The universe is immeasurably vast. God only Out There,
looking on does not help me. I seek and
know a closer God. God not only within
all that has been made, God not only within during the lifetime of Jesus of
Nazareth, but God within, right now, within me, in the salt of my tears the
beating of my heart.
Madeleine
L’Engle
The reality of our rebirth should mess with us.
Shane
Claiborne
__________________________________
The universe is immeasurably vast
Each sunrise and sunset gives us a mere glimpse of this
vastness
In the black of night
As the stars go on, literally forever
Into the vastness
We understand, as Sagan reminded us
That this planet
Our home
Is “a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.”
It is easy to get lost in this vastness
And frighteningly easy to be afraid
And yet
I believe, however foolish it might seem
That there is a force behind all this
A reality that creates beauty
An entity that not only loves but is love
That is beyond my capacity to understand
That there is something “beyond” that is woven
Into the trees that surround me,
Into the mountain that glistens gold in the fall sun
Into me
And into all creatures great and small
A reality that when it touches us
When we are open to it
Transforms
Empowers
Surprises
And, importantly
Because it is our common DNA
Binds us together
We are Sacred Children
And that Jewish person, who is terrified by the brutality
of Hamas
Is my family
And that Palestinian mother, hugging the tattered remains
of her child
Is my family
And that person who wants to Make America Great Again,
Is my family
So is that vegan who wants to protect all sentient beings
And that environmentalist
And that radical capitalist
And. . .
There are no exceptions
And THAT
Messes with my mind
It messes with my celebrations when my side “wins”
And with my anger when my side “loses”
It messes with my desire for retribution
And with that fear that wants to exclude
And with my need to accumulate and hoard
Jesus suggested that unless we “hate” our own family
We are not ready to be his followers (Luke 14:26)
Really?
Some see that as weird, even wrong!
Jesus! What were
you thinking?
What Jesus was thinking was that unless we can extend our
concept of family
Beyond our actual family, beyond our political party
Beyond our country
Beyond our religion
We cannot love people the way we are called to love
We cannot extend our love
To the other members of our “family”
We cannot sit in the dust of a destroyed house in Gaza
And feel the pain of those whose lives have been
shattered by war
Because we can only see things from one side.
The side of “our’ family
We cannot feel the fear of a nation in fear of its
existence
We cannot understand the despair of a person whose world
is changing
And who is being told by people he/she trusts, that those
who are changing it
Are evil
We cannot love our neighbor as ourselves
Instead, we are driven into factions
We are divided and polarized
And our world, this tiny speck of dust
Is filled with hate, not love
We need God
We need Love
We need that presence to be as near as our next breath
And we need that presence
To mess with us
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