tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-336899502024-03-13T21:24:20.894+00:00The night and half-light of dreams...the life and musings of a sensible, spiritual & sensual psychotherapist who will ever be Jung at heart.Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.comBlogger489125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-64413271057252714782020-06-27T23:28:00.002+01:002020-06-27T23:33:36.847+01:00Marie Martin Hoyer, RIP<font face="trebuchet">I don't know what made me open my eyes from my meditation in that moment and reach over for my phone.<br /><br />An instant later, in a chat box:<br /><br />"Irim."<br /><br />No happy or easy conversation ever begins with my name. Ever. I knew my Baz Luhrmann moment had arrived - that I was about to be blindsided at 18.23 on some idle Saturday.<br /><br />"I have something really terrible to tell you."<br /><br />In that instant I knew. Because any of the other horrific possibilities I could imagine would have come from our mutual friend, that girl who had been my lab assistant and the baby sister I never had, herself...and I would have been able to hold the space, to hold her in love and comfort.<br /><br />The internal screaming into the void began as I watched those three dots, desperate for them to form the words, yet willing them not to, bargaining with G-d to put me in a universe where this wasn't true, where I had another chance to drop her a message saying hi, kiddo, love you, drop me a line.<br /><br />The dots morphed: Marie was killed in a car accident last night.<br /><br />NO NO NO NO NO. But there is no getting away from the yes.<br /><br />What happened? How's Ellie? How can I be here for you? Would you send me a programme from the funeral?<br /><br />Getting everyone possible to pray for her and the family.<br /><br />Now, to find pictures and stories for her girls. And the first story begins with my name.<br /><br />Marie was introduced to me as someone who was going to help me with setting up labs for my classes. She looked older than her 15 years, so I put out my hand and said, "Call me Irim."<br /><br />And indeed she did, from that day to my birthday, a month ago today, though while I taught, she called me 'Miss Sarwar' in public. I can hear her now - from getting my attention to amused to that head tilt when she was saying, 'Don't try to get that one past me.'<br /><br />I met her as a young, confused, open-hearted teenager and saw her grow into the whip smart, funny, loving, generous, warm, take-no-crap woman that she became. Our conversations, no matter how far apart, never wasted time in the shallows, but headed straight for the depths - of our lives, of the world's situation, of our theology and spirituality. Who is G-d? What does it look like to love Him? How do we live our lives? She was one of the few people from whom I hid nothing.<br /><br />Oh, except for one thing, which you now know, hon: that every time you asked me to pray for you and it was answered, I lit that candle to Our Lady. Catholic win. đ<br /><br />Just a couple of days ago, I saw she was on Messenger and meant to type: Hi, kiddo, love you, drop me a line. I got distracted and forgot, but didn't worry about it because I thought we had all the time in the world.<br /><br />We didn't. You don't. Drop someone that line, tell them you love them, forgive them, hold them tight.<br /><br />Because you never know when your 18.23 on some idle Saturday will come.</font>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-29859859451627336932019-04-18T14:01:00.001+01:002019-04-18T14:03:10.890+01:00Maundy Thursday 2019: Father, into Thy hands, I commend my spirit<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Here we are at the end of the road: the end of our 40
days in the desert of Lent, the end of the Via Dolorosa, the last of the seven
words from the cross. And now, we stand
at the foot of the cross, waiting, desolate, lost, expecting nothing more after
His words, âIt is finished,â but He speaks one last time, to the Father He so
recently accused of forsaking him: âFather, into Thy hands, I commend my
spirit.â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Christians often treat that sentence as if it is novel or
peculiar to Our Lord and the cross, but that isnât, in fact, the case. The
exclamation is a strong reminder of His Jewishness, drawn from Psalm 31 and woven
into the piyut, <i>Adon Olam,</i> said on
Shabbat and often, before bed: <i>B'yado
afkid ruchi - </i></span><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">To Him I commit my
spirit.<br />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br />
<!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Also quintessentially Jewish is His relationship with
G-d, able to encompass âWhat, youâre going to just leave Me hanging here in the
dark?â as well as that cry of the trapeze artist to the catcher, âInto your
handsâŚâ and everything in between: from the agony in Gethsemane to the
tenderness of âFather, forgive them.â It is the intimacy and depth that comes
from the familiarity of everyday togetherness, of sharing the little things as
well as the large; the pain as well as the joy. A more modern example of this
Jewish closeness to G-d can be found the late Leonard Cohenâs <i>You Want It</i> <i>Darker</i>:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12pt;">Magnified, sanctified, be thy holy name</span></i><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><br />
Vilified, crucified, in the human frame<br />
A million candles burning for the help that
never came<br />
You want it darker<o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #f3f3f3; font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">We kill the flame<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="color: #f3f3f3; font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Hineni, hineni â Iâm ready, my Lord</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 14.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Shocking as those lyrics may seem to us, they are
underpinned by the sentiment: <i>I trust you
so much, I dare to say this to you</i>, <i>I
dare to challenge you</i>, as Martha did to Jesus when she said, âIf you had
been here, my brother wouldnât have died.â Though Iâve yet to get there, itâs a
relationship style I strongly resonate with, since my spiritual life can be
summed up by a favourite quote: I live my life between âJesus, take the wheel,â
and âOh yeah? TRY ME.â <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">It was my relationship with G-d I was pondering this Lent,
as I walked or led the Stations at least once a week. The idea of surrender had
popped up many times in various situations, heart to heart discussions â with
Jewish or non-religious friends, and in various materials that would just
appear: cards, books, even gravestones. I worshipped a G-d who became human and
died for me, so why was letting go so hard, even AFTER Iâd worked on my stuff;
why did it feel like that resistance was woven into the very fabric of
Christianity I was trying to live?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The answer came unexpectedly when Lynne Hutchings of
Wyoming defended the death penalty by saying that without it, Jesus couldnât
have saved humanity from its sins. We donât have time to get into just how
deeply heretical that is, so letâs just say someone should have checked her
mushrooms before she ate them. I, of course, couldnât resist putting it out
there, posting it with the headline: When substitutionary atonement goes too
far. Anyone who really knows me will be able to guess just how much earthy
language & first class snark hit that thread. But it was my theologian
friend, Sara, who summed it up for us all when she drily noted,
âSubstitutionary atonement overreaches simply by existing.â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Why does the form of atonement we believe in matter?
Because it is the lens through which we view our faith and so, it becomes the
way we live our lives. Substitutionary atonement is problematic for a whole
host of reasons, but the ones I want to point out today include how it
diminishes G-dâs nature by imagining the Almighty can only forgive sins when
someone (Christ) is punished for them and how it turns relationship into a
series of transactions â debt, payment. It makes unforgiveness, cruelty, and
transactional relationship a feature, not a bug, of Christianity. Donald Trump
is supporting white supremacists and grabbing women indiscriminately? Thatâs
ok, heâll give us the judges we want to impose the Christian version of sharia
law. Children being caged then trafficked through adoption agencies such as
Bethany Christian to white saviour parents? Substitutionary atonement â their
parents had the nerve to show up at our border asking for asylum (which, for
those of you inclined to think otherwise, *is perfectly legal*), so we punish
their children.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Iâm supposed to surrender to a G-d who enables that? Hard
pass. Luciferâs got a party in the basement that looks like a better option,
thanks. And frankly, I donât think Jesus would surrender to a Father like that
either. Substitutionary atonement reduces the cross â and Jesusâ life â to the
unremarkable: debt owed & paid, rather than a sacrifice of love. Through
that lens, the life that we know Jesus lived and the relationship He had with
His Father <i>makes no sense at all</i>, not
least His teachings on forgiveness. And though this may be a minor point, I
find substitutionary atonement lazier than a three-toed sloth on Ambien and, as
an Enneagram 8, that just irimtates me. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">And so it was that I discovered that my resistance to
surrender was based in this sense of transactional relation â debt, payment â
that made trust difficult. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Peter, a Dominican friend, and I had long discussions
about models of atonement afterwards, but nothing settled for me until I
thought, âWait, what if weâve got the question at the Trinity Redemption
meeting wrong? What if the Father wasnât asking, how do I get satisfaction, but
rather, how do I bring them home? And the big Jâs response was, well, what if I
go down and show them how to live a fully human life â which can only be lived
in you? We know what that will mean, but I will gladly accept that price for
love.â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The kaleidoscope shifted and it all made sense: the
Incarnation into a vulnerable human baby, living with his parents â and talking
back to them, a ministry of healing, challenging teaching, miracles, and
unutterable love, and finally, the sacrifice upon the cross and those words of
complete surrender to a loving father who wants to bring his children home, a
father whose arms are always open: to catch His Son â and us. If we start from *here*,
then we are meant to live our lives as Christ lived His.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Now, thereâs no doubt that the imitation of Christ is
much harder than the idea weâre paid for once and all: for one, it means my
fantasy of rounding up Jacob Rees-Mogg, Donald Trump, and their hate-spewing
authoritarian buddies around the world, dropping them on an uninhabited
Marshall Island to live Lord of the Flies style, and restarting nuclear testing
in the areaâŚis off the table. Instead, I have to learn to love them, to see
G-dâs image in them, bearing in mind that love doesnât mean just being nice and
letting them do what they want; it means finding a way to prevent them from
further hurting themselves and other, from going deeper into sin.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">How in the universe am I supposed to do that? Jesus told
me: Father, into Thy hands, I commend my spirit. But Iâm human and I canât let
go of the anger, the hurt, the need to control, to let my spirit operate
through my own good but twisted nature. It feels impossible. Perhaps that is
why we are told:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #f3f3f3; font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide
is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there
are who go in thereat. <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f3f3f3; font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Far
too often, we use that quote to impose whatever set of rules we want on others,
meaning that narrow gate is for us and those like us, but I suspect thatâs not
the case. The gate is narrow because we have to let go of everything, to let go
of our lives, to walk through:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #f3f3f3;"><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Heâs hurt me; I want him to pay.</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> Father, into Thy Hands, I commend my
spirit.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #f3f3f3; font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I canât do this. </span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="color: #f3f3f3;"> Father, into
Thy Hands, I commend my spirit.</span><span style="color: #001320;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I canât live w/o
this thing/person.</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> Father,
into Thy Hands, I commend my spirit. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">We often talk about closing our eyes and breathing in
G-d. But the only way through the narrow gate is to let G-d breathe us â to
throw ourselves back on Him over and over again, despite our Gethsemanes, our
Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani moments, our broken humanity.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I was in Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral last autumn, on
my knees during the Eucharistic prayer Iâd heard thousands of times, when I
heard these words for the FIRST time: <b><i>May He make us an everlasting gift to you</i></b>,
and was yet again overwhelmed by His sacrifice of love and the Fatherâs
commitment to bring us home. In that moment, I understood that surrender meant
not loss of self, but a return to communion.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">All I know is that Iâm light years away from being that gift
and right now, the best that I can do is to make a vow, perhaps best summed up
as follows:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">For as long as I
shall live, I will testify to love,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Iâll be a witness
in the silences when words are not enough,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">With every breath I
take, I will give thanks to G-d above, <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">For as long as I
shall live, I will testify to love.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">But
I know there is no way I can do it on my own merit, without grace, and soâŚFather,
into Thy hands, I commend my spirit. </span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-54532017557580119402018-10-31T11:31:00.000+00:002018-10-31T11:31:22.739+00:00Sermon for 31 October 2018 (Wednesday chapel)<br />
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">(Readings: Psalm 31: 15-24;
John 12: 23-32)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">You all got lucky today. Not by getting me as
your speaker, thatâs pure <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">dumb</b> luck,
but because when I told my priest friend Peter (yes, Durban surfer boy, for
those of you who were here last year when he preached or who ate his sourdough
bread yesterday) I was talking to you today, he said, in no uncertain terms, âJust
so you know: you're not allowed to produce a broomstick or a cat.â (promptly produced) I think we
all know how good I am with authority. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So, whatâs the story, morning glory? For the
younger among you, that phrase may conjure up memories of Oasisâ smash album
from 1995, but in my circle, it was in use long before. It usually meant, âStop
lying to me and telling me youâre fine, youâre as prickly as a porcupine and
standing on my last nerve. Dish â whatâs the REAL story?â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The *real* story? What does that even mean in
a â dare I say it â postmodern world, where the notion of objective reality is
questioned and many of us sound like Pontius Pilate in âJesus Christ
Superstarâ:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">So what is truth,
is truth unchanging law<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">We both have
truths, are mine the same as yours?<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">We live in a world where neo-Nazi violence is
equated with peaceful protest; where blatant, easily fact-checked lies are
diarrhoea out of the mouths of those who lead us, feeding the rabid fear and
hatred of those desperate for easy solutions of âus and themâ, terrified of
navigating the complex, nuanced world we live in. A world where polarity
threatens to destroy relationships, nations, the world, as each side cries:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">My times are in
your hand;<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Rescue me from the
hand of my enemies,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">And from those who
persecute me.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">A world in which the story we are weaving
seems a nightmare without end.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Stories. The fabric of our world: we weave
them and are woven into them; they are our process, our way of making sense of
the world and how to interact with it; the narrative we live individually and
collectively. Stories we tell ourselves and stories we interpret â from âwhat
did she mean by that?â to âWait, what does that mean for us all?â â lead us to
decisions and actions that direct and unfold the story further. Our loved onesâ
pain and joy is a story. Our history is a story. Our theology is a story. Your
thesis â quantitative or qualitative â is a story. But stories do so much more
than form the stream and sense of our day to day living - there is a deeper reason
we almost obsessively read, listen to, and watch stories, why fairy tales,
myths, fiction, and reality hold such sway: they hold up a mirror in which we
can see what we might otherwise be unable to see, and they offer us a way of
approaching truth when we might be unable to do so directly.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Thereâs that word again. Truth. What is it? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Truth is defined as âbeing in accord with
fact or realityâ and can be as concrete and simple as âI am standing on a
floor; the sun is shining; Bill Berger will smack his head on one of my office
doorways at least once this week.â But reality encompasses so much more than
the sensory, most truths may be less clear: âNo one is ever truly self-made,â string
theory (go to Damon!); the sudden, definite realisation: âI cannot do this any
more.â Itâs also worth noting that truth, in more modern parlance, means authenticity
â or being genuine, real.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Perhaps we can find a hint in the oldest
known etymology of truth from Proto IndoEuropean, deru or dreu, meaning firm,
solid, steadfast as an oak â there is a definite sense or tie to wood, and is
also the root of words like âdurableâ and âendureâ. And in whatever form it
comes â concrete or abstract â one thing we recognise about truth is that it
endures. When someone tells the truth, though they may add details or offer
different angles, their stories endure; over time, someone will act true to their
nature in all kinds of waysâŚbut like the oak, they are not immutable â the
truth has room to grow, evolve, reveal different facets â though its nature
remains the same, just as the oakâs, from acorn to full grown tree.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What is true endures in its nature, even if
it changes form.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And that is the core of all ârealâ stories:
over and over again, in infinite forms, they point to the truth: about love,
about suffering, about life, about the nature of creation â in your
methodology, you might refer to that as âtriangulationâ. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And those real stories in their infinite forms
are the heart of this weekâs feasts of All Saints and All Souls â from San Juan
de la Cruzâs burning, mystical love for G-d to Teresa de Avilaâs salty
practicality, the stories of the saints point us again and again to a single
truth: </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">unless
a </span></i><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies,
it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">. While that doesnât
always mean physical death, it does always mean dying to earthly attachments and
surrendering to G-d: we see that in the story of the rich man who goes away
sad; the Lordâs pronouncement on a camel walking through the eye of a needle;
in His warning that the gate is narrow â youâll have to put everything down to
get through. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Our Lord does
not ask us to detach out of punishment or to deny us joy and pleasure; He does
it because he knows that as surely as the stories we live can heal, nourish,
and transform us, stories can also bind and imprison us, often spun around a
single grain of untruth: I am unlovable, I must be the strong one, I must be
certain, I cannot change. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">He does it to
set us free, so ask G-d to let it fall to the ground and die, so it can rise to
bear much fruit, and so that you can become free to become the person G-d
dreamt you would be when He created you â someone free to serve Him and be
where He is, like the newest saint we will honour tomorrow â Oscar Romero.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So many of us
think we know Romeroâs story: a radical, left-leaning, liberation theologian who
caused trouble for decades. YeahâŚno.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Romero was
born in 1917 to a carpenter and his wife, one of eight children. His father was
against his desire to become a priest and trained him to follow in the family
businessâŚuntil Romero went off to minor seminary at the age of 13, continuing
to ordination in 1941 to become a conservative cleric with an inclination
towards Opus Dei spirituality who defended the Magisterium, supported the
government and the oligarchy. I suspect you could hear the chorus of âNo me digas!â
from liberation theologian priests around the country when he was appointed
Archbishop of San Salvador in 1977 because he was considered a safe pair of
hands. At nearly 60, he no doubt expected to live an uneventful life to his
retirement in 15 years. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But G-d had
other plans. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Some of the
earliest intimations of change came when he welcomed some workers into his
church alongside a priest friend of his and was told that they were paid 1.5
colones for a dayâs work. âWait, but the going rate is 2. I know [the
landowner], he wouldnât undercut wages like that. How about X, down the road,
he certainly wouldnât.â âHe only pays 1 colon.â <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">That openness,
that willingness to understand that perhaps his friends werenât who he thought
they were, in addition to his commitment to inner spiritual transformation,
opened the door to change, to the Holy Spirit moving in his life.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">On 12 March
1977, 17 days after his ascension to Archbishop, Romero stood over the bodies
of one of his closest friends, Rutilio Grande, an advocate for the
marginalised, and two others, knowing he would have to walk the same difficult
path, take the same risk. Perhaps he even thought, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">âNow my soul
is troubled. And what should I sayââFather, save me from this hourâ? No, it is
for this reason that I have come to this hour.</span></b><b><sup><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></sup></b><b><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Father, glorify your name.â<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Within weeks,
at the age of 59, this bookish, conservative archbishop became a voice for the
marginalised and a powerful critic of the government and ruling class he had,
only a month ago, supported. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">3 years and 12
days later, he was dead, shot by an assassin as he finished his homily and
moved to the altar for the Liturgy of the Eucharist. 3 years. 12 days. 5% of
his life. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But what a 5%,
when given to G-d. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">A <i>real</i> story. And what does his real story
tell us about ours?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 12.0pt;">¡<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Real stories are never that simple</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">. The term âhagiographyâ has rightly become an
epithet in many circles because it sanitises saintsâ stories to the point of
meaningless: no saint is perfect and godly from birth: there are explosive
tempers, lots of dissolution, stubbornness, attachment, plenty of privilege.
