"They Stopped Their Ears"

But they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed together upon him. (Acts 8:54-57).

The story is about St. Stephen, who had just finished an eloquent defense of the Christian faith with some harsh words for his audience—and a vision of the glorified Jesus. Apparently it was too much for the crowd, and they reacted just like…

Well, just like us.

This seems to be the procedure in 21^st-century America. If you don’t like someone’s point of view, stop your ears. Express your opinion more loudly. In extreme cases, respond with violence.

It’s reprehensible. It’s no way to create a better world. And if you’re like me, you want to blame the people on the “other side” of the political or religious spectrum for this state of affairs.

I don’t think it’s just “them.”

I have several old friends who fall into the “them” camp. When I prepare to see them again, my mind dredges up every theological argument I can find to bolster my position, whatever the issue.

But why? Maybe my friends have changed, and we can talk civilly about issues that once inflamed us. Maybe the issues won’t come up. Maybe they’re just visiting because they want to see their old friends. Why can’t I just accept them as they are?

Hospitality, that bedrock Benedictine value, demands that I do. How can I receive someone as Christ if I’m expending all my energy thwarting imaginary arguments?

May God grant us the ability to keep our ears open, our voices quiet and our hearts attuned to the other—for it is through the other that God so often comes to us.

Speaking Evangelical

I wonder whether one of the evangelical movement’s greatest strengths is also its greatest weakness.

A recent visit by our new bishop brought this to mind. His sermon touched on the fundamentals of faith: the need for repentance, the love of God, the importance of prayer and Bible study. He expressed himself in very simple, unadorned, forthright language.

That’s the strength. Evangelical language has a way of cutting through the clutter. There is a back-to-basics feel about it that those of us who “think too much” can probably use from time to time. And have used: when asked to sum up his towering theology in one sentence, Karl Barth is reputed to have said, “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”

However…

As my sister-in-law says, “Words mean things.” Language clearly shapes our outlook. When you use simple language exclusively, it’s easy to start thinking that the whole world is simple.

Of course, it’s not. And that’s the limitation I’m seeing in evangelical language: it doesn’t seem to have the depth or complexity to address life’s gray matters and thornier issues. Like whether there’s a middle ground between biblical literalism and total disregard of the scriptures. Like how God can love everyone unconditionally and yet (seemingly) require a response before extending his mercy. Those issues call for more nuance, more subtlety, more complexity in one’s vocabulary.

Maybe that goes back to yet another simple aphorism: if your only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. Lord help us to fill out our toolbox.

If You Want Peace, Work for...

“If you want peace, work for justice,” says the bumper sticker. The religion section in last Saturday’s Times Union suggested another route—and it is dangerous.

Two articles in particular delivered the message:

• A column by Laurene C. O’Brien calling us not to demonize child molesters. While stressing the critical need to protect children, she writes, “If we give in to basic vengeful feelings and allow such offenders to become easy targets and modern-day lepers, we risk unleashing hatred and disgust. Such unchecked attitudes have the power to debase us all.”
• A profile of Virginia Miller and her involvement in Dances of Universal Peace, a group that expresses “the unity found behind all religions” through sacred movement in song. “It is an interfaith event,” she says, “and helps us gain knowledge of other religions as well as of our own religion.”
  

There’s no question that peace without justice is a chimera. Yet maybe the first step toward peace isn’t justice so much as compassion. Or simple openness: if I can let down my guard, even for a minute, and honestly look at the “other side” as a human being—with, surprise, many of the same dreams and cares I have—how can compassion not creep in? And if I start feeling compassion for this person, why would I want to wage war against her?

It sounds all so lovely and sunny and beautiful, but actually it’s fraught with danger. If I let my guard down, I can get wounded, perhaps mortally. (Ask any resident of Baghdad.) If I honestly look at the “other side,” it could disrupt—even overhaul—the whole infrastructure of my belief.

Even worse, I may start to have compassion for some very unpopular people. Jesus came under heavy fire for hanging out with “tax collectors and sinners.” Urging compassion for child molesters, or suspected terrorists, or avowed racists can do the same.

Maybe the key word in that bumper sticker is work. More than anything else, opening oneself to others is a discipline that requires constant practice. And it starts with opening oneself to God, who has the power to transform us into instruments of compassion—even as he can turn our lives upside down.

But if the end is peace—not the absence of war, but true shalom­—might the work be worth it?

The Forces That Move Us

A woman in Baghdad just can’t leave home. Abstinence-only programs are failing. People still worship, centuries after the Age of Reason.

What’s happening here?

A story in Tuesday’s newspapers recounts the life—and ultimately, the flight—of an Iraqi journalist. She tells of getting married a year ago, having a daughter, decorating a home of her own on a suburban Baghdad street. Slowly but surely, Iraq’s pervasive violence crept closer to her neighborhood. She and her husband moved temporarily to her in-laws’ home for safety reasons. And then,

Two days later, a car bomb exploded on our street. It blew out every window in our home. A chunk of the bomber’s car landed in our garage. And still we returned to our home.

And still we returned to our home.

South Africa, according to a monk at Mariya uMama weThemba, is deeply ambivalent about the issue of sex. On the one hand, the country’s AIDS rate is the highest in the world. On the other, pregnancy for young women is often celebrated as a sign of fertility—a trait our forebears have honored for millennia.

Home. Sex. Child bearing. In our highly mobile, “reasonable” Western world, I think we underestimate just how overwhelming—how tidal—these drives are. We also forget that they’re essentially good. The pull toward home perpetuates community. The hunger for sex binds us together while keeping the species alive. Child bearing (and rearing) preserves our sense of family.

