Every day this month I'm listening to Advent texts, mostly drawn from Isaiah's vision of who God is and what God is doing in the world. Isaiah tends to be lyrical, using vivid images to illumine honestly the situation of the world and God's place at the center of history -- not only in ancient times, but today as well.
Isaiah' prophecy covers a wide swath of time, from a season when Israel was threatened by foreign powers, to the time when those foreign powers devastated the people and the land, to the days when God began to restore what had been demolished. There are a lot of moving pieces in Isaiah, and it's not easy to follow the action. Only God and God's desire for healing and justice holds together the far-reaching prophecy.
I recently attended The Nutcracker again, performed by a troupe whose artistic director had a different vision of the story than that to which I was accustomed. His approach was quite nontraditional. At times the action on stage seemed disjointed. I tried to follow the story line as part of the troupe danced on one part of the stage, while children huddled in mock-conversation in another part of the stage, while other characters were coming and going, stage right and stage left. My eyesight -- and attention -- wandered from corner to corner in the busy scene as I tried to figure out how this scene was carrying the plot forward.
Then I noticed help. A spotlight from above and behind me was following around the stage one pair of dancers. These were the leads, the principal dancers. The spotlight was telling me, "Follow this action. At this moment, these dancers are the most important thing happening on stage." I realized that the production crew was helping novices like me to understand the story, to catch the important movements that were key to the unfolding narrative, by use of a highlighter. For the rest of the ballet, I followed the spotlight.
In a sense, Isaiah provides us a spotlight by continually calling us back to God. In his day, there was plenty going on in the world that asked for the attention of Isaiah's community. Pieces were moving everywhere.
And in our day, there are all sorts of noisy voices calling out, "Look at me! Look at me!" Our attention is prone to wander . . . to chase an act of brutality here . . . a new political reality there . . . spending our days chasing Facebook posts, angry tweets, and news-feeds. The relentless pace can drive you nuts.
But like that ballet spotlight, Isaiah shines a light upon God. In our day, we would do well to take our cue from the prophet.
In effect, Isaiah says, "All the commotion in the world is trying to call your attention to it. Be alert. Don't divert your gaze. Don't do that. Pay attention to what God is doing in the world. Keep the eyes of your heart focused on God's work, God's promise, God's nature. Don't be distracted. Don't let your vision wander."
This isn't easy to do. I'm as distracted -- and distractable -- as the next person. But I want to ask different questions about life, the world, and the commotion around us.
What are God's hopes for the world? What is God's design for the world?
What is God doing in the world?
How is God at work today, even in the midst of much hatred, division, and alienation? How do I notice God's presence today in concrete ways?
How am I invited to join God in what God is doing in the world? When I follow the spotlight, how might God invite me to respond?
Showing posts with label Advent. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Advent. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 11, 2019
Tuesday, December 3, 2019
Learning a Different Wisdom
There must be a time of day when the man who makes plans forgets his plans, and acts as if he had no plans at all. There must be a time of day when the man who has to speak falls very silent. And his mind forms no more propositions, and he asks himself: Did they have any meaning? There must be a time when a man of prayer goes to pray as if it were the first time in his life he had ever prayed; when the man of resolutions puts his resolutions aside as if they had all been broken, and he learns a different wisdom: distinguishing the sun from the moon, the stars from the darkness, the sea from the dry land, and the night sky from the shoulder of a hill. [Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island, p. 260.]
Black Friday . . . Small-Business Saturday . . . Cyber Monday . . . Giving Tuesday . . .
Who comes up with this stuff, anyway? Well, I think I know the answer,especially when I hear the many reports of how "successful" or "unsuccessful" these days are . . . when the impact of the days is measured in $$$ and %.
Advent arrives as a blanket warming the cold, market-driven days, urging me to "forget my plans" . . . "fall very silent" . . . "pray as if for the first time" . . . "learn a different wisdom."
Advent does not speak the language of market growth or GNP or China trade deals or even "what will I get the grandchildren for Christmas?"
The season offers a quieter, gentler invitation . . . to reevaluate and recalibrate . . . to stay rooted in that which is life- and light-giving, rather than getting carried away by the distractive pulls of the moment . . . to join a more universal design that transcends my little social gatherings and travel plans and musical specials.
Merton was not writing about Advent per se, but he might as well have been describing the season.
I am tempted, this early morning in Advent, to state my goals for the season: “forget my plans” . . . “fall very silent” . . . “pray as if for the first time” . . . “learn a different wisdom.” But I think I would regret placing my own agenda on the days, forcing this grand, unfathomable season into my own little gift box, so that by the end I could measure it - maybe in % - to see how successful or unsuccessful I was.
No, I think instead I'll just be alert what shows up . . . I'll stay open to the grace and mercy hiding in whatever is . . . I'll allow the warm blanket of Advent to cover all the coldness within me and in the world.
Black Friday . . . Small-Business Saturday . . . Cyber Monday . . . Giving Tuesday . . .
Who comes up with this stuff, anyway? Well, I think I know the answer,especially when I hear the many reports of how "successful" or "unsuccessful" these days are . . . when the impact of the days is measured in $$$ and %.
Advent arrives as a blanket warming the cold, market-driven days, urging me to "forget my plans" . . . "fall very silent" . . . "pray as if for the first time" . . . "learn a different wisdom."
Advent does not speak the language of market growth or GNP or China trade deals or even "what will I get the grandchildren for Christmas?"
The season offers a quieter, gentler invitation . . . to reevaluate and recalibrate . . . to stay rooted in that which is life- and light-giving, rather than getting carried away by the distractive pulls of the moment . . . to join a more universal design that transcends my little social gatherings and travel plans and musical specials.
Merton was not writing about Advent per se, but he might as well have been describing the season.
I am tempted, this early morning in Advent, to state my goals for the season: “forget my plans” . . . “fall very silent” . . . “pray as if for the first time” . . . “learn a different wisdom.” But I think I would regret placing my own agenda on the days, forcing this grand, unfathomable season into my own little gift box, so that by the end I could measure it - maybe in % - to see how successful or unsuccessful I was.
No, I think instead I'll just be alert what shows up . . . I'll stay open to the grace and mercy hiding in whatever is . . . I'll allow the warm blanket of Advent to cover all the coldness within me and in the world.
Saturday, November 26, 2016
Advent Anticipation
Advent is the season that anticipates the birth of Christ, the four Sundays leading up to Christmas. For centuries, the Church has paused during Advent to consider the meaning of this birth, to anticipate the birth of the Savior not only at Christmas, but in every moment of life. This year, Advent begins Sunday, November 27. Songs of longing and anticipation characterize the season, as well as the sprinkling of Christmas songs that begin to engage our hearts in the resounding joy of new life and the birth in Christ to which we are all invited.
This Advent, I'm interested in some of the characters in the traditional nativity narrative. Typically, the characters get analyzed and summarized in stereotypical ways, so that we find a handful of life-lessons in their presence at the Nativity. This year, I want to take a little different track. What if we approached the story of Jesus' birth and the characters surrounding his birth as if they were each alive somewhere within us? The approach reflects my growing understanding that we as humans are much more alike than we are different . . . that all of the foibles and glories of the worst and best among us also live within me. So what would it mean, for example, if I believed that something of the shepherds from the Christmas story lives on in me? What if the spirit of the Magi were also within me? What if there is a part of me that is like the angels, who proclaimed and sang at Jesus' birth? What if I found a corner of my life that was inhabited by the ruler Herod?
The method is akin to what one might experience in a form of Ignatian meditation and prayer. It is a way, I believe, in which we can each personalize the Birth story . . . that is, not hold it at arms length to analyze it, but to allow it close in order to personalize it. Not only, then, do I enter the story, but the story and its characters enter me!
So for the next four weeks, I'll use poetry and scripture to write about some of these characters, in hopes that we will be able to locate them within our own interior . . . and in hopes that we will recognize the Christmas story as our story. I'll post thoughts several times a week on my Daily Advent blog (www.Adailyadvent.blogspot.com).
Tomorrow we begin. We'll consider the Magi, and using poetry and story we'll try to locate and be in touch with the Magi living within each of us. In the following weeks, we'll give attention to the shepherds, the angels, Herod and the innkeeper.
I invite you to make the journey with me.
This Advent, I'm interested in some of the characters in the traditional nativity narrative. Typically, the characters get analyzed and summarized in stereotypical ways, so that we find a handful of life-lessons in their presence at the Nativity. This year, I want to take a little different track. What if we approached the story of Jesus' birth and the characters surrounding his birth as if they were each alive somewhere within us? The approach reflects my growing understanding that we as humans are much more alike than we are different . . . that all of the foibles and glories of the worst and best among us also live within me. So what would it mean, for example, if I believed that something of the shepherds from the Christmas story lives on in me? What if the spirit of the Magi were also within me? What if there is a part of me that is like the angels, who proclaimed and sang at Jesus' birth? What if I found a corner of my life that was inhabited by the ruler Herod?
The method is akin to what one might experience in a form of Ignatian meditation and prayer. It is a way, I believe, in which we can each personalize the Birth story . . . that is, not hold it at arms length to analyze it, but to allow it close in order to personalize it. Not only, then, do I enter the story, but the story and its characters enter me!
So for the next four weeks, I'll use poetry and scripture to write about some of these characters, in hopes that we will be able to locate them within our own interior . . . and in hopes that we will recognize the Christmas story as our story. I'll post thoughts several times a week on my Daily Advent blog (www.Adailyadvent.blogspot.com).
Tomorrow we begin. We'll consider the Magi, and using poetry and story we'll try to locate and be in touch with the Magi living within each of us. In the following weeks, we'll give attention to the shepherds, the angels, Herod and the innkeeper.
I invite you to make the journey with me.
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 . . .
Wednesday, December 2, 2015
What Rest?
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." (Matt. 11:28)
I was particularly sensitive to Jesus' words in Matthew 11:28 when I read them a couple of days ago. They caught my attention on the long end of a stretch in which I've dealt with health issues that brought several weeks of lean sleep.
