Participation in the Life of God

This week, in his daily e-mails from the Center for Action and Contemplation, Fr. Richard Rohr is writing about hope. And on Wednesday, these words jumped out at me: "Hope is a participation in the very life of God. It has nothing to do with circumstances or events going well. It can even thrive in the midst of adversity and trial. True faith, which always includes hope and love, is a predisposition to "yes". I would go so far as to say that a foundational "yes" is the most distinguishing element between an ego- and fear-based agenda, and a Spirit-guided one."

It is commonly during the second half of life that we begin to yearn for something other than earthly goals – a sense of longing can possess our souls, turning us towards the spiritual, towards the divine. This second half of life pilgrimage does not have an end point – we travel on, deeper into the heart of God, letting go of the things which seemed so important in our earlier years – status, belongings, and so on.

I have learned that this second half of life journey towards authenticity and wholeness is about the attempt to become whole, about being the same "me" wherever I am, and whoever I am with, rather than cutting my cloth according to the circumstances. It is also about doing a lot of shadow work, about digging deep to discover the real me, the open and vulnerable person behind the façade I had spent so many years carefully cultivating. Then working out how to integrate that authentic self into the real world out there. It is a tough call, not for the faint-hearted. But so worthwhile.

Part of the journey has been about reclaiming a childlike trust in life. For me, being childlike means being open and vulnerable, trusting and curious, rather than closed down, armoured up, mistrustful and cynical. It is a courageous way to live because it means that we are more vulnerable to being hurt by others. And when we have been hurt in the past, it may be difficult for us to trust others again, to trust that the universe is not (all appearances to the contrary, sometimes) “out to get us.” I found that I wanted to trust that the universe is (on the whole) a benevolent place in which to live. Believing this may be naïve, but it has made me much happier.

I have come to understand that faith and trust are facets of our deepest nature. But as life goes on, and we encounter betrayal in our lives – as we surely will – that faith and trust can be eroded. It can take a lifetime to choose to be sufficiently vulnerable to dare to trust again. These betrayals, which sadly seem to be an inevitable part of life, need not be great ones which bring our whole world crashing down around us.  Any time someone lies to us, even a white lie, or doesn't turn up when they said they would, or is unkind to us, we can feel betrayed. Once we feel that way, it can take a lot of time to build up sufficient faith to make the world seem trustable again. It can even shake our faith in the essential goodness of humankind.

Yet I now realise that if I am to live authentically, with faith, I need to take the bold step of trusting. Otherwise, my soul will shrivel in my body and I will turn into a suspicious, armoured-up person who trusts no-one. I would not be “me” any more.

Part of learning to trust has been often choosing to leap before I look, rather than being sensible and sober and looking before I leap. I have always tended to be impulsive about seizing new opportunities to grow as a person. I’ll see an advert for a new online course (for example) and sign up for it just because it looks interesting. I have always tried to jump in the direction of new opportunities, choosing to say “Yes” to life, rather than “No, I can’t, I’m scared, what if I fail?” (Hence the bungee jump in New Zealand!) I would far rather try something new, something different and not succeed, than rest on my (very few) laurels and not LIVE.

Nothing is Certain

The early 20th century German author and painter, Ringelnatz, once wrote, "What is certain is that nothing is certain. Not even that."

And he is right. We humans like to pretend that some things in our lives are certain, because it is more comforting to believe so. But actually, the only true certainty in life is that each of us will die, some day. We cannot be absolutely, 100% sure of anything else - not of the existence of God (or whatever we call the Divine presence in our lives), not of the health of our bodies, not even that the person or people we love will still love us tomorrow. Nothing is certain.

Which is why we have faith. I would not trade certainty for questioning and doubt, and have blogged about this here. For me, the beauty of faith is that it is based on trust, rather than certainty. We can trust that God exists, and then act on that trust. We can do our best to increase the probabilities that our bodies will remain healthy (by eating healthy food and regular exercise and taking our medication). 

