Breathe in, breath out

Author, Robert Corin Morris recalled a man in his 30’s complaining to him about the results of growing up in a “classy suburb with too much freedom and too few limits.” The young man said that he yearned “for a life with constraints…” He yearned to be “fenced in” by voluntarily choosing to practice disciplines of self-restraint. He hoped to find freedom thereby from the powerful rule of his desires - a freedom in stark contrast to that which his culture celebrates.

Morris goes on to say that this young man is the embodiment of a paradox rampant in the materially “developed” nations: that more can turn out to be less, that certain kinds of freedom can become prisons of the soul, and that abundance can create its own kind of poverty. As a child of the culture of superabundance, he was promised that freedom and self-fulfillment go hand in hand. Only by following one’s heart into the widest range of life-experiences could essential self-knowledge be gained. The promised fruit would be delicious and make one wise. The young man continued, “The promise of that kind of freedom has failed. Self-knowledge is not simply a matter of doing what you want. It’s not that I don’t value freedom,” he said, “I do. But I sense there is a different kind of freedom to be discovered in restraining some of my hungers.”

When I read this I immediately resonated with its message as I’ve recently been meeting a number of people of all ages who share this same sentiment. The culture we live in is wide-open - with few restraints.  The cliche, “Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should,” fits for more and more who have found that when they’ve lived the life they thought they wanted, not only find themselves no better for it but struggling to find meaning for their lives.  

In my travels this year with a variety of different kinds of communities I engaged a secular culture that is leaning into rituals of self-restraint, in forms of spirituality that do not press in on them in the way traditional religion has done, but has freed them through the learning of self-imposed discipline. What they, and we, are seeking are boundaries, structures to contain us and hold us in a comfortable place. Constraints have been freely chosen and are very subtle. For example, people are very keen to develop rituals or practices that combine body and spirit and a time set apart.  Attending weekly worship at a church used to be one such practice. It still is for the community gathered here today; but because churches are generally tied to their own particular doctrines and have rules of exclusion, the worshipping practice has been greatly abandoned and we are now very much in the minority.  Unfortunately this has had the effect of throwing the baby out with the bath water. Some faith communities, including the Episcopal Church, have grown beyond the walls of exclusion and have the spiritual breath and depth to genuinely welcome all to share in every part of community life. But that is not well-known of course and there are many other options available. In fact, there is a tsunami of other options, and they come in many shapes and forms, some are very subtle, but all have to do with the connection of the body to the spirit by way of self-imposed disciple. Discipline around food and the ethics of food,  meditation and prayer, art and symbols, breathing and the movement of energy,  asanas and kriyas,  mudras, mantras and chanting, breath-work and movements of the body that connect one to the inner life. Each of these things are pathways to God. 

What I have witnessed this year, all around me, is an epidemic of spiritual awakening - a deep yearning to move away from institutionally imposed discipline toward self-discipline. Whole communities are forming around themes of spiritual practices - movement, breathing, eating and praying. Having a mediation practice and connecting to a community that does that together fills the need to nurture a life of discipline. Having a yoga practice that is rooted in the traditional roots, that is, to seek unity with God, and connecting to a community that does that practice together effectively provides a spiritual foundation for life. 

Yesterday, while I was practicing with my new-found Kundalini yoga community in Corning I was struck by how this works, its subtle, but very effective. I did not know anyone in the class and yet as we sat with our arms extended high into the air chanting “Har” for several minutes, until the arms were far beyond fatigued and the eyes were beginning to water, there was a sense of holding each other up, so that all of us would endure to the end and all would receive the full benefit of our collective work. Competition has no place in the spiritual life, fun and games aside.

I also have a community I enjoy in the Ithaca area and regularly go up for dinner with friends on Friday nights. This is a community that has self-imposed disciplines around food; a different kind of realized abundance. Last Friday night, while I was washing what seemed like 100 plates, no two being the same, I remarked to the host that he must be used to losing a lot of plates. Yes, he said, over the last twenty years there’s been a lot of breakage. He said the continual loss has helped them to let go of their attachments. The important thing for the hosting couple is their gift of sacred food and the love of the community that gathers on Friday nights; all the rest has fallen away.

Jesus’ teachings are meant to help us put things in proper perspective and prioritizing the important from the unimportant. It can be amazingly difficult work. But it is important work for spiritual communities to engage in. Today the lesson is about reconciliation. It is healing work, therefore spiritual work, and it extends far beyond the confines of our physical location. The goodwill we generate affects the whole community. We might think our dispute is private, but by the time we’re done telling everyone about it and not engaging in conversation with the one person we need to talk to we’ve done extensive damage to the fabric of the whole community. The way forward will result in growth for all, one way or another, but there are more helpful ways that promote health, bypassing unnecessary suffering, and respect the dignity of all involved. These are the finer points of healing work but there is a broader perspective we might hold today in light of the unprecedented number of natural disasters occurring simultaneously at this moment. 