Ahhh, but to be able to sleep again. Rest, sweet rest.
In my naivete', I've supposed that this was the rest Jesus promises. Rest. Sleep. A pause from the demands of work. Respite from the constant houndings of daily life. A moment free from "forced" creativity. Eight hours of non-interrupted REM sleep.
But when I read the passage this time, I asked some other questions of this rest.
What is the rest Jesus gives? Is is rest from physical exhaustion? Is it emotional rest? Is it rest from carrying the burdens others place upon me? Is it rest from health concerns?
And I began to consider other kinds of rest . . . rest from trying to control everyone else around me . . . rest from being attached to outcomes . . . rest from worry about things I cannot control . . . and rest from the control I try to exert over the way things turn out, that they should look the way I want them to look. . . .
Is it rest from my compulsions?
Is it rest from my attachment to security?
Is it rest from my attachment to good health?
Is it rest from my attachment to comfort?
I realize that so much anxiety and worry comes when any of these things are thwarted, when my attachment to them is threatened. Truly, the anxiety and worry represent "no rest", no sense of well-being. They are wearisome, draining, exhausting, pulling out my interior resources, spending energy on that over which I usually have little control.
For this season of my life, I sense that rest is not getting plenty of sleep. As always, I reserve the right to change my mind about these things . . . but for today, rest looks more like letting go of compulsions and releasing attachments.
My experience has been that only in the context of a vertical, Divine-human, I-Thou relationship, do I recognize these compulsions and attachments. The contemplative journey gives me the space to see myself more and more clearly, to see what is more true about myself, and to name the compulsions and attachments which are illusory.
Further, it gives me some language -- even if limited -- to speak to these compulsions and attachments. And it gives me some practices that are well-suited for breaking up the hardened soil of the attachments in order that I might live more freely for good and healing in the world.
Jesus, it would seem to me, is much more invested in this kind of liberating rest that heals me and heals the world than in my prospects for getting a good, eight hour sleep.
I was particularly sensitive to Jesus' words in Matthew 11:28 when I read them a couple of days ago. They caught my attention on the long end of a stretch in which I've dealt with health issues that brought several weeks of lean sleep.
Ahhh, but to be able to sleep again. Rest, sweet rest.
In my naivete', I've supposed that this was the rest Jesus promises. Rest. Sleep. A pause from the demands of work. Respite from the constant houndings of daily life. A moment free from "forced" creativity. Eight hours of non-interrupted REM sleep.
But when I read the passage this time, I asked some other questions of this rest.
What is the rest Jesus gives? Is is rest from physical exhaustion? Is it emotional rest? Is it rest from carrying the burdens others place upon me? Is it rest from health concerns?
And I began to consider other kinds of rest . . . rest from trying to control everyone else around me . . . rest from being attached to outcomes . . . rest from worry about things I cannot control . . . and rest from the control I try to exert over the way things turn out, that they should look the way I want them to look. . . .
Is it rest from my compulsions?
Is it rest from my attachment to security?
Is it rest from my attachment to good health?
Is it rest from my attachment to comfort?
I realize that so much anxiety and worry comes when any of these things are thwarted, when my attachment to them is threatened. Truly, the anxiety and worry represent "no rest", no sense of well-being. They are wearisome, draining, exhausting, pulling out my interior resources, spending energy on that over which I usually have little control.
For this season of my life, I sense that rest is not getting plenty of sleep. As always, I reserve the right to change my mind about these things . . . but for today, rest looks more like letting go of compulsions and releasing attachments.
My experience has been that only in the context of a vertical, Divine-human, I-Thou relationship, do I recognize these compulsions and attachments. The contemplative journey gives me the space to see myself more and more clearly, to see what is more true about myself, and to name the compulsions and attachments which are illusory.
Further, it gives me some language -- even if limited -- to speak to these compulsions and attachments. And it gives me some practices that are well-suited for breaking up the hardened soil of the attachments in order that I might live more freely for good and healing in the world.
Jesus, it would seem to me, is much more invested in this kind of liberating rest that heals me and heals the world than in my prospects for getting a good, eight hour sleep.
Tuesday, December 1, 2015
Advent's Slow Crawl
This past Sunday was the First Sunday of Advent.
The season of Advent is intended for preparation, waiting, and expectancy, beginning four Sundays before Christmas. Advent themes of hope, love, peace, and joy are intended to prepare our hearts for the birth of Jesus. In Advent truly conceived, that birth is not a faraway event represented by a calendar date, but rather a birth that takes place continually within human hearts as we make room for the coming of Christ within us.
For me, though, the season of Advent begins as more of a slow crawl. I don't get a running start, or even a rolling start into Advent. In the United States, the first days of Advent fall on the heels of Thanksgiving, travel, Black Friday, and gatherings with family and friends.
Advent crawls out of the blocks. I have to make myself speak the words and sing the songs. I'm grateful for the season, the colors, the candles, the readings, just not quite ready for it.
But Advent doesn't inquire about my readiness, nor does it particularly care whether or not I'm prepared for the season. It doesn't mind that I'm road-weary from travel or overloaded with tryptophan or that Black Friday and Cyber Monday have stuffed my inbox with two email ads for every one I can delete.
Advent comes, ready or not. It comes . . . to announce a coming.
Christ has come . . . Christ is coming . . . Christ will come.
Christ comes always, continuously, in every time. Christ comes everywhere, relentlessly, in every place, welcoming or not.
This is my slow crawl into Advent. I don't feel bad about it -- though years ago I did -- but rather just accept it for what it is. I'll come around. I'll get there eventually.
Give me a bit . . . I'll catch up to you.
The season of Advent is intended for preparation, waiting, and expectancy, beginning four Sundays before Christmas. Advent themes of hope, love, peace, and joy are intended to prepare our hearts for the birth of Jesus. In Advent truly conceived, that birth is not a faraway event represented by a calendar date, but rather a birth that takes place continually within human hearts as we make room for the coming of Christ within us.
For me, though, the season of Advent begins as more of a slow crawl. I don't get a running start, or even a rolling start into Advent. In the United States, the first days of Advent fall on the heels of Thanksgiving, travel, Black Friday, and gatherings with family and friends.
Advent crawls out of the blocks. I have to make myself speak the words and sing the songs. I'm grateful for the season, the colors, the candles, the readings, just not quite ready for it.
But Advent doesn't inquire about my readiness, nor does it particularly care whether or not I'm prepared for the season. It doesn't mind that I'm road-weary from travel or overloaded with tryptophan or that Black Friday and Cyber Monday have stuffed my inbox with two email ads for every one I can delete.
Advent comes, ready or not. It comes . . . to announce a coming.
Christ has come . . . Christ is coming . . . Christ will come.
Christ comes always, continuously, in every time. Christ comes everywhere, relentlessly, in every place, welcoming or not.
This is my slow crawl into Advent. I don't feel bad about it -- though years ago I did -- but rather just accept it for what it is. I'll come around. I'll get there eventually.
Give me a bit . . . I'll catch up to you.
Saturday, December 24, 2011
The Christmas Eve Benedictus: For Prayer and Meditation
The Song of Zechariah, also known as the Benedictus, is prayed daily each morning in the Liturgy of the Hours. It is taken from Luke 1:67 - 79, the prayer of Zechariah after the birth of a son (John) to him and Elizabeth. It is one of three "canticles" early in Luke's Gospel (Mary's Magnificat and Simeon's Nunc Dimittis) that are used in the daily prayers of the Church. It also is the Scripture passage given for reading and prayer on Christmas Eve.
I am especially drawn to the Benedictus. I have prayed it from prayer books and in monastic settings for years. Its words are ingrained in my consciousness. They have been life to me. (I've included the text of the Benedictus below, as well as a way to prayer or meditate on the passage.)
The Benedictus is also a wonderfully appropriate Advent prayer. The images fit perfectly with this season of watching for light and waiting in hope.
So for the last three years I've used this prayer as a centerpiece for the weekly Contemplative Worship experience of which I am a part. I personally find it to be a beautiful expression of Advent hope for myself and the world. Others have responded well to it, as well, and found life in its words.
Last weekend, a worshiper in that service noticed that we were still using the Benedictus in worship, especially the last two verses, once or twice in each service. This person noted that had used the same prayer last year in worship, also. She was simply making the observation about the Canticle's prominence in worship.
I responded to her comment by saying, "Yes, we've used it for three years now . . . and we're going to keep saying it until we get it right!"
We all laughed. Of course, I didn't mean, "Until we all say it the right way," or "Until we get the cadence right," or "Until the intonation suits me."
I meant, "We're going to say it until we really open ourselves to its truth."
That is, until we live in the truth that one has come to us to save us from enemies, both enemies in the outer world, but mostly enemies in our internal world . . .
. . . until we open ourselves to worship God without fear and intimation, but in mercy and loving-kindness . . .
. . . until we really get the mercy and compassion of God as it is extended toward us without condition, and then live in it more than talk about it . . .
. . . until we live in the light of God, no matter how dark our situations or our "shadows of death" seem.
. . . until our feet our guided onto the path of peace, so that we not only speak of peace, but actively live into the peace of God for all people.
The Church has been praying the Benedictus daily for centuries. We're still trying to "get it right." And we'll be praying it for a long time yet to come.
Luke 1:67 - 79
His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied:
“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel,
because he has come to his people and redeemed them.
He has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of his servant David
(as he said through his holy prophets of long ago),
salvation from our enemies
and from the hand of all who hate us—
to show mercy to our ancestors
and to remember his holy covenant,
the oath he swore to our father Abraham:
to rescue us from the hand of our enemies,
and to enable us to serve him without fear
in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.
And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High;
for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,
to give his people the knowledge of salvation
through the forgiveness of their sins,
because of the tender mercy of our God,
by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven
to shine on those living in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the path of peace.”
A Meditation
On this eve of the birth of Christ, try this for a meditation:
Read through the Canticle of Zechariah once more.
Pick out the line or phrase that seems to have your name written on it.
