Luke 2:15-20
When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”
So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.
Today on Christmas, I’ll share with you Thomas Merton’s words. In Seasons of Celebration, he writes about the birth of Christ. Merton is particularly moved by Christ as light, and our human need not only to receive the light within us, but more, to allow the light to shine through us. This is what Merton says:
Christ is born. He is born to us. And, he is born today. For Christmas is not merely a day like every other day. It is a day made holy and special by a sacred mystery. It is not merely another day in the weary round of time. Today, eternity enters into time and time, sanctified, is caught up into eternity. Today, Christ, the Eternal Word of the Father, who was in the beginning with the Father, in whom all things were made, by whom all things consist, enters into the world which he created in order to reclaim souls who have lost their identity. Therefore, the Church exults as the angels come down to announce not merely an old thing that happened long ago, but a new thing that happens today. For, today, God the Father makes all things new, in his Divine Son, our Redeemer, according to his words: Ecce nova facio omnia. . . .
At Christmas, more than ever, it is fitting to remember that we have no other light but Christ, who is born to us today. Let us reflect that he came down from heaven to be our light, and our life. He came, as he himself assures us, to be our way, by which we may return to the Father. Christ gives us light today to know him, in the Father and ourselves in him, so that thus knowing and possessing Christ, we may have life everlasting with him in the Father. . . .
Having realized, once again, who it is that comes to us, and having remembered that he alone is our light, let us open our eyes to the rising Sun, let us hasten to receive him and let us come together to celebrate the great mystery of charity which is the sacrament of our salvation and of our union in Christ. Let us receive Christ that we may in all truth be “light in the Lord” and that Christ may shine not only to us, but through us, and that we may all burn together in the sweet light of his presence in the world: I mean his presence in us, for we are his Body and his Holy Church. . . .
Christ, light of light, is born today, and since he is born to us, he is born in us as light and therefore we who believe are born today to new light. That is to say, our souls are born to new life and new grace by receiving him who is the Truth. For Christ, invisible in his own nature, has become visible in our nature. What else can this mean, except that first he has become visible as a man and second he has become visible in his Church? He wills to be visible in us, to live in us, and save us through his secret action in our own hearts and the hearts of our neighbors. So, we must receive the light of the newborn Savior by faith, in order to manifest it by our witness in common praise and by the works of our charity towards one another.
[Thomas Merton, Seasons of Celebration, pp. 102-105.]
Showing posts with label Merton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Merton. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 25, 2019
Friday, December 21, 2018
Third Friday of Advent - December 21, 2018
The Open Space
Luke 1:39-45
In Luke 1:36, the angel Gabriel seeks to convince a hesitant Mary that she indeed will have a child. As one of his corroborating claims, he tells Mary that her cousin Elizabeth is expecting a child even at her advanced age.
In those days, then, after the encounter with Gabriel, Mary hurries to see Elizabeth. Both women are in awkward places . . . Elizabeth as an aging mother-to-be . . . and Mary as a too-young, too-virgin mother-to-be. No doubt both were joyful, but also more than a bit concerned about their situations. Together they could support and comfort each other, as well as share their joy. Few others would understand their strange predicaments and few would be sympathetic to their situations.
Their meeting, though, includes a surprising confirmation of God's work. When Elizabeth hears Mary's greeting, the child within her leaps in recognition and joy. Perhaps the greeting was the typical Hebrew, "shalom."
But it may as well have been the ancient "namaste" . . . "the Divine living in me greets the Divine living in you."
Theotokos (God-bearer) icons often depict Mary holding Jesus. Some depict Jesus in Mary's womb. This icon, based on the Visitation of Mary to Elizabeth, depicts the new life within the wombs of both women. Both bear new life.
In 1965, Thomas Merton wrote about the deepest, most interior and hidden center within each of us. He called it le point vierge, literally "the virgin point." But the French phrase might better be translated the open center or the waiting space. This open space at our core is where we are most deeply and intimately connected to God, where none of our usual humanness selfishness litters, but where we are completely open to God . . . that place within us which only God can access, available only to God.
This is what Merton says:
Again, that expression, le point vierge, (I cannot translate it) comes in here. At the center of our being is a point of nothingness which is untouched by sin and by illusion, a point of pure truth, a point or spark which belongs entirely to God, which is never at our disposal, from which God disposes of our lives, which is inaccessible to the fantasies of our own mind or the brutalities of our own will. This little point of nothingness and of absolute poverty is the pure glory of God in us. It is so to speak His name written in us, as our poverty, as our indigence, as our dependence, as our sonship. It is like a diamond, blazing with the invisible light of heaven. It is in everybody, and if we could see it we would see these billions of points of light coming together in the face and blaze of a sun that would make all the darkness and cruelty of life vanish completely. . . . I have no program for this seeing. It is only given. But the gate of heaven is everywhere.
[Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, (New York: Image, 1965), 158.]
It seems to me that these two women knew well le point vierge and that they each said their, "Yes!" to it.
As the Christian mystics have reminded us through the centuries, "Like recognizes like." The new life within Elizabeth recognizes the new life in Mary . . . and the life Mary bears recognizes the life Elizabeth bears.