To that end, the healing work being done by us in our respective spiritual communities is vital to the well-being of the entire world - especially for those who are suffering. The western mindset focuses on doing and fixing in times of crisis - and that certainly is of great importance. When there is a crisis first responders need to be there to do their life-saving work. Likewise, the wave of mission and aid workers who will descend on all the areas of devastation around the world, Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia and other southern states, Oregon, Montana, Mexico, Cuba, all the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Bangladesh, and all other places that have been devastated in recent weeks, will do the essential work of rescue, medical and pastoral care, repair and restoration. But more is needed. It is time now for we in the West to learn from our Eastern brothers and sisters on doing the ancient work of healing, reconciliation and restoration with our minds.   

So if you are in this moment feeling helpless as Irma makes her way up the Florida peninsula while we are gathered for worship, and are wondering, What can I do? There are two things that you can do: First, take concrete action: Make a donation for hurricane relief. And then develop a meditation practice, beginning today. I cannot stress to you enough how important and urgent the need is for this simple practice. 

Breathe in, breath out. 

Sit quietly with your eyes closed and concentrate as hard as you can on sending to those who are fearful a sense of calm;

Breathe in, breath out. 

To those who are grieving great losses, peace and strength to meet the days to come; 

Breathe in, breath out. 

to those who are injured, healing; 

Breathe in, breath out. 

To all those without hope, call upon the angels to lift them out of their despair; 

Breathe in, breath out. 

And to those who have died, extend blessings for eternal life.  

Breathe in, breath out. 

Then sit in silence and think of nothing. 

Breathe in, breath out. 

That nothingness and the calm in brings to you connects you with the force that creates worlds. That nothingness is the most healing balm you can offer a suffering world.

In the coming days and months, as life on this planet continues to evolve, we are going to realize that we are moving into a different place. Increasingly, we will no longer tolerate the world of irresponsible consumerism and mindless materialism. We will need to leave that behind us. We will have no choice; at the end of the day nothing of the material world will survive. We are moving to a time of self-realization - not narcissistic but rather holistic. We are coming into a time of realizing that the pain of the one who suffers across the globe whom I do not know is causing me pain in my own time and place because that one and I are the same. At some point, very soon now, we will not be able to turn the TV off and simply feel that we are somehow blessed that its not us that is affected. At some point very soon we will not be able to go back to this life to which we have become accustomed. We will need the spiritual tools to deal with that kind of life. The world around us is preparing for that time. Jesus’ teachings have been preparing us all along; his wisdom is enduring. One day, very soon we will need a community that has within its ethos this wisdom and a deep sense of mystery that helps each of us connect to something far greater. At some point, sooner rather than later, we will need to reconcile to the fact that we are dependent on each other for our mutual survival. 

For millions today, that day has come. Jesus’ lesson on reconciliation points us in that direction. It isn’t just for the sake of having a well-intentioned community, it is for our continuation as a species. It was never about just getting along. It was always about something far bigger. Perhaps today we can see that in light of the scope of loss and devastation in so many parts of our nation and in the world. For millions, this day is the first day of their new life in a new paradigm - where all the old things that used to matter are now unimportant and only the very, very important things remain. Today the person you are arguing about over the color of toilet paper, the person who sets your teeth on edge, might just be the person who pulls you out of your car on a flooded street or gives you food when you have none, or is the one whose dog you have rescued. The point of the lesson on reconciliation is for the development of deeper spiritual values that creates in us a sense of responsibility for one another; an acknowledgment of our interconnectedness. 

When its all said and done, God will have God’s church; it is up to us if we want to be a part of it.

 

Waiting for Honey

In his autobiographical account, Report to Greco, Nikos Kazantizakis tells of a time when his inner life had dried up so dramatically that he decided to seek counsel from a hermit who lived in a cave on Mount Athos in Greece. The hermit counseled faith and patient waiting but Nikos wanted answers. 

How long? he asked the hermit.

Who answered: Until salvation ripens in you. Allow time for the sour grape to turn to honey.

And how long shall I know, when the sour grape has turned to honey?

One morning you will rise and see that the world has changed. But you will have changed, my child, not the world. Salvation will have ripened in you. At that point, surrender yourself to God, and you shall never betray Him.

Nikos returned to his cell and one morning awoke to a medlar tree blossoming and giving off a sweet smell  even though it was the dead of winter. He wept. “I came here to the desert and buried myself inside this cell with its humble bed, its jug of water, its two stools. Now I am waiting. Waiting for what? God forgive me, but I really do not know very well.”