The other side of being human, of course, is that we don’t always follow those drives indiscriminately. Ideally, we channel them toward the greater good. But their sheer force means that those who try to thwart them simplistically—think abstinence-only policies—may well doom their efforts to failure.

Then there’s the hunger for God. Two centuries after the Enlightenment, you might think reason would have driven religion to extinction. And yet billions of us will not, cannot, endure life without worship.

As you may have noticed, all the aforementioned drives hover around one even more fundamental imperative: connection—to home, family, neighbor. It is the connection at the very heart of God: the whole idea of the Trinity (and, perhaps, its complement in Hinduism) speaks directly to connection, to community. And as it does, it reflects the connection that, from Genesis to Revelation to 2006, God so ardently desires with all of us.

African Time (and What It Might Mean for South Africa)

South Africa struggles with its tendency to operate on “African time.” Brother Timothy at Mariya uMama weThemba describes African time this way: whatever needs to be done, “it will happen, when it happens, if it happens.” Many South Africans (business people mostly, I suspect) are trying to push their country to move away from African time so it can meet the requirements of efficiency and productivity that drive Western businesses.

That is all well and good: South Africa’s standard of living depends on it. But I also think there are lessons to be learned from African time.

The personal lessons are clear enough. After just two weeks in a culture where things take extra time and often happen imperfectly, I’ve found myself learning to accept it with an easy grace. I’m not sure I would react the same way in the U.S. I know many Americans wouldn’t: we are, by culture, an impatient people.

Right now, so are many poor South Africans. It has been 12 years since the ANC took the reins of government, and the lot of the poor has improved little, if at all. Coping with poverty takes a terrible toll on one’s psyche, so the impatience is understandable—and leaders surely need to respond.

And yet I wonder whether African time, in another way, applies to South Africa itself. One thing I have begun to appreciate while here is just how slowly social change takes place. After the exhilaration of dramatic reversals—whether the end of apartheid or the fall of the Soviet Union—comes the hard, grinding work of making life better. Maybe the sheer immensity of the task makes the slow pace of change inevitable. Even the U.S. took a couple of decades after 1776 to get its government down pat.

So what’s the import of all this? How do you convince a people that social change “happens on African time”? Is it even moral to do so? Can you do it and still hold leaders strictly accountable to improve the lot of their people with all due speed? And how important is this balancing act of managing expectations to keep an entire nation on course?

In South Africa I Heard a Voice

The poor in South Africa walk everywhere. They really have no choice. Drive on any road, no matter how remote, and you’re bound to see people walking alongside it.

I believe God used that experience to impress something on my soul.

One day at Mariya uMama weThemba monastery, I went for a run down the rutted, pockmarked road that leads up the mountain. As usual, I tried to pray as I ran; as usual, I could not keep my mind on anything. The intense South African sun kept my eyes squarely on the hardscrabble road. Finally, in one of my bursts of mid-prayer-failure honesty, I just thought, “Forget it. I can’t pray. I can’t do anything, except stare at the damned road.”

And I could sense the voice of God saying to me, “It’s OK. I am in the road too. I must be, to support the feet of the poor as they walk and walk.”

I cannot escape that sense of panentheism—God in everything—as I travel through South Africa. The monastery chapel window commands a view over the veld on the big sweeping hills, and over and over I have sensed a deep closeness between that view and the God who made it. No wonder primitive humans, viewing their surroundings with awe, considered them the work of a local god.

Our worldview has grown larger, but the connection remains. Now, we see that all creation hums with the One who created it. Which makes everything alive in ways we cannot imagine.

And it makes God present in ways we cannot imagine. To desire such closeness with us that he even supports the poor as they walk—and gives hope to all of us. Love so close. This truly is a God worth knowing.

How Important Are You?

You don’t have to be important to be important.

As strange as that sounds, you can see the truth of it throughout the stories of the church. Take the famous passage from Ecclesiasticus 44:

Let us now praise famous people, our ancestors in their generations. The Lord gave them great glory, his majesty from the beginning….Of others there is no memory; they died as though they had never been born; and their children after them. But these also were godly people, whose good deeds have not been forgotten.

This kind of invisibility has, paradoxically, brought sainthood to some. The life’s work of St. Monica was, as the Catholic Encyclopedia puts it, “to have literally wrestled with God for the soul of her son”—St. Augustine. While St. Willibrord, whom we celebrated November 7, helped convert the people of the Netherlands, he also paved the way for the tireless and more widespread evangelism of St. Boniface.

Clearly, for some people, a large part of the mission is simply to prepare the way for the full flowering of God’s action in a particular time and place. The contributions of others, however, are even more obscure—like yours and mine.

Which makes the words of Ecclesiasticus so profoundly comforting. Most of us are part of the teeming masses whose lives will not appear in any history book. And yet that should not stop us from living faithfully—for those faithful actions, however small they seem, might just resound through the ages.

I Have a Religious Objection to Cellphones

One day, after lunch at the Calabash in Grahamstown, South Africa, we held a door open for another couple. As we did, they asked us where we were from. That chance question led to a 45-minute conversation about crime in South Africa, the current government, their children’s struggles with boarding school, their current lifestyle (he has left the 80-hour weeks behind to work part-time and live here), etc. Who knows? Maybe they needed to express a lot of that, and the conversation did them good. In any event, we learned even more about the extraordinary place that South Africa is.

If we had been on cellphones when we opened that door, we would have missed all that—and the door would have closed in their faces.

