Category: Grace

Gifts in a Time of Pandemic

The very depth of emotion, the connecting to the core of one’s being, the calling into play one’s strongest feelings and abilities, can be rich, even on deathbeds, in wars and emergencies, while what is often assumed to be the circumstance of happiness sometimes is only insulation from the depths, or so the plagues of ennui and angst among the comfortable suggest.

Rebecca Solnit, “A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster”

Rebecca Solnit examines catastrophes such as the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and Hurricane Katrina for the extraordinary experiences of community, sharing, and deep compassion. She gives expression to the hurt and suffering as well as the actions, often by those in authority, that make matters worse in the crisis. Her focus, however, is on human beings shining with the beauty of humanity in the midst of great trials.

We see this humanity played out today in the many concrete acts of compassion in the midst of the pandemic. Relationships often take on a deeper significance, not only relationships to those near and dear, but to neighbors and strangers. There is the sense that we are going through this together. Often it is very simple experiences that are deepened in their significance for our lives. Recently, on a pleasant weather day, neighbors came out of their back doors to enjoy the sun. We immediately greeted one another across two fences and entered into conversation. My neighbor two doors down shared how wonderful it was, in the midst of our “staying in place,” to find each other outside at the same moment and be able to share with one another.

We experience a deeper appreciation for neighbors and for those who deliver our mail, pick up our garbage, and work in our grocery stores. In addition to the health care workers on the front lines of combating this virus, we are recognizing other “essential workers:” bus drivers, farmworkers, food processors, first responders of all kinds, delivery people, maintenance people, home health aides. Some, like the last in this list, often receive less than a living wage. Many essential workers are undocumented. Will our recognition of the essential nature of their work bring about a societal change that ensures a living wage, health care for all, and a path to legalization for the millions of undocumented workers? Can we acknowledge that every one of us is “essential” and are to be loved?

We are given an opportunity, during this time of COVID-19, to reflect on the inequalities that are present and on the kind of society we want to have. The crisis this virus has created shines a light on the inequities. The statistics that show a much larger percentage of deaths in communities of color are a reminder of what has historically been the reality: The state of health, in these communities, is an outcome of years of inequities in the provision of health care, in the existence of food deserts, underfunded education, and diminished job opportunities. What this pandemic reveals to us about these injustices, we must not ignore. Deepened understanding is a gift, as is the call to work toward the kind of change that comes from doing justice and loving mercy. Will we receive these gifts?

There is much we can receive as we go through this time of pandemic, gifts that will change our lives. Saint Paul encourages us to make the most of the time: “Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise, making the most of the time.” There is something to receive during this time for the upbuilding and renewal of community. Therefore, we must make the most of this time, so that we receive the gifts given for the recreating of our relationships and society.

Filed under: Grace, Humanity, Justice, SocietyTagged with: , ,

Where Security Resides

At some point in my early twenties, in college, it occurred to me that I was not simply seeking knowledge for the sake of knowledge and truth. I had told myself that that was what I was doing; it was a conscious desire. But I came to admit that there was more going on than simply a search for truth. There was a desire to secure my life with knowledge. There was the feeling that if I just knew enough, I would feel more secure in the world and perhaps feel that things were a little more under my control. I became increasingly aware of this attempt to secure my life, along with the realization that it was not working.

When it came to my relationship with God, in whom there is true security, I found that I was often attempting to think my way to God, a decidedly futile project. I despaired of it and continued a journey of surrendering my life to God.

I am seventy now and am mindful that my efforts to secure myself have never gone away, even as I have found security in God who, in the words of Karl Rahner, is Incomprehensible Mystery. My security is in the Incomprehensible! It is in the Mystery! Since my attempts at securing myself have not disappeared, I have been on a journey of relinquishing my life. My security is found in losing my life, my insecurity in trying to secure my life. (“For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” – Jesus)

The struggle remains. And God’s grace remains. God knows where I am in the midst of this struggle, for which I am grateful; I am thankful that God knows me and knows where I am. And God is my deliverer. The journey I am on is a journey of grace.

I share this experience, because I realize I am not alone in this, and I understand the danger of seeking knowledge and information as a way to secure ourselves. This danger is certainly found in the ways that technology can give the illusion of power and security. And the scientific method, while achieving much growth in empirical knowledge (and at the same time multiplying the questions and keeping us immersed in mystery), can, nevertheless, for some, be a means of “pinning things down” in order to gain a sense of security. When technology and science become a way of securing ourselves, our lives narrow to a very mean (as in “small”) self. On the other hand, when science is pursued for the sake of knowledge rather than security, as with all forms of knowing, it opens us up to wonder and mystery—and therefore to spirit. (Read the Journey of the Universe, by Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker.)

