Me, me, me

“The main condition for the achievement of love is the overcoming of one's narcissism. The narcissistic orientation is one in which one experiences as real only that which exists within oneself, while the phenomena in the outside world have no reality in themselves, but are experienced only from the viewpoint of their being useful or dangerous to one. The opposite pole to narcissism is objectivity; it is the faculty to see other people and things as they are, objectively, and to be able to separate this objective picture from a picture which is formed by one's desires and fears.”

                              Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

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I have wondered why

of late

religions, most of them

but particularly the one that has been my own

have been so unappealing

perhaps even, to a degree repelling

Thinking about it I have decided that it is because religions are

A bit, if not more, selfish

Perhaps a better word is immature

Everything is about power, and comfort and affluence

Believe and be blessed

Believe and be protected

Believe and be safe (from hell, or whatever other torments can be constructed)

Me, me, me

Worse, me, not you.

There are levels to this depravity

God will take care of me, and you (not so bad)

God will take care of me, and I don’t care about you (ugh)

God will take care of me, and if you are my perceived enemy, punish you

God will take care of me, and if I have decided you are not “in”, not only exclude you, but destroy you.

Perhaps this analysis seems harsh,

But it is not a new thought, we see it in the Bible, it is all over the Old Testament

In those passages some people love to haunt

But it is not Christianity

At least not mature faith

Mature faith is about service, and sacrifice,

And working hard so that no one is left behind

No one is excluded

It is about seeing others

It is about giving

Forgiving

Letting go

Reaching out

Including

Accepting

It is about loving, not the self

but the person in front of you

no matter who they are

mature spirituality is not easy

and I like Paul, will admit

that I am not there

will probably never get there

but like Paul I will press on

meanwhile I will be sorrowful

over those false shepherds who feed the American church

infant formula

and I will ache over

that one who would be King

but is totally unable to achieve even the semblance of love 

Small things

“So the small things came into their own: small acts of helping others, if one could; small ways of making one's own life better: acts of love, acts of tea, acts of laughter. Clever people might laugh at such simplicity, but, she asked herself, what was their own solution?”

                                            Alexander McCall Smith, The Good Husband of Zebra Drive

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Let the small things come into their own

The gentle words

The smiles

The hugs of acceptance and compassion

The silence of presence

Let the small things come into their own

The wood cut and stacked

The casserole offered on the altar of empathy

Let the small things come into their own

As we transform our anger and our hatred

into

ordinary acts of love

Going Home

“My soul is from elsewhere, I'm sure of that, and I intend to end up there.”

― Jalaluddin Rumi

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Many wise sages have said it

We are not our own

we come from some place

or something

or someone

and we are on a tortuous path

back

I like to think of it as “going home”

but here’s the thing

we can lose our way

as we become attached to so many things

success, money, power, pleasure

and we forget where home lies

which is why Jesus said we have to die to live

I am not Buddhist, and do not claim to understand it deeply

But it too seems to talk about being, then not-being, then being again

We exist only for a moment, and then that self dies, and is reborn into the person we are the next moment.

I think there is something in all of this

In all this dying, or letting go

In the act of constantly letting go of everything we are

So that we might become everything we might be

I see my role in life as that of letting heaven happen inside me

And making heaven happen around me

I do that best when I have a sense of where I am heading

When I am consciously walking toward that which is Love

When I live toward my values

For “my soul is from elsewhere, I'm sure of that, and I intend to end up there.”

Compassion

“Compassion is a verb.”

               Thich Nhat Hanh

_____________________

each day

each hour

each moment

we chose our paths

we choose our direction

we set our compass point

if we say we value compassion

then what does it mean

in this moment

to life toward that value?

What can I do

Right now

to walk down my value path

toward kindness and reconciliation?

yes, there are many things littering the path

fear, prejudice, anger, contempt, hurt

but what does it mean to step carefully through

the mess of thoughts and feelings

to let them go, and move toward

compassion

anyway?

for me

this day

the challenge is this

to have compassion for people who do not have compassion

I suppose this is where I turn to Compassion (God)

And ask for help!

engaging joy

He who binds to himself a joy

Does the winged life destroy

He who kisses the joy as it flies

Lives in eternity’s sunrise

                             William Blake

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It comes to us

Almost intangible at times

Call it what you will

Joy

Love

Hope

There it is

And we grasp and grab

Seeking to hug the moment

The feeling

The person

To ourselves

Ah we are such fools!

