On Choices and Values

It’s been interesting to watch how many Conservative and Liberal sources have reversed roles in the past year or so, especially regarding how people should act toward the office or person of the president and what a president should or should not be allowed to do, but in many other areas as well. When you exclude the far extremes and boil the rest down, it’s the same underlying reactions and rhetoric on both sides and it’s not getting us anywhere. Not anywhere good, anyway. 

For far too long, ridicule, fear-mongering, name-calling, and shaming have been the currency of our discourse and we need a different way to engage. This certainly isn’t to say there isn’t a right and wrong or that certain policies aren’t harmful or that we shouldn’t speak up for what we believe. But when we focus on one person or one group and make them the target of our anger and fear to the point that we are obsessed with constantly tearing them down, calling them out, and mocking them over every word, breath, and tweet, we lose sight of our own values.  

My issues with the current head of the U.S. Government Executive branch go far beyond political policy, into his treatment of women and multiple marginalized and vulnerable communities. But if I just fling my most potent insults out into the universe every time he makes another headline, then I have a problem. If I respond to him with the type of words or behavior that I find so harmful and problematic in him – whether online or even just in my own mind – then I’ve compromised many of my personal values (like kindness and integrity) and I’ve made myself a hypocrite. And if people who say their values include integrity, strong morals, Godly character, and the like were/are saying and posting awful, degrading things about our previous president, they also have an issue.

To elaborate on the wisdom of Dumbledore: It’s the choices we make in our own words, actions, attitudes, and behavior that tell us who we are. The way we respond to someone we disagree with or dislike says much more about us than it does about them.

We may hate what someone else has done, finding it truly immoral and unconscionable. But if we resort to reactions that go against our values, what are we doing? I know and love people on both sides of many issues who are caring, passionate people with strong feelings about who and what they think is best for our country. And I keep wondering what could happen if we turned the focus away from people and groups in the spotlight, at least to some degree, and looked more to answer questions like: Who am I? What are my values? What can I do to make sure that my thoughts, words, and deeds are in alignment with those values, even when what I want to let my anger and frustration boil over in insults and contempt?

I’m not saying we should do nothing, that we shouldn’t speak out or protest or disagree. What I’m saying is that we must recover our ability to stay true to our values without degrading, shaming, mocking, name-calling, and the like (unless those things are your values, then I guess you’re fine).  Most of us may be out of practice, but taking a little while to consider what responses are in line with the values we claim is a skill we can learn (or re-learn) if we put our minds to it. We can look away, at least for a few moments, from a polarizing figure to the policy, principle, or action we a concerned about and then look for constructive ways to respond. Yes, there may be times we must say which person or what group we are disagreeing with or responding to, but sometimes that isn’t necessary. I can support and promote organizations that work with immigrants and refugees, call my representatives to promote gun sense policies, and donate to natural disaster relief efforts, and I can even tell my friends about this, without ever mentioning or deriding any political figure or group.

We don’t have to stay caught in a cycle that has us going round and round, taking turns in outrage and ridicule depending on which side holds power. Most of us aren’t out there in the extremes and we don’t have to gravitate toward them just to prove a point or let everyone know what we believe. Most of us are here, in the messy in-between, and we can do better. 

One of Another

I don't remember how old I was, probably early adolescence, when I overheard a conversation between two adults, in which one stated they were a registered Democrat. I remember being utterly dumbstruck and completely horrified. I could not reconcile the good person I knew them to be with the evil that was the Democratic Party. It didn't even matter that they said they had registered that way years ago, mostly voted Republican now, and just hadn't gotten around to switching registration. I could not imagine why on God's earth this person would continue to be associated with such a depraved, godless group of people.

To be fair, I don't remember anyone specifically telling me "Democrats are evil and depraved," but that was what I had inferred from the conversations, messages, and media I was exposed to during my upbringing in a conservative, Evangelical, homeschooling environment. (Before anyone not raised in that environment gets too indignant, I encourage you to remember this demonization of those on "the other side" is certainly not exclusive to those groups.)

I like to think I've grown a lot since then. I've certainly explored a wider range of conversations, messages, and media. I do not think a person's voter registration is the determining factor in their morality or goodness or even their standing with God.

However. I'm increasingly aware of how often I still get that sinking feeling when I encounter views of family, friends, or acquaintances that are strikingly different from my own. Especially if those people profess to be Christians. Even though my beliefs are vastly different now than those I held as an adolescent, the sentiment behind my disappointment and dissent is the same: how can you call yourself a Christian when you believe that or support that candidate or hold that position?

I keep wondering how I can move past that. How can I think I've actually come very far if I'm presenting the exact same argument or having the same reaction, just from a different position.

I don't think I am alone here. From what I can tell, there is no shortage of people asking "how could you?" of those in their circles, be it only in their own thoughts or outright. If this is true, then I can hardly be alone in wondering about another way. I don't have any easy answers, but I can share what I'm learning from my wondering.

A few weeks ago, the book of Romans was the New Testament reading in the Daily Office. One passage in particular stood out to me and I keep coming back to it every time I wonder how to move past the 'how could you" to a different way:

For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor...

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” No, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. (Romans 12)

Two things stand out to me: The first is that this passage contains so many things to do and not do that just focusing on those could prevent me from having time to even think about who you or anyone else may be supporting for president. But what I really want to focus on is the phrase "we are all members one of another." That phase comes back to me every time I catch myself baffled by a friend's statement or Facebook post. I don't fully understand it, but "we are all members one of another" seems to be doing a slow work in me.

I'm starting see that in the mystical Body of Christ, there is something I'm not supposed to so readily dismiss in anything that brings out my 'how-could-yous.' And, more importantly, I'm coming to understand that the person holding those views is somehow part of me, as we are each part of Christ.

To be clear, I'm not suggesting we stay idle or silent in the face of actual wrong or evil. What I'm wrestling with and trying to express is a dissatisfaction with the way most of us have learned to engage with people on the other side. What I'm looking for is a different way.

I'm seeing that when we disagree, if I begin from "how could you?" then the last thing I'm going to remember is that we are "one of another." I will forget that we belong to each other (to summarize Mother Teresa). I will recoil or become defensive and cut myself off from you, which means I'm also cutting myself off from who I'm called to be.

It can be baffling how two people who profess a belief in the same God and read the same Holy Words can have such vastly different views. It is so easy to use these differences to harm to each other and our relationships by approaching those opposing views with accusations and incredulity. But what if we could transform these interactions? What if we could learn from and love each other, even if we never agree?

If we want to, we could start by remembering that we are members one of another, and go from there.

Part of My Story

tw:csa


“Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid.” ― Frederick Buechner

For years I have been in the process of healing from a terrible thing. There were times this process was more fits and starts than anything, but in hindsight, I can see it as a journey I’ve been navigating for much of my life. I’m writing about it now because I believe hope and healing and blessing in our own lives are meant to be shared with others.

When I was a child, I was molested by someone who was older than me, but not quite a teenager. I didn't tell anyone, even though it happened multiple times, because he told me I’d be the one in trouble if I did. Instead of telling, I tried subtle ways to get out of being alone with him. If that didn’t work, I’d end up crying, insisting that I didn't want to play with him, but my tears were dismissed and I was told to stop being rude and go play.

I spent years trying to minimize this experience or rationalize it away. I made excuses for all the reasons no one stopped it from happening. I told myself that a kid who would do that was clearly troubled, that something bad had likely happened to him, too.  I told myself the adults didn’t know what was really taking place and that they'd been taught “acting out” was defiance. I reminded myself that far worse has happened to many other people. None of this helped.

What happened is a true and terrible thing about my life.

