lent & the passion

Here we are in the time of Lent. To me, I think this should be a time of reflection and quiet and thanksgiving and awe. I am part way through re-watching the movie, The Passion of the Christ. When the movie came out in 2004, my Mom was nearing the end of her life and living with one of my sisters in Florida. Mom was not a movie-goer at all. Not even really a movie-watcher. My sister and brother-in-law took her to see this in the theater, though. Since my Dad's passing in 2001, my Mom's health had steadily gone downhill. I don't think that the doctors ever really found anything particularly "wrong" with her, medically. I think that she was literally dying of a combination of a broken heart and her body just being so tired. She was dying of old age and sadness over the loss of her beloved best friend. I think she had also suffered some small strokes, which left her unable to communicate clearly. Her words were very slurred and she was often out of breath when trying to speak. I imagine that must have been really tough for a previously fairly outspoken lady and an English teacher. When the movie was over, after she had witnessed the scenes of extreme pain and finally death, my Mom commented to my sister and brother-in-law that "He really loved us...". If she was never able to communicate anything but that sentiment, that was enough. It was what she and my Dad tought us our whole lives. They also lived what they taught.
I'm looking forward to June, when I will be making my first retreat, with the Lay Cistercians, to the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky. I had thought of trying to get some time with the Abbot or one of the monks...hopefully to pose a question that's been on my mind a little. My question was "how could the suffering and death of one man erase the sins and wrongs of everyone who ever lived?" As I watched a scene in the movie of Jesus' mother Mary watching Jesus bear the horrific lashings at the hands of the Roman soldiers, I couldn't help but imagine what it would be like to watch your child go through that right in front of you. I imagined how I would feel if I were to have to watch my son take that sort of punishment. I imagined what it would be like to stand helplessly by as a soldier asked my daughter to deny her God in order to live...or to claim Him and lose her life.
I'm thinking, now, that maybe I don't need that question answered. I think that even one of those lashes was likely more brutal than any sort of self-punishment one could do to try to alleviate personal guilt over sin or wrongdoing.
He really did love us.

expanded package

So, I was reading a friend's latest blog post, and it sorta inspired me to try to start getting more regular with my posting here.
These past two weeks have been rough ones. I almost don't want to put that "in print" here, because somehow doing that seems to make the situation that much more permanent. Like having it floating around in cyberspace will somehow allow it to remain raw...allow it to not be forgotten. Well, I guess it's out there now!
There are changes happening because of the last weeks' trials. Soon, I imagine we will be getting a bill for something close to six digits. We lost basically two weeks worth of pay as well. So we are tightening the collective belt. One of those tightening methods...I just called to have our expanded cable package downgraded to basic. I guess maybe the last two weeks of hardcore reality has allowed me to release my hold on the "reality" of others...reality that we pay dearly to have piped into our homes for our entertainment. Reality that is cut up and polished up for ratings sake.
I've got a wife and kids and dogs to love on. I've got books to finish and books to start. I have thinking and praying to do. I have concepts to form for the betterment of others. I have folks to cook for and to feed...folks who don't have regular meals, much less expanded cable.

here

These last few months have been ones of transition. Maybe that's why I haven't written much here in that time. I've watched the heat of summer fade to a seemingly short autumn and then roll into this as-yet snowless winter. I'm falling into the rhythms of my work. I was worried that I might become disillusioned by seeing the machine at work...by being "backstage at the show" and seeing the errors and beaurocracy and humanity. But it has been almost the opposite. Real people have real emotions and real shortcomings and, well, reality isn't always a "reality show" where beautiful people live perfectly and cutely flawed lives for the entertainment of others. It's funny, this chain of events that's led to me sitting here typing right now. A sizeable move, making friends, finding community, feeling life out here, living life out here. Here, I feel like I've made one of the best friends of my life...a true brother. Here, I feel like I'm finally becoming a husband and dad. Here I feel like I truly, finally, have a heart...I can really feel it beating now. Here also, I've seen people get real with me. Here, I've been confronted, chastised, humbled, asked to apologize...and then ignored. Here I gave a coat to Robert because he needed warmth. Here I've discovered I love to serve folks who deserve to be served with love. Here I've discerned, been sobered, and have woken to God's hand in artistry on the early morning skies over the mountains.

jazz

I picked up some wind chimes for the front porch. One set is a six-tube, double striker chime. The other is a set of temple bells. I sit out front and read or think, and if there's a breeze, I have music. It struck me that the music of the chimes sounds like some crazy free-jazz...random and intricate and beautiful. Today, sitting outside, it dawned on me that the wind that drives the chimes is not random. God's hand or breath or thought drives the wind that drives the chimes...creates the music. Then I thought about how God's hand or breath or thought that drives the wind also drives the clouds in their ever-changing and ultimately creative artistry. The wind turns the leaves that catch the sun and casts the shadows in just the right way. It goes on and on like that. Nothing is random. Everything is engineered perfectly.

