Category: Spirit

War and the Limits of Morality

”When the statesmen and lawyers
And preachers of duty disappear
There are no more robberies either
And the world is at peace” – Chuang Tzu (or Zhuangzi, 4th century BC)1

Chuang Tzu, in the above quote, views moral principles as supports for all kinds of wickedness and a barrier to peace.

President Biden is a moral man and speaks the language of morality and principles, a morality that provides lofty rhetoric for the support (in money and weapons) of the genocidal war in Gaza. But, of course, war of all kinds has been given principled and moral support. We do all manner of evil in the name of the good or of God.

President Harry Truman, after the dropping of atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, rationalized the use of nuclear weapons for gaining and maintaining peace: He promised “recommendations to the Congress as to how atomic power can become a powerful and forceful influence towards the maintenance of world peace.” And he gave thanks to God that the Germans failed in their attempt to produce the atom bomb. He said “We may be grateful to Providence that the Germans…did not get the atomic bomb at all.” (There are nine nations today that have nuclear warheads and, of course, we are no closer to peace.)

With our moral justifications, we are able to reason that war makes and maintains peace, blind to the reality we continue to live.

Like Chuang Tzu, St. Paul saw the limits of principles to live by. For him, the most that moral law could do is to be a disciplinarian until we come to be in Christ. It puts some constraints on us but does not keep us from evil.

For Paul, our morals and principles to live by lead to self-righteousness and the judging and condemnation of others. Moral reasoning brought about the death of Jesus. Paul’s morality, before he came to be in Christ, brought about the persecution of the followers of the Way.

As the alternative to moral principles, Chuang Tzu calls us to be open to the Tao (the Way), Paul calls us to be open to the Logos (the Word). Paul writes, ““The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart (Romans 10:8).” As with Jesus’ “reign of God,” the needed word and direction is not far away; it is near. But to receive it, we must become open by the self-emptying of our lives. Jesus tells us we must relinquish ourselves in order to find our true selves and receive true discernment and direction.

Paul tells us that the children of God are led not by a set of principles or laws but by the Spirit. The Spirit opens us to the living and active word and to the way we are to walk in. With the Spirit there is discernment and the next steps that Love gives us to take.

Nations will continue to go to war and support war and justify their actions in moral terms and with principled rationales. In the midst of this, God calls forth witnesses who will live and speak from the word that is near.

In this present evil age, their witness points to a future with hope, a future not of our own making, a future that does not arise from our ideologies, moralities, and principles, but rather comes as a gift of God. This witness springs from those who empty themselves and are open to the Word and Way that is near.

The prophet Isaiah speaks such a word of hope from a place of relinquishment and openness. Placing God’s future before us, he then calls us to walk in the light of that future:

God shall judge between the nations
and shall arbitrate for many peoples;
they shall beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation;
neither shall they learn war any more.
O house of Jacob,
come, let us walk
in the light of the Lord!

Isaiah 2:1-5
  1. Thomas Merton, The Way of Chuang Tzu, p.68 ↩︎
Filed under: Peace, Spirit, War, WitnessTagged with: ,

Politics Won’t Save Us

When traveling recently, I saw a very large sign that read, “Save America. Vote Republican.” I can imagine a similar sign from a Democrat.

I believe that politics matters and therefore who we vote for matters. When I consider who to vote for, I look for those who demonstrate some sense of social justice, mercy, and faithfulness. I have in mind the prophet Micah’s words about what God requires of human beings: “Do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with your God.”

I expect that those who are committed to justice will have some understanding of what is unjust in our society, what government policies and actions are unjust, and what steps a government can take to address injustices. I also want people in government who demonstrate mercy and compassion, who are not entirely self-absorbed and out for personal power. As far as walking humbly with God, I will settle for a demonstration of some humility. I tend to avoid politicians who do a lot of God-talk.

Politics are important and I take voting and participation in the political process seriously. But I expect very little from politics when it comes to salvation. The unethical ways that political campaigns are run and the ways that many voters are manipulated by appeals to the worst in us do not indicate much in the way of a rescue from what is tearing us apart.

