Mottoes - Part 5 "To Make a friend...."

“To make a friend, be a friend”

When I was a kid, we moved around a lot. My dad was a football coach. It’s a lot like being an army brat. I moved every year from 8th grade through graduation. The first big move, after 7th grade was awful. I was painfully shy and didn’t have the faintest idea how to make a friend. I hid in bathrooms during lunch at school because I was too shy to figure out how to invite myself to sit at a table with people in the cafeteria. I hid in bathrooms after church because I didn’t know how to make conversation with kids I didn’t know. It was excruciating. My mom’s advice on how to make friends was this motto:

“To make a friend, be a friend”

It didn’t help me navigate lunch in the cafeteria or “fellowship” time after church. I still went that entire year without a single friend.

But actually, it’s pretty good advice overall and it has served me well over the course of a lifetime.

Yay mom.

Fertile soil

happiness is a tyrant

It has been my experience that the most fertile soil of my life was the shit.  The parts of life that I raged against and dreamed of escaping.  The trash, the refuse, the parts I wanted to throw out so I could get back to strength, peace, certainty, happiness and joy. 

I like to garden.  Here's how I "make" fertile soil:

1) compost - which is nothing more than putting all the rotting organic trash in a pile and letting it turn into soil. It does this pretty much without any help from me. The only part I play is knowing what to put in and what not to put in - and what I put in is DEAD material, rotten vegetable matter, leaves and such.  It's a great metaphor for life.  Just toss in your trash, your dead material and the stuff you absolutely can't stomach.  Toss in the trash that life hands you and let it do it's work. 

Voila!  Fertile soil.

2) Manure - aka shit.  On our little hobby farm, we shovel it and add it to the compost pile. Again, we don't really have to do anything, just collect it and shovel it in. Another great metaphor - take all the crap you create, all your filth that you are ashamed of and: 

Voila!  Fertile soil.

I'm not saying anything profound here or anything we all don't already know.  And yet, we are continually fighting and struggling to avoid the shit and get back to the "good" stuff.  We are looking for a way to avoid the darkness and get back to the light.  We are drinking and taking pills, and playing games, and going from one person to the next, and distracting ourselves with countless hours of Netflix in an attempt to avoid the struggle, forget the struggle, drown out the struggle and get back to the ease.   We are obsessed with happiness.  But happiness is a tyrant and a gaping maw that will never be satisfied.   It's so much more peaceful to just shovel the shit and work the soil.   

(to comment, click on the blog title "Fertile soil") 

It's my fault

The thing about blame is it lets us feel in control.

When things in life don’t go as planned – who’s to blame? 

Sometime we blame others and sometimes it’s warranted.  Sometimes we blame others and it’s really not. 

Sometimes we blame ourselves and it’s warranted.   Sometimes it is our fault.  We didn’t show up, we didn’t keep our promise, we didn’t put in the effort that was required. 

And sometimes it’s not our fault, but we blame ourselves anyway.   I’m not good enough, not loveable enough, not hard-working enough, not thin enough, not forceful enough, not gentle enough. 

It’s my fault. 

It’s funny how, even when we’re not to blame, we often still like to make it our fault. 

“If I had just ….”

“If I could only….”

“If I were more….”

“If I were less …….”

The thing about blame is it lets us feel in control.  If it’s my fault, I can fix it, change, control it, prevent it from happening the next time.  If it’s my fault, it’s not random, arbitrary and out of my control. 

I have spent a lot of wasted effort in my life trying to change things about myself or my situation in order to avoid pain.   I say wasted effort because many times I wasn’t to blame and all the gymnastics I did to try to fix the situation amounted to nothing.  At the end of the day, I can’t be anyone other than myself – nor can anyone else.  And that’s no one’s fault – it’s just the truth. 

We don’t like how the world just randomly hands us things – things we don’t want, things we never asked for, things that are painful, things we can’t control.  So whether it’s the fault of another person, whom we can’t control or there is no one and nothing to blame, we find we are out of control. 

We'd rather be at fault. 

(to comment, click on the blog title "It's my fault") 

PB & J Communion

Eucharist: late Middle English: from Old French eucariste, based on ecclesiastical Greek eukharistia ‘thanksgiving,’ from Greek eukharistos ‘grateful,’ from eu ‘well’ + kharizesthai ‘offer graciously’ (from kharis ‘grace’).

