American Exceptionalism? Perhaps....

You think that your pain and your heartbreak

are unprecedented in the history of the world,

but then you read.  It was books that taught me

that the things that tormented me most were the

very things that connected me with all the people

who were alive, or who had ever been alive.

 

- James Baldwin, from the film

James Baldwin: The Price of the Ticket

I find myself in pain and at a loss so/too often of late.  I struggle to comprehend what we've made of this great country of ours, even as I appreciate its remaining - and, hopefully, eternal - abundance of blessings and the reality that so much of what we know of the world is not new so much as new to us.  This world has long been a place of pain and torment for too many, as has this country been; it's just that modern media has brought to us so much of what was already there but unknown to us before that we cannot evade this painful (self-)knowledge (although some clearly go to great lengths of delusion to do so).

 

What's been weighing on me lately is a sad and tawdry mélange of issues and scandals and other instances of inhumanity that trouble me precisely because they don't (sufficiently) trouble so/too many of my fellows.  Because of this I've come to agree with the definition of privilege floating around social media of late: its existence is proven when something that affects others but doesn't affect you directly also doesn't move you to consider it a problem because of the reality that it doesn't affect you.  When your empathy and compassion fail, you are indeed in a privileged position, the one of not caring or having to.

 

And what is it that so/too many are too privileged to care about?  What's in this mélange of troubling reality that gnaws at me at the moment and, seemingly, always?

 

Certainly race: that it's rearing its ugly head in new riots a half-century after the ones of my early childhood is a profoundly disturbing reality.  Yes, we've made progress in this time ... but too many of us apparently feel that enough progress has been made so that we shouldn't have to deal with the rest of the work that we have left to do.  I'll let you guess who's mostly in this camp.  If you say the 'winners' - that is, those whom racism benefits rather than disadvantages - give yourself a gold star.

 

Yet we have so far left to go and no Dreamer to lead us there.  Not to be trite, but I really do suspect that candidate Obama was right: we are the change that we've been waiting for.  Now the question is do we have the courage and conviction to do the work.  And not just some of us, but all of us; racism winners and losers alike.  It seems to me that if we really want this to be a land where all men and women - indeed, all humans - are created equal and are able to live in this way, then we have to address and eliminate racism and all of the other -isms that demean and diminish the lives of too many of our fellows.

 

And certainly, too, I am troubled by religion, especially when it intertwines with our politics in life-diminishing ways:  I am constantly dismayed that so much of what is claimed in the name of Christianity today is actually the antithesis of our Patron's example.  The institution of the Christian church has been aligned with the powers that be since the fourth century, so one could expect some 'drift.'  Yet today's religious right is, to be kind, far too often similar to or worse than those who persecuted Jews like Jesus back in the day.  We demonize the poor, the different and the Other ... when the man in whose name we do it did the exact opposite, reaching out to the disaffected, the downtrodden and the Other of His day.  And we wonder why the fastest growing segment of our population is the religiously unaffiliated?  When the ugliness that is too much a part of modern Christianity is reflected upon, is it any wonder that fewer and fewer people - and especially the young - want to be associated with it?

 

(By contrast, I have a belief that if we were to become/be true "Followers of Jesus" - to borrow Rev. Dr. Obery Hendricks' term - who are committed to emulating His example, this trend would reverse in a powerfully positive and life-affirming way.)

 

And, of course, on the world stage, it's not just Christianity.  Adherents of many religions seem to vie fiercely to prove who among them wins the metaphorical inhumanity prize.  It's true of too many believers that their behavior in the name of God is so, well, ungodly.  This leads some to conclude that big-R Religion is the culprit, but to them I say not so fast: there is much beauty being shared with the world in the name of religion, too; it's just that the ugliness seems to outweigh this too greatly and too often (and certainly gets more media coverage).  It seems to me that if we really want to worship God, that ultimate Source of Life, then we must judge ourselves by how life-affirming our behavior is, not by the often false piety that we speak or the judgment that we project in God's name.

 

And I'm also bothered by the seemingly increasing level of hypocrisy ... though this, too, is subject to the evaluative question whether it's actually increasing or whether our awareness of it is what's increasing.  The current 'scandal' in this vein involves a member of the reality-celebrity Duggar family who, while until recently shilling for a 'family values' organization, turns out to have been molesting young women and girls, including his own sisters (with, of course, some in his family dutifully covering it up).  On the one hand, the cynical me isn't surprised and hardly considers it news anymore when one of the moral grandstanders in our society is exposed; hate to admit it, but now I assume that all of them are false prophets but we just haven't found them out yet.

 

On the other hand, I shake my head in world-weariness and sadness that sexual abuse is so common in our society - one source says that 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys will be sexually molested before the age of 16 (yes, you read that right - a quarter of our daughters, nieces, etc., and a sixth of our sons, nephews, etc., will be victims of predators, in many cases who are known to them) - and yet we seem not all that outraged about it.  If you ask anyone, of course they'll proclaim their ire at and disapproval of such conduct.  So who's doing the molesting?  And, even worse, who knows about it and isn't doing anything about it and/or covering it up?  If we want to be as good as we too often think we are, these percentages must go down ... a lot.

 

And I am troubled by economic inequality in our society (and world) and our in-justice system and our bought-and-paid-for politics and our willful environmental blindness and our stunning ignorance of other people and cultures of the world and our decrepit and decaying system of public education and our focus on winning at all costs that has led to widespread shortcutting and cheating in our schools, in our sports and in our society and our seemingly endless bloodlust and incessant warmongering and....

