Rules of Life

Those who know me know I'm not big on rules-- which not ironically is part of my present predicament! And the "Peaceful Warrior" flik I wrote about yesterday isn't big on rules, either. I mean, it is clearly about discipline and insight and dedication and has a jillion one-liners that go right to the heart of the matter. But in one short scene (I get the feeling it was edited...), the mentor and the student are having this exchange, and the student repeats back to the mentor the following Three Rules for Living:

1) Paradox: Life is a mystery; don't try to figure it all out.

2) Humor: Keep a sense of humor, especially about yourself; it is a strength beyond all measure.

3) Change: Nothing stays the same! [Thus, I'm guessing, why should we try so hard to stay the same?]

Oh, and just one insight (that I can remember): There are no "ordinary" moments!

May your day be filled with out-of-the-ordinary moments! And may you be aware enough to appreciate them...

Blessings!

Rumors of Angels

I like to think that I am as aware as I can be about angels among us. I don't mean those artsy ones that the City of Los Angeles commissioned years ago. Nor the winged benevolences we often see depicted. Nor the "fallen-trying-to-get-redeemed" scruffy variety Hollywood likes to parade against type before us. And not even the more literally accurate many-eyed, many-winged type that Madeleine L'Engle portrays so effectively in her writing. No, I mean the sorts of angels we find out about only because something out of the ordinary happens because of them.

I like to think that I've been pretty good at summoning angels when I needed them. One of the times I remember best had to do with a funeral I was doing for a dear friend, a man (and whose family) for whom I cared deeply. I was praying off to the side in preparation before the services began, and I asked God to send me an angel because I needed the support. Done praying, I began to walk slowly to the place I was to take, but across my path came a man I'd never met. He introduced himself as a mutual friend of the deceased, and put his arm around me, and told me that our friend had told him how much I'd meant to him. He looked me right in the eyes and said, "I know this is hard for you, but God is with you, and you'll do fine." It was just the sort of intervention I needed in that moment. I was blessed.

I've had many other similar experiences, enough that, when we speak of rumors of angels, I tell folks, the rumors are true!

Another one happened to me just last Friday-- only this one was unbidden and took me by surprise. A man I'd never met at the gym before struck up a conversation with me. As men do, he asked me what I did. I said, "I'm a writer." Right away he said, "Then you may be interested in this movie I just saw a day or two ago." And he handed me "Peaceful Warrior." And he let me take it home! Really, that was all the conversation the preceded his offering, but of course we took a moment for a little more talk after. (He's a photographer.)

Anyway, I was a little skeptical about a movie that starred Nick Nolte as being "inspirational," but it was! And I have to say, over a weekend when sporting events were full of disappointments and downfalls, "Peaceful Warrior" did it for me.

There was a lot of spiritual wisdom in that move-- and I mean of the genuine, not the hokey Hollywood kind. It says its based on a book, the Way of the Peaceful Warrior, and the book, too, might be a good read, I don't know. I liked the movie, though.

Most of all, given where I am in both this life and this "transition," being "in the neutral zone" (as William Bridges puts it) or just the "middle muddle" (as we used to say in bereavement group), "Peaceful Warrior" gave me a story of encouragement and what Buddhists might call "right thinking." I mean, I even suspended my disbelief enough to embrace Nick Nolte as a spiritually wise man!

So I recommend "Peaceful Warrior" for your viewing pleasure-- and your spiritual growth.

And I begged my new friend to keep it for a few more days so I can see it again! Wanna come and watch it with me? HA!

Blessings!

The Fire This Time, Part Two

[Explanation: I've split this blog in half for a coupla reasons. One has to do with this being a different topic. But another has to do with the sheer length of my blogs. I have been told that blogs are supposed to be shorter...

Well, I don't know from that! I just think: It's my blog and I'll blather if I want to! But I am afraid I am becoming someone about whom I used to observe, they tell "no short stories!" Now that we are talking more regularly than maybe we ever have before, I am finding that my father is that sort of person. Or maybe he's just become that, in his grief and his loneliness. I just observe that we have no short conversations. Maybe when I am less bereaved and less lonely, my stories/blogs will get shorter, too...]

For the whole week while the fires raged up and down the coast, daylight had this orange-cast about it, a weird light, pre-Halloween. The sky was overcast, with clouds or soot, I could not tell, but there was always at least a faint smell of smoke in the air. Ash would precipitate, covering everything outside in this fine dust. In the paper, the color for "unhealthful" air was virtually the same color as the air itself!

Then, at the end of the week, the wind changed. It came from the ocean again, and carried a cool humidity that was itself relieving. The light reverted to its usual silver cast, and the air had a freshness about it I hadn't smelled in some time.

It was then, at that point, that they told us not to breathe.

Well, not exactly, but there was an article in the paper warning about the air quality, and there were news reports on the radio with the same message-- all once the air appeared to be getting better! I wondered about the timing...

And while I appreciated the message, I was reminded of a routine Bill Cosby used to do, very early in his career, maybe on one of his first albums, "Why is There Air?". Bill would speak the conversation between God and Noah. God would tell Noah to build the ark. Noah would not see the necessity for it. God would ask, "How long can you tred water?"

I felt a like question was being put to us residents of Southern California. I mean, when the air quality is so clearly "unhealthful for everyone," how long can we hold our collective breath?

The truth is, we have been holding our breath ever since the fires started, watching the reports, amazed at the bravery of those fighting the fires, sharing the grief of those whose lives have been threatened, and deeply saddened for their losses. It will take some time before so many are breathing easier...

Prayers for our neighbors and the firefighters are appropriate ways to exhale.

Blessings...

The Fire This Time, Part One

With all the wild fires we've been having in SoCal, we can be forgiven for thinking that the whole world has been burning down around us. Friends and relatives of mine back on the East Coast have thought that! They've called and written and otherwise wondered whether I was safe, and I've found myself responding that I live near the ocean... And I've wondered myself what I meant by that! Does it mean that I'd be able to run and jump in it to save myself? Such silliness...

But all of these places coming ablaze have reminded me of an odd juxtaposition I used to tell my parishioners whenever I was in trouble in the course of serving their churches-- which was quite often! On the one hand, there was that marvelous little book by Robert Fulgham (sp?), titled It was On Fire When I Laid Down on It. He was more famous for Everything I Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, and that was truly a classic encapsulation of the wise way children can be. But I liked the On Fire book even better, for the absurdities of adult human logic.

The lead story was about a man whose house burnt down around him. The firefolks rescued him, and then tried to sort out how it happened. They suspected he had been smoking in bed, but he denied that. He said that, yes, the source of the fire might have been his mattress' burning, but-- and now you're getting it!-- he said, "it was on fire when I laid down on it!"