Multiply that by several hundred, and you might understand my eccentric objection. Through the habitual use of cellphones, we’re suddenly living our lives somewhere else, all the time. What’s more, it’s even difficult to pay full attention to the person on the other end of the line.

Paying attention to the here, and the now, that God has given us is a priority in many spiritual traditions. When we pay attention, we give our entire selves to the matter at hand. We might be surprised by what unfolds before us. Most important, we tune our heart to pay attention to God, wherever he might choose to encounter us. What better way to cultivate a friendship with God than to be prepared—at every moment—to hear his voice?

Accept What Is

It was my first day at Mariya uMama weThemba monastery in South Africa. I had gone there, as I posted earlier, to “live with people from another country and lend a hand where asked.”

To that point, no one had asked.

My wife was using her library science skills to help catalog the monks’ library. But there seemed to be no task for me. And all those feelings of uselessness came to the surface. “What will happen if I’m not ‘productive’ today? Why can’t they find me something to do? Why is doing so important anyway?”

Perhaps it isn’t.

As it turned out, that was part of the wisdom that the day held for me. It was enough to try to recover from a growing respiratory infection, to do what I could to rest and recuperate, perhaps even to write things whose value I could never comprehend.

It was, in truth, the same old lesson that I had heard a thousand times already. And I must hear it again and again and again, because I clearly haven’t learned it yet. It is such a simple lesson: accept what is.

Accept what is.

What Vocation Looks Like, or Why Am I Writing This Blog?

Way back when, in the very first post, I half-kiddingly wrote that “God told me to start a blog.”

Did he really?

I have many, many doubts about this call to write. Somehow my musings don’t seem useful (but in what sense of the word?). Sometimes I seem to be casting about for topics. Sometimes I’m not sure whether I’m “supposed” to write when I don’t “feel” the movement of the Spirit.

And yet…

Whenever I sit down to write an entry, I feel a verve running through me—an aliveness, if you will. A sense that this is precisely the right thing to do at precisely this stage of my life. I do not know where this is headed. I do not know whether a book will come out of it, or an avocation in spiritual writing, or nothing at all. I seem to have been left with nothing but the writing itself.

Perhaps this is what vocation looks like. You find out a little at a time. You feel your way in the dark. You remain faithful to what you’ve been asked to do, with no concern for results.

And who said “did he really?” in the first place? Was it not the serpent?

Why Silence?

My monastery has a practice called The Great Silence. From 9:00 at night till after Eucharist the next morning, no one speaks (except when necessary).

Why?

Perhaps most obviously, silence creates a home for the spiritual life. By silencing the sounds of the everyday—both our penchant for talk and the constant noise of our culture—it allows the voice of God to come through. As we settle into silence, we quite naturally listen more attentively, tilling the soil into which God sows his word.

When silence is practiced, it usually comes with a certain “sign language” that helps monastery visitors pass the butter at the breakfast table. I’ve wondered, though, what would happen if we didn’t use any means to communicate. We might miss out on the butter—and learn to enjoy our meal without it. We might not be able to communicate something important—only to find out it’s not that important after all.

We might, in short, accept what is in front of us as gift, no more, no less. It is only one short step from there to gratitude, which opens our heart in just the way God needs in order to do his work.

A Meditation for Thanksgiving (One Day Late)

This morning’s email included an eloquent Thanksgiving meditation from Rabbi Michael Lerner, editor of Tikkun magazine. (I can’t find it on the Tikkun website; if you’d like a copy, email me.) He encouraged his readers to respond with their own meditations. Having just returned from South Africa—and seen the brutal poverty that still plagues so many of its people—I found the following response recurring in my thoughts during Thanksgiving Day.

To the One Who provides all things:

“Thank you for this food” is such a throwaway phrase. Yet here, now, on this Thanksgiving, I see the why behind it. I have met people who struggle to put even a daily meal on their tables, let alone “three squares.” I have seen the places where hunger haunts those who have so long felt the haunt of oppression. The memory of them makes the feast before me an embarrassment. Yet this feast is Your gift to me, just as their memory is Your gift to me. I bless you for both: the abundance You share with me and those I love, the common humanity that binds me with the hungry ones. May my remembrance of each—and my gratitude for both—never cease.

The Newspaper Lectionary for Oct 28

This isn’t exactly an approved spiritual discipline, but lately I’ve been reading the Saturday religion articles in my local newspaper as lectionary readings. As you’d expect with a lectionary, each Saturday brings three main articles, and the topics are only loosely connected—or not at all. The point is to read them prayerfully and see what bubbles to the surface.

Here’s what came out of today’s “readings”:

• A column about the more difficult side of the Bible, particularly familial conflicts and God’s action therein: Abraham, Sarah and Hagar, Jacob and Esau, etc. The writer, Phyllis Trible of Wake Forest University Divinity School, notes, “As disturbing as they are, these stories disclose life in all its configurations. They give voice to struggle, hurt and fear. They permit railings at God. They also show ‘more excellent ways,’ through contrast and juxtaposition, and offer an authentic narrative by which to measure life.”
• An article about a Kenyan pastor building an orphanage for children who have lost parents to AIDS. His quote: “Christianity isn’t just about going to church; it’s about living as Jesus did and demonstrating his good deeds through yourself. I’m getting up there in years and want to give my energy to people all over the world, before it runs out.”
• A brief report of an online survey in which 97 percent of respondents say they speak to God—and more than 90 percent say God speaks to them.
  

