Human being or doing?

Not everybody, and nobody all of the time, is aware of

this "eternal now" in the temporal "now."

But sometimes it breaks powerfully

into our consciousness….

- Paul Tillich, The Eternal Now (1963)

Are you a human being or are you a human doing?

My friend and pastor, the Rev. John Mennell, essentially posed this question in a recent sermon based on the Gospel of Mark. In the sixth chapter of this Gospel, the apostles share reports of their preaching, teaching and healing work with Jesus and he responds by commanding them to take some time away from the hustle and bustle of their ministry to rest. They had been working exceptionally hard, but they had failed to renew their own bodies and souls in their attempt to save others'.

How good are you at renewing your own body and soul amidst the seemingly inevitable busyness of modern life? In other words, are you a human being or are you a human doing?

In his sermon, one of the more amusing and also piercingly insightful observations that Rev. Mennell shared was that, unlike in the modern world, Jesus didn't listen to the reports of His apostles' productivity and then assign them higher goals for the next go-round. Instead, as is so often the case in the story of His life, Jesus went in an unexpected direction, encouraging his collaborators to renew themselves rather than to get back out on the road immediately.

We might say that Jesus was playing the 'long game,' but, in reality, he was teaching us yet another important lesson: one cannot share what one does not possess, and if we don't invest periodically in our own renewal, we'll find ourselves incapable of making our chosen contributions and pursuing our avocation successfully. Which is sound leadership advice, even in a secular context….

With this in mind, then, how good are you at renewing your own body and soul amidst the seeming inevitable busyness of modern life? In other words, are you a human being or a human doing?

In addition to physical rest, what are the pursuits that are uniquely restorative for/to you? How do you renew and refuel yourself in idiosyncratically meaningful ways … and at what interval(s)? If you are the least bit unclear, this is the very first restorative work that you must do right away ... and then you can begin to utilize these insights in a consistent way so that, over time, you can maximize both your contribution and your enjoyment of the journey.

By way of example, I'll share a few of my uniquely resonant renewal and restoration practices:

• Reading and reflection, especially about spirituality and topics of social interest/justice
• Writing, especially blog posts like this one, articles to be published in my LinkedIn series and/or letters to loved ones
• Resting by a body of water and allowing the wind and waves to soothe, salve and inspire my soul
• Sharing a communal meal with family, friends and/or new acquaintances
• Sharing an adventure with loved ones, both to savor the experience in the moment and to create a life-long memory
• Sharing the experience of the contemplative, spoken word worship service of my church

Is it mere coincidence, then, that when I pursue these activities I feel the presence of God most powerfully? I think not: in fact, I believe that this is exactly what Jesus was teaching us in Mark's scripture. Yes, I'll do a lot of other things on the days when I observe these practices, but in these moments, I will be and in so doing feel enveloped in the eternal timelessness of our Source. In these moments, I will experience what theologian Paul Tillich described as "time beyond time."

So, what restoration and renewal pursuits are especially meaningful for/to you? What are the things in your life that inspire, illumine and elevate your path … and how often - and consistently - do you engage in them? In other words, what is it that you do to celebrate, provide succor to and develop the unique being and Child of God you are?

As you reflect on your answers, I pray that you be fully present in the moment and, even more, that you realize that such an elevated experience of life is available to you always. In this way, may you always be clear that you are a human being and thus make choices in your life that align with and enhance this eternal reality in uniquely meaningful ways....

What are you going to do today to renew your body and soul and, in so doing, to become and be all that you can be?

Enjoy the journey....

We go towards something that is not yet,

and we come from something that is no more....

(I)t is infinitely more important that we not forget ourselves,

this individual being, not to be repeated,

unique, eternally precious, 

and delivered into our hands.

- Paul Tillich, The Eternal Now (1963)

Timeless not old.....

I got two statements, if you don't remember anything else I say:

Begin with the end in mind and die empty.

- Aeneas Williams, Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony Speech

(August 2nd, 2014)

Do you know who Aeneas Williams is? You should. Have you heard Fred Rogers' commencement speech at Dartmouth? You should. Have you been exposed to timeless wisdom recently? You should. How much better would your life be, however you define this, if you made it a practice to seek out, reflect on, learn from and live into wisdom consistently? Greater abundance awaits if we but seek it….