But an attempt to secure ourselves by our knowledge may reach its most dangerous level in theology. The temptation to have our thoughts about God secure us is great. For many, the fall into this temptation is most obvious in fundamentalist thinking, where, for example, Bible quotes are provided as pat answers to all manner of life’s problems. However, the danger exists for any theological project. We are tempted to think our way to God, rather than reflect from our lived experience of God. The danger is that our theology becomes merely another ideology that keeps hidden the primary idols (false centers) that drive our lives and undermine our relationships. Theology replaces experience rather than reflecting it. Essentially, this is the cause of so many forms of Christianity revealing little or nothing of Christ.

Jesus speaks to this when he prays, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants.” And when he says, “Let the little children come to me…for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.” And “Unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Therefore: Leave aside all your thoughts, your intelligent and well-formulated answers. Become like an infant, not knowing, open to receive. Be silent. Be still. “Be still and know.” (Psalm 46) Wait. “Be still before the Lord, and wait patiently for him.” (Psalm 37) Release your thoughts and yield to Incomprehensible Mystery. Be open to the One you can never wrap your thoughts around. You have put your faith in your thoughts; now trust the Mystery. The One you cannot comprehend will bear you up and secure you. In silence and trust, the eyes of your heart will be opened, so that you become aware of both your great need for God and God’s gracious acceptance. In that awareness, you may find that you are discerning your next steps. Your next steps, as God gives them, are prior to and greater than your reflections. Knowing and doing God’s will are preeminent over any theology.

As a response to God, the steps you take grow your true self. This experience gives rise to reflections so that you are not merely repeating what you heard from others or read in the Bible, but rather you are witnessing from your own lived reality.

Furthermore, you find that you are not bound to any one formulation of reality, but you are free to find new ways to express your experience as you change and grow. You increasingly become open to the many ways God comes to us and the many ways others have expressed this reality. You discover that, in the words of C.S. Lewis, “God is the great iconoclast.”(A Grief Observed) God keeps breaking up our images of God (for new images) lest we make any one image that in which we place our trust, our security being in God alone.

Filed under: Faith, Grace, Prayer, SpiritualityTagged with: , , , , ,

The “Gospel” That Supports Trump

Pastor Robert Jeffress, an evangelical supporter of Trump, was interviewed for an opinion essay in the Washington Post. He provided us with his (and many Evangelicals) main reason for supporting Trump. He tells us “that regardless of what happens in Washington, D.C., that the general trajectory of evangelicalism is going to be downward until Christ returns.” He explains that, as he understands Scripture, things “get worse and more hostile as the culture does.” Things get less and less “evangelical-friendly or Christian-friendly.” He sees “the election of Donald Trump as maybe a respite, a pause in that. Perhaps to give Christians the ability and freedom more to share the gospel of Christ with people before the ultimate end occurs and the Lord returns.”

This is an amazing statement from someone who purports to be a Christian leader. Why is he focused on a downward trajectory for evangelicalism rather than a downward trajectory for the world (given the state of the world)? At the heart of Christian good news is that “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son.” Jesus says that he did not come into the world to condemn the world but to liberate it, and he trains his followers for the work of deliverance and healing.

And Jesus does not look for respite from the emperor or provincial leaders. When he is told that King Herod is out to kill him, he says, “Go and tell that fox for me, ‘Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work. Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.” In effect, Jesus is saying that he does not have time to pay attention to King Herod, much less cozy up to him. He has a God-given mission that concludes, as it often does for prophets, in being killed. His focus is on the world, on hurting and broken lives. He is about healing and deliverance directed outward to others. He tells his followers it has to be the same way for them: “For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the good news, will save it.”

Jesus does not entertain a “Christian-friendly” environment. Rather, Jesus tells his followers to expect persecution and that, therefore, they must “deny themselves, take up their cross (their suffering and death) and follow him daily.” They are not to seek to secure their lives (their Father in heaven will do that); they are to lose their lives for the sake of others receiving the good news. When they get anxious, they are reminded that their Father in heaven cares for them, and they are directed to seek first God’s reign and purpose and leave to God the kinds of things that they tend to get anxious about. They are set free to focus outward to the needs of others, even unto death.

Pastor Jeffress gives an alternate vision in which Christians, astonishingly, have to count on someone like Donald Trump to give them a respite, while Trump’s actions and that of our government, cause great hurt and death to others. This view eliminates the true mission and witness of Jesus’s followers. And an alternate “gospel of Christ” gets promulgated.