Romero started on the side of the oppressors. The strict Opus Dei spirituality
that I wrinkle my nose at is what most likely gave Romero the anchor he needed
to become the man he became in those final years.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 12.0pt;">¡<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Real stories arenât linear.</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> Stories unfold in multiple dimensions and
meander â there is no clear, straight line here. On his way home from doctoral
studies in Rome, Romero stopped in Cuba and was placed in an internment camp
before coming home. In his parish at San Miguel, Romero started an Alcoholics
Anonymous group, started construction of a cathedral, promoted devotion to Our
Lady Queen of PeaceâŚand yet, despite all he must have seen, he backed the
status quo.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 38.95pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 12.0pt;">¡<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">To unfold, real stories require those three
most important words â <b>I donât know.</b></span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> If we are certain in all things, believing
them to be immutable, then the stories we live are more likely to bend around
our certainties and close us in, than unfold naturally and open out. Romero
knew those landowners, trusted those landowners to pay a fair wage. But he was
open when he saw evidence that they didnât, to say, âOh, I didnât know,â which
allowed the story he was living to change.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 12.0pt;">¡<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Real stories are unexpected; they challenge us.
</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Remember that collective
groan when he was appointed Archbishop of San Salvador, with the rich expecting
him to keep the status quo, and the liberation theologians groaning
collectively? So, how did that work out for everyone? If a story constantly follows
a path that fulfils our expectations and props up our beliefs, without even
challenging the GPS, itâs suspect.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 12.0pt;">¡<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Real stories reveal to us the true nature of
things and bring us closer to our own true nature.</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> When he saw the body of Rutilio Grande, even
though it had been creeping up on him for years, Romero knew, in that instant
what was real and what he had to do. Oscar Romero became a voice for the
voiceless, a microphone for G-d, the man G-d always intended him to be.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 12.0pt;">¡<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Real stories are always so much bigger than we
can imagine.</span></i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> There is no
way that young priest, diagnosed as OCD and over-scrupulous, with a PhD in
ascetical theology could have dreamt what G-d had in store for him. But he took
the road he knew to be true and found Jesus there.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">That all makes
sense, doesnât it? Because creation shows us a profligate G-d, a universe writ
large with everything from violets to huge galaxies, from black holes to oak
trees in countless forms, not just the one repeated over and over again:
diverse, dynamic, prodigiousâŚgranted, with a few âG-d, go home your drunk
momentsâ like the platypus and the moose-leopard-camel with a 40 foot neck we
call a giraffe. Itâs no wonder real stories are wild, large, anything but tame
and predictable.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But then â and
how very postmodern of me to close this way â what if that means <i>every</i> story is real? If, as Rabbi Arthur
Green posits and as Iâm coming to believe, âG-d is the innermost reality of all
that is, and that G-d and the universe are related not primarily as Creator and
creature, but as deep structure and surface is key,â then G-d is woven into
everything, and every story has the potential to point us to truth and bring us
home â even the ones that keep us safe or the ones we tell ourselves out of
fear. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Then every story
can be writ large, G-d in the world, such as the one of the Jewish surgeon who
worked on the Tree of Life murderer spitting anti-Semitic abuse at him,
responding that he was honoured to work on a human being who was wounded.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">In the midst
of the nightmares we create for ourselves, there is light. There will be an end
â we are promised that, even if it wonât come easily:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif;">Be strong and let your heart take
courage, *<br />
all you who wait for the Lord.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-size: 11pt; line-height: 115%;">So whatâs <i>your</i> story, morning glory? Whatever it
is, keep it real.</span></span></div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-50988275483724348042018-08-07T14:56:00.000+01:002018-10-01T11:11:35.865+01:00The original conversion story...<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This will soon be published in an anthology of Catholic women's stories. It got heavily edited along the way, and while it's a voice that fits the book, it's not MY voice. It doesn't flow in the same way, it doesn't quite capture what I mean (I'd never call my parents' faith 'lukewarm', that's *not* quite what I mean by 'their Islam was cultural at best', the editor put an exclamation point when I meant the tone to be dry), but it will do. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Don't get me wrong; I'm incredibly grateful - I know that's part of the editing deal when someone's bringing together a compilaton. I am thrilled to have the story out there to a fairly wide audience: but anyone reading it will never quite catch me. An author friend who read both versions noted that it seemed as if it was edited to cut out the strong emotion, to feel more neutral. I think she's right. But my feeling is that the messiness is part of the story; it's part of the human experience. And I think sharing that messiness is necessary if we're going to be real, to connect, so that others don't feel alone. To quote a song from <i>The Greatest Showman</i>:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>I am brave, I am bruised,</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>I am who I am meant to be - this is me.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Look out because here I come and I'm marching on to the beat I drum:</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>I'm not scared to be seen, I make no apologies,</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>This is me.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So if you're interested in the abbreviated tale full of messiness and transformation, tolle lege:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">âDaddy,
daddy, you left Mommy in there!â</span><br />
<br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">No response
from the head I could see resting against the driverâs seat, so I repeated
myself relentlessly as he drove off unheeding. As the cry reached its desperate
crescendo, my 5-year-old eyes popped open and I found myself staring at my
bedroom ceiling.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A dream. Of course. Even my kindergarten self
knew how unlikely it was that weâd stop at the Catholic church that fascinated
me every time we drove by it, let alone my mother getting out to actually walk
in. However, none of that stopped me from telling my father, every time we
drove past the church for weeks afterwards, that he had left my mother in there. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He finally turned to me in exasperation, âWeâve never been in there. We are
NEVER going into a Catholic church or any church. Ok?â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Speak for
yourself, Father. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">As time
passed and the dream receded into the background of study, Islamic Saturday school,
struggling with a deeply dysfunctional family, an uncleâs sexual abuse, one
might think that the fascination with a strange church might disappear into the
depths without a trace or hope of return.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Instead, it
turned out to be the faint, early glimmer of my road home.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">No matter how
far away I seemed, seeds of Catholicism found me. My paediatrician mother would
get copies of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bible Stories</i> to put in
her waiting room and I would devour them before they left the house.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In 1978, young me rejoiced when John Paul I
was elected and sobbed when he died. Oscar Romero and Denis Hurley were my
first clerical crushes, causing a subsequent priest friend to wryly observe,
âNo wonder the rest of us have disappointed you.â But above all, even as a
child, it was where I found home â my closest friends were Catholic, and the
love I received from them became my first taste of sanctuary. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But those
seeds could so easily have fallen by the wayside, on stony ground, or amongst
thorns, where they could have been easily lifted, scorched, or choked. It took
a long time to realise that I drew the road to me as much as the road drew me
to it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">My parents
believed in God because they were told to. From the time I was very young, I
could feel God brushing against my skin in all things â Iâd even talk to dust
particles as if they were sentient. That sense of an immanent God clashed with
the Islamic concept of a God far above us who required submission. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That wasnât
the only point of discord. I grew up in an immediate family that viewed other
people as objects: to use and discard, to step over on the way up. At best, my
parentsâ Islam was cultural, but was far more often a means of control,
especially over a girl who had the nerve to yell back at her raging father. Somehow,
in the midst of it all, I had an unshakeable sense that âthis isnât how you
treat peopleâ, that you sacrifice yourself for that which is greater than you
are: a child, the many, to end the suffering of others, for the One. Even
before I had any clear idea who He was, I understood why Jesus was on that
cross. He felt like a kindred spirit.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Eventually
the rift between Islamâs theology and my innate understanding became too great,
and in my adolescence, I lapsed, with all the requisite snark of a Generation
Xer. It wasnât until I moved out after my mother juxtaposed âarrangedâ and
âmarriageâ in a sentence (I didnât tell them I was leaving, but I did leave
them a note on the fridge) that I felt safe enough to do something other than rebel.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The path
picked up with my lab colleague, Janice Briscoe, a convert to Catholicism, who,
on hearing my childhood dream, muttered, âHe DID leave your mother in there.â <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">âWhat?â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">âNever mind.â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I worried at
that throwaway remark for years, during which time the two final parts of my
journey slotted into place: my time as a teacher at the Hebrew Academy, a
Modern Orthodox Jewish school, and my friendship with Anni. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In September
1992, I walked into Hebrew Academy with great trepidation because I knew it was
reasonably obvious Iâd been a Muslim. I need not have worried: it felt like
home within a week. For four years, my work world was a school in which the
sound of prayer punctuated the rhythm of the day; wonderful, warm staff who
invited me to their Seders, Purim services, and cantorial concerts; cheeky
students who patiently explained rabbinical commentary; affectionately shaking my head as I passed rabbis who argued in
hallways and became good friends. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I became immersed in a religion that was
grounded in daily life, one that was a way of being, not just an identity
ritual or something to learn on a Saturday. To this day, this homegoy⢠(my
friend Dorothyâs term for her non-Jewish friends) can feel the rhythm of the
Jewish liturgical calendar in her bones.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I joke that I
nearly converted to Judaism, but bacon and shellfish got in the way. Thatâs not
quite true: it was that kindred spirit, Jesus, who did. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">October 1992
brought the final step in the road, befriending my sister from another mister,
Anni, a fellow Renaissance Festival dancer, whose parents took me in as if I
were their long lost eldest daughter. Wrapped in that love, I learned that
American Catholicism was as much about boisterous affection, fuzzy toilet seat
covers, pictures of Our Lady and the pope, and âtuna casserole Fridayâ as it
was about going to church. It was with Anni that I discovered the joy of Latin
mass in the Shrine of the Immaculate Conceptionâs crypt church, where I was
able to articulate my sense of the sacraments as being Heaven kissing our lives
on Earth, invisible love made visible. It was about telling Anni, âThe guy Iâm
dating just asked why I donât become Catholic,â punctuated with an eye-roll.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I could have
saved my eyes the exercise. When my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer in
December 1993, I suddenly realised that I needed a spiritual community, somewhere
to fall. In one of our numerous phone calls, I said to Anni, âIf only I could
become Catholic.â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">âYou can,â
she said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">My squeal of
glee left her ears ringing. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">RCIA had
already started for that year, so I joined the next one in September 1994, becoming
Catholic at St Michaelâs, Mt Airy, MD (USA) on 15 April 1995, baptised by Fr Mike
Ruane and confirmed by Bishop Frank Murphy (RIP). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Thatâs all, she wrote? Hardly. As a wedding is to a marriage, so is a baptism/first
communion to a faith journey. Eighteen months after that, I left the cosy world
of being a Eucharistic Minister at<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>St
Mikeâs to come to Oxford for an MSc and stumbled over a church which had a
Sunday 11am Latin mass. I rejoiced â a seamless transition, a church that would
be a home here. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Letâs just
say it was about as smooth as a Himalayan mountain road.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">English
Catholicismâs victim mentality jolted me, coming from an unselfconscious
American Catholicism, as I noted most of those who played the victim were not
recusants, but converts whose ancestors had been on the right side of history.
The victimhood led to insularity, leaving parts of the Church suffocating. The
reactionary right wing baggage that accompanied the Latin (and later, the
return of the Tridentine) mass went from a stream to a tsunami, leaving those
of us who were committed to Catholic social teaching yet loved a smoking (only
incense, I hasten to add) high liturgy betwixt and between. The âmale servers
onlyâ and âno EMâ rules left women out of the sanctuary except to read. Any
argument was met with a mocking âYouâre just an angry feminist.â Shades of my
emotionally sadistic father were omnipresent.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But as with a
butterfly beating its wings against a chrysalis, growth needs resistance, and
that resistance turned out to be a blessing â the space to push against the
patriarchy as an adult with the resources to do so helped heal the child who
couldnât. Whether it was in my particular church, or more broadly with the growing
neoconservative traditionalist movement encouraged by Pope John Paul II and
Pope Benedict XVI, staying and pushing forced into clear relief what mattered,
stripping my faith right back to the essentials: my relationship with God, my unshakeable
faith in the events of Holy Week, my belief in the sacraments (particularly the
Real Presence) as emanations of the holy into the mundane, my commitment to our
social teaching, the oneness of G-dâs creation. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That faith
keeps my feet on the pilgrim road, my conversion new every morning, my prayer
one with Charles Wesleyâs:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Ready for all thy perfect will,<br />
my acts of faith and love repeat;<br />
till death thy endless mercies seal,<br />
and make the sacrifice complete. </span><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-4590909125502026852018-03-29T13:39:00.002+01:002018-03-31T14:26:42.889+01:00Maundy Thursday 2018 (Father, forgive them)<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. </b><br /><br />Right now, thereâs a lot in the world that seems unforgivable, isnât there? And isnât it nice to have that get out clause from Our Lord? <br /><br />For they know not what they do. But what if they DO know? The Trump voter, the Brexit voter, all who voted their spitting rage, hatred of other, leaning into ârivers of bloodâ style xenophobia and racism, then disingenuously stood back, claiming âeconomic anxietyâ or âsovereigntyâ while vulnerable groups and entire nations suffered the consequences. <br /><br />How delicious was it, then, when they began to suffer? When steelworkers didnât get those promised jobs? When they suddenly realised they were going to lose their healthcare? When they realised that whoops, much of the funding that held up their deprived communities came from the EU? How tempting to say, âNo job from Trump? What, now you want a handout from the social safety net you wanted to slash? Hereâs a bowl, thereâs the street.â Or âOh, the radioactive isotopes your child needs are in short supply because weâre out of Euratom? Well, they donât deserve to suffer, but because you decided that they and every other cancer patient should, so you could vote your hate, you deserve every ounce of unmitigated suffering coming your way.â Or a personal favourite, âI wouldnât cross the street to pour a glass of water on him if his guts were on fire, but if I had accelerant, I might just run.â <br /><br />After all, Jesus gave us that out, right? No forgiveness because they knew exactly what they did. Never mind that denying them aid and forcing them to beg or using a childâs suffering as a vehicle for revenge makes us uncomfortably like them. <br /><br />They know what they do. Just like my father did, just like my uncle did. No quarter given. They knew. <br /><br />Don Henleyâs 1989 song, <i>The Heart of the Matter</i>, nudges at that certainty: <br /><br /><i>These times are so uncertain<br /> There's a yearning undefined<br /> People filled with rage </i><br /><br />Times so very like our own. But wait. A yearning undefined? People donât know what they want? And what do we know about ourselves filled with rage, in the grip of that inferno of anger, aware of nothing but the object of our hate and our need to tear it down, completely blinded to everything else from the people around us to the consequences of our vengeance? Do we know what we do then? <br /><br />And if not, what about them? How do we arrange those three words? They do know orâŚdo they know? Now not only are the times uncertain, so are we. <br /><br />Henley goes on: <br /><br /><i> We all need a little tenderness<br /> Or how can love survive in such a graceless age? </i><br /><br />Tenderness, which might lead to compassion and forgiveness? Don, who do you think I am? Our Lady? Jesus? Thanks for the lofty thoughts, but where are we supposed to start? <br /><br />Let us begin by teasing out what forgiveness actually is: it is not forgetfulness. It does not allow someone to hurt us over and over again. It does not deny that a wrong was committed â for if nothing was wrong, there would be nothing to forgive. Forgiveness does not ignore the degree of the offence or the hurt caused. Forgiveness does not forgo consequences: reparation, loss of relationship, withdrawal of privileges. <i>Forgiveness is not reconciliation, </i>though it may open the door to it<i>.</i> <br /><br />Forgiveness is rooted in the Latin <i>perdonare</i>, later in the Germanic <i>for</i> and <i>giefan</i>, which mean âto give completely, without reservationâ. So forgiveness is completely giving release from retribution. Forgiveness is about letting go of the anger and ensuing bitterness about what happened to us. Forgiveness is about, over time, being able to be less angry, then neutral, then perhaps being able to wish the other well, even if the relationship never resumes. Above all, forgiveness is a process, not a fixed point. <br /><br />Unforgiveness freezes us, locking us in stasis, making it impossible to move or grow. So perhaps if we cannot begin by asking to be able to forgive, we might be able to begin with these words from the <i>Veni, Sancte Spiritus</i>: melt the frozen, warm the chill. <br /><br />The thaw often begins with allowing feelings beneath the frozen anger of unforgiveness to surface, the moving water of tears of pain, grief, betrayal, loss, but also the water of life: <i>I'm learning to live without you now - but I miss you sometimes.</i> For example, my father is an emotional sadist with a tendency to physically lash out, veering between a complete lack of affect and towering rage. When I told him his brother had sexually abused me for 4 years, he had exactly 6 words: <i>It doesnât matter; it's not important.</i> Plenty of pain, grief, and betrayal there. Plenty of reason for a hard, frozen exterior to survive him. So it took me decades to come to the surprising realisation that tearing myself away from him was not painless and didnât bring unmitigated relief and happiness. I found myself grieving, empty, bleeding, and yes, missing - not him, per se, but a father, one who knew and loved me from the moment my arrival on this planet was expected â a realisation that propelled me towards letting go â and healing. <br /><br /><br />So the first step in the process of forgiveness is acknowledging that we miss what is ruptured, our hurt and its depth, listening to it, making space for it, letting the running water cleanse it, and bandaging â or protecting â it while it heals. The next step is beautifully summed up in the line: <br /><br /><i>The more I know, the less I understand <br />All the things I thought Iâd figured out, I have to learn again.</i><br /><br />We must have the courage to be curious, to be uncertain. To look again at what happened, to wonder what I missed, if what I thought I saw was the whole story. I missed the horror and trauma of Partition till I came to the UK and saw the documentaries. For decades, I didnât know my father had lost 2 sisters and had been so close to one he never again said her name after she died. That knowledge made me realise how little I understood the man Iâd grown up with, which allowed for a sea change in perception when I talked to a friend after seeing a picture of my father at 20: <br /><br />Me: You know, he might have been saved. Here, he just looks wary, sad â angry, yes, but not irrevocably so. (Friend: Mmmmmm.) That just doesnât jibe with the man I grew up with. You know what else doesnât? (Mmmmm?) There was this time my cousin brought her baby girl with her, and my father just grabbed the baby, held her tight, closed his eyes and wouldnât let go. I was like, hey, I WAS HERE, REMEMBER? WHAT ABOUT ME? <br /><br />Friend: Iâve wondered about that since you first told me. Do you want to hear what I think? (Of course.) What if it wasnât that you were unlovable or that he was incapable of loving you? What if he saw this baby girl and didnât dare love her? And what if you grew up more and more like his sister, then everything came into play â the fear, the grief, the rage, and he had to push you away? Or he had to try to make you not like her? <br /><br />What if indeed. And suddenly, all the things I thought I knew, I was learning again. That staying open, that willingness to give up the story we tell over and over, that admission that maybe itâs more complicated may feel frightening, even blasphemous, if we subscribe to a theology where we believe G-d has spoken His final word or if weâve come to religion for the exoskeleton of certainty. But we must remember what G-dâs final word said as He ascended: <i>Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world</i>. He is here, working with us, through us, to redeem His creation. <br /><br />And He redeems us by adding that meltwater, the water of our tears, to our clay and reshaping us, even perhaps making it possible to look at an incredibly painful situation and reflect: <br /><br /><i>I thought of all the bad luck<br /> And the struggles we went through<br /> And how I lost me and you lost you </i><br /><br />Because perpetrator or wounded in any situation, we are <i>all</i> lost. Not one of us, no matter how much we plan, how good we are at looking into the future and gauging consequences, how many pro and con lists we make before a decision, know what we do, because we cannot see it all. Not you, not me, not the Trump or Brexit voter, not the colleague or family member who makes you consider jail time, not my father, not Judas. Maybe a little tenderness, such as that we would give a child, is in order. <br /><br />To put it another way, as Rachel Remen relates what a rabbi once said on Yom Kippur after his 1 year old daughter grabbed his nose, his tie, and his glasses during his sermon: âThink about it. Is there anything she could do that you could not forgive her for? And when does that stop? When does it get hard to forgive? At three? At seven? At fourteen? At thirty-five? How old does someone have to be before you forget that <i>everyone</i> is a child of G-d?â <br /><br />And speaking of children of G-d, itâs time to get back to his Son. What a week he has had: adored on his arrival in Jerusalem, betrayed by one of his own, denied by the man he planned to be the rock on which to build His church, agonised by doubt, mocked and spat upon by those he preached to and healed, feeling abandoned by everyone, even His Father. What must have been going through his head as he was stripped, beaten, carrying and then nailed to the cross? I canât help but wonder, before this first word passed his lips, if it was something very similar to Don Henleyâs reflection on the subject: <br /><br /><i>I've been trying to get down<br /> To the heart of the matter<br /> But everything changes<br /> And my friends seem to scatter<br /> But I think it's about forgiveness<br /> Forgiveness<br /> Even if, even if you don't love me anymore.</i></span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-60146923646315136162017-04-13T13:28:00.000+01:002017-04-13T13:33:00.936+01:00I thirst (Maundy Thursday 2017)<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12pt;">He
