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18 January 2012
A Series of Stories - Part I
THE CRACKED POT
A Water Bearer in
For two years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one
and a half pots full of water to his master’s house. Of course, the
perfect pot was proud of its own accomplishments, perfect to the end for
which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own
imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of
what it had been made to do. After two years of what was perceived to be
a bitter failure, it spoke to the Water Bearer one day by the stream. “I
am ashamed of myself, and I want to apologise to you.”
“Why?” asked the Bearer. “What are you ashamed of?”
“For these past two years I’ve been able to deliver only half my load,
because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back
to your master’s house. Because of my flaws, you have to do all of this
work and you don’t get full value from your efforts,” the pot said.
The Water Bearer felt sorry for the old cracked pot, and in his
compassion he said, “As we return to the master’s house, I want you to
notice what is along the path.”
As they went up the hill, the old cracked pot took notice of the sun
warming the beautiful wild flowers on the side of the path, and this
made the pot pleased. But at the end of the trail, it still felt bad
because it had leaked out half its load – and so again it apologised to
the bearer for its failure.
The Bearer said to the pot, “Did you notice that there were flowers only
on your side of the path but not on the other pot’s side? That’s because
I have always known about your flaw and I took advantage of it. I
planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we
walk back from the stream, you’ve watered them. For two years I have
been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate my master’s table.
Without you being just the way you are, he would not have this beauty to
grace his house.” --------------------------
13th December 2011
Jesus in the Manger: A Story of Transformation
(Richard Rohr)
http://www.malespirituality.org/images/Networking%20-%20Jesus%20in%20Manger.PDF
The question for us
is always "how can we turn information into transformation?" How can we
use the sacred texts to lead people into new places with God, with life,
with themselves? This is surely true with our Lucan texts on the birth
of Jesus. They have largely been sentimentalized in Christmas card
fashion. We enjoy such "Christmas cards", yet they don't really change
our lives in any substantive way. We do have an
amazing piece of information here: Our Jesus story says that "She
wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger because there
was no room for them in the inn" (Luke 2:7). This is an amazing and
daring picture for the beginning of Jesus' life amidst the human. It
re-situates us in terms of class, cosmos, and the fallibility of human
judgment. Soon we will find ourselves looking in disordered places for
life, and soon we will know that death can hide inside of social order. An untransformed
mind writing a story of God would surely have the Christ born in a
palace, among nobility or even royalty. The birth would be spectacular,
not sordid. It would demand respect instead of inviting confusion. Only
a transformed mind would write such a text as this, and only transformed
(or eccentric) people would allow the text into the sacred canon. Maybe
it is not surprising that we find it in only one of the four Gospels. What might Luke,
what might the Spirit, be trying to say to us through such an infancy
narrative? First of all, it is questioning most of our political and
social assumptions. Truth and goodness are not always found at the top,
but often on the edge and at the bottom, and truth is not always the
headline but probably on the back page. Not in the center of empire, but
in the backwaters of Bethlehem. Not among the established, but clearly
among those who are dis-established. A rough and risky beginning is the
chosen path of God. Next, this entire
infancy narrative has the capacity to awaken awe and mystery. It does
not answer questions. It raises them. It leads us into liminality, where
things remain deliberately unsettled, ambiguous, and therefore inviting
to new places. That is exactly what a truly sacred text should do,
although we no longer are very comfortable with sacred texts. We live
after the enlightenment and the scientific revolutions. We now expect
answers more than awe, conclusions more than connections. We want
religious magic more than religious meaning. The listening soul
is invited to "abide" inside such a text and struggle for deeper
meanings. Why would goodness be marginalized? Is that its inevitable
fate? Is God saying that vulnerability is, in fact, the preferred
starting place and stance in this world? None of us would freely choose
to live at the bottom or in what Dorothy Day called "precarity". The
text subverts all we believe about power, prestige and possessions. Lest anyone miss the
point, we start "the human life of God" with images of homelessness,
refugees, exclusion, poverty, helplessness, and maybe discrimination.