I believe that having faith is vitally important for human thriving - we have to act 'as if' the things we believe in are certain. In this way, through faithful work and trust, we can make it more likely that the things we have faith in will come to pass. But we can never, never be certain that they will. We can always and only have faith, trust. And that is fine.

A few years ago, I shared a beautiful poem about faith and trust, by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. I make no apology for sharing it again, as for me, it sums up beautifully why we don't need certainty.

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.

We are quite naturally impatient in everything

to reach the end without delay.

We should like to skip the intermediate stages.

We are impatient of being on the way to something

unknown, something new.

And yet it is the law of all progress

that it is made by passing through

some stages of instability - 

and that it may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you;

your ideas mature gradually - let them grow,

let them shape themselves, without undue haste.

Don't try to force them on,

as though you could be today what time

(that is to say, grace and circumstances

acting on your own good will)

will make of you tomorrow.

Only God could say what this new spirit

gradually forming within you will be.

Give Our Lord the benefit of believing

that his hand is leading you,

and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself

in suspense and incomplete.

I find this incredibly soothing...

God Beyond Proof

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran pastor, theologian and passionate campaigner against the Nazi regime. For this "crime", he was imprisoned by Hitler's regime in April 1943, and executed by them on 9th April 1945.

But his faith in God, in God's grace, was untouched by his sufferings. As the Wikipedia article about him comments, "His writings on Christianity's role in the secular world have become widely influential; his 1937 book, The Cost of Discipleship, is described as a modern classic." 

When his fellow dissident pastor, Martin Niemöller, founded the Pastors' Emergency League in 1933, to protest against Nazi interference in church affairs and theology, Bonhoeffer swiftly came on board. The League eventually evolved into the Confessing Church, which stood for traditional Christian values against the German Christians, who supported Hitler's policies.

He once wrote, "A God who let us prove his existence would be an idol." Which is a neat expression of the central paradox of any deistic faith. Because belief in God is essentially a matter of faith, which the anonymous author of the Epistle to the Hebrews in the New Testament defined as, "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen."

I agree with him, up to a point. Yes, none of us can prove (or disprove!) the existence of God. For people who believe in Him / Her / It, God exists; for people who don't, God doesn't. But I believe that we can know (in a certain sense) that God exists for us, through faith.  And I, along with so many thousand others, have spent considerable time and energy trying to work out what God means to me, as a Unitarian.

Over the past decade or so, I have come to appreciate that for me, God's presence is everywhere, in our ordinary, everyday lives, if we had but eyes to see and ears to hear. And is also eternal, infinite and real; not unknowable. Or at least, not entirely. I believe we can only get glimpses of the Divine, but we can become aware of Her / Him / It in everything around us, in ourselves, and in each other.

This belief makes me a panentheist, which is defined in Cross's The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church as, "the belief that the Being of God includes and penetrates the whole universe, so that every part of it exists in Him [sic.] but that His [sic.] Being is more than, and is not exhausted by, the universe."

So for me, the Divine is not only beyond proof and eternal and infinite, but also immanent, within all things. As the Quakers would say, there is "that of God in everyone". To which I would add, "and in everything."

The presence of the sacred in the natural world was first shown to me by my father, when I was a little girl. He showed me a flower and asked me to really look at it, to become aware of its intricate and complex design, having petals, sepals, stamens, carpels; each element working together to form that flower and enabling it to reproduce. He asked me, "How can we look at the design of that flower, and not believe in a creator God?" And I felt an inner jolt, which has always accompanied my understanding of a revelation of the truth. The beauty and intricate coherence of the natural world still fill me with awe and delight, and I often stop, on my walks in the forest near my home, to give thanks.

The understanding that this Divine indwelling presence also extends to humankind has taken longer to penetrate. But today, I honestly trust that there is that of God in everyone; and that God is Love at the centre of everything. And that the best way of worshipping Him / Her / It is to recognise that, and to try to live in the world in response to this sacred presence. 

Proof and trust are very different ways of approaching difficult ideas, such as the existence of a Divine Being. It is, perhaps, natural to want some proof, and many Christians cite a list of belief statements as proof of God's existence, in the form of various creeds which summarise Christian beliefs.