has sweat blood, he has been betrayed, tried, and scourged. He has carried his
cross, fallen, been nailed hand & foot, and been raised up to die in one of
the most excruciating ways possible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">He has forgiven his
murderers, promised a thief paradise, given the care of His mother to a beloved
disciple. And he has, in these last moments, felt the loss of that presence
which has been closer than His nearest human breath throughout his ministry. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Utterly alone. Forsaken. And
now, âI thirst.â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">There is a primal need to
thirst, a yearning, a desperation. We are, after all, creatures that are 2/3
water. What those of us who have done a Ramadan fast â especially in the summer
â remember is not the hunger, but the desperate need for water. That is why
what I call âintermediate formsâ of fasting allow liquid as they deny â or curb
- our food.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Think about the words we use
when we have nothing left: our tank is empty; we are spiritually dry; someone
is âdried upâ. It is no coincidence, I think, that early Fathers sold
everything and fled to the driest place on Earth, the place that would keep
them right on the edge of death, to face their demons and strip right back to
the essence of their relationship with G-d.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Thirst is bone deep; thirst
is need; thirst is a desire for life â even from the cross. And Our Lordâs
thirst isnât a passive thing: it is not âI am soooo thirsty,â or the Spanish
âTengo sedâ â âI have thirst.â He <i>thirsts</i>
â it is active; it is a desire on the hunt. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But for what? He physically
thirsts, clearly â Jesus was fully human, and it had beenâŚrather a tough day so
far, with the words of the Psalmist to fulfil before it was accomplished. Thus, the vinegar on a sponge. But, as always
with Our Lord, there is so much more.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Just as we use thirst
figuratively: we thirst for knowledge, thirst for righteousness, thirst for
justice, so does He. But again, for what? Augustine offers us a possible answer
in a phrase I saw every year during Lent when I regularly attended the Oratory:
<i>sitit sitiri</i> â G-d thirsts to be
thirsted for. Perhaps. But there is something unsatisfactory in this â this
mutual longing feels incomplete; it lacks connection; it smacks of unfulfilled
relationship â and no little emotional manipulation. Thirst for G-d or else YOU
are dehydrating Him! <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But if we flip back to
earlier in the gospel of John, we get a glimmering. Picture the scene: a hot
day in Samaria, a well, and a woman approaching it to draw water for her
family. A young man sitting there commands her, âGive me to drink.â Left
unsaid, âI thirst.â We all know her response, âSeriously? You, a Jew asking me,
a Samaritan, for a drink?â (Not quite KJV, but still.) His response is an
unexpected one: <i>If thou knewest the gift
of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldst have
asked of him, and he would have given thee living water. <b>Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: but whosoever
drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst.</b></i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The therapist in me loves
this line, because when someone tells you what they would give you, more often
than not, <b><i>they are telling you what they want from you</i></b>. Jesus will give
us <b>living water</b>, and there is a
not-so-faint echo of the later <i>And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them saying, Drink ye all of it; For this is my blood of the new testament. </i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Our Lord doesn't just thirst for us to thirst for him. <b>He thirsts for us.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12pt;">The us He knit together in
our motherâs womb, the us He dreamt we would be when He created us. The us that
not one of us could create, but that these fragile bodies of ours contain. As
Dag Hammarskjold said, âI am the vessel. The draught is G-dâs. And it is G-d who
thirsts.â</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Ah, we may think, great! The
draught is G-dâs, I am the vessel, thereâs this whole pour your life out as a
libation thing. All I have to do is be like the guy in the parable of the
talents who puts the talent in the ground and gives it back to the Master
unchanged â conveniently forgetting just how well that worked for him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But thereâs a catch. We have
this treasure of G-dâs draught in earthen vessels. And earthen vessels have a
habit of leaching and changing that which they contain. Every choice we make
through the free will granted us changes the draught of G-dâs contained within
us for better or for worse, makes it bitter or sweet.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Oh, we think, Iâll ignore the
niggle of my conscience just that one time. I canât forgive him, so I wonât try.
Iâll miss out that little kindness. Iâll tell that little lie. Iâll keep quiet
about that wrong I know is happening, someone else will take care of it. But
those âslipsâ become habit, and many littles soon become a tsunami of sin. Or,
as @absurdistwords once noted in a Twitter thread, you can only play Devil's advocate for so long before
you realize that the Devil actually has you on retainer.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And so often, it is more
subtle than that, isnât it, especially when youâre working for the Church? Of
course twisting that personâs arm was the right thing to do, it was for G-d. Of
course I know what THEIR spiritual path should be, all the while ignoring how
far Iâve come off course. I was right to ostracise them, theyâre a heretic. The
obsession with bums in pews whilst neglecting the souls of those sitting in
them. I was right to offer fraternal correction in public, his humiliation is
G-dâs will. The creeping spiritual arrogance, the pride that we, at least, are
doing G-dâs work. We would do well to remember Hammarskjoldâs admonition: <i>It was when Lucifer first
congratulated himself upon his angelic behaviour that he became the tool of
evil.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Or, to put it in Holy Week
terms: </span><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Where in our journey do we avoid
reaching Golgotha, refusing to get up the first, second, or third time we fall?
Where do we demand the resurrection without the crucifixion, or, playing the
martyr, refuse to allow G-d to take us down off our cross, so He can move us
from crucifixion to resurrection?<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So now what? Are we to
despair? Is it impossible for us to sweeten this draught? Will we forever
embitter it? Again â can you tell Iâm currently reading <i>Markings</i>? â Hammarskjold points the way through the prayer Our Lord
taught us:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Hallowed be thy name <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">*NOT MINE*<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Thy kingdom come<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">*NOT MINE*<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Thy will be done <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">*NOT MINE*<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Give us peace with thee<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Peace with men <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Peace with ourselves<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">And free us from all fear.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Free us from fear? Ah, now
that might be a way forward, since all sin is, somewhere, based in fear. But how,
in these darkest of times? 1st John tells us: perfect love casteth out fear. But
how do we poor humans find perfect love? By falling into the arms of the one
who spread them on the cross for us. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Relying on our own meagre
human resources, we will soon make the draught undrinkable. But through
surrender to Divine will, we become the finest vintage imaginable, the one He
intended us to be. And then, He can lift up our vessel and quench His thirst:
not by drinking as we drink, but by putting it to the lips of our thirsty
neighbour â the sick, the poor, the refugee - those lives He means us to touch
& heal, pouring out our lives as a libation until it is accomplished. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-60114573588818432552017-01-08T17:18:00.000+00:002017-01-08T17:35:36.916+00:00Reflections on a high school commencement address & today's politics, or, where a Republican senator hands me a guiding principle for life<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I woke up this morning thinking about someone I haven't thought about in decades - John Danforth, retired Republican senator from Missouri. As the morning went on, I thought of him more, not less.<br /><br />Weird, huh? Maybe not so much, since he was the father of D.D. Danforth, who was in my year at school - so yeah, my dirty little secret, for those of you who might not have guessed, is that I went to a posh private school, alongside the daughters of senators and kings (Hussein of Jordan).<br /><br />I'll never forget seeing him come to school, taking the steps 2 and 3 at a time from car park to the main door of the school. My 'Hello, Senator!' always met with a smile and gracious 'hello' back, no matter how much of a hurry he was in. I liked him; even in our brief encounters, you could feel the integrity and the calm around him, the exact opposite of my father; I often wondered what he'd be like as a dad.<br /><br />Those occasional brief encounters occurred for years - then, he spoke at our graduation...and it changed my life. I had that commencement speech on my wall for years, with sections underlined and starred, until it fell apart; I'd love to have it again now. I'm pretty sure he began with congratulating us, telling us how we were all being applauded, and rightly so, graduating was quite an achievement. But then.<br /><br />Then.<br /><br />He told us that we would be applauded throughout our lives, but our real job was not to seek that applause. *Our real job was to go out and GIVE it - to everyone around us: our friends, lovers, children, colleagues.* His last line was for us to go out there and 'Start clapping. Never stop.' I can't speak for anyone else at our graduation, but I could feel the electricity of truth run through me and, in that moment, I swore I would do that; that I would hold up those around me however I could. That principle was diametrically opposed to my parents' 'People are commodities to be used for your benefit,' but John Danforth's speech spoke to MY integrity; it pointed due North and let me find my way.<br /><br />This morning, it struck me: *one of the guiding principles of my life was handed to me by a Republican senator*.<br /><br />And I finally understood - I'm not just incandescent with rage, I am grieving. I am grieving the loss of men like John Danforth from our political scene. The loss of the Republican party that could be home to men like him. The loss of our common vision for a better nation and world, even if we disagree on the how. The loss of our ability to trust and talk to each other, to reach the compromises we need to go forward.<br /><br />I am a diehard Dem - but had John Danforth run in 2000, I can't say whom I'd have voted for. And had he run and won, my heart would have been happy - because I would have known I could entrust my country to the hands of this man who understood the meaning of service - not just as a senator, but as a priest.<br /><br />That is what we all need to move back towards, whatever our calling in life - a sense of service, an orientation towards the greater good. Haven't our decades of obsession with ourselves shown us that selfishness leaves us empty and brings disaster upon our heads? That connection and service bring us joy? That we need the balance of turning inward for contemplation and self-examination, then turning back outward to offer the fruits of that contemplation as service to others, to pour out our lives as a libation, and in doing so, move the world towards wholeness?<br /><br />And where is that sense of service more needed than in those who serve our communities and nations? Even if they differ in the how, the why - the greater good of humanity - must be the same. So let us commit ourselves to unseating those obsessed with exalting themselves and oppressing others and seating those committed to the greater good - whatever their party affiliation.</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-32757444356766508292016-12-31T21:02:00.001+00:002016-12-31T21:09:26.115+00:00Goodbye, 2016<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Dear 2016,<br /><br />Damn, you were brutal. We should have known what was coming when you took David Bowie 10 days into the year, with Alan Rickman to follow 4 days later. You certainly started as you meant to carry on, because 3 months later, we lost Prince.<br /><br />And just when we caught our collective breath, you'd strike again. Two months after that, Brexit, a month later, a deeply insecure, unknowledgeable, shrill, mean-spirited PM took over from a rather thick, self-absorbed one.<br /><br />Then, the US campaign: filthy, mean-spirited, hate-mongering, feeding the rabid hatred of those - on the left and right - who blindly wanted to tear down the (granted, broken) system with no thought of building another.<br /><br />Surely, we thought, surely, restraint and moderation would win. Surely, experience, the steady hand, the imperfect yet qualified candidate would win.<br /><br />But oh no, 2016, this was your 'hold my beer' moment par excellence, wasn't it? No moderation here. YOU, who took our legends and gave us Brexit, were certainly not going down the middle road. Extremism won.<br /><br />Hate trumped love.<br /><br />And in 2017, we are going to have to clean up the devastation you left behind.<br /><br />But I have one thing to say to you: thank you.<br /><br />Yes, you read that right, thank you. You hurt like f*** right from the beginning in the places where it would hurt the most: you took those who stood for and exemplified diversity, who spoke loudly that diversity was our strength, that we may be many parts, but we were one human body, and you left us those like Theresa May and Donald Trump who screech like harpies in favour of hate, division, a smaller mind and a smaller world. You were one fucking cunt of a teacher.<br /><br />But though I'm going to tell you to get the hell out and not let the door hit you on the way out, I am grateful for you. You were our true mirror. Theresa May, Donald Trump, the Tories, GOP, Putin and his ilk - they didn't arise in a vacuum: they are who we have become.<br /><br />They are who we become when we allow our points of view to dictate facts, rather than facts to inform and challenge our points of view. They are who we become when we are afraid of those not like us, when we are afraid of change, when we are afraid to move past what we know. This is who we become when we are only for ourselves, forget how to serve, and harden our hearts against those in desperate need. When we choose style (Dale Carnegie has a shitload to answer for) over substance, appearance over character. When we do a little learning, rather than drinking deeply of the Pierian spring. When we resent and deny expertise. When we no longer take the time to listen to stories: each other's, our cultures', the archetypal.<br /><br />Had we been on track, had we allowed minor corrections, had we been looking at what was true rather than looking away, you would have been an altogether different year.<br /><br />But we weren't. So you had to be our prophet and our massive correction to give us a chance to return to the dynamic balance, the homeostasis, that defines the universe.<br /><br />So again, thank you. Thank you for opening our eyes. For showing us that we have strength and fierceness we never thought we did. For shaking us out of our torpor and complacency into full wakefulness to know and fight for what we hold dear, for those things so much greater than us: love, compassion, true freedom, unity. We will always be stronger together.<br /><br />You reminded us that growth needs resistance - and often demands that we ARE that resistance. We will heed your clarion call, and we will fight. Because in the end, love WILL trump hate.<br /><br />You have given us clearer sight, more open - if more scarred - hearts, renewed our profound commitment to love, truth, justice, mercy. You have brought us a chance to Deepen (see Madeleine L'Engle) at last.<br /><br />We stay awake and stand ready at the Gate of the Year. It may be dark, but day WILL break. Let it open.<br /><br />We release you in love, with thanks - and move fearlessly into 2017, whatever it may bring.<br /><br />Fare thee well: we may have cursed you from here to the Eagle Nebula, but we couldn't have done without you - much as we hate to admit it.<br /><br />Sincerely,<br />Me</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-33580970179087272502016-11-22T17:59:00.000+00:002017-01-27T11:25:17.407+00:00Why 'nice' and 'civilised conversation' don't work in a Trumpian world<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Ok, it's now time for me to go public about the 'empathy and being nice to Trump and his supporters, because we're civilised, good people and that's how everything works. You sit down and talk things out calmly, mediate, blah blah blah. Don't be meeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaannnn!' narrative that's going around normalising him - and them.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Fucking BULLSHIT.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If you don't want to listen, if you want to dismiss me as angry, dismiss this as a 'oh that's her' rant, if the ferocity makes you uncomfortable because you need your nice little ordered world, then walk away from this entry. Because it's not MY job to make you comfortable on MY wall. You can look away. I'm not going to be other than I am for you.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">My father is a manipulative, emotionally abusive, sadistic waste of carbon molecules, with much in common with Donald Trump and many of his supporters. I spent my *entire childhood* and part of my adulthood navigating that. I got called a 'whore' at the drop of a hat, and worse than that free with my breakfast cereal.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here's what I learned. *You can't talk to people like my father, Donald Trump, or those supporters*. Any time you try civilised conversation, mediation, negotiation, they think you're weak. They see it as a way to fleece you, manipulate you, take you for everything you've got, mock you, gaslight you. Normal relationship brokering is off the table because they do not share your worldview or your moral centre. People are commodities to them, to be used and then thrown away. So cut the 'let's talk nice to them' narrative and talk to them in a way they understand.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">You know what my father understood? He understood me kicking back when he pulled my hair. He understood my yelling at him at the top of the stairs when he had gone too far. He understood my moving out with 2 bin bags, my throwing him out of my flat when he showed up, and my not giving a f*** about what he was going to tell his mother about her 'good granddaughter'. He understood my giving the car back when he threatened to report it as stolen when I went to visit my cousin and her husband. He understood me not speaking to him for the last 12 years. So, as you can see, the ONLY thing he has EVER understood, the ONLY thing that got through, was figuratively putting him up against the wall and getting in his face.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Because what my father values, what *Trump* values, is overt strength - and the balls to shove his face in it. (Interestingly, an ex white supremacist on Twitter said if people had talked nice to him, he'd still be a white supremacist. It was people getting in his face that forced him to change.)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There's no room for nice here. No room for softpedalling. No room for safe spaces - nowhere is safe now. What there is room for is love: ferocious, protective, powerful love that will go to the wall, go any distance to protect the beloved - the tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free, </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">the wretched refuse of others' teeming shores. We take the homeless, tempest-tost and give them sanctuary. THAT is who we ARE, what we fight for. The people, every last one of them. Yes, even those we need to put up against that figurative wall because in their pain and blind rage, they are trying to destroy what is most precious in our humanity. Just as I can recognise my father's awfulness arises from unresolved pain and grief and feel for it - even as I don't give him an inch - so can we understand and feel for those we must fight. But understanding and feeling for them does not mean we do not hold them accountable, that we do not hold them against that wall and get in their face with every means at our disposal: the legal system, protest, a press that fearlessly speaks the *truth* about what's happening, our vote.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We are walking in the dark, and we must light candles to find our way and give us light till the dawn returns. But don't wave a torch around and tell me it's the sun. Let the *truth* be your light, however frightening you find it.</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-60883014939648909172016-07-08T10:46:00.000+01:002016-07-08T10:48:16.441+01:00To America, after last night in Dallas<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Dallas.<br /><br />Sorrowful, yes. Shocked, no. Where justice is denied, vengeance will follow. Everyone should have seen this coming - the officers guilty of every incident of police brutality; police departments that donât train officers properly, then mindlessly protect them for wrongdoing; the Internal Affairs sections, lawyers, and grand juries that let murdering police officers off the hook; policymakers. Everyone. This was the natural consequence of a series of actions and lack of a fair, just response to them. This is the consequence of denial.<br /><br />But perhaps we didnât expect THIS. Perhaps we expected the police officers known to be guilty in notorious cases of brutality to be executed. More likely, we expected a mass shooting or a bomb at a police station, or police killed by angry demonstrators. Typical American style, thoughtless violence. Terrible one day, forgotten the next.<br /><br />This was something completely different.<br /><br />This was horrifyingly elegant - in its timing, in its execution, in its symbolism - using police and military tactics against men in uniform. There was intelligence behind this: resourcesful, strategic, patient, coldly angry. Not the hotheaded anger one expects of Americans that lead to many incidents of one-off violence.<br /><br />Cold rage. One that recruits men who can lie in wait for hours, picking off their targets. One that may have placed a number of bombs around Dallas - and even if they havenât, a member (one trapped by police, no less) had the presence of mind to say they did, so police are wasting resources trying to find those bombs after the chaos. One with members who escape in a black Mercedes. One that can wait for the right time and place to execute its plans.<br /><br />Welcome to a homegrown terrorist cell.<br /><br />Because you see, where there is a large reservoir of swirling, unresolved emotion, eventually an organising mind, a seed crystal, will emerge and draw that reservoir to it, creating a structure. A structure with a function. And that function will, for good or for ill, channel that emotion to a particular purpose. Whether itâs Martin Luther King or Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, that mind will come and draw like ones to it. That mind is here, and the energy it draws is the endless, deep rage of those who have been done wrong and who have not been heard.<br /><br />You are coming to the last exit off this highway, America, the last chance to come off, turn around, and deal with this before it is dealt with for you. Because you ignored all the earlier exits, this is going to be incredibly painful, long, and difficult, but it must be done. To paraphrase a favourite song: you missed the stop sign, took a turn for the worse. Then you went rushing down that freeway, messed around and got lost, you didnât careâŚ<br /><br />âŚand now too many of you are dying to get off.