Crossroads Voices: Giving Thanks at All Saints and All Souls

GOD’s Message yet again:

“Go stand at the crossroads and look around.
Ask for directions to the old road,
The tried-and-true road. Then take it.
Discover the right route for your souls.
But they said, ‘Nothing doing.
We aren’t going that way.’”

(Jeremiah 6:16, The Message)


At times, I stand at a crossroads and look around for direction on the path to take onward . . . and hear nothing, see nothing.

At other times, I stand at the crossroads and look around for wisdom . . . and what I hear or see or sense seems too difficult, too unreasonable. I’m not yet ready to go in the way I’m being led.

And at other times, I stand at the crossroads, noticing the several ways that branch out from that intersection, and I find myself ready to hear and follow the wisdom that I sense in that moment. Very often for me, that wisdom comes in the form of a person, a voice, another life who shows up at just the moment I’m needing wisdom at the crossroads.

Sometimes the voice that shows up is someone speaking across the ages . . . the voice of someone in days past who has lived wisely and courageously shared their wisdom . . . in order to help guide other travelers . . . a poet like Rilke or an otherwise unsuspect woman who lived underneath the notice of her times like Mother Julian.

I am aware of how indebted I am to these other voices, these other lives. I stand on the shoulders of so many others, as do you. There is no such thing as a “self-made man” or a “self-made woman.” All of us are products of those who have guided us when we were seeking direction at the crossroads, open to wisdom that has guided others before us in ways that are healing and life-giving, in ways that enable us to live with fullness of soul.

Yesterday was the Feast of All Saints and today is the Feast of All Souls. These days on the calendar give opportunity to pause and remember those who have gone before us, those who have shared their wisdom when we were at crossroads, lost and searching. I have given more time than usual this year to reflecting on the importance of these two days because of three deaths last week of persons who shared their wisdom with me in different ways, yet all when I was at various crossroads.

Eugene Peterson died last week. In a story I’ve told often, I first encountered Peterson through a friend who sent me a copy of Working the Angles in the early 1990’s. I had recently completed four years of rigorous doctoral work that had occupied every spare moment that didn’t include family or church responsibilities. I was in a dry spot, facing my own internal emptiness. I didn’t know I was standing at a crossroads looking for wisdom, but in hindsight I very clear was doing just that. As I read Peterson’s words in Working the Angles, I knew he was talking right to my heart and soul. The moment was pivotal and the course I took in reading his words had huge repercussions on everything that has unfolded in my life in the 25 years since.

Peterson gave me a language for my soul’s yearning, and some basic practices that began to feed my soul. I quickly bought as many of his books as I could find. In the summer of 1995 I took a sabbatical for study and refreshment. I took several weeks to study under Peterson at Regent College in Vancouver. The time was transforming, feasting on Peterson’s talks in the mornings, then spending the rest of the long British Columbia days exploring mountains, hiking in forests, discovering waterfalls, dipping my feet into glacial lakes. I ended up going back to Vancouver for his classes four or five times.

In recent years, I have found myself pushing back more and more on some of his assumptions, but isn’t that the way it is with our mentors? He and I grew in different ways, ways unique to each of us. Even so, I have never stopped being grateful for how he gave me an early language for what was happening in my soul.

Kyrie eleison.

Fr Thomas Keating died last week. I don’t remember my first encounter with Fr Keating. I practiced Centering Prayer – thanks to another saint, Sr Adeline O’Donoghue – before I knew who Keating was. Sr Adeline probably introduced me to him, as well, in the mid-1990’s. At any rate, the first book by Keating I read was not his introduction to Centering Prayer, Open Mind, Open Heart, but his book which explained the interior workings of contemplative prayer, Invitation to Love. Keating had a deep, experiential grasp of contemplative prayer and how it operates in a person’s soul. He was smart and knew a lot of psychology, but most of what he shared was borne of personal experience. He did not simply repeat someone else’s theory.