Pull that line out of the prayer, and then stay with it for a few moments.
Take several tries at putting it into your own words. Paraphrase it.
How is that line being lived out in your life?
Whisper the line quietly several times, until you sense the phrase sinking from your head down into your heart.
Then carry that line with you as a breath prayer through this Christmas Eve.
I am especially drawn to the Benedictus. I have prayed it from prayer books and in monastic settings for years. Its words are ingrained in my consciousness. They have been life to me. (I've included the text of the Benedictus below, as well as a way to prayer or meditate on the passage.)
The Benedictus is also a wonderfully appropriate Advent prayer. The images fit perfectly with this season of watching for light and waiting in hope.
So for the last three years I've used this prayer as a centerpiece for the weekly Contemplative Worship experience of which I am a part. I personally find it to be a beautiful expression of Advent hope for myself and the world. Others have responded well to it, as well, and found life in its words.
Last weekend, a worshiper in that service noticed that we were still using the Benedictus in worship, especially the last two verses, once or twice in each service. This person noted that had used the same prayer last year in worship, also. She was simply making the observation about the Canticle's prominence in worship.
I responded to her comment by saying, "Yes, we've used it for three years now . . . and we're going to keep saying it until we get it right!"
We all laughed. Of course, I didn't mean, "Until we all say it the right way," or "Until we get the cadence right," or "Until the intonation suits me."
I meant, "We're going to say it until we really open ourselves to its truth."
That is, until we live in the truth that one has come to us to save us from enemies, both enemies in the outer world, but mostly enemies in our internal world . . .
. . . until we open ourselves to worship God without fear and intimation, but in mercy and loving-kindness . . .
. . . until we really get the mercy and compassion of God as it is extended toward us without condition, and then live in it more than talk about it . . .
. . . until we live in the light of God, no matter how dark our situations or our "shadows of death" seem.
. . . until our feet our guided onto the path of peace, so that we not only speak of peace, but actively live into the peace of God for all people.
The Church has been praying the Benedictus daily for centuries. We're still trying to "get it right." And we'll be praying it for a long time yet to come.
Luke 1:67 - 79
His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied:
“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel,
because he has come to his people and redeemed them.
He has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of his servant David
(as he said through his holy prophets of long ago),
salvation from our enemies
and from the hand of all who hate us—
to show mercy to our ancestors
and to remember his holy covenant,
the oath he swore to our father Abraham:
to rescue us from the hand of our enemies,
and to enable us to serve him without fear
in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.
And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High;
for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,
to give his people the knowledge of salvation
through the forgiveness of their sins,
because of the tender mercy of our God,
by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven
to shine on those living in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the path of peace.”
A Meditation
On this eve of the birth of Christ, try this for a meditation:
Read through the Canticle of Zechariah once more.
Pick out the line or phrase that seems to have your name written on it.
Pull that line out of the prayer, and then stay with it for a few moments.
Take several tries at putting it into your own words. Paraphrase it.
How is that line being lived out in your life?
Whisper the line quietly several times, until you sense the phrase sinking from your head down into your heart.
Then carry that line with you as a breath prayer through this Christmas Eve.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
More Mary . . . A Model and a Prayer for the Contemplative Life
Two days ago I posted a blog here that I had written for my meditation at A Daily Advent (http://adailyadvent.blogspot.com). The reflection was based on Luke 1:26 - 38, the Gospel reading for the Fourth Sunday of Advent. That meditation briefly explored grace and "favor," trying to locate grace as the character of God that is not based on the worthiness of the recipient.
That same text is repeated today, so at A Daily Advent I took a different look at Mary, this time focusing on Luke 1:38 and writing about Mary as a model for the contemplative life. I also suggest Luke 1:38 as a kind of breath prayer to carry through the next few days.
I've included the gist of the post from A Daily Advent below.
Luke 1:38
“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me according to your word.” Then the angel left her.
I wrote two days ago about Mary and the elaborate back-story the Church constructed centuries ago about her life, as if to justify her "favor" with God on the basis of her merits. In short, the Church formulated a "history" for Mary that was pristine enough that she stood out as the one who deserved to be the Holy Mother of God. As I said then, that historical reconfiguring of her life doesn't witness to God's grace, but rather to her goodness. I don't think that's how God works in human life. Grace and favor are always about God's choosing, not Mary's deserving or our deserving.
Further, I don't need that back-story to know that Mary is perhaps the best New Testament model for the contemplative life available to us. She modeled a life of radical trust and union with God. Let me explain.
She was simple. She realized she had not earned this "favor." She took things that happened to her and around her, and she "pondered them in her heart." She "treasured them in her heart." That is, she didn't make a huge, public show of her connection to God. She didn't parade her interior life in the public eye. She didn't make a fuss about what she notices of God's work in the world. She didn't flaunt her holiness. She didn't showcase her experience of the Divine in front of others. Rather, she drew her God-experience into her heart and let it incubate there.
Mary did what her Son would later suggest we all do when we go to prayer. In the Sermon on the Mount he taught us not to pray in a way that draws attention to ourselves (on the street corners and busy intersections of life), but to withdraw to our secret room, that is, to our inner room where we meet the Father in private.
Mary got it.
She is a esteemed as the Mother of God not because of the intricate story the Church imaginatively told about her, but because of what we know from the report of Scripture.
In fact, her words at the conclusion of this text are probably the best mantra for the contemplative life I know. They state simply and succinctly the essence of life with God, the very fundamentals of union with God.
"Here I am. Let it be with me according to your word." Or, "Let it be to me as you have said."
Here I am. I am where I am. My soul is not in the past, locked into old narratives. Neither am I living in the future. I am not in some other geographical location. I am where I am, physically and spiritually. I am who I am.
It is a real gift for any of us to say, "Here I am," to be present without distractions, to allow all the aspects of our personhood (body, mind, soul and spirit) to show up in the same place at the same time.
This is so hard for me to do, but Mary not only said it. She did it.
Let it be with me according to your word. A surrender. But more, an openness to the design of God in her life, to the action of God which was mysterious and beyond her comprehension. Yet, she did not shut out God's hand. She did not close the door to God's invitation.
This is the stance of the contemplative, who steps into the cloud or walks into the darkness not knowing what is ahead, not knowing what she will find, but trusting the One who calls and invites, believing that even if the Divine work is not fully understood, it is still good and life-giving. Even when the God-path is unrecognizable, it is still a path that leads to life, wholeness, and the essence of what it means to be fully human.
You might want to make these two simple sentences your prayer for the next week. Carry the prayer on your heart. Whisper it with your lips. Let the depth of the prayer anchor you for the week.
"Here I am. Let it be to me as you have said."
That same text is repeated today, so at A Daily Advent I took a different look at Mary, this time focusing on Luke 1:38 and writing about Mary as a model for the contemplative life. I also suggest Luke 1:38 as a kind of breath prayer to carry through the next few days.
I've included the gist of the post from A Daily Advent below.
Luke 1:38
“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me according to your word.” Then the angel left her.
I wrote two days ago about Mary and the elaborate back-story the Church constructed centuries ago about her life, as if to justify her "favor" with God on the basis of her merits. In short, the Church formulated a "history" for Mary that was pristine enough that she stood out as the one who deserved to be the Holy Mother of God. As I said then, that historical reconfiguring of her life doesn't witness to God's grace, but rather to her goodness. I don't think that's how God works in human life. Grace and favor are always about God's choosing, not Mary's deserving or our deserving.
Further, I don't need that back-story to know that Mary is perhaps the best New Testament model for the contemplative life available to us. She modeled a life of radical trust and union with God. Let me explain.
She was simple. She realized she had not earned this "favor." She took things that happened to her and around her, and she "pondered them in her heart." She "treasured them in her heart." That is, she didn't make a huge, public show of her connection to God. She didn't parade her interior life in the public eye. She didn't make a fuss about what she notices of God's work in the world. She didn't flaunt her holiness. She didn't showcase her experience of the Divine in front of others. Rather, she drew her God-experience into her heart and let it incubate there.
Mary did what her Son would later suggest we all do when we go to prayer. In the Sermon on the Mount he taught us not to pray in a way that draws attention to ourselves (on the street corners and busy intersections of life), but to withdraw to our secret room, that is, to our inner room where we meet the Father in private.
Mary got it.
She is a esteemed as the Mother of God not because of the intricate story the Church imaginatively told about her, but because of what we know from the report of Scripture.
In fact, her words at the conclusion of this text are probably the best mantra for the contemplative life I know. They state simply and succinctly the essence of life with God, the very fundamentals of union with God.
"Here I am. Let it be with me according to your word." Or, "Let it be to me as you have said."
Here I am. I am where I am. My soul is not in the past, locked into old narratives. Neither am I living in the future. I am not in some other geographical location. I am where I am, physically and spiritually. I am who I am.
It is a real gift for any of us to say, "Here I am," to be present without distractions, to allow all the aspects of our personhood (body, mind, soul and spirit) to show up in the same place at the same time.
This is so hard for me to do, but Mary not only said it. She did it.
Let it be with me according to your word. A surrender. But more, an openness to the design of God in her life, to the action of God which was mysterious and beyond her comprehension. Yet, she did not shut out God's hand. She did not close the door to God's invitation.
This is the stance of the contemplative, who steps into the cloud or walks into the darkness not knowing what is ahead, not knowing what she will find, but trusting the One who calls and invites, believing that even if the Divine work is not fully understood, it is still good and life-giving. Even when the God-path is unrecognizable, it is still a path that leads to life, wholeness, and the essence of what it means to be fully human.
You might want to make these two simple sentences your prayer for the next week. Carry the prayer on your heart. Whisper it with your lips. Let the depth of the prayer anchor you for the week.
"Here I am. Let it be to me as you have said."
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Mary and the Grace That Really Is Radical
I've posted the thoughts below on my Advent blog, A Daily Advent http://adailyadvent.blogspot.com. The Scripture text is the Gospel reading for today, the Fourth Sunday of Advent.