<br /><br />Stop dying. Start living. You are a country with a beautiful dream that has turned into a horrible nightmare. Wake up, America. Wake up and face your demons. Because only then can you become the Republic for which your flag stands, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-83242836361615043402016-05-17T15:34:00.004+01:002016-05-18T10:33:42.988+01:00It's All Coming Back To Me Now<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/j8fHNdrZTSI" width="480"></iframe><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">My current earworm, following a series of unexpected ones over the last several weeks (as you can see from my last blog post. The rest are even more embarrassing, so let's not go there).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But this, I think, is the big one - and not just because of the lush orchestration, huge fuck off vocals, and an opulent video that allow me to indulge a sensuous side I rarely let out. Yes, it's cheesy. Yes, it's Celine. Yes, it's easily mockable. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So what? It's a song where Jim Steinman took a risk, committed to writing the biggest, most emotionally laden, romantic song he could, inspired by <i>Wuthering Heights</i>. No matter what you think of the result, there's something incredibly brave about pouring your entire self into a creation and then putting out there. Whatever its form, it's a precious gift.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And that gift gives so much more than the creator ever expected, often offering the chance for profound healing, b</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ecause when they unreservedly pour themselves into their creation, they allow us to do the same from the other side - and it is only when we do so that real transformation can occur.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So it is with this. Jim Steinman wrote it as a song about the darker side of love: obsession as it moves back and forth between 'We're done!' and 'No, wait...' </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But as is often the case when we step into another's creation, how it resonates with us may be completely different from the stated intent, because all creations from the heart have layer upon layer of meaning. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When I first told a friend that I couldn't stop listening to this (and listed the others from the last weeks) she said, <i>Your romantic longings seem to be surging to the forefront.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There was an instantaneous, not defensive, NO to that, because even when I first fell in love with this song, it was about so much more to me. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Now, if she meant</span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> Romantic - </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">with a capital R</span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> -</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> that nails it, because it is absolutely about my core quality of experiencing, processing, and creating through intense emotion. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>That</i> is my true indulgence here - letting myself feel. This is one of the few songs that can get me to go on a crying jag I've needed to be on for months, even years. It wrenches to the forefront my lifelong terror that anyone I'd ever be truly, madly, deeply in love with will die and the desolation of having to live with unending grief.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But above all, it's about my family and letting myself feel everything I've held at bay about that most fundamental rupture in relationship. As most of you know, I walked out of the house with a few bin bags, leaving my parents a note on the fridge door. It was a long time coming: by 4, I stayed upstairs watching the <i>Electric Company</i> when my father got home, rather than running down to meet him. In fact, I clearly remember feeling distressed when he got home, because a sense of oppression would settle over the house, as if the portcullis had come down, trapping us all inside. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Leaving was the culmination of a lifetime of inner knowing that staying in that emotional desert would destroy me</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. Either way, I would always be going it alone.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And better to go it alone and free, whatever that may bring.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I made that choice, knowing many of the consequences: my family's rage and ensuing vindictiveness; the ripples through the wider family; the relief; the fear; the need to carry on fighting. What I didn't expect, didn't dare allow myself to fully know, was</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>There were nights when the wind was so cold</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>That my body froze in bed </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>If I just listened to it </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Right outside the window </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>There were days when the sun was so cruel </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>That all the tears turned to dust </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>And I just knew my eyes were </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Drying up forever</i></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i></i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><i><br /></i></i></span></div>
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</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If I let myself feel - <i>know, </i>in the deepest sense<i> -</i> that tearing yourself away from even a deeply dysfunctional, soul-stealing place would leave you with wounds that bled so much more than you thought possible, I might have gone back. And I couldn't do that. Not for so much as a moment. Instead, defiance and resolve had to see me through:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>I finished crying in the instant that (I) left</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>And I can't remember where or when or how </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>And I banished every memory you and I had ever made</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">THAT. THAT was what was necessary to get out and stay out. If it meant chewing off my arm so I could get out of the bear trap, so be it. Anger and unforgiveness get a bad rap, but they can often be the only things that keep you moving away from a situation you should never return to. Without them, it's too easy to remember the brief moments where you could breathe, when you thought, </span><i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">Yes, this can become something good</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">: moments watching </span><i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">The Muppets</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, a magical night in the Himalayas with uncles, aunts, cousins, the youngest uncle keeping everyone in stitches</span><br />
<i style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></i>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>There were moments of gold and there were flashes of light</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Moments that, if you could stretch them into eternity, might have brought light from the darkness. But, as all moments do, they pass, and the reality is what you've always known it was...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>There were those empty threats and hollow lies</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>And whenever you tried to hurt me </i></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">
<i><div style="text-align: center;">
<i>I just hurt you even worse </i></div>
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<i>And so much deeper</i></div>
</i></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
<br />
...an unrelenting, grim, joyless landscape that just needed to be survived. Though the threats weren't empty, and you were the child, so your power to inflict deeper pain on those responsible for the cauldron you lived in is debatable.<br />
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Turn around. Walk away when you can. Don't look homeward, angel.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></i>
<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">But you were history with the slamming of the door </i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>And I made myself so strong again somehow </i></span></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">And I never wasted any of my time on you since then</i></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But here's the rub: whilst anger and defiance can get you so far, they can't take you all the way. Because even as you think you've banished every memory you have ever made, they are the ghosts that haunt you, the demons that drive you. If you believe that you've never wasted any of your time on them since then, the truth is, </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">you have</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">: </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In not feeling what you really feel - so you don't go back. In living on defiance - so you never go back. In staying numb so you survive. In not leaning on anyone else because you knew from the beginning you could never lean on them. In not truly letting anyone in so you are never again torn apart like you were by them. In always having one foot out the door so you are never trapped. In living in the grey zone, numb, so you can keep putting one foot in front of the other, moving away from them, even when you no longer need to be a spore blowing on the wind, but can become a seed planted in rich soil, expecting the sun, rain, all you need to grow.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">In these ways and so many others, you've carried them rather than banished them; wasted so much of your time on them. But is there a way to put them down after all this time?</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>If you forgive me all this </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>If I forgive you all that</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: left;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Can I? What does forgiveness mean? Where does it begin? All at once? In stages? Will I have to do it again? Does it mean what they did was okay? And what do I do without that weight? Without the anger that has driven me forward?</span></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;"><br /></i>
<i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">What do I do with the emptiness?</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> And now what?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>When you see me like this -</i></span></div>
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fUV0Y-3pHHg/Vzsmwzc8qQI/AAAAAAAABT8/FSXoFlYe4woz9zAVB0ASFRgdl30w5cgUACLcB/s1600/Mango%2Blassi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fUV0Y-3pHHg/Vzsmwzc8qQI/AAAAAAAABT8/FSXoFlYe4woz9zAVB0ASFRgdl30w5cgUACLcB/s320/Mango%2Blassi.jpg" width="239" /></a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And when I see you like that:</i></div>
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mAM7WjXRyeY/Vzsm5-1JMsI/AAAAAAAABUA/8U5WAx_sDfMgEr6URx7u_mEwETDsfKk3gCLcB/s1600/Parents.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mAM7WjXRyeY/Vzsm5-1JMsI/AAAAAAAABUA/8U5WAx_sDfMgEr6URx7u_mEwETDsfKk3gCLcB/s320/Parents.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(*my parents are on our right)</div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
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<i>We see just what we want to see...</i> </div>
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<i>...all coming back to me</i></div>
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<i>I can barely recall but it's all coming back to me now</i></div>
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That's how we begin to heal, even from the deepest, earliest trauma: not by separating, but as the song does, by bringing all of it together: by letting ourselves fully feel the nights of cold wind and the days of cruel sun, even as we slam necessary doors, allowing anger, defiance, and even numbness to carry us to the places where we can stop surviving and start living, even if, at first, only by nearly dying. The way into the light is most often through the dark night of the soul - and through the songs that carry us there. </div>
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It may all be coming back to you now, but that doesn't mean you have to go back to it. Welcome it, even when it feels like the tears will never end; hold it; be with it. Let it all find its place in you.</div>
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Remember, you made yourself so strong again somehow.</div>
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And then, as Gibran might note, your eve may be, in truth, your dawn.</div>
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The dawn that will, finally, bring you home. </div>
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Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-65588904164383214202016-05-06T12:54:00.001+01:002016-05-06T13:11:30.794+01:00Do you really want to live forever - forever young?<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/IGAVwQAmAHs" width="480"></iframe><br />
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Not sure why this crossed my path recently, but Iâm glad it did. Iâve always loved its melancholy, yearning, plaintive essence...Iâve never understood those who think of it as an upbeat paean to youth - even when I first heard it, it made me want to cry.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I mean, youâd think the first verse would give it away, right:</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Let's start in style, let's dance for a while, <br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Heaven can wait we're only watching the skies.<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Hoping for the best, but expecting the worst, <br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Are you gonna drop the bomb or not? </i></span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The essence of youth in the 80s, near the end of the Cold War - though no one knew that of course. </span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Released the year before Gorbachev took office, five years before the fall of the Berlin Wall, <i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Forever Young </i>captures the mix of hope and terror during the intense, taut period of increasing tension and decreasing DEFCON (look it up) just before, caught by movies like <i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The Day After</i> and <i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Threads.</i></span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This year, the one in which weâve already lost David Bowie, Alan Rickman, Victoria Wood, Prince, Terry Wogan, Ronnie Corbett and others, this verse didn't pull its punch:</span></div>
<div style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 14px; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Some are like water, some are like the heat -<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Some are a melody and some are the beat.<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Sooner or later they all will be gone...<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Why don't they stay young?</span></i></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I wish I knew.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But the part that grabbed me the first time I heard it and has never let go is the second part of the chorus:</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Forever young, <br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />I want to be forever young.<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Do you really want to live forever?<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Forever young.</i></span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Now, the standard understanding has never been how Iâve heard it, though I would say the phrasing supports it. Iâve always heard:</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Forever young, <br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />I want to be forever young.<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />Do you really want to live forever -<br style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none 0px;" />forever young?</i></span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Which layers it differently, giving it a different meaning and tension - and to me, itâs one of the core questions of our search for meaning. I think the only reason I saw it was because of one of my favourite childhood books: <i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Tuck Everlasting</i> by Natalie Babbitt. (Read the book - donât touch any of the dramatisations.)</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When I first heard the question sung by Marian Gold (Hartwig Schierbaum), my answer to both versions was a heartfelt, unqualified âYesâ - because, like the singer, I was terrified of leaving life not having lived it to the full, and I wanted all the time possible in which to do that. </span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Years on, my answer is - as it is to so many questions I once had unequivocal answers to - <i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I donât know</i>. Maybe I understand Angus Tuck better now. Maybe I understand better what it would be to outlive everyone I love. Maybe itâs that some part of me feels that death, in making life finite, also makes life precious. </span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> Or maybe, like Rabindranath Tagore, I see death differently:</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i style="-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Death is not extinguishing the light; it is only putting out the lamp because the dawn has come.</i> </span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And that is a dawn that, one day, I hope to step into and discover what lies beyond.</span></div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-17999723904289776002016-03-24T13:36:00.001+00:002016-03-24T13:36:53.219+00:00Truly, I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise - Maundy Thursday reflection 2016<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Truly, I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.</i> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Huh, I thought, as I considered what to say today. Unexpected words to an unlikely person â Our Lord speaks to a thief, to a man who had nothing to do with him until that moment, either for or against. Not a disciple, not an apostle, not a Pharisee. An unknown thief who admits his own sins, understands their consequences, and speaks out for an innocent man at the last possible minute receives eternal life. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Betwixt the stirrup and the ground, I mercy asked, and mercy found. </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Sobering, isnât it? Because that exchange turns everything we so often believe about salvation upside down. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Oh, we pay lip service to the âanyone can be saved right up to the last momentâ â unless youâre a diehard Calvinist, of course â but that isnât what we practise. Just watch and listen to how often we claim to know whether or not someone is saved and will go to Paradise, or, even more egregiously, <i>how often we put ourselves in the Lordâs place, claiming that we know exactly what they need to do to be in Paradise with Him</i> â as if G-d wasnât at work in their lives already. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">How often that âknowingâ has to do with their lives looking exactly like ours: same denominational team shirt, going to our church as often as we do, praying like we do, sharing our political ideology, hating the same people we do. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">My most recent experience of someone elseâs certainty about my spiritual life was Ash Wednesday, when, after a couple of monthsâ absence, I went to mass down the road. Just as I sat down at my computer, less than 30 minutes after the end of mass, an email from one of the priests hit my inbox: </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Dear Irim, </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i> As you know, Holy Communion is â amongst other things â a celebration of union with all who believe the same Faith, both across the globe and across history. You, yourself, have told us that you frequently attend a non-Catholic church on Sundays. If this is the case, then I must ask you not to present yourself for Holy Communion in a Catholic Church. If, on the other hand, you no longer attend non-Catholic churches on Sundays and Holy Days then, like anyone else who has returned to the Faith, you are of course most welcome.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>May G-d bless you during this holy season. </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Suffice it to say, G-d blessing HIM wasnât what first came to my mind. But once I could see past the shock and ensuing anger, my first thought â and almost the first sentence in my written response to him - was, <i>You canât make that judgment; you have no idea what my spiritual life has been for the last two months.</i> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> But more critically, as a Catholic who believes in the Real Presence - that communion IS the body and blood of Christ, I saw that with his request that I accept myself as excommunicated <i>latae sententiae</i>, he was literally <i>placing himself as a barrier between me and G-d</i>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In that moment, I understood that every time we judge someoneâs faith journey, every time we insist it look like ours, every time we try to force theirs into a shape that WE think is right, we place ourselves as a barrier between another and G-d. Can there be any greater sin than that? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> As with all sin, it is born out of fear and ignorance: fear that our own journey may not be the right one or that we are faltering, and ignorance of how G-d is working in their â and our - lives. We tend to forget that salvation is a relationship, a processâŚnot a fixed point.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But this Maundy Thursday, which coincides with the Jewish holiday of Purim, when nothing is as it seems and G-d delights in turning all things on their heads, letâs turn that fear and ignorance upside down. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> First, let us focus on the one journey to G-d we truly have any business conducting â our own. Letâs face our fear, destroy our ignorance by taking that hard look in the mirror, shining the light in dark corners, build our relationship with G-d rather than stand in the way of someone elseâs. Christian, convert thyself. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> Then, letâs turn our way of encountering others upside down â instead of trying to bring them where we are, letâs do as Our Lord does from the Temple to the well to the cross next to Him: meet them where they are. Let us listen deeply, hear their story, hold space for them to discover how G-d is speaking in their lives. Let us help them find their path to G-d rather than have them walk ours. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Because the G-d who created a dynamic, interconnected universe containing supernovas, plankton, and everything in between is hardly likely to be found waiting at the end of a single path for a certain type. Instead, a G-d so profligate, so extravagant, will be found everywhere, unfolding in everything, delighting in surprising us. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> Just as He did a few weeks after Ash Wednesday, when, after said priest saw me in the Lady Chapel whilst I was praying, I received an email from him. Having a no-holds-barred draft left over from our earlier correspondence, I rolled up my sleeves as I opened the email, ready to go all in â then read: </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>After you had finished your devotions I looked for you in church and in the lodge to say hello but I couldnât find you. I hope you are well. </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> And I knew I had a choice: stand between him and G-d, or give up my chance to show him whatâs what â and let me tell you, that draft email WAS a masterpiece - and walk beside him. No, he had no idea how G-d was working in my life. But then, I had no idea how G-d was working in his. What I do know is the conversation that emerged from his two sentence email, the child of correspondence fraught with hurt and anger, moved us both towards G-d, not away.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> <i>Vânahafoch hu</i> â it was turned upside down. But that uncertainty, that flipping, is nothing to fear. On the contrary, as the Maccabeats remind us, it is cause for celebration: </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>So raise your glass if you see G-d in hidden places, </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>He's right in front of youâŚ</i> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">âŚemerging all the time to say those unexpected words to unlikely people: <i>Truly, I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.</i> May we be among them.