Over the past ten years, I’ve watched my dad slip away, one small, excruciating piece at a time.  At first it was little changes.  Before he started slipping away, he was always an obsessively neat and tidy person.  He would hang tools on the garage wall and ask me to outline the shapes of each tool with a marks-a-lot ( an old-school Sharpee) so that they would always be returned to the exact same spot each time. His sock drawer was immaculate; each pair rolled exactly the same, color coded from lightest to darkest.  One of the first changes I noticed in dad was that his garage wasn’t neat and tidy anymore.  Dad had always been fastidiously clean and then I noticed that sometimes he didn’t shower every day.   Dad was always a “fix-it” guy and a true handy-man, but suddenly he wasn’t fixing anything around the house.  Mom bought a new barbecue grill and he didn’t put it together for her.  I realized at some point that it wasn’t because he had lost interest, or become lazy, it was because he couldn’t anymore. 

He started falling frequently, and staying in bed all day.  He became incontinent and this very proud man didn’t seem embarrassed in the least when he would wet or soil himself. 

For the last 2 ½ years, he’s been in a nursing home- the final indignity.  He’s lost his mobility and his dementia gets worse by the day.  He is unable to communicate verbally anymore in any meaningful way.  He has a tough time bringing words to mind in order to complete a sentence. 

I grieve the loss of my dad a little at a time as there’s less and less each day of the dad I knew.  But behind the inabilities, vulnerabilities, and indignities he is going through, one thing endures.  My dad was always such a giving person.  If you needed something, he was there for you.  When my brother in law was burned in a house fire, dad flew up to northern Michigan and sat at my brother in law’s bedside, feeding him ice cream.    If you were moving, he was there to help.  When I went through my divorce, he was always coming into town to be with my kids while I went to night classes, went on business trips, tried to make a new life for myself.  He tiled a bathroom for me, built in a fourth bedroom for my son.  He was one of those people that truly enjoyed giving to others and being the hero.   He was my rock.  

And dad was a romantic.  He was the kind of man who bought my mom flowers and jewelry for special occasions, opened doors for her, and I hear he was a great dancer.  Now, he can’t dance or go out and buy her roses and diamonds, and a nursing home is about the least romantic place to spend time with your lover.  But,   every day, he orders a peanut butter and jelly sandwich from the lunch room.  After his lunch, he takes the sandwich back to his room and waits for my mom to come for her visit.  When she comes to see him each day after lunch, he takes half the sandwich and gives her half.  Then together, as their lives and their 61 year love affair slip away; this beautiful couple share this bread, and jelly and peanut butter.  This is their daily eucharist, their holy communion.  It’s all he has left to give her. 

“This is my body”

And it’s beautiful.   

(to comment, click on the blog title "PB&J Communion") 

Mottoes - Part 4 "You can be anything you want to be"

...we miss both our own humanity and the humanity of others.  And we will miss the chance to extend grace.

My parents gave me and my siblings this motto so that we would feel confident and feel like the sky was the limit.  I gave it to my kids too.   If you can dream it, you can do it.  It’s the proverbial American dream.

The trouble with this motto is that it’s just not true.   It’s more true for some and less true for others, but it’s never wholly true for anyone.  I am a white, upper-middle class female.  My parents were college educated and gave me a college education.   I had more chance of this motto being true than most.

but still …. 

This motto tells us there are no limits, but no matter how much positive thinking we do, or how much faith we muster, no matter how much good energy we send into the universe, or how hard we work, there are limits.   

Financial limits, social limits, intellectual limits, physical limits. 