Disconnected? Sure, somewhat. But there is a thread here. The God we worship is utterly mysterious and sometimes disturbing. His actions in the world often baffle us, as when he is present—or absent?—amid terrible conflict. Moreover, following this God requires a complete conversion of our lives: a giving over of ourselves to the service of others.

And yet—and yet—nearly everyone continues to seek connection with this God.

I suspect there are two reasons. One harks back to St. Peter’s timeless phrase: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” Indeed, there is no one else who encompasses the world and every creature therein.

Somehow, that encompassing brings profound comfort to the soul. And perhaps it is because we sense, more deeply than anything else, that this presence loves us, deeply, completely. Which is the other reason why we never seem to give up on union with God: because we know, without knowing, that the world is all about God, and God is love.

No Blog for Six Weeks?

In blog years, it’s been an age. Six weeks between entries. Clearly, I’ve been irresponsible.

Or have I? To be sure, blogging has become an important spiritual discipline for me. Maybe, though, there are times when the lack of blogging is just as important—or more so. Maybe that time is better spent listening to the silence. And maybe that’s true for readers as well as for bloggers.

I do have an entry or two to post, and I will do so soon. In the meantime, I hope you have enjoyed the silence. Next time I go silent for a while, consider it an invitation to do the same.

The Mono Diaries

About a month ago, I was diagnosed with mononucleosis. If you’ve ever had it, you know the exhaustion that pervades your days. Some days it’s hard to do anything but work and sleep. Daily naps are highly recommended. Not exactly the productivity that our culture requires—or even the active ministry that the church holds out as an example of godly living.

Therein lies the problem.

When I can’t bring myself to engage in extracurricular activities—when it’s even hard to keep my mind on prayer—I tend to feel vulnerable, useless, even slothful. The temptation is to fight it: to try exercising or forgo the naps or just do. And yet the only treatment (it’s a virus, so there is no cure) is to rest. Frequently.

For weeks.

Which creates an interesting spiritual effect. It strips away all the layers of my being—all the things from which I can derive my value—and leaves me with just me, and God. No holy feelings or inspired insights, just a naked soul looking at God, and God looking at the soul.

Maybe it’s the most basic connection we can have with the Divine. And maybe it’s the most dynamic too. In any event, it requires a sea change of thought—a repentance, if you will. “Be still and know that I am God” (Ps 46:10). At times like this, you realize how utterly countercultural “being still” is—and how rich a spiritual treasure. Perhaps it is then, in a way unlike any other, that God pours himself into the soul.

The FEAR of the Lord?

What does it mean to fear God?

Many commentators tell us to read fear as reverence, but I think that’s too simple. At several times in my life, I have come face to face with situations where fear was exactly the right word.

One jumps immediately to mind. After a season where I endured intense family illness and other trials, a beloved church leader—someone whom I admired immensely—dropped dead in the prime of life. He had contributed so much to the life of the church, and by all appearances he had so much more to give. Yet there we were at his funeral, all of us in shock, and I couldn’t help but wonder, “Who is this God, anyway?”

In short, I felt fear. What would this God do next? How many more blows could I accept from his hand?

And yet, somehow, fear is not the end of the story. If it were, we would have to spend our days in neurotic appeasement of God—or simply run away from spirituality altogether. Instead, I cannot shake the thought—the reality—that God’s obvious and extravagant love ultimately trumps that fear. St. John said it himself: “Perfect love casts out fear” and, at his core, “God is love.”

This fear/love dynamic must be what the disciples experienced after Jesus’ strange discourse on “I am the bread of life.” It was so hard to hear that many followers turned away. Yet when Jesus asked his closest friends, “Will you too go away?” they answered with a semi-exasperated, semi-tender, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

Yes, this fear of God is a good thing: it is a sharp reminder of who we are and who God is. But maybe I experience that fear because I am not (by any means) perfect in love. Maybe, then, the fear of God is simply a guide on our path to perfect love, much as the law was our guide to the cross. And when we perfectly rest in the love of God—maybe only after death—fear fades away.

Radical Acceptance: How Far Can We Go?

The church should be a safe place for all people—a place where they feel embraced for who they are.

That sounds like a wonderful vision for the church. It is also one loaded statement, thanks to the little word all. Consider:

• A few years ago, a local teenage girl was implicated as an accomplice in one of our region’s most brutal murders. The press coverage was nonstop, and she became a bête noire. Some months later, she showed up at the church we then attended. The church leadership politely asked her not to return. Should they have?
• A couple in the same church went through a bitter divorce, and his inappropriate conduct played a major role. Both left the church; after a year or two, he suddenly reappeared in the back pew, obviously a broken man. Should we have welcomed him back?
• If Osama bin Laden showed up in your church next Sunday, clearly wanting to be there, would you welcome him? Should you welcome him?

I suspect the answers are no, yes, and yes, respectively. But there is nothing easy about these situations.

The Bible, on this issue, seems at odds with itself. Leviticus seems to exclude some people solely on the basis of certain disabilities. Jesus clearly shared the company of prostitutes and riffraff. God is love, to be sure, yet in many passages he appears to demand a response from us before extending his mercy.

I wonder whether C. S. Lewis’s The Last Battle holds a glimpse of the answer. (I’m working from memory, so bear with me here.) As Aslan the lion (symbolizing God) leads his followers into heaven, the direction is “farther up and further in.” Some of those followers, beset by doubts and grumblings, enter heaven but stop—permanently—right inside the door, going no farther. Only those who are willing to follow Aslan end up going “farther up and further in.”

