Being enslaved and/or addicted to the news cycle in the West is dangerous not only to our mental and spiritual well-being, but also to our physical health. It is one of the ways the "master class" (to use Eugene V. Debs old-school term) keeps us anxious, distracted, and reactive. The stress and hyper-tension that is intentionally created by Tweets, FB, 24/7 reporting, and all the rest keeps us awake, unsettles any sense of equilibrium, and taxes our immune system. It is no coincidence that ALL of my spiritual directors for the past 30 years have urged me to: 1) disconnect from all forms of so-called news on a daily basis, and, 2) practice periodic total fasting from the "news" throughout the year. I recall reading somewhere that the late Jean Vanier made a commitment to watching only one news summary each week - and it was fundamentally a time for weeping and prayers of lament. The rest of his hours were spent listening to and visiting with his loved ones, walking in nature, praying the hours, and sharing food and laughter with those who needed him the most. I think he was right.Over the past year, various mainstream media writers have confessed that they, too, have recognized the value of fasting from social media, cable newscasts, and print journalism. David Leonhart of the NY Times not only stopped posting during the time between Christmas and New Year's Day, but also wrote in support of turning off your phone for thanksgiving. "About a month ago," he wrote, "my wife and I decided that our family would spend a Saturday without the internet, a practice known as a Tech Shabbat (a reference to the Jewish day of rest)."
I wasn’t sure whether I’d like it, I’ll admit, and our kids were even less sure.But it was wonderful. We hung out with friends, without distraction. We never had to ask, guiltily, “Sorry, what’d you say?” because we had been only semi-listening. In between scheduled activities, we took a walk and played a board game, Settlers of Catan. I spent time thinking about long-term projects instead of replying to unimportant emails. It felt productive, rejuvenating and, yes, fun. Tiffany Shlain, a filmmaker who popularized the idea of a Tech Shabbat, says that on her day without screens, she laughs more, sleeps better and feels healthier. As she writes in her recent book, “24/6”: “Having one day off each week shocks you anew into the realization of how bizarre it is that everyone is head-down, looking at screens all the time. That should never feel normal.” (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/
24/opinion/thanksgiving-technology.html)
What non-religious spiritualities often miss is the essence of spirituality - that is spiritual habits, spiritual exercise, spiritual discipline, spiritual behavior and action in the world - (which) is why people prefer the non-religious kinds of spirituality: they are easier. They make fewer real demands. They don't make you change your routines, our your habits, or yourself, or your world. They don't require a turning of the heart, the inner transformation that Thomas Aquinas called "faith." ... These attitudes fit well both with the culture of comfort and convenience in contemporary (Western) societies - the culture of self-assertion and expressive individualism - sometimes called a culture of narcissism.
(p. 188)
A colleague recently captured the dilemma of this moment in time in his post: Keeping the Christmas Decorations Up Till the Feast of the Epiphany. "While the Reformation and the Age of the Enlightenment may have freed us from the "evil" superstitions of religion, it also stripped us of the sensuality of the spiritual in our lives." Nearly everyone in the USA has fled the moribund and antiseptic worship habits of the Reformed tradition. Countless have given up on the Roman Catholic experience with their never-ending disclosure of yet another sexual violation. And younger believers have abandoned the emotional buzz of Evangelicalism because of its anti-science, anti-intellectual irrelevance. In the absence of a sensual, sensible, mystical, and morally meaningful faith traditions, it is no wonder many look for simpler, easier, do-it-yourself spiritualities.