For Reflection:
** Perhaps today you would greet Mary with the words of the Christian mystic, Hildegard of Bingen:
Mary, ground of all being,
Greetings!
Greetings to you lovely and loving Mother!
You birthed to earth your Son.
You birthed the Son of God from heaven
by breathing the Spirit of God.
** What within you leaps when Mary enters the room? Ponder that image for a moment.
** In what concrete way are you theotokos (a bearer of God) this Advent?
Luke 1:39-45
In Luke 1:36, the angel Gabriel seeks to convince a hesitant Mary that she indeed will have a child. As one of his corroborating claims, he tells Mary that her cousin Elizabeth is expecting a child even at her advanced age.
In those days, then, after the encounter with Gabriel, Mary hurries to see Elizabeth. Both women are in awkward places . . . Elizabeth as an aging mother-to-be . . . and Mary as a too-young, too-virgin mother-to-be. No doubt both were joyful, but also more than a bit concerned about their situations. Together they could support and comfort each other, as well as share their joy. Few others would understand their strange predicaments and few would be sympathetic to their situations.
Their meeting, though, includes a surprising confirmation of God's work. When Elizabeth hears Mary's greeting, the child within her leaps in recognition and joy. Perhaps the greeting was the typical Hebrew, "shalom."
But it may as well have been the ancient "namaste" . . . "the Divine living in me greets the Divine living in you."
In 1965, Thomas Merton wrote about the deepest, most interior and hidden center within each of us. He called it le point vierge, literally "the virgin point." But the French phrase might better be translated the open center or the waiting space. This open space at our core is where we are most deeply and intimately connected to God, where none of our usual humanness selfishness litters, but where we are completely open to God . . . that place within us which only God can access, available only to God.
This is what Merton says:
Again, that expression, le point vierge, (I cannot translate it) comes in here. At the center of our being is a point of nothingness which is untouched by sin and by illusion, a point of pure truth, a point or spark which belongs entirely to God, which is never at our disposal, from which God disposes of our lives, which is inaccessible to the fantasies of our own mind or the brutalities of our own will. This little point of nothingness and of absolute poverty is the pure glory of God in us. It is so to speak His name written in us, as our poverty, as our indigence, as our dependence, as our sonship. It is like a diamond, blazing with the invisible light of heaven. It is in everybody, and if we could see it we would see these billions of points of light coming together in the face and blaze of a sun that would make all the darkness and cruelty of life vanish completely. . . . I have no program for this seeing. It is only given. But the gate of heaven is everywhere.
[Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, (New York: Image, 1965), 158.]
It seems to me that these two women knew well le point vierge and that they each said their, "Yes!" to it.
As the Christian mystics have reminded us through the centuries, "Like recognizes like." The new life within Elizabeth recognizes the new life in Mary . . . and the life Mary bears recognizes the life Elizabeth bears.
For Reflection:
** Perhaps today you would greet Mary with the words of the Christian mystic, Hildegard of Bingen:
Mary, ground of all being,
Greetings!
Greetings to you lovely and loving Mother!
You birthed to earth your Son.
You birthed the Son of God from heaven
by breathing the Spirit of God.
** What within you leaps when Mary enters the room? Ponder that image for a moment.
** In what concrete way are you theotokos (a bearer of God) this Advent?
Wednesday, December 19, 2018
Third Wednesday of Advent - December 19, 2018
Emptiness Breeds Hope
Judges 13:2-7, 24-25
Luke 1:5-25
Ancient peoples valued childbearing as a sign of fruitfulness and blessing. People devoted themselves to gods and goddesses of fertility to assure abundant crops, many children, and plentiful resources.
While the Hebrew people did not have deities who oversaw fertility, they were continually tempted to give homage to the fertility gods and goddesses of other nations. Infertility, in both the Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian Scriptures, was a state of dishonor.
In fact, the prevalent theological understanding in both testaments took an extreme view of childlessness. Having no children signaled God's curse and was seen as God's punishment for something the woman or a family member had done. To live a life of barrenness was a harsh sentence that meant ostracism and reduced standing in the community.
Yet, scripture also contains a rich history of women in Israel who were barren for long periods of time before God intervened to give them children (Sarah, Hannah, among others). In many instances, these children became important leaders in Israel.
Today's Old and New Testament readings tell two of these stories.
Judges 13 tells the story of Samson, born to Manoah and his wife who had been childless. "Barren" typically describes a woman like Mrs. Manoah in scripture. Her womb was empty, in other words. But God intervened and gave them Samson, a child they specially dedicated to God as a Nazirite. Samson would grow to become an Israelite hero.
Luke tells the story of Elizabeth and Zechariah, childless and advanced in years. Luke is careful to line out for his readers that both Elizabeth and Zechariah remained faithful to God despite their "empty" condition -- which their community likely viewed as God's curse -- even while they continued living in hope.
God's intervention in Elizabeth and Zechariah leads to the birth of John the Baptist, who we have met already this Advent.
The stories stand against the notion that childlessness is curse, and against a fated understanding of life's unfolding. God is in control of history . . . not just the world's history, but also the history of you and me. We are not subject to the whims of human initiative or efforts to control life by means that make sense to us.