discernment

I have come to what seems like a time of enormous change. I am very uncertain about these looming and immediate choices that we have to make. It's decision time, and the moves that we make in the next 48 hours or so will overwhelmingly impact and define our lives for at least the next seven years.
Maybe it's because I've never sat still for that long that it seems so scary to commit to sitting still. Maybe it's because things seem to be always in such a state of constant flux that my common sense tells me to "wait, wait...let things play out and see what happens".
We came here with next to nothing and entered into a life...entered into relationships...relationships with people, relationships with a potential church community, relationships with jobs, etc. Some of those relationships are great and blossoming. Some have wavered to the point where I don't know if it's something we can count on when the clinch tightens. Some relationships have almost completely fallen away.
My instinct is to push everything away, cut ties, and to run in a different direction. Running west always seems to make some sort of sense...that option is always hanging out in the periphery of my mind as if to say, "I know how you feel about me and I'll be here waiting here for you to choose me."
The word "discernment" never really meant much to me until now. But now, the concept of (and struggle for) discernment is presenting itself over and over.

humility

I blasted through the Rule of St Benedict yesterday. I thought it was a really interesting, humble, and well thought out Biblically-based writing. Obviously, one needs to relate what you are reading to this day and age, as we don't go asking our pastors for permission to strike someone else at church. At least I don't.
I appreciate the way that Benedict always humbly defers to the Bible as the source, and to his own book as a resource.
In the Rule, there are twelve steps of humility.
Humility is something that I naturally rail against. It's not something that comes naturally to me. Now, "humiliation"? That I have some background with. Maybe a lack of natural humility is a defense mechanism against being humiliated.
Coming out on top, having the last word, being the first or the best or the fastest or the whatever...these are things that have always resonated with me. After all, isn't this how we are programmed? In school, we are taught to try be the best. In sports, we must beat the other team at all costs. In business, there are ladders to be climbed and therefore heads and hands to be stepped on. In traffic, be the first off the line when the light turns green. Troll for the parking spot closest to the door of Barnes & Noble. Be sure to get on the shortest line at the supermarket...even if it means running back and forth trying to figure out exactly which line that is. These things are what we are programmed to do. But I don't think we were created for these things.
I am learning humility in real ways these days. I feel like I have a handful of chains attached to the ring in my nose (figuratively!). They pull this way and that...sometimes in different directions at the same time. Sometimes one of the chains gets dropped and it just drags. I'm trying to learn to react (or not react as the case may be) in appropriate ways. Because I don't want the programmed ways of the world to be my ways.

____________________

By the way, if you are interested in reading the Rule of St Benedict, I found a really good version of it here. It is interspersed with helpful, gracious, and sometimes funny commentary by Philip Lawrence, OSB, Abbot of Christ in the Desert.

isaiah & tom

Isaiah 5:23 ...And then line your pockets with bribes from the guilty while you violate the rights of the innocent.

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Isaiah 3:14-15 ...You've played havoc with this country. Your houses are stuffed with what you've stolen from the poor. What is this anyway? Stomping on my people, grinding the faces of the poor into the dirt?

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We must never overlook the fact that the message of the Bible is above all a message preached to the poor, the burdened, the oppressed, the underprivileged. - Thomas Merton

Much of my reading lately has been dealing with how we view the poor, how the situation of poverty can be addressed, and how we should respond. Writers and activists like Thomas Merton and Mother Teresa are referenced by other writers and activists like Henri Nouwen and Shane Claiborne. These folks seem to chase each other around (figuratively) with complementary writings and ideals....ideals that were both ahead of their time and ancient in their wisdom and humanity.
Also, the Old Testament book of the prophet Isaiah seems to come up quite a bit when considering things like "injustice", "the need for societal change", "poverty", "revolution", and "being radical".
The above-quoted verses and writings were both things that I stumbled across while reading this morning.

So where do we start? What do we do? How can we deal with the tragedy of poverty? There are aproximately 100 homeless folks here in the city. I do some cooking and serving, from time to time, at one of the local homeless shelters. But I always feel that wall there...like "rich-suburban-guy-doing-his-miniscule-part" for the minority oppressed. And I'm nowhere near rich...or even really all that suburban! When the service is over, I probably head off in the car to go and consume something. And they go off hoping to consume anything. I guess I feel like these folks are my neighbors, and but for God's grace, I could so easily be on that line for a once-a-month hot breakfast. So I'm thinking...trying to figure out ways to be more human...to be a good neighbor...to try to catch a glimpse of Jesus in the eyes of these interesting and lovable folks. Maybe provide the opportunity for them to see a glimpse of Jesus in my eyes too. We've got a lot. And we so often take that for granted.
Word.

A banner once hung on the front of a deserted church in Philadelphia. It read...

"How can we worship a homeless man on Sunday and ignore one on Monday?"