 

The list could go on and on ... which is the point: in so many ways we have literally lost our way as a society and our ego-salving claim to American Exceptionalism rings ever more hollow over time.  In fact, I might go so far as to say it exacerbates the problem: when you can retreat into the fantasy that you're the best, you feel no pressure to acknowledge the reality that you're not and address it.

 

But, try as we might, we are not leaving our children a better world than we inherited in many, many meaningful ways.  And this we own.  The world has become a better place in my lifetime, but not nearly enough progress has been made to stem the tide of our own inhumanity.  Ultimately, this may be the test of our Exceptionalism: in that we have chosen to ignore so much of what diminishes the lives of so many of our fellow citizens and human beings - especially now that we're so much better informed about so much of it (and, in fairness, so much more aware than previous generations could have been) - perhaps we are different.  Perhaps we're exceptional in that we know how bad things are and have just chosen not to care....

 



Americans suffer from an ignorance that is

not only colossal but sacred.

 

- Attributed to James Baldwin

 

God Gave Noah the Rainbow Sign....

One must say Yes to life,

and embrace it wherever it is found -

and it is found in terrible places....

- James Baldwin

The Fire Next Time

 

I've lost my James Baldwin (collection of books) - or, at least, cannot locate him/them at the moment and feel that periodic intense need to do so - and I find myself in one of those 'terrible places' as the author and artist suggested.  Being without Baldwin for those of us who've discovered him is very much like the delirium tremens experience of an addict.  It seems that every year or two I feel an intense need to rediscover his brilliance and salve the wounds inflicted on my soul by this weary and wearisome world.  And now I cannot find him....

 

The antecedent cause of this latest Baldwin jones is the excellent American Masters documentary on his life.  Two truths be told, I've read a fair amount of Baldwin and not while I was in school and had both the time and the environment to do so deeply, and yet much of what was shared during this moving biograhical documentary was new to me.  It seems that I've only known the man through his writings and have now been exposed more fully to his life (and the particular contexts from which his writings spring), so I am greatly enriched for the experience ... which is the same sensation I experience when reading his (mainly non-fiction/essay) work.  And to think that he's been gone more than a quarter-century and my admiration for him continues to grow.

 

In part this is because so much of what he wrote about has yet to become timebound.  James Baldwin was described not as bitter but as angry by no less than the late great Maya Angelou ... and the causes of his anger - injustice, racism, heterosexism, classism, etc. - continue to this day only slightly abated.  Yes, there has been progress, but not as much as one would think in the half-century since the publication of his seminal work The Fire Next Time.  We are still talking about the institutional racism in our society, still decrying the oppression and exploitation of the poor by the rich and still amazed and dismayed by the strikingly inhumane practice of religion - especially the Christian religion - by many of its supposed adherents, among the many causes of our dis-ease and distress.

 

Oh how I wish his writings would fade from timely to dated, from open, raw and painful to uncomfortable and embarrassing reminders of days gone by.  Oh how I wish that James Baldwin weren't just as relevant today as during his lifetime ... and perhaps even more so now.

 

Where are our modern Jimmy Baldwins?  The eloquent, articulate and elevating capturers and communicators of our hurt, our pain, our weariness ... as well as our desire for love and life?  Who speaks as movingly as he did to the mass of Americans - mostly white then as now - to help them understand what it feels like to be labeled and limited against one's will?  Or to be transported by those you love, whomever they turn out to be?

 

[This being said, one has to wonder if they would listen.  The ferment of the '60s seemed to compel their attention ... but does the modern age call forth such a response, such openness and willingness to listen (even if, then as now, for a very brief time)?  Some, it seems, revel in the reality of their refusal to listen....]

 

And yet Baldwin isn't just great to help frame and address society (and its inevitable and durable ills).  He's also a profound and generous guide to life.  His meditations on love, spirituality and other aspects of the human experience touch and inspire as well.  For example, I continue to be transported by his observation that

 

Love takes off the masks that we fear

we cannot live without

and know we cannot live within.

 

I'm still staggered and guided by his piercing perspective on the Divine, that

 

If the concept of God has any validity or use,

it can only be to make us larger, freer and more loving.

If God cannot do this,

then it is time we got rid of Him.

 

And I finally have matured enough to understand how profound an observation it is that

 

To be sensual, I think,

is to respect and rejoice in the force of life,

of life itself,

and to be present in all one does,

from the effort of loving to the making of bread.

 

So much of what I value in my life now revolves around the gift of loving and being loved and around the breaking of bread with those with whom I share this gift....

 

And maybe as I sit here writing - his cardinal gift - and appreciating his influence - even if felt initially in absence, in temporarily lost access - I am more aware of him deep within my soul than I realize.  James Baldwin still haunts me, and I hunger for his wisdom, so that I can live life more fully, more perceptively and more lovingly as well as be prepared for the inevitable, for the fire next time....

 

There is never time in the future

in which we will work out our salvation.

The challenge is in the moment;

the time is always now.

 



Listening To That Inner Voice....

I believe in God, but not as one thing, not as an old man in the sky.

I believe that what people call God is something in all of us.

I believe that what Jesus and Mohammed and Buddha

and all the rest said was right.

It's just that the translations have gone wrong.