The stories also suggest that God values emptiness, and the rest of scripture validates this truth. The one who is empty lives in hope, open to God's filling. About this hope that arises from emptiness, Thomas Merton said:
Supernatural hope is the virtue that strips us of all things in order to give us possession of all things. We do not hope for what we have. Therefore, to live in hope is to live in poverty, having nothing. And yet, if we abandon ourselves to the economy of Divine Providence, we have everything we hope for.
[Merton, No Man Is an Island, pp. 14-15]
For Reflection:
Reflect on some way you feel empty today. In what way are you "barren"? Perhaps you are barren of energy . . . empty of creativity . . . drained of love . . . peace is gone . . . missing the company of a person who is far away.
Today's meditation suggests that emptiness is the beginning of hope. Our poverty feeds hope in God and prepares us inwardly to receive the whatever-may-come of God without controlling what the whatever-may-come looks like.
Judges 13:2-7, 24-25
Luke 1:5-25
Ancient peoples valued childbearing as a sign of fruitfulness and blessing. People devoted themselves to gods and goddesses of fertility to assure abundant crops, many children, and plentiful resources.
While the Hebrew people did not have deities who oversaw fertility, they were continually tempted to give homage to the fertility gods and goddesses of other nations. Infertility, in both the Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian Scriptures, was a state of dishonor.
In fact, the prevalent theological understanding in both testaments took an extreme view of childlessness. Having no children signaled God's curse and was seen as God's punishment for something the woman or a family member had done. To live a life of barrenness was a harsh sentence that meant ostracism and reduced standing in the community.
Yet, scripture also contains a rich history of women in Israel who were barren for long periods of time before God intervened to give them children (Sarah, Hannah, among others). In many instances, these children became important leaders in Israel.
Today's Old and New Testament readings tell two of these stories.
Judges 13 tells the story of Samson, born to Manoah and his wife who had been childless. "Barren" typically describes a woman like Mrs. Manoah in scripture. Her womb was empty, in other words. But God intervened and gave them Samson, a child they specially dedicated to God as a Nazirite. Samson would grow to become an Israelite hero.
Luke tells the story of Elizabeth and Zechariah, childless and advanced in years. Luke is careful to line out for his readers that both Elizabeth and Zechariah remained faithful to God despite their "empty" condition -- which their community likely viewed as God's curse -- even while they continued living in hope.
God's intervention in Elizabeth and Zechariah leads to the birth of John the Baptist, who we have met already this Advent.
The stories stand against the notion that childlessness is curse, and against a fated understanding of life's unfolding. God is in control of history . . . not just the world's history, but also the history of you and me. We are not subject to the whims of human initiative or efforts to control life by means that make sense to us.
The stories also suggest that God values emptiness, and the rest of scripture validates this truth. The one who is empty lives in hope, open to God's filling. About this hope that arises from emptiness, Thomas Merton said:
Supernatural hope is the virtue that strips us of all things in order to give us possession of all things. We do not hope for what we have. Therefore, to live in hope is to live in poverty, having nothing. And yet, if we abandon ourselves to the economy of Divine Providence, we have everything we hope for.
[Merton, No Man Is an Island, pp. 14-15]
For Reflection:
Reflect on some way you feel empty today. In what way are you "barren"? Perhaps you are barren of energy . . . empty of creativity . . . drained of love . . . peace is gone . . . missing the company of a person who is far away.
Today's meditation suggests that emptiness is the beginning of hope. Our poverty feeds hope in God and prepares us inwardly to receive the whatever-may-come of God without controlling what the whatever-may-come looks like.
Thursday, December 13, 2018
Second Thursday of Advent - December 13, 2018
Violence and the Kingdom of God
Isaiah 41:13-20
Matthew 11:11-15
In the Gospel text today, Jesus introduces John the Baptist. We, the Gospel readers, have met John already. Now Jesus speaks to who he is.
John played a critical role in the unfolding project of God, but John's understanding of Jesus was incomplete. He imagined God's Messiah would come with fire, as an ax ready to chop down trees.
So Jesus claims that those who truly give themselves to a God-oriented life (kingdom of God) as modeled by Jesus, would have greater understanding and do more to shape the world than John . . . a wild and extreme claim.
Then, in a verse which is subject to a variety of interpretations, Jesus points out that people have been violently trying to live the kingdom-of-God-life (God-centered life) since the time of John. Perhaps the violence itself was influenced by John's fiery rhetoric, his ax-chopping-down-the-trees metaphors.
From the time of John the Baptist until now, violent people have been trying to take over the kingdom of heaven by force. (Matt. 11:12, CEV)
For a long time now people have tried to force themselves into God's Kingdom. (Matt 11:12, The Message)
From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subjected to violence, and violent people have been raiding it. (Matt. 11:12, NIV)
In his life's work and in his life's words, Jesus is clear that violence has no place in the kingdom of God. The God-centered life is not forced upon anyone and is not achieved by violence done to persons. It is not accomplished by powerfully forcing on people a set of beliefs or standards. There is no coercion in the kingdom of God.
And yet Christians all through the centuries continue to get this wrong. When Emperors Constantine and Licinius in 313 issued the Edict of Milan, they ushered in an age when the interests of the Church and the state were intricately woven together. With Christianity the favored religion, citizens of the empire were expected to be baptized, sometimes by force. The marriage of the Church to the state created an unhealthy union propelled by coercion.