I ended up meeting Keating a handful of times and hearing him speak in person. He was a large man, commanding a room in his white monk’s habit, but gentle and funny. And in either conversation or teaching, his words always seemed to arise from a deep place within him. There was weight in his speech, gravitas, something that seemed to come from a deep interior well. He knew who he was and was comfortable with who he was, so he was not demonstrative or persuasive or motivational. He did not need to be someone other than the person he was. My time with him helped shape my own notion of what it means to be wise . . . that wisdom comes from spiritual reflection and integrating life experiences, from considering life deeply.

I grieve that the world will be without Fr Keating’s physical presence. But I celebrate that wisely, Keating and others years ago formed Contemplative Outreach as a structure that would carry on the work of contemplative prayer and serve as a vehicle for transformation through this unassuming prayer practice.

Christe eleison.

Robert Winn died last week. In my home church in Tulsa, I served on the staff for four years during college and for a year after college before leaving for seminary . . . and I served alongside Robert. I was fairly new to the “Christian-thing” and brand new to the “church staff thing.” Robert was the older, wiser presence – in my late teens, I thought he was an old man . . . turns out Robert was only 14 years older than I am, so he was in his early 30’s . . . still, he was an “old man” to me as a teenager.

Robert was the one person on that staff I could go to for advice and wisdom, the person whose door was always open to me. Any other staff person, I would have needed an appointment to see. I could seek him out with questions about how to do things, how to approach certain aspects of ministry. He was funny, relaxed, and the afternoons we spent in ping-pong battles in the church’s game room produced some epic matches. He was a friend and an early mentor. For many years, I carried with me Robert’s notions about what it means to serve well on a church staff. As much as anyone, especially early in ministry, he taught me about survival in a local church.

Kyrie eleison.

Who have been your “crossroads” voices?

For whom do you give thanks at All Saints and All Souls?

Kyrie eleison
Christe eleison
Kyrie eleison

The "Who" and "What" of Wheat and Weeds: Part 1

Jesus then told them this story:

The kingdom of heaven is like what happened when a farmer scattered good seed in a field. But while everyone was sleeping, an enemy came and scattered weed seeds in the field and then left.

When the plants came up and began to ripen, the farmer’s servants could see the weeds. The servants came and asked, “Sir, didn’t you scatter good seed in your field? Where did these weeds come from?”

“An enemy did this,” he replied.

His servants then asked, “Do you want us to go out and pull up the weeds?”

"No!” he answered. “You might also pull up the wheat. Leave the weeds alone until harvest time. Then I’ll tell my workers to gather the weeds and tie them up and burn them. But I’ll have them store the wheat in my barn.”

(Matt. 13:24 - 30)


For years I've heard this parable used as a text on discernment, that is, how to distinguish wheat from weeds, good from evil. With even a casual reading of the parable, however, you can see that interpretation runs counter to what the parable teaches. Rather than instruction on how to determine what is wheat and what is weed, the parable in essence says, "Don't bother with worry over what is weed and what is wheat. In many cases you won't be able to figure out one from the other. In pulling out what you think is bad, you may in fact be rooting out something life-giving. And in cultivating what is good, you may be encouraging something detrimental to wholeness. Let it be for now, and trust God to do the weeding out when the time is right."

Thus, the parable serves as a cautionary word against judgment and presuming to know how to sort out the good from the bad. After all, our notion of wheat and weed is most often personally or tribally referenced, so that our investment in what is good or bad shapes how we see. Something I see as completely wheat is seen by another person -- perhaps from a different political party, a different nationality, a different race, a different sexual orientation, a different worldview -- as weed. Only in our arrogance do we stand in our own center and claim our own view to be absolute Truth. Yet, such arrogance lives within each of us. It is the arrogance of our own presumed "knowing" that Jesus cautions against in the parable.