And maybe that is the message to “all” people. Come. You are welcome here—always. You will experience God’s love here—always. And this God invites you on a journey that will consume your life in joy…that will mold you into your best self. To embark on this journey, you will need to respond. The specific response is up to God. So respond when you’re ready. Until then, welcome.

Here’s the magic part. You know what happens when they respond to God—or even want to respond to God? God responds to them. That opens up the soul to a greater response, and God responds to that. It’s a wonderful spiral that takes the soul “farther up and further in.” All the church has to do is provide a safe place for that to happen...and a light but guiding hand along the way.

On the Wrong End of Exclusion

A visit with an old college friend turned tense—and I had a small, fleeting glimpse into what it’s like to be excluded for who you are.

I had worried about this visit from the start. Quite simply, she did not approve of certain areas of our life (my wife’s and mine) and would prefer that we never talk about them—especially to people she’s trying to impress. This became an issue on Saturday night, when we dined with a good friend of hers. This good friend has a bevy of animals, as do we, so I started to talk about them. Meanwhile, College Friend tried desperately to stop me from mentioning our guinea pigs, who are a delight to my wife and me and a balm to our souls.

They are a part of who I am. She rejects that part. I feel anger for her rejection, shame that maybe our lives aren’t good enough, loathing for our small crappy house and these “rats” in our basement.

Is this what it’s like to be rejected for being you?

Look, I’m a straight white male with a good career, so I don’t get this very often. But it made me think about people who experience it a lot, on a far more substantial level: people routinely slighted for their color, their gender, their sexual orientation, their stand on abortion, you name it.

The prevailing culture is good enough at this. Why should the church follow suit? Shouldn’t the church be a safe place for all people—a place where they feel embraced for who they are?

I know how basic, and perhaps naïve, this sounds. But the next part isn’t so basic: how do we practice radical acceptance? It’s a thorny issue, and we’ll look at it in the next post.

Mindfulness and Guinea Pigs

How can a baby guinea pig teach you about Benedictine values, like mindfulness, obedience, and balance?

I love raising guinea pigs because they provide excellent training for life. Just by living, they deepen our acceptance of sex, death, and miracles. Just by needing to be fed—every single day—they force us out of ourselves every single day. They give and receive love freely.

And yes, they teach Benedictine values. One of our sows recently had a litter that I suspect was premature. After three days, the babies stopped gaining weight, and it became clear that they needed a nutritional boost. So we started hand-feeding them with kitten milk replacer through a syringe, twice a day.

That’s trickier than it sounds. It is very easy to squirt the fluid in too fast—and send it into their respiratory instead of their digestive system. At that age, such a mistake is usually fatal. To avoid this, you feed leisurely, let them lead, and focus exclusively on what you’re doing.

In other words, you feed mindfully. You obey by letting another of God’s creatures lead you—and express the will of God for you in that moment. You feed leisurely and thereby appreciate life’s balance. It doesn’t get more Benedictine than that.

The Silent, Tectonic Movement of God

Sometimes I’m awestruck by the silent, yet tectonic, way God moves in the soul.

Here’s one very small example. While extremely fruitful, the dialogue with my friend Bill, which I’ve mentioned in my last few blog entries, left me exhausted and tense. It was a familiar feeling: the recent wrangling in the Episcopal Church—and my internalizing of it over the course of the summer—had generated the same feelings. At the same time, the dearth of my writing efforts resulted in a vague malaise, as though I desperately needed exercise and hadn’t done any lately.

Not that I really knew any of this at the beginning of the week. At best, I had a vague apprehension of some of it.

And yet, without even noticing it at first, I lingered long over Morning Prayer each day this week. The Office has taken me about half again as long as it usually does. And I don’t think my neurosis about “getting it right” was the cause. Looking back, I think God was drawing me into a deeper experience of prayer, of him, to refresh my soul and get me back to writing.

Apparently it worked. Last night my ill-at-ease feeling came to a head, and I realized I needed to write. This is my third blog entry for the morning. Clearly, I needed this—but I needed the deeper prayer first, to reconnect me to the source. And the source himself led me there.

How Close IS God?

Several weeks ago, I was blessed with one of those sudden, striking insights that leaves you wondering about its source. I’m also wondering exactly what it says about the presence of God.

It came during one of my long-distance drives, which I often use to engage in centering prayer. Rather, I try to engage: my focus on God quickly wanders to my work, our animals, the farms I’ve driving past—anything but God. At some point, I usually snap out of it, chide myself, and refocus on God…only to have the whole thing happen again. If you’ve ever tried centering prayer, you know the drill.

During one of the “chide sessions” on this particular drive, the thought suddenly hit me: “Why are you worried about your focus? It’s all God. It all leads back to God.”

Yow.

Well…yeah. We do believe that the Holy Spirit is always with us, that God permeates heaven and earth. Matthew Fox, commenting on the sermons of Meister Eckhardt, calls it panentheism: the idea that God is in everything. (Contrast that with pantheism, in which God is everything.) If panentheism is true, anything that crosses our mind in prayer is permeated with God’s presence; every “distraction” has the potential to lead us back to God, if we let it.

Certainly, there’s value in clearing distractions and being present to God more intentionally. But perhaps panentheism takes the pressure off us as we seek God in centering prayer. And who knows? Maybe these “distractions” can unveil a view of God we might never have found any other way.

Dialogue in the Real World

I mentioned that I’ve been corresponding with an old, cherished friend from my days in Massachusetts. As it turns out, we hold conflicting views on some very basic matters of faith—he, for instance, believes the Bible is literally true, word for word; I see the matter differently. But we have always managed to maintain our “bonds of affection” while discussing things energetically, often vehemently.