- John Lennon

It's been a week since Easter and I've been in a reflective mood: the days that have followed the holiest one of the Christian year have been challenging for me, to put it mildly.  So I've been trying to get in a more spiritual frame of mind and to regain my equilibrium by accessing and drawing on the depth of my faith.  I sit quietly and wait for that inner voice, the one that is my own and seems to stream from my very depths, the one in which I feel the touch of God and am moved to ponder His Infinite Mystery.  And merely in this reflection and contemplation I begin to heal and steel myself for what is to come (while, hopefully, leaving the past behind except for the wisdom with which it's gifted me).

 

Yet as I listen to my inner voice, I come to know two things clearly:  First, too often of late, in it I hear anguish, a hurting more for the world than for myself, but a hurting nonetheless.  And, second, I know that it is my voice, not God's, and this helps me: while I feel His Grace and Touch as I heal, I realize the thoughts are my own, my truth, not His Truth, limited as they are by my human perspective.

 

God doesn't talk to me directly, and that's good: I had too much religious schooling when I was young, so the prospect of speaking directly to God is still a frightening one ... and, in my adulthood, I've come to be wary of those who claim to be a human - meaning finite and flawed - vessel for the Infinite.  And yet I feel His/Her/Its Presence regularly.  Not that He/She/It isn't always there, but just that I'm more aware at some times more than others.

 

And that's the point: God is, however we limited, flawed and finite humans perceive this in any given moment and choose to describe this Ultimate Reality.  To me, among other things, this means that all human conceptions of God are as limited, flawed and finite as we are.  We can't know God as He/She/It is, we can only sense the Divine and try to craft a description in limited, human terms.

 

For example, though I started this piece using the traditional male pronoun to refer to God - capitalized, as I was taught, of course - He is not a male ... and we only describe God this way because men have been the most dominant gender of our species for millennia and thus have decided to refer to and conceptualize God in this (limited) image and language.  He is not human, so He has no gender.  As much as it's more familiar to refer to God as Father, He isn't: God is the Source of our (human) life, to be sure, but He isn't a he, and our Father image is a reflection of our projection of something familiar onto God rather than His/Her/Its revelation of a particular gender.  It seems to me that choosing to see God in such limiting terms creates all sorts of problems, including the tendency to project and fetishize.

 

If you disagree with this last hypothesis, ask yourself the following question:  Why is it that the most popular and ubiquitous picture of Jesus portrays Him as a straight-dirty-blond-haired Caucasian (in Warner Sallman's classic 1940 painting)?  Would all of us - especially (American) Caucasians (particularly of the fundamentalist/conservative stripe) - continue to pray to Him if He were portrayed more realistically, as the swarthy, light brown-skinned Palestinian Jew with curly dark hair that He likely was?  I seriously doubt this.  It seems likely to me that the key to the popularity of the picture in the last 85 years is that it reflects an American ideal more than a 2000-year old historical reality.  And if you don't believe me, just ask Megyn Kelly of Fox News....

 

So, if God's not a he, what is He/She/It?

 

Great question!  And here's where modern theology comes in and, for many, doesn't help that much.  Many question the viability of Theism, the concept of the personal (and most often anthropomorphic) God who acts in human history.  There are many suggestions as to more accurate depictions.

 

For example, one of the many such 'new' conceptions was offered in the late 1940s and early 1950s by theologian Paul Tillich (in his classic compendium of sermons The Shaking of the Foundations, among others), when he suggested that God be thought of as the Ground of Being, or even as Being itself.  For many  this doesn't work as a meaningful God conception because, among other reasons, it seems impersonal and distant.  Well, of course it does: it's a complete contrast to the external, theistic God that we've all been taught for most (if not all) of our lives.  It's intangible and intellectual, not emotional and tangible like we project the theistic God to be.  And yet just because we may believe the latter/what we've been taught doesn't make it true.

 

And that's another point on which I'm becoming clearer: just because we as fellow believers or citizens or whatever classifications believe something doesn't make it true.  We want it to be true, and many may feel that they need it to be true (especially for control and/or security reasons), but, again, this doesn't make it true.

 

Just like 'believing' (or, in reality, claiming) that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God.  It isn't.  That's not my opinion, that's fact, verified by a legion of biblical scholars (who, conceptually, are God's children).  For starters, on its face we know that it's not inerrant: there are hundreds of internal disagreements and/or contradictions, including the two different birth stories in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke or even the two different creation stories in the first two chapters of the very first book of the Bible, Genesis, to name a few.  And the lack of thematic continuity in literally hundreds of places throughout the Good Book attests to its having been edited and enhanced many, many times in antiquity by all too human hands.  So the fact that many who choose to describe themselves as Christians claim that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God doesn't make it so.  And the fact that this can be disproven but is believed anyway is one of the reasons that blind faith is questioned so vehemently (and appropriately) today.

 

I could list other 'new' conceptions of God like those of Bonhoeffer and Bultmann, et. al., but by now I think that I've established the point that there is no one true way to see - and/or experience - God.  The fact that there are literally hundreds of human religions proves this.  And lest some 'true believer' of whatever sect claim that his/hers is the only true religion, let's just ask for the proof.  There is none, beyond belief ... and, as we know, just because we believe something doesn't make it so.

 

And yet one of the most virulent expressions of human religion today is the deplorable and immoral level killing that is perpetrated in God's name.  Here's another thing on which I've become clear in recent years: if you kill, hurt or in any way diminish another's humanity in the name of God, you're doing God wrong.  God is not tribal, but universal ... meaning that God is not a Christian, a Muslim, a Jew, a Buddhist, a Hindu, or an adherent of any of the other myriad belief systems and sects that we humans have created to express our awareness of the Ultimate Reality.  A popular FaceBook meme captures this nicely:





 

God was not a Buddhist.