Wayne Simsic, who wrote of Nikos’ experience went on to say: Such open-ended waiting at a time of crisis is not reinforced in our culture; we tend toward impatience and a quick fix to take away pain and suffering. We may enter the desert willingly, but we want answers. Nevertheless, on the level of faith, we realize that we should trust this journey into the darkness. Like the Magi, depicted in the T.S. Eliot poem, we hear “voices singing in our ears” telling us that this journey into the night desert is folly but we also know that we have lost our taste for the old ways of security and comfort. Like the early Desert Christians, we intuit that the journey will be one of dying, dislocation from the usual way of seeing and understanding self and the world, but we realize that dying is necessary. Answering the desert call stretches the spirit but also opens the eyes, focuses attention on the one thing most important. (Weavings, Vol. XXVI, No. 1, pg. 13-15) Jesus says it this way: :"For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? (NRSV)

Simsic asks: “Are we willing to stay put long enough, to wait in the darkness, and to trust that the waiting will be fruitful? Do we believe that inner balance and even spiritual renewal can be found at a time of desolation and seeming loss of hope?” (Ibid. p. 15)

Peter and the disciples are moving into that uncomfortable place as they are confronted with the inevitable end facing their beloved teacher; they are moving with resistance toward the dark night of the soul written about with such clarity by St. John of the Cross, who knew it so intimately. John had been taken prisoner for his religious beliefs, was tortured, starved and left to die in his cell. Miraculously, he escaped imprisonment and wrote of his spiritual experiences in the midst of unimaginable physical and mental suffering. Simsic writes that when John’s teachings “concerning the dark path of the soul were found by a group of Carmelite nuts to be too harsh, he referred them to his poems and told them that in the metaphors they would find his original inspiration…. In the deep stillness of a dark night a hush comes over the soul and the Spirit has room to work.” (Ibid. p. 16) 

Peter is not there. We are not there. The world is not there. The hush has not yet come; the Spirit has not been given room to work. 

Peter, who was just a moment ago named by Jesus as the rock upon which the church will be built is now a stumbling block, focusing on worldly things and not divine things. Our attachment to worldly things is, will, and has always been, a stumbling block for us. It is the loss of these attachments, sometimes sudden, unexpected and unwanted that sends us deep into grief and misery. Many thousands of people in Texas are in this place now - many have lost all their worldly possessions as well as those they love. And yet, following all such disasters, years down the road will come the stories from a few of how such loss led to a spiritual awakening. It is the harder road most certainly. It is a harder thing to be transformed by tragedy then to do the work of change first so that no matter the storm that comes the soul is bonded not to earthly things; but is so completely graphed into the divine life that no loss, least of all the coming of death, can promote suffering. This may sound like Buddhist talk, but it is fact at the heart of Christianity. We perceive the releasing of our attachments through the eyes of world - as loss - but it is only gain. To have nothing is to have everything. To be free of the ties that bind is perfect freedom. Ram Dass once said, “Why do I need money when it is all around me?” When another guru was asked, “But where will the money come from?” He replied, “From where ever it is now.” God’s economy is not the economy we live by. It is altogether different and resistance to it is great and causes much suffering for us and for all those who cannot see another way. In response Jesus does not restrain himself in his reaction: “Get behind me Satan!”  Our attachments to false things, false idols, leads us daily from the Christ we deeply long to follow. The undoing of such attachments requires a gradual pulling away, a reconciliation with our inner world, our higher self, the divine within that calls us live quite differently. This is the Dark Night of the Soul. St. John wrote of this darkness:

O guiding night!

O night more lovely than the dawn!

Answering a desert monk’s request for spiritual guidance, Abbot Moses replied, “Go sit in your cell, and your cell will teach you everything.” (Ibid., p. 16)  “This counsel may have disheartened the monk because, after all, he had remained true to his cell and was being asked to return to it, stay put, and continue facing the death of his own self-interest, desires, and self-righteousness. As we retreat to an inner cell, our own encounter with divine presence through the day, we realize that it is a ‘place’ not of tranquility but of inner upheaval…. Eventually the dimensions of our cell grow to include more and more of our lives and we realize that we are being called to complete surrender to divine presence; nothing should be held back. Desert monks spoke of purity of heart, a single-minded focus on the divine image in every aspect of our lives, grounded in the intuitive awareness that we are called to lose ourselves completely in God.” (Ibid., p. 17)

The place of complete surrender is the spiritual location from which Paul speaks to the church in Rome. Paul has returned to the cell; writing this letter from his imprisonment and unsure if he would live to visit the church he founded but had not yet visited. Nothing was held back. Paul writes to the faithful Roman church: 

“Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.”  (NRSV)

If we feel this is a tall order, then we see this only as a list of moral attributes, character traits we are to acquire for the perfection of the spiritual life. That is putting the cart before the horse. Paul is describing the transformation that comes from returning to and sitting in one’s cell for a very long time. It is not forced behavior that ripens the sour grapes, but rather it is the patient waiting that transforms them into honey. One does not do these things in order to be righteous, one learns righteousness and becomes all these things because there can be no other way. Discipleship is not about learning through action, that is the way of the world. It is about being in the world as gently as a leaf hangs on a tree, or a blade of grass comes up from the earth, or a bird flies through the air. It is not forced, it does not require more than what is necessary for life, it does not destroy the tree or the soil or the air in order to have its place there. It rests in its place among all created things. The hallmark of a rich spiritual life is harmony. Jesus teaches: Do not let your hearts be troubled. Fear nothing.

