We are gradually creating an Online Community Conversation and are looking for others to join us as fast as we can unleash the technology. In this editon we report excerpts fromRon Ein's New Vision of Justice and Victor Bremson's Letters to our Grand Children. A few more writers will join our community soon with topics on Art, Film and Ethical Estate Planning. Please respond to our writers with your opinions by joining ForTheGrandChildren at www.forthegrandchildren.org. We appreciate your support and together we will make a difference.

Joyful News of thw Week: See the entire world in only 4 hours thanks to TED Awards and Pangea Day: TED grants 3 worthy people their wish each year to help change the world and Pangea Day is one of those grants from 2006. The specific grant encourages people from around the world to create films about food, home, water, laughter, sorrow, hope, landscape, despair and joy. A jury of top filmmakers will select films to be featured on Pangea Day, May 10, 2008 which is becoming a huge international event. Here is a preview. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl3xHIsvF9o

Victor Bremson is now calling his column Letters to Our Grand Children. His first letter is called-- WE LIVE IN STUPID TIMES: Excerpt- I must report that we live in the most stupid of times. This is probably not a great way to encourage you to continue reading but it is the truth. We are engaged and apparently trapped in a war without justification. Our planet is burning, climate change is occurring and we don't even know how to feel about it. Our social justice systems are breaking down. We have in fact become stupid! There seems to be at least a couple of reasons why this is occurring. Our brain chemistry is being manipulated and we don't understand the deep advice of the great wisdom teachers of our history. But there is great hope. Read the rest of Victor's blog at http://www.forthegrandchildren.org/node/104 and write and tell us what you think about it?

Ron Ein has picked a name for his blog---A New Vision of Justice and here is an excerpt from this week entitled MUST WE CHOOSE BETWEEN SAFTEY AND JUSTICE: Excerpt- A few weeks ago I had a long catch-up call with an old friend from back East. My friend is a long-time progressive activist, a man of conscience and principle. We are both former English literature teachers, so we always share our latest readings. One of these was Sasha Abramsky 's American Furies, which describes the social, political, religious and economic forces that have helped create our state of mass incarceration. As I described the book to him, I also shared my anger and disgust at this American gulag, of which Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo are only variations. My friend quietly interrupted me with "truth be told, these people deserve to be in prison." How many of you out there agree that people in jail "deserve" to be? Ron's entire blog can be found at http://www.forthegrandchildren.org/blog/54 please read it and let Ron know what you think.

Upcoming Event: Our friend Rich Lang at Trinity Methodist in Ballard is presenting Al Staggs in two one man performances on October 6th and 7th. The program is entitled AN EVENING OF MERTON and BONHOEFFER -- For details: http://www.forthegrandchildren.org/node/102

Please consider signing up for the September 29th, Awakening the Dreamer Symposium, at Edmonds Unitarian: http://www.forthegrandchildren.org/node/46.

This is Volume/issue 1.7. We have archived prior issues of this newsletter under Resources/A Joyful Future at www.forthegrandchildren.org. You can always unsubscribe to these emails by replying to them with unsubscribe in the subject line- but we hope you don't as we have big hopes for this work. Special request: Please notify us if this weekly letter is difficult to read and why, and also what your browser and operating system is? You could also give us feedback about the format and how we could be doing it better. Thank you.