Two peasants at the mercy of the demands of empire. Mary, Joseph, and
Jesus are mere statistics, and not subjects of their own destiny. They
are not "in control of their lives" as we love to idealize today. The
holy family is bereft of the benefits of citizenship. It will set the
stage for a later affirmation in Ephesians of a different social order
that can now emerge: "you are no longer aliens or foreign visitors, but
you are citizens with all the saints and part of God's household"
(2:19). This resituates the soul outside of the usual system of rewards
and punishments. It hints of a new freedom, a freedom that we who
idealize Mary and Joseph do not even want. The Reference Point has now
changed. Although the text
never speaks of ox and ass and animals in a stable, one wonders why this
staging has almost universally been accepted and pictured? Many say this
intuition finds foundation in the opening verses of Isaiah where the
people of Judah and Jerusalem are judged less perceptive than the
animals: "The ox knows its owner,
and the ass its master's crib, but Israel knows nothing, my people
understands nothing" (1:3). We have hints here of a larger ecology.
Nature and animals seem to participate in Being naturally and without
resistance. They give glory to God by being who they are without
question or critique. We are the only members of the Great Chain of
Being who resist and resent what is. We are the only unwilling players
in this new drama of Incarnation. Not only do the angelic hosts
recognize the new integration of heaven and earth(2:14), but somehow the
shepherds who were a class outside of social respect, lowly earth bound
animals, and even the straw of a feeding trough all receive him
graciously. I cannot help but
think that Luke had access to the following passage from the Book of
Wisdom in writing his lovely account of the birth of Jesus: "Like all the
others, I too am a mortal man, Descendent of the
first being fashioned from the earth, I was modeled in
flesh within my mother's womb, For ten months
taking shape in her blood, By means of virile
seed and pleasure, sleep's companion. I too when I was
born, drew in the common air, I fell on the same
ground that bears us all, A wail my first
sound, as like all the rest. I was nurtured in
swaddling clothes, with every care, No king has known
any other beginning of existence. For all there is one
way only into the world, as out of it". (Wisdom 7:1-6) I suspect we have
chosen to dismiss this text primarily for the same reason that we have
sentimentalized-and therefore forgotten-the infancy narrative itself. It
emphasizes similarity. It comes from unitive experience. We have for too
long been reading sacred texts from our dualistic consciousness, split
from the very mystery that the story of the birth of Jesus seeks to
reveal.
23rd November 2011
The Season of Advent
First Sunday of Advent: “Shine through the dark” (Mark 13:24-37)
The darkness of our world can seem overwhelming at times; it’s easy to
be cynical. The realist, though, is the one who can hold both sides of
reality together: that the world, you and I are composed of both beauty
and brokenness. There is no other reality but this mixture of beauty and
brokenness. Yet most of the time we are asleep to the present moment –
either caught by the past or planning the future. This is why Jesus
implores us to “Stay awake”! He means stay awake to the eternal comings
of God into your life. God will shatter our complacency but provide a
safe harbour for our fears, so stay awake to the unexpected and
surprising ways that God shines through the dark.
Second Sunday of Advent: “Witness to the Light” (Mark 1:1-8)
The most difficult people with which to deal are those who are
convinced they are always right. We need people totally different from
ourselves – “John the Baptist” figures – to shock us into seeing how our
petty perceptions and defensive attitudes can subtly shield us from
encountering the Living God. When we enter into fear we close our eyes,
fearful that what we most yearn for – to be loved unconditionally – may
be taken away from us. The coming of Jesus witnesses to the continual
presence of the Light that says “Do not be afraid”. Our lives are
to be light for the world. We witness to the Light through the way we
grant general amnesty to those around us.
Third Sunday of Advent: “Let our spirit rejoice” (John 1:6-8, 19-28)
John the Baptist is not afraid of those in power. He is not
disrespectful, but he knows that they do not make him who he is before
God. John does not live from fear but from faith. His security is in the
faithfulness of God to him. John can rejoice because he knows his
identity is secure; no one can take this identity from him. This is the
only thing that enables us to live without fear, for anything else is
built upon neediness and insecurity. Our spirit then is free to rejoice.
It is the incomparable joy that comes from the ultimate security of
knowing we are always and forever within God that gives us the courage
to proclaim truth fearlessly, just like John the Baptist.