The world is in great turmoil, as it always is. It may be that we are, collectively, in the dark night as we witness to the suffering all around our nation and in so much of the world. What shall we do when there is so much to be done?

We do what we can do.

We trust in working of the Spirit.

We do what we can to relieve suffering.

We speak truth to power.

We take care of our neighbor.

And we return to our cell, day by day, hour by hour, and wait. We return to prayer and meditation and study. We wait for the hush to come. We give the Spirit room to work. We return again and again to sit in our cell who teaches us in the still hours of the dark night. How long? Until salvation ripens within us and the sour grape turns to honey. The world will not change. It is us who will change. And then, and only then, will we be at peace as we wade through the waters of chaos. Then we will be free. 

Sobering Work

Catholic theologian, John Shea, begins his commentary on the Great Commission by saying:

“So much begins when the heart cries, “This shouldn’t be!”

He is referring to our cries against hypocrisy and oppression, injustice and moral dysfunction. Times when we look around and see what is, and say, it shouldn’t be like this. Most everywhere we look today, we could say, This shouldn’t be!

Shea continues, saying: “It took me a long time to value prophetic grievers, the people who felt the underlying pain of situations and give it a voice. I always felt: ‘Enough already: let’s get on with it.’ Prophetic grieving was the first step, and I was always leery it would be the last step. We would complain and do nothing.”

Shea’s wariness is historically accurate. The prophets cry in the wilderness; most often in a great sea of silent apathy. It doesn’t mean they are wrong, it just means that no one is listening. The challenge to every prophetic voice is the numbness of the masses who have been anesthetized to the pain of the world. It has been the role of the prophets, preachers and sages for eons to awaken our hearts, to move us to compassion, to cry out, “This shouldn’t be!" and propel us into action.

Shea sees Jesus role here as not only prophet, but as one modeling the action necessary in response to that which should not be. As a prophetic witness Jesus sees all possible futures and sets about working toward the one in which justice and mercy reigns, the future bound up in the proclamation of Good News. So close is this possible future he tells the disciples, “the Kingdom of God has come near.” Now is the time to be sent out, now the harvest is plentiful he tells the disciples. He gives them authority over the demons and the ability to cure any illness and then commands them to go and take what has been freely given to them and freely “cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.” This is the work of everyone who follows Christ. And in our baptisms we have been given all that is needed to accomplish it. We have been given a great responsibility and we are not helpless, nor are we powerless.

So the work of the gospel is twofold: First we are to listen to the prophets in our midst, to see what they see; to see injustice, to see suffering, to see oppression, to see inequity, and to join their cries against every infraction against humanity and mother earth.  The second task is to do curative work. And the kind of work Jesus gives his followers to do is not the first thing that usually comes to mind when we think of the role of Christians in the world today. 

We are to cure the sick. Every person who has been baptized has been given the ability to lay hands on another for the purpose of healing. We do not appreciate the power that is in us and give that power away most of the time. We look to modern medicine to bring us to health and have forgotten or no longer take seriously the ability to assist one another with prayer and anointing and the laying on of hands. We are to cure the sick.

We are to raise the dead. This one might seems a bit of a stretch, but it isn’t. When we are distracted and our senses are suppressed by the many things in our culture that easily lull us into a kind of apathetic sleep, we are dead. We are, in fact, not living as full human beings; we cannot see fully what is going on all around us, we are desensitized to violence, corruption, environmental plundering, abject racism, and the outrageous ineffectiveness of every sector of governance to a stunning degree; we are lulled into complicity by hours of mindless television viewing, video gaming, engagement in social media and endless consumerism. Our worth is measured by materialistic standards and we have been formed and shaped by a capitalistic ethos which has no spiritual foundation. Happiness is contingent on having things and people acting as they ought too. When we eat junk, watch junk, talk junk, and our minds are cluttered with junk, this is what it means to be dead. Jesus commands us to raise the dead; and we must begin with ourselves. 

We are to cleanse the lepers. Lepers are people who are believed to be unclean due to a physical affliction. Leprosy has been eradicated in places of affluence, but not in places of profound poverty; there people cannot afford to buy the antibiotics that would save them from a life condemned to suffering and isolation.  The withholding of lifesaving medicines to those in need, whoever they are, wherever they are, on the basis of greed is a symptom of the unhealth of the human condition. Greed is spiritual sickness. But if we are seeking a cure from outside ourselves we are misguided. Remember that it is we who have called to heal the sick. 