Neither minimizing nor rationalizing creates a magical path to healing. What I told myself about those involved is probably true. It is also true that far worse has happened to many other people. But I now understand that I can only heal by dealing directly with my own experience – an experience that has influenced the way I see myself, how I relate to people I'm supposed to trust, and how I parent my own children.

Part of dealing with my experience has been realizing that what happened to me was made worse by unhealthy fears created in a culture of fear. My fear of punishment made me afraid to tell anyone what was happening. The adults who dismissed my tears feared what others might think of my behavior.  They also feared that taking the time to try to understand my “acting out” would be an indulgence that would lead me to even more defiant behavior.

When we succumb to a culture of fear, we have trouble distinguishing healthy fear that is an appropriate response to real danger from unhealthy fears that create more fear, harm, and secrets.

I'm learning, however, that we can learn to identify and break free from the unhealthy fear that causes us to react in hurtful, controlling, or dismissive ways with ourselves and with others. Pema Chödrön writes, “Interrupting our destructive habits and awakening our heart is the work of a lifetime.” While it's true that healing from living in unhealthy fear is a process that takes a lifetime of work, each step we take in that process brings us closer to wholeness and freedom.

For me, the process took physically separating myself, as best I could, from places and people dominated by unhealthy fear. It took stumbling my way into a daily practice of contemplative prayer. It took (after much searching) finding a church where the voices of women and children are valued and heard. It took letting go of most of what I’d been taught about relationships and parenting in order to find new understandings. It took finding life-giving friendship where I could be true to my process in a safe and accepting dynamic. It took finding a good therapist. And it is still taking time.

It's true that it has not been easy. I've struggled and doubted and second-guessed. It's taken a lot of hard work and tears and reevaluating. There are times I still worry over the possibility of terrible things happening. I'm still affected by terrible things that did happen. I still have a long way to go and lot to learn.

But I've also discovered it is possible to own my story and choose how to move forward, that I can choose love over unhealthy fear. 'Love is kind' (1 Corinthians 13) and 'Love casts out fear' (1 John 4) have become deeply held truths for me. If you’re needing to find a way to heal from your own terrible thing or simply realizing you need stop living in unhealthy fear, don’t give up. Love can be a lifeline for you, too.

If it seems too overwhelming, start small. Start one new practice – meditation, mindfulness, hiking, biking, walking, setting a loving intention every morning, taking a few deep intentional breaths every night, appreciating one beautiful thing every day – anything that can help you start to separate yourself from the habits of unhealthy fear. Find a way to get help, from a professional if you can, or from a trusted friend. Work on one relationship. I started with my kids, convinced that since love is kind then my interactions with them must come from a place of kindness rather than fear. None of us are able to change the past, but we can choose a brave and loving way to live now.

I know that love can't always stop terrible things from happening. I know that love can't necessarily make other people respond the way we hope they will. But choosing love changes us. Each time we make a conscious choice for love over unhealthy fear, we become less afraid. We open ourselves to growth and to healing and to new understandings. We become people who can be a safe, life-giving, loving space for ourselves and for others.

And that is beautiful.



_________________________________________________________________________________
Note: I know that sexual abuse and trauma varies in degree and each survivor will have his or her own journey to healing. If you are traveling this journey, please reach out to those who are qualified to support you. Many areas have excellent local organizations or you can contact a national organization like RAINN at https://rainn.org/ or 800-656-HOPE(4673). You are loved and worth the effort it takes to find hope and healing.

Brené Brown's wisdom has been invaluable to me on this journey. 

I encourage you to read her books or visit her website here.

Knowing Without Grasping

Silent Saturday is held the first Saturday of every month at St. Patrick's. A few of us gather and someone reads aloud one of the passages for the next morning or shares a short meditation. We then observe three sessions of silent prayer, in increasing duration, followed by walking meditation around the perimeter of the sanctuary. The two ladies who started it have faithfully held this ritual for years, and I've been joining them since summer.

This month, they were both out of town and I agreed to lead the session. The first Saturday of February dawned a glorious, unseasonably warm day. No one else showed up for Silent Saturday, but one of our Altar Guild members was at the church to set up for Sunday's service. I asked her if she'd like to join me, but she politely declined, explaining that she only had time that morning for set-up.

Not wanting to delay her from her other Saturday commitments, I encouraged her to go about her work and to not mind me. I'd just carry on as usual from one of the pews.

She was incredibly gracious, obviously careful to make as little noise as possible. Even so, it was somewhat difficult to settle in to silence with the sounds of preparation echoing occasionally in the space.

But then something happened. The Eucharistic words "Body of Christ, Bread of Heaven" began surfacing in my thoughts as I sat with my eyes closed and hands open. For someone like me who wrestles with the idea of Christ -- simultaneously drawn to The Word Made Flesh and skeptical of the assertion that Jesus Christ is the only way to God -- this was a bit unexpected. No matter how I tried to detach from the words and simply be present in silence, I kept returning to them. And somewhere in the space between her activity and my stillness, I knew and participated in the Body of Christ.

Knew, yet still couldn't grasp.

It was an experience like stretching my hand out the window of a moving car, feeling the air slip over the surface of each finger, over my palm, permeating each pore. Leaning my head so the rush of wind envelops my face and teases my hair. Breathing deep. The current around me and inside me... and yet. I can't hold on to it. I can't close my fist around it and put it in my pocket. Can't hold a single breath.

I have to exhale.

I'm obviously reaching to wrap words around the experience. I know I can only give an approximation. But I think it has something to do with balance and being present in the moment. Sometimes we are the ones in silence, whose hands are still and open. Creating space. Waiting. Sometimes we are the ones in motion, whose hands are moving and serving. Setting a table. Preparing bread. Some of us do one more than the other.

But we can all eat the bread of angels. Taste an incomprehensible mystery. Open ourselves to glimpse what we cannot grasp. The body of Christ. One Body, many parts. An inhale. An exhale.

We balance each other.

We are each other.

And maybe, sometimes, if only for a single breath, we know it.

Buffy and Winter

I had high hopes the new year. I was going to have a renewed sense of purpose and focus on establishing some new practices. Only, that's not what happened. I just couldn't seem to muster up the motivation or the discipline.

Instead of focusing on practices and purpose, I spent the better part of January binge-watching the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which I had never seen before. I spent any time I had to myself watching Buffy save the world a lot. After spending most of 2015 hardly watching any television, this was... well... a change from that.

I'm not saying it's good or bad. It's just what happened.

I did manage to stay with a couple of my old daily practices. I continued Morning Prayer, and, thanks to an overly-energetic puppy who joined our family in June, I still took walks in the woods every day. I admit I probably would've foregone the walks if the dog would have let me get away with it.

Since I couldn't find my way to starting any new practices, I placated my conscience by trying to use the time in the woods to be present and notice what was going on around me as the seasons made their way through the woods. Even as I experienced a growing sense of general disconnection due to my lack of motivation and discipline, I determined to look for what was still beautiful as the green of Summer and the colors of Fall gave way to the short, cold, gray days of Winter.

I always try to take at least a minute in the woods to close my eyes and breathe deeply, to make myself aware of my connection to the earth beneath my feet and the trees surrounding me. Right now, most of the trees are empty. Just trunks, really, with bare branches sticking out in angles.

I've been feeling a lot like those trees.

I began 2015 with anticipation. I'd been told my career was about to be upended, so I thought it would be a year of big, exciting, scary change. But then it wasn't. And now it's 2016 and I'm in seemingly the same place with nothing temporal to show for the transformation I thought was inevitable. Like a tree in winter, whatever shelter or beauty I had in former seasons is gone, carried away in the biting, Autumn wind. I have nothing to offer.