Could we do it again? And if we could, would it mean anything for the church?

Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve e-mailed back and forth on the whole inerrancy issue and some associated hot buttons, like gay ordination. To be honest with you, it was rough. It was so easy to let the emotions take over, so tempting to fire back a heated response. Some of Bill’s words stung; others were just hard to read because they reflected a perspective so at odds with my own.

And yet…

I learned some things I didn’t know. When Bill reads the Bible, he takes into account things like cultural context, use of literary devices, etc.—just like me. Maybe he’s different from most “inerrantists,” but I didn’t think they did that sort of thinking. Maybe I was wrong; maybe I need to explore their perspective further.

More important, Bill never lost sight of the fact that we were both seeking truth, both worshiping the same God. The guy hangs out with a lot of people who don’t share his worldview—and they maintain “bonds of affection.” So did we: we closed this part of our discussion by agreeing that love gives us the freedom to disagree while holding us together. Next week we’ll move on to another topic.

Hear me correctly. We’re not some wonderful paragons of virtue. But, by the grace of God, we did manage to have a dialogue, learn some things, grow some more, and come out friends. If a couple of everyday schleps like us can do that, is there still hope for the church?

The Beauty of the Errant Bible

In the last few weeks, an old and very dear friend got in touch with me after 20-some years apart. At one point in our lives, we pondered the mysteries of God together, and through the magic of email he has picked up the discussion once again. His last email described his belief in biblical inerrancy, and in my reply, I had the opportunity to spin out a thought that I’ve long treasured but never articulated. Here it is:

It's funny, because I've had a very different experience with the whole idea of inerrancy. Somewhere along the line (couldn't really pinpoint when), I started letting go of the idea of word-for-word, everything-literal inerrancy, and for me it opened up a depth of the Bible that I never knew. All of a sudden, God could speak in metaphor, in poetry, in stories that didn't have to be factually true but still delivered a message that was truer than any fact (if such a thing is possible). I could start exploring who wrote this letter or that book, who they were writing to, and just what they were trying to say that maybe I missed the first time round. In some strange way the words became more alive to me. At this point, I couldn't say whether most of the Bible is factually true, but then it doesn't matter to me--because it's true nonetheless.

Here's a rather innocuous example: the Magnificat. Did Mary really utter those exact words? From one standpoint, it's kind of doubtful: illiterate peasant women just don't tend to go around saying stuff like that. But...whether she did or didn't, those words do reveal something wonderful about the character of Mary herself--and say absolutely amazing things about God: the God who turns things upside down, the God the prophets knew.

People From Another Country

This past weekend, while visiting my wife’s relatives, I picked up an article from the religion section of the local newspaper. The writer describes a young friend who is going to Mexico on a mission trip. What really grabbed me was her description of mission: “They are not vacationing but, rather, seeking to live with people from another country and lend a hand where asked.”

Initially this struck me because my wife and I are planning such a trip. We will stay in a South African monastery while she, an archivist, catalogs their library and helps establish their archives. Rather than have any specific goal, however, I relish the thought of simply “living with people from another country and lending a hand where asked.” When that happens, the other people set the agenda; we share, not our opinions or our ideologies or our cultural biases, but simply ourselves.

Whenever I read that one sentence from the article, I kept wanting to read it as “lend a hand where needed.” But that’s not as helpful. Needs are open to interpretation; I can decide what you need and try to provide it—and that won’t help. But when it’s “where asked,” I have to wait for you.

But does one really have to travel to be present to others like this? In a way, we are all “people from another country” to one another—people with vastly different perspectives, ideas, and values. So if each time we encounter someone, what would happen if we simply lived with them, remained present with them, and listened? Perhaps nothing would happen. Or perhaps we would be available just when they need us.

Hidden Lessons from General Convention

I’m profoundly disappointed. So, it seems, is just about everyone else. And maybe that’s the single best thing to come out of the Episcopal Church’s General Convention.

After days of discussion, the convention passed Resolution B033, which calls for restraint in consecrating bishops “whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church.” That “wider church,” in the form of the Windsor Report, had called for an outright moratorium on the consecration of gay and lesbian bishops.

“Liberals,” like me, are disappointed that it’s a step back from full inclusion of gays and lesbians in the church. “Conservatives” complain that it leaves too much room for the church to go forward in ordaining gays and lesbians.

Do I detect the aroma of the will of God in here?

Might it be a stroke of divine brilliance to allow passage of a resolution that ticks everyone off? Might God be using that disappointment and anger to give us a jolt, force us out of our own heads, and consider new ways to be the worldwide church?

Maybe it’s just me. This morning, mulling over my own disappointment, I realized that I’ve become too attached to the results of this Convention. It’s taken over too much of my thought life, as though the entirety of human history depended on its outcome. And though I have prayed for God’s wisdom to prevail, I ended up surprised when that wisdom turned out so much different from anything I had thought.

Maybe what I’m saying, bottom line, is that I didn’t quite let God be God enough.

Please don’t get me wrong. The issues considered at General Convention are very important. They touch on things at the heart of our faith: issues of justice, of mercy, of just how you interpret Scripture, of how we can disagree and still be the church.

That last part is important, because technically, as of right now, we’re still all related to one another, church-wise. And because of that, we have to keep talking—and listening—to those we so deeply disagree with. It’s such hard work. It hurts like hell sometimes. But I really think that dialogue, and prayer, will be the only things that see us through.