But the metaphor of lepers may also be extended as a call for the full acceptance of all those who are different from ourselves. In Jesus’ day healed lepers were legitimized by religious authorities before they could be accepted back into society. To cleanse means to legitimize, to give authority, to extend freedom, to release from oppression. Who are the lepers today? Who do we see as unclean? Whose nature do we judge as unacceptable? Whose claim to life and liberty is deemed illegitimate? Who among us is less than? Who is foreign; who are the immigrants and the refugees? Who do we fear? What cultural and social myths prevent us from knowing that we are one people of many colors and languages and customs? Today, in our observance of Juneteenth we celebrate one victory. The laws have changed, freedom has been won. But the disease of perceived separation and individualization, the disease of racism that is deep in the tissues of our society remains, often existing in whole communities unchecked and in many places, nurtured and encouraged. Do we not know that being white, with a long history of racial oppression that continues to this day, makes us lepers to much of the world? We are to cleanse the lepers. 

We are to cast out demons. Of all the things on that list this one seems to be the one that seems the most improbable, if not fantastical. In fact, we gloss over it, as if it had not been spoken. But this is the one we really need to be working on. I don’t know when exactly we stopped taking seriously the existence of demons. Thankfully, the indigenous peoples never stopped taking them seriously. They know a demon when they see one. But largely we don’t believe in such things therefore we don’t see them. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t there. The gospels are full of accounts of Jesus casting out demons, or unclean spirits. It must have been important if it made the ‘to do’ list for the disciples. Have you ever seen a demon? I propose to you, that they are all around us, and sometimes in us. And they don’t really belong there. Demons are powerful entities that create havoc in the world and in our lives. And they should never be dismissed or ignored. Jesus took their work very seriously. I’m not sure why we don’t. Perhaps we think that science has somehow debunked demonology as mythology. But science itself tells us that there is far more unknown in the universe then known. Or perhaps the institutional memory of the Salem Witch Trails and the evil it performed still casts a long shadow. The influence of the movie, The Exorcism, has surely influenced us with horrific visons. While it is true that casting out demons is serious work and requires extensive training it is equally true that the goal is always and solely for healing, for both the person afflicted and misplaced spirit. It is never to do harm or inflict suffering in any way. The policy of the Episcopal Church is as follows: “In accordance with established tradition, those who find themselves in need of [exorcism] should make the fact known to the bishop, through their parish priest, in order that the bishop may determine whether exorcism is needed, who is to perform the rite, and prayers or other formularies are to be used.” However, our bishops are no longer trained to do this work. And yet who could possibly observe the world in its present state and not see that we are possessed by forces that work against God’s purposes and are in need of spiritual intervention? We are to cast out demons. 

This is the work of the Great Commission. It is the nitty gritty behind the command to love one’s neighbor as ourselves. It is healing work. We are called to nothing less than to heal the world. We begin with the healing of our own wounds and dispelling our own demons. Our healing creates an internal environment in which love can enter in and the illusion of separation can dissipate. Then, and only then will we see what we are doing to each other and to the earth and to the creatures of the earth and be moved to cry out: This shouldn’t be! 

Compelled by Love

The celebration of the Feast of the Holy Trinity does not occur in a vacuum. It follows immediately after the day of Pentecost; that is, upon the realization of the completeness of the Godhead. The three parts of the Godhead may be expressed in various ways: such as, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or  Creator, Sustainer, and Redeemer. Borrowing from the indigenous people another way of expressing this mystery is simply, Flesh, Force, Spirit. St. Paul puts it this way: The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit; grace, love, communion. Regardless of how it is expressed, it resides firmly in the event of Pentecost, which is not just a day on the calendar in which we all wear red, but is the foundation for all of Christendom. 

And so picking up where I left off on the Feast of Pentecost, I am going to continue with another writing from Benedictine monk, Bede Griffiths, whose 50 year ministry in India and Hindu influence will be clearly visible: 

“At Pentecost the disciples were ‘filled with the Holy Spirit.’ They underwent a radical transformation. Something happened which transformed them from a group of weak and spiritless men into a community of believers who set out to change the world. This something was a mystical experience. It was a breakthrough beyond time and change, beyond the agony of suffering and death which they had experienced in the crucifixion, into the world of absolute reality, which was summed up for the Hebrew in the name of God. They experienced God; they ‘realized Brahman,’ as a Hindu would say, they “Knew the Self, the Spirit, the eternal Truth, dwelling in the heart.” 

The transformation that comes from experiencing God cannot be overstated. It is in knowing God that all right action proceeds. It is not static. That is to say, for instance, when meditation is recommended, it is for the purpose of experiencing God, but it is not the end game - it is only the beginning. Prayer is the starting place. Out of the transformation that comes of knowing God, whether in prayer or in some other transcendent experience, one is moved to action. Jesus makes this clear with his final directive: Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” The key words here are “go, teach, obey.” However, the experience of the Godhead, who is both transcendent and immanent in nature, comes before the word, “go.” There are countless examples of persons who have been transformed by their experience of God, and we look to them for guidance - ways in which to lead our own lives, how we might fully express the faith that is in us. Here are but a few:

Dorothy Day founded the Catholic Worker movement, which offers hospitality to the poor, and went to jail dozens of times to protest war and economic injustices. She wrote: 