But surely something happened or is happening. Trees don't cease to exist in winter. Things are happening under the ground, right? I tried to reassure myself with those thoughts. But I've since learned that trees are dormant in winter. Almost nothing is happening. They wait out the season, drawing on resources they saved in the other seasons, trying to stay alive. Not especially encouraging to my analogy. But then I found this:

"It is possible to force a tree to evade dormancy if you keep it inside and with a stable temperature and light pattern. However, this is usually bad for the tree. It's natural for trees to go through dormancy cycles, and the lifespan of the plant is dramatically decreased if the tree is not allowed to go dormant for a few months. Trees have winter dormancy for a reason, and it's best to just let them run their course as nature intended."

I know I'm not a tree, but something about those words is reassuring. Seasons of dormancy are natural and healthy. I remembered that Parker J. Palmer uses the seasons a metaphor for exploring selfhood and vocation in his book 'Let Your Life Speak.'

Palmer writes that winter is a reminder that "times of dormancy and deep rest are essential to all living things. Despite all appearances, of course, nature is not dead in winter-it has gone underground to renew itself and prepare for spring. Winter is a time when we are admonished, and even inclined, to do the same for ourselves....Winter clears the landscape, however brutally, giving us a chance to see ourselves and each other more clearly, to see the very ground of our being."

Maybe I stumbled into this dormant season and maybe binge-watching an old TV series isn't the best way to renew myself and prepare for what's next. A part of me is a bit terrified that nothing is next. Terrified that the trees will soon be filled with leaves and new life and I'll still be dormant, with nothing to offer.

I guess that could happen.

But maybe recognizing the necessity of an occasional time of dormancy can bring me the perspective I need. I hope it will help me be more understanding of myself and others. And I pray I can now try to look clearly at the ground of my being and at least open myself to the possibility of a new season.

Love is Kind

If you’ve attended more than one wedding in your life, there is a chance you are at least vaguely familiar with chapter 13 from 1 Corinthians in the Christian Bible. It's the one with all those beautiful words about love. Even couples who aren’t especially religious often include these verses in their ceremony:

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.

I don't know about you, but a lot of what I see called “love” seems nothing like this. There are probably countless reasons for that, but one I’ve been thinking about specific to the Church is our tendency to idealize a passage for a singular situation or relationship, and in the process, hinder our ability to be transformed by it. It is one thing to parade out beautiful, poetic words for a day of celebration with a joy-filled couple. It is quite another to take those words down from a pedestal and give ourselves over to their life-altering truth.

My new appreciation for 1 Corinthians 13 began when I came upon these words in Psalm 69 some time ago: “Answer me, O LORD, for your love is kind; in your great compassion, turn to me." The phrase for your love is kind captured my attention.

Throughout my life, I’ve heard God’s love described many ways, but “kind” is not one I remember. Kindness as a general concept isn't especially revolutionary, but this was completely new way for me to understand God’s love. I've spent a lot of time reflecting on the idea and asking myself what it means to profess faith in a God whose love is kind. What beliefs do I hold that are incongruent with this concept? What are the practical implications for my life?

In light of 1 Corinthians 13, I’ve come to understand that it’s not only God’s love that is kind. Real love is kind. My love needs to be kind.

This truth is not just for a wedding day and is not only for a person’s relationship with their spouse, as important as kindness is for those partnerships. There are also no qualifiers such as “Love for fill-in-the-blank is kind” or “Love is kind unless….” I’m made uncomfortably aware of all the times I’ve acted in an unkind way in the name of “tough love” or “speaking the truth in love” when what I was really doing was reacting out of anger, judgement, fear, or self-righteousness.

The first way I began to incorporate “love is kind” into my life is in my relationship with my children. It has changed the way I parent. When I struggle over how to respond to new challenges, I do my best to ask, “What is a kind response?” Lately I’ve even added in, “Am I being patient? Am I insisting on my own way?” My kids are different people from me. They have different perspectives, ways of understanding, and getting things done.  It is loving (and kind!) to be patient and not always insist they see or do things my way. Of course I still have moments when I give in to irritation, impatience, and rudeness. I’m human. But the words “love is kind” have forever altered the way I experience parenthood.

And what of Jesus telling us to love our enemies and to love our neighbors as ourselves? No matter how I try to spin it, I can’t free myself from the realization that this includes kindness.

When I’m facing conflict, when I feel deep dislike, or when I’m baffled at the actions of another, I often struggle with an urge to react. What I’m coming to see is that when I react with judgement, blame, disgust, shaming, or self-righteousness – anything other than love and kindness – I still have work to do.

Others have had different lives and experiences from mine. I can rarely know why people do or say things I find baffling or appalling. I admit I have a hard time not being rude or resentful if someone dismisses my idea in a meeting or insults me for a belief I hold, so I'm still wrestling with how to experience true loving kindness toward someone who does far worse. I am learning to see that even even when I feel incredulity or outrage or fear, I'm not exempt from the truth that love is kind. That has to be what I’m working toward, even when I fall short.

I cannot change other people. What I can do is allow the truth that love is kind to transform me and pray that I will continually learn to live it better. I can recognize unkind, unloving behavior for what it is. I can purpose to learn how to better respond in the face of all that I don’t understand. I can ask questions. I can offer kindness. I can be love.

Love is kind.

The Gifts of Silence

My word for 2014 was Silence. I practiced this mainly in daily centering prayer (which is basically time in stillness and silence dedicated to being totally present with God), but I practiced it in other ways as well. There are few things I can write that will convey my experience with Silence, because it was so much more difficult and beautiful and isolating and connecting than I could have possibly imagined. What I can do is share with you some of the gifts I discovered in Silence. These are not gifts to me only, but are gifts I've come to understand are waiting for anyone who is able to make space and time in their life to practice Silence regularly. I imagine each of us would experience these gifts in a different way and that these gifts I'm writing about now may not be the gifts others would recognize most from Silence. Yet I do believe that in a regular practice of silence, most of us would find these and other gifts in one way or another.

One gift is a growing realization of connection with others--past and present--who have made a practice of silence part of their lives. I see now that over the past few years, I had been striving to express all my thoughts and ideas and experiences and inner turmoil, but could not find sufficient words. Through my previous experience and resources, I tried to flesh it out, but always fell short. I felt increasingly frustrated by a complete lack of my own understanding of the faith crisis I was experiencing and the void in my vocabulary preventing me from explaining myself.

Becoming comfortable with silence allowed me to spend necessary time listening and finding others who were expressing what I was experiencing in words that meant all the things I'd been longing to explain. I’ve discovered in books and lectures the wisdom of a host of teachers and guides far ahead of me on the Spiritual journey and more in-tune with the process. I've also connected with a few beautiful souls whose journeys have allowed us to meet and support each other as we walk new paths.

Another gift is the acceptance that change in relationships is part of life and that growing apart isn't always someone's "fault." I’m coming to understand that some connections with others are for a season, when our paths intersect and are aligned in some way. When our paths diverge, the love and support shared in those close times still exists as part of the beauty of our lives, albeit in a different way than before. It’s still difficult for me to see this as a gift, because the pain of accepting change is hard, but I know that it is a gift. I know that the love I received while I was walking closer with some people was a balm to my heart when I was floundering, and I pray that the love I offered was the same for them. I pray that somehow our paths will bring us to a new closeness in the future, yet whether or not that happens, I hope with all my heart that they find just what and who they need in all the transitions and intersections that lie ahead.