Our own times are no stranger to that kind of compulsion. A friend -- and "research assistant" -- shared a blog with me Monday, the 50th anniversary of Thomas Merton's death, which remembered Merton warning that the marriage of religious fundamentalism and American nationalism would produce "the greatest orgy of idolatry the world has ever seen." (http://www.matthewfox.org/blog/on-the-50th-anniversary-of-thomas-mertons-death#)
Advent reminds us that God's ways are radically different from the ways of the world (and even the Church). The kingdom of God among us does not come in force and violence, but as a vulnerable child born to parents who were outside society's power structure.
For Reflection:
Have you ever used violence, excessive power or force, or compulsion to accomplish what you thought were noble ends?
Reflect on your experience in light of this Advent text.
Isaiah 41:13-20
Matthew 11:11-15
In the Gospel text today, Jesus introduces John the Baptist. We, the Gospel readers, have met John already. Now Jesus speaks to who he is.
John played a critical role in the unfolding project of God, but John's understanding of Jesus was incomplete. He imagined God's Messiah would come with fire, as an ax ready to chop down trees.
So Jesus claims that those who truly give themselves to a God-oriented life (kingdom of God) as modeled by Jesus, would have greater understanding and do more to shape the world than John . . . a wild and extreme claim.
Then, in a verse which is subject to a variety of interpretations, Jesus points out that people have been violently trying to live the kingdom-of-God-life (God-centered life) since the time of John. Perhaps the violence itself was influenced by John's fiery rhetoric, his ax-chopping-down-the-trees metaphors.
From the time of John the Baptist until now, violent people have been trying to take over the kingdom of heaven by force. (Matt. 11:12, CEV)
For a long time now people have tried to force themselves into God's Kingdom. (Matt 11:12, The Message)
From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subjected to violence, and violent people have been raiding it. (Matt. 11:12, NIV)
In his life's work and in his life's words, Jesus is clear that violence has no place in the kingdom of God. The God-centered life is not forced upon anyone and is not achieved by violence done to persons. It is not accomplished by powerfully forcing on people a set of beliefs or standards. There is no coercion in the kingdom of God.
And yet Christians all through the centuries continue to get this wrong. When Emperors Constantine and Licinius in 313 issued the Edict of Milan, they ushered in an age when the interests of the Church and the state were intricately woven together. With Christianity the favored religion, citizens of the empire were expected to be baptized, sometimes by force. The marriage of the Church to the state created an unhealthy union propelled by coercion.
Our own times are no stranger to that kind of compulsion. A friend -- and "research assistant" -- shared a blog with me Monday, the 50th anniversary of Thomas Merton's death, which remembered Merton warning that the marriage of religious fundamentalism and American nationalism would produce "the greatest orgy of idolatry the world has ever seen." (http://www.matthewfox.org/blog/on-the-50th-anniversary-of-thomas-mertons-death#)
Advent reminds us that God's ways are radically different from the ways of the world (and even the Church). The kingdom of God among us does not come in force and violence, but as a vulnerable child born to parents who were outside society's power structure.
For Reflection:
Have you ever used violence, excessive power or force, or compulsion to accomplish what you thought were noble ends?
Reflect on your experience in light of this Advent text.
Thursday, December 6, 2018
First Thurday of Advent - December 6, 2018
Hearing the Word
Isaiah 26:1-6
Matthew 7:21-27
“These words I speak to you are not incidental additions to your life, homeowner improvements to your standard of living. They are foundational words, words to build a life on. If you work these words into your life, you are like a smart carpenter who built his house on solid rock. . . ." (Matt. 7:24, The Message)
25 years ago, I did all sorts of things with the words spoken by Jesus. I studied them, memorized them, took seminary classes to illumine them, read books about them, taught them, preached sermons about them, quoted them. . . . I became skilled at handling the words, but much less skilled, to use the phrase in The Message, at "working these words into my life."
Jesus calls some ways of handling his words, "building a house on sand."
He calls other ways of handling his words, "building a house on solid rock."
Building a house in Jesus' wisdom saying is metaphor for building a life. In truth, God is present both in the house/life with a sand foundation and in the house/life with a foundation of rock. God is not limited by our wisdom and skill -- or lack thereof -- in building a life. Thus, what may be lacking in the house built on sand is our simple awareness that God is already in the house. Lacking that awareness, we allow ourselves to be thrown around by storms and windy weather, when acknowledging God in the house would immediately give us a solid foundation on which to stand.
In one of his journals, Thomas Merton wrote this:
I am content that these pages show me to be what I am, noisy, full of the racket of my imperfections and passions, and the wide open wounds left by my sins. Full of my own emptiness. Yet, ruined as my own house is, You live there!" (Merton, The Sign of Jonas.)
For Reflection:
1. Spend time today reflecting on Matthew 7:24 from The Message. Notice the words, phrases, or ideas that stand out to you. What do you hear God saying to you through these words, phrases, or ideas? What invitations from God do you sense?
2. Write your own "journal entry" in the style of Merton's entry above. How would you express your own sense of what Merton communicated in his short statement?
