learning to face the horror of this day like the trees...

Only the most naive - or untested - among us honestly believed that the US Senate would convict President Trump of high crimes and misdemeanors. We may have quietly dreamed that a miracle of conscience would prevail. Or at the very least, that a few witnesses, including John Bolton, would be allowed to testify. But in the dark recesses of our hearts we understood what it meant for Republicans to hold a numerical majority in the Senate: justice would cynically be thwarted in order to give the current regime a pass. But something worse than cynicism has taken root in the Republican Party. The Reverend Dr. William Barber called it the frightening triumph of white Southern justice in the US Senate:

On Wednesday last week, before the House managers began their opening statement in the impeachment trial of Donald J Trump, the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, stood by his desk on the Senate floor and conferred at length with the White House counsel, Pat Cipollone. When the Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, noticed their excited gestures from across the aisle, he cupped a hand to his ear and made a show of trying to listen in. Members of the media who were confined to the press gallery took note and chuckled. The acquittal Trump has demanded of Senate Republicans was all but assured, and McConnell felt no need to pretend impartiality. But the corruption that is regularly laughed off in our age of political cynicism makes me shudder – not least as the son of civil rights activists who risked their lives to expand American democracy in the 20th century. The coordinated cover-up we are witnessing as 53 senators conspire to facilitate Trump’s obstruction of Congress is deeply troubling to anyone who knows the long history of southern courthouses where district attorneys openly coordinated with all-white juries and corrupt judges to cover up acts of racial terror. With patience and decorum, Mitch McConnell has brought southern justice to the US Senate.

(https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/31/impeachment-trial-our-democracy-is-fragile-black-americans)

In my later years I have tried to avoid hyperbole. I also want to give others the benefit of the doubt. That said, it is clear to me that Mitch McConnell has perfected the cruel art of bullying and bargaining with his members to insure that they stay in-line. Further, he does this so that he and his Republican colleagues can continue to ride the juggernaut of fear-mongering, race baiting, and slander they first began to craft during the Goldwater and Nixon campaigns and perfected during the Reagan/Bush years. This Southern Strategy tapped into white racial fears that dominated the American South for 100 years after Reconstruction and were rekindled during the civil rights era. Republican strategist, Kevin Philips, put it like this in a 1970 NY Times interview:

From now on, the Republicans are never going to get more than 10 to 20 percent of the Negro vote and they don't need any more than that... but Republicans would be shortsighted if they weakened enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. The more Negroes who register as Democrats in the South, the sooner the Negrophobe whites will quit the Democrats and become Republicans. That's where the votes are. Without that prodding from the blacks, the whites will backslide into their old comfortable arrangement with the local Democrats.

It is not an accident that in 1981 Ronald Reagan campaigned at the Neshoba County Fair just outside of Philadelphia, MS. In 1964, civil rights workers Goodman, Scherner and Channey were murdered there by the Klan for trying to register African-American voters. Fifteen years later, Reagan's handlers knew that by simply appearing at this fair - let alone saying that he supported states' rights - their candidate would communicate solidarity with the Klan's agenda. It was just one of a host of "dog whistle" tactics that Lee Atwater and others used to advance the cause of Reagan and then Bush-1. You may remember the threatening Willie Horton ads? (If not, Google them!) Atwater, thinking he was off-the-record in a 1981 interview that was eventually published by Southern Politics magazine in the 1990s, was unequivocal:

As to the whole Southern strategy that Harry Dent and others put together in 1968, opposition to the Voting Rights Act would have been a central part of keeping the South. Now [Reagan] doesn't have to do that. . You started out in 1954 by saying, "Nigger, nigger, nigger." By 1968 you can't say "nigger" — that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now [that] you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about (now) are totally economic things... I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me — because obviously sitting around saying, "We want to cut this," is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "Nigger, nigger, nigger."(Lamis, Alexander P. (1999). Southern Politics in the 1990s. Louisiana State University Press. pp. 7–8. ISBN 978-0-8071-2374-4)

To maintain power in 2020, the Trump base needs red meat and circus to keep it engaged. That's what the President's rallies accomplish: they whip true believers into a frothy rage and give the Liar-in-Chief a chance to strut his pathetic stuff. It is showbiz for the faithful and narcissistic pandering for the President. The rest of the Republican party, however, understands that they must turn out just enough swing voters in white, working class areas of the Rust Belt and the so-called Fly Over States to tip the Electoral College in their favor. The Republican Party of 2020 is a white nationalist institution. Small wonder we see McConnell persuading Lamar Alexander to waffle on his principles in order to: 1) keep Tennessee in play, and 2) give Susan Collins of Maine a pass to look righteous when it doesn't really count. Constitutional scholar, Heather Cox Richardson, joined Brother Barber in lamenting these vulgar Southern justice manipulations:

Few people thought the Republican-controlled Senate would convict the president, but I, anyway, thought they would acquit him after continu-ing to argue he was innocent. Instead, they have done something shocking. They have conceded that Trump did what he is accused of: he tried to smear his rival so he could win reelection in 2020, in a scheme that both apparently broke laws and also looks quite like what happened in 2016. But, they say, his actions do not constitute an impeachable offense...Trump, of course, has already said that the Constitution gives him “the right to do whatever I want,” and Senate Republicans have now agreed. As the president’s lawyers made claims for his expansive power during the Senate trial, House impeachment manager Adam Schiff warned that we are witnessing “a descent into constitutional madness.” When will Trump ask another leader for a favor? What will he withhold or offer in return? What will he do to cheat in 2020? How will he undercut his opponent? To which countries will he turn for help to win reelection? It is not in his make up to be chastened; rather, he will be emboldened. Trade deals, treaties, the use of our soldiers, cyber-warfare from Russia or Saudi Arabia… it is now all on the table. 

