The Beloved Earth

“I believe in God…the creator…of earth maybe one of the most proclaimed – and least believed, barely practiced – assertions of all the propositions in the Creed.  In fact, religion itself has forever proclaimed the truth about the value of Creation on one hand and taken it away on the other.  Earth, we got the impression, was a kind of divine mistake.  Its temptations delayed our sanctification.  Its glories, beautiful but false, seduced us to substitute lesser things for the real values of life.  Its cycles simply reminded us of the inferiority of our own natures.  Dust we were and to dust we would return.  It pitted the material against the spiritual dimensions of life.  It misled us about the purpose of existence.  It was the forbidden apple in everybody’s life.

“The earth, we said, was the thunder roll of divine presence.  And then we proceeded to ignore its place in the flowering of the human spirit and the achievement of human development.  Creation loomed as a temptation to be overcome. “    Joan Chittister from "In Search of Belief"

I am lucky to have been raised by a father who loved nature.  He taught me to be observant of what was around me whenever we were outside the city. Not only did he love spotting some wild animal (large or small) but he taught me to read the signs of the wilderness. One time when Brad and I and our family were coming down from Glacier Point at the end of a week’s camping, our truck engine quickly became hot.  We had no water with us.  I was able to spot a water source not too far off the road.  We filled up whatever utensil we had, used a pair of my tights as a filter and were able to add enough water to get to civilization for repair. My dad was responsible for this.  

 When my mother was able to sell her business and have more time to do what she loved, she became quite the gardener.  Her passion seemed to be having her hands in the dirt and growing flowers, fruits, vegetables.

My mother and father turned a barren piece of high desert property into an oasis.  They started raising a hog and a beefalo every year.  My dad could not watch when the slaughter truck would come out to turn his beloved animals into the next year’s main course for both my parents and our family.  Even though he knew better, he loved those creatures.

Like my parents, I have grown in my passion for the earth.  I think this is one of the things that fascinates me about Native American spirituality.  If this God is the creator of all, and I have no idea how that really happened, then nothing that was created by this Mother/Father should we consider either evil or disposable.  We should passionately love this place we live and do what we can to care for it and preserve it.  I hope I can pass this to my grandchildren.  

 I hope I can help them hold on to the child-love of the dirt, the birds, the squirrels, worms and all the rest of our co-inhabitants.

SILENCE

I was very determined to post regularly to my blog.  But the incidents of last Friday have kept me silent.  I don't want to go into all the emotions and thoughts that have been mine this last week.  And, if you are a friend on Facebook, you already know some of those.

In the midst of reading the books I mentioned before, this horrific event takes place.  All it has done is make my questions about the Divine deeper and more plentiful.

I will be back.  I just need to do a bit more processing and let a bit more time go by.

Is Truth a Journey?

I'm reading three very interesting books right now.  It's hard to take time to reflect on all that I am reading.  I wish I could have someone sitting next to me, reading the same books, so we could discuss chapter after chapter.

Here is just one thought from my reflection this morning.  It's not that we have different truths or that truth changes.  It's that we are all on different paths in our journey so we have different views.  As we each continue on our path, turning corners, climbing hills, going down into the valleys, we may see each other's view of truth.  Sometimes we will never see it because it is our path and our journey. 

My dad had the most amazing ability to see animals in the wild.  I mean we would be driving 60 miles an hour and he would say, "Did you see that deer behind those trees?" Not only did I not see them but I couldn't turn my head fast enough as the road we were on curved away. 

I wonder if that is how it is that truth sometimes looks different to different people?

The Spirit of Redeeming

 

This morning I was listening to a guided meditation.  The leader suggested picturing all the people on earth before the coming of the Christ.  What were they doing?  What did it look like?
Then I was instructed to picture God standing somewhere in the heavens observing this same scene.  What did God think?  How was the decision made that some kind of redemption was needed?

My picture of earth was war, people fighting, yelling, being unkind, trying to make sense of life, striving to care for their families, struggling to do the right things.  I imagined God saying, "We need to help these people.  We need to show them a way to live that will bring peace and joy and happiness into their lives.  This is not what I intended."

God's solution was to send Christ.  If we observed the way he lived and worked at living the same way, our world would be a place of peace and joy; at least more of the time.  Could this actually be the ultimate salvation?  I'm not saying Christ's sacrifice was not part of it, but it did make me think that his death may have been almost a natural consequence of living the type of life that was so opposed to what was going on. 

I have observed that when you question, when you speak something that may cause the "normal" way of thinking to be challenged, the opposition rises up.  We get so uncomfortable when someone questions our ways; when someone suggests things may be different than we have believed.  When we are asked to at least consider living our lives differently, changing our hearts and our minds something in us rebels.

I want Christ's life and not just his death to be my salvation and the salvation of the world. I hope as I grow older I can continue to be pliable, soft, moldable, changeable.  It's hard.  It means sometimes doing things that aren't easy.

Time to Start Again

I often feel "inspired" to write something. Many times, I am just too lazy to act. I usually feel like it doesn't matter to anyone else, so why bother.  And, I think, "This thought will pass with no effect" so just let it go.

On one of my many trips to the library, I checked out Joan Chittister's book "Called To Question".  I read as much of her work as I can get my hands on.  By the middle of the first chapter I knew I had to own this one, to add it to my library of Chittister, Benson, Norris and Nouwen.  I wanted to be able to mark this book up good!