Jesus was not a Christian.

Muhammed was not a Muslim.

 

They were teachers who taught Love.

 

Love was their Religion.

 

Now we can debate how much each of them taught and practiced Love, but, again, this is a human debate and has nothing to do with who or what God is even though each of them is considered to offer a pathway to Him/Her/It.  Slyly, the meme establishes a great point: each of these sages saw and/or described the Ultimate Reality differently and yet we acknowledge the depth and meaning of their insights into the Divine by choosing to use them as the portals to a more spiritual life ... even though they didn't and don't agree on the 'right' path thereto, unless you believe that they were aligned in that they each espoused Love.  But this digression is itself an artifice to reinforce the larger point that irrespective of what each of us chooses to believe - be that the tenets of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Baha'i, etc. - God is ... and the choice of path is ours alone however we feel about another's path or others' paths.

 

In other words, just because we believe a certain way doesn't make it so and God is, whatever we believe.

 

Which brings me back to the anguish that I too often feel as I reflect on the abuse of religion in our world.  Simply put, we get God wrong way too much and to our collective detriment.  That we kill in the name of the Source of Life is proof both that we don't get God and that we are too flawed to comprehend fully the Infinite and Ultimate Reality.  That we are too often religiocentrists - believing that our view of God is the 'right,' true and the only one - just reinforces the point.  What kind of Divine would favor a few of His/Her/Its children over others?  Not one worthy of our devotion and belief, for sure....

 

And, in my humble view, only in the acknowledgment of the limitations of our humanity, especially our inability to know God fully, will we find our salvation.  Only when we accept that the one thing that we have in common is that we are indeed all Children of God - however we choose to see Him/Her/It - can we begin to honor God by emulating Him/Her/It.  As far as I can tell, this means that we treat each other in life-affirming ways, which, now that I think about it, means in a loving way.  Hey, maybe FaceBook is right: God is Love after all....

 

The moment I have realized God sitting in the temple

of every human body, the moment I stand in reverence

before every human being and see God in him -

that moment I am free from bondage,

everything that binds vanishes,

and I am free.

- Swami Vivekananda



 

An Easter Reflection....

I like your Christ.  I do not like your Christians.

Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.

- Mahatma Gandhi

 

 

On the eve of the holiest day of the Christian year, I'm perplexed: as deeply spiritual and Episcopalian Christian as I am/as I've become, I'm ever more dismayed by what I perceive to be the routinely and so often almost completely unchristian behavior of others who claim to share my faith ... and I'm also dismayed by the relative silence of so many so-called Christian leaders in combatting this reality.  It doesn't make me any less a believer in Christianity; actually, it has the opposite effect: in response to the unchristianity that's so prevalent in our society (and world), I'm actually called to be more Christian ... or, actually, Christ-like.  And, in modern America, these are two very different things....

 

In my humble view, modern Christianity - at least as many of its professed adherents practice it - is in need of a major overhaul ... and, should it not choose to change dramatically, it will surely die eventually as Bishop John Shelby Spong has predicted.  The signs of this decline are legion and evident: from declining church attendance to the rise of the religiously unaffiliated and "unchurched" to the ever-distressing politicization of the faith coupled almost always with a distinctly unchristian and inhumane vehemence.  I seriously doubt that if Jesus were to return today that He would recognize (or accept) most of what's being done in His name.

 

An instructive case in point is the advent of so-called "religious freedom" laws in twenty of the fifty United States, with Indiana's and Arkansas' iterations serving as the current flashpoint.  As much as some defenders attempt to deny (while they dissemble), the practical effects and the sponsors of such legislation are instructive: in the case of Indiana's Religious Freedom Restoration Act, when it was signed in a private ceremony by Governor Mike Pence, several of those invited to stand by him as he did so were in fact among the most vociferous of opponents of gay marriage/rights/equality.  So, if we take the governor at his word that the law wasn't enacted to allow Indianans to discriminate against LGBT fellow citizens - although, in fact, this is just what it did allow - then what are we to make of the reality that a significant proportion of its most visible supporters and, ostensibly, catalysts and proponents want and expected it to allow just that?

 

And though there was popular outrage and an uprising of conscience in response to this travesty, it seems to me that the response from many high profile 'Christian' leaders was muted.  Some progressive Christian denominations were observed among the protestors, but many, many other so-called Christian leaders were not.  In fact, many in the more supposedly socially conservative and fundamentalist wing of the faith were the law's greatest champions and defenders.  They asserted, quite correctly, that the law would allow them to avoid serving those whom they believed their religion to condemn ... like, say, our gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgender brothers and sisters.  They see it as a legitimate and welcome  (political) protection of their religious right to discriminate against those whose lives and lifestyles offend them.  Hmmm....

 

To me - and, again, in my humble opinion - this is so wrong on so many levels, but for the sake of brevity let me focus on just two:  First, how on earth can the American constitutional freedom to practice a religion be conflated with the right to discriminate in the public sphere (or, perhaps more accurately put, square) because of it?  If church and state are truly to be separated as the cherished American value alleges, then the State cannot abridge the public rights of one group to satisfy the desires of another one under the cloak of protecting the latter's religion/religious beliefs.

 

An extreme example to illustrate the point:  If I were a devout Muslim and decided (incorrectly) that my religion allowed me to discriminate against Christians, how would this be received in this still Christian-dominant country?  Can any of us seriously imagine even progressive Christians leaping to the defense of such 'religious beliefs'?  Of course not.  The idea only has currency because the dominant group - in present-day America meaning (so-called) Christians - wants to exercise its considerable institutional/political power to do so.  It only works because the in-group wants to discriminate against an out-group (or out-groups); no in-group would ever agree voluntarily to condone discrimination against itself.

