Ramblings on a rainy Sabbath...

On this rainy fall Sabbath day in the Berkshires, a few random thoughts are wandering around my head.  The first was prompted by a note from our guests from Turkey who last week joined us in Pittsfield.  On Sunday, they were in worship with us, too - along with the Jazz Ambassadors - and later spoke about the escalating war in Syria.  Ahmet wrote about being in Christian worship: 

This was the first that we ever attended. The preacher and our friends from the community, now numbering too many to name, showed us that brotherhood, friendship and peace knows no boundaries. We were treated to beautiful music by the Sister City Jazz Ambassadors, including one of our favorite pieces, "Take Five" by Dave Brubeck. Later the choir and an eleven year old girl who had the most beautiful voice and ability made our eyes get wet. I hope the church gets a larger congregation and more support as its fame grows and that they can sponsor another trip abroad for the jazz group.

I hope I was able to respond to their trust by giving a good speech after the service and answering some questions about the current politics of the Middle East and possible catastrophe scenarios, about men's greed, avarice and desire for violence, all supposedly for good reasons and ends.

After worship on Sunday, a member of my congregation wrote to me saying, "I've never really thought about 'Take Five' as a spiritual song before.  I've liked it but never thought about what it might be saying on a deeper level.  But what would happen if every day I stopped and TOOK five minutes to pray - and listen - and wonder?  I would be more at peace and I could share that peace with others in new ways, too.  Who would have ever thought that jazz could lead me into deeper prayer?"  It is amazing what an open heart will discover, yes?

That brought me to another thought - one I began last week about beauty and peace-making - in which I wrote about St. Thomas Aquinas' definition of beauty as that which is complete (or whole), that which is harmonious and that which is radiant.  Two ideas keep coming back to me:

+ First, this notion of complete - or wholeness - is less about being "finished" and more about experiencing a deep satisfaction.  As I understand it, the Hebrew word shalom is not about the absence of conflict.  Rather, it is about living in a way where everyone has enough and everyone has a place.  It is about radical hospitality and deep compassion.  It is what Jesus was talking about in the Sermon on the Mount when he said, "I have come to fill the law full."  Not finish or complete it, but strengthen and enrich it so that it brings blessings to everyone.

+ Second, Baraba Nicolosi suggests that another way of speaking about the words of Aquinas might be that beauty evokes rest, joy and an awareness of our destiny in God's grace. I like that:  rest on every level - spiritual, emotional, political, physical - is that which   refreshes and renews.  It is a way of being that is an antidote to anxiety and fretting.  It, too, is akin to the shalom that makes certain everyone and everything has a place. Interestingly, Nicolosi goes on to observe that political art is almost never beautiful.  It is manipulative and designed to make a statement rather than strengthen rest, joy and grace. What's more, the beautiful has precious little to do with distracting us from reality.  Like contemplation, beauty asks us to take a long, loving look at what is real.

And that leads to my third random thought for this day concerning grief:  it is a strange and mysterious friend.  We're gearing up for my sister's memorial service over the first weekend in November - all the arrangements have been made - and I have discovered a growing sense of dread has taken up residence within my soul. I couldn't put my finger on it at first, but last night in our PTSD conversation I couldn't stop weeping over all the sorrow within me and around us all.  (NOTE: this group is a trial exploration designed to help civilians both come to terms with the PTSD of returning vets and perhaps act with compassion in solidarity with them.)  It isn't that I don't want to see my brother and sisters again - that will be fun - and I will enjoy the long drive, too. 

No, what I am beginning to realize is the grief that currently infects me has been hiding within for a long time - and Beth's death made me too weary to bury it. In the gospel according to John there is a story about Jesus weeping.  His tears come after hearing that his dear friend, Lazarus, had died. 

I've always trusted this story:  Jesus wept for the pain in his own heart, for the suffering the sisters of Lazarus were experiencing and for the emptiness the whole community embraced.  I think he also wept because the death of Lazarus exposed his own mortality.  Currently in my faith community I am trying to be present with a host of people facing various forms of cancer and disease - and some are moving ever closer to death.  Unlike Jesus with Lazarus, however, there is nothing I can do to change or fix things except be present in love - and weep.

Fr. Ed Hays spoke of weeping as one of the ways Jesus prayed.  I am going to trust that, too because my tears feel like prayers.  For me weeping feels like a way to accept my powerlessness and express my longing for God's grace.  It is a way to enter into the truth of everything I can't fix and trust that God's love is bigger than my emptiness. This is a rich time filled with beauty and grief, sweet music and weeping, peace-making and fear.   

So just after I posted this I saw that today is my brother's birthday.  God I love that guy and miss him so - another paradoxical invitation to more tears - and the rain keeps coming down, too.