What if the disciples at Pentecost

When the wind of the Spirit had roared

Had rushed to shut the windows

Seeking to capture

To own

To control

Stale air

I do not know

I fear, how to let the joy fly

Unbound

it is there in a lingering look

a touch

a smile

let it simply arrive

and be 

un-becoming

“Maybe the journey isn’t so much about becoming anything.

Maybe it’s about un-becoming everything that isn’t really you,

so you can be who you were meant to be in the first place.”

                                                           Paul Coelho

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Jesus once said that we have to die in order to be born

an odd statement that

you would think that we have to be born in order to die

but our journeys prove the point

for we are not free to become who we truly are

to reflect our divine heritage

unless we first die to our ego

die to the ways others have chosen to define us

die to our greed, our hate

our fear

die to our essential selfishness

as I face a world that seems increasingly evil

as I watch my country become a horror

as it lives under the influence of extreme selfishness

my ability to die to my own “stuff’

is increasingly challenged

I want to, and sometimes do

Go over the edge, into dark places

But I must remember that life is always

Dying and being born

Ending and beginning

Every moment what was passes away

And newness becomes possible

Every moment the self dies

And then

Resurrection

A new beginning

So in the pale light of a winter morn

As I walk through fresh fallen snow

And marvel at the purity

It will die

And be born

again

it is enough

“To do the useful thing, to say the courageous thing,

to contemplate the beautiful thing: that is enough for one man's life.”

               T.S. Eliot, The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism

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when the road behind stretches long

and the road ahead is short

one cannot help but wonder

about enough

have I done enough?

loved enough

served enough

said enough

accomplished enough

what makes a life anyway

Jesus tells us that we are to make heaven happen

What does that even mean?

I can think of many ways of grading my life

Money earned

Titles obtained

Degrees awarded

Good behaviors

Bad behaviors (oh oh)

People loved

People who love me back (hmmm)

It’s a trap

This thinking that we can measure our lives

On a scale from 1 to 10

Its really not that difficult

Have you done something useful?

Useful is useful

Almost everyone can be (and is) useful

And the person who stocks the shelves in my local store

Is just as useful as a member of congress (perhaps more so)

Have you said something courageous?

This can be so many things!

It can be “I love you”

It can be “I am hurting”

It can be, “I’m sorry, but I think that is wrong”

Courageous can be confrontation,

But it can also be openness

Finally it means one takes the time

To stop, to breathe, to be in the moment, and to

“contemplate the beautiful thing”

Ah so easy

A mothers love is a beautiful thing

The mountain on a sunny morning

Fresh now

Autum colors

All beautiful

Compassion is beautiful, judgement is not

Love is beautiful, hate is not

We can sort it out

And set our minds on “beautiful things”

Refusing to wallow in

Unprecedential tweets

Refusing to focus on the hate on Facebook

We can go for a walk

Look at the mountain

Listen to the owl

Ah

These simple things are enough for one’s life

I’ve done enough

I’ve done enough

So have you

Finding Peace

It walked among the clouds today

The air was crisp,

The mountain nestled in its duvet of clouds

A few snowflakes dusted my coat

And Finn, the dog, was happy

So many sticks

So many smells

It was a time of peace

And yet my mind was not a peace

My heart was not calm

My soul was rended

every day I wake up to things that profoundly disturb me

I am tired of attacks on healthcare

Greed

An unbridled lust for power that will excuse any behavior

I am assaulted by the waves of hate that emanate

By white supremacists

And gunmen coldly killing from high places

I am tired of those who call good evil and evil good

I do not understand

The shaming of the poor

The neglect of the vulnerable

And so, I am not at peace

the other night a person, whom I value greatly

asked me, “Are you angry every day”

and my answer was “yes”

angry, and sad

And I do not quite know what to do with that

Is it OK to be angry

And when does the anger turn dangerous and destructive

I have chose to live according to the teachings of Jesus

Not the teachings of the white evangelical church, which I believe has lost its way

(or it could not embrace Trump, who is the anti-thesis of Jesus)

But the teachings of Jesus

What does that mean, in terms of how I respond to the things I see going on around me.