Let me offer you a couple of levels, beyond the background above, on which to consider the parable. I'll write about the "what" today, and then shift the field a bit to reflect on "who" in the next essay.

What
Consider the parable as a story about your own inner world. In the parable's language, your life is the field. And in the field of your life, the Farmer has scattered good seed, wheat-seed. There is treasure within you, and the capacity to do good in the world. You have gifts woven into your unique DNA, that when shared with the world bring life and light and healing. Inside you is the image of God, the God-seed if you will, that is full of life and waits to germinate, blossom, and produce fruit. Within you there is wheat.

But according to the parable, there is also weed scattered within you and me. We are each neither fully wheat nor fully weed. The field is not "either-or," but "both-and," both wheat AND weeds.

Each of us acts daily out of self-interest, an ego-centrism that is hard to weed out. Or perhaps we carry within our body some condition that limits our capacity to do what we'd like to do, and we think of that limitation as a weed.

The "what" of the parable -- at least as I'm presenting it -- are those qualities, traits, and characteristics within me or you which we want to characterize as wheat or weed. In fact, the "what" may include all the interior material that makes up my life, what it means for me to be me and you to be you.

And the teaching of the parable simply says, "None of us can accurately see what is wheat and what is weed in our own life. We may find some personal trait unpleasant . . . or we may struggle with some condition that feels debilitating . . . or we may think of some very good qualities about ourselves. . . . But we are not God, who alone sees all the way through us."

The parable cautions us against pulling too many of our interior weeds, those things -- I'm calling them "whats" -- that make up our interior world. I have learned this lesson the hard way. Once I became intentional about my connection with God years ago, I immediately wanted to get rid of the bad habits, debilitating conditions, and unpleasant feelings I felt hindered my connection to God. My language was, "I'm going to obliterate them!" as if I knew what was best for my life. Now, decades later, I am still learning that some of the experiences which seem most unpleasant to me, difficult and even paralyzing, are the ones shaping me most, deepening my connection with my own self, God, others, and the world.

I don't always resist judgment, just as I can't stop presuming to know what is best -- I'm finding this open stance to be especially difficult in the contentiousness of contemporary life, in which I want to presume to know what is wheat and what is weed -- but I am a work in progress. I recognize my limited ability to see what is true and what is false, what is wheat and what is weed, at least this morning as I write this piece.


Practical Helps

**In your prayer, ask God for the grace to give you a spirit of generosity, especially with yourself. "God, I'm asking for the grace to be generous with myself." This is a very Ignatian form of prayer which acknowledges that we do not generate this generosity (or whatever you are asking for) on our own. Rather, we receive it as a gift, as grace.

**Pray the Freedom Prayer:
"God, free me from the need to control what my life looks like."
"God, free me from my need to be perfect."
"God, free me from my impulse to judge myself."
"God, free me from my need to control my relationship with you."

**Regularly practice some form of Christian contemplative prayer, perhaps Centering Prayer or Christian Meditation. These more interior forms of prayer each have at their heart a continual letting go of thoughts, images, and mental commentaries. Practicing the prayer regularly, you will find that the "letting go" which takes place during the prayer time may be extended to ordinary life. Then, the compulsion to judge yourself or to presume that you know what is best for your life can be released in everyday life just as it is in the time of prayer.


I'll share some reflections on the "who" of wheat and weeds in the next post.

When Death Comes

I wrote last week about the Dylan Thomas poem, "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night" (you can read the poem and the post about it below). Thomas urged, according to some who know his life and work better than I, approaching death with "rage" and with a kicking-and-screaming resistance. The poem references his dying father, though Thomas may have intended to portray his own stance toward death.

Rather than adopt Thomas' words literally, I've approached the poem's encouragement to rage and resistance as an invitation to ongoing life, creativity, and exploration, even to breath's end. For myself, I hear: "Don't stop living, don't give up your exploration, don't stop becoming, even in the face of death."