In my soul, I believe today to be an ugly and troubling one on a host of fronts: Brexit is now in full-tilt boogie mode, Australia is on fire - again, the so-called Trump Middle East Peace Plan is a total disaster for both Israel and Palestine, the border wall is falling over in Mexico, and a new immigrant ban is being raised-up as more red meat just before the State of the Union address. In so many ways, the triumph today of Southern racial justice adds insult to injury for all who seek to honor truth, democracy, civil rights and simple human decency. In this morning's NY Times, David Brooks put it like this:

Men and women are primarily motivated by self-interest. No other partial truth has done as much damage as this one. If you base your political and social systems on the idea that the autonomous self-interested individual is the basic unit of society, then you will wind up with an individualistic culture that widens the maneuvering room between people but shreds the relationships and community between people.Populists on the right and the left look at this current reality and they come to a swift conclusion: The game is rigged! Liberalism is a con! Then they come to a different conclusion. The essential logic of society is not actually individuals seeking their self-interest. It’s groups struggling for power. Society is an arena where certain groups crush other groups... On the Trumpian right it’s the coastal cultural elite trying to crush and delegitimize the white Christian patriots of the heartland. On the cultural left it’s the whole Michel Foucault legacy. Language is a tool the oppressor class uses to permanently marginalize the oppressed. On the economic left it’s the Bernie Sanders class war. The greedy capitalist class rigs the system and immiserates the working class.

So what do we do? Slink away and lick our wounds? Give in to the cynical racist populism of the status quo and find ways to make it work for our side? Focus only on inner spiritual peace? Get ripped? Binge watch "The Sopranos" one more time?  Let me suggest an alternative - well, maybe two. The first involves some honest perspective. Ezra Klein, founder of Vox.com, reminds us in his new book, Why We're Polarized, that:

The era that we often hold up as the golden age of American democracy was far less democratic, far less liberal, far less decent, than today. Trump’s most intemperate outbursts, his most offensive musings, pale before opinions that were mainstream in recent history. And the institutions of American politics today are a vast improvement on the regimes that ruled well within living memory. If we can do a bit better tomorrow, we will be doing much, much better than we have ever done before.

So let us call-out the Republican white nationalism that carried the day in the Senate this evening. Let us own it and never forget it. And then let us set our hearts and minds on what really counts: building community. David Brooks continues:

Human beings didn’t evolve into the world’s dominant species because we are more autonomous. We didn’t do it because we’re more vicious in tooth and claw. We thrived as a species because we are better at cooperation. We evolved complex social networks in our brains to make us better at bonding, teaching and collaborating. We don’t cooperate only to get things we want individually. Often, we collaborate to build shared environments we can enjoy together. Often, we pick a challenge just so we can have the joy of collaborating. Relationships are ends to themselves. Thus, the best future for American politics is not based on individual competition or group war. It’s based on this narrative: We are an incredibly diverse society that got good at collaboration because we had to. The best future politics puts collaborative pluralism, weaving, at the center.

Perspective and some deep breathing is alternative number one. The second has to do with watching, listening and honoring the rhythm of nature as a mentor in this struggle for community. The poet-singer-activist, Carrie Newcomer, put it like this in a poem she calls, "Making Sense," that resonates with everything I know to be sacred as the right next step.

Finding what makes sense
In senseless times
Takes grounding
Sometimes quite literally
In the two inches of humus
Faithful recreating itself
Every hundred years.
It takes steadying oneself
Upon shale and clay and solid rock
Swearing allegiance to an ageless aquifer
Betting on all the still hidden springs.

You can believe in a tree,
With its broad-leafed perspective,
Dedicated to breathing in, and then out,
Reaching down, and then up,
Drinking in a goodness above and below
It’s splayed and mossy feet.
You can trust a tree’s careful
and drawn out way
of speaking.
One thoughtful sentence, covering the span of many seasons.

A tree doesn’t hurry, it doesn’t lie,
It knows how to stand true to itself
Unselfconscious of its beauty and scars,
And all the physical signs of where and when
It needed to bend,
Rather than break.
A tree stands solitary and yet in deepest communion,
For in the gathering of the many,
There is comfort and courage,
Perseverance and protection,
From the storms that howl down from predictable
Or unexplainable directions.

In a senseless time
Hold close to what never stopped
Making sense.
Like love
Like trees
Like how a seed becomes a branch
And compost becomes seedlings again.
Like the scent at the very top of an infant’s head
Because there is nothing more right than that. Nothing.
It is all still happening
Even now.
Even now. 

Most of us white, bourgeois intellectuals aren't very good at waiting. Or learning from Mother Nature. Or collaborating. Or taking our cues from those who have been beaten down so long it all looks like up to them. But if EVER there was a time to get out of our own way and relearn how to rebuild our community from the ground up, it is now. I hate today - and I paradoxically give thanks to God for it so that we might strengthen our tender hearts from the inside out and "hold close what has never stopped making sense: like love, like trees" and all the rest. Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

counter-cultural balance: part four...

Whether it is baking bread as a spiritual discipline, playing music, walking in the woods, or sitting in quiet Centering Prayer meditation, two truths have been constants for me when it comes to spiritual disciplines: 1) the more I practice, the deeper I trust God's grace; and 2) I am a consistently inconsistent contemplative. I am restless, easily bored, full of myself, addicted to thinking, prone to fretting, often distracted, profoundly grateful, and deeply in love with the One we call Holy. I wander a lot in the wilderness. I get lost a lot, too yet God always finds me. More often than not these days, my heart grows homesick quickly. As I learn to be a little more still and wait upon the Lord, God comes to me. I don't find God, as Henri Nouwen writes: God finds me. The more I give my self to practices of centering, the more I am open to receiving God's love that will not let me go. Nouwen adds:

To pray is to listen to the voice of love. That is what obedience is all about. The word obedience comes from the Latin word ob-audire, which means “to listen with great attentiveness.” Without listening, we become “deaf” to the voice of love. The Latin word for deaf is surdus. To be completely deaf is to be absurdus, yes, absurd. When we no longer pray, no longer listen to the voice of love that speaks to us in the moment, our lives become absurd lives in which we are thrown back and forth between the past and the future. If we could just be, for a few minutes each day, fully where we are, we would indeed discover that we are not alone and that the One who is with us wants only one thing: to give us love.