Along the same lines, there was a much more serious book called Young Men and Fire by a man whose name I've forgotten. (You are catching a glimpse of my household disarray. I can't seem to find the book at the moment. Good thing my mind, even more cluttered, does sometimes cough up a fact or idea or two!) But I do remember him to be the same man who wrote A River Runs Through It, so you can guess it was pretty good. It was about a wild fire that broke out in Montana in the '30's, I seem to recall.

Anyway, I learned somethings from that book. One of them was what to do when you're about to be surrounded and over-run by fire. Wild fires are almost impossible to out-run, and fire being what it is, sometimes lighting "back fires" can be its own danger, because, well, they can "back fire"... So what the book tells is what happened to a number of young men who were fighting this wicked blaze in MT. They were about to be overrun by the fire after the wind had shifted and blown it back at them. In the mountainous terrain, there was not going to be an easy escape. So the team leader lit a patch of ground around his men, and told them to lay down in it! Yes, to lay down in the fire...

Those who did, survived. Those who didn't, didn't outrun the wildfire and didn't survive...

So this business of it being on fire when I laid down on it can be positively saving.

In one of the fires outside San Diego it happened to work for a family. There was a story in the paper about four people (father & mother in their 70's, dtr in her 50's and her "boyfriend" in his 40's) whose property was getting overrun by fire and the fire department had failed to notify them of the danger and told them to evacuate. So they were stuck. What they did was drive their mini-van into a patch of clear field; they kept the motor running and turned up the air conditioning up, and stayed as cool as could be while the fire went around them and the thick smoke rolled over them. They lived to tell their tale!

I don't know that I would've taken shelter in a gasoline powered vehicle in order to survive a fire... but it worked for them! And maybe the principle is the same as laying down in the fire.

The point I used to make with my troubled congregations was that, maybe instead of always trying to put these congregational fires out, if we just stayed put, stay relaxed, and "lay down" in it, maybe we get protected by the Fire of the Holy Spirit and we get "baptized" by fire, and we have a deeper experience of the power of God.

...I know. The folks in my congregations weren't buyin' it either. Something about churches: they keep wanting to put the fire out... Laying down in the fire seldom if ever occurs to them!

And if it were a real fire, I don't know that I would have the courage to lay down in it either... I mean, I'm very good with figurative fires, but what the people all around us have experienced is awe-fully devastating...

Still, there is something from Young Men and Fire about making a "contrary" or "counter-intuitive" response to life-threatening circumstances that simply appeals to me. And if doing that contrary thing sounds as absurd to others as "it was on fire when I laid down on it," well, then, at least we can find ourselves joined in laughter!

Blessings!

A Proliferation of Not Knowing?

Because of the way my Saturday mornings go, I rarely get to hear "Click and Clack" the Car Talk guys on NPR. I had heard them often enough to know they were funny. This AM, as I was running late, I found out how profound they can be.

They started out by talking, of all things, about the Nobel Prize for Economics. They segued into a letter from "Andy," received in the mists of their program's time. Evidently, Andy had asked a classic question, which went something like as follows: "If one person who does not know anything about a subject is joined by another person who also does not knowing anything about that subject, does the expression of their combined opinion have the same level of 'knowing,' or does the level of 'knowing' decrease?" As one of the brothers noted, is it might be possible to know "less than nothing?"

Of course, this not-knowing times two is the very premise of their show (they would say), but evidently, the question has more profound implications than the apparent absurdity of Andy's query. For the brothers went on to cite yet another listener who had written about a phenomenon of human behavior. That writer (I believe it was a woman) said basically that when three or more have gathered, it is difficult for one of them to disagree with the others, especially if one states their opinion categorically, whether they actually know what they are talking about, or not. In other words, someone who actually does NOT know anything can precipitate what the program called an "information cascade," simply because others are inclined to be agreeable!

The Car Brothers figured that this not only explained the popularity of their show..., but also had some bearing on the Nobel Prize for Economics, which they said was recently awarded to some academics who had figured out the same thing! This notion of an "information cascade" has economic consequences, it was said. I figured it just explained tabloid journalism..., and gossip..., and perhaps television programming.

But I was also wondering whether it might have positive spiritual consequences. Back in the day, when I was teaching bereavement volunteers how to be effective listeners, one of the three principles I taught was, "We don't know anything." Not-knowing helped us clear away our pre-conceptions and pre-judgments, and be open to whatever we were being told was the mourner's own experience.

Suppose, I found myself thinking this morning, that a Presidential candidate began to live by the principle of not-knowing. I mean, do any of them really "know" what to do about Iraq or Global Climate Change, or the increasing divide between the rich and the poor in our country and world-wide? What if, in fact, we began to expect them not to know anything? Wouldn't this be a more honorable stance than the picky partisanship we now witness? More, if not-knowing could cascade, would more Presidential candidates step forward and tell us that, what do you know, they don't know anything either? What if not-knowing became something of a gauge of a candidate's honesty, and openness, and willingness to listen, to a variety of opinions and maybe even to us, the voting public? What a concept! Heck, we might even witness a revival of that early American political party, the "Know Nothings!"

I don't know whether it would good for history to repeat itself in that way, but it sure would be nice if we would not bequeath to history a continual repetition of leaders who tell us they know something that they really don't. Especially if these folks are simply counting on us to go along in some sort of shameless "information cascade."

Beyond wondering why the phenomenon was not called a "misinformation cascade," I have two encouragements: Let's see if we can't find some way to be more respectfully disagreeable with each other, thus reviving actual debate and discussion. And let's hope for people to come forward to lead us who know the true value of not-knowing. Both of these combined would be a good antidote to the empty know-it-all-ism whose prevalence has such unfortunate consequences for us these days.

The Secret of Life

"The Secret of Life is enjoying the passage of time..." I suppose I'd heard James Taylor sing his lyrics many times before, but when, on a PBS special to honor JT, India.Arie sang them..., well, I began to believe.

As a person, India.Arie appears way too young to know very much about "the passage of time." Looking at her, hearing her sing words that should maybe be coming out of the mouth of someone who had more obviously lived, reminded me of the old story about the young preacher in his first congregation whose sermons just didn't seem to be moving his congregation. So, maybe with Jonathon Edwards in mind, he decided he'd preach against sin, figuring maybe that was what folks always wanted to hear, and he'd have a winner. He gave it all he had, but still his congregation didn't seem to respond as well as he'd hoped. He asked a trusted elder why. And the elder said, "Son, you ain't lived long enough to preach about sin!" Well, in a way, that's what I'd thought about India.Arie.