Unexpectedly, several times in just the past that day, I've encountered wisdom. Wasn't looking for it and honestly wasn't that open to it at the time … but both instances that I'd like to share here have left an indelible impression that I hope to carry forward in my life, so I share them with you….

Aeneas Williams is now pastor, but if you recognize his name at all, it's likely because he was an exceptional defensive back in the National Football League for fourteen seasons and was recognized for his appreciable accomplishments by being inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2014. I was always a fan - he just seemed to carry himself so differently and better and with such grace that it was noticeable both on the field and off in his playing days - but I never really knew what had become of him in his retirement.

As it happens, even though I'm boycotting the NFL along with so many who are repulsed by its tone deaf and cowardly record with respect to social justice and the care of its current players and alumni, as I scrolled through the program guide, I noticed a segment of the program  A Football Life that featured Williams (https://gamepass.nfl.com/video/aeneas-williams-a-football-life), so I watched it. And I am so thankful that I did, because I'm an even bigger fan of Aeneas Williams now and even more impressed with him as a human being than I have been him as an outstanding and truly all-time player.

You see, Aeneas Williams is truly a man in full, a human being fully alive, imbued with a sense of purpose and living on purpose in an otherwise chaotic world, and thereby he is making an even greater contribution off the field than his incredible body of work on it. Suffice it to say that I was truly happy for him and his family when I learned a few years ago that he was being inducted into the Hall of Fame: it was a hard-won and richly deserved honor for an exceptional and exemplary player and leader, because during his career he had always been a positive influence not only on teammates but on the organizations with which he was affiliated and on the larger body of active players during his day. So I was gratified to learn even more about this exceptional person and his impact … and then they began to examine his life in retirement, which is even more impressive than his exceptionally impressive playing career.

Aeneas Williams is a man of deep faith and has chosen to become a small-town pastor and community leader. But not just in any small-town: by coincidence, it turns out that he has settled in Ferguson, Missouri. Yes, that Ferguson. And though we all have horrific memories of what happened there in the aftermath of Michael Brown's death just four years ago, as is typical with our media, we know much less about the appreciable renaissance that's occurred since … in which, it turns out, Aeneas Williams has played a meaningful role. He is still the same understated, by example leader, but now his focus is helping others see hope in the midst of despair and to make this the basis of informed choices that will lead to better outcomes for them and, actually, for us all.

Aeneas Williams' example inspired me and, even though I've lived a parallel life of service throughout my for-profit career, it reminded me just how important being a positive influence and role model in the lives of others truly is. Specifically, his example has inspired me to ensure that every time I have the opportunity to share meaningfully with someone I should take it, or, to use his phrase, I should live as if my goal is to "die empty," having left all of myself and what I have to contribute out on the field of my life. Yes, I've given a great deal over the years, and at appreciable cost to me and my loved ones at that, but this is a small price to pay both to pay forward the myriad blessings that I have received and to have the opportunity to contribute meaningfully to fellow human beings' success and fulfillment in life.

Simply put, Aeneas Williams is one of my heroes, not just on the field but in life, which matters so much more … and he's so very different but in meaningful ways quite similar to another of my heroes to whom I was reintroduced recently, Fred Rogers.

That's right, that Fred Rogers, as in Mr. Rogers, the creator of and lead character in the exceptionally long-running and profoundly influential television program Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood.  Currently on my list of things to do is to see the new documentary tribute about his life and work, Won't You Be My Neighbor? So I didn't expect to be reacquainted with him and his legacy via my Facebook feed this morning, but I'm so thankful that I was.

You know that Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood ran for a long time, right? But did you realize that it was for more than thirty-three years, from 1968 to 2001? Me either. And did you know that this gentle, courtly man whose on-camera persona was the embodiment of understatement and grace was actually the graduate of an Ivy League college, a Presbyterian minister and one of the most progressive social influences in our society for decades? I suspect you may have known the latter, but, like me, not the first two realities about this singular gentleman's life. But what brought me back to - and has greatly enhanced - my appreciation for Fred Rogers is his 2002 commencement address to his alma mater, Dartmouth (https://news.dartmouth.edu/news/2018/03/revisiting-fred-rogers-2002-commencement-address).

If you know Fred Rogers, you know him to be the very embodiment of graceful, classy humanity: he was an exceptional person in so many ways, including as "an extra special, kind man" (which is actually how he described one of his collegiate professors). And he was also an incredibly incisive social observer and innovator in his ever-understated way, which it turns out, was also supremely positively influential. So his commencement speech is as he described the world, "a magnificent jewel."

