Once we see that our deepest self, the real person in us
is not limited to being any one particular image-self but is actually a Child
of God, one who simply says “I am I, here, now”
- once we really grasp that all
need for this elaborate and expensive defense system evaporates Then we are free to love others, to will
abundant being to them, to all…
Our sense of feeling good in being ourselves does not
come from any kind of contrast or comparison with others It comes directly and immediately out of our
realization of being a creative act of God, simply unique and absolutely
precious.
We [should] have a sense of ourselves as the process of
be-ing, as an ever-renewed act, a continuous motion of living, which is God’s
ever-present act of creating us. Looking
toward others we sense them also as creative acts of God, being made fresh from
moment to moment, not limited to the descriptions of their past qualities or
acts…
Beatrice
Bruteau, Radical Optimism, p. 69
Sentient Publicatons, 1993, 2002
____________________________________
This morning the world changed.
Brown and gold became white.
As the world
Ever renewed, despite our best attempts to destroy it
Became, in a moment, something new
And here am I
A creative act of God
Always changing, being ever renewed
A child of God
Creation and I both reflect God
We are both, in our own way, incarnations of a God who
Is transcendent, immanent, and cosmic
I sometimes call the reality that we experience through
creation, God
But the name God is inadequate for the task
It touches on the transcendence of God perhaps
The fact that God is “beyond”
To transcendent we have to add cosmic
Which reminds us that God is not only vertically beyond
imagination
But is also horizontally transcended, broader and wider
than we can contemplate
covering and embracing all
And then there is immanence. Presence
The Sacred being woven into the fabric of creation,
Into the rocks and trees, mountains and rivers
Flora and fauna
Woven into us as human creatures
Into me. And you.
So, we have God
this transcendent, Cosmic, immanent being
this reality is that beyond
that is Sacred
that is Love
Once upon a time this reality
The Sacred, Creative, Loving
Something bigger
Became a focused presence
In a child, an adolescent, a man we call Jesus
And we were reminded of the nature of
What I will call God (it is just easier)
And we were reminded who we are
Children of God
Creatures in the process of be-ing,
as ever-renewed acts of creation
always growing and changing
surrounded by others, by a creation
that is constantly being renewed (day by day)
In a sense I cannot, need not be defined
Any more than God can be defined
I am a presence, I have this body
But I am transcendent, as I participate in God
And I am cosmic, as I but necessity must also be
Connected to all other human creatures (and more)
“I am you, and you are me and we are all together”
Who could have known Lennon and McCartney would get it
right?
I love the idea that I am being made fresh, moment-by-moment
And I love the idea that each person
Is being remade moment by moment
Every other person
Kamala, Donny, that person who can’t control their use of
alcohol
Who lives down the street
That person who helped me, and the one who hurt me
The one who looks like me, and the one who doesn’t
The MAGA Republican, the Democrat
The Indigenous person, the immigrant
All
All are creative acts of God.
And I can look at myself, and look at others
Without being limited to their past qualities
Or their past acts
Their past success or failures
For they are constantly being created
And are unique and absolutely precious.
This gives me hope, because who knows what God can do
With me, with you, with them
This gives me the capacity to forgive
Because each person, even Donald Trump is poised right on
the edge
Of newness
It is easy, in this time of strife and chaos,
in this time marked by hate and violence (verbal and
physical)
To give ourselves, and those around us, hard edges
To define people as static and stuck
They are a libtard
MAGA
an animal
garbage
male, female, black, white, and everything in between
enemy, friend
but what if we understood that this moment is only a
moment
and in the next moment we, they, can be different
will be different
What if we tried to live forward
Not just live forward but live forward in expectation and
love
Uniting with others where they are
In this moment
Knowing it is just a moment
And that love and forgiveness, hope and joy
Just might change who they are
In the moments to come?
And change us too?
Can we give each other
That gift?
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