</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-27872813988841396142016-02-10T13:43:00.002+00:002016-02-10T13:52:04.944+00:00Hypocrisy, or, Ash Wednesday Chapel Talk 2016<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One of the great things about having a Greek housemate is the unlimited opportunity for etymological discussion. âHey, George, I know youâre checking out the female lead in <i>Blindspot</i> right now, but what IS the real plural of octopus?â Of course, our most recent discussion (after my amused explanation of <i>polyamory</i> â he got the <i>poly</i> part, of course) revolved around the word âhypocriteâ as found in todayâs gospel, derived from the Greek á˝ĎÎż, meaning âunderâ and ÎşĎίνξΚν, which seems to have several meanings: to investigate, to discern, to accuse, to judge, to separate.<br /><br />The common explanation for the derivation of hypocrite is that <i>hypokrites</i> was the term for taking part in a stage production â and that wasnât always a good thing. It is said that Demosthenes ridiculed his archrival, Aeschines, for having been an actor, reflecting the general belief at the time that because actors were skilled at putting on and taking off various personas, they could not be trusted as politicians. Certainly, this is borne out by the 1980 American election and the fallout across the ensuing decades.<br /><br />But Iâm more inclined to play with the possibilities offered by á˝ĎÎż and, using the first person present, ÎşĎίνĎ. In the interest of time, Iâll only mention a couple: if we put âunderâ (as in beneath, e.g., hypodermic) together with âI separateâ, the implication is that âI separate what is under from what is above,â â the essence of <i>hypocrisy</i>. But equally interesting is the idea of âunderâ (as in lacking, deficient â e.g., hypothyroid) and âinvestigate or inquireâ, meaning that âI under-investigateâ: i.e., I do not <i>investigate</i> enough â bringing in the idea that a hypocrite does not explore his beliefs or motives as he should, leaving him lacking in self-awareness, unable to <i>discern</i> properly. <br /><br />So <i>hypocrisy</i> is the <i>separation</i> of what is below from what is above driven by the lack of self-awareness created by not <i>investigating</i> deeply enough, leaving us unable to <i>discern </i>clearly. <br /><br />In Matthewâs gospel, it seems we are being told to give, to pray, to fast in secret. At first glance, we may think, âWait, what? What about proclaiming the gospel, going out and sharing the good news? Arenât we meant to be a missionary people? Whatâs wrong with going public?â Let us not be like the hypocrites: let us take the time to investigate and discern.<br /><br />What is actually said? </span><br />
<ul><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">
<li>So when you give alms, do not have it trumpeted before you; this is what the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets <b>to win menâs admiration</b>.</li>
<li>Do not imitate the hypocrites: they love to say their prayers standing up in the synagogues and at the street corners <b>for people to see them.</b></li>
<li>When you fast do not put on a gloomy look as the hypocrites do: they pull long faces <b>to let men know they are fasting</b>.</li>
</span></ul>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">
In other words, the problem isnât public observance, but the <i>underlying motive</i> for such observance: winning the approval of others; being seen as good; showing oneâs spiritual superiority. Here, religious observance becomes a <i>hypokrisis</i>, a public performance for applause (later âplay actingâ); it is not what is true â and therefore, not part of the faith Our Lord gave us.<br /><br />It is what we do away from the public eye, what we do when we are (or think we are) alone that speaks our truth: it is where we sob out our grief when we tell everyone we are ok; where we feel our loneliness despite living a desperately active social life; it is the 3am wakefulness where our true fears and anxieties find us, no matter how we keep them at bay in daylight. </span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Therefore, give in <i>private</i> â when you mean it, pray in <i>private</i> â when you will tell G-d the truth, fast in <i>private</i> â when it symbolises something to you: because it is when you are most real that you will <i>truly</i> give, <i>truly</i> pray, <i>truly</i> fast. Like all things, true faith and its observance must begin from the inside outâŚit cannot be created from the outside in.<br /><br />We are all hypocrites, because somewhere, whether we are aware of it or not, what we profess and what we actually believe are not congruent. We may not be a Bernard Law or a Jimmy Swaggart, but somewhere, weâre not telling the truth, even to ourselves. <br /><br />And you know what? Thatâs utterly human. We are wired for connection, for approval, for love â and early on, most of us learn that being ourselves may not bring us the connection we need, but being something else will â so we split, become that which brings us what we think we canât live without and learn to hide that which we think would deny it to us. Hypocrisy arises because we live in a world polarised: this or that, good or bad, insider or outsider. Our world isnât one that holds the opposites and paradoxes inherent in and threaded through the wholeness of Creation; it is one that mistakes reductionism for elegant simplicity.<br /><br />In the end, hypocrisy leaves us living lives divided, out of integrity with ourselves, with G-d, and with the world, disconnected and alone, because despite our hope, it is not we who are loved, it is the persona we have created â the one that at first seems our liberation, but then becomes our prison.<br /><br />So how, then, do we move towards the truth that will set us free? Like the <i>Boston Globe</i> Spotlight team, featured in a recent film, we investigate tirelessly, digging for the truth, leaving no story buried in <i>Metro</i>, even when it seems unbearable. We come to G-d, our hearts broken, not our garments torn â knowing that a broken and contrite heart, He will not despise. <br /><br /><i>Behold, You desire truth in the innermost being/And in the hidden part You will make me know wisdom. </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i>And what might that truth look like? In the Blue Peter tradition of âhereâs one I did earlier,â I offer Sara Bareillesâ song written for Waitress, soon to open on Broadway, as an example (and, of course, as appropriate, swap âboyâ for âgirlâ, and âheâ for âsheâ):</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>It's not simple to say</i></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">
<i></i></span>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><i>That most days I don't recognize me</i></i></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>That these shoes and this apron</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>That place and its patrons</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Have taken more than I gave them</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>It's not easy to know</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>I'm not anything like I used to be</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Although it's true</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>I was never attention's sweet centre</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>I still remember that girl </i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She's imperfect but she tries</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is good but she lies</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is hard on herself</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is broken and won't ask for help</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is messy but she's kind</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is lonely most of the time</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is all of this mixed up</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And baked in a beautiful pie</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is gone but she used to be mine </i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>It's not what I asked for</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Sometimes life just slips in through a back door</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And carves out a person</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And makes you believe it's all true</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And now I've got you</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And you're not what I asked for</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>If I'm honest I know I would give it all back</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>For a chance to start over </i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And rewrite an ending or two</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>For the girl that I knew </i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Who'll be reckless just enough</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Who'll get hurt but</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Who learns how to toughen up when she's bruised</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>And then she'll get stuck and be scared</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Of the life that's inside her</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Growing stronger each day</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>'Til it finally reminds her</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>To fight just a little</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>To bring back the fire in her eyes</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>That's been gone but it used to be mine </i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Used to be mine</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is messy but she's kind</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is lonely most of the time</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is all of this mixed up and baked in a beautiful pie</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>She is gone but she used to be mine</i></div>
</i><br />Whatever your shoes, apron, place, and patron, whatever your âX but Yâ, whatever you feel is lost - you are not either/or but both/and: melancholy and joyful; regretful and grateful; angry and compassionate; tough and gentle - all of these mixed up and baked in a beautiful pie: whether itâs cherry, pumpkin, pecan, apple and blackberry, shepherdâs, steak and kidney.<br /><br />Sound messy, uncertain, uncomfortable? It is. But G-d has always been in the mess â as Terry noted a few weeks ago, weâre not meant to simply be neatly immersed in G-d, separate as a swimmer is from the water, but <i>infused</i> with Him, as water is with tea or chicken with a marinade.<br /><br />Hypocrisy, like all sin, is slavery born of fear â fear of being unloved, fear of lack, fear of being hurt, fear of not being enough - and rooted in division. So let us stop separating and start investigating the whole, replacing fear with curiosity, bringing G-d all of us, allowing Him to infuse it. Only then can we fully be in a relationship of love with Him, and then, with others.<br /><br />This Lent, let us take our first steps from slavery into the unknown, into the desert â worrying, complaining, afraid, with all our belongings and mess - knowing that we wonât be led by a seraph, an archangel, or a messenger â but by G-d Himself: <br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Why does G-d come Himself, Grandpa?</i></div>
<i><div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Ah, Neshume-leh, many people have puzzled over this question and have thought many different things. What I think is that the struggle toward freedom is too important for G-d to leave to others. And this is so because only those who become free can serve G-dâs holy purposes and restore the world. Only those who are not enslaved by something else can follow the goodness in them.</i> </div>
</i><br />(excerpted from 'The Real Story', in <i>My Grandfatherâs Blessings</i> by Rachel Remen â read the whole story for the background to the last paragraph)<br /><br />This Lent, letâs go home.</span></div>
</div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-49911989831623171352015-07-11T23:48:00.001+01:002015-07-12T00:35:17.962+01:00Setting off on an Ignatian Prayer Adventure<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">A couple of months ago, I picked up <i>The Ignatian Adventure</i> by Kevin O'Brien. I read the opening chapters, then put it down to pick up a couple of other books, finish a report, and have just sat down with it again to begin the Ignatian exercises.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Right now, I'm on <a href="http://www.ignatianspirituality.com/ignatian-prayer/the-spiritual-exercises/an-ignatian-prayer-adventure/week-1" target="_blank">week 1, day 1</a>. The process is as follows: begin with a prayer, read the Scripture passage or imagine the scene, pray, then <a href="http://www.ignatianspirituality.com/ignatian-prayer/the-what-how-why-of-prayer/review-prayer-by-keeping-a-journal" target="_blank">review the prayer</a>. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Today's focus was Who is G-d for you? How does G-d see me?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I thought, <i>Jesu, I have no idea</i>. <i>But that's the point, I guess.</i></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">The Scripture to pray over slowly and really feel was Isaiah <a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/isaiah/43" target="_blank">43:1-7</a>.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Unexpectedly, I found myself shaken:</span><br />
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I have called you by name: you are mine.</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po" id="29043002">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span class="bcv"></span>When you pass through waters, I will be with you;</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">through rivers, you shall not be swept away.</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">When you walk through fire, you shall not be burned,</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">nor will flames consume you.</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po" id="29043003">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span class="bcv"></span>For I, the L<small>ORD</small>, am your God,</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">the Holy One of Israel, your saviour.</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I give Egypt as ransom for you,</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Ethiopia and Seba<a class="fnref" href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/isaiah/43#29043003-1"><sup>*</sup></a> in exchange for you.</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po" id="29043004">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span class="bcv"></span>Because you are precious in my eyes</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">and honored, and I love you,</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I give people in return for you</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">and nations in exchange for your life.</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po" id="29043005">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span class="bcv"></span>Fear not, for I am with you;</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">from the east I will bring back your offspring,</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">from the west I will gather you.</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po" id="29043006">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span class="bcv"></span>I will say to the north: Give them up!</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">and to the south: Do not hold them!</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Bring back my sons from afar,</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">and my daughters from the ends of the earth:</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="po" id="29043007">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span class="bcv"></span>All who are called by my name</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I created for my glory;</span></i></div>
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></i>
<br />
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I formed them, made them.</span></i></div>
<div class="poi">
<br /></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><i>You are mine</i>. Something said to me over and over again by my parents, a statement of ownership, of my duty to them, not love - a claustrophobic phrase. But somehow, when I read this, it was like being held. You are mine: a shoulder to rest my head against, arms to be held in, somewhere to belong, sanctuary. Home.</span></div>
<div class="poi">
<br /></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Then: For me? You would do that for me? Walk with me through water and fire; give anything in exchange for me; gather what was scattered; demand my freedom from whom and whatever enslaves me? You love ME that much?</span></div>
<div class="poi">
<br /></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I don't get it. I can't even begin to comprehend it. To me, love has been duty, chains that bind, relentless taking on the part of others (witness those who show up only when they need to bend my ear about something or just vomit their stuff as if I'm a bucket, then go), dysfunction, needing to chase for crumbs of connection (witness no small proportion of my guy friends and EVERY man I've been romantically interested in).</span><i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span></i></div>
<div class="poi">
<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">But this? I don't understand this. I get DOING it, yes. <i>But I don't understand it being done for me</i>. <i>No one does this</i>. <i>No one is there like this</i>. There's always something to pay, usually the demand, conscious or not, that I am there, endlessly caring, giving, non-judgmental, non-human - no grumpiness, anger, darkness, needs of my own, just relentless compassion and giving of my gifts. Yet You would care enough to be with me through everything, to do anything for me, without my having to run after it or earn it?</span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I'm not sure I can relax into this. </span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">As I prayed, I fell asleep, because I really can't do a concentrated 40 minutes of prayer yet; I tend to do 5 min stints during the day, or keep it as an ongoing background conversation and that may be how I structure these exercises - I'm sure Ignatius would understand. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">As I always do, I dreamt.</span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I dreamt that I ran into a guy friend of mine who was being reserved - fitting the pattern I have (taking after my father, of course) - of guy friends who give intermittently, so you really have to stretch the connection in the same way you stretch that last bit of butter or jam to cover your bread. He was holding a little one, and I played with her, then put my hand on his arm and he stepped back. I was hurt by it, a bit angry, but curious too. </span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Then the scene changed and we were at a party. The scene above was repeated, except this time, he stepped well away, into a dark alcove. My arm, still outstretched, was suddenly held reverently, as if it were the most precious thing in the world, and my hand kissed with the utmost love. The look on my friend's face was a mixture of WTF, anger/affront - almost possessiveness - and a sudden realisation that if someone valued me that much, maybe he valued me more than he thought. The man who had kissed my arm stepped in front of me - South Asian, turban, proper moustache and all - saluted me with his talwar and bowed. My first reaction was to recoil; my second, one of gratitude and affection. I curtsied in return. </span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="poi">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I have no doubt this - and other dreams - will be part of the exercises for me. There is much to unpack here, but at the moment, my reaction of recoiling is what's holding my interest: recoiling at the fact that he was South Asian, and thus too close to my father for comfort; recoiling because of discomfort at being publicly treated with such love; recoiling at the lavish expression of <i>cherishing me</i>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">It also feels tied to <a href="https://youtu.be/wH8SxG6jYac" target="_blank">this song</a> that I rediscovered yesterday - one of a lover going to his beloved, expressing his love with abandon, the lover's only goal being to reach the beloved:</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">mahabuuba main aa rahaa huun<br />Beloved, I am coming.<br /><br />jo khwaab dekha hai tujhko dikhaane<br />The dream I've seen I mean to show you<br /><br />voh khwaab main laa rahaa huun<br />That dream, I'm bringing to you</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br />chup kyon main rahuun ab kyon na kahuun<br />Why should I remain silent? Why shouldn't I tell you?<br /><br />mere dil ka sukuun tu hai<br />You are my heart's peace.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Id quod volo?</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">To be that to someone and for them to be that to me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I need and desire that in physical form, with another human being, and I will not apologise for or diminish that. Neither would He - marriage is a sacrament where each lover sanctifies their beloved, after all - an earthly witness to G-d's love for us.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">But also, to the One who would walk through the waters and the fire with me,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Who would exchange anything to free me,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Who would bring me home from the ends of the earth,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Who would gather the scattered,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Who loves me with abandon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">And whose I will always be...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">to You I say:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><i>Mera dil meri jaan mera saara jahaan<br />My heart, my soul, my whole world,<br /> </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><i>Saara armaan tu hai</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><i>All my desire is you.</i> </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Mere dil ka sukuun tu hai<br />You are my heart's peace.</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">That is who You, my G-d, are to me.</span></div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-28084687023674365472015-04-02T14:09:00.000+01:002015-04-02T14:39:09.187+01:00It is finished: ΤξĎÎΝξĎĎιΚ<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It is finished. <i>Consummatum est</i>, as proclaimed on status after status of Catholic students finishing their exams. Or the single word in the Greek â ΤξĎÎΝξĎĎιΚ, âIt is finished,â which also has echoes of fulfilment. The verb tense is significant â the perfect tense in Greek, meaning that a completed action has continuing consequences â in this moment, this word, the sacrifice of Our Lord, now completed, continues to redeem humanity today. <br /><br />The perfect tense applies to our lives as well. All that ends in our life - school, jobs, relationships, ways of being - has continuing consequences in the present, finding a way to new beginnings in the future.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But in this moment, beneath a darkened sky, as G-d hangs on the cross, speaking a word of utter finality, no new beginning seems possible â simply an endless, bleak emptiness into eternity. But even so, this end must come.<br /><br />Our endings must come too: we lose people we love. We lose jobs in a world that identifies us by what we do, rather than who we are. We can no longer live in a way, in a story, that is now far too small for us: âI was abused.