Limitations are important to acknowledge.  Limitations are the things in our lives that, if we pay attention, will teach us who we are.  They will teach us that we are human and do not have ultimate control.  Control is what this motto can become all about.  If we believe the motto that we can be whatever we want to be, and we don’t temper it with a healthy dose of reality, we can feel as though we are in control of our outcomes.  This type of control leads to blame.  We assign blame to ourselves and to others if our goals and expectations are not met.  Maybe we didn’t work hard enough, believe it enough, or stick with it long enough.  Maybe others didn’t either.  It allows us to take a short-cut and not really get to know ourselves or others.  Who are we really?  Where did we come from?  Where are we going?  What kinds of issues are we dealing with?  Without getting to know ourselves and others, we reduce the person to a formula rather than an individual.  The person becomes someone who just didn’t put forth the appropriate amount or type of effort, or didn’t have the right mentality, or faith or stamina.  And so, we miss both our own humanity and the humanity of others.  And we will miss the chance to extend grace.  Maybe the person who falls behind in school has a learning disability, or the person who has poor work attendance has a mental or physical illness.  Maybe that person who has put on weight is taking care of a disabled child and doesn’t have time to exercise, or maybe the person who can’t pay their rent lost their job and their savings paying for medical treatments.    

But sometimes it feels better to maintain the illusion of control.  We can get caught in the trap of working so hard to preserve the dream, that we don’t live the life we were meant to live.   The continued resolve to put forth more effort or believe more in order to gain the greener grass is the best distraction from doing the things we really CAN do and living our lives in the present. 

When my son was two or three, we were driving and he began to cry suddenly and inconsolably from his car seat in the back.  I asked him what was wrong and he said, “I’ll NEVER be a bird!!!”  I was confused at first, then realized that he had just realized that the "you can be anything you want to be" narrative I had given him just was not true.  No matter how hard he tried in life, he would never be a bird;

he would always be a human

But human is nice.  

(To comment, click on the Title of this blog post, "Mottoes, Part 4.  'You can be anything you want to be'"

Mottoes - part 3 "It can always be better"

The myth of enough is a gaping hole, consuming, eating away at all the good stuff and leaving behind the bones of discontent. 

I grew up raised by a football coach father with many wonderful qualities.  He loves his children and was a strong and reliable presence for us.  He is a man of strong will.  He is a man who pulled himself up by the bootstraps and who wanted to pass along to his children the wisdom that had allowed him to rise above his abusive upbringing by an alcoholic father and mentally ill mother. 

 One of the mottos he passed along was:

 “No matter how good a thing is, it can always be better.”   

 The problem with this life motto like is that it is true.

-no matter how good this relationship is, it could always improve

-no matter how thin I am, I could always be thinner

-no matter how I parent my children, I could always have done it better

-no matter how much I give, I can always give more

- no matter how good that meal was, I could have cooked the meat just five minutes less, or five minutes longer.

-no matter how lovely my home is, it can always be nicer, cleaner, more artful

-no matter how much I get done, I could have done more

-no matter how much I relaxed, I should have relaxed more

-no matter how spiritual I am, I could always go deeper

-no matter how good sex is, it can always be better

-no matter how well I’m doing at work, I can always achieve more

-no matter how good my job is, there’s likely something I love more,  that is more meaningful, more interesting, more fulfilling, or pays better

All true

All irrelevant. 

Nothing is ever good enough, perfect enough.  It can always be better.     YEP.

The myth of enough is a gaping hole, consuming, eating away at all the good stuff and leaving behind the bones of discontent.  It is the mouth with an insatiable appetite for more, More, MORE, MORE, MORE

How exhausting it is. 

Matthew 19:13-26 tells a story that contrasts the children to a rich man.

Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them.

Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”  When he had placed his hands on them, he went on from there.

Children have no achievements with which to justify themselves.  Children don’t have it all “figured out” yet.  They are wonderfully unformed and unfinished.  They don’t know they are not perfect, because  perfect is not even on their radar yet.  And it is this very quality that makes them perfect.

Good and bad don’t enter their mind until society teaches them to judge and categorize and criticize.    They proudly display their imperfect crayon drawings on the refrigerator, they rejoice in the imperfect cakes they bake, they don’t even notice the messes they make, they think the off-key song they sing is beautiful and the uncoordinated dance they dance is wonderful.   They believe they are the most amazing person on the face of the earth and everything they create is beautiful – until someone tells them otherwise

Just then a man came up to Jesus and asked, “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?”

“Why do you ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good. If you want to enter life, keep the commandments.”

“Which ones?” he inquired.

Jesus replied, “ ‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother,’and ‘love your neighbor as yourself.’”

“All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?”