 

Another reason that these laws are so repellent to me is that they completely contradict the example of Christianity's Patron.  Jesus was known for communing with the dispossessed and advocating for the powerless against the interests and system of the powerful.  In fact, this is why he was put to death, because he afflicted the powerful on behalf of the dispossessed.  Translated to our time, this suggests that Jesus would be communing with those often spurned by society, including, sadly and still, our LGBT brothers and sisters.  Can any one of us imagine Him demonizing the LGBT community as so many of today's 'Christian' leaders have?  Can any of us imagine Him condoning discrimination against them ... or Jews ... or African-Americans, etc.?  Of course not.  Which makes Gandhi's observation so prescient: too many of us modern 'Christians' are so unlike our Christ.

 

To put a finer point on it, for those who claim their objections are Scripturally-based, such freedom-to-discriminate-under-the-guise-of-religious-freedom runs counter the final charge that the Lord gave his disciples before he left the earth physically.  As captured in the Gospel of John (13:34, NRSV), He instructs them:

 

I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.

Just as I have loved you, you should also love one another.

 

Suffice it to say that there's no way to contort this commandment to suggest that discrimination in Jesus' name is in any way loving.   So, yet again, so many of His ostensible followers ignore, pervert or outright contradict His commandments, in this case under the guise of their belief in Him.  Can anything be more unchristian than this?

 

So, as we prepare to remember Christ's life and legacy in the celebration of Easter, I'm reminded of Rev. Dr. Obery Hendricks' distinction - in his brilliant and classic book The Politics of Jesus - between so-called/self-professed Christians and Followers of Jesus: many if not most of the former support the modern status-quo-aligned institution of the Christian church - including its misguided and perverse efforts to promote so-called religious freedom - while the latter believe that emulating Christ's example is the true version/practice of the faith.  When I see Christians discriminating in Christ's name, I'm glad not to be one of them, but ever more thankful to be a Follower of Jesus and hope that you will be, too, whatever your religion may be....

 

In other words, Jesus' view is that laws are to serve us, not oppress us.  That is why in our practice we must always stress the foundational principles of Jesus' politics - justice, righteousness, and steadfast love.  Any laws that are not based on these principles are inconsistent with the politics of Jesus.

- the Rev. Dr. Obery M. Hendricks, Jr.

The Politics of Jesus:

Rediscovering The True Revolutionary Nature of

Jesus' Teachings and How They Have Been Corrupted

 



Avoiding The Bitterest Of Tears....

Our lives are defined by opportunities,

even the ones we miss.

- Eric Roth,

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Screenplay)

 

Earlier today, I got off the phone with the wife of a dear friend of mine quite shaken.  It turns out that he'd had a serious health challenge - one that was potentially fatal - and, thankfully, is now recovering nicely after multiple surgeries.  I was shaken because my heart ached for these two wonderful soulmates and their family and other friends, who were facing the real possibility of grave loss and now the modest relief of a long period of recuperation and convalescence.  I was grateful for my friend and his wife that they have many other friends who've stepped into the breach to support them and was reminded yet again by this near-miss, this almost tragedy, that life is simply too short to miss opportunities.

 

For those of you who've read this blog over the past fourteen months or so, you've read several times of my sense of loss, of the pain of losing treasured friends from whom I had drifted too far away in life and thus could no longer recover our intimacy.  To put a fine point on it, I've had 13 friends die in a period of just 13 months!  I am stunned to write this as the pain returns anew, due both to my sense of loss and to my sense of sorrow for the departed and the other lives in which their absence is so acutely felt.  In each one of these sad cases, one theme threads consistently through: they were people who were dear to me but insufficiently near to me, loved and admired ones whom I wanted to know more intimately but with whom I never got - which actually means, damningly, "made" - the time.  In other words, these relationships and memories will forever be tinged with regret as I am reminded that I had let us drift too far away in life and now will forever be prevented from righting this mistake in death.

 

At mid-life, I never expected to experience anything like this, this too large sense of loss.  Some part of this is actually the result of a fortunate, dual gift: I have lived a reasonably long time and had the privilege to have my life touched and elevated by the presence of many good people.  The downside of this blessing is that it's very difficult to keep in close touch with so many of them ... and then when they leave you too soon it's even more difficult to accept that they're gone.  I can't help but think, Lord forgive me, that there are so many a--holes who live on seemingly forever (or at least a really, really long time) and yet so many good, kind souls leave us far too soon ... physically, at least.

 

But this leads to another lesson that I've learned in mid-life, in large part due to the too early departures of my parents and now reinforced by the too numerous early departures of esteemed friends: after the pain of loss, a paradox can occur.  Because they are no longer with me physically, I am forced to remember - and continue to treasure - my parents mentally, emotionally and spiritually.  So, too, now with (too) many of my friends.  I see the imprint of their spirits in my life constantly, as current events trigger memories of past ones that are almost exclusively happy ... and they live on in my heart and soul as they once did in my experience physically.