Fourth Sunday of Advent: “Trust in the Night” (Luke 1:26-38)
In the Church’s tradition, Mary the mother of
Jesus is the symbol par excellence of the one who shows us how to
trust the unknown. It is in the unknown spaces – sometimes called
liminal or threshold spaces – that faith is formed and deepened. At
these times we come to realise we are no longer sure, no longer in
control, no longer the holders of a master plan. To “trust in the night”
is to surrender our control needs and to fall into faith – which is the
security to be insecure. Mary knows that by herself she can create no
lasting life; she needs to co-operate with the grace of God. To “trust
in the night” is to let the eyes of our soul be expanded, just as our
own pupils expand in the dark. This attitude gives us a greater capacity
to see what we could not envisage before. Faith enables us to see in the
dark.
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14th
November 2011
For
the Feast of Christ the Universal King
(Ron Rolheiser
OMI)
http://wcr.ab.ca/old-site/columns/rolheiser/2001/rolheiser120301.shtml THE COSMIC CHRIST Pierre Teilhard de
Chardin was once called to Scripture agrees.
Christ is more than just an historical person who walked this earth for
33 years, though he is that. He is more than a great teacher, marvellous
miracle-worker, and extraordinary moral-exemplar, though he is that too.
Indeed Christ is even more than the God- man who died for our sins and
rose from the dead, though that is a crucial part of his identity.
Christ, the scriptures tell us, is also someone and something within the
very structure of the cosmos itself, the pattern on which the universe
was conceived, is built, and is now developing. As the letter to
the Colossians puts it: "Christ is the firstborn of all creation
[physical and spiritual]; for in him all things in heaven and on earth
were created ... all things have been created through him and for him.
He is before all things and in him all things hold together." This concept
challenges the imagination, implying far, far more than we normally dare
think. Among other things, it tells us that Christ lies not just at the
root of spirituality and morality, but at the base of physics, biology,
chemistry, and cosmology as well. This has many implications: First of all, it
means that the spiritual and the material, the moral and the physical,
the mystical and the hormonal, and the religious and the pagan do not
oppose each other but are part of one thing, one pattern, all infused by
one and the same spirit, all drawn to the same end, with the same
goodness and meaning. Simply put, the same force is responsible both for
the law of gravity and the Sermon on the Mount and both are binding for
the same reason. All reality, be it
spiritual, physical, moral, mathematical, mystical, or hormonal is made
and shaped according to the one, same pattern and everything (be it the
universe itself hurdling through space, the blind attraction of atoms
for each other, the relentless push for growth in a plant, the
instinctual hunt for blood by a mosquito, the automatic impulse to put
everything into his mouth by a baby, the erotic charge inside the body
of an adolescent, the fierce protectiveness of a young mother, the
obsession to create inside an artist, or the genuflection in prayer or
altruism of a saint) is ultimately part of one and the same thing, the
unfolding of creation as made in the image of Christ and as revealing
the invisible God. The fact that
Christ is cosmic and that nature is shaped in his likeness means too
that God's face is manifest everywhere. If physical creation is
patterned on Christ, then we must search for God not just in our
scriptures, in our saints, and in our churches, though these shape the
boundless nature and energies of God into principles and dogmas in a way
that allows us to somehow appropriate them as trustworthy and normative.
However if Christ is also the pattern according to which the universe
itself is unfolding, then what's good and what's inside of God is also
somehow manifest in the raw energy, colour, and beauty of the physical,
be that the beauty of sunset or a symphony, which we can more easily
acknowledge as religious, or be it the more morally ambivalent, but
undeniable, beauty that is manifest in the body of a movie star, the
voice of a pop singer, or the colourful and lively sexual energy that
bubbles inside the culture. Clear or ambivalent, everything reflects the
same pattern. Finally, if
Christ is the structure for the cosmic universe itself, the question of
the normativeness of Christ for salvation ("There is no way to
salvation, except through Christ.") poses itself differently. The
famous early Christian hymn in Ephesians speaks of "a plan to be
carried out in the fullness of time to bring all things into one, in
Christ." What's implied here, among other things, is that Christ is
bigger than the historical churches, operates beyond the scope of
historical Christianity (although admittedly he does operate within it),
and has influences prior and beyond human history itself. It is Christ,
visible and invisible - the person, the spirit, the power, and the
mystery - who is drawing all things, physical and spiritual, natural and
religious, non-Christian and Christian, into one. As Kenneth Cragg puts
it: "It will take all the religions of the world to give full
expression to the whole Christ."