The Church, both historic and contemporary, has talked a great deal about "grace," but usually in ways that have not been "graceful."
We ("we" because I'm a part of the Church) have talked about grace with our lips, but been more concerned to punish "sinners" and those who do not measure up to some artificial standards.
We have spoken of "mercy" and asked liturgically for "mercy," but have not witnessed to mercy in our life together.
On the whole, those who follow Christ have little experience of "grace" as a practiced way of living. For most, it is an empty concept, just one of those church-y words devoid of impact, something the pie-in-the-sky crowd talks about on Sundays.
Maybe the words below can speak a bit more about the radical nature of grace as an alternative way of ordering life. It is intended simply as a piece for daily devotional use.
jw
Luke 1:26 - 38
In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end.”
“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.”
“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me according to your word.” Then the angel left her.
"Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you." . . . "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God."
Mary was perplexed and pondered the words. I imagine myself receiving this greeting, this statement of being favored by God.
What did I do to deserve this?
Why am I favored?
I immediately want to make the "favor" about something I've earned, a reward for some kind of good I have done or something I have accomplished.
"I've been faithful in my little bit . . . so now I'm receiving some favor." There is a deep well of that kind of deserving that lives within me.
The Church didn't help us with this one through the centuries, making up an elaborate back-story about Mary and her lineage with the intent of showing how perfect Mary was, how spotless and sinless she was. The point was to suggest that Mary was chosen for this role because she deserved to be chosen by God . . . that this was a reward for her meticulous and morally perfect life.
The implicit message was that you could only be chosen by God if you were morally perfect. You could only be "favored" if you were sinless. You could only bear God's Son in the world if you measured up. You could only receive God's grace if you were completely blameless.
Many of us have lived underneath these overt and subtle messages from the Church for a lifetime. We have heard the messages and internalized them, so that now the message of deserving and perfection comes not only from the Church, it also comes from within us.
Followers of Christ everywhere have lived under these false, "anti-grace" messages for centuries.
If indeed the choosing of Mary by God was a graced choosing, then the Church's imaginary back-story has to be thrown out.
You get a hint of the radical grace (the language of "favor") in the story by noticing Mary's reaction to the "grace-greeting." She was perplexed. She had to ponder it. Apparently, she couldn't find any rational reason for the choosing. She couldn't understand what she had done to deserve this "favor" or grace.
If the Church through the centuries had really allowed this to be a story of grace, the back-story about Mary might have remembered that she was a rebellious teenager, often in trouble with parents and authority figures, and living counter to the social (and religious!) norms of her day.
In fact -- though I have no evidence for my imaginative re-interpretation -- the scenario I have suggested may be closer to Mary's truth . . . which would explain, perhaps, her perplexity at Gabriel's greeting, and what she had to ponder in her heart.
Because in the end, for whatever her actual history, the "favoring" did not rest on Mary's merits, but on the God who extended the "favoring."
Likewise, when I enter the passage and hear that I, too, am favored, this favoring does not exist because of what I have done or who I am; but rather it comes to me (and you!) because of who God is. That's how it always is.
I don't need to understand it or analyze it or pick it apart. I am invited simply to rest in it. Like Mary . . . "Here I am . . . let it be to me as you have said."
The Church, both historic and contemporary, has talked a great deal about "grace," but usually in ways that have not been "graceful."
We ("we" because I'm a part of the Church) have talked about grace with our lips, but been more concerned to punish "sinners" and those who do not measure up to some artificial standards.
We have spoken of "mercy" and asked liturgically for "mercy," but have not witnessed to mercy in our life together.
On the whole, those who follow Christ have little experience of "grace" as a practiced way of living. For most, it is an empty concept, just one of those church-y words devoid of impact, something the pie-in-the-sky crowd talks about on Sundays.
Maybe the words below can speak a bit more about the radical nature of grace as an alternative way of ordering life. It is intended simply as a piece for daily devotional use.
jw
Luke 1:26 - 38
In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end.”
“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.”
“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me according to your word.” Then the angel left her.
"Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you." . . . "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God."
Mary was perplexed and pondered the words. I imagine myself receiving this greeting, this statement of being favored by God.
What did I do to deserve this?
Why am I favored?
I immediately want to make the "favor" about something I've earned, a reward for some kind of good I have done or something I have accomplished.
"I've been faithful in my little bit . . . so now I'm receiving some favor." There is a deep well of that kind of deserving that lives within me.
The Church didn't help us with this one through the centuries, making up an elaborate back-story about Mary and her lineage with the intent of showing how perfect Mary was, how spotless and sinless she was. The point was to suggest that Mary was chosen for this role because she deserved to be chosen by God . . . that this was a reward for her meticulous and morally perfect life.
The implicit message was that you could only be chosen by God if you were morally perfect. You could only be "favored" if you were sinless. You could only bear God's Son in the world if you measured up. You could only receive God's grace if you were completely blameless.
Many of us have lived underneath these overt and subtle messages from the Church for a lifetime. We have heard the messages and internalized them, so that now the message of deserving and perfection comes not only from the Church, it also comes from within us.
Followers of Christ everywhere have lived under these false, "anti-grace" messages for centuries.
If indeed the choosing of Mary by God was a graced choosing, then the Church's imaginary back-story has to be thrown out.
You get a hint of the radical grace (the language of "favor") in the story by noticing Mary's reaction to the "grace-greeting." She was perplexed. She had to ponder it. Apparently, she couldn't find any rational reason for the choosing. She couldn't understand what she had done to deserve this "favor" or grace.
If the Church through the centuries had really allowed this to be a story of grace, the back-story about Mary might have remembered that she was a rebellious teenager, often in trouble with parents and authority figures, and living counter to the social (and religious!) norms of her day.
In fact -- though I have no evidence for my imaginative re-interpretation -- the scenario I have suggested may be closer to Mary's truth . . . which would explain, perhaps, her perplexity at Gabriel's greeting, and what she had to ponder in her heart.
Because in the end, for whatever her actual history, the "favoring" did not rest on Mary's merits, but on the God who extended the "favoring."
Likewise, when I enter the passage and hear that I, too, am favored, this favoring does not exist because of what I have done or who I am; but rather it comes to me (and you!) because of who God is. That's how it always is.
I don't need to understand it or analyze it or pick it apart. I am invited simply to rest in it. Like Mary . . . "Here I am . . . let it be to me as you have said."
Friday, December 16, 2011
Holy Spontaneity
For 34 years I've been engaged in ministry as a vocation. That means I've walked through 34 Advents and Christmases.
[Well, I guess technically I only have about 30 Advents under my belt. In the evangelical tradition of which I was a part for the early years of my spiritual journey, Advent was not observed and I wouldn't have known a thing about the word. I "discovered" Advent as a high-church Baptist in Fort Worth, Texas . . . and remember that first Advent being blown away by the colors, the symbolism, the richness of the days preceding Christmas. It was one of the most life-giving "discoveries" of my life at that time!]
Each year is very different, but also very much the same. While Christmas brings its own nuance, in 34 years the pace of the days between Thanksgiving and Christmas has not changed a bit. It is fast and constant. Long ago I stopped lamenting how busy life becomes at Christmas time. It does no good to gripe and complain about being exhausted or tending to special services and projects or about spending time shopping for friends and loved ones. I go into the season knowing that I'm going to be busy and that my time will be pressed. I acknowledge that my calendar will fill quickly and that my interior introvert will ache to run off into a quiet room, shut the door and hide for a few days.
But neither do I completely give in to the parts of the season that seek to divert my attention from God's work in me and in the world. One practice that helps keep me sane through Advent is what I call "holy spontaneity." It is the sort of spiritual discipline that is appropriate for any time of year, but seems especially beneficial around the busyness of Christmas.
In my vision, "holy spontaneity" simply means that I take time occasionally during December to do things that are unscripted. By "unscripted," I mean things that are not on my calendar. "Holy spontaneity" -- for me, anyway -- is made up of things that are not on the map of my life and that have no motivation behind them. In other words, they are not things that I do in order to accomplish something specific.
For me, they fit well within Eugene Peterson's definition of "sabbath time," that is, wasting time for (and with) God.
For example, during Advent I may take a drive without a specific destination. I'll just drive and see where the road takes me. I'll give attention to what I see as I drive. If I feel like stopping at a park I'll stop. If I need to get out and walk, I'll walk.
Or I'll go to a store or a mall, not to shop, but just to walk around. I'll notice people. I'll notice the colors in the store, the decorations. I'll be deliberate in compassion for those who work in those stores. I don't need to buy anything and I have no agenda. I just go.
Or I'll take a walk, just to walk. In order for it to be "holy spontaneity" for me, I'll take a different route than I usually take for my evening dog-walk. I won't plan the route, I'll just walk.
Granted, none of the things I've just mentioned sound particularly "spiritual." But in the midst of a season that can feel rushed, wearying and over-calendared, a bit of holy spontaneity can be life-giving.
Maybe this works well for me because my life is so scheduled, so tightly regimented. My calendar fills up and I have little room for flexibility. I know what needs to be accomplished each day -- whether I actually accomplish it is another matter!.
So holy spontaneity is simply doing something for which there is no plan, no agenda, no script. It means taking a piece of time here or there to be open to something unscripted that arises, to attend to what may come up without trying to force or manipulate something to be significant.
To the extent that holy spontaneity is a spiritual practice that highlights surprise, it lends itself to being more present to each moment, more aware of what is happening in the "right now."
You might want to give it a try in these last ten days before Christmas. You may find that a few moments of holy spontaneity give renewed depth and meaning to all your other moments of busyness and obligation.
And if, as you read this, you find yourself thinking, "There's NO WAY I have time for that!", then maybe this is the spiritual practice that would serve you best this Advent.
[Well, I guess technically I only have about 30 Advents under my belt. In the evangelical tradition of which I was a part for the early years of my spiritual journey, Advent was not observed and I wouldn't have known a thing about the word. I "discovered" Advent as a high-church Baptist in Fort Worth, Texas . . . and remember that first Advent being blown away by the colors, the symbolism, the richness of the days preceding Christmas. It was one of the most life-giving "discoveries" of my life at that time!]
