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Listen

Quiet friend who has come so far,

feel how your breathing makes more space

around you.

Let this darkness be a bell tower

and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.

Move back and forth into the change.

What is it like, such intensity of pain?

If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,

be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,

the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,

Say to the silent earth: I flow.

to the rushing water, speak: I am.

          Rainer Marie Rilke (quoted by DBB in Sunday Musings, 8/13/23)

 

The voices that are easiest to hear are often those voices to whom I should listen least. And the listening I need to hear most is often the hardest to hear, because it is quiet, and like God to the Prophet Elijah, it speaks only in the stillness after the whirlwind has passed.

          Diana Butler Bass

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God says

God told me

The Bible says

Our church says

 

FOX says

MSNBC says

There are loud gongs and clashing cymbals everywhere

 

There are angry souls,

Demanding to be heard

Yelling and screaming

Telling us what is wrong, what is right

 

Demanding that we hate and fear

 

Telling us to be afraid

To pick up the sword, or rather the AR-15

And kill

Eradicate

 

Telling us that the chief end of humankind

is to rule, to dominate

and perchance

destroy

 

We live in the whirlwind

in a searing time

where like a wildfire driven by the wind

foul forces

urge us to embrace our darker angels

 

We seek Sacred in the noise

in the loud demanding noises

in the huge auditorium, filled with smoke and mirrors

in the mass gatherings where people

whose egos ooze and poison

tell us to follow them

to the promised land

(where White American Christianity once again rules)

 

It is hard to miss the voices of hate and fear

Of dominance and greed

Loud and harsh, intrusive and constant

 

It is hard not to listen

To those voices that tell us what we want to hear

That tell us we are better, smarter, more righteous

That tell us we are right, and they are wrong

We are blessed, they are cursed

 

It is hard not to listen to those voices

That excuse our behaviors

That insist we can ignore climate change

The poor

The homeless

 

But those voices are like the strong winds

That tear into the mountains and break the rocks into pieces

Like the earthquakes that shake

And the fire that burns (I Kings 19)

 

All too often Sacred is not in them

And we are deceived

 

Where is the voice we need to hear

that almost silent whisper

that echoes gently in the stillness?

 

Where is the Truth that is often so hard to hear

Among the clamor

Hard to hear because it tells us what we do not want to hear.

 

Where is the One who whispers

Here I Am.

I Am

 

The voice of El

Comes to us in unexpected ways

Through unexpected people

 

It comes to us on foul city streets

On lonely rural roads

It echoes across the waters

It lingers in the trees

 

It comes from that person who has no place to live

From that one dying alone

From the person struggling with addiction

From that transgender person who has been denied the right to be

 

It whispers to us in the voices of the poor

It drifts like smoke from the devastation on Maui

It comes almost silent and small from those oppressed

Marginalized

And minimalized

By those who would dominate and control them

 

We live in the whirlwind

In a world of earthquake and fire

But still

If we listen

The Voice is there

 

I am

I am here

I am love

You are loved

Please love