I think of my dear friend Paul, a gentle soul who did not literally "rage," but who continued to explore his own unique path right to the moment when the darkness suddenly and unexpectedly consumed him. He was not a "rager" in any way, no anger in him that I could see. He was a lover, yet full of questions that could not be answered. But Paul's doubt was an honest doubt. It wasn't showy doubt, or doubt for the sake of doubt. He had honest questions about God and life. But every day he gave himself to a core practice of prayer and meditation. He faithfully kept searching, even in his questioning.

When I talked with him, he was never interested in convincing me of anything. He had no agenda in which he needed "converts" to his own intricate pattern of belief and unbelief. He simply loved in his gentle way. I always felt that Paul's spirit in the world was healing, so great was his capacity to love without condition. Up to his last day, he honestly explored what, for him, were the big questions of life. And he did so with love. When he died suddenly, he left a huge void in the world . . . a loss of his presence, his love, his questions, and his healing.

I think of another dear friend currently in hospice care. She is not literally raging while in palliative care in Houston, but she is exploring this new threshold fully. She is not passive nor idle. As her sister said to me recently, in life she taught us how to live, and now as another threshold approaches she is teaching us how to die. Even now, she is centered by a daily practice of sitting prayer and meditation. She is held, not in rage, but in ongoing exploration, in her continual creative impulse to live the one life which she has been given, and in her openness as she moves through this season of her life.

She has been my spiritual guide for decades, and has been the wise soul of the spiritual landscape in Southeast Texas, as well as within her own religious order. She has guided us in life, and now she is guiding us as she approaches a different threshold . . . not by a kicking-and-screaming rage, but by her own life centered in the heart of God.

Both of these friends have embodied in their journeys what Mary Oliver has written in her poem, "When Death Comes." For me the poem is a statement of intention about becoming, searching, questioning, and exploring right up to the end of life. Never angry or raging, Mary Oliver in the poem simply invites an explorer's heart that carries one to the final threshold.


When Death Comes

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox;

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,
tending, as all music does, toward silence,

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

When it's over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it's over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.


[Mary Oliver, New and Selected Poems, Beacon Press]

Post-Election: A Pastoral Letter

I am the pastor of a Contemplative Community in Houston, Texas. It is a diverse community of seekers, who are intentionally engaging a life-stance rooted in the Christian mystical/contemplative tradition. For months, the Presidential campaign had sent ripples through the community, making conversations awkward and straining relationships. The election itself only served to bring those tensions closer to the surface. As a clay-footed pastor of this beautiful and imperfect community, I wanted to speak into our life together in a healing way. I wrote this pastoral letter to my "flock" about 24 hours after the election results were in. I include the letter here as I sent it to my congregation.



I have struggled over the last 24 hours to know what to say to you as your pastor. Some, I realize celebrate Tuesday’s election as a victory. For others, it is simply relief to finally be done with it. Others have found themselves numb. Many have expressed grief and anger (“sad” and “mad” are both primary emotions, but very different, though sometimes hard to distinguish). The uncertainty felt by some has morphed into fear in others.

In short, I’ve seen no “typical” or generic response to the election. We each feel what we feel. Our emotions are not right or wrong . . . we don’t need someone to fix us or to quote a Bible verse to make us feel better . . . we don’t need to gloat that we were right and others were wrong . . . we don’t need to feel vindicated if identified with the majority nor defeated if identified with the minority.

The aftermath of the election was sure to be this way, regardless of who became the President-elect. Either way, his/her supporters were going to be at odds with her/his supporters. The strain felt among families and friendships, in workplaces and congregations for months leading up to Nov. 8 has now become an awkward tension as we collectively ask, “What’s next?”