One of the most profound gifts I found in Silence is summed up in this quote:

"With grace I am led to see that the only person I can judge, with God's help, is myself. I slowly come to understand that part of what is keeping my community from being all that it can be is my own lack of love, my own carelessness with God's love and the love and struggles of [others]. Seeing us in process and being able to value our incompleteness has been for me a great means of grace." - Macrina Wiederkehr

This reminder that we are all in process is a beautiful, beautiful gift. We are all incomplete. We are all at various stages on our journey. Of course I still experience my own ego and self-righteous judgment welling up when others react or respond in ways I disagree with or when they make choices I don't understand. Yet from my time in silence I sense that I am becoming more in-tune to the knowledge that many of my own actions, choices, and responses may bother or confound others. I can recognize this and soften my heart. I can accept that there is only so much change and progress humans can make in a single day or interaction, so I must be patient with myself and with others. I can work to set aside judgment, to be a peaceful and loving presence even in the midst of what causes me confusion, hurt, and anger.

Silence is a gift, which opens our hearts to many other gifts. I am so thankful for the gifts of Silence. I am so grateful for the transforming work continuing in my life, which has its roots in one word in 2014.

If we fill our lives with silence, then we live in hope, and Christ lives in us and gives our virtues much substance. Then, when the time comes, we confess Him openly before men, and our confession has much meaning because it is rooted in deep silence. It awakens the silence of Christ in the hearts of those who hear us, so that they themselves fall silent and begin to wonder and to listen. For they have begun to discover their true selves. If our life is poured out in useless words we will never hear anything in the depths of our hearts, where Christ lives and speaks in silence. - Thomas Merton

A Meditation on Psalm 63

"O God, you are my God; eagerly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you." Psalm 63:1


Psalm 63:1 has become a bit of a mantra for me. I say it silently each morning as I quiet my thoughts before I begin my Centering Prayer, and I find that I return to it throughout the day. I don't always repeat the full verse; sometimes "O God, you are my God" is all I need to re-focus my thoughts.

Several months ago, I realized that as I focused on the words, I would hear "O God, you are my God" as "O God, you are *my* God." I know this may seem minor, but as I considered what it means that I was emphasizing the word "my," I determined there may be a better way than subconsciously putting the focus on my own thoughts or feelings of God.

I realized the better way to hear the phrase was: "O God, you are my God." As in, God IS my God, not God is MY God. God -- who is so intimately present to each of us every second, who created each of us in God's image, who is "being" itself and yet who exists so completely other and separate from anything we can think or project on that Being -- that God is my God.

I've also come to see that if God is my God, then nothing else can be. Of course I would have said this, but it struck me that if I truly, in the depths of my being believe "O God, you are my God," then I need to be consciously aware that:

My loved-ones are not my god.

My roles of daughter, sister, friend, wife, and mother are not my god.

My hopes and dreams and wants and wishes are not my god.

My religion is not my god.

My nation is not my god.

My political views are not my god.

My identity not my god.

My social status is not my god.

My physical appearance is not my god.

My reputation is not my god.

My thoughts are not my god.

My earthly possessions are not my god.

My ideas are not my god.

My opinions are not my god.

My self-worth is not my god.

My life is not my god.

Only God is my God.

I've even begun to insert these sentiments into my mantra when I feel myself identifying too deeply with a thought or emotion that distracts me from a better way to handle everyday situations. For example, I will try to pause and think, "God, YOU are my God. The results of this effort are not my God. You are my God." Or "God, YOU are my God. This person's approval or esteem is not my God. You are my God." Sometimes just the act of stating both who should be my focus, along with who-or-what should not be, is enough to help me navigate frustrating situations with grace.

It has only been a few months, and I'm not perfect at remembering every time, but I'm thankful this is becoming a practice for me. God is my God. Everything thing else is simply part of life, to either be enjoyed or endured.

It really is as simple and beautiful as that.

All I have to do is keep practicing.




Note: for more resources and information on Centering Prayer, I encourage you to check out the  Contemplative Outreach website and/or listen to some of Thomas Keating's work on Audible. Another resource I've discovered recently is Gravity Center, which lists several wonderful resources and offers some excellent videos on contemplation. 

Like Nothing

I've been learning silence for over five months now. I am working to overcome the constant temptation to fill my life with the consumption or production of noise. I find I more often leave my iPod or the television off, instead of leaving one or the other on for background sound. I've taken intermittent breaks from social media. I've hardly written. I've been practicing centering prayer. I've been sitting with process. I've been letting go. So much letting go.

Richard Rohr says that even though he regularly attempts to do so, trying to talk about the letting go we do in silence and presence seems impossible because it "feels like nothing." I have to agree with him. It's like the feeling of a sigh. It's like nothing and everything. It's inexplicable and yet I want so desperately to explain it because maybe then I would have a better understanding of it.

I've only scratched the surface of what silence can teach me. I'm still unmooring, letting go of things that hinder my process. I am still on the threshold between "before" and "after," but just barely. I know what the before was like, but I'm not yet in the after. Actually, I'm not even sure there is an after. All I can sense is a before and a now.

Before I started sitting with silence, my life was all reaction. It was frantic tending of squeaky wheels or dogged avoidance of things that overwhelmed. It was ill-thought responses born from a fear of missing opportunities, not meeting expectations, or leaving things unsaid. Before this experience with stillness and silence, time meant scarcity and urgency and finitude. Before, I constantly measured myself against other people's standards and absorbed their "you should"s as judgement on my life and my performance and my self. I spent time worrying why things that worked for other people didn't seem to work for me and wondering what might be wrong with me that I couldn't keep it together or make people like what I thought or get them to agree with me. Life felt like conflict and striving and opposition much of the time.

Now, the time I spend in silence each day feels like taking a long, indulgent breath. Now, I've realized that I don't have to react to everything because it is okay to step back to formulate a response. Often I find that a response is not even necessary. Time, now, seems like an abundant gift stretching in both directions in a beautiful excess of eternity. I'm not even sure I believe in "missed opportunities" anymore; I believe in what happens. Now, I realize that it is impossible to control the way others respond or how they feel about me or if they ever agree with me. I have to follow my path because it is right for me. I can allow others to follow their path. I don't have to be in conflict or striving or opposition, because I can look for what there is to learn in the now.

I am acutely aware of how my own opinions, indignation, and expectations hinder my ability to love, understand, and be compassionate. I am realizing we are all in process. I can see that it is all grace, and that no one needs grace more than I do. Of course, awareness and realization are just the beginning and I am a long way from practicing any of this perfectly.

And yet, all of that is internal. I can't possibly prove any of it. To anyone else, it probably looks like nothing.




"With grace I am led to see that the only person I can judge, with God's help, is myself. I slowly come to understand that part of what is keeping my community from being all that it can be is my own lack of love, my own carelessness with God's love and the love and struggles of [others]. Seeing us in process and being able to value our incompleteness has been for me a great means of grace." - Macrina Wiederkehr

Unmoored

I am a word person. There are words I love simply for how they look in written form. There are others I love for how they sound, and still others I love for what they mean or who they remind me of. Sometimes I think about situations for much longer than necessary, for the sole purpose of figuring out a single word to describe how I feel about or perceive it.

I am also a writer. Not the kind who is gifted with words crying out to become books or columns or academic papers. No, I'm the kind of writer who uses writing as a way to work through things in her head, regardless of how many people may or may not read it. For as long as I can remember, when I have things I need to process, I write them out.

But I'm currently finding elusive both words and the ability to write things out.

I want to write more about Silence, and maybe I will at some point. Right now, however, I feel too fragile to try to put words around where it is taking me. I can't even seem to write about it privately without feeling a sense of betrayal, as though I need to only hold the experience and let it be what it is without analyzing or searching for explanation.