Looking at my journey thus far, I can clearly name five practices that have given me a measure of attentiveness that pushes back at all the absurdities and softens my hard heart: I think of them as the Five Cs.

+ Contemplation:  practicing silence and solitude. This practice has at least three distinctive parts. First, the solitude of restoration: resting like the Holy One on the Sabbath and relaxing like Jesus at the end of a long day. Second, the solitude of exploration: wrestling with our demons like Jesus in the desert or ancient Israel on the path to the land of milk and honey. And third, the solitude of formation: study, training and personal reflection like St. Paul's time in the desert after his Damascus Road experience.

+ Compassion: simple acts of service. Jean Vanier wisely told Krista Tippett that the best way to overcome despair is to share simple acts of tenderness and mercy where we live. He called it the "10 Foot Rule" where those who see a need respond to it in ways we can touch. Bring food to the hungry, visit the lonely, clothe the naked in your own community and any sense of futility evaporates. My experience tells me Vanier was right. 

+ Challenge:  consciously saying "no" to empire.  Richard Rohr speaks of this as the "quiet refusal" of Jesus to "participate in almost all external power structures or domination systems." How do I use my cash? My credit? My time? My leisure habits? What food do I buy? Or coffee? Or tea? Or chocolate? How are my retirement funds invested? None of us can fully unplug from empire, but we can do a lot more than we think with intentionality and a commitment to the Beloved Community.

+ Celebration: feasting in community.  Once again Vanier is my guide and each L'Arche home my teacher. At the close of every day - and whenever a birthday or anniversary pops up - individuals are celebrated with gusto by the whole community. Good food, good drink and lots of laughter follow as the party teaches us we are beloved. Much of the ministry of Jesus took place around a common table and in our all too busy lives we can reclaim our humanity by doing likewise.

+ Camaraderie: publicly acts of solidarity. To combat alienation and oppression I sense people of faith are called to stand up in public for the wounded and the powerless. This is not "noblesse oblige," but rather the recognition that we are all sisters and brothers of one human family regardless of race, tribe, gender, religion or class. Pastor Niemoller's poetic lament is an honest articulation of our shared destiny: "If they come for me in the morning, they will come for you at night. Remember: first they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me." They came for the LGBTQ and Roma communities, too and no one spoke out as well as those with physical and intellectual disabilities.

We live in a dangerous and absurd time. To strength our commitment to trust and tenderness, we need practices. Maybe mine can help.

on endings, emptiness and a dark silence...

A bit of divergence today - a quiet reflection on slowly moving into the reality of a new year - starting with this poem:

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change...

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent Earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

(SONNETS TO ORPHEUS, Part Two, XXIX by Rainer Maria Rilke)

While we were away in Tucson, the reality of endings became vividly clear to me: I wrote about them, I felt them in my soul, I talked about them with treasured friends, and I sensed them as we walked through the silence of the Sonoran desert. So many endings so deeply felt that I could neither deny nor escape their gift: an awkward inner emptiness. "Sit in the darkness awhile," it seemed to whisper. "Listen and be still. Practice what you preach." And when I paid careful attention, there was also this: "Please, for God's sake, don't rush into anything new for at least a season." Maybe more. 

The year had ended. My collaborations in various artistic projects was over. And the land in Massachusetts was frozen and dark. Rilke suggests that we choose to let the darkness become our bell tower - a source of strength - from which we ring out tones formed within the uncontainable night. This is a very different type of music, these dark, bell tower songs, sparse and spacious rather than solid. Substantial, of course - but less crowded. And this music takes patience  to comprehend for there is more silence surrounding each note and just the hint of melody. 

Rabbi Lawrence Kushner in a wise, little volume, The Book of Letters, writes that both the dark letters of the printed Hebrew alphabet as well as the light space surrounding them hold meaning and beauty for those with eyes to see. "A mystic," he observes, "is anyone who has the gnawing suspicion that the apparent discord, brokenness, contradictions, and discontinuities that assault us every day might conceal a hidden unity." Even in the emptiness there is more to know. He adds:

The "burning bush" was not a miracle. It was a test. God wanted to find out whether or not Moses could pay attention to something for more than a few minutes. When Moses did, God spoke. The trick is to pay attention to what is going on around you long enough to behold the miracle without falling asleep. There is another world, right here within this one, whenever we pay attention.

Paying attention, learning to rest in the emptiness rather than fret, trusting that the darkness is every bit as beautiful as the light is the invitation of this season. In Tucson, a place that takes pride in limiting the lights of the night so that the stars and planets might shine out boldly, the darkness - and the stars - become vivid. So, too, the silence of the desert. It is complete. Such stillness asks us to move slowly into the mystery. No rushing lest we miss the blessing. Perhaps the best articulation of this comes from Kabir Helminski who writes in The Knowing Heart:

Anyone who has probed the inner life, who has sat in silence long enough to experience the stillness of the mind behind its apparent noise is faced with a mystery. Apart from all the outer attractions of life in the world, there exists at the center of human consciousness something quite satisfying and beautiful in itself, a beauty without features. The mystery is not so much that these two dimensions exist – an outer world and the mystery of the inner world – but that we are suspended between them, as a space in which both worlds meet ... as if the human being is the meeting point, the threshold between two worlds.