 

To out a finer point on it, ironically, I find myself closer to my parents in death than I was in the last years of their respective lives.  Now, they are constantly on my mind because I hear the echoes of their love as it plays forward into the circumstances of my life ... whereas during their final years, months and weeks on the planet, I was busy living a too full life and they were trying not to interfere and 'distract' me with their struggles both physical and spiritual.  (In hindsight, of course, I wish that they had so 'burdened' me, as my mother once described it, but this was their choice, not mine.  What I didn't realize then but appreciate fully and painfully now is that my choice could and should have been to seek out this gift of a burden, as it was a harbinger of the closing of a beautiful and supremely meaningful chapter of my life that could have been all the more significantly and indelibly enhanced had I anticipated and used more effectively the time before its end.)  Simply put, not a day goes by when something that my mother and/or father said to me or experienced with me plays out in an identical or similar way in my life - especially with my family - and I feel them with me anew.  They will never die, I believe, because they'll continue to live on through me and, after I slip this mortal coil, in the wisdom and love that I've paid forward in my earthly life.

 

So, too, it's beginning to be with my departed friends, who range in age from 60 (i.e., not that old) to eight (i.e., way too young).  The vagaries of life bring them back to me frequently, and they are often more powerfully present with me now in memory than they were during their earthly lives when we took each other for granted but didn't realize that we were doing so (while also assuming that there would be future time together to 'catch up' and maintain a more meaningful intimacy).  This memorial presence is indeed a meaningful one to be cherished ... but it pales by comparison to the temporal gift of life and the spontaneous beauty, wonder and meaning that it offers in fully lived and savored experience.

 

Which brings me back to my almost-departed friend:  He's recovering after some serious surgeries, so I won't be visiting him now (at least until he's physically able to benefit from such an experience).  But I am grateful for this 'second chance' during our physical lives.  He's yet another of those people whose role in my life is more meaningful than he probably knows and therefore that he's more treasured and appreciated than he knows (which also means "more than I've said").  And his beloved wife of more than three decades is a beautiful soul in her own right, one of those people with whom you just can't help but feel happier and uplifted by being in her orbit.  After visiting him and them during his convalescence, I've made a promise to myself to invest some quality time with them periodically.  I would like them to get to know my new wife and for her to get to know me even better by befriending those whom I hold dear.

 

And, too, I would like to learn from the past and this present circumstance and go forward differently and better.  I hope that this second chance leads to a better, more fulfilled experience for us all: for my friend and his wife, because they will know how much I truly esteem and care for them, and for myself (and my wife) because I will have used this ultimate of God's gifts, my time here on earth, more meaningfully and, thus, immortally....

 

The bitterest tears shed over graves are for words left unsaid and deeds left undone.

- Harriet Beecher Stowe, Little Foxes:

Or, the Insignificant Little Habits Which Mar Domestic Happiness

 

A Thousand Winds....

Do not stand at my grave and weep.

I am not there.

I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow.

I am a diamond glint on snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain.

I am the autumn rain.

When  you awake in the morning hush,

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of birds circling in flight.

Do not stand at my grave and weep.

I am not there.

I do not sleep.

- Mary Elizabeth Frye



Today I attended the memorial service for the wife of a dear friend, one of those friends whom you hold in high esteem and yet never quite seem to have or find the time to get as close to as you would like.  I knew his wife socially but can't recall more than a few brief conversations.  But I wasn't surprised to learn that she was an incredible, multi-faceted, deep and kind person today (or that she was a beloved colleague, friend, family member, mother and wife/soulmate).  Turns out that she was just as unusual and outstanding a person as her husband ... and perhaps even more so....

When I arrived, I chose to sit next to another friend (among many) whom I hold in high esteem and with whom I am not as close as I would like to be.  It turns out that he had been asked to share a tribute, about which he was nervous and clearly emotional.  I had no idea that he knew my other friends and - glibly, it turned out - assured him that he - and it, the experience of delivering the heartfelt tribute - would be fine.  It further turns out that he and my friend's wife had been colleagues and close collaborators and friends.  (This is one of the delicious ironies of life that I've come to appreciate much more in middle age: that just when you think that you know something or someone, it turns out that you've barely scratched the surface.)

When I arrived, he was clearly in a sad and morose mood, and as we began to talk - about subjects unrelated to the present situation - this improved immeasurably.  He thanked me for this and I was touched and honored to be able to support him in what was clearly a difficult moment.  Then he honored me in an even greater way by asking me to assist him by backing him up: in case he was overcome during his tribute, he asked me to step in and finish reading it.  I was touched and honored even more deeply.

In a word, his tribute was wonderful.  It was respectful, filled with admiration, at times funny and at others pained (and painful).  A clear, multi-faceted and impressive picture of my friend's wife sprang into view and, for many of us, helped us to draw closer to her in death in a way that we wished we had experienced in her lifetime.  And my friend the eulogizer made it through despite a few moments of emotion from which he had to retreat briefly.  As he exited the stage, I congratulated him on his fine remarks, hugged him to calm and heal him and he exited quickly via a side door.

After a couple of minutes when he didn't return, I went to find him ... and he had been overcome: his dear friend's death had indeed hit him hard and he was sobbing deeply.  I comforted him briefly and walked around the corner to stay available should he need me.  When he appeared a few minutes later he was better composed and appreciative of my presence.  And then it hit me....

I - and many of us, I suspect - live with regrets every day, many more than I would like.  Among the most affecting of these in recent years is the regret engendered by the death of friends to whom I was insufficiently close and whose passing wounded by reminding me of the missed opportunity during their lifetime.

But in this moment, I was experiencing life at its most transcendent and meaningful: I was 'there' for a friend, one to whom I hope to be closer in the future, but, more importantly, one for whom I was present when I needed to be at that very moment.  And I appreciated the opportunity.  In profound and ennobling clarity, I was indeed present and in the moment, fully alive, loving wastefully (or, at least, honestly and altruistically) and being all that I can be (which, in this situation, meant being an empathetic and compassionate friend).