We have ways we talk about our torn selves and society. We use psychological terms (repression, suppression, denial, avoidance, wishful thinking, rationalization, anxiety, obsession, addiction, etc.) and sociological terms (systemic racism, ethnocentricity, discrimination, sexism, power structures, class conflict, etc.). But there is another term that, outside religious circles, gets little mention. And that is the word, “sin.” It points to the underlying spiritual condition of our fragmentation.

In the New Testament letters of Paul, “sin” is often used to refer to the underlying power that affects our lives. Indicative of this are various phrases he uses: “power of sin,” “enslaved to sin,” “freed from sin,” “captive to the law of sin,” “sin that dwells within,” living “under sin,” and not letting “sin reign.” With this language, Paul indicates that sin is at the root of all human brokenness. He, therefore, rejects the idea of listing various sins that we must then work on eliminating in order to better ourselves. Our problem goes much deeper than something we can simply work on.

The problem of sin is the problem of our alienation from the source and center of our being and identity. Ultimately, the change that is necessary is spiritual. All other solutions to this fundamental problem are simply ways of managing our emotional, mental, and physical brokenness so that we can, on some level, maintain relationships, employment, daily business, some semblance of “success,” and the ability to “carry on.”

That is why scriptures, in one form or another, call us to the recentering of our lives. Our deepest need is to be reconciled to God. And, given the depth of our problem, only God can do this. So, Paul writes, “In Christ God was reconciling the world to God’s self.” (2 Corinthians 5:19)

The Gospel of John points to an enlightening that must happen for us to begin to acknowledge the depth of our problem. We are told that the Spirit of truth comes to prove us wrong about sin (It is worse than we think). The Spirit brings us to a point where we acknowledge that our problem is something we are unable to manage. It is more than all our psychological and sociological descriptions and solutions.

Furthermore, the Spirit must prove us wrong about sin, “because we do not believe in [Christ].” (John 16:8-11) We do not believe in the need for God as our Rescuer. We think we can solve our problem. We do not need outside help. We do not need the work of reconciliation that God has accomplished for us in Christ Jesus. So, the Spirit comes to enlighten us.

When we find ourselves giving up on ourselves to fix our problem; when we come to recognize our radical need for help and begin to turn to God, our Liberator, it is the Spirit proving us wrong about the nature of our condition and drawing us toward the help we truly need. Spiritual change is on the way.

Filed under: Grace, Humanity, Spirit, TruthTagged with: , ,

Building True Community

Left to ourselves, we are failures at building true community. We prove this over and over again. We divide ourselves off from others in a great multiplicity of ways: by race, ethnicity, nationality, class, gender, sexual orientation, politics, ideology, religion, values, personal morality, self-interest, and so on. We form into groups, camps, and parties that go to war with each other. Both political conservatives and progressives can be quite smug about their own positions and demean each other. They can essentially write each other out of the realm of compassion. Our divisions cut us off from the humanity of others (and from our own humanity).

Eberhard Arnold, founder of a community deeply oriented to social justice in the early part of the last century, a community patterned after the church of Acts which shared all things in common, says this about their community: “What we are seeking together is not any dogma, any stringing together of religious words, but a power. The essence of this elementary power is love and unity, a love and unity that extends into the outermost aspects of life and action and work.” He was very clear about this power: “Only through the Holy Spirit, which comes upon us, are we enabled to achieve a unity of consciousness, which brings about a complete unanimity of thought, willpower, and emotional experience.”

There is no other source of true, abiding unity than the Spirit. Our divisions are the outcome of our alienation from God who is the source of our ability to be and remain in relationship. The unconditional love of God “poured into our hearts by the Spirit” makes true community a reality.

The fact that we see so little unity in the world, including in and among churches and religions, points to the deeply spiritual roots of our problem. In our alienation from God, we try every kind of foundation for our unity other than the foundation of the Spirit. Churches have attempted doctrinal unity and moral unity. They have attempted unity on the basis of a way of thinking, a way of interpreting sacred texts, and a way of acting. And then they have fought over these things and often tried to impose them on others.