The spiritual engages more than the rational side of our lives(which is about all the Reformation churches do) it also engages our senses, so that we can smell and taste and feel the presence of the divine in our lives beyond just thinking about the Divine. So I am glad to bring to my Protestant affiliation all of my Catholic baggage around the sensuality of the incarnation. I am proud to keep the Christmas decorations up beyond Christmas(the rational thinkers look at Christmas as an event on the calendar and scurry to take every down immediately), because the sensuality of the manger and the tree and the lights give flesh to what the incarnation is about, in a way that moves us beyond the head and into the heart and the guts and the work a day world that needs a little more sensitivity to life, more patience with the struggle of life. One of the children at our Christmas Eve service(the first Children's sermon ever in our congregation) when asked what do we know about babies said: "They cry all the time!!!" I said yes, and it moves us to respond by feeding and caring and doing all the other things we do for babies. So is to the sensuality of the incarnation and the great manifestation of the Epiphany: God becomes human so that we might experience more of the divine in our midst! (Find Vern's other insights on Face Book.)
+ Ethan Blake describes one approach in an article in The Forward:
"Jewish or Gentile, rigid or fluid, as a boisterous Friday night dinner or solo Saturday retreat — the practice of Shabbat can offer an accessible gift of spiritual transformation. As we strive daily to fix our inherently broken world in quests for idols and deceptive messiahs, perhaps Shabbat is a true and accessible utopia, neither a perfect nation nor era of peace, but a weekly consciousness that sees infinite gratitude for what really matters in our finite lives." (https://forward.
com/life /faith/ 414199/the-secular-case-for-a-biblical-sabbath/)
+ Tim Cahan points to a vastly different way in Rolling Stone: "A week before Kanye West and the Kardashians turned Easter Sunday into a hyped up celebration of music and merch, Diplo, Flume and a half-dozen other electronic acts had descended upon the shabby-chic Two Bunch Palms resort outside Palm Springs for a two-day event dubbed “Secular Sabbath.” Their goal: to provide an oasis for calm and creativity, set close enough to Coachella for attendees to feel the music, but far enough for them to feel a difference too."
(https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/kanye-sunday-service-diplo-flume-secular-sabbath-coachella-828693/)
The second alternative reclaims the importance of eating together, entering the silence of contemplation together, and caring for one another's wounds in community. It is free from denominational dogma and dominance, too but firmly rooted in the historic wisdom traditions of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or Buddhism. This clip from last week's PBS News is illustrative.
What all of the new/old experiments emphasize in very different ways are:
+ Maintaining primal encounters with the sacred: "Those moments when a mysterious power seems to break through the surface of ordinary human existence" as Heintzman describes it. Spirituality is not about belief or doctrine but encounters with the sacred - and how they can change our lives.
+ Linking our horizontal and vertical experiences of the holy with time-tested wisdom: Spiritual practices shared both in community and in private often are enriched when interpreted by tradition. Cynthia Bourgeault writes that when spirituality is shaped only by experience, it loses touch with the practice of surrender - and remains shallow.
+ Learning to discern the connections between ecstasy and everyday reverence: There is a rhythm to mature spirituality - like the beating of the heart - that trains us in the "in and out, back and forth, permanence and change, part and whole, union and union-union, rhythm of creation" that can sustain us through all of reality. (Heintzman)
After the current regime murdered Suleimani - boasting of their horrible act as righteous and ratcheting up their ugly rhetoric when diffusing fear and hatred would be in order - our news cycle went into hyperbolic overdrive. Non-stories filled with violent images filled the airwaves. Like Chris Hedges used to say: our "news" is addicted to blood and adrenaline, pumping us all up in ways that are degrading and unhealthy. Once again, I sense that it is time to turn them all OFF. It is time to be together with others in prayer. And silence. And it is time to dial back our own reactive vitriol. We can be angry, challenging, and direct without being vulgar, stupid, and cruel. We can join our voices with other peace-makers seeking a way through the danger that builds solidarity instead of merely adding more self-righteous noise to the already cluttered cacophony.
During the season of Epiphany, that begins with the Feast Day tomorrow, until Lent: why not practice a fast from the news cycle? Why not replace your obsession with prayer? Your speaking with silence? Your individualism with community? Could you? Would you? What do you need to make it happen? Let's give it a try maybe using this as our foundation?
Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved, as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
And it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
Amen.
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