But I say again, belief is not the same as proof. We cannot prove the existence of God, but I honestly don't think it matters. What matters is that we live our lives in the best way we can, try to make a positive difference in the world, and do as little harm as possible. And I appreciate that belief in a divine being is not necessary to resolve to do this, but I find that it helps me, as it helps countless others.

      

   

TGIF: Trust, Gratitude, Inspiration and Faith

I completely agree with the German humourist, poet, illustrator and painter, Wilhelm Busch, who once wrote, "Happiness often comes from paying attention to small things, unhappiness often from neglecting small things."

Because I believe that being open to, aware of, awake to the "small things" around us, the small experiences which happen to us, can give us a great and very useful sense of perspective. Let me give you a recent example: yesterday, I was driving to Danetre Hospital for my pre-op assessment, and feeling moderately terrified. But the autumn foliage on the trees by the side of the road was absolutely glorious to see - all the shades of yellow, orange, brown, copper, bronze, burgundy and red - and seeing them, appreciating their beauty, soothed my fears immensely.

And during my appointment, the consultant surgeon who is going to do my operation treated me with respect and kindness, explaining clearly what is going to happen, and listening to and answering all my questions. Which helped to pull me out of my fear and to begin to feel a certain quiet confidence that all would be well. 

I'm sure that during the next couple of weeks, I will have regular intervals of fear and trembling, but I also know that my habit of noticing the "small things" will help  to bring me back to myself - the self who has faith that everything will work out okay; that I might be uncomfortable for a few weeks, but in the end, it will have been worth it.

Brené Brown has much to say about the benefits of gratitude. She writes in The Gifts of Imperfection, "We need both happiness and joy.... But in addition to creating happiness in our lives, I've learned that we need to cultivate the spiritual practices that lead to joyfulness, especially gratitude. In my own life, I'd like to experience more happiness, but I want to live from a place of gratitude and joy."

And, "I believe a joyful life is made up of joyful moments gracefully strung together by trust, gratitude, inspiration and faith."

I couldn't agree more. Which is why one of my spiritual practices is an evening gratitude practice - under the heading 'Small Pleasures', I record in my journal at least three things that have made me feel grateful that day. They can be tiny things, such as "Fitbit synced!" or huge things, like the recent birth of my grandson. Or regular quiet pleasures, like "nice, relaxing evening with Maz, Luna, and crochet."

And because I record these small pleasures every day, I have some ammunition to overcome the feelings of dread and fear.... And that conversely, if I did not have a daily gratitude practice, I believe it would be only too easy to get lost in the negativity, thus causing myself unnecessary suffering. So my resolution for the next few weeks is: I will do my best to do all the things the surgeon advises me to do, then trust that everything will work out well.

"Trust, Gratitude, Inspiration, Faith." I commend them to you as a better, more joyful way of living, more sure and reliable than "Thank God It's Friday." 

Our Childlike Hearts

 This week's quotation, by the Chinese philosopher, Mengzi, tells us, "A great man is he who does not lose his childlike heart."

And I agree that "childlike-ness" is an important quality for us to nurture in ourselves. Childlike, not childish. For me, being childlike, means being open and vulnerable and trusting and curious, rather than closed down, armoured up, mistrustful and cynical. 

Of course, it means that we are more vulnerable to being hurt by others. And when we have been hurt in the past, it may be very difficult for us to trust others again, to trust that the universe is not (all appearances to the contrary, sometimes) "out to get us." 

But I do think it is a rewarding, if sometimes challenging, way to live. Jesus has two things to say about little children. The versions I have taken are from the tenth chapter of the Gospel of Mark. He says, "Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs." Then a breath later, he underscores this by saying, "Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it."