Jesus got angry, I think

He got angry at those who thought they owned God, and acted accordingly

He got angry, I suspect, at those who put money and power over people

But I believe that the anger of Jesus was qualitatively different from my own

Why?

Perhaps because Jesus’ anger was more fully in the context of love.

Perhaps because the anger was less about him, and more about those abused and broken

And more about the Sacred than the secular

A year ago I posted something by Thich Nhat Hanh.  That quote is relevant to my ponderings today.

“Someone asked me, “Aren’t you worried about the state of the world?” I allowed myself to breathe and then I said, “What is most important is not to allow your anxiety about what happens in the world to fill your heart. If your heart is filled with anxiety, you will get sick, and you will not be able to help.”

It is not OK, I think to ignore the state of the world

It is not OK not to be profoundly impacted when the person with the most power, belittles others

And acts like a bully

It is not OK not to care, when healthcare is taken away from the “least of these”

But, whatever response one has, must, if we take Thich Nhat Hanh, and Jesus, seriously, come out of a heart that is not dominated by anxiety, anger, hate, or fear.

It appears to me that the only solution there is

To the dilemma of how to live in a world that is going the wrong direction,

Is to fill one’s heart with the things that come from the Sacred

If one’s heart is full enough of love, hope, joy, peace, gratitude, generosity, acceptance, forgiveness, compassion, if it is full enough of Sacred, then there will be little room for hate, fear, anger, greed, and that all-consuming lust for power.

Which means

That as I walk in the snow, with happy dog bouncing around me

My mind should be stayed on

The snow flake falling, the dog dancing,

On the feel of the morning air, and the smell of the firs

And I should not be muttering to myself, about “many things”

It is not that I will not be angry

I was angry yesterday

I am angry today

And I will probably be angry tomorrow

But my hope is that my anger will be transformed

By Sacred Presence

And love

And that instead of becoming like that which I resist

Destructive, and small

Assaultive

Tearing others down

My anger will be transformed by grace

Into listening

And gentleness

So that I can overcome evil, not with evil

But with good

Be Kind

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.”

                              Plato

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We all have our inner battles

Sometimes we might well

Have cease fire with ourselves

But rarely an armistice

The war wages between what we want

What we need

Where we think we are

Who we think we are

But sometimes

As we settle into the quietness

And step away from the brain

We can watch the flow of thoughts

And not fuse

With all that which would assail us

And in that moment

Remember who we are

Sacred child

Beloved

Gifted

Forgiven

And then become

Sacred child

Loving

Gifting

Forgiving

The Simple Path

“The Simple Path

Silence is Prayer

Prayer is Faith

Faith is Love

Love is Service

The Fruit of Service is Peace”

                              Mother Teresa

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in the cold darkness of early winter

the world is strangely quiet

there is no wind

no song of the owl

serenading the night

the is only stillness

and in the still

wishful thinking

which finds its way heavenward

and become a sort of prayer

hoping for

nay believing

in the stillness

in the great silence

which contain all the power of Sacred love

and in the frigid blackness

warm comes to the soul

and the heart rises

and one walks

not toward an abyss

but toward the noisy world

where there

are things

to do 

Dangerous and Noble Thngs

“I want to think again of dangerous and noble things.

I want to be light and frolicsome.

I want to be improbable beautiful and afraid of nothing,

as though I had wings.”

               Mary Oliver, Owls and Other Fantasies: Poems and Essays

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there are time my mind whispers

and times when it shouts

there are times when paying attention to my thoughts

is like trying to watch 100 TVs all set to different channels

perhaps I need to step away from my brain

and merely accept what I am feeling

and notice what I am thinking

and let me go

dropping everything

except one dangerous or noble thing

letting go of that which weighs me down

so that I can once again be light

and hopeful

and creative

so I can once again

soar

God's Salvation

God’s salvation is the reordering of a society addicted to fear

Into a society empowered by love     Tripp Hudgins

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This God thing

Is not about fire insurance

Or being “blessed”

It is not a matter of getting earthly power

Or earthly wealth

It is not about using Sacred text

To use and abuse others

It is not about ritual

It is about

Love

About seeing the other in front of you

Forgiving the one who hurt you

Letting go of your own fears

Being open

And kind

Generous

And compassionate

It is about walking the walk

With one who took his love all the way to the cross

Who gave up ego

Power

Even life

So that love would live

talk of love

Admit something.