Isaiah 26:1-6
Matthew 7:21-27
“These words I speak to you are not incidental additions to your life, homeowner improvements to your standard of living. They are foundational words, words to build a life on. If you work these words into your life, you are like a smart carpenter who built his house on solid rock. . . ." (Matt. 7:24, The Message)
25 years ago, I did all sorts of things with the words spoken by Jesus. I studied them, memorized them, took seminary classes to illumine them, read books about them, taught them, preached sermons about them, quoted them. . . . I became skilled at handling the words, but much less skilled, to use the phrase in The Message, at "working these words into my life."
Jesus calls some ways of handling his words, "building a house on sand."
He calls other ways of handling his words, "building a house on solid rock."
Building a house in Jesus' wisdom saying is metaphor for building a life. In truth, God is present both in the house/life with a sand foundation and in the house/life with a foundation of rock. God is not limited by our wisdom and skill -- or lack thereof -- in building a life. Thus, what may be lacking in the house built on sand is our simple awareness that God is already in the house. Lacking that awareness, we allow ourselves to be thrown around by storms and windy weather, when acknowledging God in the house would immediately give us a solid foundation on which to stand.
In one of his journals, Thomas Merton wrote this:
I am content that these pages show me to be what I am, noisy, full of the racket of my imperfections and passions, and the wide open wounds left by my sins. Full of my own emptiness. Yet, ruined as my own house is, You live there!" (Merton, The Sign of Jonas.)
For Reflection:
1. Spend time today reflecting on Matthew 7:24 from The Message. Notice the words, phrases, or ideas that stand out to you. What do you hear God saying to you through these words, phrases, or ideas? What invitations from God do you sense?
2. Write your own "journal entry" in the style of Merton's entry above. How would you express your own sense of what Merton communicated in his short statement?
Tuesday, December 4, 2018
First Tuesday of Advent - December 4, 2018
Beginning . . . Again
Isaiah 11:1-10
Luke 10:21-24
Isaiah's prophecy looks to a time when a "root will come up from the stump" of Jesse (King David's lineage) . . . "from his roots a Branch will bear fruit."
In something that looks final (a stump), something new will begin to appear.
Something small and hidden (roots) will be the beginning of fruit-bearing.
In Luke 10:21, the revelation is entrusted to children, to the unsophisticated, not to the learned. We all have to begin as children, in other words.
Today's readings make clear a basic spiritual truth: The first step of the spiritual life is to begin, and to begin where you are, not where you would like to be or where you have been in the past.
Begin here, not there.
Begin now, not then.
Don't ever think of yourself as so advanced that you have no need to begin right here, right now. I've heard too many people through the years say, "I can't begin now . . . I'll begin when _______."
The only place from which you can begin is here. Now.
When a Benedictine monk was asked by a visitor what the monks did all day at the monastery, he replied, "We fall down and get up. Fall down and get up. Fall down and get up" (hence the title of John McQuiston's book on Benedictine spirituality, Always We Begin Again).
About the spiritual life, Thomas Merton wrote this: "One cannot begin to face the real difficulties of the life of prayer and meditation unless one is first perfectly content to be a beginner and really experience himself (sic) as one who knows little or nothing, and has a desperate need to learn the bare rudiments. Those who think they 'know' from the beginning will never, in fact, come to know anything. . . . We do not want to be beginners. But let us be convinced of the fact that we will never be anything else but beginners, all our life!" (Thomas Merton, Contemplative Prayer, pp. 36-37)
For Reflection:
1. Spend some time reflecting on what it means for you to be a beginner. How does that feel to you? What does it raise up within you? What part of you resists being a beginner? Sit with this as non-judgmentally as you can.
2. Take one of the quotes above (the Benedictine monk or the Merton quote) and sit with it. In whichever quote you choose, notice what ideas or lines speak to you. Also notice which ideas you resist. Bring both that which draws you and that which you resist into your prayer today.
Isaiah 11:1-10
Luke 10:21-24
Isaiah's prophecy looks to a time when a "root will come up from the stump" of Jesse (King David's lineage) . . . "from his roots a Branch will bear fruit."
In something that looks final (a stump), something new will begin to appear.
Something small and hidden (roots) will be the beginning of fruit-bearing.
In Luke 10:21, the revelation is entrusted to children, to the unsophisticated, not to the learned. We all have to begin as children, in other words.
Today's readings make clear a basic spiritual truth: The first step of the spiritual life is to begin, and to begin where you are, not where you would like to be or where you have been in the past.
Begin here, not there.
Begin now, not then.
Don't ever think of yourself as so advanced that you have no need to begin right here, right now. I've heard too many people through the years say, "I can't begin now . . . I'll begin when _______."
The only place from which you can begin is here. Now.
When a Benedictine monk was asked by a visitor what the monks did all day at the monastery, he replied, "We fall down and get up. Fall down and get up. Fall down and get up" (hence the title of John McQuiston's book on Benedictine spirituality, Always We Begin Again).