“All through those weary first days in jail when I was in solitary confinement, the only thoughts that brought comfort to my should were those lines in the Psalms that expressed the terror and misery of man suddenly stricken and abandoned. Solitude and hunger and weariness of spirit - these sharpened my perceptions so that I suffered not only my own sorrows but the sorrows of those about me. I was no longer myself. I was a man. I was no longer a young girl, part of a radical movement seeking justice for those oppressed. I was the oppressed. I was that drug addict, screaming and tossing in her cell, beating her head against the wall. I was that shoplifter who for rebellion was sentenced to solitary. I was that woman who had killed her children, who had murdered her lover.” 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German Lutheran pastor who escaped the Gestapo in 1939, opposed Hitler and was arrested and hanged for being part of an underground movement to assassinate him. His profound writings remain a Christian witness in the face of abject evil. He wrote:  “Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness and pride of power and with its pleas for the weak. Christians are doing too little to make these points clear rather than too much. Christendom adjust itself far too easily to the worship of power. Christians should give offense, shock the world far more then they are doing now. Christians should take a stronger stand in favor of the weak rather than considering first the possible right of the strong.”

Thomas Merton was a contemplative monk in the Trappist order. He came out against the Vietnam War and died mysteriously in Bangkok, Thailand, after giving a lecture to a group of nuns and monks on Karl Marx and monasticism in 1968. He wrote: “Jesus not only teaches us the Christian life, He creates it in our souls by the action of His Spirit. Our life in Him is not a matter of mere ethical goodwill. It is not a mere moral perfection. It is an entirely new spiritual reality, an inner transformation.” 

Oscar Romero was the archbishop of El Salvador during the civil war that ravaged that country in the late 1970’s through the the 1980’s. He was constantly harassed by the Vatican when he took opposition to conservative, wealthy landowners and the military. He spoke out on behalf of social justice and was eventually shot down while celebrating the Mass by the military. He said this, shortly before his death: “You can tell the people that if they proceed in killing me, that I forgive and bless those who do it. Hopefully, they will realize that they are wasting their time. A bishop will die, but the church of God, which is the people, will never perish. The church would betray its own love for God and its fidelity to the gospel if it stopped being a defender of the rights of the poor, or a humanizer of every legitimate struggle to achieve a more just society… that prepares the way for the true reign of God in history. When the church hears the cry of the oppressed it cannot but denounce the social structures that give rise to and perpetuate the misery from which the cry arises.”

As I hope you can see plainly, the Trinity is not a doctrine. It is the fullness of the Godhead. But it means nothing apart from our personal experience of it. The Trinity is love. What we celebrate today is divine, self-giving love, from which we are driven to right action. Any action, not rooted in love, is misguided. 

Mechtild of Magdeburg described it this way: “From the very beginning God loved us. The Holy Trinity gave itself in the creation of all things and made us, body and soul, in infinite love.” It is from the intimate knowing of this infinite love, the experience of the self-emptying Godhead, that we are compelled to do the righteous work of the Gospel: Go, teach, obey.

The Pentecost Question

Today is the Major Feast Day of Pentecost. On this day we recall when we first received the Spirit of God, the essence of the Christ, the Advocate, the third person of the Trinity. In terms of the life of our faith, it is on par with Christmas and Easter. Lacking the consumer marketing status of either of those and coinciding with high school graduations and the beginning of the summer vacation season it has taken, not even backseat, but trunk status, in the increasingly secularized life of the church.  I am particularly grateful for the balloons and festive flowers and to all of you who are wearing read today to mark the occasion.

The day begins with this lesson, that reads like a selection from a science fiction novel: "When the day of Pentecost had come, the disciples were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.  Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. Amazed and astonished, they asked, 'Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? …. in our own languages we hear them speaking about God's deeds of power. All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, 

‘What does this mean?’”

The lesson from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians will spell out the supernatural gifts of the Spirit that each of us has received; gifts which grow in us if we give them attention: “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses.” 

To borrow from Acts: What does this mean?

And finally, from the Gospel of John is reported the ghostly appearance of Jesus whom no locked door can prevent, and whose very breath imparts the Holy Spirit: “…the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked… Jesus came and stood among them and showed them his hands and his side…. he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” 

What does this mean?

When I read these accounts and take into view the supernatural specter of the whole of the biblical account - from creation to the great flood and plagues of frogs and locusts and rivers that run with blood, and horns that take down great walls, and the burning bush and the parting of the sea and dreams that changed lives, not to mention the course of history on many occasions, and the hundreds of visitations of angels - I could write an entire book just on the supernatural occurrences of our canon. Today, this part of the life of our faith is in our face in a big way - it is inescapable. 

But what does it mean?

