Holy Cross Day

It is not possible to look at the present condition of our land and people and find support for optimism. We must not fool ourselves.

It is altogether conceivable that we may go right along with this business of "business," with our curious religious faith in technological progress, with our glorification of our own greed and violence always rationalized by our indignation at the greed and violence of others, until our land, our world, and ourselves are utterly destroyed. We know from history that massive human failure is possible....

On the other hand, we want to be hopeful, and hope is one of our duties. A part of our obligation to our own being and to our descendants is to study our life and our condition, searching always for the authentic underpinnings of hope. And if we look, these underpinnings can still be found.

Wendell Berry, Economy, Freedom and Community, and Sex
with thanks to inward/outward

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Many people live with the unconscious or conscious expectation that eventually things will get better; wars, hunger, poverty, oppression, and exploitation will vanish; and all people will live in harmony. Their lives and work are motivated by that expectation. When this does not happen in their lifetimes, they are often disillusioned and experience themselves as failures.

But Jesus doesn't support such an optimistic outlook. He foresees not only the destruction of his beloved city Jerusalem but also a world full of cruelty, violence, and conflict. For Jesus there is no happy ending in this world. The challenge of Jesus is not to solve all the world's problems before the end of time but to remain faithful at any cost.

Henri Nouwen

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I wrote about this last month, but these passages, arriving in email newsletters, reminded me again just how vital, and hard, it is to keep these things in mind always.

Today is Holy Cross Day. Today we remember Jesus’ victory over sin and death, and the fact that his cry from the Cross – τετέλεσται (tetelestai), it is finished – means something much more like, “It is completed. I’ve done it!” than “I’m done for!” (There’s a good article in Open Source Theology on this which is well worth reading.)

Paradoxically, perhaps, I find Nouwen’s conclusion, in the passage I’ve quoted, very heartening. If Jesus had preached a happy ending in this world, then where is it? Instead we see a world riven with “cruelty, violence and conflict.” Our own hearts are broken, divided, and unfaithful. Well, mine is, anyway. Pain is the rule rather than the exception in our lives. Even at our happiest, the shadow of loss and death lies across our sunlit hours like a stain.

Jesus knows this: it is why he came to be born as man, born from that frail and unthinkably courageous girl whom we call, down all generations, blessed, and to die so horribly as she stood vigil at the foot of that Cross. It is why that death was not the final victory of death, but the final victory of life, and why Mary’s grief was swallowed up in glory. Death is not the end: it is transformed. It is now the door to eternal life, and to a new Heaven and a new earth, in which

[God] will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.

Revelation 21.4

The Cross is indeed Holy. From an instrument of torture and death, Jesus’ blood has made it into our refuge, the fountain and source of grace, mercy and peace to all who believe. Holy, and glorious!

Fearful and wonderful…

How long shall I be in the world of the voice and not of the world of the word? For everything that is seen is voice and is spoken with the voice, but in the invisible world there is no voice, for not even voice can utter its mystery. How long shall I be voice and not silence, when shall I become word in an awareness of hidden things; when shall I be raised up to silence, to something which neither voice nor word can bring?

John the Solitary 5th c., from Sebastian Brock, 'John the Solitary, On Prayer', Journal of Theological Studies, New Series, 30 (1979), 84-101, p. 87, with thanks to Voice in the Wilderness

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Word without voice? Word as silence?

Sometimes I think music subsists as much in its silences as in its sounds: beyond the attack and decay of a note is the time before it was sounded, and the time after. Beyond its pitch is an infinity of vibrations that are not sound; beyond its scale degree are uncountable microtones.

We are this kind of thing ourselves – there was a time when each of us was not, and there will be a time after us, and yet our limited lives are shot through with eternity. A bit of the Spirit – who, being spirit, cannot be divided – is in each who lives, human or otherwise (Psalm 104.30), and so the perishable will somehow put on imperishability (1 Corinthians 15.42ff), and we shall “become word in an awareness of hidden things” – not in these glimpses, reflections in broken water, but in steady truth and certain rest, and

“God himself will be with [us];
he will wipe every tear from [our] eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.”

(Revelation 20.3-4).