About the spiritual life, Thomas Merton wrote this: "One cannot begin to face the real difficulties of the life of prayer and meditation unless one is first perfectly content to be a beginner and really experience himself (sic) as one who knows little or nothing, and has a desperate need to learn the bare rudiments. Those who think they 'know' from the beginning will never, in fact, come to know anything. . . . We do not want to be beginners. But let us be convinced of the fact that we will never be anything else but beginners, all our life!" (Thomas Merton, Contemplative Prayer, pp. 36-37)
For Reflection:
1. Spend some time reflecting on what it means for you to be a beginner. How does that feel to you? What does it raise up within you? What part of you resists being a beginner? Sit with this as non-judgmentally as you can.
2. Take one of the quotes above (the Benedictine monk or the Merton quote) and sit with it. In whichever quote you choose, notice what ideas or lines speak to you. Also notice which ideas you resist. Bring both that which draws you and that which you resist into your prayer today.
Sunday, November 27, 2016
Magi: A Spirit of Exploration
After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” . . . Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.” After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route. (Matthew 2:1 – 2, 7 – 12)
In the landscape of the biblical narrative, the Magi were foreigners, outsiders, and strangers. They were auslanders in terms of their people group (the vividly descriptive word "auslander" in German literally means "outside the land") and auslanders in terms of their relationship to biblical faith. By most all historical accounts, the Magi were gentiles and not God-followers. They likely would have been regarded as pagans by the Gospel writers.
Apart from their religious orientation, they were scientists and astrologers, who believed that movements on earth and in the sky signaled some happening of significance. They were observant ("seers") and inquisitive, carefully searching out the earthly world and the celestial world for signs and wonders. They searched, not merely out of curiosity, but because they believed that the entire cosmos was connected and interrelated. In that sense, they were mystics in the best sense of the word, attentive to the world around them, noticing signs and movements that connected with real-world happenings. Something in the sky pointed them to important shifts on earth. They believed in a coherent world, a world held together as a whole, a world in which one thing, happening in one place, had implications and meaning in other parts of the world.
The world is coherent. Paul wrote of Jesus, “In him, all things were created . . . and in him, all things are held together” (Col. 1:15, 16).
Thomas Merton said that a hidden wholeness unifies everything.
So they were trained to be observant, to be watchful, to notice shifts, and then to make connections between the observed world and the more numinous personal world or inner world.
For the Magi, the presence of a new celestial light signaled a shift in their inner world. We don’t know how this happened, or why they came to this particular conclusion about a new star in the sky. We only know that they were compelled to chase it. Something within them drew them to follow the star, though they did not know where the journey would lead, though they did not have all the facts beforehand, though they had no guarantee of the outcome. They set out on a journey, trusting . . . going, yet not knowing where they were going.
They set out on pilgrimage, very much in the spirit of Celtic peregrinatio . . . that is, a journey or quest in which the pilgrim does not know the outcome. The Celtic saints would set out in a coracle, or small dingy, without a destination, trusting that the shore on which they landed -- if they landed at all -- would be the place God wanted them to be.
So the spirit of the Magi is the spirit of exploration, adventure, and wonder, a heart of openness to the mystery of the larger world, and the belief that the entire world is held together as a whole -- events in one place have meaning in all places.
I believe that Magi live within each of us. No matter how well-ordered or structured our lives, there is a something within us that longs to press out to the edges of life, that yearns to go beyond the little that we know and believe, and that truly does hunger for a spiritual journey that can shift life. Something within us wants to believe the world is coherent, that amidst the world's chaos, all things are held together.
For consideration:
Think about your own life experiences . . . even if you have to go back decades, consider a time when you followed an inner impulse -- you followed a star -- even when it seemed irrational or crazy to do so. Why did you take that particular path? Did you find it difficult to trust this path that you could not see? What kept you on that part of the journey?
In the landscape of the biblical narrative, the Magi were foreigners, outsiders, and strangers. They were auslanders in terms of their people group (the vividly descriptive word "auslander" in German literally means "outside the land") and auslanders in terms of their relationship to biblical faith. By most all historical accounts, the Magi were gentiles and not God-followers. They likely would have been regarded as pagans by the Gospel writers.
Apart from their religious orientation, they were scientists and astrologers, who believed that movements on earth and in the sky signaled some happening of significance. They were observant ("seers") and inquisitive, carefully searching out the earthly world and the celestial world for signs and wonders. They searched, not merely out of curiosity, but because they believed that the entire cosmos was connected and interrelated. In that sense, they were mystics in the best sense of the word, attentive to the world around them, noticing signs and movements that connected with real-world happenings. Something in the sky pointed them to important shifts on earth. They believed in a coherent world, a world held together as a whole, a world in which one thing, happening in one place, had implications and meaning in other parts of the world.
The world is coherent. Paul wrote of Jesus, “In him, all things were created . . . and in him, all things are held together” (Col. 1:15, 16).
Thomas Merton said that a hidden wholeness unifies everything.
So they were trained to be observant, to be watchful, to notice shifts, and then to make connections between the observed world and the more numinous personal world or inner world.
For the Magi, the presence of a new celestial light signaled a shift in their inner world. We don’t know how this happened, or why they came to this particular conclusion about a new star in the sky. We only know that they were compelled to chase it. Something within them drew them to follow the star, though they did not know where the journey would lead, though they did not have all the facts beforehand, though they had no guarantee of the outcome. They set out on a journey, trusting . . . going, yet not knowing where they were going.