It is not an easy message for most of us adults to hear. Jesus seems to be saying that we need to open our hearts, to accept the world as it comes. Which ain't easy.  Yet I have found that when I am closed down, armoured up, mistrustful and cynical, I think the worst of others, I become defensive and bitter. And I don't want to live my life like that. I want to believe the best of others, I want to reach out with love and compassion and curiosity. I want to be as brave as a little child. I want to trust that the universe is (on the whole) a benevolent place in which to live. Is that naive of me? Quite possibly. Does it make me happier? Defnitely.

Trusting in God

 This week's quotation comes from the Book of Psalms in The Hebrew Bible. It reads, "Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him, and he will act." 

I envy the writer of those words his simple trust. (I don't think I'm making an unwarranted assumption that it was a man). Because simple trust in God is not easy, in these complicated days. At a time when our news headlines are full of stories of war, violence, sadness and grief, it is difficult to trust that God knows what He/She/It is doing.

I recently listened to the audio book of The Shack by William P. Young. And its central character, Mack, who is grieving the adbduction and murder of his youngest daughter, brings up this very issue. And Papa (God the Father) tells him, "There are millions of reasons to allow pain and hurt and suffering rather than to eradicate them, but most of those reasons can only be understood within each person's story. I am not evil. You are the ones who embrace fear and pain and power and rights so readily in your relationships. But your choices are also not stronger than my purposes, and I will use every choice you make for the ultimate good and the most loving outcome."

When Mack protests that she shouldn't allow bad things to happen, she replies, "You see pain and death as ultimate evils and God as the ultimate betrayer, or perhaps, at best, as fundamentally untrustworthy. You dictate the terms and judge my actions and find me guilty.... You don't think that I am good. If you knew I was good and that everything - the means, the ends, and all the processes of individual lives - is all covered by my goodness, then while you might not always understand what I am doing, you would trust me. But you don't."

Mack makes one final comment, "I just can't imagine any final outcome that would justify all this." And Papa replied, "We're not justifying it. We are redeeming it." Later on in the book, Sophia (who is the personifcation of Papa's wisdom) tells him, ""Papa has never needed evil to accomplish his good purposes. It is you humans who have embraced evil and Papa has responded with goodness. ... Give up being his judge and know Papa for who he is. Then you will be able to embrace his love in the midst of your pain, instead of pushing him away with your self-centered perception of how you think the universe should be."

Later on, Papa explains, "Just because I work incredible good out of unspeakable tragedies doesn't mean I orchestrate the tragedies." 

Which has given me a whole other understanding of God. I have realised that the only way forward is to let go of judgement and trust. I like how Mack learns to trust but, like him, I find it so very hard. That last quotation really hit home. It helped me to understand that although God, because he has given us freedom, will not intervene in the affairs of this world, he will "work incredible good" out of it. Hard to hold on to, hard to believe, but what if it is true? Can I let go enough of judgement to trust in God's goodness? I'll get back to you on this.

Trust Uplifts the Soul

 The title of this blogpost is a quotation by Jean Jacques Rousseau, the 18th century Genevan philosopher and writer. "Trust uplifts the soul."

And yes, of course it does, but my goodness! It can be hard to trust at times. I have written before about trust and betrayal here. And I wrote, once we feel betrayed, "it can take a lot of time to build up sufficient faith to make the world seem trustable again."

I am naturally a fairly trusting person, but a couple of weeks ago, this trust was betrayed, which resulted in a good friend of mine being defrauded of a lot of money. The banks are now dealing with it and they are going to get their money back, but it has left a nasty taste in my mouth. Was I stupidly naive? Yes, probably. Has my faith in the essential goodness of humankind been shaken? Yes, a little.

But I know that if I am to live in faith, I need to try to trust again. Otherwise, my soul will shrivel in my body and I will turn into a suspicious, armoured-up person who trusts no-one.  I would not be "me" any more. 

And so I am going to take a deep breath and try to put this incident behind me. I have well and truly learned my lesson and will be far more cautious about anything involving money in future. But I will try not to let this unpleasant incident warp my life. 

One Step at a Time

 Martin Luther King Jr once wrote, "Faith is taking the first step, even when you can't see the whole staircase."