Then I bought a cd of hers, and I've been thoroughly enjoying it! But she hooked me right away on the first tune, "Intro: Loving," which starts out with the Serenity Prayer set to music, and ends with the prayerful plea to "love with an open heart." I began to think that maybe she had lived more than I'd thought. In fact, I know nothing about her life, but her songs, at least on that cd, had many themes of someone in recovery. So maybe she knows something about the passage of time after all.

And then there was that article recently in the LA Times about how old age-- or at least, an older age than I am yet!-- is the "most satisfying" time in life for many. Indeed the folks in the article seemed to be enjoying the passing of time! I was happy for them, and in fact, I think we as a society need to hear more stories that have as their moral the point that getting older does not mean becoming less vital. I mean, we may never reach the point of some other cultures in which simply having amassed a certain number of years brings with it a veneration and respect. But since none of us are getting any younger, it is good to hear that we can fear less getting older.

Of course, the engine driving this possible transformation in our social thinking is the "pig in the python" demographically speaking, the Baby Boom Generation, of which I are one. When we were young, it was good to be young. As we got to be middle-aged, it was still good to be "younger," even if one had to achieve that surgically. Now that we are getting toward our sixties, it is all the more difficult to achieve youth at any price, and maybe we are wanting to hear that age has benefits besides getting into movies more cheaply.

Even on what has become one of my favorite shows on TV, besides sports, "Tell Me You Love Me," the sex life of a sex therapist is portrayed in a manner just as, shall we say, "candidly," as the sex lives of those younger persons in her practice. Of course, all of us should age as gracefully as Jane Alexander, but nonetheless, this is clearly not our parents' TV show, and maybe we can rejoice in our own quiet ways that someone more or less our ages is shown to have a sex life! Makes me feel better about aging already...

I guess my point is that if, or maybe since, the "secret of life is enjoying the passage of time," change is what happens as time passes. Very little actually remains the same. And time does not merely "pass," it changes us as it goes by. Time adds, and time subtracts. Time presents its own challenges, some of them anticipated perhaps, but I suspect many more of them not anticipated at all.

And one of those challenges does very much seem to be that of truly enjoying the passage of time. As we become grizzled and wizened, whence our sizzle? It seems to me that we ourselves have something to do with whether the cup that aging gives us to drink is bitter or sweet.

I hope for all of us happy hearts, an enduring capacity to laugh at ourselves and at life, and spirits of effervescent joy!

On God's Side?

Here we are on the morning after the Red Sox have absolutely drubbed the Rockies-- talk about "Rocktober!" Does the Colorado baseball team really want to continue with efforts to register the word "Rocktober" as a trade-mark (an effort creating anxiety in the music biz) after they themselves got "rocked" last night? Maybe it is time for them to come down to earth...

(This is what "humiliation" and "humility" and "being humbled" are all about: coming down to earth; from the same root at "humus"-- which is wonderful stuff when you can get it! The difference in meaning of those words has to do with the nature of the descent, and whether the landing was gentle or not!)

Anyway, an article in the LA Times (on the editorial page, not the sports pages! See? Sometimes I go elsewhere for my sports information!) told me some things about the Rockies I didn't know. Like: "The Rockies have become known as the closest thing MLB has to a faith-based club. The front office runs the franchise on what it describes as Christian principles..." Etc. This has contributed to their thinking that God is on their side. That, before last night, they had won 21 of 22 straight, many evidently attributed to God's "intervention!" At least, so indicates the article.

The article goes on to explore the ethical conflicts inherent in being Christian (or religious in general), on the one hand, and being a baseball/sports club/business, on the other. For instance, when the Rockies beat the San Diego Padres to get into the playoffs, they did so courtesy a phantom touching of home plate by Matt Holliday and an umpire's generous call. After the game, Holliday thanked God for the victory and would not say whether he thought he'd scored or not. The Christian ethic would have been for honesty, the sports ethic for claiming victory regardless, and the sports ethic won out.

(Personally, I would have thought that God would have favored a team called the "padres" over one called the "rockies." And it is clear to me that for about 20 years now God has not favored one called the "dodgers!")

In any case, the differing ethical demands of heaven and earth are only one of the problems with thinking that God must be on your side when you are winning. Another is, are we to think ourselves as God-forsaken when we lose? Is that how the Rockies are thinking of themselves this AM? (Surely they are not thinking that God was a Red Sox fan all along? Ah, but the way they have been playing since "the Curse of the Bambino" was lifted...)

One response to such folks as populate the Rockies' organization is to say that God doesn't care about sports, but I don't want to believe that about God. I prefer to think that God does care about sports, just as God cares about all human endeavor, but that God's interest is in our being "good" sports, and learning what we can about matters spiritual in that pursuit.

So what I hope what the Rockies, and other teams like them, learn, is that God "makes the rain fall on the just and the unjust" (just as God did last night in Boston), and that God is "with" us whether we are winning or losing, and maybe that God is more concerned for us about "process" rather than "outcome."

Because, after all, we Christians believe God has already taken care of the "outcome!" It is the "process" that is more telling about the quality of our faith and the nature of our relationship with God.

Maybe that's what the Rockies are learning, too...

Blessings!

Indian Summer

I have no idea how warm days in September or October got to be called "Indian Summer," as they were when I was growing up in the East. I don't even think we can have an "Indian Summer" here in SoCal, since, let's face it, temps are fairly even year round. But this AM was so warm on my front porch that it drove me inside, and I've had to wait until the cooling of the setting sun for these moments of relaxation.

I have listened to my father talk about his grief today, and I'm taking some comfort in our parallel processes. In some things we are alike: The way ordinary sounds are amplified when one is in solitude, both of us notice. And we share a tendency to speak just to hear the sound of speech--something I find tenderly comforting to know about my father. In other things we are different: My Dad is more a "typical" male, processing his inner world by working on projects in the outer one. (For instance, I doubt there is one stitch of my mother's clothes left in his home at this point!) I mull, and ruminate, and inwardly dissect... It's all so... mind-bending, stomach-churning, heart-rending! I should take a page from my father's book: he measures his well-being in terms of how little emotion he shows on any given day! Would that I could. Emotionally, I can be all over the place!

Yet I like it somehow that our days are not "normal" for either of us. I feel a kind of "companion" in him that I have not felt, maybe ever, certainly for some time. And there is the Gift of this time, this period, in which we might get to know each other better. Who would have thunk?

...