â âNothing good ever happens to me.â âI am a Christian, so the world will always persecute me.â Those stories may no longer suit us, but they have become our identity, the only way we know ourselves. And so, even though we know the ending must come, we hold on tightly to what we know, fists clenched, arms wrapped around ourselves, keeping the known old in and the mysterious, frightening new out â frozen like Lotâs wife: desperately unable to hold on to what must â or wants to - leave, and with closed hands, desperately unable to receive the grace we need, to trust that a new beginning will come. <br /><br />We are in good company: in Gethsemane, Jesus too, tries to hold on, depicted vividly in <i>Jesus Christ Superstar</i>:<br /><br /><i>I only want to say if there is a way<br /> Take this cup away from me<br /> For I don't want to taste its poison<br /> Feel it burn me, I have changed<br /> I'm not as sure as when we started</i><br /><br />In Our Lordâs agony, we find echoes of our own journey when endings come upon us: betrayal, anger, doubt as He bargains for things to remain as they are: </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Listen, surely I've exceeded expectations</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Tried for three years, seems like thirty</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Could you ask as much from any other man? </span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As he progresses to contemplating the ending â âBUT if I dieâ â he begs for the certainty that we seek in our lives: <br /><br /><i>Can you show me now that I would not be killed in vain?<br /> Show me just a little of your omnipresent brain<br /> Show me there's a reason for your wanting me to die<br /> You're far too keen on where and how and not so hot on why</i><br /><br />Before finally accepting the ending that is coming:<br /><br /><i>Why then am I scared to finish what I started?<br /> What You started, I didn't start it<br /><br />God, Thy will is hard, but You hold every card<br /> I will drink Your cup of poison</i><br /><br />Or as we know the more traditional, acquiescent line from the gospel, <i>not my will, but thine be done</i>. Our Lord, fully human as we are, wants to cling to what He knows: bargaining, raging, grieving, but finally accepting, because He knows that to do more, to carry on when it is time to move on, will have grave consequences for the future. This sacrifice does not just end something: it consummates a marriage between Him and His bride, the Church, <i>consummatum est</i> â ending one story in preparation for a new, larger one. It is not just finished, it is fulfilled: ΤξĎÎΝξĎĎιΚ.<br /><br />For us too, in ways large and small, ΤξĎÎΝξĎĎιΚ â though we so often cannot see the seeds of fulfilment through our devastation at the finishing â and the fulfilment may be some way in the future. We may resist finishing because we are afraid that the end means that the love, the joy, even the difficulties of the situation will vanish from our lives â but the perfect tense reminds us that life is not so; even if the situation is ended, its essence has woven itself into our being. Or we may try to make an ending sharp, short, surgical, denying it matters, pretending it never happened, locking it away. Both keep us bound, but Our Lord shows us the way to live an ending that sets us free: a way of grieving, of unfolding our arms and opening our hands through intimacy with the Father, sharing with Him our darkest, deepest, most uncomfortable feelings at this loss, from resistance to rage to abandonment, asking âWhy hast thou forsaken me?â<br /><br />After the storm, in that barren, uncertain place where we thirst, when we finally know the truth, accepting that it is finished â even feel ourselves unravelling as we open our arms on the Cross with Our Lord and let go â let us remember that though the relationship, job, time that is ending may be the <i>stuff</i> of our lives, it is <i>not</i> our lives â it did not form us in our motherâs womb, breathe life into us, it does not know the number of hairs on our head. Our lives are elsewhere, and every single one of these smaller acts of letting go prepares us for the ultimate act of surrender, where we give up our lives â ΤξĎÎΝξĎĎιΚ - so that we may truly live, through the words <i>Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.</i></span></div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-20573934242716687062015-02-18T11:19:00.000+00:002015-02-18T12:02:00.618+00:00Ash Wednesday chapel reflection<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>A sermon given at OCMS (my work) chapel on Ash Wednesday, 18 February 2015</i></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /><br />As a Catholic working in an evangelical Protestant institution, Iâve often wondered how my Catholicism is seen when it becomes visible at work, as it does this morning. My suspicion has always been that most of you think that last night, decadent papist that I am, I looked like this: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /><br /><a href="https://scontent-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xaf1/v/t1.0-9/285669_10151302688531297_1263157966_n.jpg?oh=12a3c63219cd617cb6754ae360472a5c&oe=554B2260"><img border="0" src="https://scontent-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xaf1/v/t1.0-9/285669_10151302688531297_1263157966_n.jpg?oh=12a3c63219cd617cb6754ae360472a5c&oe=554B2260" /></a><br /><br /><br /> and that today, Iâm going around looking like and thinking this <br /><br /><br /><a href="https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc3/v/t1.0-9/574632_10151309622796297_727235079_n.jpg?oh=007c38d5255e90df207ef52269ebe8ff&oe=554CD9E1&__gda__=1435099806_82fd116fc04a18ffa7d1c89a311fda5d"><img border="0" src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc3/v/t1.0-9/574632_10151309622796297_727235079_n.jpg?oh=007c38d5255e90df207ef52269ebe8ff&oe=554CD9E1&__gda__=1435099806_82fd116fc04a18ffa7d1c89a311fda5d" /></a><br /><br /><br />The first is somewhat wide of the mark, the second, less so.<br /><br />Thereâs little doubt that Grumpy Cat could be considered what many these days might refer to as âmy spirit animalâ, especially if anyone has heard my delicate opinions on religious observance and behaviour: from the stiff high church my-rubrics-are-better-than-your-rubrics âMore lace is graceâ crowd to the oft zealous bonhomie and non-ritual of many a low megachurch, few have escaped my lifelong tendency to snark.<br /><br />So it may come as a surprise when I say âRitual matters.â One might wonder how someone who believes that can relentlessly mock those who take ritual so seriously? On the surface, holding both positions may seem untenable. Look beneath the surface, and it begins to make sense.<br /><br />Ritual is utterly human; we all engage in it â for those who would claim that low churches donât, just observe the unspoken rules of when and how to react within the âunstructuredâ service, or ask them to change the Bible Study time by 15 minutes. But we often forget that ritual is a <i>vehicle</i>, not a <i>destination</i>. When we obsess about its appearance or form, or proudly deny its necessity, we have made ritual a <i>destination</i>, an end in itself, where it becomes meaningless, even destructive â the latter being seen most starkly in the lives of those with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, or OCD, where an anxious need for ritual for its own sake, to ward off some deeply felt impending catastrophe, can make it impossible to live in the world.<br /><br />But ritual as a <i>vehicle</i> is something else altogether: it leads us to something larger, to a deeper reality, even if on the surface, it may seem trivial. For example, every morning when I come in, I ask Rachel if she wants me to put some water in the kettle for her. 9 times out of 10, the answer is ânoâ, but the point of asking is NOT to get a âyesââ it is something larger â a way of connecting at the beginning of the day.<br /><br />If the small rituals â âDo you want coffee?â, the goodbye kiss for a loved one, the lighting of a pipe â matter, how much more the large ones that mark the moments where we cross thresholds, caught in that liminal space where we have one foot in each of two worlds, unsure how to leave one and enter the other? Moments where we make the choice to die to our old lives to be resurrected into a new â baptism; coming of age; marriage; ordination? <br /><br />Ritual as a vehicle leads us into new, necessary, often difficult places â but they are needed, and what unfolds there is holy. Here, ritual becomes an outward sign of inward process, of inward grace, even though that process may not unfold as we expect, or even as we hope. Less dramatically, ritual guides us through liminal liturgical days of the year: Jewish Yom Kippur; the Muslim Lailat il Qadr; and yes, today, our Ash Wednesday. Ritual matters. Ritual is sacred.<br /><br />It is for that reason that every year, on this liminal day when I take my first step into Lenten twilight, I wake up an hour early, travelling down the road, entering the dark, pre-7.30 mass hush of the Oratory to the faint, ever-present smell of incense, so still that the rustle of the brethrenâs thin breviary pages can be heard through church. The confessional door opens and shuts, doing brisk trade for a weekday morning, the church slowly filling as those of us ready for work in this world make time for the other. After a while, several distinctive treads converge on the sacristy from favourite pews, and out of the silence, we move into the rhythm of the mass: collects, responses, readings, the imposition of ashes with the stark words, âRemember that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return,â communion, then out into a world where Ash Wednesday is just another work day, where one no longer quite belongs. Tonight, I will attend the longer solemn mass, allowing me to re-enter and anchor in the Lenten world.<br /><br />âBut why?â you may ask. What matters about Ash Wednesday, about Lent? If I had 50p for every time Iâve heard, âI donât do Lent,â Iâd never have to work again. Given the post-mass coffee conversation in January, which sounds like parrots echoing, âWhat are you giving up for Lent?â â my usual response being, âChurch or being nice to people, not sure whichâ â anti-Lent sentiment is easy to understand. Too often, Lenten abstinence becomes a matter of secular goals and pride â I should know, I still brag about the year I gave up curry â rather than spiritual practice.<br /><br />If not with giving up teaspoons of sugar, or sweets, or even curry, where do we begin? As with all ritual, by going back to its roots, to what it is meant to symbolise or <i>re-present</i>: Our Lordâs 40 days fasting in the desert before beginning his public ministry, where He was tempted by Satan. <i>Here</i> is where we begin.<br /><br />How then, do we model our Lent on our Lordâs time in the desert? What can show us the way? First, from the story of Jesusâ temptation, we learn that <i>He was led by the Spirit</i>â this withdrawal was no capricious decision of his, but <i>divinely mandated and led</i>, and so should ours be, through praying that G-dâs will be done and by making space for the Spirit to lead us.<br /><br />He was <i>led into the desert</i>: that starkest of environments where nothing can be hidden, where all things are stripped back to their essentials, where resources must be drawn up from hidden depths, places that may not even be known to exist. Too often, we build our identity and our faith from the outside in: based on how we think it should look; on what others, particularly the given culture, see as âgoodâ or as âsuccessâ; our need for approval, which we mistake for love. So our Lent must be about stripping this false identity back and rebuilding it properly from the inside out: connecting with and coming right with ourselves and with G-d, allowing that to emanate outward to permeate the world, stripping back the barriers that keep us from fully being in our life in Christ: our defences, our need to control, our need for approval, our desire for power, our need to grasp â all the things that arise from fear which drive out our ability to live in perfect love.<br /><br />He was <i>tempted by and engaged with the devil</i>. Giving something up or a glib 'I'm not going to be negative' is often a way of avoiding engaging with anything of substance, an avoidance of looking at ourselves unflinchingly and confronting our demons head on. We cannot ignore Satan when he tempts us: we, like Jesus, must answer. To truly enter Lent, we must search every corner of ourselves, opening every door, entering our darkest places. If we note where he tempts us, engaging him there with Christ, who has also been tempted, beside us, Satan cannot help but live out his angelic name, Lucifer â bringing light to bear on what was once in darkness, which can then be brought before G-d to be transformed.<br /><br />Afterwards, Our Lord was <i>ministered to by angels</i>. G-d is always with us, offering support in many forms: through prayer, friends, Scripture, even through things we may consider our weaknesses. Even when He seems absent, because we must find our way to Him in free will, we must have faith that He is with us and allow Him to be with and minister to us in the ways He chooses to do so.<br /><br />Our Lord's temptation in the desert <i>is an initiation â a dying to the old and rising to the new, foreshadowing his crucifixion and resurrection in Holy Week and Easter</i>. He was led to the desert, fasted, was tempted by Satan, and ministered to by angels â and when He emerged, he was no longer the private man He had been, but the Son of Man who was to heal, preach, and die on the Cross for our sins. So too must Lent be an initiation for us: a dying to that which keeps us from G-d and rising to new life in Him.<br /><br />In this desert time, this Lenten twilight, let us not mistake stripping back to the heart of things, following in Christ's footsteps, for becoming <i>less</i> human. Too often we see our humanity as something to struggle against and excise rather than something to grow into and make whole. In few places is this mindset clearer than in the ubiquitous Christian question: "What would Jesus do?" â a purported attempt to help, but really a spiritual bypass to cut off another's very human mess so it doesn't bring us too close to our own. Itâs not a question <i>that makes any sense, at least not in the answers we offer</i>. If youâd asked my father what I would do when he suggested an arranged marriage, heâd have said, "Sheâll be upset, sheâll fight, but sheâll do it.â Never would he have dreamt of saying, âSheâll fill two bin bags with clothes, leave us a note on the fridge, and move out, never to spend another night under our roof.â <i>I couldnât have said that.</i> And if we donât know what those nearest us â or even we - would do, how much less do we know what our Lord & G-d would do? As I like to remind people when they ask that question,<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://41.media.tumblr.com/2c6c5281c765f7406f2af9d3827d83ed/tumblr_mxmj5tp6fQ1qz4s6ho1_1280.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/hHY77Mt7vXjAqqwgdzKES7VmV0TF6VZyDKNpA44v7P6RibXX7ZvY6AmCwjfDWR_-z-v1-mZlbRYDyVr4NwmPieaCeNCvWSlopZ6vV4g8Ju4rxmPamHpCwmqUtmzPdF65cjbEJ3UTBMrihX4hq6gwBGBpmQ" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Jesus got angry and...<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://scontent-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xaf1/v/t1.0-9/208419_10150168601246297_7341716_n.jpg?oh=68be7d317cf41ca292b6a909e2ef4312&oe=558C8499"><img border="0" src="https://scontent-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xaf1/v/t1.0-9/208419_10150168601246297_7341716_n.jpg?oh=68be7d317cf41ca292b6a909e2ef4312&oe=558C8499" /></a><br /><br /><br />...Jesus gave into doubt, agony, and fear in Gethsemane.<br /><br />As our creed states, Christ was <i>fully human</i> as well as fully divine: in becoming man, He sanctified every aspect of our humanity: our hunger, our thirst, our joy, our love, our pain, our rage, our doubt â and therein lies the real answer to WWJD: Jesus would live the mess and help others live theirs. To follow Him, we must do the same: we must become more human, not less. To do otherwise is to deny the Incarnation and the goodness of G-d's creation, to make the grave error of mistaking wounded for evil. Our humanity needs inhabiting, not avoiding; healing, not destroying. Lent is about stripping back down to and coming into right relationship with our humanity and with G-d.<br /><br />So often, I find that literature pulls everything I want to say together in a beautifully succinct, layered narrative, and today is no exception. I close with a passage from The Summer Tree, the first book in Guy Gavriel Kay's Fionavar Tapestry. In this trilogy, 5 Canadian university students are suddenly transported to the first world from which all others were born, Fionavar, each finding their vocation as the story unfolds. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In this moment, Paul Schafer has offered himself as sacrifice in place of the High King of Brennin, whose refusal to undertake the required three days hanging on the Summer Tree has brought drought to the land: showing that when we refuse to carry our cross, refuse to become more human, we are not the only ones who suffer. Paul offers himself as a way to punish himself for the car crash in which his girlfriend, Rachel, died. We join him on the third day, after many trials, a divine visitation, and support from a mysterious grey dog who has stayed with and fought a battle for him:<br /><br /><i>And he understood then, finally: understood that it had to be naked, truly so, that one went to [G-d]. It was the Tree, stripping him down, layer by layer, down to what he was hiding from...<br /> <br /> He was the Arrow now. The Arrow on the Tree, and he was to be given naked or not at all.<br /> <br /> And so, on the third night, Paul Schafer came to the last test, the one that was always failed, the opening. Where the Kings of Brennin or those coming in their name, found that the courage to be there, the strength to endure, even love of their land were none of them enough. On the Tree, one could no longer hide from the living or the dead, from one's own soul. Naked or not at all, one went to [G-d]. And oh, that was too much for them, too hard to be forced to go into the darkest places then, so weak, so impossibly vulnerable.<br /> <br /> And they would let go, brave Kings of the sword, wise ones, gallant Princes, all would turn away from so much nakedness and die too soon.<br /> <br /> But not that night. Because of pride, of pure stubbornness, and because, most surely, of the dog, Paul Schafer found the courage not to turn. Down he went. Arrow of the G-d. So open the wind could pass, light shine through him. Last door.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i>As Paul's heart finally broke, as his tears for Rachel finally fell, so too did the drought of Brennin break and rain fall, bringing promise of new growth to a land long barren. When we choose to carry our cross, enter fully into our humanity, engaging with both our light and our deepest darkness, we are not the only ones who are blessed.<br /><br />May we who step into the desert this Ash Wednesday, following in Our Lord's footsteps, find the courage to be led by the Spirit, rending our hearts and not our garments, allowing ourselves to be stripped down, coming before G-d naked and vulnerable through that last door: so open that the Spirit's breath passes and G-dâs light shines through us, emerging into new life with Christ, Our Lord, on Easter Day. Amen.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>sin otra luz ni guĂa </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>sino la que en el corazĂłn ardĂa. </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>AquĂŠsta me guĂŻaba </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>mĂĄs cierta que la luz del mediodĂa.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br />And I saw nothing,<br />With no other light to guide me,<br />but the one that in my heart burned.<br />It guided me,<br />More surely than midday light.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">When it is dark, when nothing lights us from without, we suddenly realise we are lit from within by a flame that that may blaze brightly or be banked, but is ever present. </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Then, it is the light burning deep within us, the one placed in us - our light - that must guide us, burning away the dross, the masks, the non-essential, leading us to do what we would would never imagine ourselves capable of in the comfort of daylight.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">That inner light, not lit by us, but burning within us since our birth? Our joy. </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">It is often the dark night of the soul that brings us to it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">San Juan de la Cruz, meet Gaudete Sunday.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Why is this? Because joy, unlike happiness (or at least the current understanding of happiness as pleasure), resides at depth. Think about how we express our sense of it: 'I am brimming with joy,' 'I am full of joy,' as if joy were something welling up from deep within us, from a spring we were not aware of until it overflowed into our consciousness and onto those around us. And so the foundation of joy must be sought in the depths, not the turbulent shallows, not the noisy sunlit topside, but in places of stillness, of light and shadow, in the place where we feel most deeply, the place that often only shows when life rips our outer persona from us through catastrophe, sorrow, the dark night of the soul.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Perhaps Gibran expresses it best:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.<br />And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.<br />And how else can it be?<br />The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.<br />Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As we approach Christmas, we get a hint of that understanding of joy as something deeper in one of my favourite carols, <i>The Seven Joys of Mary</i>. We glide through it until we hit the dissonance of the penultimate verse:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>The next great joy that Mary had, </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>It was the joy of six.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>To see her own son Jesus Christ </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Upon the crucifix.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Wait, WHAT? Excuse me, songwriting dude, but are you on the medieval equivalent of CRACK? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Perhaps. But perhaps too, he had an understanding of joy that we have lost. Perhaps he understood that Our Lady remembered that she had been told that a sword would pierce her soul also, and that she had been pondering it in her heart ever since her son was in swaddling clothes. Perhaps he knew, too, that as she looked up at Him on the cross, the depth of her pain was equalled by the depth of her joy in having been His mother, having had that closest of relationships with Him, as Gibran reminds us:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If that last example was too theological, let's look at a secular one from a fortnight ago - Michael Clarke's eulogy for one of his closest friends, Phil Hughes:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>He'd definitely be calling me a 'sook' now, that's for sure.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>[snip]</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>I walked to the middle of the SCG on Thursday night and I felt those same blades of grass beneath my feet, where he and I and so many of his mates here today have built partnerships, taken chances and played out the dreams we had in our heads as boys.<br /><br />The same stands where the crowds rose to their feet to cheer him on and that same fence he sent the ball to time and time again.<br /><br />And itâs now forever the place where he fell.<br /><br />I stood there at the wicket, I knelt down to touch the grass. I swear he was there with me, picking me up off my feet to check if I was OK. Telling me we just needed to dig in and get through to tea.