This insight from English Benedictine monk and author, Bede Griffins, who served India for over 50 years is helpful:  “In all these religious systems the danger is that the logical structure and rational doctrine will obscure the mystical vision, so inherent is the tendency of the rational mind to seek to dominate the truth which it should serve. This is the danger of all religion. It begins with a mystical experience, the experience of the seers of the Upanishads, of the Buddha under the bo tree, of the Hebrew prophets and the apostles at Pentecost, of Mahomet receiving the message of the Koran. But this experience has to be put into words; it has to descend into the outer world and take the forms of human speech. Already at this stage it is open to misinterpretation; the conflict between the letter and the spirit begins. Then the logical and rational mind comes and creates systems of thought: heresies and sects spring up, and the Truth is divided. This is due to the defect of the rational mind, imposing its narrow concepts and categories on the universal truth yet it cannot be avoided because the Truth must be proclaimed.”

Firmly girded in the written word, Christians have managed to largely domesticate the events of Pentecost. Let us be clear, they are astounding. To say that they are ‘supernatural,’ to set apart them from normal, human experience, is a way of capturing them and imprisoning them in cages of suspended belief. Jesus spent his entire ministry exposing a world that is perhaps more real than the world we claim as reality. But the truth is that the Cosmic Christ is not at all of another world - is not super-natural - but is very much the fabric of what makes up the world we inhabit in this very moment. The giving and receiving of the Spirit - invites us to share the in-habitations of the unseen, invisible, indisputable sacred world of the divine.  But how do we cross the divide?

Last Friday at the coffee group, David Stinebeck told us about a great veterans graveyard in Bath where there are some 13,000 laid to rest. It is so large that most can simply drive through it, which is a gratifying experience in itself. But David said something that really struck me. He said that if you really want to experience the place you need to park your car and walk the grounds of the cemetery and read the gravestones and immerse yourself in it allowing yourself to be moved by the experience of being surrounded by so many people who gave their lives in military service; that there was no comparison between driving through it and walking through it. 

I submit to you, that the same is true of religious life. Most just drive through - and we do so with great devotion. We are heroically busy with the work of ministry, with the physical labor of mission, and participation in the worship life of the church. It is entirely possible to fill our entire lives with the works of religious life and still be just driving through.

The church year is filled with invitations to park the car and walk instead. Today however, reaches past invitation - it is a portal - a door of sorts. A portal through which we may enter a passageway of otherworldly events and find our way into an alternate reality that coexists with this one; the world of the Cosmic Christ who cannot be held back by locked doors, that death does not destroy but sets free. It is no less than the kingdom of God. To walk means to see the created world as sacred and human constructs for what they are. To walk is to know that each of us is far more powerful then we could have ever imagined. To walk is to know that time is cyclical and not linear. To walk is to know that our dreams are windows and that the divine resides in everything that is. To walk is to know that we are simply stardust and temporary but our souls are eternal. To walk is to know that we are bound to the Holy Spirit; one body, many parts, but one and only one body.  To walk means becoming aware of the other world, the spirit world, the habitation of the godhead that is all around us – to know that there is but only a thin veil between this and that. Do not believe because you see, but see because you believe. 

Bede Griffins went on to say: “The divine essence, the Holy Trinity, is totally present in every particle of matter, every atom, and every electron. However you would like to divine the universe, the whole creation is totally pervaded by God. The cosmic religion has this awareness of God pervading the whole creation which we, as a whole, have lost.” Another great mystic once said, "If you can't see God in all, you can't see God at all."

I, therefore, invite you to ask yourself one question: What does this mean?

An Easter Day Walk in the Woods

Easter Day is synonymous with springtime. For many this day marks an official start to the spring season. Unless it occurs very early, Easter Day’s festive celebration is made even more cheery by the longer, sunnier days and warmer breezes. In the South, the unofficial dress code allows that women may begin to wear white on Easter Day. That was a big deal when I was a kid; I got to wear a new white sweater with the flowery pastel colored Easter dress my mother made for me with a new pair of white paten leather shoes and white socks with lace trim. The forsythia is in full bloom now, the fruit trees are just about to flower and there are little leaves appearing on the lilac bushes. And all we want now after the long, cold winter months is to be outside. It’s time now to clear the debris of last fall’s garden and begin preparing the soil for planting. The best examples of resurrection are given each spring. The grey forests begin to come alive with color at long last. The long dark night of winter is past and the vibrancy of a new day is upon us. The Easter story is tethered securely to a spring day.

This connection is so firmly rooted in my psyche that when I picture Matthew’s gospel account of the women coming to the tomb and finding it empty, in my mind’s eye I have included flowering bushes and lush green grass. When Jesus greets them on the road I see all around them flowering pink cherry and white pear trees. For me there is a necessary connection between the created world and the resurrection because I believe the work of the cross was not limited to just the work of atonement but also for the work of renewing the whole of creation. Isaiah reads, “For now I create a new heaven and a new earth!”

Thomas Berry, a priest in the Passionist order called himself a “geologian” for his love of study of the earth and its systems. He wrote that “gardening is an active participation in the deepest mysteries of the universe.” He went on to say, “We will recover our sense of wonder and our sense of the sacred only if we appreciate the universe beyond ourselves as a revelatory experience of that numinous presence when all things come into being. Indeed, the universe is the primary sacred reality. We become sacred by our participation in this more sublime dimension of the world about us.” 

