poems, silence, anxiety and living into the peace that passes understanding...

This poem has been popping up and demanding attention for a few days. And while I don't quite know what to make of it completely, it evokes something of this moment in time for me - and it feels right.

Early Hominids by Faith Shearin

In one museum scene they are bent over fire
and in another they hold their first stone tools
while the ice age approaches. They have been
painting mastodons and mammoths
in their caves, art already in their animal grasp,
and they have been leaving footprints
in volcanic ash, shedding their skeletons
in deserts. They have begun the journey
from trees to suburbs, have been dressing
themselves in early hats and considering
an alphabet. The young neanderthal looks like
a boy who bit you on the playground
and the woman beside him might be the woman
we avoid at the grocery store. This is evolution:
hair loss, math, a desire for furniture. Already
they worry about predators and weather; already
they have designs for a more comfortable bed.

(for more on the poet please go to her web page @ http://faithshearin.com)

An oblique but consistent assurance is present in these words: the soul of Hawthorne rather than Emerson peeking through the text to paraphrase Gregory Wolfe. Struggle is real - harsh and hairy with no room for romantic fantasies -  and yet, and this is equally true, built into the essence of our DNA it seems there is also a quiet yearning for "a more comfortable bed." A better life. An existence beyond that which is "nasty, brutish, and short." (Hobbes) I see this consistently in nature: there is a natural cycle of death begetting life on the road back into death and still more new life once more. Cosmologists suggest that the rhythm of Eucharist is built into the fabric of creation: from out of death comes new life that nourishes the world. Think Big Bang. Food chains. Fire.

This morning David Leonhardt's words in the NY Times suggested something similar in his consideration of the tensions between Iran and the US that are manifesting themselves in death. At the outset, let me be clear: I take a lot of my political/philosophical/theological cues from Reinhold Niebuhr. As a realist, rather than an ideologue, "Reinnie" reminds us that: Original sin is that thing about man which makes him capable of conceiving of his own perfection and incapable of achieving it. He suggests that:

+ Original sin is not inherited organically as Augustine's incomplete and even misogynist science posited; rather it is experienced in the anxiety born of both human freedom and dependence. "We either seek to avoid finitude" by asserting our complete independence and/or loyalty to an idea, leader, or ideology - the sin of pride - or we give up our freedom in pursuit of material pleasures - the sin of sensuality. The wonderful irony in Niebuhr's insight is that "the very freedom that is the occasion for sin also calls us, through conscience, to achieve greater justice and community."(Hein on Niebuhr on Human Nature, Sin and Justice @ https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/
jchlet1&div=7&id=&page=) Built into the logic of creation itself is death and a path into new and better life because of this death. This wisdom is implicitly in his Serenity Prayer, but explicit in this classic summary: 

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we must be saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.

+ This tension between freedom and dependence - anxiety vs. sensuality balanced by conscience - can be seen in what I would call Iran's "measured" response to the belligerent and ill-considered spontaneity of the US President. Our leader, without adults in the room who know how government and diplomacy work and without an ethical bone in his body, appears to be ruled by his reptile brain. He is incapable of thinking and planning for the common good coherently and so acts and reacts in the most vulgar and dangerous ways. What Leonhardtt notes, however, is that there is a larger wisdom being played out.

Last spring, a former Pentagon official named Ilan Goldenberg wrote an article for Foreign Affairs called “What a War with Iran Would Look Like.” It included:

"Between the United States and Iran there is a distinct potential for misunderstanding, not least when both actors are making decisions under time pressure, on the basis of uncertain information, and in a climate of deep mutual distrust. Iran may mistake a one-off strike by the United States as the beginning of a significant military campaign that requires an immediate and harsh response. The danger that the United States will send confusing signals to the Iranians is especially high given Trump’s tendency to go off on Twitter …"

So far — in the hours after Iran’s retaliatory attack on two bases in Iraq that house American troops — this kind of vicious cycle does not look immediately likely. The attacks may not have killed any Americans, and Iran’s foreign minister signaled that the attacks “concluded” Iran’s response to the killing of its top general, Qassim Suleimani.

+ There are, of course, no guarantees - especially given the near insanity and incompetence of our current Commander in Chief. Quoting Ilan Goldberg last night, Leonhardt adds: "The missile attacks are not necessarily the entire Iranian response.” added:

My sense is that Iran needed to do something quickly, something symbolically, something that was public given how public the killing of Soleimani was. … But Iran didn’t want to trigger an all-out war. This Iranian attack is bold. It’s major. It’s significant. But it stops short of killing a large number of Americans. Then the Iranians, on their own state television, they’re saying things like 30 Americans were killed and that Iranian planes are flying into Iraqi territory. They’re saying all kinds of crazy things, which is really for their own domestic audience. So the reality is Iran found a way to, at least for the moment, respond relatively proportionally. … I think Iran will look to do other things over time, just maybe not as public. I still think we need to be worried about things like cyberattacks, terrorist attacks, targeting American embassies, assassination attempts on American officials. I think all those things are entirely on the table for potentially years, frankly, in retaliation.

My point in sharing is simple: breathing and taking time before reacting to almost anything - especially acts of international violence - is essential for peace-makers. All the public hang-wringing and hyperbole of the past few days only deepens our anxiety and traps us in an addictive downward spiral. It is another ironic sign of grace that while our news cycles have been hyper-ventilating about all the horrific possibilities that may occur, Fr. Richard Rohr's on-line meditations have been focused on silence. Not as an escape from reality, but rather as a way to live into this moment with a non-anxious presence that empowers our hearts with peace. 

When we connect with silence as a living, primordial presence, we can then see all other things—and experience them deeply—inside that container. Silence is not just an absence, but a primal presence. Silence surrounds every “I know” with a humble and patient “I don’t know.” It protects the autonomy and dignity of events, persons, animals, and all created things. To be clear, the kind of silence I’m describing does not ignore injustice. While some folks who claim to be enlightened contemplatives are merely navel-gazers, as Thomas Merton suggested, there are others who use silence to advance the cause of justice. Barbara Holmes explains:

"We tend to presume that one must create silent spaces for contemplation. It is as if we have drawn the spiritual veil around contemplative activity, seeking to distance prayerful and reflective practices from the noise of the world. [That couldn’t be further from the truth!]... European domination in Africa and in other nations elicited the silence of those captive cultures... Some of us allow [silence] to fully envelop and nurture our seeking; others who have been silenced by oppression seek to voice the joy of spiritual reunion in an evocative counterpoint."

Merton added: "That as frightening as it may be to “center down,” we must find the stillness at the core of the shout, the pause in the middle of the “amen,” as first steps toward restoration." Fear and anxiety are not the way to live into the Beloved Community. They are not an alternative to the brokenness and anger of this era, but a sign of how deeply were are enmeshed in the mess. Rohr adds:

We must find a way to return to this place, live in this place, abide in this place of inner silence. Outer silence means very little if there is not a deeper inner silence. Everything else appears much clearer when it appears or emerges out of silence. Without silence, we do not really experience our experiences. We are here, but not in the depth of here. We have many experiences, but they do not have the power to change us, awaken us, or give us the joy and peace that the world cannot give, as Jesus says (John 14:27). Without some degree of inner and even outer silence, we are never living, never tasting the moment. The opposite of contemplation is not action, it is reaction. We must wait for pure action, which proceeds from deep silence.

Within the mess, within the sin, within the anxiety, and our worry about " the predators and weather, already (we) have designs for a more comfortable bed."