And when it comes to trying to share any of this with people I know, words may as well not exist. There is almost no one who seems safe enough for me to attempt an explanation of what is going on or how vulnerable and exposed I am. I feel disconnected from just about everyone at present.

By habit, I was contemplating this experience and attempting to come up with a word for it. Maybe I can’t write about all the details or explain myself out loud, but if I could at least identify a single word to encompass it all, I’d be able to put this phenomenon into that word and hold that word in the midst of what is unfolding.

 

Unmoored.

That’s the word I kept coming back to every time, even though I wasn't entirely sure what it meant. Sure, I knew it was a nautical term and I had an impression of its meaning, but had never looked it up in the dictionary. In my mind I associated “unmoored” with “adrift,” but "adrift" didn't entirely fit. So I looked it up.

un·moor  [uhn-moor]

1. to loose from moorings or anchorage.

2. to bring to the state of riding with a single anchor after being moored by two or more.

That's all I have at this point. I’m not even going to attempt to explain how entirely accurate the definition is for what I’m experiencing. Perhaps someday I will have more words and be able to write a beautiful reflection on my unmooring season. Maybe, but not today.

Inexplicable

This is a short reflection on some of the words I've encountered and have been sitting with as I explore what silence means for me this year. I use "sitting with" because stating I'm "learning" or "understanding" could give the impression that I have a better grasp on any of this than I actually do. The following may not seem to scream "silence," but it's there.

In a series of talks with Fr. Thomas Keating, Fr. Richard Rohr speaks of how our ego or "false self" is what causes us to define ourselves in terms of what we dislike or what we are against. This "contrariness," as Julian of Norwich terms it, closes us off from experiencing deeper levels of faith and life, "because it’s always defining itself in terms of analysis, critique, judgment, labeling, or positioning, and this game of positioning is a mind game." Rohr says this mind game is "entirely an inner system that makes [us] feel important," but actually leads us into conflict with ourselves and others. It is necessary to let go of our false self in order to be who we truly are, but he explains that letting go of how we've learned to define ourselves can be incredibly distressing:

It’s all about letting go... It’s not about controlling or achieving or promoting or attaining…  it feels like dying in the first instance, because you've spent so much time living out of this mind and this ego that you think is you.... It will feel, in the first instance, like losing and like dying…these “little dyings” that have to become an art form and that you have to go through once, twice, several significant times to know, as the poet said, “What did I ever lose by dying?”

As I'm sitting with these words and others from Keating and Merton, what I'm experiencing does seem, at the risk of sounding a bit dramatic, "like losing and like dying."

In the midst of that, however, I think I might also be just beginning to catch infinitesimal glimpses that I am someone aside from all the ways I've previously defined myself - aside from what I do or don't do, what I like or dislike, how others approve of or disapprove of me - and apart from any labels or judgement that could be applied to me by myself or others.

I don't know how else to explain or define any of this. I know that it feels quite humbling and somewhat lonely.

And yet, inexplicably, also like becoming known.

OneWord 2014: Silence

"We work out our salvation in silence and in hope. Silence is the strength of our interior life....Without this silence, our virtues are sound only, only an outward noise, a manifestation of nothing..." - Thomas Merton


What words do I use to explain why "silence" is my word for 2014? I've been trying for weeks to write this post, but I realize I must rely heavily on the wisdom of others to communicate why I chose Silence this year.

Merton and other contemplatives like Thomas Keating and Richard Rohr write of silence as the place within each of us where we discard our false-selves and the external props we often depend on to "prove" ourselves or our faith. By embracing and fully experiencing our inner silence, we learn to be who we truly are. I've been re-reading portions of Thomas Merton's No Man is an Island, and keep returning to this excerpt:

It is useless to try to make peace with ourselves by being pleased with everything we have done. In order to settle down in the quiet of our own being we must learn to be detached from the results of our own activity. We must withdraw ourselves, to some extent, from effects that are beyond our control and be content with the good will and the work that are the quiet expression of our inner life. We must be content to live without watching ourselves live, to work without expecting an immediate reward, to love without an instantaneous satisfaction, and to exist without any special recognition. 

We cannot experience this making "peace with ourselves" or "quiet expression of our inner life," without becoming well-acquainted with our interior silence.

I often feel a compulsion to react to what is going on around me and to fill silence with outward noise. Yet I've realized in the past weeks that I need to withdraw from the impulse to react, so I can explore the true motivations for my reactions. When I am filling space with my own noise, I am not making room for what God may be trying to speak to me in silence, nor what I may need to hear from others speaking out of the silence of their interior life.

Practicing silence doesn't mean always being silent, but it does mean honoring my own silence and the silence of others by not giving in to the discomfort that seeks to fill it without purpose. Practicing silence is one way in which I can learn to detach myself from a desire for others to hear and understand me, in order that I will hear myself and others more clearly and with understanding.

I'm not going to preemptively limit this experience by trying to create a detailed plan. I intend to explore more deeply the practice of contemplative prayer and I may attend some religious services where silence is practiced in community. I hope to go on a spiritual retreat that cultivates silence if I can, but I'm not making that a requirement. I am open to the possibility (read: probability) that my year with silence will be nothing like I'm envisioning right now.

Here is a final excerpt from Merton that I've been meditating on and which influenced me to choose Silence for 2014:

If we fill our lives with silence, then we live in hope, and Christ lives in us and gives our virtues much substance. Then, when the time comes, we confess Him openly before men, and our confession has much meaning because it is rooted in deep silence. It awakens the silence of Christ in the hearts of those who hear us, so that they themselves fall silent and begin to wonder and to listen. For they have begun to discover their true selves. If our life is poured out in useless words we will never hear anything in the depths of our hearts, where Christ lives and speaks in silence. 

I want to fill my life with silence, so that when I speak I am not pouring out useless words, but rather speaking hope to the silence in the hearts of those who hear.

OneWord 2013

At the beginning of the year, I wrote an awkward post about how the word "weave" was going to be my word for 2013. I had a vague idea of how it was going to go: I would figure out how to put myself back together and I would write about it. I wasn't so naive to think I completely knew what I was doing, but I figured that was okay because I would work it out as I went.

I was wrong.

I managed to write about my word several times, but I did not figure out how to put myself back together. I have not figured out much of anything.  All I did was begin the year with a certain thought in mind and take a few steps I thought might support it. From the outside looking in, my life probably seems the same now as it was in January.

And yet, I feel as though nothing is the same at all.

I cannot possibly view the world, other people, or even myself. the way I did a year ago.  I've started grasping the hem of writings on incarnation and intersectionality and prayer and true self and peace and so much wisdom from those whose life experience is vastly different from mine, and yet still connected to mine through shared faith. At this point, I can offer you neither proof nor a coherent explanation of how this wisdom is weaving together in my life.  All I can offer is that my spirit feels different - both restless and at rest, both filled with doubts and grounded in truths, both tangled in questions and buoyed by hope.

I've found a home in the Episcopal Church. I've discovered that I better engage with the mystery of Christ through the seasons of the liturgy and I've found people with whom I feel an inexplicable kinship.  In many ways I feel like a refugee seeking solace in that tradition, yet I also feel like a person born in exile, who has finally been welcomed home.

I know I should be attempting to summarize my OneWord experience, but I simply cannot.  I feel this year has been a gift in ways I completely do not understand, but I hesitate to name it thus because I'm still trying to figure out how it has come about. I longed for these changes, but I did not know they were what I was longing for, nor did I cause them to happen. The weaving, the peace, the hope - it has happened and is happening as I read the words of monks and prophets and saints, and as I discover new insights that I am only beginning to comprehend.  I am at once thankful and in awe and humbled and borderline incredulous.