Right now the Taliban, with their particular interpretation of the Koran, are prepared to impose their beliefs on an entire nation. There are forms of Christianity that attempt something similar, that promote the idea that Christians are to have dominion and therefore must move into positions of power in order to impose their theological and political constructs on others. Clearly, Jesus’ words about being servants and not lording it over others are ignored.

In our alienation from God, we run from the Spirit. We prefer churches founded on elements of our own making. What if the Spirit were poured out on us like the Spirit was poured out on the disciples on the Day of Pentecost in Acts or on those gathered at the Azusa Street Mission in 1906? Outpourings of the Spirit give us the impression that, by the Spirit, we are taken up and empowered for God’s purposes and, at the same time, released from control over our own self-proposed and constructed purposes. We fear surrendering control, even when it is to God’s purposes of love—especially when it is God’s cross-bearing love. The truth, however, is that, in the Spirit, we receive true control and our true selves. As one theologian has put it, “Our independence is found in direct proportion to our dependence on God.” We receive the “freedom of the children of God,” the freedom of love. Ultimate dependence on anything else is tyranny.

Where there are communities formed in the unity of the Spirit, there is outwardly directed love, compassion for others, mercy, inclusion, liberating action, and works of healing. These communities do not pour condemnation upon others but offer grace and healing. They often operate out of the limelight but are themselves light. When we encounter them, we know them by their fruit: they do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with their God.

Filed under: Spirit, UnityTagged with: , ,

No Substitute For Discernment

Those of us who are citizens of the United States of America are presently involved in making decisions regarding leadership in our nation, decisions about who to vote for. We are having to discern and decide among human beings, like us, who are flawed. People of faith pray for guidance as they listen to candidates and weigh various factors of our present situation. Some, however, may look to religious leaders for direction and may tell themselves that it is enough to get direction from this or that “man of God” or “woman of God,” as if we could simply rely on another person to tell us what to do without exercising discernment. However, Jesus tells us that we each have a responsibility to exercise discernment. He tells us that not everyone who says “Lord, Lord” is connected to God’s reign. Therefore, we are responsible to know them by their fruits; we are to exercise discernment in relation to religious leaders and what they tell us.

Jesus tells us not to be like religious leaders who are hypocrites or play-actors and who do what they do “so that they may be praised by others.” What we see of them, their outward actions and words, is a cover for what is inside. We are to exercise discernment so that we recognize false prophets. Outwardly Jesus tells us they wear sheep’s clothing, but “inwardly they are ravenous wolves.” (Matthew 7:15-16) They may talk religiously, read their Bible, and tell us that they are for a return to morality in America. But Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 7:21)

Jesus tells us that we know false prophets by their fruit, that is, by their actions and by what is important to them. What they treasure tells us where their heart is. “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:21) We cannot see into another person’s heart; we cannot see what motivates them, but we can see their fruit. We see what gets expressed and acted out, and, in this way, we see what they treasure, what they go after, and what is truly important to them.

Do their lives manifest what Jesus calls the weightier matters: doing justice, loving mercy and living faithfully? Do they, like Jesus, actively care for the plight of the poor, the outcast, the refugee? Do they extend God’s mercy and welcome to the broken and the bound. Are they about healing and liberation? Or, instead of God’s welcome, do they lay heavy burdens on others by condemnation and blame, or even by belittling and ridicule?

Whether we are discerning our next steps or discerning whether to listen to a particular teacher, proclaimer, or prophet, it comes down to a matter of discerning God’s will: The one who enters God’s reign is the “one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” We must discern not only our next steps (God’s will for us), but discern false leaders and proclaimers. This is critical for our life together and for the building of true community. We must be careful that we are not led astray or that we lead others astray. If our prejudices, fears, and attitudes toward others govern how we see things, then we will be attracted to religious leaders that cast blame on others and demean those we do not like.