The rich man on the other hand thought he had it figured out.  He knew who was “good” (Jesus) and had pretty much achieved perfection as his religion defined it.   He had obeyed all the commandments. 

Jesus confronted his idea of goodness and perfection: 

GOODNESS

“Why do you ask me about what is good?”   Well, because you’re JESUS.   I mean if we can’t ask Jesus about what is good, then what hope is there?  How can we know what is good and what isn’t if we can’t ask Jesus himself!!!

“There is only one who is good” Jesus seems to be saying here – look, don’t be fooled, there is nothing you can do to achieve goodness.  No special knowledge I can give you that will help you to figure it all out.  Goodness  isn’t the goal. 

Then Jesus says, “If you want to enter LIFE, obey the commandments”.   

Notice he does NOT say, “if you want to be GOOD, obey the commandments. “ 

Moral and religious perfection, even if it could be achieved (which it cannot), does not make us GOOD.  It can help us to enter a way of life that is life-giving rather than destructive.  It cannot make us good.

PERFECTION

“Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.””

Jesus is showing here that perfection cannot be attained.  No matter how much we do – even if we do everything we think God has asked of us, we can always do more.  It’s never enough.   The richer we are – the more we have and the more we have it figured out – the harder it becomes. 

“Who then can be saved?”

Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

I always read this wrong.  At first, I thought it was telling me that God would miraculously give me the strength to achieve goodness and perfection, then I thought it meant that I was part of a special forgiven group that were made good and perfect through God's forgiveness.  But now I believe that what it means is that God’s way out of this trap is Grace.  Not forgiveness, but Grace - we usually think the two are synonymous.  I'm talking about a grace that says no one is good and there is nothing you have to do.  Perfection isn’t attainable.  I'm talking about a grace that says we are already OK.  Already perfect in our imperfection.

In the Garden of Eden story the serpent comes to the woman and tells her that she is not good enough, not yet perfect.  She needs this special knowledge of good and evil and if she gets it she will be better than she is now.  She will be “like God” – perfect.  If only she could know what was good/what was evil/who was good/who was evil, perfection would be attainable!!! 

She falls for it.

We all fall for it.  

We fall from grace.

Grace is the state under which no one is good but God, and there is nothing you have to do.  Perfection isn’t even on the radar.

Peter Rollins in  “A Satanic Community”, calls any community that tells us we have to be something else or get somewhere else is a satanic community and is in league with “the devil.” Not satanic as in a literal dude with horns and a pitchfork.  Not satanic as in a literal snake in a tree.  Not satanic in any literal “being” sense.  But satanic in the sense that it is a voice of deception that leads you to a place of self-destructiveness and other-destructiveness.  Satanic in the sense that it leads you away from life and creativity. 

Wow. Think about church and what you’ve been told in church!

The spiritual task is to exorcise this voice and the  technology we use to exercise this voice is Grace.  Grace is the idea that you’re accepted as-is.  To experience Grace is to experience the idea that you are accepted for who you are and to accept this acceptance.  It isn’t about saying we will give you a second chance to get to your ideal.  It’s about saying there is no ideal you need to get to – you’re fine the way you are.  Or rather, you’re not fine the way you are and that’s OK. 

Ironically, it’s actually the experience of not having to strive for some ideal that helps transformation take place.  It’s like quicksand, the more me move and the more we strive, the deeper we sink.  It’s only when we stop that we stop sinking.  It’s THEN that transformation happens. 

In the state of grace, the motto changes from

“no matter how good a thing is, it can always be better”

to

“don’t try to move from grace in order to perfect yourself”

Under Grace we are already OK.

Perfect in our imperfection.

No improvement required.

As –is

Enough.

(To comment click at the top on the title of this post - "Mottos - Part 3 "It can always be better"

Mottoes - Part 2 "The Cow"

"No one will buy the cow if the milk's for free"

This motto was passed along to me by my mother.  I'm sure she was well meaning.   It’s a motto a lot of mothers of her generation passed along to their daughters. 

Here’s what the motto communicates:

“If you give sex away before marriage, no one will want to marry you."

Or in other words:

"The only thing that makes you worth having is what's between your legs." 

This motto is about two things; being a sex object and using sex as a means of power and control.  