Teilhard was right. We need a Christology wide
enough to incorporate the whole Christ and our imaginations need still
to be stretched.
Teilhard de Chardin: “Glorious Lord
Christ: the divine
influence secretly diffused and active in the depths of matter, and the dazzling
centre where all the innumerable fibres of the manifold meet: power as
implacable as the world and warm as life; you whose forehead
is of the whiteness of snow, whose eyes are of
fire and whose feet are
brighter than molten gold; you whose hands
imprison the stars; you who are the
first and the last, the living and the
dead and the risen again; you who gather
into your exuberant unity every beauty, every affinity,
every energy, every mode of
existence: it is you to whom
my being cried out with a desire as vast as the universe: ‘In truth … you
are my Lord and my God.’”
(Hymn of the Universe [New York: Harper and Row
1965] p34)
30th October 2011
The Communion of Saints: All Saints' Day - November 1st
Patrick Oliver:
The passage into eternity is about
letting yourself be loved for no reason
The passage into eternity is about
dying well to what has previously held you
The passage into eternity is about
trusting the transition between worlds
The passage into eternity is about
desiring to see the luminous presence in everyone
The passage into eternity is about
learning to carry one’s life choices
The passage into eternity is about
learning to trust the darkness
The passage into eternity is about
letting God raise you
The passage into eternity is about
learning to receive everything as gift
The passage into eternity is about
coming to see everything as one
and within the One God
Richard Rohr OFM:
The communion of saints means that
your goodness
is not just your own, nor is your badness. You carry the
lived and the unlived lives of your parents, grandparents, and
great-grandparents as far back as DNA and genomes can trace it—which is
pretty far back. We are the very first generation to know that
this is literally and biologically true. Living in the communion
of saints means we can take ourselves very seriously (as a summation)
and not too seriously at all (you are just a part of the whole!) at the
very same time.
I hope this
frees you
from
any unnecessary individual guilt—and more importantly frees you
to be
full "partners in God's triumphant parade" through time and history (2
Corinthians 2:14). You are in on
the deal, and yes, the really big deal. You are all a very small part
of a very Big Thing!
9th October 2011 The lectionary gospel reading for this Sunday was from Matthew's story of the wedding feast. I'd like to put in the Thoughts Column my rendition of this story as it appears in my "Freeing of God", as the story is usually interpreted in quite a different way.
(Matthew
22:1-14)
Jesus begins to speak again to the Pharisees and chief priests, to
address this issue of authority that they’ve raised. He tells them a
parable to highlight how God’s Dream for the world contrasts with the
ways and wiles of human rulers and authorities.
He recounts a cruel dictator king (and Jesus’ listeners have known a
few) who wishes to put on a public show for his son’s wedding. Servants
are sent out to invite many to become part of this feast, but because no
one wants to have anything to do with the king and his brutal ways, they
refuse to come. The king’s dumbfounded, but he doesn’t give up, and
sends some more servants to make sure there’ll be people to come to the
feast so he won’t be shamed.
He tells the servants, ‘Tell those who are invited, “My wedding feast’s
all prepared; the bullocks and cattle are slaughtered, and everything is
ready!”’ But the people find other more pressing things to do: one goes
off to his farm, another to his business. Many get hold of the servants
who’d been sent to them, and they vent all their bottled-up resentment
towards the cruel king by treating the servants disgracefully, and
finally murdering them.
The king’s infuriated when he hears of this, so he demands that his army
kill those who’d murdered his servants, and burn their city. After all,
there’s no more seemingly justified and righteous brutality than
retaliatory bloodshed – especially when both parties believe themselves
to be in the right, and when they both fall into their passionate hatred
with a clear conscience.