<br /><br />Telling me off for that loose shot I played. Chatting about what movie we might watch that night, and then passing on a useless fact about cows.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Only those closest to you, those who take the greatest joy in your presence and whose hearts will break into a million pieces when you go, know exactly when you'll be calling them a sook and that you pass on useless facts about cows. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In the midst of his deepest sorrow, Michael Clarke remembered and spoke of his deepest joy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Joy is that light in us anchored in authenticity, intimacy, connection - with ourselves, with G-d, with others.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In the end, joy is rooted in that deepest & truest of all things: love. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Whilst joy is constant, its form is not: it can be the quiet contentment of a sleeping babe in arms; the fierce exultation in a friend's accomplishment; the gratefulness for the chance to sit with a friend in their darkness; the sense of rightness about our current path; being unexpectedly brought alive by beauty whilst gripped by the most ferocious depression.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Joy is not external trappings, though it can be expressed by them: candles, vestments, incense (which always takes me back to childhood summers at Anarkali bazaar), jumping up and down, squees, song, fizzy happiness. The touchstone is this: are those external trappings a way to hide, a way to maintain external order over internal chaos, to keep a death grip on the sunny topside, desperately avoiding the descent to the depths you can feel coming by the increasingly strong tug on your ankles? Or are they in consonance, in harmony, in <i>order,</i> with who you are and what you are feeling and how you want to express it?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As you wear those beautiful trappings and gravely celebrate or loudly dance and proclaim your happiness about G-d and saviour, do you ignore those who reach out to you in pain because it provokes panic and anxiety, fear that their pain will drag you under? Do you desperately hope that they will take the hint from your silence and never come to you again? Or, if you find yourself able, do you go up to them and say, 'I'm sorry I didn't say anything, I didn't know what to say,' - the reaction that will make me want to cup your face in my hands, look you in the eye, and say, 'I know. You can't even be with your own pain, how could I expect you to sit with me in mine?'</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If you're avoiding sitting with pain, honest connection, even though you paint a beautiful picture, hug everyone around you, dance and sing, smile and laugh, tell everyone how happy the good news makes you, that's not joy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If, no matter what you wear, how you celebrate, you come towards me when I express my pain, reaching for connection, if you have the courage to stand up and talk about the dark night of the soul you experienced as a curate in a sermon on Gaudete Sunday, <i>that</i> is joy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Joy insists that we go where we would often rather not - to our deepest places, where our oldest, most essential pain, sorrow, and darkness reside. But amongst these sit our truest essence, our brightest light, our surest guide - because all these things: light and shadow, joy and sorrow, woundedness and healing <i><b>are true</b></i>. And all of them are born of love: lost, rejected, given, and received. Joy will always insist on our truth and, like the chrysalis forcing the butterfly to beat its wings against it, on our growth.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Joy doesn't promise us ease - those days that we can only take one breath at a time because the pain is so intense will still come. But it does promise us the light that will guide us step by step, more certain than the light of midday, until...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>and from the darkness we have light,</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>which make the angels sing this night</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And if you think the angels will sing one iota less joyously for your step into love and freedom than they did for the birth of the saviour, I suspect you have another think coming. I think San Juan might agree.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">May you ever hear them sing as you follow your light through the night to join with your Beloved.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Gaudete.</span></div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-57028733260612695692014-12-10T00:29:00.002+00:002014-12-10T10:13:40.317+00:00Advent, or, Prepare ye the way of the Lord<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tKUi6XiTNe8/UCVp6gwGn9I/AAAAAAAAAmo/Qr7y-66wnOo/s1600/JesusAndSamaritanWomanAtJacobsWell.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tKUi6XiTNe8/UCVp6gwGn9I/AAAAAAAAAmo/Qr7y-66wnOo/s1600/JesusAndSamaritanWomanAtJacobsWell.jpg" height="257" width="320" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I was scrolling through my facebook feed when I noticed that a clerical friend had liked a picture of the sacrament of penance/confession with the caption, 'Shopping is fun. But there's a better way to prepare for Christmas.' Hated the caption, loved the sentiment, not keen on saccharine Victorian depictions (though I did like that one). So here I am, blogging for the first time in a quarter, echoing it in my own way.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It is rare that I allow anyone to glimpse my true religious sensibilities: I use either humour to deflect or I have others, such as Pope Francis, speak for me. Both are defences to shield that which is incredibly precious and tender, needing protection, not exposure to ridicule, cynicism, or harshness. That soul essence is meant to suffuse me, so that indelibly intertwined with my light and shadow, imbued by my humour, stubbornness, and strength, it can then meet the world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Part of that sensibility is the deep awareness closer than my breath, for as long as I can remember, of Advent being an approach to something deeply sacred, momentous, breathtaking. As is the hard truth that I have barely felt it - and Christmas - for years. I long for the sense I had as a Muslim child looking out my window on Christmas Eve night, waiting for midnight with baited breath, knowing something was coming, coming - then finally going to bed just after midnight in the certainty It was here and all was well. Somewhere, that got lost, and as magical as Midnight Mass is, it only ever brings a light brush with that feeling - during the Genealogy, <i>It came upon a midnight clear</i>, the odd moment during mass. Perhaps there is too much sensation, too much light, too much movement - and that awareness, that feeling, needs stillness, darkness, aloneness, and stretched senses beyond the usual five.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But that moment of wonder and knowledge also needs openness, clarity, the emptiness of a vessel meant to have something poured into it. Much as I'd like to imagine I am that, I'm too committed to telling myself the truth to believe it. I know better, and though I've worked at becoming that empty vessel, diligently addressing issues, leaving places that haven't worked, telling myself 'I can get through this event that has made it hard for me to breathe, bringing up so much emotion I feel like I'm drowning: G-d is always with me,' it has been, in internet language, an epic fail. Usually rather self-aware, I've been at a loss as to why nothing was helping.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As is the way of all things, if you wait long enough, if you listen hard enough, the answer will find you. And it was choking up whilst reciting a couple of Rachel Remen's stories over a week ago that made me finally understand what was going on.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In the first story, Rachel speaks of ER doctors who had come to her, </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">wondering what had happened to their humanity</span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> because they would watch horrible things happen before them and feel nothing. We would recognise that as burnout, as does Rachel. But whereas most of us would put it down to mental weakness/breakdown, she nails the numbness as emotional overload: if we do not process our feelings, we eventually become so full that we can no longer feel. If ER doctors don't process their emotions at what they see and experience, at the patients they save and lose, then they will watch horrible things happen before them and feel nothing, because they are so full of undifferentiated and unprocessed feeling, they can't feel any more.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In short, we burn out because we refuse to feel, to grieve, to let go.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I completely choked up as I told John and Liz the second story about Rachel's transformation during her training: from crying with parents when they lost their baby to delivering the news of the death of a child so stoically that the father looked at her and apologised for crying. She said she thought back on that moment with shame, wondering when she became a person to whom a newly bereaved father had to apologise to for crying over the loss of his child.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">My intense reaction to simply relaying both those stories, which I had told many times before without the same emotional charge, hinted that they held the cure to what ailed me: my loss of that sense of the sacred, that hushed expectancy, that magic I knew of Christmas as a child. Not that alone - also the sense of G-d's presence I have taken for granted and now struggle to find. I let it sit, too weary to worry at it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I didn't <i>need</i> to worry at it. I knew how hard this year had been, how much had been rent open. How I'd walked through the most breath-stealing revelation and betrayal about someone who had been close to me, unsure of how to let anyone near to comfort me, to listen, unsure of how to completely collapse so I could rebuild. But G-d was with me, right? I could do this. I could walk through this - and not only WALK through it, but be there for others in crisis as well - so THERE. How I'd stood, week after week, watching the tableau unfolding, pushed beyond feeling by a sense of betrayal, feeling like an idiot for having given so much, knowing it was time to walk away. Sitting month after month, untangling so much pain from the past that whole weeks went by in a haze, my presence barely touching the world I walked through or those I listened to.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As the week went on, apparently unrelated issues arose: my resentment at having my sleeve figuratively tugged by those who seemed endlessly in need, only speaking when they wanted something, their 'How are you?' nothing more than a token awaiting 'Fine' so they could start; my rage at those who seemed to have no sense that they weren't the only ones in need/pain; my unwillingness to socialise; my increasing irritability and unwillingness to give anyone leeway; my desperation to perpetually cocoon.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Like a jigsaw puzzle, the 'unrelated' pieces proved they were the ones essential in filling out the whole picture. The answer was blindingly obvious and crystal clear: I was burned out because I hadn't processed my own emotions. I'd insisted that, even helped, others process theirs, but as is often the case, I hadn't practised what I'd preached. My emotions, and those of others I'd worked with, had set like cement throughout my emotional being. I hadn't just lost my sense of joy and the sacred; I too had become someone to whom a newly bereaved father would apologise.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>That</i> is why that picture of the confessional my friend liked, with its horrid caption, struck home when it normally would have produced an 'Oy vey, how tacky': because stepping into that most vulnerable space, the confessional - both the sacrament & the emotional space - is my answer, how I am to prepare a way for the Lord. An honest, deep, unflinching confession will break open and loosen the cement, allowing me space to talk further and process that tsunami of emotions, emptying me so I can be that vessel capable of being filled with the awe and wonder of those long ago Christmas Eve nights, of feeling G-d's presence in every place and every breath.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">We all need our cement loosened and our vessels emptied.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">For me, going deep, taking unflinching stock, then going to confession is not a joyless duty or an occasion for fear. It is, as in the picture above, being the Samaritan woman sitting at the feet of Our Lord, having emptied myself to Him, in turn <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+4" target="_blank">receiving the water that will become in me the spring of water welling up to eternal life</a>, allowing G-d's love to fill not just me, but all around me, as it flows through and where He will.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It is a way of coming back into my right place in the order of things, of coming into harmony.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Shopping IS fun, and I'll be doing some of that - I know I won't be alone. But even as I fill up my shopping cart, I'll be preparing for Advent by emptying my vessel.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I hope I won't be alone in that either.</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-60018145611441670902014-09-14T20:21:00.001+01:002014-09-14T20:46:45.737+01:00Ten books which have changed my life (FB challenge)<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">So, the Northern Lights are reluctant to make an appearance here, which means I will be doing the 10 book challenge I've been nominated for several times over. With the usual disclaimer that so many more than 10 books have changed my life, and in no particular order except the one in which they come to mind:<br /><br />1. <i>The Joy Luck Club</i> by Amy Tan: it articulated so much about being a child of immigrants that I had felt, but had been unable to express. I couldn't put it down, I couldn't stop crying, and it may be time to re-read it.<br /><br />2. <i>A Wrinkle in Time</i> and all related books by Madeleine L'Engle. To this day, I use Echthroi, Deepening, kairos and chronos to explain things. I was talking to a friend the other day about another friend I'm worried about, and I said, 'You know, he reminds me of Charles Wallace under IT.' L'Engle's theology helped me articulate mine, and I lost myself in her stories. I still do. And I still cry when Progo...oh, go read them!<br /><br />3. <i>Goddesses in Every Woman</i> by Jean Shinoda Bolen. My introduction to archetypes and Jungian psychology. Need I say more?<br /><br />4. <i>Women Who Run with the Wolves</i> by Clarissa Pinkola-Estes. I got a copy in 2003 when a Catholic acquaintance was giving hers away. I owe her the deepest thanks: not only did it fill my love of fairy tales and my need for diving deep into the psyche, it was so beautifully written, it read like poetry. Bliss.<br /><br />5. <i>My Grandfather's Blessings</i> (and its companion, <i>Kitchen Table Wisdom</i>) by Rachel Remen. H/T <a href="https://www.facebook.com/alisonporter">Alison Porter</a> for this recommendation. Rachel's stories of her family, her practice, her life, entwined with her reflections on the deeper significance are absolutely soul-restoring, and food for spiritual hunger. She is one of my heroines, and I actually have 2 copies - one I lend and one that doesn't leave the house.<br /><br /> 6. <i>The Wizard of Oz</i> & associated books: These were the first books I remember being able to completely lose myself in, to escape from here. The irony being, of course, that I collected the whole set because they were the books my uncle bribed me with so I wouldn't tell my parents about the sexual abuse. Several years later, he asked for him back, and I said, 'No.'<br /><br /> 7. <i>The Prophet</i> by Kahlil Gibran: I discovered this on a bookshelf in my father's office when I was 11ish, saw it had been given to him by one of his brothers (NOT that one, but Ambereen and Saira's dad, whom I absolutely adore), and my curiosity was piqued. I took it upstairs to my bedroom and was immediately entranced. Even then, though I didn't have the depth of experience to fully understand and appreciate it, I knew I'd found MY spirituality, MY prophet - and his name wasn't Muhammad.<br /><br /> 8. <i>The White Dragon</i>/Pern series by Anne McCaffrey: I found it in the Holton library when I was about 11, and it was the first Pern book I read (I later went back and read the series in order, along with the other trilogies I could get my hands on). I identified deeply with Jaxom and fell in love with Robinton - and later fiercely identified with Menolly in the Harper Hall trilogy (but I wanted to Impress a dragon!).<br /><br /> 9. <i>The Shack</i> by William P. Young: Blew the doors off my understanding of G-d and the Trinity. My entire relationship with G-d shifted profoundly after reading that book, because I finally began to trust that I was loved. I have a hard copy, but I suspect it's one I'll want on my Kindle for easy access.<br /><br />10. <i>Train to Pakistan</i> by Khushwant Singh: I knew my parents had been through Partition - and for some reason, when I was young, I'd assumed it had been a very orderly transition, not recognising much of my parents' behaviour for what it was - the result of extreme trauma. It was only when I stumbled across a documentary here on Partition, sitting through it horrified, that I truly understood. A friend recommended Khushwant Singh's book - a gripping, harrowing read that made me finally understand what my parents had been through and why they were who they were.</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-85798464732195670522014-05-16T16:54:00.002+01:002014-05-16T17:00:12.519+01:00I grieve...<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Since 4 May, I have been doing Desmond Tutu's <a href="http://forgivenesschallenge.com/" target="_blank">Forgiveness Challenge</a>. After Iyanla Vanzant's four weeks back in December, I thought this would be easy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">*Pauses to laugh hysterically*</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The last fortnight has been among some of the toughest emotional work I've done, and that's on top of the last 6 months, which has been an emotional wringer on its own, kicking me out of my numbness into a perpetual ache in my solar plexus, where layer after layer of dark sticky fascia like material feels as if it is being ripped from my inside...sometimes it's just sore, sometimes it makes one want to bend over double - it's always there. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But I finally feel alive - and am beginning to feel so much clearer. To quote John Cougar Mellencamp, 'Hurts so good.' And so does this challenge, even when it knocks me for six through a poem, meditation or making me write down what's going on for me.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Today was the latter when, on day 13, I was asked what I grieve. I thought I might write a couple of things that encompassed everything else, keeping it abstract and at a safe distance, my natural way of defending myself from the pain and the overwhelming grief and sense of loss that followed.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The first part of the challenge was listening to an interview with Alanis Morrisette, and then she said these words that struck home: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As long as we hold on to the victim consciousness, the rage, and the blame, we don't have to feel grief. And the sensations somatically of grief in our body for a lot of us can be really uncomfortable. There are a few feelings. For some of us, anger is more tolerable than full-blown grief.</span></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If I ever wondered why I was so angry, my answer was right there.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I started writing...and didn't stop. Couldn't stop. Everything I'd held in, pretended I didn't grieve, or pretended I'd gotten past, poured out into my diary. But I knew there was one more step. I had to speak it out loud. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Remember, I'm naming it and feeling it. I know I probably don't need to say it, but this needs the space held for it, so please, nothing about moving on, thinking positively, 'you can do something about it' or anything that gets me away from sitting with this. I've spent my whole life defending, being capable, and holding the space for others - now it's time to be with and honour my own vulnerability.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">So here goes:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I grieve... </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...that I never had ground under me </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...that I never had a childhood and the carefree joy and silliness that goes with it</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never knowing the freedom in just being, which I still have trouble with </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never being safe in a pair of loving arms</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never holding my brother as a baby or bonding with him as he grew older</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never being able to rest in the certain knowledge of being safely held and unconditionally loved </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...the loss of that which so many other children took for granted: love, security, affirmation, rootedness </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never being celebrated in the way this friend celebrates her daughter on graduation day: "Bittersweet today. I just can't believe how fast you grew into a beautiful young woman! I am so proud of you! And as I sit here with tears... I know you are destined for awesome things!!! I love you" </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never being deeply and truly known from the moment of my birth</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never being close to those whose blood runs through my veins </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...the loss of that primal belonging to mother and family; for the sanctuary that belonging offers </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never having the freedom to explore my heart, my talents, my gifts, my body, to work out my shape and way of being as I became a woman </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...the loss of the celebration of graduations, birthdays, days that were mine </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...never having sense of endless possibility of the late teens, early 20s, the wanton freedom and the ability to let go and experience - clubbing, travelling, what I wanted to do because I didn't know - still don't sometimes - how not to be a spore rather than a seed </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...the loss of being able to love with abandon, to give into lust, to explore what my body wanted and be with it. Why? Because with an uncle, I had learned that my body was for someone else's use. From my parents, I learned it was clumsy and something dirty, to be ashamed of</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...not having that deep love and intimacy of a long-term relationship because of fear and because I can't believe that I could be loved like that</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...feeling unloved for as long as I can remember</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...the loss of the time spent fighting them for every precious second of freedom from their need to make me an extension of them, even as an adult</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...I grieve. And in grieving, I heal...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.<br />And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.<br />And how else can it be?<br />The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.<br />Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?<br />And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?<br />When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.<br />When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight. <br /><br />Some of you say, "Joy is greater thar sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."<br />But I say unto you, they are inseparable.<br />Together they come, and when one sits, alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed. <br /><br />Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.<br />Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.<br /><br />When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.</i></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">--Kahlil Gibran</span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...and feel the shoots of joy spring up from the seeds of sorrow.</span></div>