So as I struggle with the regret of not being able to live fully, love wastefully and be all that I can be in every moment, it hit me: sometimes, life is fully lived by achieving moments/glimpses/flashes of this eternity in the midst of the temporal.  At that moment - and perhaps only for a shining moment - I was living as I hope to and I felt my humanity fully.  It was a moment, yes, but also a harbinger: the more that I dare to be present, the greater the possibility that I'll be able to reach my higher self ... at this point, it seems, in response to another's need but eventually, hopefully, on command/proactively in alignment with my vision for my life.

Which brings me back to the purpose of that day, to reflect on the life and legacy of a friend.  And as I reflected on the poem in her memorial program, Mary Elizabeth Frye's A Thousand Winds, I had another revelation: this is how I've come to see immortality.  I no longer believe in the cloud-filled heaven about which I was taught as a child but I do still believe in (a kind of) immortality.  And I believe that the Kingdom of God about which Jesus Christ spoke can be and is a present-world reality (too).  I believe that we experience the eternal, the timeless in the midst of life/in the time-bound, from time to time to time (or, perhaps if we're particularly evolved, regularly) ... as I did at the memorial service earlier today.

I believe that my parents and grandparents are immortal because they are always with me in my mind and heart ... and so they are with my wife and my children and stepchildren and my family and friends and all with whom I interact.  I've passed them and the myriad lessons that they taught me on in innumerable interactions and ways.  They are an important and meaningful part of me ... and so their influence and impact is an important and meaningful part of mine....

I believe that I'll be immortal in this way, too: in the influence that I've had on the lives that I've been privileged to touch during my earthly life.  And maybe that influence/presence attenuates over time, but it's there, just like I'm ever mindful of my parents and grandparents and all the others who've touched me so indelibly in my life and am passing on these gifts in my interactions every day.

So, indeed, even though I don't wish to be buried after my earthly life, no one should stand at my metaphorical grave and weep, because I won't be there, either.  I'll be alive in the hearts and memories of those I've touched, in those transcendent moments when they experience the eternal in the midst of the temporal in some way that I've influenced, in whatever they hold sacred that relates in whatever small way to me.  And I'm OK with this: it seems better than a cloudy heaven to me....

And now my dear friend's wife will live on in me more meaningfully, too:  In part because of who she was, especially as described by those who had the privilege to know her better than I.  In part because of whom she touched in her earthly life who've now touched me more meaningfully (and, in once case, indelibly).  And in part because of the experience of the eternal with which I was gifted while celebrating others' timeless experiences of her.

And that's the funny thing about the timeless in my experience: it can come in the most unexpected and sublime ways and at the most unexpected and sublime times.  Earlier today I went to pay my respects to the dead and to support the living and ended up living timelessly for a glorious moment.  I'm not clear as I'd like to be about how I can get closer to living that way more consistently, but I am clear that the serendipitous opportunities to do so that I've experienced happen more often when I engage fully with life rather than shrink from it, when I offer and share myself openly and honestly rather than retreat and protect myself and when I honor and engage the humanity of others and in so doing find my own....

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life and the world.

- John Milton

We All See God Differently ... And Yet We Are All Children of God....

What you see and hear depends a good deal

on where you are standing; it also depends

on what sort of person you are.

- C.S. Lewis, The Magician's Nephew

Often, my priest, Rev. John Mennell, will ask a simple question when folks are gathered in some worthwhile pursuit at our church.  "Where have you seen God lately/this week?"  Invariably, in response to this simple inquiry, I will be flooded with recent intimations of the Divine, as I was recently on a retreat with members of the Men's Group at my church, at the most recent meeting of the group at church yesterday morning and, last night, at a dinner with several members of my church.  In each of these varied settings, I felt a sense of the Eternal in the temporal, the Kingdom in the here and now, which, for me, is how I experience God at this point in my life.

 

The House of Antioch, as the group of members of our church who meet regularly for a meal, fellowship and friendship is called, is a diverse group.  Most of us are "8 O'Clockers," members who attend the earlier, music-less, more contemplative service at that time.  The others attend the traditional, choral service at 10am and one of that cohort is a former Senior Warden - in effect, the Chairperson of our Vestry/governing board - though you would never know it from her unassuming demeanor.  Those of us who attend the early service are a varied group, too: one couple is retired and joined the church several years ago upon returning to live in town; another is a practicing attorney whose faith journey is welcomed and supported in our progressive, open church environment; and my wife and I are the final couple in this cohort, her a five-year member who joined at my suggestion before we became a couple and me a 25-year member who's now active in numerous church "ministries," including its Spiritual Enrichment effort.

 

Before we were selected to join the House of Antioch - in the context of an effort to have church members gather outside of worship services to get to know each other better in informal settings - for the most part we knew each other, but not well.  Suffice it to say that after only two dinners, this has changed - we are getting to know each other quite well - and this experience is one of the cherished ways that I have seen (read = experienced) God lately.

 

At last night's dinner, after some 'secular' discussion about various topics - including the often taxing demands that professions make on those who pursue them and, especially, on their families - we began to speak about matters spiritual.  Eventually the discussion turned to how we see God, spurred, in part, by a recounting of the unique perspective of our former Bishop, the Rev. John Shelby Spong, on the subject.  What ensued was a robust, multi-faceted reflection on the Divine, replete with perspectives as diverse as the members of our group.  It was an elevating, Spirit-filled exchange from which we all benefited, and in and after it I perceived the presence of God.