Gays and the Episcopal Church

Since this week’s Episcopal General Convention is deliberating the issues that have roiled its “parent” body, the Anglican Communion, I figured it was high time to read the Windsor Report. This report looks at the recent controversy over gay union and consecration—specifically, what it’s done to the worldwide church’s unity-in-diversity—and recommends a course of action for healing. I found it a mature, nuanced, thoughtful document, and maybe it provides a basis for all of us, pro- and anti-gay consecration, to go forward together.

What really grabbed my attention, however, was Paragraph 135 of the report:

We particularly request a contribution from the Episcopal Church (USA) which explains, from within the sources of authority that we as Anglicans have received in scripture, the apostolic tradition and reasoned reflection, how a person living in a same gender union may be considered eligible to lead the flock of Christ.

OK, I’m Episcopalian. I believe in the validity of Gene Robinson’s ordination. And I’m just nervy enough to think my perspective counts. So here goes:

1. So much of this comes down to how you read the Bible. Many believers read it literally and ahistorically: that is, every word (by and large) is not only true, but also meant to apply to all believers at all times. These are good people, and their faith is genuine. But once you dig deeper into this approach, you run into trouble—and the controversy over homosexuality is an ideal example.
2. In the entire Bible, there are perhaps five to seven isolated passages (or individual verses) that touch on homosexuality. Two of them—the creation story and the Sodom/Gomorrah story—can support a wide range of interpretations, not just a condemnation of homosexuality. The two condemnations in the Jewish law are clear enough; however, if we take the Jewish law literally, as applying to us, we also need to exclude people with disabilities from worship and stop wearing polyester blends. St. Paul condemns homosexuality twice, and I’ll admit that his passages give me a bit more trouble. But it’s interesting to note that he mentions the issue almost in passing.
3. On the other side of the scales, the Bible as a whole repeatedly speaks to the value of mercy. “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” “Love one another as I have loved you.” For all God’s Old Testament punishments, ultimately his orientation is one of love, restoration, healing. And even those punishments tell us something here: God directs so much more of his anger and grief to injustice, ill treatment of the poor, and worship of other gods than to sex in general, let alone homosexuality.
4. What does this emphasis mean? To be sure, we as believers cannot tolerate certain behaviors, but right now we’re focusing on the wrong ones. Far better to speak prophetically to, say, the rising gap between rich and poor, the world’s all too frequent genocides, the abuse of children, and our obsession with celebrity and consumer culture. On the mercy side, we ought to be trying to see just how big a tent we can make our faith. Why not err on the side of acceptance, rather than exclusion?
5. Now let’s turn to reasoned reflection. The evils that I’ve just described have something in common: they clearly serve to dehumanize those made in God’s image. A reverence for materialism, for instance, completely neglects the rich spirituality inside all of us; as that spirituality withers, our capacity for mercy and cooperation evaporates. Child abuse and the others are obvious in their maltreatment of human beings. Now let me pose this question: how does a loving, committed, monogamous relationship between two people of the same gender inflict dehumanization? Based on the gay couples I’ve known, I just don’t see it; if anything, they elevate the humanity of each other and those around them.
6. To show mercy, display commitment, and elevate the humanity of those around you: aren’t those precisely the type of qualities we want in any clergy person, especially a bishop? Don’t they qualify such a person, regardless of sexual orientation, to lead the flock of Christ?
   

Let me make it clear: I am exactly one person, with exactly one voice. So there’s every chance I’m all wet in some part of this or another. But this is intended, not to be the final word by any means, but to contribute one small strand to the dialogue that will fashion our response to the Windsor Report. May it help to bring healing to our brothers and sisters worldwide.

Loving Those We Have Seen

It’s funny how you can hear the same Scripture passage for years, and then one day it reveals a completely different insight. The readings from a few Sundays ago included this snippet from 1 John:

“If we do not love others whom we have seen, how can we claim to love God whom we have not seen?”

When I heard the verse read out loud, it suddenly struck me as backwards—and I realized that I’ve come to consider loving God as the easier of the two. God is gentle, loving, perfect: someone, in short, who’s easy to love. Taken from another angle, God is invisible, so it’s easy to make of him and his will what I want. That makes for a smoother relationship.

But it’s not love.

Maybe that’s why other people are the real proving ground of love. They’re right in our face, with all their warts and imperfections and annoying habits and offensive opinions. It takes a deliberate choice, made over and over, minute by minute, to put oneself aside and love these people.

And maybe that is easier. Because with human beings, at least we’re dealing with a semi-known quantity. So if we can learn to love them in that self-denying way, maybe it’s the first step to doing the same with the utterly ineffable God: the God whose actions in the world are infinitely more bewildering and, sometimes, disheartening. To put oneself aside for that kind of God takes practice—exactly the practice we get with one another.

Lending an Ear...to Everyone

Two ordinary events occurred in my life over the past two days, and I think there’s an extraordinary connection between them.

On Friday, I was reading posts on an e-mail list of advertising creatives (it’s associated with www.commercial-archive.com) when I discovered that one of our regulars is a Gnostic priest. Knowing absolutely nothing about Gnosticism, I asked him about it, and he referred me to some posts on his blog, like egina.blogspot.com/2004/12/gnosticism-101.html. I was delighted to discover how much our faiths share: the ineffability and the immediacy of God, the need to seek God out, the importance of Jesus, etc.

Then, on Saturday, I ran into a young woman from our old (Reformed) church in the local supermarket. Her faith could be described as evangelical Christian, and it always touches me, because she experiences God so intimately and so enthusiastically. We discussed the new pastor, his passion for Bible and spiritual studies, her praying for (and receiving) direction on a new job opportunity, etc.