Our being is the meeting point, the threshold, between two worlds where we experience a trust for a beauty that is without features. As I was practicing my upright bass last night - and then listening to some old songs by Pentangle - I found myself mesmerized by the notes that weren't played. Or the deep vibrations of my lowest notes plucked in isolation. Without accompaniment. With just a few random bluesy notes sung beyond words. For a moment - at least - I rested at that threshold - and loved it. It has been reported that John Coltrane played himself into sobriety, kicking his heroin addiction, by improvising so resolutely that at the end of a week of solitude he no longer had a monkey on his back. He knew that threshold and spent the rest of his life welcoming others to it through his music. 

The music - and prayer - of this dark bell tower feels a lot like the notes that Danny Thompson plays in this remake of Pentangle's "I've Got a Feeling" or Jacqui McShee's vocals. It is, of course, their reworking of the Miles Davis classic, "All Blues," and is as perfect a genre bender as anything I have ever heard. Take a listen - and rest in the fullness of the empty places.

counter-cultural balance: part three...

NOTE: Today's reflection is part three of my contemplation/balance quartet. The previous postings have suggested that: 1) silence and solitude are an essential component to living as one fully engaged in the world; 2) our activity for peace and compassion is always a reflection of our inner/true condition; and 3) an open and peace-filled heart takes practice.

Once upon a time, one of my mentors - the Rev. Dr. Thomas Dipko - spoke to the people gathered in Tucson about my unorthodox and irreverent spirituality. He noted that within our tradition of Western Reformed Christianity, I was often the odd person out: my vision for ministry was mystical, my inner life was apophatic, and my spiritual practices were sacramental. In many ways I did not fit into the Congregational Way. The Eastern Orthodox tradition? Most likely. Perhaps even parts of the Anglo-Catholic heritage. But probably not comfortably within the often verbose, hyper-intellectual, Enlightenment-driven, rational and linear theology and practices of the United Church. 

And yet, there we were: celebrating the 20th anniversary of my ordination into ministry chanting contemplative Taize tunes in a candle lit sanctuary in the desert. Who could have guessed? As his homily concluded, Tom used a story from the Chasidic world to drive home the point that while our habits, intellect and preferences always have their place, what is most important in our journey with God in community is humility and patience. "There are many ways to sing the Lord's song," he smiled before saying:

One Yom Kippur, the Baal Shem Tov was praying together with his students in a small Polish village. Through his spiritual vision, the Baal Shem Tov had detected that harsh heavenly judgments had been decreed against the Jewish people, and he and his students were trying with all the sincerity they could muster to cry out to G-d and implore Him to rescind these decrees and grant the Jews a year of blessing.
This deep feeling took hold of all the inhabitants of the village and everyone opened his heart in deep-felt prayer.

Among the inhabitants of the village was a simple shepherd boy. He did not know how to read; indeed, he could barely read the letters of the alef-beit, the Hebrew alphabet. As the intensity of feeling in the synagogue began to mount, he decided that he also wanted to pray. But he did not know how. He could not read the words of the prayer book or mimic the prayers of the other congregants. He opened the prayer book to the first page and began to recite the letters: alef, beit, veit - reading the entire alphabet. He then called out to G-d: "This is all I can do. G-d, You know how the prayers should be pronounced. Please, arrange the letters in the proper way."

This simple, genuine prayer resounded powerfully within the Heavenly court. G-d rescinded all the harsh decrees and granted the Jews blessing and good fortune. The Rabbi paused for a moment to let the story impact his listeners. Suddenly a voice called out, "alef." And thousands of voices thundered back "alef." The voice continued: "beit," and the thousands responded "beit." They continued to pronounce every letter in the Hebrew alphabet. And then they began to file out of the synagogue.

They had recited their prayers.
(http://ascentofsafed.com/cgi-bin/ascent.cgi?Name=567-02)

In some ways it has been uncomfortable to be an ecclesiastical misfit: I ache for silence when others yearn for conversation; I like to take a "long, loving look at reality" while activists hurriedly organize to get something - anything - done; I tend towards stories, jazz, and poetry yet my tradition was built upon precise theological doctrine; and I favor ortho-praxis (right action) in a culture searching for ortho-doxos (right belief.) Despite the awkwardness, however, I was blessed in each of four the churches I served with mentors in the outward journey. They became for me what John the Baptist was for Jesus. And their love, life experiences, prayers, and commitment to caring for others brought a measure of balance into my heart. Growing in community filled me full to overflowing as we faced joy, grief, birth, death, illness, and heart-break as one body.

It was in community that I found the words necessary to formulate a personal "rule of life" - a set of spiritual practices blending the inward/outward journey of faith - that also held value for doing spiritual formation in the local church. I chose the monastic expression, "rule of life," for two reasons. First, Western Reformed Christianity has lost any distinction between a life shaped by faith and popular culture. The early Church, however, came into being with a mission: to show the love of God through living compassionate lives, and, to train others to be disciples of grace. The very word church, ekklesia, in Greek means "those who have been called out." Out of our habits, out of our culture, out of our addiction/obsession with empire. Without a guide or map we inevitably get lost. Our cousins in Judaism look to Torah, the other side of the family, Islam, looks to the Holy Qur'an. We look to Jesus who taught us at the start of the Sermon on the Mount:

You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot. You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

To live as a holy people - unique and called by God to express the charism of grace in the world - a rule is essential. The rule gives us a vision - and as the ancient prophets of Israel said, "Without a vision, the people perish." That is the first reason for using the monastic words. The second is more subtle: all religious traditions have touchstones. To name our formation guide a rule links us to sisters and brothers in other faiths so that we never think ourselves better than others. This has been an historic offense in Christianity -  and addressed openly only in the past 50 years. We honor our different and unique callings, yes, but never at the expense of others. We are connected to God's wisdom in all of our spiritualities. Our "rule," therefore, serves as a shepherd leading us beside still waters, guiding us through valleys of the shadow of death, restoring our souls. To speak of our rule is to recognize all rules on the journey into deep ecumenism - or generous orthodoxy - in this season of confusion.