So, what is this alternate gospel? What kind of gospel seeks a “respite” for ourselves while putting up with degrading, demeaning language directed to others, often to the most vulnerable among us? What kind of gospel provides personal respite while allowing children to be separated from their parents at the border? What kind of gospel makes room for the consistent demeaning of people fleeing from great danger to seek asylum? What kind of gospel has nothing to say to the racist actions of a president who sets a tone for the country? What kind of gospel provides respite for white followers of Jesus while making room for demeaning, dangerous language directed to black and brown people? What kind of gospel has us so absorbed with our own condition that we minimize the impact of the rhetoric and actions of this president on others, or simply do not care enough to pay attention to the effects of his actions on others? What kind of gospel does not call us to confront the lies and deceit and injustices?

A “gospel” that puts up with so much pain and hurt at the expense of others while providing “respite” for Christians, has hidden idolatries that “accepting Christ” apparently does little to disclose. This “gospel,” rather than calling for repentance, carves out a place for the idolatry of nation and race, as well as other idols our culture worships such as our comfort, pleasure, possessions, and power. It allows for a form of “Christianity” whose message, in many aspects, is nationalist and often implicitly white nationalist. It is idolatrous. Oblivious to the idols that enslave us, we enjoy our worship and our thoughts about God’s grace toward ourselves while maintaining all manner of self-righteous and destructive attitudes toward others. We may even disregard repentance altogether. This “gospel” may leave us “unaware that the kindness of God would lead [us] to repentance.”(St. Paul) We may go around saying, “I accept Christ. I accept Christ,” as if that were the end of the matter.

The truly good news that Jesus proclaims is that the reign of God is near and is a gift and is available to all. Therefore, Jesus tells us to turn (repent) from our idols (our allegiances that are false to our true selves) and enter into God’s reign. Under God’s reign, we receive the freedom of the children of God—the kind of freedom we see in Jesus, the child of God. In Jesus, we see freedom from being directed by fears, including the fear of others; we see freedom to show mercy, to do justice, to love others. When we begin to experience God’s reign, we discover a very different kind of governing from that of the nations of the world, and we become witnesses in word and action to God’s ways of governing. We are witnesses by our compassion and mercy toward others, our welcome of those different from us, our work for justice, and our being instruments of God’s healing in the world.

Filed under: Grace, Justice, Love, Society, WitnessTagged with: , ,

Witness in a Time of Social Breakdown and Hypocrisy

An article in The Nation, Yes, Donald Trump Is Making White People More Hateful:
A new study finds empirical evidence of the “Trump Effect,” by Joshua Holland, concludes with the following words:

“It appears that both are true: Obama’s election activated white voters’ racial grievances and anxieties about being displaced by other groups. But it was Trump’s nasty rhetoric that gave them permission to say what they might have kept quiet out loud – and in some cases, to act on those feelings.”

I am reminded of St. Paul’s words: “The law was our disciplinarian until Christ came.”[Galatians 3:24]

We must not underestimate the power of a nation’s laws and its social norms. Before a person discovers the power of grace, it is often society’s norms that provide the boundaries for behavior. On the other hand, we must also not overestimate the power of laws and social norms. We have seen how lies and propaganda can undermine norms and move nations to authoritarian rule and even genocide. The genocide in Nazi Germany and the genocide in Rwanda are examples. The rhetoric that dehumanizes and appeals to hate paves the way.

Furthermore, laws and norms, in relation to human behavior, always have the weakness of being too general to help us in our everyday situations, in our relationships with partners, coworkers, friends, and enemies. They also prove weak when there is a daily onslaught of lies coming against them. And, of course, there have always been unjust laws.

And yet the law, as weak as it is, does have a disciplinarian effect and, therefore, provides some degree of social order. But that is until grace (the experience of God’s liberating presence) comes into our lives and we experience the Spirit. Paul is quite radical here: “But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law.”[Galatians 5:18] This is because the Spirit produces what the law cannot: “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things.”[Galatians 5:22-23]

If we have come to experience grace and to live in some measure from the Source of all life, then we are called to be witnesses to that reality and to speak and act beyond what the law provides. At this time, in these United States of America, when the law is being undermined and social norms are further weakened, we must declare the larger reality: what is on the heart of God as we are coming to know it. We must embody and give witness to the matters Jesus says get neglected: Doing justice, loving mercy and living faithfully. We have to call for justice in specific ways to correspond to specific injustices. We must demonstrate mercy in specific situations where people are being demeaned and judged. And we must do this faithfully, trusting in God, walking humbly with our God.

We must do this in an age of hypocrisy when it is easy to be a Christian without Christ, to name the name, but not live in the reality. Jesus says, “You will know them by their fruits.” I have often read comments by those who identify themselves as “unbelievers” and yet who call “Christians” to account on the basis of what Jesus has said. Many who do not name the name of Christ can see the falsehood of those who name the name but do not live the life.

In a time of breakdown in the so-called “rule of law” and in social norms, our nation is in need of witnesses to that which comes from grace: the call to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with God.

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