Now here’s the connection: If you were to put all their beliefs side by side with all of mine, we certainly wouldn’t agree on everything. On some things, we might disagree vehemently. But I find that, when I listen, it gives my own faith an opportunity to expand. There might be something in Jordan’s Gnosticism, or Beth’s evangelicalism, that sheds light on a mystery, gives me a new perspective on an old issue, or simply reveals another detail about how God works.

That means that we do ourselves an injustice when we refuse to listen. Of course, refusing to listen is our stock in trade as Americans these days. Somehow that forces us to focus narrowly on the issues that separate us—and ignore the far broader common ground that we share.

God’s way too big for any of us to understand. We need all the help we can get: from people on every side of every creed. That requires some intense listening. I hope, as this blog develops, that it becomes a place where that kind of listening can happen.

St. Dunstan and Our "Ordinary" Lives

During our usual Wednesday mass at St. Paul’s in Albany, our priest delivered a homily on St. Dunstan, who served as Archbishop of Canterbury in 960. Among his many accomplishments, Dunstan apparently reformed the monastic culture of his day and engaged fully in the details of everyday life, from politics to metalworking. Why? Because all life belonged to God, not just time spent in prayer or worship or “Christian service.”

For me, this had a familiar and comforting ring. The Rule for Associates at Holy Cross Monastery, where I have made my spiritual home, includes a section on balance as a monastic value. The section begins with “Our ordinary life is our spiritual life.” Another passage refers to the fact that “all life is holy.”

Of course, it’s easy to say this. But what joy, and freedom, come in those occasional times when I can get myself to live it. There is a freedom to relax, to be present to whatever crosses my path, to accept the now as God’s gift and respond to it accordingly. At the end of the day, I can look back and see that my activities—while often insufficient for my silly standards—harmonize well with God’s.

It’s life as pull. Our culture, by contrast, drives us into life as push: we plan out everything to the second, feel compelled to accomplish more than one day can possibly hold, ignore what’s in front of us because we’re on our way to the next thing.

It does cost to get off the merry-go-round. Maybe we’re not as efficient, or we get less done. But if we don’t get off, we lose something of the richness of God. And that richness is surely worth savoring.

What If This Is It?

Last month, I joined my family in attending a memorial service for my parents, both of whom died last year. More precisely, we attended memorial services: one for the public, and a more intimate one for just the family. The family service consisted of walking in the rain up a small hill to a memory garden; there my nephew placed the urn with my parents' ashes in a small hole, and we proceeded to cover it with earth.

As I stared at the urn with the dirt on top, a thought struck me with full force. This is it. No matter what we do, where we go, we all end up here.

Over the years, I've come to believe that a deep acceptance of death--our own death--is a game-changer in life. The resurrection, the reality of life beyond the grave, makes that all the more true. If our ultimate destiny is union with God, nothing can rob us of our freedom in this life. In any given situation, what's the worst that can happen? We'll die and go to God! Big deal! It allows us not to worry about status or success, but simply to hear and do the will of God, regardless of the consequences.

But this thought was different. Even if we end here--if somehow God created the cosmos so there is no resurrection--it is enough. Enough, that is, to follow God throughout this earthly life, with no thought of reward. The relationship itself, the chance to pour oneself out in doing good: these are reward enough.

Allow Me to Introduce Myself...

This blog is not about me. Nonetheless, you might want to know where I’m coming from, at least from a spiritual standpoint.

At the most basic level, I am a Christian, specifically an Episcopalian. For the last 10 years I’ve read and pondered some of the deeper thinkers of the contemplative life—people like Thomas Merton, Meister Eckhart, Teresa of Avila. This interest has led me deeper into monastic and contemplative practices, like silent and centering prayer.

About a year ago, I became an “associate” of Holy Cross Monastery in West Park, New York, an Episcopal order. In essence, associates take a modified version of the Rule of Life that the monks live by, and tailor it to their life in the world. So, for instance, I’ve committed myself to daily prayer of various sorts, spiritual reading, life balance, and being present to those around me, but I still own a house, love my wife, and run a business (as I mentioned before, I write ad copy for a living). I am no priest or theologian: just a regular guy who can’t get enough of God.

While I identify myself as Christian, that by no means excludes the truths found in other faith traditions. I find myself enthralled by what I read of Hinduism and Buddhism, for instance. The fact that both Christians and Hindus essentially revere one ineffable God who appears in three persons quite amazes me.

So that’s me. In this space, we’ll very likely talk about many of these things. Come on along for the ride.

Beginnings

God told me to start a blog.

OK, that’s a smart-aleck way of putting the matter. But there is something to it. Let me explain.

Not long ago, it came to my attention that I’d been at my career—copywriting—for 20 years. What had been a life-changing asset (building and running my own business) was now beginning to wear me down. A friend suggested I might want to do something to nurture my spiritual life.

It took me about five seconds to realize what that something was. In short, I needed to write about things of the spirit: not just individual practices (though those factor in substantially), but also a spirit’s-eye view of our modern world. Most important, I needed to engage in a dialogue—or, even better, a multilogue.

This is a passion with me. I look at the world and see a place that’s starving for real, honest dialogue. Our politicians and pundits talk at each other at best. Perspectives on any issue, no matter how complex, get oversimplified to black and white. We can’t even begin to address these issues until we hear everyone…and explore together. Plus, we learn when we listen. How bad can that be?

Obviously, one person and one blog won’t make that happen. But many voices, speaking and listening to one another, just might make a small dent.

So let’s talk.