Mother God

From Mirabai Starr, in her book Wild Mercy, comes a quote to think about, as we look at the mess religion has made of the planet, and us.  As we think about the ways we end up cooperating with our own oppression (and destruction).

 

“Pretending God’s a dude hasn’t exactly worked out well for the vast majority of the human family, let alone the animal and plant communities or the air or the waters”

 

Indeed.

 

Certainly any image we have for what we often call God is going to be deficit.

We simply cannot contain Sacred in any image, any word.

 

Certainly not the word father

Or king

 

We can only grab facets of the Sacred.

And those facets, which we finally grab them melt in our hands like snowflakes

 

Our very attempts to capture them destroys them.

 

We take the concept of God as dude and find ourselves with a religion that mimics toxic masculinity.  Pushy, aggressive, dominating, careless.

 

We take the concept of God as King and we end up with an abuser, dispensing favor to the favor and curses to the cursed  We end up with righteous cruelty.

 

There are many words, and we must embrace them all, and cling to none.

The Sacred is wisdom

It is wind and fire (Spirit)

It is life-giving water

It is love

 

The Sacred is expressed through truth

and creativity,

compassion,

and love.

 

It is confusing!

Holy Spirit, water, and fire

Opposites

One sears, one greens

One quenches the other

Add wind and what do we have?

 

We cannot know or understand, other than

that this power that flows in our veins like blood

changes things

changes us

 

This day, as I think about injustice done

and bloodied bodies at a Christmas Parade

and the hate fill machinations of the political right (and sometimes left)

and the plight of the poor

and the oppression of the vulnerable

 

I need Sacred in all its fullness

I need to believe that somehow, in some way

Sacred can touch all of this

 

In the same way that Jesus touched

the world with healing and kindness

and newness

 

I need to believe that there is power here

but not the raw power of empire

or the ravaging power of guns

or the cruel power of piety

 

but the power, perhaps, of a mother

 

and as a child, I want to run to my mother

and be gathered in her arms

and comforted

 

not so that I can ignore the pain

but so that I can face it

and touch it

with love

 

to return to Starr

“Gather your burdens in a basket in your heart.  Set them at the feet of the Mother.  Say ‘Take this, Great Mama, because I cannot carry all this shit for another minute.’ And then crawl into her broad lap and nestle against her ample bosom and take a nap…”

 

Give us rest, O Sacred

That we might re-enter life as those made new