A SIMPLE RULE OF LIFE: Following Jesus in the 21st Century

Five touchstones guide my journey. They begin with the stories of Jesus in the New Testament and ripen by celebrating both the Via Negativa of Eastern tradition (apophatic spirituality) and the Via Positiva of the West (kataphatic practices). The Serenity Prayer is foundational in this rule, showing me how to focus my mind on God's peace and learn to see with the heart. The wisdom of our era has a place in the rule, too by recognizing Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences (i.e. verbal, logical, bodily, musical, spatial, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalistic) as well as the personality traits explored in both the Myers-Briggs typologies and the Enneagram. (The fourth installment of this reflection will add commentary to each of the touchstones listed below.)

+ Silence and solitude:
     - the solitude of restoration: rest and relaxation
     - the solitude of exploration: wrestling with our demons in the desert
     - the solitude of formation: study and personal reflection

+ Simple Acts of Compassion: living into 10 foot rule
     
+ Unplugging from Empire: the "quiet refusal" of Jesus

+ Feasting in community: challenging fear and despair at the table

+ Public acts of solidarity: standing with those in need

credits:
+ https://fineartamerica.com/featured/hasidic-playing-the-flute-boris-shapiro.html
+ https://resource.acu.edu.au/ankelly/Chapter7.htm

counter-cultural balance: part two...

NOTE: Part two of my reflections on contemplation as balance builds on the insights of Richard Rohr @ https://cac.org/category/daily-meditations /2020 /page/2/. In my experience, poetry, music, and visual art are often the best ways to enter into the wisdom of sacred balance. That's why I try to include examples from artists who illuminate the mystical path. They evoke in our hearts what theologians try to explain to our minds. They honor the mystery rather than try to tame it with linear logic. I am also committed to using the time-tested insights of scripture and prayer as guides on our pilgrimage towards balance.
                      +
Not long ago I came upon this poem by Lelia Chatti, "Confession," that gives shape and form to the quest for balance as I understand it. She is a Tunisian-American poet who currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. The poem begins with words from the Holy Qur'an: 

Oh, I wish I had died before this and was in oblivion, forgotten.
Mary giving birth, the Holy Qur’an

Truth be told, I like Mary a little better
when I imagine her like this, crouched
and cursing, a boy-God pushing on
her cervix (I like remembering
she had a cervix, her body ordinary
and so like mine), girl-sweat lacing
rivulets like veins in the sand,
her small hands on her knees
not doves but hands, gripping,
a palm pressed to her spine, fronds
whispering like voyeurs overhead—
(oh Mary, like a God, I too take pleasure
in knowing you were not all
holy, that ache could undo you
like a knot)—and, suffering,
I admire this girl who cared
for a moment not about God
or His plans but her own
distinct life, this fiercer Mary who’d disappear
if it saved her, who’d howl to Hell
with salvation if it meant this pain,
the blessed adolescent who squatted
indignant in a desert, bearing His child
like a secret she never wanted to hear.

The witness and wisdom of Scripture - all Scripture in every tradition - is complicated. It is bathed in the oral history and heritage of our faiths so it is draped with blessing and curse. There is always insight and grace in these traditions. Like Bene Brown writes in another context: they are doing their best - and I trust that this is true for individuals as well as our spiritualities. And yet, wherever there is light, there must also be shadow. And our religious inheritance is saturated in shadows: historic prejudice is embedded within it, our cultural fears and shame live there, too alongside varying expressions of misogyny and homophobia. So, trusting Scripture demands discernment. 

Sadly, my own spiritual tradition, which bubbled up from the transformational crucible of Western Europe's Protestant Reformation, has lost touch with its roots. Once a brilliant center for serious Scriptural reflection in service to social justice and compassion - think Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Edwards, Gladden, Tillich, Barth, and Shinn back in the day; or more recently Trible, MLK, Cone, Cobb, Coakley, Brueggemann, Wink, Buechner, and Davis more recently - it has now slipped into shallow biblical exegesis driven more by ideology than careful reflection on our sacred texts. Paradoxically, the Anglo/Roman Catholic realm that once seemed locked into the limitations of hierarchical mythos, has become my go-to sources for rigorous contemporary Biblical scholarship. Think Rohr, Brown, Vanier, Nouwen, Finney, and Bourgeault. 

A recent example from the January 16, 2020 Daily Meditation by Fr. Richard Rohr is illustrative. In "A Quiet Refusal" Rohr carefully articulates the humble
Biblical consensus re: the way Jesus engaged in social transformation, and, why it matters. It is the best and most honest way of describing the path of Jesus I have found. 

Because Jesus did not directly attack the religious and institutional systems of his time until his final action against the money changers in the temple, his primary social justice critique and action are a disappointment to most radicals and social activists. Jesus’ social program, as far as I can see, was a quiet refusal to participate in almost all external power structures or domination systems. Once we have been told this, we see it everywhere in the four Gospels. Jesus chose a very simple lifestyle which kept him from being constantly co-opted by those very structures, which we can call the sin system. (Note that the word “sin” is often used to describe individual wrongdoing, but I’m using it in a much more corporate way, as I believe Jesus and Paul did.) Here are a few examples:

+ The city of Sepphoris was the Roman regional capital of Galilee and the center for most money, jobs, and power in the region where Jesus lived. It was just nine miles from Jesus’ hometown of Nazareth. Yet there is no record that Jesus ever went there, nor is it mentioned once in the New Testament, even though he and his father, Joseph, were carpenters or “workmen” and Jesus traveled through many other cities much farther away. He also seems to have avoided the money system as much as possible by using “a common purse” (John 12:6, 13:29)—voluntary “communism,” we might say. Go ahead and hate me!