Institutions and structures change, shift, fall, are rebuilt . . . that includes nations, political structures, companies, and even the Church. It is one – of many – reasons Jesus said not to place faith in the institutions, in leaders, in political parties, or even in the Church. He foresaw, for example, the fall of the Temple as a religious and national institution within Israel. His words were heard as blasphemy, especially when he said that he would build another Temple, this time in the human heart. But Jesus was forever taking these outer events and symbols, and pressing them inward toward the heart. He asked interior questions about outer events and happenings in the world.

Therefore, wherever you are with the events of the last few days, I invite you to tend the garden that has been given to you. Trying to solve the world will lead to frustration, despair, and ultimately more anger. You can’t fix the world singlehandedly – as even President-elect Trump will learn in the coming days. But you can tend the garden that is yours. That garden, first and foremost, includes your own soul. That garden also includes your relationships, those within your sphere of influence. Tending your garden is not about fixing someone else’s garden, not about locating all the problems “out there” in others, or in the system, but rather about turning the soil of your own life. It’s about working your side of the street.

How am I trying to do that in this season? First, I begin with myself, my own stance, my own feelings. I do soul-work in a deeply honest way. It shifts from finger-pointing at others to a personal glance.

So I take inventory of how it is with me.
• “What does it feel like to be Jerry today?”
• “And what has been touched in Jerry that has produced these feelings? What values have been threatened? What core values have been touched, so that I either celebrate or lament?”
• “What does it feel like to be Jerry feeling this feeling?”

I ask this of myself, not to become more inward focused, not for the sake of introspection, and not in order to judge myself as a failure, but in order to be familiar with myself and my own landscape. I want to be aware – or conscious – of my own interior, in order to see what is at work within me. This is a part of the illumining work of God’s Spirit.

I want to let this work take its time in me, because I realize that most often, my first reaction (the first glance or first gaze) is self-protecting, self-serving, and not grounded in love. Usually the first glance is defensive, judgmental, and categorizing. When I press myself to stay with the interior work, I can often get to that second glance or gaze, which most always includes threads of mercy and the capacity to see self and others more generously.

Second, I want to become aware of my mind’s chatter . . . whether it is the chatter of election elation, or the chatter of election analysis, or the chatter of fear and despair.

[The internet and social media can be a great gift, but they can also feed the worst impulses within us. Consider a fast from news feeds and social media for 24 hours or so. In my experience, these sources only feed and perpetuate my mind’s chatter, increasing the number of “monkeys” jumping around from swing to swing within my head. It’s almost impossible for me to cease my mind’s chatter when I’m constantly feeding the monkeys more food.]

Some form of contemplative prayer – Centering Prayer or Christian meditation – that invites you to disengage from thoughts and feelings may be especially helpful, so that at least for a few minutes, you can let go of the chatter and the cycling of your analytic mind.

Third, consider carrying a breath prayer along for this season of your life . . . a phrase that you can breathe or whisper as you move through your day, especially when you find yourself overwhelmed by the situation. Whisper the prayer as you work, as you walk, as you drive, as you eat, as you wait on hold. Let the simple prayer itself hold you.

“Be still and know that I am God.” (Ps. 46:10)
“The earth is yours, and all that is in it.” (Ps. 24:1)
“You are the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?” (Ps. 27:1)
“In your light I see light.” (Ps. 36:9)

Finally, I affirm that we are a diverse spiritual community made up of persons from across the political, racial, socio-economic, educational, sexual orientation spectrum. We do not represent a single political vantage point. A glance across the Chapel on any given Sunday morning, and I see a multitude of life-situations and perspectives, each with meaning for that particular person. Our task together is love and mercy. It is the growing edge for all of us, especially in our life together and in our witness to the world. We each find different ways to embody the life of Christ to the world. None of us do that in the same ways. We are united by the common quest to deepen our lives into the heart of God for the transformation of the world . . . not by common perspectives or beliefs or ideologies.

We may not always sense it at a surface level, but we are one in the One who has called and named us.

I am glad – and sometimes overwhelmed – to be your pastor in a time such as this.

In love and peace,
Jerry