September 8, 2004
LOVE IN ACTION FOR ALL
By jane davis
I didn't know, when I was asked to be a media witness at an electric chair execution in Georgia (Dec. 1993), that my life would be changed forever. I simply thought, "How odd that I am being asked to witness such a thing." I was a contributing writer to Prison Life magazine and, by law, a certain number of media witnesses are required. What I do know is that when they brought Chris Berger into the execution chamber from the adjacent holding cell his eyes found mine as he stood in the doorway between the two. His ashen face and terrified, wide, dark, foreboding eyes seared my soul. "There is a much bigger reason [than writing an article] that I am being asked to witness this," I thought to myself, "and I don't know why!"
There were approximately 20 witnesses in the stark room with three church-like pews on the other side of a large glass partition that separated us from Chris and the chair. I sat at the edge of my seat, my hand lying on the vomit bag placed beside each witness. I could feel my pulse quicken, my heart race, my mouth go dry as I began reacting to my surroundings. Chris stared through me. Into me. Our eyes and souls locked. I felt utterly helpless. "I love you, Chris. Go in peace!" I mouthed to a man I didn't know. I wanted to bring dignity to moments that had none.
After his last words asking forgiveness from 'anyone and everyone he had ever hurt in any way', the dark brown leather flap was placed over his eyes and face. I was frozen on the edge of my seat. I looked around the room in quiet desperation. The silence was eerie as we sat watching a human being be killed. It sent waves of nausea through me. As the 2200 volts of electricity burned through him, I gasped for breath, my mouth gaping open. His arms strained against the leather straps holding him tightly to the chair that was his deathbed. His clenched fists and forearms turned deep rolling shades of blue and purple. His body strained and convulsed. While he crossed over from life to death, I, too, transitioned in an inner explosion, an inner "knowing" of the true connection of all of us as human beings. It was a moment that could be called noetic and that changed the course of my life.
A few months later, I was awakened at 2:00 AM with words screaming inside me to come out. I struggled against them wanting to go back to sleep. However, it was as compelling a moment as any I have ever had. The clarity of the words spelled out an acronym and told me, "This is your calling, this is your life's purpose and message."
HOPE-HOWSE. Help Other People Evolve thru Honest Open Willing Self-Evaluation/Expression. It told me that we would have a logo consisting of an eye, a heart and a hand. The importance of the logo was because we were going to do a lot of work in prisons and the logo would bring positive energy when seen. The eye was about rigorous self-honesty; the heart was about faith and the hand about action or service to others. It was a simple psycho-spiritual model that simply said, "We are all One Heart." We all struggle.
So began a walk in the world with this new decree. On one hand, I didn't really know what I was doing on the other hand everything seemed so clear. The clarity was about seeing through people, just as Chris had seen through me before he was executed, to their hearts as well as their darkness knowing both were present.
Everyone whose path crossed with mine was simply a "human being" and in that we were connected with our human struggles - sex, prayer, money, emotions, life. The hand in the logo constantly reminded me that our hands are always to be extended to whomever crosses our path.
There was no other definition. I began traveling around the country visiting prisons and death rows, doing writing workshops and spiritual coaching. "A client of mine is on death row in Texas," an attorney called to share with me. "Can you visit him?" "Yes," I responded, and without hesitation, I went. It was a Jewish inmate who had not had a Jewish visitor in 17 years. Our four hours flew by. When the guard told us we had ten minutes left, I felt a panic. How does one end such a visit?! "When was the last time you said the Shema (the most important Jewish prayer)?" I asked Max. His eyes filled with tears gave me my answer. I put my hands, fingers spread in a fan, on the window separating us. He put his on the other side. "Shema Yisrael," I began as tears streamed down his cheeks and his lips mouthed words that had been dormant and stuck for so long.
"I'm in a motel downtown somewhere," the familiar voice on the other end informed me. "I need help." It was one of the girls who had participated in a HOPE-HOWSE writing program at a residential facility for kids-at risk. She had been prostituting to keep herself alive. "Of course you can come here," I said and took her in for five ¸ months until she got into the Jobs Corps. Members of the community helped with a job, clothing, food and support. It was "the community raises the child" in action not just words.
"My husband and I are nearing divorce. Our sex life is horrible and I think he is seeing someone else." The door was open for painfully honest work.
Sarah, ten years old, came to many of the HOPE-HOWSE gatherings where we simply brought people from all walks and Ways of life together. "I went around and looked everyone in the eyes," she told me. "I knew there were people there who had been in prison but everyone looked so nice."
A kitten was saved after some children almost killed it and joined three dogs already living in community of conscious caring.
I believe that is what Chris Berger taught me in his execution. The true Oneness of us all. The need for accountability. For honesty. For caring, thru actions about all of our neighbors. Last year I had to go back to work because I was about out of all resources that allowed me to simply serve without asking for money.
I went to work inside a super-maximum penitentiary as a mental health provider and I continue to find the goodness in all of us even where we least expect to find it and I find the darkness in those who have the courage to share who they really are. "Let's start with the worst of you and go from there," I like to begin because then we can create honesty, intimacy and connection for things human.
Originally Published in Institute of Noetic Sciences Review
IONS Review #63 March-May 2003
Reprinted with permission from the author.
jane davis is the founder of HOPE-HOWSE. She is at work on her first book, "Letters To my Master"© which tells her story, an unabridged story of a woman's journey from the developing sexuality of a little girl thru adulthood, the pride and confidence sports brought to her life, of the beginning, growth and recovery of alcoholism, surviving a family's demise, success in the business world, coming to terms with God and faith Judaism and Christianity, and the development of HOPE-HOWSE as a philosophy.
For more about HOPE-HOWSE got to http://www.hope-howse.org/