In my upbringing, religion often echoed this motto.  Religion tells girls that if you are not a virgin on your wedding night, you are damaged goods (a damaged object), soiled ( a soiled object), less than perfect (objects can and must be perfect), less desirable (than the perfect, unsoiled object),

less than.

Not only does this motto teach a girl that she is only desirable because of sex and is not much more than a  sex object, but sex  in this cow scenario is not about love and intimacy but about control.  This motto says that I can (and should) control a man through the withholding of sex. 

Holy cow.

(To comment click at the top on the title of this post - "Mottos - Part 2 "The Cow")

Mottoes - Part 1 "Be tough"

There are several problems with being tough.  First of all, it’s a lie. 

We all have mottoes - things we say to ourselves or words of so-called wisdom we learned from others along the way.  Mottoes are supposed to be little sayings that encapsulate a set beliefs or ideals that can guide us through life.    The trouble with mottoes is that they often lead us astray.  This is first part of a series on the mottoes I have had in life which did me no good at all. 

We are all made up of each and every experience that ever happened to us.  They are all stored in our subconscious and are influencing us moment by moment without our even being aware.  Although we think our conscious minds are calling the shots in our lives, they are not – our subconscious is mostly what drives us. 

It is our instinct to avoid or recoil from pain and suffering.  It’s a good instinct – a survival instinct.  But often times instincts that are there for our survival, can turn into ways of being that ultimately tear us down.  Our fight or flight response, when it’s ON daily, leads to stress-related illnesses.  Our bodies’ attraction to high fat, high sugar foods …well, we all know where that leads. 

And our avoidance of pain and suffering can also end up nowhere good. 

If there is a part of us that has suffered, we often try to just put it away. 

“Don’t think about it”

“Don’t dwell on it”

“get over it”

“Be tough”  

That was my dad’s motto – be tough.   My dad was a football coach.  He was tough.  His motto "be tough" got him through a lot as a child of an abusive and alcoholic father.  He said it to us as kids - repeatedly.  

There are several problems with being tough.  First of all, it’s a lie.  I’m not tough and neither are you.  We are all weak, and fragile.  We all feel stuff and that is totally OK, totally honest and totally human.     The second problem is that no one can keep up being tough.  If we don't allow ourselves to be weak and fragile, it will come out in our bodies.  We will have muscle spasms, headaches, backaches and any other number of other problems.  Our bodies cry out to us, "HEY!!  Guess what!!  You're not as tough as you're trying to be!"  Our bodies always tell the truth and will try to get us to stop being tough all the time.  Another problem with being tough is that to be tough you have to reject the part of you that isn’t.   And to reject it, you pretty much have to tell yourself that it’s bad, and worthy of rejection.   The idea that some feelings are good and some feelings are bad is built in to our society.  It’s ingrained in us almost from infancy.  So we reject the parts of us that we have been taught are bad:  weakness, fear, anxiety, sadness, confusion, boredom, uncertainty.  When we encounter these feelings, we find ways to get rid of them as quickly as possible:  deny, medicate, blame, lash-out, act out.  Anything we can do to return to “good” feelings like: strength, certainty, happiness, confidence. 

Those “good” feelings are only half of us.  We are rejecting half of ourselves, and rejecting half of others as well.  How can we have lives of love if we reject fully half of all that makes us and everyone else human?  Who is going to love our “dark” side? 

We walk through life feeling lonely and unloved because we have rejected half of ourselves and others have as well.   Imagine what it would feel like if we lived in such a way that the side of ourselves that we keep in the shadows, the things we don’t want people to know for fear of their rejection – were loved and appreciated every bit as much as those qualities we call our strengths. 

It starts with us.   An exercise that I use is a visualization of cradling pain and suffering.  I learned it years ago when I was becoming certified to be a hypnotherapist.   In this visualization, I imagine the thing I am trying to reject in myself.  Maybe it’s a personality trait, a behavior, a past experience, or an experience I’m having right now.   I imagine holding that thing and cradling it like a mother holds and cradles her baby, speaking words of love and acceptance to it.  Sometimes the mother doesn’t even know why the baby is suffering, but the very act of cradling the baby soothes its suffering.   I find in myself that this visualization lets me acknowledge that within me are many, many feelings and experiences that are not tough.  They are soft, and vulnerable, and hurt; and that's OK.....they are loved.