+ Jesus healed the poor woman whose doctors made her spend all she had “while she only grew worse” (Mark 5:26). His three-year ministry was, in effect, offering free healing and healthcare for any who wanted it (Jew and non-Jew, worthy and unworthy)... He clearly respected eunuchs, which would have been the generic term for nonbinary or trans-genders (see Matthew 19:12), probably inspired by the universalism of Isaiah 56:4-5.

Rather than force an anachronistic social construct on Jesus - i.e. revolutionary agitator, political power broker, community organizer, etc. - Rohr synthesizes the witness of Jesus shared in Scriptures and and suggests how this might make sense for us today:

What can we learn from Jesus’ life about how we might address the systems of inequity and oppression in our own cultures? One lesson seems to me that we have to “start local.” Jesus doesn’t begin in Jerusalem or head off to Rome to take on empire. Rather he starts in his own hometown, among his own people, helping those who are hurting and naming those who are responsible without a hint of self-righteousness. He simply goes around doing what he knows to be right, which he surely discovered during his long periods of solitude and silence (a form of contemplation) on the outskirts of town, and others begin to join him.

Rohr refuses to do what some progressive theologians in my tradition like Borg, Spong, or Daly attempt: forming Jesus in their own image. I value the heart of these theological revolutionaries: their commitment to human dignity, freedom, love, and liberation is beyond question. Their quest for the Beloved Community is one I share, too. But the revolution of Jesus is small. Hidden. Quiet and truly counter-cultural. It is not in a hurry and never hyperbolic or puffed-up. This is where I find both liberal and conservative ideologies obscuring the mystical manner of Jesus: to portray him as a contemporary social radical or a purveyor of the gospel of wealth is disingenuous. It requires shallow and manipulative biblical interpretation. And it offers no clues for living sacramentally into the way of grace. The quiet way of Jesus as described in the New Testament, however, tells us that at least these ingredients are involved in living into holy balance:

+ Quiet time and solitude: rest and reflection - the solitude of restoration as well as exploration - is essential so that we might be renewed in body and spirit.

+ Simple acts of compassion:  feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and visiting the lonely, sick, imprisoned, and forgotten - what tradition calls the seven corporeal works of mercy - including giving drink to the thirsty, sheltering the homeless and burying the dead is the outward sign of an inward and spiritual grace.

+ Disengaging from the powers of empire: what Rohr calls Jesus' "quiet refusal" to personally participate in the systems of domination and exploitation. In the 21st century, this is complicated. But finding small ways to reduce our dependence upon and complicity within the structures of violence and injustice is foundational.

+ Rejoicing and feasting in community: Jesus loved a good party - and one of the ways he fought despair was to feast with friends - and encourage them to invite the forgotten to the table of joy, too.

+ Quiet acts of solidarity: silently carrying another's sorrow, grief, or oppression is how we share and experience God's presence. "This is my new commandment," Jesus said after washing the feet of his friends, "that you love one another as I have loved you." As a servant. As a friend. As the hands, eyes, feet and soul of Jesus in our world.  Like the hymn says:

I will hold the Christ-light for you in the night time of your fear.

I will hold my hand out to you, speak the peace you long to hear.

I will weep when you are weeping, when you laugh I'll laugh with you.

I will share your joy and sorrow till we've seen this journey through.

Most of us must learn to be grateful for all that is small, forgotten, and silent. We have been well-trained to want more and create more rather than seek out the "still small voice of the Lord" in our everyday encounters. The counter-cultural balance of Jesus up-ends our self-importance through humility, humor, feasting, tenderness, silence, and compassion. I think St. Paul hit a home run when he wrote in Romans 12:

I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect... 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. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers. 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... Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. 

credits:
+ Mario Sanchez Nevado
+ https://www.christianartforsale.com/bible-verses-art.html
+ https://www.pinterest.at/pin/373728469064672910/
+ https://fineartamerica.com/featured/jesus-religi

+ https://www.flipkart.com/tamatina-jesus-canvas-paintings-last-supper-modern-art-catholic-paintings-35-x-23-oil-inch-35-painting/p/itmfac9yudftmnqk

counter-cultural balance: part one...

Those who know me well will know why I appreciate this poem: it speaks of an embodied tenderness - the fruits of contemplation - and a way of being in the world that shares and then strengthens love.

Poem with an Embedded Line by Susan Cohen by Barbara Crooker

When the evening newscast leads to despair,
when my Facebook feed raises my blood pressure,
when I can't listen to NPR anymore,
I turn to the sky, blooming like chicory,
its dearth of clouds, its vast blue endlessness.
The trees are turning copper, gold, bronze,
fired by the October sun, and the bees
are going for broke, drunk on fermenting
apples. I turn to my skillet, cast iron
you can count on, glug some olive oil,
sizzle some onions, adding garlic at the end
to prevent bitterness. My husband,
that sweet man, enters the room, asks
what's for dinner, says it smells good.
He could live on garlic and onions
slowly turning to gold. The water
is boiling, so I throw in some peppers,
halved, cored, and seeded, let them bob
in the salty water until they're soft.
To the soffrito, I add ground beef, chili
powder, cumin, dried oregano, tomato sauce,
mashed cannellinis; simmer for a while.
Then I stir in more white beans, stuff the hearts
of the peppers, drape them with cheese and tuck
the pan in the oven's mouth. Let the terrible
politicians practice / their terrible politics.
At my kitchen table, all will be fed. I turn
the radio to a classical station, maybe Vivaldi.
All we have are these moments: the golden trees,
the industrious bees, the falling light. Darkness
will not overtake us.