Each year is very different, but also very much the same. While Christmas brings its own nuance, in 34 years the pace of the days between Thanksgiving and Christmas has not changed a bit. It is fast and constant. Long ago I stopped lamenting how busy life becomes at Christmas time. It does no good to gripe and complain about being exhausted or tending to special services and projects or about spending time shopping for friends and loved ones. I go into the season knowing that I'm going to be busy and that my time will be pressed. I acknowledge that my calendar will fill quickly and that my interior introvert will ache to run off into a quiet room, shut the door and hide for a few days.
But neither do I completely give in to the parts of the season that seek to divert my attention from God's work in me and in the world. One practice that helps keep me sane through Advent is what I call "holy spontaneity." It is the sort of spiritual discipline that is appropriate for any time of year, but seems especially beneficial around the busyness of Christmas.
In my vision, "holy spontaneity" simply means that I take time occasionally during December to do things that are unscripted. By "unscripted," I mean things that are not on my calendar. "Holy spontaneity" -- for me, anyway -- is made up of things that are not on the map of my life and that have no motivation behind them. In other words, they are not things that I do in order to accomplish something specific.
For me, they fit well within Eugene Peterson's definition of "sabbath time," that is, wasting time for (and with) God.
For example, during Advent I may take a drive without a specific destination. I'll just drive and see where the road takes me. I'll give attention to what I see as I drive. If I feel like stopping at a park I'll stop. If I need to get out and walk, I'll walk.
Or I'll go to a store or a mall, not to shop, but just to walk around. I'll notice people. I'll notice the colors in the store, the decorations. I'll be deliberate in compassion for those who work in those stores. I don't need to buy anything and I have no agenda. I just go.
Or I'll take a walk, just to walk. In order for it to be "holy spontaneity" for me, I'll take a different route than I usually take for my evening dog-walk. I won't plan the route, I'll just walk.
Granted, none of the things I've just mentioned sound particularly "spiritual." But in the midst of a season that can feel rushed, wearying and over-calendared, a bit of holy spontaneity can be life-giving.
Maybe this works well for me because my life is so scheduled, so tightly regimented. My calendar fills up and I have little room for flexibility. I know what needs to be accomplished each day -- whether I actually accomplish it is another matter!.
So holy spontaneity is simply doing something for which there is no plan, no agenda, no script. It means taking a piece of time here or there to be open to something unscripted that arises, to attend to what may come up without trying to force or manipulate something to be significant.
To the extent that holy spontaneity is a spiritual practice that highlights surprise, it lends itself to being more present to each moment, more aware of what is happening in the "right now."
You might want to give it a try in these last ten days before Christmas. You may find that a few moments of holy spontaneity give renewed depth and meaning to all your other moments of busyness and obligation.
And if, as you read this, you find yourself thinking, "There's NO WAY I have time for that!", then maybe this is the spiritual practice that would serve you best this Advent.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Amazed at What You Find Within
Thomas Merton followed Bernard of Clairvaux (12th century) in writing about the three Advents of Christ. The first Advent, Bernard said, was the coming of Christ in human form, born to Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem.
The third Advent will be the coming of Christ again at the end of the age.
During the season of Advent, we give most of our time to the first Advent, and a little less to the third Advent.
We seem to be slowly recovering the second Advent, which according to Bernard and Merton, is the continual coming of Christ into our lives in our times. This is an ongoing Advent that happens every day within us and in our world. Christ is born into our life-world momently, whether we notice his coming or not.
Thus, Meister Eckhart and others have urged us to prepare a space within our hearts for his birth every day -- not just for one day or one season a year!
Merton put it this way in Seven Storey Mountain: "The soul of a monk is a Bethlehem where Christ comes to be born." And not only monks, but all who give themselves to Jesus in openness and with intention, are invited to open up the stable of the heart, the Bethlehem of the heart to allow Christ's birth within.
I am drawn to meditations and art that help me open up to this birth. It can be hard to trust that God could birth something of value within me . . . yet deep within I believe that is what God does in and with each one of us. Like Mary, we open ourselves to God's work within us and we, too, bear Christ constantly in our lives.
These words, written by Kathleen Norris, helped me believe today that Jesus is being birthed in me.
The job of any preacher, it seems to me, is not to dismiss the Annunciation because it doesn’t appeal to modern prejudices but to remind congregations of why it might still be an important story. I once heard a Benedictine friend who is an Assiniboine Indian preach on the Annunciation to an Indian congregation. “The first thing Gabriel does when he encounters Mary,” he said, “is to give her a new name: ‘Most favored one.’ It’s a naming ceremony,” he emphasized, making a connection that excited and delighted his listeners. When I brood on the story of the Annunciation, I like to think about what it means to be “overshadowed” by the Holy Spirit; I wonder if a kind of overshadowing isn’t what every young woman pregnant for the first time might feel, caught up in something so much larger than herself. I think of James Wright’s little poem “Trouble,” and the wonder of his pregnant mill-town girl. The butt of jokes, the taunt of gossips, she is amazed to carry such power within herself. “Sixteen years, and / all that time, she thought she was nothing / but skin and bones.” . . . Told all her life that she is “nothing,” the girl discovers in herself another, deeper reality. A mystery: something holy, with a potential for salvation. The poem has challenged me for years to wonder what such a radically new sense of oneself would entail. Could it be a form of virgin birth?
[Meditations on Mary: With Essays by Kathleen Norris (New York: Viking Studio, 1999), 30 – 31.]
The third Advent will be the coming of Christ again at the end of the age.
During the season of Advent, we give most of our time to the first Advent, and a little less to the third Advent.
We seem to be slowly recovering the second Advent, which according to Bernard and Merton, is the continual coming of Christ into our lives in our times. This is an ongoing Advent that happens every day within us and in our world. Christ is born into our life-world momently, whether we notice his coming or not.
Thus, Meister Eckhart and others have urged us to prepare a space within our hearts for his birth every day -- not just for one day or one season a year!
Merton put it this way in Seven Storey Mountain: "The soul of a monk is a Bethlehem where Christ comes to be born." And not only monks, but all who give themselves to Jesus in openness and with intention, are invited to open up the stable of the heart, the Bethlehem of the heart to allow Christ's birth within.
I am drawn to meditations and art that help me open up to this birth. It can be hard to trust that God could birth something of value within me . . . yet deep within I believe that is what God does in and with each one of us. Like Mary, we open ourselves to God's work within us and we, too, bear Christ constantly in our lives.
These words, written by Kathleen Norris, helped me believe today that Jesus is being birthed in me.
The job of any preacher, it seems to me, is not to dismiss the Annunciation because it doesn’t appeal to modern prejudices but to remind congregations of why it might still be an important story. I once heard a Benedictine friend who is an Assiniboine Indian preach on the Annunciation to an Indian congregation. “The first thing Gabriel does when he encounters Mary,” he said, “is to give her a new name: ‘Most favored one.’ It’s a naming ceremony,” he emphasized, making a connection that excited and delighted his listeners. When I brood on the story of the Annunciation, I like to think about what it means to be “overshadowed” by the Holy Spirit; I wonder if a kind of overshadowing isn’t what every young woman pregnant for the first time might feel, caught up in something so much larger than herself. I think of James Wright’s little poem “Trouble,” and the wonder of his pregnant mill-town girl. The butt of jokes, the taunt of gossips, she is amazed to carry such power within herself. “Sixteen years, and / all that time, she thought she was nothing / but skin and bones.” . . . Told all her life that she is “nothing,” the girl discovers in herself another, deeper reality. A mystery: something holy, with a potential for salvation. The poem has challenged me for years to wonder what such a radically new sense of oneself would entail. Could it be a form of virgin birth?
[Meditations on Mary: With Essays by Kathleen Norris (New York: Viking Studio, 1999), 30 – 31.]
Friday, December 9, 2011
The Advent Prose -- An Ancient Prayer for the Season
On December 9, 1962, Thomas Merton referred in his journal to a text that was shaping his prayer for peace. The text is called, in Latin, the Rorate Coeli, and is taken from Isaiah. The Latin text is attributed to Aurelius Clemens Prudentius, a 4th century author, and has been said or sung for centuries during Advent, mostly in Anglican and Roman Catholic settings.
After seeing the reference in Merton's journal from 49 years ago, I was curious about this ancient text. I found that it is commonly known as The Advent Prose, and in some circles used quite frequently for liturgical prayer in corporate worship during this season.
But it also is helpful as a personal, devotional prayer-tool. As I've stayed with this prayer over the last few days, I've found it compelling, and its imagery has led me to some unexpected places in my own meditation. I'll share The Advent Prose (Rorate Coeli) with you below. You can find more information about it at http://topmostapple.blogspot.com/2011/11/advent-prose-2011.html
The core piece of this section of the prayer is taken from the Latin translation (Vulgate) of Isaiah 45:8, and is a prayer for God to bring forth a Saviour.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
Be not very angry, O Lord, neither remember our iniquity for ever:
thy holy cities are a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation:
our holy and our beautiful house, where our fathers praised thee.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
We have sinned, and are as an unclean thing,
and we all do fade as a leaf:
our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away;
thou hast hid thy face from us:
and hast consumed us, because of our iniquities.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen;
that ye may know me and believe me:
I, even I, am the Lord, and beside me there is no Saviour:
and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, my salvation shall not tarry:
I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions:
fear not for I will save thee:
for I am the Lord thy God, the holy one of Israel, thy Redeemer.
After seeing the reference in Merton's journal from 49 years ago, I was curious about this ancient text. I found that it is commonly known as The Advent Prose, and in some circles used quite frequently for liturgical prayer in corporate worship during this season.