Just as the Kingdom is here, and yet to come, within us, yet about to break upon us, so we live in eternal life even now: our little, sleep-rounded lives lie in the palm of that piercèd hand that made the vaults of Orion, the unimaginable distances and lambent deeps of interstellar space. Truly, we are fearfully and wonderfully made…

Collaboration or competition?

When you truly know, the giveaway is that you know that you do not know! Truly holy people are always humble. If you are not humble, you have not experienced the Holy One. If you don’t see humility in religion, you know it’s not on the right course.

The prophets are always calling Israel to such humility. They represent the self-critical and honest part of religion. Without the prophetic element, religion is always self-serving and idolatrous. True prophets please nobody, neither left nor right, which are mere ideologies. According to Jesus, the whole world will hate you if you follow him (Matthew 10:22). When you are truly prophetic, both the left and the right will mistrust and attack you.

Richard Rohr, adapted from CAC Foundation Set: Gospel Call to Compassionate Action (Bias from the Bottom) and Contemplative Prayer (CD, DVD, MP3)

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I know I keep on saying this in one way or another, but I do feel that what Rohr says here has a bearing on how we view prayer. Too often prayer assumes that if we do not know, then we ought to, and oceans of ink and forests of trees are expended by good and honest Christian charities producing and distributing prayer bulletins, prayer newsletters, prayer diaries and other aides de prière, so that supporters may pray in a more informed manner.

Perhaps those who put so much effort and so many resources into producing these publications intend us merely to be better informed, and so come to prayer with their needs closer to our hearts; but I worry that some of us will simply founder beneath the burden of detail, and fail to pray at all since we cannot pray for everything. In any case, God’s purposes may be greater and stranger than anyone may imagine who is caught up in the day-to-day minutiae of running an aid agency or a homeless shelter.

We need prophets, as Rohr so rightly says. We need, too, those who come before God in reckless prayer, crying out for mercy and justice, not for specific instances of charity. Of course we are right to pray for charities, Christian and otherwise, and for their work. Some of us may be called, by reason of personal involvement, perhaps, to pray extensively of one or another. But prayer activism is not the same as prophetic prayer.

Nor, come to that, does prophetic prayer consist in recasting Jeremiads in terms of contemporary events, like so many “words” coming out of certain Christian camps in recent years, proclaiming God’s wrath and judgement on corrupt and disobedient nations as if the Incarnation and all that follows from it had never happened.

We live in the Kingdom; but the Kingdom is not yet. We are redeemed; but the world is not, nor will it be. Someday there will be a new heaven and a new earth. Meanwhile, we work and pray to build the Kingdom one kindness at a time, knowing that it will never be more than an outpost of love in a broken and dying world. Jesus knew that, which is why he rebuked Peter for trying to keep him from the Cross (Matthew 16.23).

Elaine Aron, in her book The Highly Sensitive Person, argues persuasively for society's need for sensitive, reflective people just as much as for extraverted, dynamic types. She categorises them as (p.18 et passim) “priestly advisors”, informing and balancing the “warrior kings” whom both the media and the man in the street tend to value above all. It seems to me that Christian society has just as deep a need as any other for those who are called to the contemplative rather than the active to take their vocation seriously. As Aron points out, introverts are not failed extraverts: they are a different, and equally valuable, kind of human being. Being human is a collaboration, not a competition, or at least it should be.

Perhaps those of us who are called not to “know how to pray as we ought”, but to pray, as Paul said in Romans 8.26-27, within the Spirit’s own intercession, need to stop feeling like second-class citizens of the Kingdom, but to realise that we are a vital part of its growth, as important as – though not more important than – those who are called to give their lives in active service. We need to talk, to inform each other, to understand each other. But it is easier, maybe, for activists to publish prayer bulletins than it is for contemplatives to communicate their calling to live out their intercession. Hence, perhaps, blogs like this?

There is a crack in everything…

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.