In one of my earlier posts about my OneWord, I wrote:

There was a time when.... I tried to believe that God was up there directing every detail of my life – from the grade I got on a test to finding a pair of shoes in my size on sale.  But I just don’t believe that now.  I do believe we are created in God’s image and I do believe that God is there, but I also think many things just happen. 

I still don't believe that God is directing every single detail of my life like some kind of cosmic puppeteer, but I can't deny that there seems to be no logical explanation for how how certain things have come together this year. I have to admit that in the past twelve months I've seen glimpses of what, despite all my doubts, I can only attribute to the Divine.

Considering my life as a weaving-together instead of an unraveling has made me more open to the ordering of what had previously been a tangled, unraveled mess.  It has caused me to look for connections where I never would have before. I know I'm not done. I can't wrap up this word and put it on a shelf on December 31st as though it were a completed project and all the pieces of my life are now woven into a finished product.

The weaving will continue at its own pace and in its own time. I have no idea how different or similar my life will look next year at this time, but right now, in this moment, I'm so very thankful for whatever or whomever promoted me choose the word weave.

It's been quite a year.

An Advent Reflection: Hope

O come, O Come Thou Day-spring bright
Pour on our souls Thy healing light
Dispel the long night's lingering gloom
And pierce the shadows of the tomb
 - From 'O Come, O Come Emmanuel,' origin unknown

Every year I dread when the days turn cold. The weight of darkness seems to increase as the daylight hours decrease. The chill and the gloom close in all around, and even inhaling deeply or lifting my eyes to look for beauty seems difficult.

Everything feels too heavy. Everything feels too cold. Everything feels too dark.

Yet in this, my first year observing Advent, there is a barely perceptible shift. I can sense moments of peace when I call to mind that I am intentionally observing this low time—that I've embraced this waiting in the dark, this participation in an age-old and sacred longing.

I am merely one of multitudes who have defied the gloom and shadows with hopeful expectation.

Being present to this yearning does not make me continually cheerful or warm or bright, but it does increase my awareness of the presence of Hope. I know Hope is pressing in close, right along with the heaviness and the chill and the darkness.

This Hope calls to mind the love and compassion of God. This Hope whispers reassurance that the darkness will not consume.

Hope waits with us, unfailing, as we anticipate the moment when Divine Light pierces the darkness and heals our souls with Love.


Yet this I call to mind
    and therefore I have hope:
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
    for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
    therefore I will wait for him.”
The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him,
    to the one who seeks him;
it is good to wait quietly
    for the salvation of the Lord.
Lamentations 3: 21-26

I Am Not a Fighter of Giants

I keep hearing people talk about having a place at the table. I’m not arguing that they shouldn't pursue a seat.  I know that a lot of good could come from more diversity at that table and I know some people have a calling to face off against giants.

But I don’t think that table is where I want to be.

I am not a fighter of giants.

I hate being in any situation where I don’t feel welcome. I’m not going to spend my days trying to get the attention of someone who ignores me when I extend my hand. I will let people exclude me, because I know I cannot make someone see me if they refuse to look or hear me if they refuse to listen.

I also hate to be in a place where I am welcome, but others are not. Even at a table where everyone is allowed a seat, if some of those seats are offered grudgingly, with averted eyes or conditions or shying away, I don’t want to sit at that table. That kind of table will not feel like home. I don’t to be where I know anyone else feels unwanted or where I am only welcome if I close ranks and ignore others who are still standing, unwelcome. 

I want to sit at a table where we see and honor all the ways we are different, as well as all the things we have in common.

I want to sit at a table where we see each other’s identities and bodies as reminders of Incarnation, without designating any single type or expression as the norm from which others vary.  

I want to sit at a table where pain can be spoken of freely and is heard without hostility or excuses, where we truly listen to each other and value each other as individuals. I want us to celebrate each other's joys and triumphs as though they were our own.

I want to sit at a table where we see the world as it could be, should be, as a beautiful tapestry with all of us woven together to make something strong and breathtaking out of whatever expression of God’s image we experience in our embodied selves.

I want to sit at a table where we are siblings in humanity and love is our language, where even if our names for God are different or even if people join us who don’t believe in things like Incarnation or the Imago Dei, they still feel welcome to pull up a chair.

I want to sit at a table where there is always more room for people who want to experience family and speak to each other with love.

Yes, I know many will scoff and say it is impossible. I will be called an idealist and a dreamer for wanting that table to exist and thinking people might join each other there. 

I don't care. 

I know there are others who also want that table and are already showing up, making connections, doing the work to try to make it reality.

So maybe, at least in some moments, it already is.

Book Club: Telling God's Story

I'm part of a group reading through the book Telling God's Story (by Peter Enns), in effort to gain some insight around how to teach our kids about our faith in a way that (we hope) avoids some of the misconceptions we grew up with.  If you are interested in following along, you can find the group Facebook page here, and you can find links to some of the other members' thoughts here.  I didn't write anything about chapter one, but I finished chapter two this weekend, and below are my thoughts. 

Recently Luke was filling out an activity-book survey.  He asked each of us if we believe in ghosts, then tallied our answers: I don't. Ryan and Luke aren't sure. Owen does. He looked at the page for a few minutes, before saying that the dog probably believes in ghosts, so his mark would be with Owen. Owen responded, "And if he does, then mom loses! Two, against two, against one."

I know it was an innocent comment, but I still questioned his statement that just because more people think something, that makes it right. We discussed it and agreed that the only way I would really "lose" in that scenario is if we had a way to prove that ghosts exist. And if we could prove that, then yes, I would lose because I would be wrong. Conversely, if we could prove ghosts do not exist, but then he and the dog would "lose," and I would "win," even though a larger group thought the wrong thing.

And don't many of us often make that type of mistake, thinking we must be right when more people agree with us? We look around at the people we interact with and when we discover areas where we agree, we feel like we win, and we feel like those who disagree with us lose.

Even though, realistically, we know that being in the majority doesn't automatically make a person right.

When I was growing up in the midst of Conservative, Evangelical, Homeschooling families, I saw this "majority is right" thinking often. Whatever was the new darling book or speaker or conference or curriculum, seemed to work its way through most of the families -- the families who were "right."  And while some of those things may have been right for some of those people, I now think that some of those things were wrong, or at least wrong for some of us.

This probably contributes to why I am so very skeptical of bandwagons.

So when I found myself rather enthusiastically agreeing to join a book study on teaching the Bible to one's children, I started questioning myself. Even when the book arrived and I started reading the introduction, I couldn't quite shake the anxious feeling that I was treading a little too close to that line of joining in with other like-minded people and jumping on a bandwagon.  And despite that I appreciated the first chapter, I still had my doubts -- not specifically because of the content, but because I was concerned about following a majority of people I respect and setting aside any reservations I had about doing so.

Then I got to the second chapter and read this:

The Bible is not a book on how to invest your money, which political party to join, whether to homeschool, where to go to college, whom to marry, where to live, whether you should buy that car, America as God's chosen people, or a blueprint for present-day world events. It is not, in other words, a "Christian owner's manual." Too many Christians assume that the Bible is the guidebook to address all of life's questions. But that is not what the Bible is designed to do.... 

In this light, I want to introduce what I think is the single most important biblical concept for living a Christian life, not only today, but during any era: wisdom.

When we get down to it, much of our lives as Christians requires us... to "wing it." I don't mean that the Christian life is haphazard with no guidance. I mean that many of the decisions we are called to upon to make every day we make, not because of a verse here or there, but because of the wisdom we have accumulated over the years. That wisdom is acquired through the study of Scripture, prayer, life in a Christian community (not just "going to church"), and plain old life experiences...