The more I'm in the "soup" of this time, the more I'm coming to appreciate it. Oh, there is still a lot of pain over losses suffered or imminent. (I mean, I'm not done, by any stretch of the imagination.) And there are sometimes overwhelming fears about the question "what's next?" being answered with "nothing..." And there seems to be a rather steady diet of "crow" I must eat... meaning, I am being made aware of aspects of myself or consequences of my actions that I might otherwise just as soon have been left in the dark about... But that is "growth," isn't it? And isn't increased awareness a good thing? And isn't repentance a positive process? And doesn't my faith assure me about the outcome of such times?

Yes, and don't the real crows in the neighborhood circle overhead? HA! They remind: No matter how thorough we are, there is always more of them to eat!

Such is life...

As the gold in the sky turns to pewter, and the Cleveland Indians fall behind in their effort to extend their summer, I am discovering that I am grateful even for days when it would otherwise seem that I have nothing to be grateful about!

I am grateful for this day... And for warmth, in the air, in your regard, in my heart for all of you... Blessings...

Gifts of this Morning

I'm in an "Oklahoma!" mood this morning: Oh, what a beautiful morning/ Oh, what a beautiful day! This morning is unusually sunny and still: not even enough breeze to move the palm trees, let alone my wind chime. Even the birdsong seems hushed. Noise has abandoned the street on which I live and taken itself elsewhere down the road. It is so quiet I can hear the sound of planes flying out of LAX, a distant grumble in a very clear sky.

A humming bird came to greet me-- on my back porch, where I have no flowers. An angel watching over? A raptor, maybe the one who landed on my front porch a few days ago, came and sat atop the telephone pole, until a crow harassed him and they both went out of sight to play. He was larger than I'd remembered. Do we have red-tails in this neighborhood? Maybe there are raptors-- and angels-- all around.

It isn't often lately that I've awakened to this sunny a world. It has been cloudy more often than not lately, and it rained yesterday, at least for a bit. I'm aware that I look to the weather in the outer world to brighten up my inner one. I sulked a bit yesterday. Maybe today I'll be cheerier.

In this "in-between" time in my life, when I am letting go of so much I was sure of and am so very uncertain of what there might be to hold onto ahead, there are lots of times when I am not at all sure how to feel! I know. That sounds odd, even to me. But the predominate feeling is one of "suspension," which is not really "suspense," because "suspense" is more like a waiting for something to happen when you know something will. "Suspension" is like waiting for something to happen, and you're not sure whether anything will, and more, you're not sure when something does happen whether it will be something you welcome or just one more thing you've been dreading! Sometimes I get to the point where a "good" day is a relatively uneventful one...

Someone once described life as being like swinging on a trapeze: in order to go forward, you've got to let go of the one bar and reach for the bar to come. I have to tell you, I have never liked that metaphor! I mean, even circus performers who practice swinging on trapezes a lot, fall often, even when they have a reasonable assurance that there is indeed a bar coming for them!

I know: timing is everything! Well, when one is told one has to let go of one bar before there is any assurance of the bar to come, if indeed there is a bar to come, then even "suspension" is pretty difficult to maintain! I have to think that "falling" is inevitable.

I think my father is feeling that "drop" now, after my mother's death. I know that our "transitions" are different, but we are finding it comforting to be able to console each other.

And, really, "falling" isn't so bad... No, really, what I mean is, falling isn't so bad IF one has a sense that one was not "flying without a net" in the first place! I have been grateful to find a network of support for me, and I believe my father is discovering something similar (he went to his first bereavement support group this morning). In that way, falling can be both a relief and a joy! There's nothing quite like the drop, the catch, the bounce! All of that is and has been quite gratifying.

After the "fall," though, one faces climbing the ladder and "flying" again... Ahhh, therein lies the trepidation. Lots of days, it looks like a very long way to climb to me.

But today, I am cheered and buoyed by the Life I see around me. It is easy to face the day when the day is as beautiful as this.

You're doin' fine, Oklahoma!/Oklahoma! OK! Today I am "Oklahoma!"

Blessings. I am grateful for your quiet support.

Some Odyssey

In order to help me make sense of this time in my life, I have turned, gratefully, to William Bridges' classic, Transitions:Making Sense of Life's Changes. The sub-subtitle is even more applicable: Strategies for Coping with the Difficult, Painful, and Confusing Times in Your Life. This is certainly that, for me!

I first met Bridges and had been introduced to his basic concepts some years ago, at a national hospice conference in AZ. I adopted his three-fold sense of the how "transitions" are made in response to the event(s) of change-- Endings, Neutral Zone, and New Beginnings-- for some of the participants of the bereavement program I managed. Bridges weaves systems-thinking, developmental psychology, literature, and anthropology into a non-analytical, symbol-driven framework of how we can deepen our understandings of how we endure, and maybe even grow, through life's changes. He helps us see that each of our life stories has these kind of "mythic" elements. We can thus understand ourselves better from these greater, over-arching perspectives.

At least, I am trying to understand myself in that way, and I've found what he has written about Odysseus' journey home to be helpful to me at this time in my life: The Odyssey helps me understand my odyssey!

As we might remember, The Odyssey begins with sudden and surprising defeat after victory. In trying to fathom what has gone wrong, Bridges says, "Odysseus discovers in one way and then another that he has crossed some mysterious line in his life and that everything that once worked for him now works against him." Ahhh, I am thinking...

Bridges has a quasi-Jungian take on The Odyssey: As The Iliad was about the first part of a man's life, and is male-oriented, The Odyssey is about the latter part of a man's life, and thus, in being female-oriented, is instructive for men about how to integrate their "feminine" side, a life-task for later in life. Thus, in The Odyssey, the roles of women-- to help, to hinder, to advise, to tempt, to aim towards and to avoid-- all influence Odysseus' journey.

To get home to Penelope, Odysseus has to navigate a narrows between "Scylla and Charybdis, the monster and the whirlpool." Bridges writes: "Circe had explained to him that he could negotiate the narrows only if he did not resist the dangers there." But of course (HA!), Odysseus does "resist the dangers there"-- he engages both Scylla and Charybdis, and is in consequence even further reduced.

I have come to think of my passage through this year as a navigation past Scylla and Charybdis. The role of "Scylla" has been played by the One who would make herself my enemy. And the role of "Charybdis" has been played by the One who would make herself my "partner"-- or at least, that was her word for herself. Now that we are no longer in relationship, I can acknowledge that it had its "whirlpool" quality, that I "resisted" it mightily, that it sucked me down and in, only to "regurgitate" me out again, so I could paddle away on what was left of me.