But it also is helpful as a personal, devotional prayer-tool. As I've stayed with this prayer over the last few days, I've found it compelling, and its imagery has led me to some unexpected places in my own meditation. I'll share The Advent Prose (Rorate Coeli) with you below. You can find more information about it at http://topmostapple.blogspot.com/2011/11/advent-prose-2011.html
The core piece of this section of the prayer is taken from the Latin translation (Vulgate) of Isaiah 45:8, and is a prayer for God to bring forth a Saviour.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
Be not very angry, O Lord, neither remember our iniquity for ever:
thy holy cities are a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation:
our holy and our beautiful house, where our fathers praised thee.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
We have sinned, and are as an unclean thing,
and we all do fade as a leaf:
our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away;
thou hast hid thy face from us:
and hast consumed us, because of our iniquities.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen;
that ye may know me and believe me:
I, even I, am the Lord, and beside me there is no Saviour:
and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour forth righteousness:
let the earth be fruitful, and bring forth a Saviour.
Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, my salvation shall not tarry:
I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions:
fear not for I will save thee:
for I am the Lord thy God, the holy one of Israel, thy Redeemer.
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
The Christmas Illusion
Years ago I heard someone talk longingly about their past experiences of Christmas, lamenting how commercial and complicated Christmas had become. This person spoke of childhood memories of Christmas. "Christmas was much simpler then," is how the matter was stated.
He spoke of going to Christmas Eve services as a child . . . his fascination with candles lit and held by persons across the worship space . . . the beauty of the Christmas carols sung by hundreds of worshipers on that holy night . . . the colors and smells in the worship place . . . seeing everyone dressed up for that very special service. In retelling the childhood memories, there was the longing for "simplicity" and "simpler times."
It caused me to consider my own experiences of Christmas as a child. I thought of several things that had seemed very basic to my experiences of Christmas in Oklahoma; upon further consideration, however, I realized that they were actually not simple at all. What I experienced as "simple" was, in fact, hard work for someone else.
Christmas Eve services required ministers to preside, choirs to sing, ushers to ush, persons to prepare the space beforehand and to clean the space afterwards. My part? I got to attend and then go home.
Large family gatherings required that someone clean house, gather groceries, prepare the meal, and then clean up the mess afterwards. My part? I ate the meal and then took a nap.
You see how it goes. . . .
When I became a parent, I realized that my work was only beginning when the children went to bed on Christmas Eve. Of course, they wanted to stay up late to get a peek at Santa Claus. So even after going to bed, they lay there unable to sleep. Or sometimes they faked sleep in order to get an early glimpse of their Christmas presents.
Thus, it was usually very late when someone (you've guessed who!) had to assemble the bicycles, set up the toys, wrap last-minute gifts, or -- the most stupid idea I ever had -- set up the trampoline in the backyard, beginning around midnight. When the kids went to bed, well, that was the beginning of my night! There was nothing simple about it . . . except the perception.
That the season is or should be simple is an illusion . . . usually carried from childhood. It is the Christmas illusion. Advent and Christmas are no simpler than any other season of daily life.
So you might hear things like, "We (folks tend to speak in "we" language about these kinds of illusions rather than "I" statements) need to get back to the real meaning of Christmas."
The real meaning of Christmas is that Christ comes into our world, that Jesus is embodied in our lives, that God took on flesh to live among us and within us.
I don't need to run off and hide in a hole to live out that real meaning of Christmas. I am invited, rather, to engage life as it is, not as I wish it to be.
In truth, spirituality is not an escape from the real, not a way to hide from responsibilities and relationships. It is, rather, a different way to engage what is real. It is a way of entering into life as it is, not life as we wish it would be. Spirituality means engagement and encounter, not escape.
So it is of no use for me to try creating a "perfect Christmas" or to get back to some idealized notion of what we should see and feel through Advent and Christmas.
The perfect Christmas is not the one where we hide our heads in the sand, but rather the one in which we engage life-as-it-is with and for God.
He spoke of going to Christmas Eve services as a child . . . his fascination with candles lit and held by persons across the worship space . . . the beauty of the Christmas carols sung by hundreds of worshipers on that holy night . . . the colors and smells in the worship place . . . seeing everyone dressed up for that very special service. In retelling the childhood memories, there was the longing for "simplicity" and "simpler times."
It caused me to consider my own experiences of Christmas as a child. I thought of several things that had seemed very basic to my experiences of Christmas in Oklahoma; upon further consideration, however, I realized that they were actually not simple at all. What I experienced as "simple" was, in fact, hard work for someone else.
Christmas Eve services required ministers to preside, choirs to sing, ushers to ush, persons to prepare the space beforehand and to clean the space afterwards. My part? I got to attend and then go home.
Large family gatherings required that someone clean house, gather groceries, prepare the meal, and then clean up the mess afterwards. My part? I ate the meal and then took a nap.
You see how it goes. . . .
When I became a parent, I realized that my work was only beginning when the children went to bed on Christmas Eve. Of course, they wanted to stay up late to get a peek at Santa Claus. So even after going to bed, they lay there unable to sleep. Or sometimes they faked sleep in order to get an early glimpse of their Christmas presents.
Thus, it was usually very late when someone (you've guessed who!) had to assemble the bicycles, set up the toys, wrap last-minute gifts, or -- the most stupid idea I ever had -- set up the trampoline in the backyard, beginning around midnight. When the kids went to bed, well, that was the beginning of my night! There was nothing simple about it . . . except the perception.
That the season is or should be simple is an illusion . . . usually carried from childhood. It is the Christmas illusion. Advent and Christmas are no simpler than any other season of daily life.
So you might hear things like, "We (folks tend to speak in "we" language about these kinds of illusions rather than "I" statements) need to get back to the real meaning of Christmas."
The real meaning of Christmas is that Christ comes into our world, that Jesus is embodied in our lives, that God took on flesh to live among us and within us.
I don't need to run off and hide in a hole to live out that real meaning of Christmas. I am invited, rather, to engage life as it is, not as I wish it to be.
In truth, spirituality is not an escape from the real, not a way to hide from responsibilities and relationships. It is, rather, a different way to engage what is real. It is a way of entering into life as it is, not life as we wish it would be. Spirituality means engagement and encounter, not escape.
So it is of no use for me to try creating a "perfect Christmas" or to get back to some idealized notion of what we should see and feel through Advent and Christmas.
The perfect Christmas is not the one where we hide our heads in the sand, but rather the one in which we engage life-as-it-is with and for God.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
A John O'Donohue Blessing for Advent
I don't think O'Donohue wrote this for Advent, but it fits -- at least for me.
For a New Beginning
John O’Donohue
In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.
For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.
It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.
Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.
Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life’s desire.
Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.
[John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space between Us (New York: Doubleday, 2008), 14.]
For a New Beginning
John O’Donohue
In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.
For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.
It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.
Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.
Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life’s desire.
Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.
[John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space between Us (New York: Doubleday, 2008), 14.]
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Thoughts on Prayer for the Season Ahead
The Church as an institution largely has failed in her task to develop people of prayer and Spirit. We could each list our reasons for the failure, and perhaps offer our own testimony as to how or why we missed the spiritual connection even in the midst of the body charged with handling spiritual matters.
I have my own litany of reasons for the impotence of the Church in helping people connect with deeper meaning and the Source of all life, and many of them are tied to personal experience and observation.
It is especially significant, I believe, that the Church has failed to help people connect more deeply and consciously with God in prayer. It has been devastating to contemporary life that prayer has come to mean discourse with God in which the one praying gets what he or she wants from God.
I don't think that's an entirely faulty supposition . . . it's just not the full extent of prayer, nor even the primary reason for prayer. Prayer that presents a wish-list to God for God's approval and satisfaction turns God into a celestial vending machine to which we go in order to get what we would like to have . . . most of the time what we cannot get for ourselves without outside help (health, self-esteem, prosperity).
Again, that way of prayer may be fine and good, but it is not enough to sustain our lives, to hold up the weight of who we are.
Rather, prayer is a life-stance, a way of being in the world with and for God. Prayer is not something that we do from time to time, and prayers are not something that we say from time to time. Prayer is who we are, the life we live in intimate connection with God.
Prayer is the consciousness we carry with us moment by moment that all of life concerns God -- not just Sunday services of worship or an occasional small group at the church.
Prayer is the awareness that we are not alone, but rather that God is with us always (in time) and everywhere (in space).
Prayer is the realization that my very life in an embodiment of God in the world, that Jesus walks where I walk and that Jesus touches what I touch.
In other words, prayer is an all-encompassing, unifying force that draws all of life together.
Because prayer is a life-stance and because it does take in all we are and all we do, we are wise if we can cultivate ways to be more consciously open to God who is present always and everywhere. We are wise to find ways to remind ourselves that we are never apart from the Source of our lives. We are wise if we can discover practices that remind us of our soul's ongoing connection to God.
Reminders of that connection are especially important in seasons like Advent and Christmas. They are important, not because these are holy seasons -- they are holy seasons -- and not because our devotion during these seasons is more important than devotion at others times.
We need to be reminded of our connection to God in the days preceding Christmas precisely because there are so many other things screaming for our attention. There are people calling our names, and the inner voices of our own expectations, and the desire to be all things to all people that fills up our calendars during December.
Please hear this: When the other voices and noises and obligations get loud, we do not lose our connection to God. No, we are still connected, as we are always connected, to the Source of everything. But we do lose our awareness (consciousness) of that connection. We can easily get swept into the tide of the season, we stop living mindfully, we get caught up in other concerns and get pulled by other centers of gravity.
Some specific spiritual practices may be important for you this Advent season. They would be practices or disciplines that would ground you through the weeks until Christmas, and would serve to remind you that all of life is prayer.
Your practice could be spending more time in saying prayers . . . but it could just as easily be something else that served to remind you that ultimately, all of life is prayer.
If you could find a spiritual practice that helped you stay aware of your life-giving soul-connection to God through this season, that's the practice I'd commend to you. If you stay faithful to that practice and carry through Advent that God-awareness, I'll promise you are more prayerful and fulfilling Christmas.
I have my own litany of reasons for the impotence of the Church in helping people connect with deeper meaning and the Source of all life, and many of them are tied to personal experience and observation.