Early in the prologue, I found a quote that speaks for my heart as concerning writing.
Joan Chittister:
"Writing makes a person very vulnerable.  It opens you to public criticism, to ridicule, to rejection.  But it also opens conversation and thought.  It stirs minds, and touches hearts.  It brings us into contact with our souls.  So how can it possibly be a waste of time, an idle act, a mistake, a betrayal of truth?  Who can possibly tell us not to do it? '

I, myself, can't tell me not to do it.  From the first blog I ever wrote, I have said that I do it for myself.  The above speaks to this.  It stirs my own mind; brings me into contact with my own soul.
So, I will once again attempt this. 

If you are reading this, you will find for the next several posts I am caught up in Called To Question.  That is where my mind will be as I post. I have just written Joan (with very little assurance that she will answer me).  I shared some of my own deep question of walking this faith.  Maybe it will have helped just to put it to paper (ok, screen).

Please feel free to join this conversation as I write.  Here are the rules; actually just one: no name calling or labeling.

Silence

A COLLECTION OF THOUGHTS

Etty Hillesum, in An Interrupted Life, wrote "One does not put things on paper to create masterpieces, but rather to gain some clarity."  Robert Benson quotes this in That We May Perfectly Love Thee followed by, "My work at least as I have come to see it and understand it, is to try to tell my own story with some degree of clarity and art."

This is how I feel about what I put here.  Today is just a group of really, non-related things that have gone through my mind the last several days.

I am reading Dorothy Day's autobiography and my mind is going a hundred miles a minute.  On page

38 she writes, "I felt even at fifteen, that God meant man to be happy, that God meant to provide him with what he needed to maintain life in order to be happy, and that we did not need to have quite so much destitution and misery as I saw all around and read of in the daily press. From my earliest remembrance the destitute were always looked upon as the shiftless, the worthless, those without talent of any kind, let alone the ability to make a living for themselves.  They were that way because of their own fault.  They chose their lot.  They drank.  They were the prodigal sons who were eating the swines' husks only because they had squandered their inheritance.  Since it was in the bible it must be so.  Even Our Lord Himself said that the poor we would always have with us."

I fear I was somewhat raised with this attitude as well.  I cannot remember the church I was raised in ever talk about caring for the poor.  I know the scriptures were read but we were never encouraged to do something about it.  In my mother's family, we had a few that were always poor.  And, truth be told much of their pain was self-inflicted in that they made some really bad decisions.  However, we never discussed what kind of pain forced them into those decisions.  It was just that Grandpa and Grandma kept bailing them out.  I cannot remember a time when my nuclear family did something to help the poor we didn't know.

I want that thing that is deep in my heart to be gone.  There has been a guilt-driven attention to this act of love active in me lately.  But, I have yet to find my focus to act it out.  This is not an excuse!  The time has come.



Now, a totally disconnected direction....Here are some haikus I have written over the last several months.  I just thought it would be good for me to share them.

I am alone here

Now waiting to be rescued

Trying to have faith

God, my mystery

Where now have you brought me to?

God, my mystery

I once knew a God

He has become a stranger

Shall we meet again?

My heart, once vital

Has become blinded by words

Can silence restore?

Words, words, words, words, words

Words destroy, destroy, destroy

Words, words words, words, words.

A Memory - Yet Present

I came across this in one of my journals from last year.  Realizing I still feel this way, I decided to include it here.

Walking the beach at Cayucos, this awareness comes creeping up slowly.  I don't even recognize it's arrival.  As I try to identify it; I guess at it's meaning.  While standing by the waves as they endlessly, tirelessly continue to come, I feel how small and insignificant I have become.

Is there really not to be anymore to my life than it is right now?  Was my life at some point purposeful and directional?  Or do I just remember it that way?

I suddenly feel as though I have been born to a new life; one vaguely connected to my previous one.  As I think about this it is as though I have been dropped into this place with a directive - "so, go...live!"

I have to be honest with myself - I don't know how to "so, go...live!"  Am I not to have some great purpose?  What would be said about me when I die if this is the extent of my "power and influence"?

If ----big question here---this is my path, how do I learn to walk it with joy and satisfaction?  How do I discover the possibility of more?  How do I let that possibility go?

THE GATHERING

Two experiences this weekend has brought back a familiar question.  What is church?  Now for those of you who may read this and not consider yourselves religious or spiritual, read anyway.  I’d like your thoughts.

Saturday night we met at friends’ home along with 10 other adults and a few kids.  We had dinner.  We watched some football (well, the guys did).  The ladies talked about kids, education, grandkids, serving others, and even sharing when each of us started our periods.  When the football game was over we all got together and started discussing God, the universe and man.  A dvd was started about a man traveling around the US asking people on the street what they thought about God, her followers and the church.  If some of us weren’t so old we could have stayed longer and continued the discussion among ourselves.  We left loving each other more and being aware of carrying each other in our hearts and minds.

This morning Brad and I attended a traditional church service.  There was some prayer, some singing, a reading of scripture and a “message” of which the majority was about the business of the denomination.  Now, let me say, we have attended this church a few weeks.  The people are very gracious and friendly and there is nothing “offensive” about the liturgy.

While sitting in the service I kept thinking about our Saturday night experience and the question kept reverberating in my brain, “Which one of these is really church?”  Now I know this is probably very subjective but isn’t anything dealing with spirituality and how it is worked out in your own life?  I find myself asking questions like:

                Which of these experiences caused my love for friends to grow?

                Which of these experiences inspired me to be more involved in justice (or the lack thereof)?

                Which of these experiences caused my spirituality to be challenged and fanned to greater   intensity?

Are these valid questions to ask about church?  How do we define church?  In which atmosphere would I feel more compelled to ask people to join me?   Is church supposed to be a welcoming of God into our everyday lives?  Is church to be a place that when you leave you are a more aware person; more aware of God and of others and the condition of the world?

Of course, for me this also presents a decision.  How do I find myself in this “place” on a regular basis?

Enough with the questions, now comes the answering.