Just as for Odysseus both Scylla and Charybdis played vital and in the end constructive roles in his journey toward wisdom, so have my "Scylla" and "Charybdis" done the same for me-- even as I have "resisted" them! What Bridges says of Odysseus has been true of my experience: "[H]e is stripped of the various supports on which he had earlier relied. As grievous as that loss is, it also leaves him able to know himself in a new sense." Ahhhh, I am thinking... There is a positive outcome to all of this!

Ally or enemy, left hand or right, inner or outer: all of these dimensions of ourselves which also become entrusted to others and enacted in our lives are aspects of this larger story, this coming to greater understanding, this growth through change, this transformation through transition. As Odysseus was guided by his deities, am I not guided by my Deity? Is there not some Greater Purpose at work in this?

For Odysseus (at least if we are following Bridges), one thing that was learned was a new kind of courage, the courage of "letting go." I have often said that "we shape our lives by what we hold onto and what we let go of," but maybe I ought also to be learning that, as in Ecclesiastes, there are "seasons" for holding onto and "seasons" for letting go of-- and I am in the latter "season!"

Bridges writes: "We all go through hell to learn what we need to learn to complete our life's journey." Surely, I have needed to learn how better to integrate my feminine side! Surely, I have needed to learn how better to let go. Surely, I have found that the mythic roles we play in each other's lives transcend whether and when we find each other to be "friend" or "foe"-- for, in the end, we are manifesting some greater truth, one that exceeds those labels or names.

I am learning to love and appreciate both my "Scylla's" and my "Charybdis-es"-- wherever I might find them-- outside of me, or within. For how else do I learn to go where God would lead me, and learn what God would have me learn, as God turns me toward "home"? After all, does not The Way always lead through "narrow" places?

Blessings for each of us, on our journeys...

No Monkey's Uncle

It is true that funerals bring families together, and my mother's memorial was no exception. I saw family members and friends of... that I hadn't seen for years, maybe decades. One of these was my Uncle Jack, who is actually my cousin, but who questions family nomenclature, anyway?

My Uncle Jack and I have started an e-correspondence. He sent me the following the other day:

Man's inhumanity to man throughout history is: A) the result of evolution; or B) the product of intelligent design?

I wanted to share my response in this space. I replied:

Yes, where does Evil originate? There is a tension about this in the Bible, too. In Genesis, there are at least three factors that go into the Fall: 1) human behavior, that is, Adam and Eve did eat; 2) God's Creation itself: the Garden had both the Tree with the Forbidden Fruit and the Snake-- thus temptation and the tempter were part of it; and 3) everyone was "allowed" to play their roles, which is to say, God did not step in to keep the eating from happening, nor to keep the Snake from tempting!

Of this I have (at least!) two thoughts: a) when we pray the prayer Jesus taught us, we pray, "lead us not into temptation;" evidently there is some quality in God which does! and b) although there may be arguments for either of your options, Jack, for the origin of Evil [on the one hand, the Darwinian "survival of the fittest" has led to its own "man's inhumanity to man," while on the other hand, if we believe as many of our Founding Fathers believed (they were Deists, not really Christians per se), that God got the world going then kept "hands off" so that we are responsible for our own behavior], I happen to believe that we can affirm at least one "blessing" in Evil: it is at least the background and maybe the raison d'etre of what we've come to know as "God's Redeeming Love!"

I take this to mean that, regardless of the ills we suffer from and visit upon one another (and even ourselves), in the End, we are understood in some divine fashion, and thus even our worst actions bring about some Good-- thanks be to God!

I'd be interested in what you, the Reader, thinks, too. How would you have answered my Uncle Jack?

Blessings...

The "Un"-Natural?

I am a regular reader of the sports pages, and not just for the scores. Often I find some of the newspaper's best writing there, and yesterday was no exception.

Mike Boehm had a very well written column in which he compared the Roy Hobbs as Bernard Malamud penned him in 1952 with the Roy Hobbs as Robert Redford played him in the movie with the same name, "The Natural." Like Boehm's, there have been many articles written in these days of expectation and dismay, as the sports world awaits the findings of the commission investigating the extent of steroid use in baseball.

Other sports have similarly been dealing with the perfusion of "performance enhancing drugs." At least one, cycling, may be permanently damaged by lab tests and their post-cursors, commissions and controversy. Marion Jones recently became the latest star of track and field to confess to steroid use and to return otherwise hard-won Olympic medals. Shame has become the suspect shadow of glory. We are no longer clearly joyed by any triumph. The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat are both pursued by technicians in white coats with needles and little plastic cups.

Sometimes I find myself wishing for the "good ol' days," when our sports heroes were, like Babe Ruth, hard-living sorts, boys in men's clothing. Something changed with the advent of "excellence" in sports. Chicago's "Monsters of the Midway" were, well, pretty monstrous, back in the day before we expected them to grow up, and before they expected themselves to be "athletes." Somehow, as we've concentrated on what is "fair" we've lost a sense of what is "play." Sports was supposed to be about entertainment and fun, but it has come to be about business and seriousness. And sports' players "play" less: too much is at stake in "take out slides," for example, when millionaires are on the field, and in the press boxes, and in the front offices behind the scenes.

This is my lament, not Mr Boehm's! And his is better, or at least more salient. He decries the way the Hollywood has changed our culture, by giving us a series of idealized images that take us further from our human condition. He points to what happened to Roy Hobbs, who, as Malamud wrote him, was "a conflicted, angry loner who didn't get enough love as a child, who's not a bad sort, really, and has principles, but who tends to undermine his best intentions and best interests." This, of course, is too complex for Hollywood's simplifications of our visions and our minds, and so we see little of this in the Redford portrayal.

And maybe we don't even want to see, is Boehm's argument, because maybe in the escape into entertainment that both movies and sports (and these days the evening news) have in common, we do not want to face certain realities. We simply want to be thrilled, Boehm suggests.

Yet there is something to be gained from "going by the book," as it were! Boehm writes: What I take from "The Natural" is that decent enough people can give in to temptation; that they repeat mistakes instead of learning from them; that the fear of appearing to be vulnerable, flawed and old is a damaging fear of what's unavoidably human; that wonders ever cease; and that this is all very sad. Malamud is writing about the human condition, not just about baseball. He's asking us to stop demanding fantasy, and to understand-- and maybe to forgive-- the truth."

Boehm concludes: Which Roy Hobbs would you choose-- the idealized one who brings down the stadium lights? Or the painfully real one whose last swings, his honest best, won't bring redemption for the all-too-human mess he has made?

