Bicycling’s Unjust Risks Must Be Addressed

 I’ve been riding a bicycle in the margins, along the gutters and on the side shoulders in fear of multi-ton vehicles and distracted drivers all my adult life.

Most of the time, as I pedal my bike as an urban commuter and cross-country adventurer, I feel like a sitting duck (and, as such, I identify with folks who live with raw vulnerabilities to forces that can instantly destroy one’s life).

It’s not right. It’s not just. We can do much better.

Public roadways belong to everyone. Safe public mobility is everyone’s right. 

It’s way past time for investment of our tax dollars to change to include pedestrians and cyclists as an equal consideration in all transportation planning. 

To policy makers: you are responsible. We are watching and voting. Will you seek our input? 

To all: be a pedestrian/safe cycling advocate every chance you get. Start by slowing down, giving space, making room on the road. Go beyond. Insist on inclusive, safe mobility commitments for all elected public servants and those who serve in public bureaus/departments.

I do not own a motor vehicle. My bicycle is how I get where I need to go. I’m out there. I’m vulnerable. I’m counting on you.

Addedendum: shout out to my State Senator Andrea Hunley for her advocacy for inclusive mobility in the Indiana State Legislature. Thank you, neighbor!

To Love or Not Love the World

Recovering from a Malformed View of the World took Time

At age six, I understood why I couldn’t see ‘Mary Poppins’ in the theatre. I already knew the Fundamental Evangelical mantra: the world was evil, Hollywood and movies were the epitome of “the world,” and the Bible says “love not the world, neither anything that is in the world.” 

But I kinda liked the world. ‘Mary Poppins’ seemed good to me.

From childhood, I was taught to loathe the world and shun anything “worldly.” This was the holiness church ghetto in which I lived. It would take me years to understand that this was not normal, a deformation of a healthy worldview with a skewed moral compass.

Eventually, through some tepid—and some quite insanely risky—forays into “worldliness,” I came to appreciate, respect, regard, live in and caringly critique “the world” in which I reside as a fallen, fallible, striving neighbor.

Through encounters with authentic and loving “worldly” neighbors—those whose genuine goodness defied/defies my malformed Fundamental Evangelical moral and metaphysical constructs—I have come to embrace this world, my neighbors and my responsible role in this world as what matters most.

Greater than the warning to “love not the world” is the radical admonition of Jesus to “love your neighbor as yourself.” As we do so, the way of the hoped-for future for the world opens before us.