These words do NOT advocate the heresy of quietism. Nor do they celebrate the social sin of privilege. Rather, they honor balance. And compassion. The way of incarnational spirituality. In a culture constructed upon duality - yes or no thinking, in or out politics, with me or against me religions - Crooker's poem could sound like avoidance. For those obsessed with productivity - women and men vexed by liberal guilt, the inability to wait constructively, or the shame of never doing or producing enough - balance and perspective suggest laziness or complicity. At the very least, some might see this as selfishness. But the truth of living into the wisdom of God's creation is that contemplation and action always embrace. Psalm 85 tells us that:

Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet;
righteousness and peace will kiss each other.
Faithfulness will spring up from the ground,
and righteousness will look down from the sky.

The way of transformative and incarnational spirituality marries engagement with the world along with times for solitude and reflection. As I often do,I find  this insight from Fr. Richard Rohr useful:

When we named the Center for Action and Contemplation, I hoped our rather long name would itself keep us honest and force us toward balance and ongoing integration beyond the first generation. However, over the last thirty-five years, I have witnessed how many of us attach to contemplation or action for the wrong reasons. Introverts use contemplation to affirm quiet time; those with the luxury of free time sometimes use it for navel-gazing. On the other hand, some activists see our call to action as an affirmation of their particular agenda and not much else. Neither is the delicate balance and art that we hope to affirm. By contemplation, we mean the deliberate seeking of God through a willingness to detach from the passing self, the tyranny of emotions, the addiction to self-image, and the false promises of the world. Action, as we are using the word, means a decisive commitment toward involvement and engagement in the social order. Issues will not be resolved by mere reflection, discussion, or even prayer, nor will they be resolved only by protests, boycotts, or even, unfortunately by voting the “right” way. Rather, God “works together with” all those who love (see Romans 8:28).

To be real, to be tender, to be strong and loving requires balance: checking out of the busyness is part of the healing, but so is challenging the cruel status quo by living with compassion.

rain and clouds and mystery in the desert...

It rained in the desert yesterday - a rare and holy time. Today the mountains are nestled in clouds that are slowly fading as the sun takes charge of the day. When it rains in this part of the desert, you can experience it with all your senses - especially its smell. The creosote bush, larrea tridentata or chaparral for the cognoscenti, secretes a coating on its leaves when it rains that helps it retain moisture. When the gentle musky aroma is released,desert dwellers smile and say: "Ah, I can smell the rain." It is one of the small blessings I continue to miss even after all these years. The poet, Ofelia Zepeda of the Tohono O’odham nation, put it like this in "It Is Going to Rain."

Someone said it is going to rain.
I think it is not so.
Because I have not yet felt the earth and the way it holds still
in anticipation.
I think it is not so.
Because I have not yet felt the sky become heavy with moisture of preparation.
I think it is not so.
Because I have not yet felt the winds move with their coolness.
I think it is not so.
Because I have not yet inhaled the sweet, wet dirt the winds bring.
So, there is no truth that it will rain.

Today we will gather up some creosote branches in a plastic bag to hand in our shower at home. Today I will also go searching for some 'Piñon and Mesquite

incense, two other unique scents of the desert that we treasure. Our little house in Massachusetts will soon smell like a lost portion of the Sonoran desert by the time Lent begins. That will help me pray this year - and I need all the help I can get. Another of Ms.Zepeda's poems, "Smoke in Our Hair," puts it like this:

The scent of burning wood holds
the strongest memory.
Mesquite, cedar, piñon, juniper,
all are distinct.
Mesquite is dry desert air and mild winter.
Cedar and piñon are colder places.
Winter air in our hair is pulled away,
and scent of smoke settles in its place.
We walk around the rest of the day
with the aroma resting on our shoulders.
The sweet smell holds the strongest memory.
We stand around the fire.
The sound of the crackle of wood and spark
is ephemeral.
Smoke, like memories, permeates our hair,
our clothing, our layers of skin.
The smoke travels deep
to the seat of memory.
We walk away from the fire;
no matter how far we walk,
we carry this scent with us.
New York City, France, Germany—
we catch the scent of burning wood;
we are brought home.

I love those smells - and her poetry. I love the desert, too for reasons I cannot explain except to say its vast and subtle beauty opens my heart like nothing else. One last poem from Ofelia Zepeda contain these words that evoke for me the sacred mystery of some poetry:

My parents are illiterate in the English language

They speak a language much too civil

for writing.

It is a language useful for pulling memory

from the depths of the earth.

It is a language useful for praying with the

earth and sky.

("Birth Witness")

desert notes after a bit of wandering...

The joy of wandering slowly without expectations or agenda is restorative to this old soul. With serious rest and plenty of time to take in the native beauty of the desert - to say nothing of savoring the world's finest Sonoran Mexican fare with close friends - these past few days have been blessed.

I am carrying the United Church of Christ New Century Psalter with me on this pilgrimage. It was a gift from one of my mentors, the Rev. Dr. Thomas Dipko, on the occasion of my 20th ordination anniversary. Nearly twenty years later, I still look to the Second Canticle of Isaiah for focus:

Seek the Lord while God may be found,
call upon God while God is near...
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways my ways, says God.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are my ways higher than your ways
And my thoughts your thoughts.
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
And do not return there until they have watered the earth,
Making it bring forth and sprout,
Giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth:
It shall not return to me empty,
But it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
And succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

Sitting in the late afternoon sun, surrounded by Saguaro cacti and mesquite trees, a few thoughts that have been hibernating within bubbled up to the surface with clarity in the silence. The first is that this is a time for more silence. A time to honor the inward and outward emptiness of my life as a way of treasuring the mysteries. Less words, more quiet; fewer engagements, more savoring; a narrowing of projects to concentrate on transformative contemplation. I rather like the way Richard Rohr put it recently when he said that the contemplative life is NOT about quietude or self-absorbed introspection. Rather, "contemplation helps us discern what is truly important in the largest, most spacious frame of reality and to know what is ours to do in the face of “evil” and injustice." It implies living ever more simply with an appreciation for clarity along with the willingness and ability to say yes or no to the many options, distractions, and possibilities all around and within me.