A week ago my good friend Dee and I were hiking in the woods on a private trail that is part of her family’s land that they’ve had possession of for some 150 years. This particular trail follows along a run for four miles. Every few yards she would stop and tell me a story, or explain where we were by particular land marks. It was the most enchanted place I have ever been. She said that at the head of one of the springs that was pouring out of the side of hill next to the trail that there was a rock with an inscription that read: DUTCH IRISH 1858 that had been there her whole life. But a few years ago someone came and took it away. This was the playground of her childhood some 65 years ago, though much of what she remembered was gone; the grapevine swings and the forts they built with rocks and tree limbs. Many of the springs that once gushed with water that were now dried up. Gone too was the big pile of rocks that marked the road that went up to the quarry and waterfall. She was distressed by all the fallen timber and natural debris that had fallen into the run; evidence that no one is there to clear it away any longer. This was the original and only road through this mountain, she said, and added, but of course back then it was just for horses and wagons. 

She told me all about her Uncle Fred who owned the land, her dad’s brother. About a half mile into the trail a house appeared. I said I could believe there was a house here on the trail and she said, “Neither could Uncle Fred.” Many decades before a neighbor who did not know where the property line began or ended built his house on the run, but on Fred’s side of it. When the error was discovered the neighbor gave Fred 40 acres in trade and the matter was resolved. 

She said that Uncle Fred wasn’t much of churchgoer. But on account it was Easter and all, his wife, who was a Baptist, talked him into going with her to worship. The preacher went on and on about a man who was a notorious drinker and gambler and carouser and a womanizer. It was a long sermon and Uncle Fred was not a bit happy about being there. I had a vision of him walking out of the church and shaking himself off, like a dog who just got dipped in a flea bath. On the way home he said that the only good part of the service was that guy in the sermon. I think Uncle Fred and I would have gotten along. 

Uncle Fred spent his life preserving the land as a heritage for those who came after him. He’s long since gone to glory, and unfortunately, for all his good intentions while living, he didn’t make any provisions for the land after his death and so much of what was, is no more. His brother was convinced that big, old magnificent barn was full of snakes and burned it down. All that’s left now is the stone foundation. The land was divided up among the children and their children, some of whom sold it off or have let the homes and trailers that they’d put up go to rot and ruin. But who could of imagined, after all? Dee reflected. When you’re young you think that things will always be the way they are and you can’t imagine it any differently. 

Through all the changes and changing of hands the trail along the run remains untouched. In the summer the tops of the trees join together far overhead to create a canopy. The trout are still plentiful in the swirling deep waters of the run, and the crawfish and the orange newts too. Many of the springs still run year round, their openings crested with thick, vibrant green moss; the clear, clean water dripping two feet across, creating the appearance of a curtain of silver chains. Animal tracks covered the damp trail, evidence of bear and deer and foxes, groundhogs, and skunks, and porcupines and black squirrels. It was clear that some bigger animal had been running, its deep footprints were embedded in the mud. The forest was alive with the sounds of birds and little creatures scurrying away from us making the dried leaves look like popcorn. We understood without saying so that we were only guests in those woods and I felt an enormous sense of respect for each living thing there. Along the trail there were clusters of short little yellow flowers with scruffy brown stems. And the sight and sound of the cold quick running water across the mossy rocks was as peaceful as most anything I’ve ever known, as filled with the Holy Spirit as the grandest cathedral, the bending trail as straight a path to God as has ever been. Theologically speaking, the closeness we feel to God through nature is evidence of God’s self-communication. It is “God’s bestowal of grace upon creation,” says Judy Cannato.

The last 1700 years of Christianity has made the teachings of Jesus somewhat complicated. And the theological reflections around his death and resurrection and his life and the doctrines and dogmas about the resurrection fill volumes of books that fit under the heading of Christology. In a cursory search I found nine theories on the atonement; that should tell you a lot. The bottom line of each of them is a universal belief that all Christians share about God. And that is that God is love. That love is unabashedly revealed in the risen Lord. But it is also evident in every blade of grass and every star in the heavenly constellation. The whole of the created world is an outpouring of God’s love, a cosmic Christ that reaches far beyond our doctrinal limitations. Thomas Berry wrote, “We must feel that we are supported by that same power that brought the Earth into being, that power that spun the galaxies into space, that tilt the sun and brought the moon into its orbit.” 

On this most wonderful day in God’s created world let us now celebrate the Pascal feast surrounded by the flowers of remembrance of those who have gone before; with the sweet fragrance of Spring in the air; with our precious guest, the lamb, our four-legged brother/sister; with the four elements of creation: earth, air, fire and water - all our relations; with the sacred Word and festive song; with the spiritual food of the body and blood of Christ Jesus, and the assurance of the promise of the resurrection: that there is nothing in all of heaven or on earth that can separate us from the love of God.