Everyone you see, you say to them "Love me."

Of course you do not do this out loud:

Otherwise,

Someone would call the cops.

Still, though, think about this,

This great pull in us to connect.

Why not become the one

Who lives with a full moon in each eye

That is always saying,

With that sweet moon

Language

What every other eye in this world

Is dying to

Hear?

                                           Hafez

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We all have a need be loved

To feel loved

To experience touch

To know that someone cares that we are there

And cares that we are gone

We seek to “hear” of love in so many way

And so we smile and talk

We accomplish

And strive

And yet perhaps the way to

Stumble upon that which we seek

Is not to say (silently of course)

In the depth of our soul, “Love me”

But

To each person we meet….

“I love you”

No escape

Resist your temptation to lie

By speaking of separation from God,

Otherwise,

We might have to medicate

You.

In the ocean

A lot goes on beneath your eyes.

Listen,

They have clinics there too

For the insane

Who persist in saying things like:

"I am independent from the

Sea,

God is not always around

Gently

Pressing against

My body."

From: 'The Gift'

Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

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There are times we think

That we are all alone

We stumbling through a day, a week

A month, a year

A life

Thinking that we are connected to no one

We do not have a love

Perhaps not even friends

And we walk alone

But we are never alone

All around us

In the sky the earth

In the sun the moon

In the breeze

Is Sacred

All through us

In our mind, with its incessant crazy chatter

In our heart, sometimes aching and wounded

In our soul, in that deep place

Where we are

Who we really are

Is Sacred

God is touching

No

God is embracing us

Every moment

We cannot

escape

If love is shattered

I cannot think that the Beloved Friend,

Who made the world so fair, should choose

to rent ....

this lovely curtain of .... the night and day, ...

Nor break ....unless some day

He means .... to mend. "

- Omar Khayyam ( from: Rubaiyyat )

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how can we not believe

when we see the sunrise sunset

the colors

bright and muted

orange and green

shadow and brilliance

how can we not believe

as we listen to the birds sing

and the music of the water

that the Sacred is anything but Love

or that the sacred rends

if the fabric of creation

is torn

if love is shattered

that is on us

with our fear and greed

our ego needs for power

and how can we not believe

that as we do our worst

the Sacred seeks what is best

and works within each heart

and soul

to repair and heal

that we might then

as well

repair and heal

that which we have broken and wounded

thoughts about contempt

" Do not view ... anyone with contempt,

for the friends of God .... are often hidden. "

               Makhdoon Ashraf Jahangir Semnani

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I often say

That as Sacred Children,

We must emulate our Sacred heritage

We must love

As the Beloved loves

Unconditionally, completely, forever

I truly believe

That we are all Sacred Children

And that the Sacred seed is hidden in each of us

Sometimes well hidden, but still there

And so I believe

It is not best to view another with hatred, contempt, disrespect

But I cannot live it out

I truly cannot

I cannot help but view with disrespect a President who uses division as tool of manipulation

I cannot help but have contempt for those who would cut services to the needy

To hand a tax cut to the rich

I cannot find much room in my heart and soul and mind

For compassion and forgiveness for a man who sits in a room

36 stories up, and kills 58 people

I know I should try to understand

To feel his pain

The abyss into which he had fallen

But I can’t

So I will pray for him, his family

I will pray for those who were killed, and those who loved them

I will pray for Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell

And pray for Trump

And pray for America, that it will wake up to its culture of violence

And its need for gun control

And I will pray that

We can all seek understanding and respect

And I will pray most earnestly

For myself

a little rain

It rained last night

A rare gift in a very dry summer

Everything is fresh

And new

The air is clean, the leaves gleam

The dust is settled

The grass is showing signs of life

In moments like this

Awash with freshness

That powerful images of renewal

Make total sense

So often Sacred Presence is symbolized by

Springs of living water

Streams in the desert

Foot washing

Rain

The Sacred drenching us with presence and love

Cooling, enlivening

Cleaning, refreshing

Greening

Think of it how you will

This morning I walked

I started knee deep in dust and destruction

A small human being with a lot of power

Had just trashed a lot of valuable human beings with no power

(Think Puerto Rico)