We must do what Paul tells us to do: “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice” and “be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God.” It is only by relinquishing our lives to God that we are able to discern God’s will. It is this discernment that enables us not only to see what is of God and what God calls us to do but to recognize the voices that declare God’s will and those that do not.

Filed under: Faith, Leadership, Prayer, SpiritTagged with: , , ,

Getting Real About Racism

In response to recent racist tweets from President Trump, many of his supporters have reiterated his claim that what he was communicating was not racist. Trump tells us that there is not a “racist bone in his body.” Even though Trump’s racist expressions are blazingly obvious, he and these supporters operate in denial.

Anyone who has become increasingly aware of their own dishonesty, will not find this denial surprising. If we have become mindful of our inner life, our feelings, attitudes and motivations and have been willing to examine and confront fear, envy, jealousy, selfishness, prejudice, lust, greed, and so on, we have recognized also how hidden these things are until we are willing to be self-aware. The more we grow in mindfulness, the more we see that to which we were previously blind. We find ourselves on a journey of coming out of denial.

Racism, like any sin, hides until we are open to the Spirit of truth and willing to confront it. In the same way that no one escapes sin, no one escapes racism. Growing up in a racist society, we are all under the influence of and affected by racism. We may be affected in different ways (dependent on whether we grew up white or as a person of color), but we are all affected. Coming to recognize our own racism, or how racism has hurt and diminished us, happens as we are increasingly aware of our inner selves.

Our inner life, of course, affects our outer actions. If we do not recognize racism in ourselves, or its effects, we will still act out of that inner reality and rationalize our actions. When we do begin to see, and as our insight grows, we gain clarity with what is occurring, not only within us but, around us. We see with increasing clarity and subtlety the racism in our society. We become open to hearing from those who have been affected by racism. We seek those who give voice to their experience. We find that we need the voices of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, and Rashida Tlaib. We need what they see from the vantage point of their experiences in the United States of America.

We need not, however, be surprised at the degree of blindness present in our society. How can we be surprised, when we ourselves have had the experience of going from blindness to sight (a journey on which we must continue). If we do not recognize that gaining insight into ourselves is a gift—a matter of grace, then we become self-righteous and judgmental, unable to reach out to others with our witness. We write them off as if they were incapable of change. (We can be grateful that God does not write us off.) If we have changed we know that change is available to others as well.

To put this in the language of recovery from addiction: If we are recovering racists, we go to other racists with something like a 12 step program which starts with coming out of denial: “We admitted we were powerless over racism—that our lives had become unmanageable” when it came to seeing the needs and hurts of others and having empathy and compassion. And we “turned our will and our lives over to God,” to the Source and Mystery of our lives, to the gracious Presence.

Paul, in Romans 8, reminds us to be mindful of the Spirit. “To set the mind on the flesh (disoriented attitudes, desires, and values) is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.” In the Spirit there is oneness. The dividing walls come down. We cannot simply continue to justify our divisive attitudes and rationalize our motivations of fear, resentment, and prejudice. We can no longer construct a religious facade over these elements of our inner life, nor give support to them in our social life.

The unexamined self is capable of a great deal of ignorance and hurt, and without the Spirit of truth, we operate unaware of what drives our actions. We operate blindly and full of our rationalizations (all of which appear good to us). As we read in the Gospel of John, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth.” (John 16:13) With the Spirit, there is openness and receptivity for what is true and real. We are given eyes to see and ears to hear, which is where all change starts. The Spirit (and this openness) will lead us to be witnesses and agents of change in our society.

Filed under: Healing, Mindfulness, Racism, Spirit, WitnessTagged with: , , , ,

Christmas Reflections on Incarnation

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. (John 1:1-3,14)

Christmas is not the celebration of baby Jesus but of the entirety of Jesus’ life and the whole of humanity. It is the celebration of incarnation, the “Word become flesh.” We are giving thanks that we become truly human by becoming divine. The Word of God, God’s self-expression, participates in our humanity. Or to say it another way, humanity participates in the divine nature through Christ who is the Participant of the divine nature. (2 Peter 1:4)

In the early centuries of the church, especially with eastern Christianity, the word “divinization” was used as a way to express the meaning of incarnation. God, who created all things through the Word or Image of God—stamping all of creation with divine reality, raises up God’s creation into union with God. God “divinizes” God’s creation. We humans are that aspect of an evolving universe that has become self-conscious and that experiences itself as open to God. We are spirit as well as matter.