It is especially significant, I believe, that the Church has failed to help people connect more deeply and consciously with God in prayer. It has been devastating to contemporary life that prayer has come to mean discourse with God in which the one praying gets what he or she wants from God.
I don't think that's an entirely faulty supposition . . . it's just not the full extent of prayer, nor even the primary reason for prayer. Prayer that presents a wish-list to God for God's approval and satisfaction turns God into a celestial vending machine to which we go in order to get what we would like to have . . . most of the time what we cannot get for ourselves without outside help (health, self-esteem, prosperity).
Again, that way of prayer may be fine and good, but it is not enough to sustain our lives, to hold up the weight of who we are.
Rather, prayer is a life-stance, a way of being in the world with and for God. Prayer is not something that we do from time to time, and prayers are not something that we say from time to time. Prayer is who we are, the life we live in intimate connection with God.
Prayer is the consciousness we carry with us moment by moment that all of life concerns God -- not just Sunday services of worship or an occasional small group at the church.
Prayer is the awareness that we are not alone, but rather that God is with us always (in time) and everywhere (in space).
Prayer is the realization that my very life in an embodiment of God in the world, that Jesus walks where I walk and that Jesus touches what I touch.
In other words, prayer is an all-encompassing, unifying force that draws all of life together.
Because prayer is a life-stance and because it does take in all we are and all we do, we are wise if we can cultivate ways to be more consciously open to God who is present always and everywhere. We are wise to find ways to remind ourselves that we are never apart from the Source of our lives. We are wise if we can discover practices that remind us of our soul's ongoing connection to God.
Reminders of that connection are especially important in seasons like Advent and Christmas. They are important, not because these are holy seasons -- they are holy seasons -- and not because our devotion during these seasons is more important than devotion at others times.
We need to be reminded of our connection to God in the days preceding Christmas precisely because there are so many other things screaming for our attention. There are people calling our names, and the inner voices of our own expectations, and the desire to be all things to all people that fills up our calendars during December.
Please hear this: When the other voices and noises and obligations get loud, we do not lose our connection to God. No, we are still connected, as we are always connected, to the Source of everything. But we do lose our awareness (consciousness) of that connection. We can easily get swept into the tide of the season, we stop living mindfully, we get caught up in other concerns and get pulled by other centers of gravity.
Some specific spiritual practices may be important for you this Advent season. They would be practices or disciplines that would ground you through the weeks until Christmas, and would serve to remind you that all of life is prayer.
Your practice could be spending more time in saying prayers . . . but it could just as easily be something else that served to remind you that ultimately, all of life is prayer.
If you could find a spiritual practice that helped you stay aware of your life-giving soul-connection to God through this season, that's the practice I'd commend to you. If you stay faithful to that practice and carry through Advent that God-awareness, I'll promise you are more prayerful and fulfilling Christmas.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Advent Dawns
I notice that my life follows definite rhythms, not always predictable, but always moving, changing, shaping in different ways.
I've come to think of them as the seasons of my life. Certain seasons in my work, for instance, have a rhythm in which I experience either more or less energy, depending on the season.
My health follows a particular rhythm. In times of poor health or chemotherapy treatments, I have less energy and I'm able to engage a bit less in the rigors of daily work.
I've learned that if I can identify the season in which I find myself, it will help me to enter into it and move through it in ways that are life-giving and freeing. I have learned this lesson the hard way. I spend many years resisting seasons in which I found myself. I was convinced that life should be always "upward and onward," getting better and better, ever fluorescent, flowering and prospering. That's not reality, but I was convinced that life should be lived that way.
When I began entering into the seasonality of life, I realized that each season has its own energy, its own pace, its own needs. For instance, if you think in terms of literal seasons, winter has a different energy than summer and fall. Spring has a different energy than fall or winter. There are things appropriate to one season that may not be appropriate to another.
So a huge part of knowing myself, or "noticing my own life," is to identify where I am at any given moment, and to allow myself to be in that place as honestly and faithfully as possible. It is freeing for me to let myself be where I am, rather than trying to force myself into another place or another pattern that is not appropriate to the moment.
Some of my personal seasons move around the Church calendar. In my background as an evangelical Baptist, I did not honor the movements of the Church year much. I've discovered through the years, though, that there is tremendous energy in my life's movement in unison with the rhythm of the wider Church.
So Sunday, November 27 begins the season of Advent. It is a season of color, of patience and waiting, and of preparation. Its disciplines are helpful for me, and always seem to fit the season of my soul.
I realized last week, as I was going through the routine of breaking in a new journal, that it would begin primarily with my Advent journey for 2011. There was something significant in that for me . . . looking at a book of 196 pages, all blank, with lines awaiting me. Who knows what will make it to those pages? But some of the first things to appear there will be prayer and reflection from this season of Advent.
At another website I'll offer brief thoughts on the daily Scripture readings for Advent. You can find those reflections at www.adailyadvent.blogspot.com. I invite you to join me there over the next five weeks as we explore the season of Advent together.
I've come to think of them as the seasons of my life. Certain seasons in my work, for instance, have a rhythm in which I experience either more or less energy, depending on the season.
My health follows a particular rhythm. In times of poor health or chemotherapy treatments, I have less energy and I'm able to engage a bit less in the rigors of daily work.
I've learned that if I can identify the season in which I find myself, it will help me to enter into it and move through it in ways that are life-giving and freeing. I have learned this lesson the hard way. I spend many years resisting seasons in which I found myself. I was convinced that life should be always "upward and onward," getting better and better, ever fluorescent, flowering and prospering. That's not reality, but I was convinced that life should be lived that way.
When I began entering into the seasonality of life, I realized that each season has its own energy, its own pace, its own needs. For instance, if you think in terms of literal seasons, winter has a different energy than summer and fall. Spring has a different energy than fall or winter. There are things appropriate to one season that may not be appropriate to another.
So a huge part of knowing myself, or "noticing my own life," is to identify where I am at any given moment, and to allow myself to be in that place as honestly and faithfully as possible. It is freeing for me to let myself be where I am, rather than trying to force myself into another place or another pattern that is not appropriate to the moment.
Some of my personal seasons move around the Church calendar. In my background as an evangelical Baptist, I did not honor the movements of the Church year much. I've discovered through the years, though, that there is tremendous energy in my life's movement in unison with the rhythm of the wider Church.
So Sunday, November 27 begins the season of Advent. It is a season of color, of patience and waiting, and of preparation. Its disciplines are helpful for me, and always seem to fit the season of my soul.
I realized last week, as I was going through the routine of breaking in a new journal, that it would begin primarily with my Advent journey for 2011. There was something significant in that for me . . . looking at a book of 196 pages, all blank, with lines awaiting me. Who knows what will make it to those pages? But some of the first things to appear there will be prayer and reflection from this season of Advent.
At another website I'll offer brief thoughts on the daily Scripture readings for Advent. You can find those reflections at www.adailyadvent.blogspot.com. I invite you to join me there over the next five weeks as we explore the season of Advent together.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
A Rilke Poem for Advent Darkness
This poem found me a few days ago. For me it matches the mood of Advent, the darkness and waiting to which we are each called. It calls me to a rootedness that doesn't fight the darkness, but rather allows the darkness to make me more fully and completely human.
There is a contradiction in darkness and waiting that makes us terribly uncomfortable, especially as persons who want our pain wrapped up in a tidy bow. But the task of becoming fully human is never clean. Seldom does it draw in straight lines and in perfectly square corners. Growing up is messy work. Maturity, including spiritual maturity, comes at a cost. Every experience of life has within it the capacity to be our teacher.
Rilke was familiar with darkness. As with most artists, his creativity emerged from this seedbed which was very much underground, cold, dank, still and in some ways seemed to be without life.
So this is an expression of Rilke's stance toward darkness.
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.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.
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 II, 29, trans. by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows]
There is a contradiction in darkness and waiting that makes us terribly uncomfortable, especially as persons who want our pain wrapped up in a tidy bow. But the task of becoming fully human is never clean. Seldom does it draw in straight lines and in perfectly square corners. Growing up is messy work. Maturity, including spiritual maturity, comes at a cost. Every experience of life has within it the capacity to be our teacher.
Rilke was familiar with darkness. As with most artists, his creativity emerged from this seedbed which was very much underground, cold, dank, still and in some ways seemed to be without life.
So this is an expression of Rilke's stance toward darkness.
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.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.
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 II, 29, trans. by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows]
Saturday, November 27, 2010
The Season of Advent
Sunday, November 28 is the First Sunday of Advent. I love this season of the year. Advent moves through mystery and hope toward the birth of Christ. Through the season of Advent I'll write daily meditations on the Scripture for the day at my blog site, A Daily Advent. The address is www.adailyadvent.blogspot.com.
“Church-time” begins with the season of Advent. The first Sunday of Advent marks the beginning of a new Church year. It comes after the long stretch that the Church calls “Ordinary Time.”
In the Church calendar, the season of Lent leads into Passion/Palm Sunday, then into Holy Week, culminating on Resurrection Sunday . . . or what we celebrate as Easter. Then we continue our Easter celebration until the Feast of Pentecost, which has both Old Testament and New Testament antecedents for Christians.
Ordinary Time begins after Pentecost, which usually occurs in late May or early June. Through the long summer and fall, we are invited to notice God in the ordinary, in the mundane. There are no special observances to heighten our attention, no Lents, Easters or Pentecosts. Life is ordinary. In the rhythm of the Church calendar, the year ends after this lengthy stretch of Ordinary Time.
But then Advent comes, and suddenly the waiting and ordinariness seems more purposeful. Advent signals that now we wait with an end in mind. It is not simply a season of “getting ready for Christmas.” Advent signals that it’s time to get in touch with our hopes and our longings, that we begin to open ourselves to what we most need. We notice our inner stirrings, that for which we most deeply hunger. We wait, often in darkness, in order to see great light.