Proving how destructive spiritual, emotional, and relational smallness can be

I was burning

(OK I still am, but its better)

But as I walked I was reminded

That after the drought, the rains usually come

After the heat, the coolness

Brown turns to green

And even that destroyed by fire or wind,

Or even human careless, can become restored.

I believe in the Sacred

I believe in the power of love

But I now know, more than ever before

That unless people of faith, people with big souls

Let the Sacred move within them, and then from them

Unless we start getting involved in countering what is coming

Out of greed, and hate and smallness

Our world will become more of a living hell than it is right now

O Sacred one

Pour out your power in these days

For the small have gained the seats of power

And all those things you hate, greed, selfishness, cruelty, brutality, racism

Are being promoted

We need a little rain

We need a lot of rain

To wash away that which would smother and destroy

Deep Things

There are no words for the deepest things. Words become feeble when mystery visits and prayer moves into silence. In post-modern culture the ceaseless din of chatter has killed our acquaintance with silence. Consequently, we are stressed and anxious. Silence is a fascinating presence. Silence is shy; it is patient and never draws attention to itself. Without the presence of silence, no word could ever be said or heard. Our thoughts constantly call up new words. We become so taken with words that we barely notice the silence, but the silence is always there. The best words are born in the fecund silence that minds the mystery.

                                                                                      John O'Donohue

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in that moment

between darkness and dawn

when the sun merely hints at its presence

there is a profundity

one is assailed by the silence

and finds relief in the owls

who suddenly decide

to sing a love song

in that moment you can hear yourself breathe

hear the crunch of your feet on the earth

feel your heart beat

feel your feelings

and experience the roar of your brain

as it fills the silence with people

ideas,

and hear the roar subside,as you

take a deep breath

and feel the coolness of the fall

flow through you

and let everything go

except that one sliver of light

that one clarion call

that one feeling

of love

and let the face of your beloved

arise

Love is bigger

“Hope is not about proving anything. It's about choosing to believe this one thing, that love is bigger than any grim, bleak shit anyone can throw at us.”

                                            Anne Lamott, Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith

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Many of us believe some simple truths ( at least we see them as truths)

That there is something bigger than us

From whom we all come

And that something is love

Unconditional, unending, unreserved love

And that as Sacred Children

Who carry a part of this powerful reality,

Whom some call God

Within us

We all have a piece of the Sacred

A sacred seed

That from within that deepest part of ourselves

Moves, breathes, shapes, empowers

And shapes who we are

We can deny this presence

We can shut it down, silence it, entrap it

But it is there

And when we give it room to move

It wins

It is bigger and strong than anything the world can throw at us

Bigger than hate, greed, a lust for power, racism,

Even bigger than Donald Trump’s ego

I believe that as we seriously try to live out this love

This unconditional, unending, unreserved love

We change the space around us

We make it softer

More forgiving

We move from greed to generosity

From exclusion to acceptance

From cursing to blessing

Of course this is not an easy way

A few people have managed it

A few

People

Ghanhi perhaps

Nelson Mandela

Martin Luther King Jr

Dag Hammarskjold

Frankly we find this life of love puzzling

We deem it foolish and weak

But we know its power

Which is why we so often seek to silence and destroy those lives that live

For this imperative to love calls everything we prize in our competitive

Winner take all world

Into question.

And sometimes as we face the lies of Trump

And the ugly theocracy of Moore

And the judgmental shaming mentality of the rich

We question our sanity

This belief that love is indeed

Stronger than all else

And it is usually more hope

Than certainty

That moves us forward

Uncertainly

Down that path trod by

Martin, and Dag, and Mahatma

And yes

Some guy named Jesus

But if we lose this hope

We lose everything

And

All those forces and values that are not love

Win

Love wins, only if we accept it

Grab it

And most of all live it

In spite of

everything