In it, he shares the wisdom of "the last of the great Roman philosophers, and the first of the scholastics of the Middle Ages," Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius. (Sure, we all remember him!) And that of Yo-Yo Ma and Saint-Exupery to boot. But what he mainly does is to offer sage advice to a cadre of people embarking on the next chapters of their journey.

And, in true Fred Rogers style, he offered them what he called "an invisible gift," by asking them to invest one minute in silence to ponder "those who have helped you become who you are today." I can imagine that although the assembled were honored to be hearing from Mr. Rogers, I suspect that they were looking even more forward to the end of his remarks and to that of the ceremony itself … except that momentarily they had underestimated this quiet force of nature, as we've all tended to do. Gently yet profoundly he stopped them and refocused them on gratitude rather than their understandable and well-earned pride. In so doing, he shared a gentle reminder of what should be the priority of our priorities. "It's not the honors and the prizes, and the fancy outsides of life which ultimately nourish our souls," he noted, but "the knowing that we can be trusted" and "that we never have to fear the truth" for this "is the bedrock of our lives, from which we make our choices" and therefore "is very good stuff."

He concluded his remarks with an exhortation of which we should all be mindful and share every day, too:

So, in all that you do in all of your life,

I wish you the strength and grace

to make those choices which will allow

you and your neighbor

to become the best of whoever you are.

That was sixteen years ago, but is no less powerfully true today. That's the thing about Aeneas Williams and Fred Rogers: they are - and they have lived in ways that are - timeless, not old. Were it that we could live so eternally, too....

In this spirit, then, I wish all of you the gratitude-infused courage to live a life that's timeless both in its substance and its impact and, at Mr. Rogers' behest, I leave you with the words of the great philosopher as he quoted them:

O happy race of mortals,

if your hears are ruled as is the universe,

by love.

Unbelievable....

To embrace life, to increase love, to have the courage to be - 

these, for me, are the doorways through which

I walk into the mystery of God..

This God is real to me

and Jesus is still my doorway into this reality....

I walk eagerly into this life-centered God experience....

I bear witness to the faith that leads me and the whole world

to live fully, love wastefully and be all that we can be.

 - Bishop John Shelby Spong, Unbelievable (2018)

For many, many years now, Bishop John Shelby Spong has been sharing his unique experience of God with fellow human beings of every stripe and type. To some, he is a heretic: someone who refuses to swallow whole the orthodoxies and dogma of the Christian church with which he has been affiliated for more than six decades. To others, he is a hero: someone whose willingness to wrestle with the challenges of life and faith has encouraged the development of new and vibrant pathways to God. Having studied Jack's work and having come to know him a bit in recent years, I'm definitely in the latter camp. He is both my hero - personally and professionally - and my guiding theological light, as his unique approach to faith and spirituality has encouraged me to develop my own, which has, in turn, led to a profoundly abundant spiritual life that I could not have imagined even a decade ago.

Don't get me wrong, I also believe that Jack's a heretic, but in the very best possible way: he has long evidenced the courage and conviction to question the oh-so-human dogma and practice of institutional Christianity … and in this speaking of the truth to power he has both enraged and unsettled the church's hierarchy and reached and reclaimed many of its ostensible adherents. I am one of these whose spirituality has been encouraged and developed by Jack Spong's wisdom and piercing insight, and because of this I have now found both a strength of affiliation with the Christian church and a personal theology that I never before thought possible. 

Thank you, Jack, both for your example as a heretic and for your encouragement for me and many others to try it! I am not now a member of the Church Alumni Association (as he slyly describes the Christians who've left this institution in droves in the past generation) because of Jack: thanks to him, I was able to see a place for myself within the Church, rather than outside of it, and have been benefiting from and contributing meaningfully through this affiliation for many years now. I'm proud to be both a heretic - which for me means that I've developed an idiosyncratically resonant personal theology that doesn't correspond fully (or event that much) to the institutional church's teachings - and, now, the Senior Warden of my Episcopal church.