Advent begins four Sundays before Christmas. It is colored in purples and pinks, and characterized by mystery, waiting, anticipation, and hope. The word "advent" literally signifies a coming or an entrance. Thus, this is not only the coming of a new Church year, but it is more so the coming or advent of God's most complete self-revealing, which will come as Christ is embodied in human life.
Through Advent God tends to invite us toward more reflective and mindful living. It is an appropriate invitation given the pace at which many of us will live over the next month. To journey toward Christmas with intention and awareness could be the most precious gift we give to ourselves and others through Advent.
“Church-time” begins with the season of Advent. The first Sunday of Advent marks the beginning of a new Church year. It comes after the long stretch that the Church calls “Ordinary Time.”
In the Church calendar, the season of Lent leads into Passion/Palm Sunday, then into Holy Week, culminating on Resurrection Sunday . . . or what we celebrate as Easter. Then we continue our Easter celebration until the Feast of Pentecost, which has both Old Testament and New Testament antecedents for Christians.
Ordinary Time begins after Pentecost, which usually occurs in late May or early June. Through the long summer and fall, we are invited to notice God in the ordinary, in the mundane. There are no special observances to heighten our attention, no Lents, Easters or Pentecosts. Life is ordinary. In the rhythm of the Church calendar, the year ends after this lengthy stretch of Ordinary Time.
But then Advent comes, and suddenly the waiting and ordinariness seems more purposeful. Advent signals that now we wait with an end in mind. It is not simply a season of “getting ready for Christmas.” Advent signals that it’s time to get in touch with our hopes and our longings, that we begin to open ourselves to what we most need. We notice our inner stirrings, that for which we most deeply hunger. We wait, often in darkness, in order to see great light.
Advent begins four Sundays before Christmas. It is colored in purples and pinks, and characterized by mystery, waiting, anticipation, and hope. The word "advent" literally signifies a coming or an entrance. Thus, this is not only the coming of a new Church year, but it is more so the coming or advent of God's most complete self-revealing, which will come as Christ is embodied in human life.
Through Advent God tends to invite us toward more reflective and mindful living. It is an appropriate invitation given the pace at which many of us will live over the next month. To journey toward Christmas with intention and awareness could be the most precious gift we give to ourselves and others through Advent.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
The Lies We Buy at Christmas
I don't mean to mislead by the title, "The Lies We Buy at Christmas," but I'm not on a rant about shopping and malls and commercialization. I'm as tired of those rants as I am of the actual commercialization.
Actually I'm thinking this morning about Christmas carols. We all sing songs mindlessly, I realize that.
[Digression: I'm occasionally shocked when I hear a song that I enjoyed from my youth/young adult years -- the 70's and 80's -- and pay attention to what the lyrics are saying. "I like that song, but I didn't know it was saying THAT!!" Hmmmm . . . maybe that's why my mother didn't want me listening to those radio stations!]
As someone who gives attention to corporate worship experiences, however, I try to pay attention to the message that songs convey. What does a song say? What is its tone? When people sing it, especially in a setting of worship, what do they carry away?
[Confession: I'm not a big Christmas carol guy. I'll sing them . . . if you make me. But I'm not someone who tunes the car radio to ALL-CHRISTMAS-MUSIC-ALL-THE-TIME beginning Thanksgiving. To my knowledge, I've never gone "dashing through the snow in a one-horse open sleigh." So why sing it? Last week at a Christmas party we sang, "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas, just like the ones we used to know." I've NEVER known a white Christmas, so I have no dreams of one. "And may all your Christmases be white"? Nothing against Bing Crosby, but if that's his Christmas blessing for me, I'm cursed!]
Really, though, I'm not as concerned about Bing Crosby and "White Christmas," or about the fantasy world of "Jingle Bells" nearly as much as I am the "religious" Christmas songs we sing that make Jesus into a fantasy character.
"Away in a Manger" may be a sweet lullaby, but it offers an image of Jesus that is pure fantasy. "The little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes." Really? I thought the point of Christmas was that God became one of us, that God took on human flesh, that God entered the world fully human, not as an invincible Superhuman, but as a vulnerable, authentic person. Have you ever known a human baby not to cry . . . at least once, at least at some point? The carol doesn't feel honest to me. It misses the point of Christmas. Maybe it's fine to sing at family gatherings or at the Garden Club, but it's not a worship song.
There are other songs, as well, that present some stylized, photo-shopped Jesus, the kind of Jesus was wish for, the kind of Jesus we want Jesus to be.
On the other hand, there are Christmas songs that are intensely real, songs that refuse to airbrush God or our lives.
"O holy Child of Bethelehem, descend to us we pray.
Cast out our sin and enter in, be born in us today.
We hear the Christmas angels, the great glad tidings tell.
O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel!"
And I particularly like the old monastic chant that has thankfully made its way into our hymn books . . . and hasn't yet been purged from them:
"Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
and with fear and trembling stand;
ponder nothing earthly-minded,
for the blessing of his hand,
Christ our God to earth, descendeth,
our full homage to demand."
"King of kings, yet born of Mary,
as of old on earth he stood,
Lord of lords in human vesture,
in the body and the blood;
he will give to all the faithful
his own self for heavenly food."
So I sing selectively during Advent and at Christmas. My life is already full of enough lies. I don't need to propogate more of them.
Actually I'm thinking this morning about Christmas carols. We all sing songs mindlessly, I realize that.
[Digression: I'm occasionally shocked when I hear a song that I enjoyed from my youth/young adult years -- the 70's and 80's -- and pay attention to what the lyrics are saying. "I like that song, but I didn't know it was saying THAT!!" Hmmmm . . . maybe that's why my mother didn't want me listening to those radio stations!]
As someone who gives attention to corporate worship experiences, however, I try to pay attention to the message that songs convey. What does a song say? What is its tone? When people sing it, especially in a setting of worship, what do they carry away?
[Confession: I'm not a big Christmas carol guy. I'll sing them . . . if you make me. But I'm not someone who tunes the car radio to ALL-CHRISTMAS-MUSIC-ALL-THE-TIME beginning Thanksgiving. To my knowledge, I've never gone "dashing through the snow in a one-horse open sleigh." So why sing it? Last week at a Christmas party we sang, "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas, just like the ones we used to know." I've NEVER known a white Christmas, so I have no dreams of one. "And may all your Christmases be white"? Nothing against Bing Crosby, but if that's his Christmas blessing for me, I'm cursed!]
Really, though, I'm not as concerned about Bing Crosby and "White Christmas," or about the fantasy world of "Jingle Bells" nearly as much as I am the "religious" Christmas songs we sing that make Jesus into a fantasy character.
"Away in a Manger" may be a sweet lullaby, but it offers an image of Jesus that is pure fantasy. "The little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes." Really? I thought the point of Christmas was that God became one of us, that God took on human flesh, that God entered the world fully human, not as an invincible Superhuman, but as a vulnerable, authentic person. Have you ever known a human baby not to cry . . . at least once, at least at some point? The carol doesn't feel honest to me. It misses the point of Christmas. Maybe it's fine to sing at family gatherings or at the Garden Club, but it's not a worship song.
There are other songs, as well, that present some stylized, photo-shopped Jesus, the kind of Jesus was wish for, the kind of Jesus we want Jesus to be.
On the other hand, there are Christmas songs that are intensely real, songs that refuse to airbrush God or our lives.
"O holy Child of Bethelehem, descend to us we pray.
Cast out our sin and enter in, be born in us today.
We hear the Christmas angels, the great glad tidings tell.
O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel!"
And I particularly like the old monastic chant that has thankfully made its way into our hymn books . . . and hasn't yet been purged from them:
"Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
and with fear and trembling stand;
ponder nothing earthly-minded,
for the blessing of his hand,
Christ our God to earth, descendeth,
our full homage to demand."
"King of kings, yet born of Mary,
as of old on earth he stood,
Lord of lords in human vesture,
in the body and the blood;
he will give to all the faithful
his own self for heavenly food."
So I sing selectively during Advent and at Christmas. My life is already full of enough lies. I don't need to propogate more of them.
Monday, December 14, 2009
Stumbling over Joy
Like many other life-realities, I'm aware that I can't really define joy; I do, however, know joy when I experience it.
Joy seems somehow bound up in the essence of things, the inner reality that sources an outer way of living in the world.
Pursuit of happiness does not guarantee joy. Happiness is merely intoxicating, the thirsty man or woman drinking salt-water. Happiness requires another outside condition or external stimulus to produce more happiness.
Joy, on the other hand, lives internally somewhere around soul-level. It is deeper and longer-lasting than happiness, not necessarily giddy but most always tied to gladness and gratitude.
The prayer in Psalm 43:3 implores God to send out light and truth in order to guide the steps that would lead me to my deepest joy and gladness.
The divine messengers brought an announcement to working people (shepherds), saying, "Don't be afraid; I bring you good news of great joy for all people" (Lk. 2:10).
"Don't let your fear freeze you. It keeps you stuck in the mindless repetition of your fragile life. I have news that will shatter the frozenness and set you free to live."
To me, the "shattering of frozenness" and the "freedom to live" get to the essence of joy.
Joy seems somehow bound up in the essence of things, the inner reality that sources an outer way of living in the world.
Pursuit of happiness does not guarantee joy. Happiness is merely intoxicating, the thirsty man or woman drinking salt-water. Happiness requires another outside condition or external stimulus to produce more happiness.
Joy, on the other hand, lives internally somewhere around soul-level. It is deeper and longer-lasting than happiness, not necessarily giddy but most always tied to gladness and gratitude.
The prayer in Psalm 43:3 implores God to send out light and truth in order to guide the steps that would lead me to my deepest joy and gladness.
The divine messengers brought an announcement to working people (shepherds), saying, "Don't be afraid; I bring you good news of great joy for all people" (Lk. 2:10).
"Don't let your fear freeze you. It keeps you stuck in the mindless repetition of your fragile life. I have news that will shatter the frozenness and set you free to live."
To me, the "shattering of frozenness" and the "freedom to live" get to the essence of joy.
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