crisis is revelatory

When faced with a radical crisis, when the old way of being in the world, of interacting with each other and with the realm of nature doesn't work anymore, when survival is threatened by seemingly insurmountable problems, an individual life-form -- or a species -- will either die or become extinct or rise above the limitations of its condition through an evolutionary leap.”

                                         Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose

“Crisis is what suppressed pain looks like; it always comes to the surface.

                                         Bryant McGill

___________________________________________

there is one thing we can insist on

always

always

a crisis is revelatory

there are many ways of thinking about crisis

John F Kennedy

Grabbing hold of somewhat a creative interpretation

of the Chinese word for crisis

an interpretation probably first found

in a journal for missionaries in China in the 1930s,

framed crisis as opportunity plus threat

the actual meaning of the word is

“danger at the point where things meet”

perhaps we could better say, danger at the point where things collide

we are at a moment where “things” are meeting

where they collide

the past and the future

old ways and new

but more profoundly

at the point where Covid 19 collides with our lives

we are finding other powerful collisions!

between individual rights and freedoms and the common good

between selfishness and selflessness

between compassionate concern for all and a focus on one’s own individual want and needs, with a disregard for others mixed in

and it is at this point that things get revealed

it seems to me that in a crisis, what is at a person’s core

what is in a person’s heart

the health of a person’s soul

the depth of a person’s spiritual

comes to the surface

for good or for ill

we are seeing people make amazing sacrifices for others

being amazingly generous

compassionate

caring

we see people putting their lives on the line for others

their businesses on the line

we see people accepting, finding peace

and living lives of compassion and calm

and we see people

in whom hate an anger have bubbled to the surface

we see the faces of hate screaming into the faces of the police

and into the faces of masked healthcare workers

we see people waving the flags of racism and hate

and carrying instruments of death

threatening

intimidating

it’s a hot mess

what makes the difference?

I think it is what is in the heart

Whatever is in the heart gets released

As crisis breaks the heart open

If a person has compassion and love at their core

If they have allowed the God who is love

Space

Then what comes for in this time

Is compassion and love

A concern for others

If not

If what is at the core is fear

Or hate

Or racism

Or anger

Then what comes to the surface

Is angry tweets

And destructive behaviors

and pain and violence

and intimidation

we important lessons in such times

about ourselves

and about God

One thing I have learned during this time is why Jesus so frequently

told people they had to die to the self

and become people willing to be radically

loving

generous

kind

I know, for myself,

that it is when I can let go of “me”

however imperfectly,

things change

it is when I let go of me

and cling to the Sacred

(as a child clings to a parent during a thunder storm)

That I find peace

That I find calm

Safety

and it is then that good things surface it my life

compassion

and kindness

and a willingness

to work for the common good

so my hope

in this time crisis

is simply this

that what will be revealed in me

is a little sacred presence

and a lot of love