But even more than I appreciate Jack as a heretic, I revere him as a person and a trailblazing religious professional. In fact, his theology is at the core of mine now, for which I am indescribably grateful. And as I studied the development of his theology, I was also introduced to other theological eminences whose insights have illuminated  and elevated my spiritual path. Other than Jack, three of my greatest theological influences are Bishop John A.T. Robinson, Paul Tillich and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the first two of whom have also had an especially profound influence on the evolution of Bishop Spong's theology. Cobbled together in an idiosyncratically meaningful way, their insights have led to a simple, three-pronged faith that has been profoundly life-affirming for me:

First, though I consider myself a Christian, I don't believe that this particular faith is the only path to God, nor does it exclusively have all of the 'right' answers in the spiritual domain. (In fact, to me, the Church is a decidedly human institution - which isn't inherently a bad thing as long as we don't get this twisted - while God alone is divine.) Accordingly, I have studied, benefited from and incorporated insights from multiple faith traditions, especially, in my case, Taoism and Buddhism. So, in reality, I'm really a Christian-Taoist-Buddhist, which might be a little hard for the folks in the Baptist church that I grew up in to wrap their heads around, but it works beautifully for me.

Second, I choose to be Christian because I believe that Jesus Christ's example is worthy of emulation by us all. I no longer buy the dogma that He's the only son of God, or, necessarily, that he was even Divine in the sense of being especially aligned with God. (Truth be told, I believe that God is in all of us and that Jesus just did a better job - the best job ever, actually - at reflecting this than we average humans do.) In fact, following Bishop Spong's teaching, I believe that Jesus reflected the insights of early Christian Bishop Irenaeus of Lyons, who (in modern language) observed that the glory of God is a human person fully alive. To me, Jesus is one of history's finest examples of what it means to be fully human and fully alive. I consider myself a Christian because I hope to live into His example ever more lovingly and impactfully every day, and I accept that His standard of embodying and sharing love constantly and with all is as simple as it is profoundly difficult to live. Every day, I fall short in myriad ways, but I am lifted by the belief that Jesus' love compels me to pick myself up, dust myself off and try even harder to be the better person that I am capable of being. I take it as one of God's and life's delicious ironies that the simplest and yet most profound way to live is also the hardest.

Third, based on these two preceding spiritual principles, my guiding philosophy comes straight from Bishop Spong: I believe that I'm called by God to live fully, love wastefully and be(come) all that I am capable of being every day of my earthly life. I further believe that if I am able to live in this way, more moments of my life will resonate in ways that are eternal in the sense that their import and impact will be forever felt. So, perhaps another irony of my faith is that while I no longer believe in Heaven and Hell as I was taught them in my youth - meaning, plainly, that there is no physical life after my earthly death - I do believe that we can live eternally in the here and now, in this one and only earthly life, and Jesus' example is my proof: though He is no longer with us physically, the way in which He lived His earthly life is so profound an example that we feel His presence to this day (and even define the way that we measure time by it). The eternal life that I hope to live is like His: that long after I'm gone physically, the love that I shared and the contributions that I made will be resonant in the lives of others and especially, hopefully, in those of my loved ones and their progeny.

So, in this Spirit, I leave you with the profound theology of Bishop Spong and pray that you, too, will find your spiritual being immeasurably enriched and your spiritual journey lovingly illuminated and elevated by it:

I cannot tell you who God is or what God is.

No one can do that.

That is not within the capability of any human mind.

All I can do is tell you how I believe I have experienced God.

God and my experience of God are not the same.

…

I believe I have experienced God as the Source of Life. ...

If God is the Source of Life,

then the only way I can appropriately worship God

is by living fully.

In the process of embracing the fullness of life,

I bear witness to the reality of the God who is the Source of Life.

I believe I have experienced God as the Source of Love.

Love is the power that enhances life. ...

If God is the Source of Love,

then the only way I can worship God

is by loving "wastefully"....

By "wasteful" love I mean the kind of love

that never stops to calculate whether the object of its love

is worthy to be its recipient.

It is love that never stops to calculate deserving.

It is love that loves not because love has been earned.

It is in the act of loving "wastefully" that I believe I make God visible.

Finally, I believe I experience God,

in the words of my greatest theological mentor,

Reformed German theologian Paul Tillich (1886-1965),

as the Ground of Being. ...

If God is the Ground of Being,

then the only way I can worship God

is by having the courage to be all that I can be;

and the more deeply I can be all that I can be,

the more I can and do make God visible.

So the reality of God to me is discovered

in the experience which compels me to

"live fully, to love wastefully and

to have the courage to be all that I can be."

May we all live so well and eternally....