(To comment click at the top on the title of this post - "Mottos - Part 1 "Be Tough")  

Relationship with God

So, how do I go about “having a relationship” with something that is part of my very being?  

relationship

noun  re·la·tion·ship  \ ri-ˈlā-shən-ˌship \

1: the state of being related or interrelated

2: the relation connecting or binding participants in a relationship: such as     a : kinship        b : a specific instance or type of kinship

3a : a state of affairs existing between those having relations or dealings         b : a romantic or passionate attachment

Do you think maybe the term "relationship with God" is problematic? As time goes on, I find it feels weird to say it. There are all kinds of relationships and the word “relationship” can be used in many different ways, but usually when we talk about relationship with God, we are talking about the type of relationship that is an interaction between two separate entities.  We are taught that we need to work on this relationship and seek out this relationship.

And yet perhaps God is not something “out there” that we have to search for, and strive after and work to have a relationship with.  Perhaps he is within us and a part of us and all we have to do is recognize that.  The Bible is full of imagery of God as the ground of our being rather than a distant being “out there” :

“God is through all and in all” Ephesians 4:6

“For in him we live, move and have our being.”  Acts 17:28

 “in him all things hold together” Colossians 1:17

“Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” I Cor 3

In order to think about God as something or someone with whom we have a relationship of exchange or a relationship that requires tremendous effort on our part, God has to be “other”.  We have to be separate in order for the idea of that kind of relationship to work. It seems to me that sacred scripture talks much more about God being “in and through” than being separate and apart. If God dwells in us and we are the temple of God’s spirit then it’s interesting that we still think of God as something “out there” and separate from us.   

The problem could be in the name.  We've named God and by giving "God" a name, he has become an entity separate from ourselves.  When Moses asked God for a name, he was given none but was told that he was to call God "I am that I am".  Names and labels can create separation and misconceptions.  

I think we’ve not realized just how intimate this thing with God is supposed to be.  If God is in me, a part of me, if God is the very thing that holds me together and the force in which I “live, move and have my being” then it is safe to say that God is not something separate and apart from me.   God is integral to myself and in the very fiber of my being. What could be more intimate than that?  How can I be separated from the very thing that holds me together?  I cannot.  We are one. 

So, how do I go about “having a relationship” with something that is part of my very being?  

When it comes to ourselves, we don't say we have a relationship with those aspects that are integral to us.  We don’t usually talk about having a relationship with our bodies, or our minds, or our cells, or our spirits. We just ARE with ourselves. Our bones and muscles hold us together, our blood could be said to be the thing that allows us to live, move and have our being and yet we don’t talk about having relationships with these things.  They are a part of us.  Sure, we “relate” to our bodies; we eat, we exercise, we bathe and take care of our bodies, but this is not the type of relationship that is some kind of back and forth or exchange between two separate entities. 

If I think of my body as something disconnected and separate from me, it’s problematic.  I won’t be able to hear what it is telling me in the tension of my shoulders or the tightness in my chest. I might eat or drink too much, no matter how awful it makes my body feel.  I might not eat anything at all.  Disconnection from our bodies can lead to increased anxiety, depression, body dysmorphia, eating disorders, cutting, addictions, sexual acting out, and psychosomatic illnesses. 

If we have become disconnected from our body, we don't have to work to build any type of relationship, the relationship is already there - built in.  We just have to learn to re-connect ourselves and get back in tune and in touch.  Maybe it’s the same when we think we are separate and disconnected from God.  Rather than working to build a relationship,  we just have to figure out how to re-connect ourselves to our source and to see and hear what is already there.     

“We are not just made by God, we are made of God.”  Julian of Norwich

(To comment, click on the blog Title "Relationship with God")

Embracing Darkness

"...if you are willing to enter the cloud of unknowing and meet God in the dark—maybe even the dark of a tomb—you might be in for a surprise."

I came across this article today on religionnews.com.  I couldn't agree with BBT more.  

https://religionnews.com/2014/04/14/barbara-brown-taylor-encourages-christians-embrace-darkness/

She’s been called a heretic by some and a prophet by others. Baylor University even named her one of the 12 most effective speakers in the English-speaking world.  Her name is Barbara Brown Taylor, and she is on a mission to redeem the darkness.