The king says to the servants: ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those
who were invited to it have refused my generosity. These people still
pay me no respect, so go to the street corners and
drag in people if you must, so
I won’t be humiliated!’ So the servants go out onto the highways and
byways, and since the king has terrorized and destroyed the people’s
city, everyone – whether they’re considered good or bad – decide it’s
better to co-operate with the servants rather than resist. Eventually
the king gets his wish, and he fills his hall.
Now when the king enters the hall to greet his “guests” who’ve been
forced off the streets, he notices one person standing there who isn’t
wearing the proper attire, and not dressed the way custom dictates. ‘How
did you get in here, friend, without being properly dressed?’ asks the
king callously. But the man is silent before the ruler.
Because the king’s heart is full of hatred and cruelty, he’s on the
lookout to punish someone – anyone – at the feast, to make up for the
embarrassing rejection which the people have given him. So the king
over-reacts to the solitary person who hasn’t dressed according to the
correct protocols, and he delivers his full ire upon the dissenting
guest. ‘Tie up this menace!’ the king splutters to the ushers.
‘Bind him and throw him outside, where he’ll rue his actions, and
will have time to mourn and suffer the stupidity of his
insubordination!’
Jesus comments on this rather graphic parable: ‘The ways of God are not
the ways of the world. Remember what I’ve told you: not “love your
friend and hate your enemy”, but “love your enemy”! Not “an eye for an
eye”, but “don’t become like the one who hates you”! Now the man in the
story who gets bound and thrown out denotes the fate for all of you who
non-violently resist the ways of worldly kingdoms just as I will, and
you – like I – shall neither be understood nor applauded!
‘Don’t be surprised that you’ll invoke the ire of insecure petty rulers,
who must insist upon sycophants feting and fawning, adulating and
adoring. In the wedding feast in God’s Dream, it’s God who delights and
dances with you; it’s God who takes you in, sits you down and waits upon
you. That’s turning the status quo upside down!
‘At the feast of God’s Dream for the world, those who are
self-sufficient find no nourishment, and those hungry to return the
divine gaze find themselves satiated. If you think you’ve “got it”, then
you haven’t; if you think you understand, then you haven’t begun! God’s
Dream stands in direct contradiction to the ways of the world, so be
prepared to be bound, to be thrown out of your good standing, to suffer
and, if necessary, to die for the sake of faithfulness to my Way.
‘Your authority’s to come not
from the systems and powers of this world, but from your relationship
with me and with my Abba Father who trusts you. Spiritual authority is not about power
but about service, surrender and acceptance of suffering as the way into
soul transformation. I call everyone to this radical way of life, but
few choose the narrow way of love over hate, of faithfulness over fear,
of sacrifice of self over self-sufficiency, and of response over
reaction. And yet truly – it’s the only way to real life!’
27th September 2011
“Currach”
(Irish word for ancient wooden boat used by pilgrims)
We tell stories from the pieces of our lives,
benchmarks that lead us to each other and away
till finally we return to God and our beginning.
We stop and listen. The children say ‘tell us more,
tell us how it was in the days when you were young
and remembered everything.’
Smiling in the shadows, we allow our oars to dig deeper.
‘I believe it was like this …’ and we tell the tale again
as the silent children, fingers trailing in the water,
sense the Other, the larger stillness beyond the owl’s call.
‘Did you cry?’ one asks. ‘I seem to remember I did,
but it may have been that I laughed until the tears
came down my cheeks like the water on your fingers.’
And another: ‘Were you afraid?’
‘Yes’, I say, ‘I was afraid then, but I am afraid no longer.’ And the
small ones, eyes wide,
watch the pinpoints of light guiding us home.
(Penelope Ann Thomas, printed in
Presence journal, March 2006, p18)
Meeting
May you meet Mercy each day:
in the light of your own heart,
at the hands of your loved ones,
in the eyes of the stranger
and of the needy.
And if by chance you do not at first meet it,
listen patiently for word of it
and it will tap you on the shoulder:
a quiet surprise,
a small gesture,
the tender look
given and received
in the encounters of your day.
(Mary Wickham RSM, from Souvenirs
of Spirit: Poems and Prayers, Spectrum publications) ------------------------------------------------------
11th September 2011 A thought for 9/11 -
(from
the Mennonite Peace and Justice Newsletter – a story from the Truth and
Reconciliation Commission in
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