They set out on pilgrimage, very much in the spirit of Celtic peregrinatio . . . that is, a journey or quest in which the pilgrim does not know the outcome. The Celtic saints would set out in a coracle, or small dingy, without a destination, trusting that the shore on which they landed -- if they landed at all -- would be the place God wanted them to be.
So the spirit of the Magi is the spirit of exploration, adventure, and wonder, a heart of openness to the mystery of the larger world, and the belief that the entire world is held together as a whole -- events in one place have meaning in all places.
I believe that Magi live within each of us. No matter how well-ordered or structured our lives, there is a something within us that longs to press out to the edges of life, that yearns to go beyond the little that we know and believe, and that truly does hunger for a spiritual journey that can shift life. Something within us wants to believe the world is coherent, that amidst the world's chaos, all things are held together.
For consideration:
Think about your own life experiences . . . even if you have to go back decades, consider a time when you followed an inner impulse -- you followed a star -- even when it seemed irrational or crazy to do so. Why did you take that particular path? Did you find it difficult to trust this path that you could not see? What kept you on that part of the journey?
Friday, December 18, 2015
For Those Weary of Planning for and Talking about Christmas
"I'm tired of planning for and talking about Christmas. I just want some space to sit with it, apart from the many self-imposed distractions and tugs that scatter my attention."
I said these words last week to some friends as we talked about our experience of Advent and Christmas. I've been planning Advent and Christmas services since early November. I've been talking about Christmas, both in writing and in speech for almost that long. I'm tired of it. I'm tired of talking about the concept and planning for the experience. It feels blasphemous that I should want something to be ended before it has even arrived -- especially something so "holy" as Christmas. Yet, that is the honest truth about my interior state.
And I feel this way not only about the planning that is part of my daily work. My personal planning for Christmas is nearly shot, also. Day after day I'm haunted by inner voices that whisper, "But what are you going to buy so-and-so? . . . and what about a gift for what's-her-name? . . ." Shadowy voices rumble around within me, voices of compulsion and drivenness. Some years my gift-giving is divinely inspired -- the year I gave my golfing friends Titleist golf balls inscribed with, "MEDITATE THIS, THOMAS MERTON!" -- but not so this year. It's been a grinding chore. I'm about to give in, now one week before Christmas, go to Amazon.com, and hit the "BUY!" button: "Squatty Potties for everyone!!" I'd have them in hand for distribution by December 22.
One of my friends, to whom I vented about my weariness over Christmas talk and planning, asked a helpful clarifying question: "If you were able just to sit with the season, what would you find?"
I don't know what I'd find. I believe there would be much less compulsion and drivenness crowding the soul-space. Maybe there would be simple openness, even emptiness. As it is, I sit each morning in my mauve rocker with the worn armrests, reading Advent and Christmas texts, waiting for something to come at me . . . waiting to hear . . . waiting to catch a glimpse. Little seems to move toward me. It's mostly just sitting in a space in which precious little seems to be going on . . . except the compulsiveness, the self-guilt over my sad gift-giving, and the weariness that accompanies those voices.
In fact, I feels something like a kind of "virgin" through the season, as the Virgin Mary entered her own experience in emptiness and simple openness. (I have more thoughts on the "virginity" to which the season invites us . . . I may share them in this space in a few days.)
To be sure, I look at my calendar and see services, events, gatherings, where I am compelled to have something to say about Christmas . . . and I will gladly step into those places . . . after all, I'd hate to waste all this great planning and strategizing of the last two months.
But mostly, I'm longing for no thinking, no words, no strategizing, no talking about. Instead, simply a sitting-in. A being-with.
And IF you find a Squatty Potty under your Christmas tree . . .
I said these words last week to some friends as we talked about our experience of Advent and Christmas. I've been planning Advent and Christmas services since early November. I've been talking about Christmas, both in writing and in speech for almost that long. I'm tired of it. I'm tired of talking about the concept and planning for the experience. It feels blasphemous that I should want something to be ended before it has even arrived -- especially something so "holy" as Christmas. Yet, that is the honest truth about my interior state.
And I feel this way not only about the planning that is part of my daily work. My personal planning for Christmas is nearly shot, also. Day after day I'm haunted by inner voices that whisper, "But what are you going to buy so-and-so? . . . and what about a gift for what's-her-name? . . ." Shadowy voices rumble around within me, voices of compulsion and drivenness. Some years my gift-giving is divinely inspired -- the year I gave my golfing friends Titleist golf balls inscribed with, "MEDITATE THIS, THOMAS MERTON!" -- but not so this year. It's been a grinding chore. I'm about to give in, now one week before Christmas, go to Amazon.com, and hit the "BUY!" button: "Squatty Potties for everyone!!" I'd have them in hand for distribution by December 22.
One of my friends, to whom I vented about my weariness over Christmas talk and planning, asked a helpful clarifying question: "If you were able just to sit with the season, what would you find?"
I don't know what I'd find. I believe there would be much less compulsion and drivenness crowding the soul-space. Maybe there would be simple openness, even emptiness. As it is, I sit each morning in my mauve rocker with the worn armrests, reading Advent and Christmas texts, waiting for something to come at me . . . waiting to hear . . . waiting to catch a glimpse. Little seems to move toward me. It's mostly just sitting in a space in which precious little seems to be going on . . . except the compulsiveness, the self-guilt over my sad gift-giving, and the weariness that accompanies those voices.