Boehm made me think about our acceptance of each other-- and ourselves. And how we either limit that acceptance, or find ways to embrace each other.

I'm also grateful that I do not have to rely upon even my honest best to "redeem" the "all-too-human" messes I have made. I know that my Redeemer lives...

Blessings...

Sunset/ Sunrise

I have to admit, in my life I've see more sunsets than sunrises! But I take a certain joy in both. It is wonderful, at a certain time of year, to be heading off to work out in the AM, and see the sun coming up over the mountains and spreading its golden light over the valley... Even the "city" I live in looks good with the sun at its back!

Recently, when I was up in Lone Pine and poised to ascend Mt Whitney, we were up before dawn, and thus saw the sun reluctantly peek over the mountains. The shadows in the Owens Valley, the colors on this side vs the shadows on the other, all made for a unique (to me) sunrise. "Here comes the sun," the Beatles sang, but it was more as if we climbed one mountain in order to see the sun rise over the others.

Once I was driving home from my daughter's up in Carmel Valley. I'd left before dawn, and so saw the sun light the Grade long before its rays hit the valley. Even then, as I drove along 101, it seemed the sun was reluctant to rise. It sent fog and clouds and all sorts of obfuscations just to distract and deceive me as I looked left for its eventual appearance. When it finally did "pop" over the ridge-line, the day was already upon us. Its heralds and messengers had already scattered; its appearance was almost anti-climactic.

But as I said, dawns are not my "thing," sunsets are. Long ago, on the shores of Lake Kitchegoomee(?), er, Wallenpaupak (we were in PA, afterall, not WI), I would sit with my parents (principally my mother; sunsets back East tried my father's patience, they took so long! He'd do better out here, where the sun virtually NEVER "sinks slowly in the West!") and watch and wait for the sun not only to sink behind the horizon (often elevated by trees and what we were accustomed to thinking of as "mountatins"), and then spread it array of colors out across sky and clouds, painting a fitting end to whatever sort of day we'd had. A pause to give thanks it was. A time for breathing, between day and the coming night.

As I write this I am sitting on my front porch. The front porch is for Fall and Winter sunsets, the back for Spring and Summer ones. There is always this melancholy about front porch sunsets. The days are shortening, and the sun moving slowly but reliably south, like the pelicans, seeking refuge in some unknown rookery for the night. From where I live, one can actually perceive the turn, from South to heading North, then reaching the apex, turning back again. A cycle, repeated: the Eternal Return, from which the Ancients received such reassurance, and learned to regulate the cycles of their own lives.

Something happened to Western perceptions with the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. We began to think that life ought to be lived linearly-- onward, and hopefully upward, always! The downs were to be brief aberrations of the ups! If we are climbing Jacob's ladder, then every rung is to go higher, higher.

That may work for some. But for me, especially at this time in my life, there is definitely a feeling of the "sun" setting on what was. And it is very unclear that my "rungs" to come will go "higher, higher." Who knows?

Instead, I take what reassurance I can from this experience: yes, as surely as the night follows the day, so does another day follow that night. Every sunset hold promise of a sunrise-- even if the nights are getting longer these days!

I used to revel in the sunsets for the pauses they offered to stop and give thanks for the day, and all of the gifts that each day brought. These days, the "gifts" are fewer in number, at least as I can tell. So now my emphasis has shifted. I watch the sun go down, I give thanks, but I also pray for the promise of another day, and passage through this night until dawn comes.

I am confident that, although the sun has set on my life that was, and I am living in the certain darkness that always follows, there will be a dawning, and I will be shown the way to go into what God has Promised me is to come.

Wherever you are in the "diurnal" cycle of your life, may the rhythm of your days provide you with reassurance about the rhythm of your years. God is with you, and with me, always, be it day or night, sunset or sunrise.

Blessings!

The Beauty of Danger

Recently, another raptor came to my porch. I believe it was a Cooper's Hawk-- small, blue and brown. Perhaps it was attracted by the "wild" birds I feed. My porch has become quite a haven for mourning doves. I've been told that this is a sign of a "peaceful" home, to have doves around. I was wondering more whether they were sent to me to companion me in my mourning...

The arrival of the hawk was brought to my attention by the sound of something slamming against the sliding porch door. Birds occasionally fly into it, but this was louder. I turned to see the raptor sitting on the table's umbrella, collecting itself. I was held in its magnificence! I thought to run to get my camera, but I feared it would be gone when I got back. I stilled myself, and watched... I was saddened when it flew away-- but went to look for what it might be hunting. Sure enough, a dove took frightened flight when I opened the door, releasing itself from its hiding.

I thought: in Nature there is no good or evil. Predators and prey, yes. Survival. Life and death. But animals do not characterize each other in terms that may be taken to be pejorative. There IS danger, but not evil. And everything is beautiful, as the sappy song says, "in its own way"...

Sometimes I feel like St Francis in my own little slice of the natural world on my porch. I am not as grand as he; my porch is often all of the Nature I can handle! But it is its own spiritual teacher. For instance, the squirrels eat the seed I've intended for birds and dig up my geraniums in order to bury the peanuts they take from someone more generous than I in their offerings. The squirrels are "pests" to me, but not evil, and not even "bad," even when I think ill of them. St Francis must have learned the compassion and even-handedness of love from his interactions with the animals... At least, so I care to think!

What St Francis is most famous for, outside of those little statuettes that find their way from garden shops to gardens, is his prayer. (I'm tempted to make the trite connection between "prey" and "pray" here somehow...) You know it. It begins, "Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace..."

Well, before I left my most recent employment, er, before I was shown how to leave..., I had taken an on-line course on "managing the changing organization." In it, we were taught an acronym for what most managers face when they are trying to manage the change their businesses want to implement. It was "GRASS:" Guilt, Resentment, Anxiety, Self-Absorption, and Stress. If "all flesh is grass," then one can imagine how universal these feelings are among those having to adapt to change!

In response, I wrote a prayer, an adaptation of St Francis', called "A Prayer for Managing a Changing Organization." It goes like this:

Lord, make me an instrument of Your Change!
Where there is Guilt, let me bring Mercy.
Where there is Resentment, let me bring Understanding.
Where there is Anxiety, let me bring Serenity.
Where there is Self-absorption, let me bring Inspiration.
Where there is Stress, let me bring Comedy (for all need to laugh a little bit, and laughter relieves stress!).

Anyway, if you notice, I've countered the acronym of GRASS with that of MUSIC! HA! Music, as we all know, endures, and transcends grass...