Leonard Cohen, Anthem

We are fallen things in a fallen world. This place is broken. It was broken a very long time ago, and it has been falling to bits ever since. We cannot stand aside from this brokenness. Schadenfreude is prohibited. We are in this, all of us, up to our necks. You can read the first few chapters of Genesis how you like – it makes no difference to me whether you take it as literal, metaphorical or merely allegorical – it comes to the same thing in the end. Jesus knew this very well. He spoke of it often, most tellingly perhaps in the parable of the weeds (Matthew 13.24-30):

He put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, “Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?” He answered, “An enemy has done this.” The slaves said to him, “Then do you want us to go and gather them?” But he replied, “No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. Let both of them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.” ’

He knew that it was painful and despair-inducing to live like this, and he knew we would always try to find ways to mend things, to pull up weeds. He knew too that it would be impossible to get it right – trying to pull up the bad stuff we’d injure and destroy the good. We can see this principle at work every day in Afghanistan, in Syria, Somalia… We can’t help it, perhaps, we have to try and fix it; we can’t bear to watch and do nothing. Paul saw this too:

I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labour pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

Romans 8.18-25

We can’t know how to pray. But, Paul goes on to remind us (vv.26-27):

…the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

We need to learn to stay still, to wait on the Harvester at the end of things. Till then, all I can do is pray as I have been shown, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner…”

White Stones...

God gives you two names: yours and God's. That is why we end most prayers with the phrase "in the name of."

Listen for that place deep within where God has revealed to you that secret name that lovers reveal to one another in intimate moments, where God has told you who God is for you. It could be unlike anybody else. You receive and reflect a part of God that no one else will ever reflect. You receive and reflect back to God a part of the eternal mystery that no one else ever will.

Where God has given you God's intimate name, you can also receive your own deepest name. It takes awhile; it takes some listening, some silence, some suffering, probably. It takes some waiting, desiring; it takes some hoping. But finally we discover that place where we know our secret name, our deepest identity, our real “name” in God.

I hope someone has given you freedom and permission to trust your own inner experience, to listen and to live from this place where God’s name and your name are the same "I Am." That is the only goal of all religion: to finally join Jesus in trusting and saying that "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30).

Adapted from Radical Grace, Daily Meditations, p. 291, Day 304

This is scary stuff. We mustn't misunderstand what Fr. Richard is trying to say here. Scripture is full of these callings-out, markings-off, re-namings. Ezekiel 9:4, Matthew 16:18, and especially Revelation 2:17. We are not who we think we are.

CS Lewis once wrote: "There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously - no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption."

Our new name is not less than this. It may be much more. But at the very least our new name calls us out of our ordinary assumptions, and shows us for the children of God we actually are. And that in itself is deeply scary to beings who are used to commerce and sleaziness, sickness and success. None of those things, none of the things we measure ourselves and each other by will last. They will be burnt away, every one, and then where will we be, standing in the wind on the shores of all eternity, clutching our white stones...?

All Creation Cries to You…

When we think of oceans and mountains, forests and deserts, trees, plants and animals, the sun, the moon, the stars, and all the galaxies, as God's creation, waiting eagerly to be “liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.” (Roman 8:21), we can only stand in awe of God's majesty and God’s all-embracing plan of salvation. It is not just we, human beings, who wait for salvation in the midst of our suffering; all of creation groans and moans with us longing to reach its full freedom (ibid. v.26).

In this way we are indeed brothers and sisters not only of all other men and women in the world but also of all that surrounds us. Yes, we have to love the fields full of wheat, the snow-capped mountains, the roaring seas, the wild and tame animals, the huge redwoods, and the little daisies. Everything in creation belongs, with us, to the large family of God.

All of creation belongs together in the arms of its Creator. The final vision is that not only will all men and women recognise that they are brothers and sisters called to live in unity but all members of God's creation will come together in complete harmony. Jesus the Christ came to realise that vision. Long before he was born, the prophet Isaiah saw it:

The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them.

The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox.

The infant will play near the hole of the cobra, and the young child put his hand into the viper’s nest.

They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.

(Isaiah 11:6-9)

We must keep this vision alive.

Henri Nouwen, from Bread for the Journey
[NB I have taken the liberty of replacing the Bible passages with the NIV translation rather than the unidentified one used my Nouwen.]

Advent is not just about waiting for Christmas: it is about justice and liberty, about the coming of the Kingdom, the triumph of the mercy of Christ . As Francis of Assisi saw so very clearly, God’s mercy in Christ extends to all creation, and so our prayer and our longing for mercy and justice must encompass all creation too.