In fact, I feels something like a kind of "virgin" through the season, as the Virgin Mary entered her own experience in emptiness and simple openness. (I have more thoughts on the "virginity" to which the season invites us . . . I may share them in this space in a few days.)
To be sure, I look at my calendar and see services, events, gatherings, where I am compelled to have something to say about Christmas . . . and I will gladly step into those places . . . after all, I'd hate to waste all this great planning and strategizing of the last two months.
But mostly, I'm longing for no thinking, no words, no strategizing, no talking about. Instead, simply a sitting-in. A being-with.
And IF you find a Squatty Potty under your Christmas tree . . .
Monday, November 29, 2010
The First Tuesday of Advent -- November 30, 2010
Luke 10:21 - 24
At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.
“All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no one knows who the Father is except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
Then he turned to his disciples and said privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.”
You'll notice that today's passage from Luke is full of the language of seeing and hearing, hiddenness and revealing. These words represent an underground current that runs through the Gospels. It is a current that is especially strong during Advent.
For all of us there are things hidden. The basic condition of our humanity is that we don't see what is real. We live in illusion. We don't see what is most true about ourselves, others, the world, and most of all about God.
Furthermore, since this condition of un-seeing and un-hearing is fundamentally a part of our condition as humans, it is completely unfair to chastise persons for not seeing what they cannot see. Yet, so much of traditional religious expression holds people over a barrel for not knowing what they don't know or for not seeing what they are not able to see.
So if chastisement for not seeing and not knowing is out of bounds, what should be our posture?
The prophets of old may not have seen the fullness of God, according to Jesus' words, but they spoke what they did see. And beyond speaking what they saw and proclaiming the experience of God they had, these prophets pointed to a time when the incompleteness of seeing and knowing would be fulfilled.
They spoke with confidence and faith about what they knew and experienced of God. But there was also a humility about the prophets. They did not know what they did not know; however, they knew that they did not know. It makes all the difference.
Strange as it may seem, the beginning place of seeing is to acknowledge that you don't see. The beginning place of knowledge and wisdom is to confess that you don't know.
During Advent we confess that we live in darkness. Like the Hebrew Prophets, we testify to what we have experienced of God. We also acknowledge that we don't see totally. The illusion with which we live darkens our sight, clouding both our seeing and our knowing.
The light embodied by Jesus illumines our lives, enables our seeing, enlivens our knowing.
This is how Thomas Merton speaks of seeing and knowing in the spiritual life:
In the spiritual life there are no tricks and no short cuts. . . . One cannot begin to face the real difficulties of the life of prayer and meditation unless one is first perfectly content to be a beginner and really experience oneself as one who knows little or nothing, and has a desperate need to learn the bare rudiments. Those who think they "know" from the beginning never, in fact, come to know anything. . . .
We do not want to be beginners. But let us be convinced of the fact that we will never be anything else but beginners, all our life.
At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.
“All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no one knows who the Father is except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
Then he turned to his disciples and said privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.”
You'll notice that today's passage from Luke is full of the language of seeing and hearing, hiddenness and revealing. These words represent an underground current that runs through the Gospels. It is a current that is especially strong during Advent.
For all of us there are things hidden. The basic condition of our humanity is that we don't see what is real. We live in illusion. We don't see what is most true about ourselves, others, the world, and most of all about God.
Furthermore, since this condition of un-seeing and un-hearing is fundamentally a part of our condition as humans, it is completely unfair to chastise persons for not seeing what they cannot see. Yet, so much of traditional religious expression holds people over a barrel for not knowing what they don't know or for not seeing what they are not able to see.
So if chastisement for not seeing and not knowing is out of bounds, what should be our posture?
The prophets of old may not have seen the fullness of God, according to Jesus' words, but they spoke what they did see. And beyond speaking what they saw and proclaiming the experience of God they had, these prophets pointed to a time when the incompleteness of seeing and knowing would be fulfilled.
They spoke with confidence and faith about what they knew and experienced of God. But there was also a humility about the prophets. They did not know what they did not know; however, they knew that they did not know. It makes all the difference.
Strange as it may seem, the beginning place of seeing is to acknowledge that you don't see. The beginning place of knowledge and wisdom is to confess that you don't know.
During Advent we confess that we live in darkness. Like the Hebrew Prophets, we testify to what we have experienced of God. We also acknowledge that we don't see totally. The illusion with which we live darkens our sight, clouding both our seeing and our knowing.
The light embodied by Jesus illumines our lives, enables our seeing, enlivens our knowing.
This is how Thomas Merton speaks of seeing and knowing in the spiritual life:
In the spiritual life there are no tricks and no short cuts. . . . One cannot begin to face the real difficulties of the life of prayer and meditation unless one is first perfectly content to be a beginner and really experience oneself as one who knows little or nothing, and has a desperate need to learn the bare rudiments. Those who think they "know" from the beginning never, in fact, come to know anything. . . .
We do not want to be beginners. But let us be convinced of the fact that we will never be anything else but beginners, all our life.
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