But also, I have to say, this prayer has become more personal in these days of my life, when I believe that God IS changing me, and changing me rather radically. I have experienced myself as GRASS-- the guilt, resentment, anxiety, self-absorption and stress have been what they have been! There have been many aspects of this change that God is bringing about in me that I simply have not liked! Let alone the way it is being brought about...

But you know, I hope I've managed also to hear God's MUSIC-- to be merciful to myself and to be receptive to the mercy offered me by others; to increase in my understanding of myself, and to be pleased to be charitably understood by others; to find my moments of serenity, in accepting what I've done and cannot undo, and to be comforted by the peace others have offered; to be open to inspiration, and encouragement, and to open my own imagination to what God might further reveal; and most of all, to find some comedy in all of what feels too often to me to be tragic, for I am firm in my belief that God's transformations are of our tragedies, into comedies-- God likes to laugh, I have to believe, even more than God consents to cry.

I appreciate the MUSIC each of you are to me, to my ears, to my soul, to my soothing. Such MUSIC is the beauty in the danger of these times for me... And I thank you...

Divine Quilting

I am blessed with an abundance of acquaintances who share garnered wisdom, and thus encourage me. Life may be less what it is, and more what we think it to be! The perspective in the following appeals to me. It is called, "Quilt of Holes:"

As I faced my Maker at the Last Judgment, I knelt before the Lord along with all the other souls.

Before each of us laid our lives like the squares of a quilt in many piles; an angel sat before each of us sewing our quilt squares together into a tapestry that is our life.

But as my angel took each piece of cloth off the pile, I noticed how ragged and empty each of my own squares was. They were filled with giant holes. Each square was labeled with a part of my life that had been difficult, the challenges and temptations I was faced with in every day life. I saw hardships that I endured, which were the largest holes of all.

I glanced around me. Nobody else had such squares. Other than a tiny hole here and there, the other tapestries were filled with rich color and the bright hues of worldly fortune. I gazed upon my own life and was disheartened.

My angel was sewing the ragged pieces of cloth together, threadbare and empty, like binding air.

Finally the time came when each life was to be displayed, held up to the light, the scrutiny of truth. The others rose; each in turn, holding up their tapestries. So filled their lives had been. My angel looked upon me, and nodded for me to rise.

My gaze dropped to the ground in shame. I hadn't had all the earthly fortunes. I had love in my life, and laughter. But there had also been trials of illness, and wealth, and false accusations that took from me my world, as I knew it. I had to start over many times. I often struggled with the temptation to quit, only to somehow muster the strength to pick up and begin again. I spent many nights on my knees in prayer, asking for help and guidance in my life. I had often been held up to ridicule, which I endured painfully, each time offering it up to the Father in hopes that I would not melt within my skin beneath the judgmental gaze of those who unfairly judged me.

And now, I had to face the truth. My life was what it was, and I had to accept it for what it was.

I rose and slowly lifted the combined squares of my life to the light.

An awe-filled gasp filled the air. I gazed around at the others who stared at me with wide eyes.

Then, I looked at the tapestry before me. Light flooded the many holes, creating an image, the face of Christ. Then our Lord stood before me, with warmth and love in His eyes. He said, "Every time you gave over your life to Me, it became My life, My hardships, and My struggles.

Each point of light in your life is when you stepped aside and let Me shine through, until there was more of Me than there was of you."

May all our quilts be threadbare and worn, allowing Christ to shine through!

--There is no author or attribution mentioned of this on my copy of it? Does anyone know who wrote it?

Thank you for being a blessing...

Other Worldly

I had the opportunity yesterday to go someplace I'd never been before: Disney's California Adventure. I hadn't heard very good things about it, but then, what I'd heard were evaluations of the "rides:" not very good, was the verdict, but the judges were more the Magic Mountain sort of teen adventure seekers, and, yes, I could see how by their lights they could be right.

But the first thing I noticed was that California Adventure is not an "amusement" park. I was raised near Willow Grove, PA, where there was an amusement park. People would come from Philadelphia to spend the day in rather gentle amusement, on roller coasters and ferris wheels and swan-boat rides-- and listening to John Phillip Sousa conduct the band in the gazebo!

In a way, California Adventure was more like that. I mean, there were families strolling, and amusements for children, and Disney-themed distractions (I wouldn't say "attractions"), all spread out for lots of walking and very gentile behavior. (Everyone was very polite.) And more than rides there were restaurants and eateries and souvenir stands and opportunities to spend even more money, adding in a gently suckling way to the (to my mind) rather outrageous cost of admission.

Plus there was entertainment, or what passes for it these days, which is to say, nothing of the enduring quality of Sousa, and all of it far less martial. There were stage shows, and a traveling "high school musical" review. And there was music, ubiquitous music, coming from speakers always within earshot, so that one could scarcely have a quiet thought of one's own, for the constant buzz of reminders of where one was and how one was to feel. Why I wasn't more annoyed at the music was a testimony to its success in setting my mood.

The day was more relaxing than exhilarating, and therein lies the loss of "amusement," or at least the change in its cultural definition since the time of Sousa and slower roller coasters. California Adventure is a "theme" park; it makes no claim to "amuse." No wonder the Nirvana generation, with its "here we are; now entertain us" sensibilities is neither amused nor entertained. As a theme park, California Adventure succeeds quite well. One is ushered in fine tram fashion from the ordinary world of one's usual habituation into this "themed" world, in which everything is eerily similar to one's other world (especially if one is residing in California), only cleaner, and cheerier, and far less problematic.

A little slice of Heaven on earth? Both my partner and I knew of people who bought annual passes to Disney's parks and to Knott's Berry Farm, and regularly went there for... escape? or relief? They go often, looking for a "better place"...

I was reminded of that phrase, a "better place," because I've been told often lately that that is where my mother is: a "better place." And it made me wonder about the possible similarities between our visions of Heaven and our experiences of "theme" parks: Is Heaven just another Theme Park to us?

I find myself recoiling inside, wanting to say, I hope not! But I don't know why not... I mean, my mother's mother believed that after she died she'd go to a place where the streets were paved with gold, and when she spoke about it, what she envisioned Heaven to be was quite like what she knew Philadelphia to be like, only cleaner, and with gold cobblestone streets!

I don't know that my mother's visions of Heaven were as explicit, but being at California Adventure made me wonder whether our visions of Heaven were influencing what we looked for in places of diversion, and by the by, whether our places of diversion were not somehow influencing what we hoped to find in our after-lives?

...