What this means is that God does not come to us as an afterthought or an add-on to creation and to our humanity, but inseparable from who we are, when we are truly ourselves. We cannot be truly human without, at the same time, being divine—that is, “children of God.” We were created for union with God.

When we are alienated from God (what Christians mean by “sin”), we experience the loss of our humanity. What we have lost is our divine center. We have tried to make ourselves the center of our own universe, no longer at home with God or the universe. We construct a false self and produce broken relationships and broken societies and a broken enviornment.

We have ways of expressing this loss of humanity. We speak of our inhumanity. We speak in negative terms. We are unloving, unwilling, untruthful, ungrateful, unfaithful, impatient, unkind, unspiritual, in a state of disunity, discord, disorientation, etc. What we have lost is the fruit of the Spirit of God, “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” (Galatians 5:22-23) When we are godless, we are inhuman.

When Jesus proclaims God’s reign and calls us to repent, he is telling us to turn back to God as the center and source of our lives. He is expressing the same call as the prophets before him: “Return to your God, hold fast to love and justice, and wait continually for your God.” (Hosea 12:6)

Jesus declares that God’s reign is near. The source and center of our lives, the fountain of life and our true humanity, is not far away. We can turn again to the divine center. “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” (Isaiah 30:15) Therefore James tells us to “draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.” (James 4:8) Right now, in this moment, we can again draw near to God, knowing that God is drawing us near.

Filed under: Faith, Humanity, Spirit, SpiritualityTagged with: , ,

Listen and Testify

“For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” (John 18:37)

Jesus testifies to the truth, and those who are committed to the truth listen to what he says. But before Jesus testifies to the truth, he listens to the truth: “I do nothing on my own, but I speak these things as the Father instructed me.” (John 8:28) So Jesus listens and then speaks.

And Jesus is our example for listening and speaking. He is our model for what it means to be truly human as God created us to be. We, like Jesus, are to listen to “the Father.” We are to live from the source of our being. And then we are to testify to what we receive. In a world of lies and deceit, we are to testify to the truth.

Of course, that means that we have to turn from lies and deceit to the truth. Above all, we have to turn from the fundamental lie of our human condition, the lie that denies our creatureliness, that would have us operate as if we were the source of our existence—as if we could come up with our identity apart from God.

Jesus calls us back to reality, to the source of our true selves that is never far away. God is near and the word of truth is near. It is, as Saint Paul reminds us, on our lips and in our hearts, when lips and hearts are surrendered to God, when we worship in spirit and in truth and are open to the Spirit of truth. And “when the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.” (John 16:13) The Spirit guides us into who we are to be and what we are to do.

In a world that is deceived about our essential selves and callings, we are sent to be witnesses. We are to testify to what we hear, we who are growing into listeners of the truth. In this way, we are light in the darkness. It is a high calling, being listeners and testifiers to the truth. It is a calling we receive in Christ. As we are conformed to the one who is the Listener and Testifier, we become listeners and testifiers.

Our world, our society, needs those who receive and declare truth, the truth of being human and being community—the truth that demands the commitment of our whole selves, the commitment to love and have compassion for one another, to live as one humanity in God, sharing in all of creation’s oneness with God.

Our societies and the world need the witness of those who receive the Spirit’s guidance for the situations of our time and for the unfolding future, people who hear what the Spirit is declaring in the present. The world needs to hear something other than that which comes from the political and moral ideologies of our time or from the entrenched ways of a false humanity that operates as if it were its own source of being.

Gracious God, give us eyes to see and ears to hear. And then give us the courage to speak and to act in this time in which we live.

Filed under: Faith, Prayer, Spirit, Truth, WitnessTagged with: , ,