 

As we shared openly about how we perceive Him/Her/It, there were an honesty and stepping beyond vulnerability that was palpable, as was a clear respect for each other's contributions to our collective exploration.  In this supportive environment, doubts were shared openly and challenging questions were put to the members of the group.  (One of my favorite of the latter occurred when one member, a retired CEO and lifelong [or "cradle"] Episcopalian, proffered energetically in response to another member's idiosyncratic perspective on God, "Isn't that just an glorified form of Humanism?")  In sum, for more than an hour on what became a long but uniquely satisfying evening, our group groped, shared flashes of inspiration, questioned and wrestled with our perceptions of the Divine, what it means to be a Christian and/or Episcopalian and how we each see God a little differently.  It was truly a wonderful, illuminating experience ... and, for me, a profoundly meaningful God-experience.

 

Among the propositions with which we wrestled was Bishop Spong's belief that we are called by God to live fully, love wastefully and be all that we can be, which echoes the sentiments of the second century bishop St. Iraneus of Lyons who perceived that the Glory of God is man - now more inclusively phrased as "the human person" - fully alive.  What struck me was how the group engaged on this passionately, especially how it relates to our Patron, Jesus Christ, what it means to be a Christian in the 21st century and how this compares to and contrasts with other religions/belief systems.  Some members felt that it captured this calling well and others wanted more.  In other words, there was a healthy - I think - diversity in how we see and experience God....

 

So, today, as I made my way through modern theological sage Karen Armstrong's latest book, I was struck by similar themes revealed in an exploration of the development of Jainism and Buddhism.  The Jains' patron was Vardhamana Jnatraputra, reverently called Mahavira by his followers.  For him, Ms. Armstrong notes, "the only way to achieve liberation (moksha) was to cultivate an attitude of friendliness toward everyone and everything.  Here, as in the Upanishads, we encounter the requirement found in many great world traditions that it is not enough to confine our benevolence to our own people or to those we find congenial; this partiality must be replaced by a practically expressed empathy for everybody, without exception."  (The Upanishads are a collection of foundational Hindu texts dating, scholars believe, from before the 6th century BCE to the beginning of the Common Era.)

 

Ms. Armstrong continues that "Jains, like Upanishadic sages, taught their disciples to recognize their community with all others and relinquish the preoccupation with 'us' and 'them' that made fighting and structural oppression impossible. ... Jain meditation consisted simply of a rigorous suppression of all antagonistic thoughts and a conscious effort to fill the mind with affection for all creatures.  The result was samayika ('equanimity'), a profound, life-changing realization that all creatures were equal."

 

Then, when examining the founding of Buddhism, the author observes that "The Buddha's enlightenment was to live for others.  Unlike other renouncers, who retreated from human society, Buddhist monks were commanded to return to the world to help others find release from pain."

 

Comparing the two belief systems, Ms. Armstrong concludes that "Buddhists and Jains were self-made men, reconstructing themselves at a profound psychological level to model a more empathic humanity."  (Emphasis mine.)  Sounds a lot like loving wastefully to me....

 

And that's the point, as we struggled to comprehend and synthesize in our group last night and, indeed, as believers of good will the world over seek to do, it would appear that there are common themes running through our different ways of seeing God, be they individual or collective.  One of them is this principle of Universal Benevolence, that we are called by our Source to be loving in our conduct to our fellow man/humans, irrespective of their religious or other affiliations.  In essence, then, we are called to remember always that we are Children of God first and to honor this inner divinity in our interactions with each other.  Another way to say this is that we are called to love each other as God loves us, unconditionally, without discrimination for the receiver or concern for reciprocation ... indeed, wastefully....

 

So, for me for example, this makes the "marriage equality" and other issues pertaining to affirming and celebrating the humanity of our LGBT brothers and sisters quite simple: they are Children of God first and foremost and thus deserve to be treated lovingly and supported in every way that those of us who are not LGBT want to be.

 

So, too, with respect to the less fortunate among us: they are Children of God first and foremost and thus deserve to be treated lovingly and supported in every way that those of us who are more fortunate wish to be.

 

Also with respect to those who are different from us: they are children of God first and foremost and thus deserve to be treated lovingly and supported in every way that those of us who are not "the Other" want to be (because there is no 'us or them,' only us, Children of God...).

 

And ... well, you get the picture....

 

So, to sum it all up, as I experienced exhilaratingly with my fellow members of the members of the Men's Group both on retreat and not, with my fellow members of the House of Antioch last night and in the pages of Karen Armstrong's latest piercingly insightful book today, we all see God differently, in idiosyncratic ways that both reflect and celebrate the diversity in which He/She/It created us.  Yet we are all Children of God, endowed by our Creator with abundant and yet different gifts and lives.  May we ever recognize this, that beyond being human we are something even greater - of God - and live accordingly ... which for me, means a continuing but joyful struggle to live fully, love wastefully and be all that my/our Source created me to be and, in so doing, to support my fellow Children of God humbly and gratefully as they do so, too....

 

In closing, a sincere thank you to those of you along my path who've helped me in ways large and small, intentional and accidental, to come closer to understanding the ineffable mystery of the Divine.  Please know that I see and appreciate you both as God's gifts and as proof of His/Her/Its profound, enriching and indelible presence in our world....

 

You must ever act in consciousness of your divinity and recognize in each being a brother, a Child of God.  The whole world is one family.

- Sri Sathya Sai Baba