[Title of this post courtesy of Marty Sampson]

Living in the end-times…

We are living in the end-time! This does not mean that creation will soon come to its end, but it does mean that all the signs of the end of time that Jesus mentions are already with us: wars and revolutions, conflicts between nations and between kingdoms, earthquakes, plagues, famines, and persecutions (see Luke 21:9-12). Jesus describes the events of our world as announcements that this world is not our final dwelling place, but that the Son of Man will come to bring us our full freedom. “When these things begin to take place,” Jesus says, “stand erect, hold your heads high, because your liberation is near at hand” (Luke 21:28)… The terrible events surrounding us must be lived as ways to make us ready for our final liberation.

Henri Nouwen, from Bread for the Journey

It is so easy to lose sight of what Jesus said about times like ours, in the fear, uncertainty and doubt surrounding us from the media and virally, on Facebook and Twitter and countless forums up and down the intertubes… I even had an email from the Christian card company CrossCards today, promoting a “free book” by a Messianic Jewish group, claiming to explain the appalling consequences facing the world as a result of the US President’s Middle East policy.

The Beatitudes contain their own hints—“Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me”—of the difficulties we are likely to face, yet they also contain the assurance that all is indeed in Jesus’ Father’s hands (Romans 8:28), and will lead in the end to healing and to glory.

But the healing and the glory come only by way of the Cross. It is only Jesus' obedience, death and resurrection that make any of this possible. “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (I Corinthians 1:18) “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.” (Colossians 1:19-20) and it is only as the Cross becomes mine that I can be part of this great outpouring of mercy “in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” (Galatians 6:14)

When we come to understand this strange identification, both with the crucified Saviour and with the broken world, then we come into the intercessory dimension of the Jesus Prayer, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

I do not give to you as the world gives...

Many people live with the unconscious or conscious expectation that eventually things will get better; wars, hunger, poverty, oppression, and exploitation will vanish; and all people will live in harmony. Their lives and work are motivated by that expectation. When this does not happen in their lifetimes, they are often disillusioned and experience themselves as failures.

But Jesus doesn't support such an optimistic outlook. He foresees not only the destruction of his beloved city Jerusalem but also a world full of cruelty, violence, and conflict. For Jesus there is no happy ending in this world. The challenge of Jesus is not to solve all the world's problems before the end of time but to remain faithful at any cost...

About the end-time Jesus says: "There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars; on earth nations in agony, bewildered by the turmoil of the ocean and its waves; men fainting away with terror and fear at what menaces the world, for the power of heaven will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory" (Luke 21:25-28) All of this is already taking place. For anyone who has listened deeply to the heart of God, the despair of the world and the coming of the great liberation are both visible every day.

What then should we do? Jesus says it clearly: "Stand erect, hold your heads high, because your liberation is near at hand" (Luke 21:28). There is so much hope here. We do not have to faint but can stand straight, welcoming our Lord with outstretched arms.

Henri Nouwen, Bread for the Journey

 

I am convinced that most of the saints were religious dropouts from societies that were going nowhere. Faith called them to drop out and believe in something else.

Jesus' announcement of the reign of God was telling us that culture as we've created it is on a track toward self-destruction and emptiness.

All we have to give up is the utterly false understanding that we have of ourselves from civil society. For some reason that liberation seems to be the most difficult thing in the world!

Richard Rohr, from Radical Grace

 

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.

Jesus, John 14.27

I wonder if I'm odd in finding these thoughts comforting at times like this...?

Not just one more thing...

The spiritual knowledge that we belong to God and are safe with God even as we live in a very destructive world allows us to see in the midst of all the turmoil, fear, and agony of history "the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory" (Luke 21:27). Even though Jesus speaks about this as about a final event, it is not just one more thing that is going to happen after all the terrible things are over. Just as the end-time is already here, so too is the coming of the Son of Man. It is an event in the realm of the Spirit and thus not subject to the boundaries of time.

Those who live in communion with Jesus have the eyes to see and the ears to hear the second coming of Jesus among them in the here and now. Jesus says: "Before this generation has passed away all will have taken place" (Luke 21:32). And this is true for each faithful generation.

Henri Nouwen, from Bread for the Journey

This is one of the most astonishing bits of eschatological preaching I've read. One of those, "Of course!" moments... how limited we can be in our thinking, how tied to our unquestioned concepts of time and matter. Physicists know better!