All of that philosophizing aside, someone asked me whether I thought my mother's being in a "better place" was somehow now letting her have a greater, and presumably consistently benevolent influence on my life and other events in this plane. I thought about it, and I think that for the moment anyway I can't be sure about Mom's continuing actions in my life. I certainly could use her help and compassion, don't get me wrong! But while I am less sure about what role she's playing in my life now, I thought for sure that Mom had had some influence over events in the National League East, where the Mets suffered the "greatest collapse" in the history of baseball, and Mom's beloved Phillies scarcely lost a game since she died, even with one of the worst bullpens in major league ball, thus securing a conference title and a place in the playoffs.

That is, I was pretty sure that Mom was behind whatever divine intervention had brought all of that about... UNTIL the Phillies lost two straight games-- HOME games, no less-- to the Colorado Rockies, to just about doom their chances of going further. Mother, if she's watching, is surely "groaning in travail" with Dad and me over the Phillies' poor play.

And maybe she's finding more Colorado Rockies' fans in Heaven than Phillies' fans! Someone up there sure seems to be on their side!

Blessings...

Quick Quote

Sorting through the piles of clutter that had accumulated around my computer, I can across this, from Eleanor Roosevelt:

"Do what you feel in your heart to be right-- you'll be criticized anyway!"

Shades of that young man's thoughts attributed to Mother Theresa, I know...

But I have to say, underneath the determination and encouragement espoused in these reflections, I'm beginning to see some misanthropy and even the rather depressing point of view that good people doing good things tend to come under fire!

I never much worried about that-- before! And I hope that, now, I don't all of a sudden change in how I approach life. I mean, I don't want to care, all the while looking over my shoulder for the Critic or the Judge! Where's the fun in being good-hearted if one is constantly expecting backlash?

I don't know... I'm still finding my way through this time, still recovering the heart that was attacked in July... Bear with me... Blessings...

Being Stoic

People often ask me how I'm doing (or, as we say in Philadelphia, "how're ya dewin' ?"), and I'm glad for their interest and their care. Most of the time, though, the question sort of pulls me toward the center. That is, there is a wide range of things I may be feeling or thinking at any given point in time. But when I am asked how I am, I usually am able to give a more "neutral" or even-toned response, even when things might be screaming bloody murder inside me!

It is sort of like having a NASCAR race going on, but being able to press the "mute" button so others can't hear the noise!

This may be why one person said to me the other day, "You sound like you are taking this all pretty Stoically..." At the time, that sounded to me both absurd and like a reasonable goal: Would that I could be Stoic, I thought.

Then I saw the following on a license plate holder of a new black Mercedes: "What would Marcus Aurelius do?" Ah, I thought, is it easier to be Stoic if one drives a new Mercedes? Or is a Mercedes a "reward" somehow of Stoicism?

Anyway, I knew my cynicism and fiscal insecurities were showing, so I did what any Web-savvy thinker would do, I Googled "Marcus Aurelius!" From his Meditations I gleaned the following for our mutual edification:

"We are made for cooperation, like feet, like hands, like eyelids, like the rows of upper and lower teeth. To act against one another then is contrary to nature." [2.1]

"You will give yourself relief, if you do every act of your life as it it were the last, laying aside all carelessness and passionate aversion from the commands of reason, and all hypocrisy, and self-love, and discontent with the portion that has been given to you." [2.5]

"If you work at that which is before you, following right reason seriously, vigorously, calmly without allowing anything to distract you, but keeping your divine part pure, as if you might be bound to give it back immediately; if you hold to this, expecting nothing, fearing nothing, but satisfied with your present activity according to nature... you will be happy. And there is no man able to prevent this." [3.12]

"Take away the complaint, 'I have been harmed,' and the harm is taken away." [4.7] (I have to say, in my present circumstances, I especially liked this one! Would that both the One who would be my enemy and I could do this!)

And finally this on "facing death:" "You have embarked; you have made the voyage; you have come to the shore: get out." [3.3]

OK, so I don't know whether I can ever be THAT Stoic! But I have at least one answer to the question, "What would Marcus Aurelius do?" The answer is: Be calm.

I can aim for that!

Holy Fool

As you might imagine, the last two months have been for me a time of great self-reflection. All kinds of conflicting thoughts and emotions have flowed through me. I have been in turns angry and afraid; self-righteous, feeling unfairly victimized, and embarrassed at how my own behavior led to these unwanted and dismal consequences; brave and accepting, on the one hand, and horrified and disbelieving on the other. Many times I have felt downright foolish to have fallen into this state of things, especially at this time in my life. What happened to my self-control?, I've asked myself.

Well, in this as in all things, those who share about themselves with me are also my teachers, and we are mutually lifted up in grace and love.

So it was when the following was shared with me. It is a quote from Theodore I. Rubin, MD-- a physician and a writer-- taken from "O" magazine, pg 81, the October 2007 issue:

"I must learn to love the fool in me-- the one who feels too much, talks too much, takes too many chances, wins sometimes and loses often, lacks self-control, loves and hates, hurts and gets hurt, promises and breaks promises, laughs and cries. It alone protects me against that utterly self-controlled, masterful tyrant whom I also harbor and who would rob me of human aliveness, humility, and dignity but for my fool."

Ah, I think as I read this, I truly have been foolish in many of the decisions in my life, not just those which have led rather precipitously to this moment. And yes, while I am embarrassed by my foolishness now, at the time, when I knew in some ways that I was being foolish, AND was enjoying being so-- I felt more alive, and more balanced, and for real moments FREED from the sometimes stultifying expectations that others can have of ministers. (In Rubin's words, others really DO expect ministers to be "masterful tyrants"-- of themselves and other people. This expectation robs many who would be sensitive to the sacred to be more focused on law rather then grace, and on rectitude rather than freedom. [Paul in Galatians: "For freedom Christ has set us free....])

So, OK: How DO I learn to love this "fool" in me? I recognize that my fool has gotten me into trouble-- but my fool also exults in life and living in ways that my "masterful tyrant" would only keep buttoned down!

I am working at this these days, plumbing my depths, peering into my darkness as well as my light, looking for God... I am comforted to remember places in the Gospel where the holiness of foolishness is lifted up... not only by Paul, of all people(!), for one... but also in the whole theme of the kerygma. Take John 3:16: "For God so loved the world that he gave His only Son..." How foolish was THAT? HA! Yet how else do we learn that God is not the "masterful tyrant" we fear God to be, but the merciful and generous Giver of Grace that we come to believe God to be?

As I endure through the gauntlet of reminders of how foolish I have been, I am companioned by the One who was foolish enough to love me as I am, now, and in the first place, and forever. I need no other comfort than that...

Except! I continue to rejoice in the comfort given me by others who are also foolish enough to love me! Let us be holy fools together!