enter the wide seas of humanity and swim along with the herd. I see myself
in a thousand faces. After the bullshit settles, I know we are much the same. I have the
nagging feeling that what I reject in others is uncooked stuff within myself. What of it? I
can swim, get out of the water and dry off when I choose. I do it essentially for me,
although at times I've been very generous. On many occasions, in the past, I've done it
for money. Self-interest is also important. Mother Theresa is a unfortunate icon for the
Helper, not because she attempted to unselfishly serve others but that she needed all that
machinery (a church, someone with a pointed hat and large imposing books of
nonsense). So much excess baggage! Some people maintain that it's good to follow her
example. Friends, I say you don't need all that stuff! Wake up ! There is no furnace, or
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for that matter, no eternity of playing a harp.

Friends, I say you don't need that stuff!

The last coyote slowly ambled away. He was tall, with long straggly legs. He
looked old, with some tufts of hair missing from his head. His coat was uneven and
faded. Although indisputably part of the herd, he seemed to maintain a distance from the
others. He watched me until he was far away, then changed direction and disappeared
from view. I supposed he felt somewhat alienated. (Projection is not a bad thing if you
are aware of what you're doing). He reminded me of myself and I felt enriched that he
was sharing the journey.

L.G.