And there it is. Wisdom. That is what I want my kids to see in the Bible, to see in Jesus, to see in my faith, and learn for their own lives. Peter Enns is not advocating in this book a blanket set of moral codes or a checklist of behaviors. He even acknowledges that what wisdom might allow for one child or family, it may not for another.

This is so refreshing.

Enns is not asking me to jump on a bandwagon, but rather to use the means available to me to do the reading, research, living, asking, observing, and praying necessary to understand my faith, and then to apply all of those in my interactions with my children as I strive to share God's story with them.  This doesn't mean that I will simply go along with whatever I hear from a popular speaker or automatically go wherever the majority is headed.

I must use wisdom to determine what to do for my own life, majority or not, and I must use wisdom to teach my kids wisdom and discernment for their own lives.

I'm still overwhelmed at the thought of being primarily responsible for teaching my children about God and the Bible.  I still have so many questions and I still ask myself all the time if I'm getting things wrong.  Most of this stuff cannot be proven, only lived and experienced for ourselves, so there are no clear winners or losers when it comes to all the ways Christians can disagree over the Bible.

In light of this, I'm thankful for this book and this group and I'm looking forward to what other insights I can glean from it in the coming chapters and from the others who are reading them.  We may not entirely agree, but we are seeking to gain and share wisdom.

That's really the best any of us can do.

Inevitability

I know everyone loves the colors and the days so brilliant and crisp they seem like a fairy tale. I know the grass is still green. I know the sun, when not hidden, still filters through the leaves with golden shimmers.

I know I should love it.

But to me it feels heavy.

I realize these are the year's last nice days.

I lace up my shoes. I force myself out into the wind, under the clouds. The puddles spray leftover rain onto my calves as my feet strike the pavement and propel me forward. Sometimes I can focus on my stride. On beating my time. On pushing myself to run faster, to stretch, to feel only the air enveloping me and the rhythm and my breath.

But sometimes I don't care how fast I am.

Sometimes I get distracted by the red-tailed hawk swooping gracefully to a tree and calling for its mate. Sometimes the clouds are too ominous and the colors too striking and all I can feel is the brilliant yellow and red against angry, dark skies.

Sometimes all I can see is a final, defiant display of beauty in the face of winter's inevitability.

And when I see that, I feel both exhilarated and defeated.

The dull, gray winter will come regardless.

The gloom will settle in and all will be shades of white and shadows and endless months of chill.

The weight is almost too much.

Yet I can't deny the faint whispers of hope in the falling leaves.

This isn't final.

Spring waits in the shadows.

Nothing can stop it.

It will come.

It always does.

What if I'm Wrong?

“From keeping nativity scenes in public buildings to keeping “one nation under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance, defending America from the perceived takeover of secular humanism became the purpose of the modern church… Evangelicals read Christian books and listened to Christian music. They sent their kids to Christian colleges, where they received Christian educations.  Apologists and theologians talked about the biblical approach to homosexuality, the biblical response to global warming, and the biblical view of parenting… 

It was within this social context that I and an entire generation of young evangelicals constructed our Christian worldviews. You might say that we were born ready with answers. We grew up with a fervent devotion to the inerrancy of the Bible and learned that whatever the question might be, an answer could be found within its pages... To experience the knowledge of Jesus Christ, we didn’t need to be born again; we simply needed to be born. Our parents, our teachers, and our favorite theologians took it from there, providing us with all the answers before we ever had time to really wrestle with the questions.”

– Rachel Held Evans in Evolving in Monkeytown

If there were a sentence in the above quote about the Evangelical homeschooling movement, it would perfectly describe my upbringing.  I grew up hearing the story of how I would tell people, when I was only four years old, that Jesus climbed down a ladder from heaven into my heart.  God was a character in my life who was always there.  I did not, in any serious way, allow myself to entertain the notion that God might not exist or that God might not be who I was told he was until after I had graduated from (Christian) college and gotten married. 

The absurd thing to me now, is that I honestly, with all my heart, believed that I knew God existed because I believed I had considered all the evidence and come to that conclusion myself.  I would hear other people talk about their experiences with God and I would incorporate that language into my own talk about God, not really understanding that I was equating believing the right answers about God with believing in God.

I think I’ve come a long way since then.  I wrestled with my questions and discovered a faith that is entirely different from what I was taught, but one that I embrace with all my heart. 

One of my biggest struggles now is how I teach my kids about God.  All that stuff that Rachel Held Evans explained happened because parents wanted their kids to know God in the way they had come to experience God.  They thought they were doing what was best for their kids.  With the homeschooling and the Christian everything, my parents thought they were doing what was best for me.  But I do not want to indoctrinate my kids into my faith; I want to help my kids understand God in a way he is real to them.

Yet, what if, by attempting to discard most of what my parents did and take a different approach, I'm just screwing my kids up in a different way than the way I was screwed up?

What if embracing their questions and not forcing them to accept my answers leaves them wishy-washy and completely unsure of anything?

What if not insisting they attend church with me every Sunday leaves them without a love for The Body of Christ?

What if allowing for discussion and not expecting immediate, unquestioning obedience undermines their respect for authority?

What if teaching them to respect other religions leads them away from Christianity?

What if I’m doing it all wrong?

These are only some of the questions that keep me from going back to sleep when I wake up at 3AM.  

I realize that raising kids is a process, not a project.  Some things I will certainly mess up no matter how much I don’t want to and some things I will get right on accident.  I keep coming back to these words from Brian Zahnd that give me hope that allowing my kids to grow up in the way that they should go, will at least be less damaging than the heavy-handed approach I was raised with: 

Perhaps we will have to believe that the gospel story itself, faithfully told, still has the capacity to astonish. Perhaps we will have to believe that the risen Christ can still make himself known in astonishing ways.  When we take it upon ourselves to explain the gospel so we can promote its benefits and get people to sign on, we unintentionally but inevitably diminish the mystery and beauty of the gospel.

I had to realize for myself that even though I’d known about God my entire life, my faith was not my own.  It was indoctrinated into me and wasn’t something I understood for myself. 

It wasn’t until I discovered for myself the astonishment, beauty, and mystery of the Gospel that I was able to know in the depths of my being that I wanted to be a Christian.  It may sound somewhat reckless, but I don’t even care if it is true.  It is faith.  I cannot prove it.  The acknowledgement that it may not be true in no way diminishes my hope that it is or my certainty that this is the way I want to live my life.

If I try to make anyone else, my kids included, experience God my way, I’m not leaving space for them to be astonished by God in their own way.  Drawing again from Zhand: 

Christianity is not a science; it is a faith…. Christianity is a confession, not an explanation. We confess Christ; we don’t explain Christ. We confess the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Resurrection, and the Ascension, though we cannot fully explain these mysteries. We leave room for mystery. We honor the mystery. We recognize the beauty in the mystery. 

Perhaps I’m not doing everything right.  Perhaps my kids will have to spend years unraveling the way they were raised and will have to find their own way that looks nothing like mine, just like I had to do.  I hope not, but I acknowledge that it is possible. 

All I can do now is to keep raising them in the most loving way I know how and continue to confess Christ and Incarnation and Resurrection and all the other mysteries in my daily life.  I can leave room for them to be astonished by the beauty and mystery of the Gospel in their own way and remind them it is okay if we don’t always come to the same understanding. 

And I can trust that if it is true – that if God is who I believe he is – that it’s enough.

A Prayer Attributed to St. Francis

Lord, make us instruments of your peace.

Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon;

where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope;

where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy.

Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;

to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;

and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Amen.

– A Prayer attributed to St. Francis

 

Grant that we may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.

I feel increasingly isolated from people I used to feel close to.  I don’t know what to say to anyone, so I’ve barely been saying anything at all.  I spend a lot of time reading, a lot of time "listening" on various websites, but not a lot of time on Facebook and not a lot of time engaging in conversations.  I have emails and messages that have been sitting unanswered for weeks.  It isn't that I don't want to connect with people; it really is that I have no idea what words to use. 

I'm afraid if I start talking, I'll say what I really want to say.  I want to say that I feel I was sold distortions of Scripture, but that I have a different understanding now and for the first time in a long time I don’t feel I have to apologize for being a Christian.  I want to say that our preoccupation in this country with guns and violence and personal liberty in the name of God grieves my heart.  I want to say that I do not see love in exclusion, I do not see truth in nationalism, and I do not hear the Gospel in every-man-for-himself.  I want to say that I am falling in love with psalms and collects and the Church and – maybe for the first time – with my faith. 

But when I've floated variations of these words to the people I used to talk to, I’m often met with cautioning admonitions or incredulous looks or side-glances or criticism for sounding like I agree with the “wrong” people.

I keep asking myself if it’s me.  I wrack my brain, going over conversations word-for-word in my head, asking if anything that came out of my mouth sounded like I was judging.  Did I speak words that sounded like disapproval?  Did I sound like I was insisting on agreement with my point-of-view?  Did I seem insincere when I said, “I understand why people think differently, but this is how I understand it”?  No matter how lightly I tread on the eggshells, they end up broken and slicing tender flesh.

I want to say out loud the things my heart keeps repeating.  

I want to speak Mercy.

Mercy, not sacrifice.   

Lord, have Mercy.  

Lord, in your Mercy, hear our prayer.  

I want to say that sometimes in the way-too-early morning, when I’m awake because my mind started racing at 3AM and rendered going back to sleep hopeless, I get up and walk outside and it’s dark and calm and I hear “be still” echoing in my thoughts.  I want to say that in those moments I realize I am finally starting to believe that this faith, this hope, may actually be a beautiful way to spend my life. 

I don’t want to argue.  If other people experience God in a different way than I am or if they have a different understanding than I have, I accept that.  I am not trying to convince anyone of anything or talk them out of what they think.  We can disagree.  All I want is to look at someone in the face and tell them how wrecked I feel and see understanding instead of disapproval. 

And on one level, I know it isn’t wrong to want to talk to someone who understands.  I know it is okay for me to wish for that connection.  Yet, this isn’t really about me and I don’t know how to balance it.  I’m failing miserably.  I can’t avoid people I love because it hurts to get those looks and feel their judgment.  And if another person isn’t offering understanding or consolation or love to me, I should still be seeking to understand and to console and to love.  But how do I remember to listen to understand instead of talking to be understood? How do I learn to soothe and comfort when tensions are high?  How do I communicate love in the face of disapproval? 

I think it may have something to do with a table. 

And breaking bread. 

Perhaps I should start there.

Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;

to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love. 

Lord, in your mercy, hear my prayer. 

Where to Go From Here

After we got married, Ryan and I rented one half of a duplex in a tiny, map-dot-of-a-town, right off US 68, forty miles north of Cincinnati.  We thought of going on a vacation early that fall, but then remembered we had recently graduated from college with a stupid amount of student-loan debt and he was getting ready to go back to school and we had no money for a vacation.  Instead, we both used our paid vacation week to stay home and tackle painting white the hideous grease-brown cabinets in the rental kitchen.

And we seriously underestimated the investment of time and effort required for that task.

Thoroughly exhausted and with our patience wearing dangerously thin, we decided to take one day and do something away from the house and away from those damn cabinets.  We got in my old Nissan and started driving south on US 68.  (Because obviously, if you're sick of working together for 18 hours a day on a tedious project, the ideal break from that would be to spend an entire day together in the car.)

I don't remember anything we talked about.  We probably spent a lot of time listening to music and not talking at all.  I remember we pulled over at a few places along the way to take photos, as well as taking a lot of drive-by pictures out the window.  I remember that by the time we got to Lexington, Kentucky the trip wasn't seeming like such an awesome idea.  While we could drive away exhaustion and frustration for a little while with the open road ahead of us, we still had to drive all the way back home to our bills and our real life and those damn cabinets.

And it was a long drive back.  

Sometimes I think about what it would have been like if we hadn't gone back.  I'm not talking about actually running away, I just wonder what it would have been like if we hadn't felt like we had to do the standard jobs-kids-house thing and had done something totally different instead.  There were times we talked about it.  We talked about moving to the city, where I'd go to grad school.  We talked about moving to North Carolina so he could pursue a different type of job opportunity.  But we didn't.  We always went back to real life -- near our families and where we grew up -- just like we did that day when we got to the other side of Lexington and turned around.

Our road-trip experience is only going to get me so far as a metaphor for my spiritual journey, but as I was reading the Daily Office this morning, something reminded of that trip and that same feeling of wanting to keep going because there were so few good reasons to go back.

In terms of my spiritual life, there are days I ask myself what was the big deal with how things were, back when I was still trying to fit that ideal of the good Christian girl my parents tried to raise me to be.  Some days I wonder what the hell I'm doing with all this unraveling and shattering and searching and weaving.  I am tired.  I feel alienated from a lot of people I used to feel like I was close to.  Would it really have been so bad to have stayed where I was?

I read the words of other people who have left behind a lot of the same things I have discarded and they seem so sure of their journey.  They are so sure of it that they can blog about it almost every day while writing a book about it and debating their thoughts about it on social media.  They have answers and direction and purpose.  It's not that I want to be those people, it's just that their certainty makes me wonder how I am still so unsure.  If I made the conscious decision to unravel it all and burn down what was left and leave all those paradigms in the dust, why do I still have that feeling in the pit of my stomach that I have no idea where I'm headed?

And that's the thing about going somewhere without any real plan.  At some point, the sense of adventure loses its luster and you get tired and irritated at yourself for agreeing to such a thing and you can't decide if it is worse to keep going or to give up and turn around.  Even if you're mostly sure it is worth it to press on, you can't be sure that what's ahead is actually better than what you left behind.  Perhaps what you're getting away from was painful, but maybe the unknown isn't actually better.

I am not sure.  I continue reading and questioning and praying and processing.  I'm squinting, trying to determine if this direction is really where I should be going.  I have this feeling that it's right there.  I can't see it, I can only sense that ahead is a better understanding of this beautiful mystery of the gospel and that this journey is about grasping the hem of Incarnation and astonishment and redemption and love.

I recently read Beauty Will Save the World by Brian Zahnd.  In it, he writes, "To rediscover Christianity in all of its astonishing mystery and beauty will utterly overwhelm us and make all of our notions about its devaluation feel completely redundant. It will leave our skepticism in shreds."  That is exactly how I feel.  Everything is slanting and my cynicism is falling away and it seems that rock around my heart is starting to crumble.  I can feel myself being broken and wrecked and I feel raw and exposed and I'm quite honestly a little frightened, but I keep going.  In a way, I'm not sure I could turn around, even though it seems that might be easier.

At this point I can't tell if it's me and my stubbornness or if the Holy Spirit may actually exist in the way I've always wondered was truly possible.  I really hope it's all true.  I really hope that if I keep going, someday, I'll manage to reach the point where my awareness of the mystery and beauty assures me I'm going in the right direction, even if I'm still not sure of where I'll end up.

I really don't want to go back.