American Jedi Page #5

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is that we do encourage

people to do self-reflection.

Actually look inside yourself,

and recognize what

your strengths, and

your weaknesses are.

There is no emotion.

- There is peace.

- [Woman] There is peace.

- [Gabe] There is no ignorance.

- [Group] There is knowledge.

- There is no passion.

- [Group] There is serenity.

- [Gabe] There is no chaos.

- [Group] There is harmony.

- [Gabe] There is no death.

- [Group] There is the Force.

- [Gabe] The Force is with us.

- [Group] Always.

- [Jedi] When you deal with

binaries, it seems, at first,

that the task is to overcome the

problematic one, and

go to the solution.

It gets more

complicated than that.

We need both

emotion, and mastery.

We need inner peace, of course,

we also need our passions.

In the end we'll need both

sides of these things.

- Looking at the Jedi code,

I noticed that it is just making

a few statements

about how things are.

And not telling us

what we must do.

- There are a lot

of things about

the Christian religion,

that are problematic.

And one of them

happens to be the

way that many churches

regard homosexuality.

And, I can see

someone going from

Protestant, or

Catholic, Christianity,

into Jediism, simply

because of the acceptance,

that they may feel in

Jediism that they don't

feel in the Christian world.

- There is a huge

contrast between

being gay in the Catholic world,

and being gay in

the Jedi community,

and once I realized

my own sexuality

was gonna be an

issue, at first I had

reconciled to that

fact, that okay,

I'm gonna be gay,

but then, because

I'm Catholic, and I

respect that faith,

then, yes, I recognize that I'm

never gonna be with somebody.

I'm gonna just be

celibate the entire time.

Spiritually is a huge

part of who I am,

and the Jedi I saw

as the amalgamation

of all things spiritual.

They accept all of me.

I don't have to hide who I am.

- I think it's

tragic for the church

to lose people because of that,

but I embrace it,

that's why I embrace

something like

Jediism, because it

has potential of showing

us, as Christians,

why we're wrong on the

homosexuality issue.

Especially my denomination,

which is United Methodist.

- Jediism, for all

of its, sort of,

strange origins, is

accepting of people.

It has an openness to it.

Possibly because of

its newness, and for

some people that's

just the right fit.

- My name's Michael Hannigan.

I've been a Jedi for

over 20-ish years.

- So Michael Hannigan

will be coming

to hang out with

the Chicago Jedi,

before going to

the Jedi gathering.

Hannigan is also

testing this year.

- I have probably

been one of the most

controversial people

within the community.

If you talk to people

you either have a,

I love Hannigan,

I hate Hannigan.

There's some in between people,

but most people hit extremes.

And if you take Mace Windu,

from Star Wars movies,

like how he was,

multiply that by 10,

that's pretty much where I was.

- He's an aggressive

personality.

He's a unpredictable

personality.

He's about attention.

He's about perpetuating

his reputation,

of this disruptive

Force, in the community.

He can, then, I don't

know, take a swing at me,

because, hey now I

get to, you know,

further that reputation.

Oh, look at me, I'm the

crazy guy who swung on Opie.

- There he is!

- One of the things you must do,

if you are on the

path, is you have

to go down and

wrestle with a dark.

You have to go within

and find the darkness.

Now, if you have a

person, or a situation,

who has driven you

to that, you're

maybe even kind of

lucky, because then

you are drawn into it,

you engage with it.

And you learn,

hopefully, how to deal

with it, and how to lift

that up, from yourself.

- Opie, after many years.

- Here we are with their big...

- Here it is.

- Give me a hug.

- What you doing, buddy?

How was the trip?

- 18 hours, not bad.

I got to see a drunk person

spew at my first bus stop.

- [Friend] Lovely.

- Got to see some crazy

ass couple fights.

Nobody's ready to meet me

in real life, in some ways.

Like, they are not

ready for the...

You know, if you can see

me on ones, and zeroes,

on the computer, and

you have a completely

different impression,

versus when you meet

me in real life, and

you see that I'm more

full of energy,

there's no negativity.

I lost my dad.

He died, and I felt more

alone, and wanted to escape.

(fire sizzles)

And the one thing I

liked about, you know,

using drug use, was it

wasn't actually being high.

That part I couldn't tolerate.

But it was the side affect of

having absolutely no emotions.

That way, you know, I

didn't have to mourn.

I didn't have to

grieve, because, well,

you didn't have the

emotion to do so.

In fact, I didn't

have the emotions

until six months after

I stopped using drugs.

So, I'll say I went 2.5 years

being completely emotionless.

(somber ambient music)

- Many of us have

suffered it, and yet

hung on long enough

to be recognized

as being who we are.

Sometimes it's just our calling.

It's just our calling

to go through that.

It's a unique

spiritual experience,

that you are having.

- I think that the

negative energy

is going to be the

delusions that we have,

and the basic

delusion that we have

is assuming that everything

that we see is real.

This is taking

everything at face value.

This is the main delusion.

- Opie and I can have

a reality TV show,

where we live together,

for like a year.

- [Friend] You've already

got my money on both of you.

- And we have this

sponsorship, because

everybody would watch that.

How about this, for six

months out of the year,

we'll go to different Asian

countries for training,

the other six

months of the year,

we'll travel across

the United States,

and we'll bum out on

other Jedi's couches.

Picture Opie and

I going and doing

human weapon fight quest,

for like six months, right?

And then going across

the United States,

and training him

like different Jedi,

and doing the concept.

Like going to Ross' school.

And, you know, sparring

with Ross' people,

and then fighting each other.

- I'm still trying

to get the mental

image of you and him

strangling each other

out of my head, but keep going.

- We'll see what happens.

(laughs)

- [Friend] Opie's

still trying to

get the mental

image of you's two

trying to strangle each

other out of his head too.

- Anytime anybody asks me if

I did this, or I did that,

if I remember it, I

f***ing said that, I did.

If I don't remember it, sorry.

I really, truly, don't.

- Everybody's accountable

for what they say online.

- Once I went off on

Gabe, and Amy is the

one that I directly went off on.

- [Opie] Amy is in Moon Shadow?

- [Hannigan] Yes.

- Oh, you're a piece of garbage.

- [Hannigan] I know.

- What's the matter with you?

- You know, have I

been a jerk, a jag off?

I certainly have.

But, all I can do is say, yeah,

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