</div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-70391707656856473712014-05-07T17:01:00.000+01:002014-05-07T17:01:21.970+01:00Dream log: where I'm under a thresher, then in the next dream, forgive my father<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Flora - our awesome cook for Wednesday lunches at work - was driving like a bat out of hell on Randolph Rd East near its intersection with New Hampshire - 2 minutes from the house in which I grew up. White-knuckled, grabbing the dashboard, I said, 'Flora. I know this road. It's narrow, it winds, and you can't take the turns THAT FAST.'</span><div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">She, of course, ignored me. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Fortunately, she stopped off on the side of the road before I had a heart attack. The area near us was a vast field, and the sky was that unearthly, pearlescent yellow that harbingers a storm, with black clouds not far off. Coming towards us was a giant, post-apocalyptic looking machine, which turned out to be a thresher - we were too late to move fully out of the way. A friend (unknown IRL) said, 'The sides! Bend over double and go down the inside of the wheel! Following his instructions, I tucked myself tight to the left hand set of wheels (to my right, since we were going in the opposite direction) and turned to see a man underneath the machine who seemed to be guiding it in some way, walking so close to me we could have brushed shoulders - yet he seemed unaware of me.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Even bent over double, I felt a flat rectangular piece of machinery press into my back over and over, the pressure not quite unbearable, but so intense that I woke up feeling it press into my back one more time before I was fully in this reality...</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...I cracked open an eye and blearily checked the clock. 5am. Argh. Tossing and turning finally led to falling into an uneasy doze, where I was suddenly with someone else and we were pinning things to the sides of of a peach posterboard cone. Both our fathers, with whom we'd had tremendously difficult relationships, had died, and we were pinning things up and stating reasons for why they might have been the way they were. The emotional tenor was intense, and it was almost as if their spirits were there.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Suddenly, she pinned up small star-shaped flowers that were glowing, translucent white, with yellow centres that were becoming an otherworldly gold, as she said to me: "He didn't do so well in this physical reality, but his soul loves you." I choked and sobbed, and woke up feeling that intensity of grief, understanding, and finally forgiveness.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The clarity, the spaciousness has stayed with me all day.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Oh, and I didn't know what the flowers were, so I looked them up - Star of Bethlehem. Symbolic in the obvious way, but also <a href="http://www.bachflower.org/star_of_bethlehem.htm" target="_blank">eerily appropriate</a> in <a href="http://www.victorianbazaar.com/meanings.html" target="_blank">several others</a>...</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...dreams are powerful medicine.</span></div>
Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-83852948924623126322014-04-17T13:30:00.000+01:002014-04-17T13:50:49.086+01:00My G-d, my G-d, why hast thou forsaken me - a reflection on the fourth word of Christ from the Cross<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">Midway.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">We are now midway through the Via Crucis, that most harrowing of
journeys, the point at which the reason for beginning a difficult journey can
feel so long forgotten, and at which the end is nowhere in sight. It is the
moment when looking back can show us how far weâve come, give us a clearer idea
of where we are, and offer us the courage to go forward â in the words of
Caryll Houselander:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">Now from the Cross, before his eyes are darkened, he can look back
down that road which is indeed an image of the road through life of all those
who will come after him.<br />
<br />
He has known pain, exhaustion, apparent failure, shame; but it has not only
been tragedy. He has known too the blessed dependence of a man upon other men;
he has been helped by them and accepted their help; he has realised the joy and
the light that comes to other men through helping him, above all through
helping him to carry his cross. He has known compassion from the women he met
on the way, compassion and the heroism it inspires â the women who blessed him
openly with loud voices and Veronica who dared the mockery of the crowd and the
authority of the armed guard to come close to him and wipe the tears and filth
from his face.</span></i><span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">He has known all these things and more in his Incarnation, and now
he comes to the final experience that brings him to full humanity: despair.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">Weâre not comfortable with the idea that our Lord should despair,
or feel darker emotions, such as rage or doubt. Look at how we glide over the
rawness of Gethsemane, the rage of the cleansing of the temple, the despair of
this moment.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">Why? Because to acknowledge that G-d incarnate must descend into
the abyss means that we ourselves cannot avoid it, however much we hope that
our faith will allow us a spiritual bypass; however we weave our religion â
whether through ornate liturgy or relentless positivity and âgoodnessâ â to
create a neat, safe world and pretend that the darkness has no claim on us by
calling <i>it</i> 'sin', and <i>ourselves</i>, when we avoid it, 'good'.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">But to claim that despair is a sin is to claim that Jesus sinned
on the cross. To claim that rage is a sin is to claim that Jesus sinned in the
temple. To claim that doubt is a sin is to claim that Jesus sinned in
Gethsemane. To deny the darkness that is part of us is to dishonour Our Lord â
because it is to say that His humanity was a lie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">But the truth is that when we deny the existence of our darkness,
claiming we feel none of it, it is <i>our</i>
humanity, <i>our</i> faith, that is the lie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">Because there is no truer moment than now â the moment Jesus hangs
on the cross in utter agony, midway through his harrowing journey, crying out
to the Father, âEloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?â<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">The emptiness. The desolation. The inability to trust what is to come,
to believe in what he has left behind, this descent into the abyss marks the
final moments of his Incarnation in which he has lived the full experience of
his people. He has laughed, he has grieved, he has been angry, he has loved, he
has comforted, he has doubtedâŚ<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">âŚbut only now does he despair, feeling abandoned by G-d, and in
this moment, he has truly become fully human â truly felt as we have felt.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">Because he despaired, falling all the way into the abyss, I was
not alone that desolate night I put one leg over an 8th floor balcony railing,
intending to swing the other over and fall into the car park below. You are not
alone in your darkness. Because Christ felt as we felt, NONE of us are EVER
alone.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">He is with us in every joy, every sorrow, every ordinary moment.
And because he experienced them, because he has walked the road, he shows us
the way forward.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">What does Jesus do in this moment of utter despair? He doesnât
attempt to be what he thinks G-d wants him to be; he doesnât try to suppress
his sense of abandonment; he doesnât pretend to feel or be anything other than
he is. He DOES stay in relationship - He speaks to His Father: âMy G-d, my G-d, why
hast thou forsaken me?â He brings his desolation to the Father, surrendering
it, and in so doing, allows it to be transformed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">As Houselander noted, Christâs road is the road for all of us who
follow: when we allow ourselves to feel the darkness, giving it to G-d rather
than trying to hide it behind our backs because we think itâs âbadâ, when we
admit we thirst and finally surrender, commending our spirit into G-dâs hands,
new life will follow.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;">But that new life will not be like our old one; it will be
something beyond our imagining, for acknowledging the darkness, risking the
descent, allowing the surrender bring great gifts that change us at the deepest
level. We may not know how, for that is part of the mystery, but we may get a
glimpse in this exhortation to Christ often sung on Palm Sunday:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua', serif;"><i>Bow thy meek
head to mortal pain, then take, O G-d, thy power and reign.</i></span></div>
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Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-74932419447539838242013-12-23T01:29:00.000+00:002013-12-23T13:58:47.920+00:00The gift of giving into despair<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.rebellesociety.com/2013/09/17/facing-the-darkest-side-of-a-beautiful-person/"><i>Whoâs telling the truth? Nearly everyone becomes a liar. Nearly everything becomes a betrayal. The journey of life becomes so insignificant that we seek only the dark â we dim our lights until we can no longer see. We can no longer feel...</i></a><br /><br /><br /> This morning, after feeling balanced and open for months, the emotions I'd been holding in check to function - grief, the emotions that sit beneath being strong for others, soul-weariness - all came crashing down. I strongly suspect it's part of the forgiveness practice I'm working through: last night was 'Forgiving your feelings': so no surprise that, after decades of being marginalised, they decided to pour through the open door once it was cracked open.</span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Weeks ago, in a therapeutic discussion, I discovered that my core emotion wasn't anger, as I had thought, but despair. </span></span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; line-height: 24px;">Today, that was what overwhelmed me. Finally, after years of fighting it, I did something different. I stayed still and let the tsunami engulf me. </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And the oddest thing happened. As I went through my day, thinking 'It's all a lie,' I felt a profound sense of peace, even as I felt things I shouldn't:</span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>I completely, irrevocably give up on them.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>That friend will never be able to offer the emotional support I need, because they can't deal with my darkness.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>She'll always play the victim even as she pretends not to; she's never going to change.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>I actually believe that his part of this friendship is about needing me, not genuine affection and appreciation for who I am. I don't think he really sees or wants to see me. I'm done making the effort.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>These people will always value status, money, and chase approval. Our core values will always be diametrically opposed. There's no point in engaging.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Why do I keep offering myself, my friendship, things that deeply matter to me to people who are utterly incapable of receiving it? WTF IS WRONG WITH ME? </i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>He's always going to charm his way through life and never discover who he really is. And because this is a shallow world that values appearance over substance, that is going to be reinforced. What difference would reaching out make? I'll leave him to his long, slow, internal death. </i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>I don't care. </i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>They are only going to see what they want to see - why see a marriage, mother and child in trouble when you can pretend to see a perfect family? </i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>I will never get any better - life will continue to be bleak, joyless, and living my purpose and passion will continue to elude me, as will the love and connection I want more than anything.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>I don't belong here.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Nothing I do makes a difference.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>So, why am I here?</i></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And so on. </span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I felt the utter absence of hope. I let that be my truth; I acknowledged what was real. I didn't desperately scrabble for hope, thinking, 'I MUST hope, no matter what form it takes,' nor did I scrabble for faux Christmastide feelings; I left my hands by my sides. I let it overwhelm me.</span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It is still overwhelming me.</span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But I chose not to lie...and my usually sharp, blunt, German surrogate mum showed a surprising gentleness. My perpetually busy friend checked his motion and heard me, pulling me in for a quick hug that allowed for a much-needed lean against a safe shoulder - and was genuinely present, despite a hundred other things that needed doing.</span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">These moments reminded me of Andrew Bunch's sermon at work's Wednesday chapel last week, when he spoke of the siege of Samaria and the nature of Advent hope. Advent hope, he said, comes when we are at the end of our rope - in the case of the siege, famine and women eating their children; that it often comes from those we despise - as it did from the lepers, who had nothing to lose and had taken the risk of entering the tents of the Syrian army, only to discover the siege broken; and that it is unexpected, miraculous, something we never could have expected - something that has room to happen because we haven't closed off possibilities by insisting that hope appear in a particular way. </span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 24px;">I await that extraordinary hope, but I remember that, as today's preacher reminded us, whilst the experience is exceptional, often, the manner is ordinary. That moment when a friend checks his motion and holds the space. That moment when you steel yourself for an expected 'Well, dear, just carry on, these things pass,' and instead get an affectionate look, a finger brushing across your cheek and a gentle, 'You're going to be ok,' from an unexpected quarter. In a song that offers you the only prayer left right now: </span><i>But I offer all I am for the mercy of Your plan - help me be strong. Help me BE. Help ME.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Suddenly, you realise that THIS time, you've actually changed enough that you WILL let G-d help, because THIS time, you've finally offered your <a href="http://www.stevewiens.com/2013/12/11/consenting-to-be-lost/" target="_blank">consent to getting lost</a>. </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Which means that you finally trust that babe in the manger enough to step into those outstretched arms and let Him bring you home, even if you can't feel His love just yet. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">But you know that, as today's preacher noted, if you stay present to your life as it unfolds, the opportunities to love (and be loved by) G-d come over and over again. </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">And if you stay present, you sense that in one of those encounters, just as you've finally consented to get lost, you'll finally feel - and truly know - you are loved. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Real hope - not the manufactured, even desperate, hope we scrabble for to avoid the dark night of the soul bearing down on us...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">...that is the gift of giving into despair and the long dark night.</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33689950.post-61585042298926918612013-12-17T16:32:00.002+00:002013-12-17T16:46:45.757+00:00Freedom, or, making sure (some) dreams don't come true<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Dreams shouldnât always come true, as we know. Sometimes, we can make sure they donât. <br /><br />Last night, a snippet of a long, involved dream had to do with a gorgeous, blue-patterned butterfly on top of a pool of water. I kept trying to rescue it before its wings got waterlogged, but suddenly it was camouflaged against a larger dress of the same pattern and I couldnât find it. I searched desperately for it on the dress that was suddenly covering more than half the pool, catching glimpses of it being very still, then losing it. Finally, lifting the very heavy, wet dress out, I snapped it out in the air to release the butterfly. The susurration of wings from out of the dress made my heart lift, then I saw it was a grey owl, not the butterfly. I snapped out the dress again, just in case, but nothing.<br /><br />With a heavy heart, I stepped out into a large garden as an announcement was being made about a close friend of mine. I canât remember what it was, but I woke an instant later, a chest-wracking sob threatening to break out. It took a long time to be able to settle down to some semblance of dozing, which was all it was for the rest of the night.<br /><br />I woke and showered, returning to a butterfly/moth (of a similar pattern to one in the office, who had appeared and hovered for days after my uncle died) fluttering wildly, trapped in the paper globe lampshade on the ceiling. <br /><br />I sat down on my bed, in shock at the parallel to my dream. Then I committed â this would NOT end like the dream. I lifted the globe, trying to entice the butterfly outâŚno go. It would come as far as the bottom, creep around the edge cautiously, then go back to its panicked flying inside the globe. I laughed ruefully, the symbolism of how we stay in situations that imprison us, come to the edge of freedom and go back in to what we know, not lost on me. To quote Rachel Remen from My Grandfatherâs blessings: <br /><br /><br /><i>I was surprised: "But they were suffering, Grandpa. Why didnât they want to go?" <br /> <br /> My grandfather looked sad. âThey knew how to suffer,â he told me. âThey had done it for a long time and they were used to it. They did not know how to be free.â<br /> <br /> I was shocked. âBut what about the Promised Land, Grandpa? Wasnât it true?â<br /> <br /> âYes, it was true, Neshume-le, but the choice people have to make is never between slavery and freedom. We will always have to choose between slavery and the unknown.â</i><br /><br />And that butterfly, like us, at the edge of the unknown, chose slavery, again and again. One moment, when I saw its still silhouette through the lantern, my heart stopped, afraid that real life would end like last nightâs dream. <br /><br />I was damned if it would. I lifted the globe to disturb its torpor, and finally, enough to force it out, holding my hand against the opening at the bottom as it beat against me, desperate to return. Finally, it settled on the outside of the globe, climbing up. Once it was high enough not to be able to return too easily, I went and flicked off the light, then opened the curtains, making the grey dawn the brightest part of the room. <br /><br />I stood by my bedroom door in the reluctantly lightening near-solstice morning, willing the butterfly to move, my heart lifting as it landed on the net curtain. I leapt across the room, pushing open my window, pulling down the net curtain to try to force it over the top. Resisting, the butterfly went sideways. I laughed, saying, âTrying to take down your defences too soon, am I? Ok, you lead.â<br /><br />I waited, and when its tiny, insect leg brushed the top of the net curtain, I pulled the curtain down far more gently than the first time, coaxing rather than insisting â out of my own panic, my own need to change the ending of the dream â that it set itself free.<br /><br />In the next instant it was on the window pane, a heartbeat later it flew out, finally free. <br /><br />I choked back another sob, a happy one â suddenly realising what my deepest commitment was: freedom. Mine and othersâ. I may have often misunderstood what freedom is; my understanding of it continues to evolve and deepen, knowing it has as many faces as those who experience it, generated from the same bedrock of truth and love â and it is to fostering that freedom in all that my vocation lies: as a teacher, as a therapist, as the pastor Iâve always felt the calling to be, as the person Iâm becoming.<br /><br />For to be committed to freedom is to be committed to life truly and deeply lived, in whatever form that takes. Lâchaim.<br /><br />I often thought â and I suspect it was true, at first â that my passion for freedom came from growing up in a country that proclaimed it, in escaping a family that tried to enslave. And in the moments where I am fighting desperately, I still feel that. But even as I have known that my ways of being - my tendency to force things into the open; to use anger to transform; to speak out (rarely with the greatest of tact) in places where acting in was the norm; to push for depth and authenticity â that all these things were forged in a difficult family, I have also known that my passion for freedom was woven into every cell, was breathed into me by the G-d who knit me in the womb and called me by name. I have always known that it had a deeper purpose, and again, Rachel Remen â or rather, her grandfather, calls it by name:<br /><br /><i>âWhy does G-d come Himself, Grandpa?â<br /> <br /> âAh, Neshume-le, many people have puzzled over this question and have thought many different things. What I think is that the struggle toward freedom is too important for G-d to leave to others. And this is so because only the people who become free can serve G-dâs holy purposes and restore the world. Only those who are not enslaved by something else can follow the goodness in them.â</i><br /><br />That is why.<br /><br />And though I may fight for it, push myself and others towards it, force the truth into the open, hold the space for others to find their way, it is G-d who comes down and leads â whether a butterfly finding its way out the window or someone leaving an abusive situation of many yearsâ standing. <br /><br />Our nightmares need not define us â not every dream needs to come true.<br /><br />That is the freedom to which we are called - and when we answer 'Yes,' choosing the unknown - to which we are led, by none other than G-d Himself.</span>Pragmatic Mystic http://www.blogger.com/profile/08877990361303745003noreply@blogger.com1