For the past three years Di and I have been "beholding." Our guide was the Blessed Virgin Mary who began her journey into faith by embracing what the holy was already doing in her life and holding these things in her heart. Hers was not a journey of judgment, but trust. She honored the mystery and let its wisdom be revealed over time. She embodied holy patience. And that is what we sensed during a retreat three years back, too: let's live into the possibilities that are already clear. During that time we visited some of our favorite places and people, played a lot of music with treasured friends, spent serious time with our beloved family, and got to know the land, trees, soil and wetlands in the place we called home. It was a rich and rewarding season as beholding gave us eyes to see and ears to hear what God was already doing in our lives.

The second insight that grew clearer in the silent sunshine was so obvious that it took a while for me to recognize it: "to everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven." The wisdom tradition of ancient Israel teaches that there is a flow to creation. There is life and there is death, there is light and there is dark, there is joy and sorrow, beginnings and ends, dancing and music as well as silence and solitude. After 40 years of ministry, I know this to be true experientially: I have started and concluded four discrete ministries in four different parts of the US; during each of those ministries I have welcomed new friends and staff and bid them farewell, too; I have baptized and buried hundreds of children of God; I have celebrated the marriages of some and grieved the divorces of others; and I have seen each congregation blessed with the charisms of hospitality, compassion, joy, and justice for a few years only to see them dry up and perish on the vine. This ebb and flow is simultaneously inevitable and vexing. Like friends in AA ask: why do some respond to the 12 Steps while others flounder and even die? "Only Thou knowest," replied the prophet Elijah. 

And that is what slowly dawned on me in the desert sun: now is a time for saying good-bye. Trusting the mystery more than my habits. Cynthia Bourgeault has written that seeing with our heart is becoming still enough to discern what God's purpose for our lives might be and trusting it. Our heart has little to do with what gives us a buzz, and everything to do with linking our deepest joys with God's mercy, compassion, and truth. Sitting in the silence I heard this passage from Scripture speak up: "I have come so that your joy may be full." Complete, as in filled full, but also full as in thorough or saturated. God's love has come so that we might live into our truest, most creative, and tender selves from the inside out. As one who periodically spends time with others doing "spiritual direction" - listening carefully for where the Spirit may be calling to another - I know this to mean making choices. St. Paul says that all things may be possible, but not all things are equally important. Or nourishing. Or even holy.

One truth this pilgrimage is clarifying is why I am bringing some commitments to a close. Another has to do with joy, trust, rest, and grace as this treasured Scripture puts it: Follow me, all ye who are tired and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Follow me and you will learn to trust the unforced rhythms of grace. This is my season to trust the unforced rhythms of grace. And there is one more insight: I need to be present and close as Di wrestles through her health challenges. We clearly do not know what is to come except to say it will be challenging. As we get ready to celebrate our 25th anniversary, I want to do all I can to support and care for this sweet soul. This has been a pilgrimage into the mystery. The late Henri Nouwen speaks to me at this moment when he writes:

Most of us distrust God. Most of us think of God as a fearful, punitive authority or as an empty, powerless nothing. Jesus’ core message was that God is neither a powerless weakling nor a powerful boss, but a lover, whose only desire is to give us what our hearts most desire. To pray is to listen to that voice of love. That is what obedience is all about. The word obedience comes from the Latin word ob-audire, which means “to listen with great attentiveness.” Without listening, we become “deaf” to the voice of love. The Latin word for deaf is surdus. To be completely deaf is to be absurdus, yes, absurd. When we no longer pray, no longer listen to the voice of love that speaks to us in the moment, our lives become absurd lives in which we are thrown back and forth be- tween the past and the future. If we could just be, for a few minutes each day, fully where we are, we would indeed discover that we are not alone and that the One who is with us wants only one thing: to give us love.

new musical horizons are taking shape...

One of the ideas that I am going to be sitting with for the next two weeks while in sunny Tucson is this: Is it time to create a Pentangle-like groove here among some of my favorite local musical friends?  
Their subtle mix of jazz and Celtic folk tunes fueled by great vocals and two of the finest acoustic guitar players ever - Bert Jansch and John Renbourne - drives me crazy! I don't know if the time is right - and if the players I want to bring together are free and/or interested - so I am just putting this out there as a teaser. I know I am hungry for it. (BTW this clip comes from the 2008 revival; it is Pentangle's refashioned interpretation of the Miles Davis classic: "All Blues" that they first did back in 1970.)

I have a similar fascination for their cover of "Sally Go 'Round the Roses." I was knocked out back in 1963 when the Jaynettes put it out first: the instrumentation sounds like it was recorded under water, the vocalists sound sultry while singing a melody that hails from an old English nursery rhyme and a few years later Grace Slick and her band, The Great Society, gave it a proper psychedelic treatment. What Pentangle does, however, emphasizes the English folk song tempo mixed with a hot bass, stunning guitar riffs and the playful call and response vocal between Jansch and lead vocalist Jacquie McShee. 

Ok I confess that my favorite upright bass player of all time, Danny Thompson, comes from this band, too. They were the first "genre benders" in music to sweep me off my feet and I have never gotten over them. Lots to ponder as new horizons open up... we'll see, yes? Take a listen to this and ponder with me.