“Christianity has never has anything nice to say about darkness,” says the 62-year-old Episcopal priest in her new book, Learning to Walk in The Dark.  Taylor charges churches with propagating a “full solar spirituality” that “focuses on staying in the light of God around the clock.” But she says the faithful need to discover a “lunar spirituality,” which recognizes that humans need both darkness and the divine light .

It’s fitting that Taylor’s book should release before Holy Week, a time when Jesus entered what many Christians would call one of the darkest periods in his own life.  Was Christ’s dark period a positive thing overall? I imagine most Christians would say “yes.” Yet, some of those same Christians resist embracing darkness in their lives.

In the first part of my interview, Taylor and I discuss her message about darkness and why she thinks Christians need it. In part two, which will be posted tomorrow, we explore hot topics such as what she believes makes one Christian, if she believes in a literal devil, and whether she is afraid of dying.

RNS: How do you think modern Christians have misunderstood darkness, both in scripture and in life?

BBT: Once you start listening to how people use the words dark or darkness, it doesn’t take long to realize that the references are 99% negative. I don’t know how that happened in every day speech. Maybe it’s a linguistic fossil leftover from our days in caves or maybe it is a predictable association for people who’ve become addicted to light.

Where scripture is concerned, I don’t think Christians have misunderstood much of anything. From Genesis to Revelation, darkness is used a synonym for ignorance and sin and evil and death. But there are also narrative passages that form an easily missed minority report.

RNS: You also talk about the positive use of darkness Isaiah 45 (“I will give you hidden treasures in the darkness”). You obviously think we have misunderstood something, no?

BBT: When I say we haven’t misunderstood anything, that’s if you go through a concordance and look up the words. If you look up “dark” and “darkness,” scripture is unanimous. But if you look up the stories, it’s a whole different thing.

In Genesis, darkness existed before God even got to work as a primal substance. Everything was made by God from dark. In Exodus, God promises to come to Moses on Mount Sinai in a dense or dark cloud. Here, darkness is divine and where God dwells. Abraham meets God in the darkness, Jacob wrestles an angel in the middle of the night, and angels announcing Christ’s birth to the shepherds at night. There’s so much that happens in the dark that is essential to the Christian story.

Linguistically, it’s the pits. Narratively, it is a different story.

RNS: What’s your working definition of darkness?

BBT: Darkness is everything I do not know, cannot control, and am often afraid of. But that’s just the beginner’s definition. If I am a believer in God, then darkness is also where God dwells. God may also be frightening and uncontrollable and largely unknown to me, yet I decide to trust God anyway.

RNS: You say “many old-time Christians are looking into the dark right now.” How might your message help them?

BBT: I mean “mainline” Christians. It only takes about a minute in any news source to notice in decline in everything from membership to budgets to congregations combining and buildings going up for sale. Sometimes when I visit these embattled churches, I feel almost like I’m working for hospice visiting churches that are just scared to death they’re dying. You can almost smell the sweat in the room as they fret about what in the world they’re going to do.

But if you really work for hospice you learn to work with what is left. The remaining time, resources, relationships. Even for mainline Christians who are looking into the dark, there is reconciliation and healing and intimacy and community that can take place in the dark. There’s also a lot of humility in the dark, which might be a great curative for a religious tradition that’s been on top for a long time.

RNS: You critique many some churches for having a “full solar spirituality.” But don’t people—those wrestling with depression and fear, for example–want and need hope?

BBT: First, you equate full solar spirituality with hope. But there’s plenty of hope in the dark too. And you also equate darkness with depression and fear. But there’s a lot of healing and liberation in the dark. So you’re using those speech patters that I’ve noticed more and more.

There is a lot of what happens these days that I would call “spiritual bypassing,” where one offers a religious formula to will help you stay on top. But I cannot sell out the Christian message, which at its heart says that when the bottom drops out and you’re screaming your guts out at God, there’s more. It says that if you are willing to enter the cloud of unknowing and meet God in the dark—maybe even the dark of a tomb—you might be in for a surprise.

The great hope in the Christian message is not that you will be rescued from the dark but if you are able to trust God all the way into the dark, you may be surprised.

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