Yes. We have to learn to trust in ourselves, in what is important to us, and take that first step anyway. I believe that faith and trust are facets of our nature which we are born with. But as life goes on, and we encounter betrayal in our lives, that faith and trust can be eroded. It can take a lifetime to choose to be sufficiently vulnerable enough to dare to trust again.

And these betrayals, which sadly seem to be an inevitable part of life, need not be great ones which bring our whole world crashing down around us.  Any time someone lies to us, even a white lie, or doesn't turn up when they said they would, or is unkind to us, we can feel betrayed. Once we feel that way, it can take a lot of time to build up sufficient faith to make the world seem trustable again. 

In her book Daring Greatly: How the Courage to be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent and Lead, Brené Brown explains that, "it's a chicken-or-the-egg issue: We need to feel trust to be vulnerable and we need to be vulnerable in order to trust. There is no trust test, no scoring system, no green light that tells us that it's safe to let ourselves be seen. The research participants described trust as a slow-building, layered process that happens over time."

So it is wonderful to see people like Martin Luther King Jr, who have faith in what they believe, have faith in what they are working towards, and take that first step anyway, regardless of the consequences. It takes courage to have faith, courage to trust, courage to be vulnerable. But if we choose to live with faith and trust, the rewards can be wonderful, wonder-ful.

Trust for the Journey

Following our dreams is part of being human. Every one of us aspires to do something, be someone. And yet, the quotation by Günter Kunert, from this week's postcard tells us that the journey is already under way...

"Wohin auch immer wir reisen, wir suchen, wovon wir träumten, und finden doch stets nur uns selbst."

Which being translated, means: "Wherever we travel, we seek what we dreamed of, but always find only ourselves."

Every day we are on this Earth, we are adding new adventures, new experiences to our lives. And we always, always take our past experiences along with us. Every human being is the sum of their experiences. And these past experiences will inevitably have an impact on how we perceive what is in front of us today, now. That is how we learn, how we grow.

I don't think it is possible to "start afresh" to leave our pasts behind us. At least not completely. Because our brains do not get wiped clean of our memories. But it is possible to process our experiences, to discern their meaning, to learn from them, and then to move on, enriched by them.

Both therapy and spiritual direction help with this process. When I started my spiritual direction training, we were given a beautiful poem by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin on the first week of the three year course.

Patient Trust

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something
unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of all progress
that it is made by passing through
some stages of instability—
and that it may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you;
your ideas mature gradually—let them grow,
let them shape themselves, without undue haste.
Don’t try to force them on,
as though you could be today what time
(that is to say, grace and circumstances
acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.

Only God could say what this new spirit
gradually forming within you will be.
Give Our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.

If we can trust, we will find ourselves in the course of our journey through life.

Patience and Trust

As some of you will know, I have recently been called to be quarter-time minister at Northampton Unitarians. This has been a leap of faith on the part of the congregation - we are currently very small in number, but great in heart. We moved to a fine new building at the end of last year, and are hoping that the opportunities for growth from these developments will prove to be a turning point in the life of the congregation.

We have started regular Tuesday Gatherings, a different one for each week of the month - Discussion Group, Happiness Project Group, Meditation Group, Heart and Soul Gathering, and also regular Friday Gatherings to walk our splendid new labyrinth. Some people are coming along, which is super. It is early days yet,

But I am finding that, like Ce'Nedra in David Eddings' splendid books The Belgariad,  I am "not emotionally constructed for waiting." So it was good to be reminded that my focus has to be on my call to provide spiritual ministry in Northampton, and then to let go of expectations and outcomes. It is only three months since we moved in, and there is plenty of time yet for people to discover us, and the wonderful faith that is Unitarianism.

So I was so pleased to come across this quote, by Leon Brown:

"You cannot expect miracles to happen overnight. 

Be patient, be loving, 

and little by little the change you seek will come."

I am going to take this for my mantra in the days and months ahead.

Big Brother Is Alive and Well

The other evening, I was relaxing with my significant other, after a very busy weekend, idly leafing through the paper. When my attention was caught by a headline on the front of the Weekend section (we buy one paper on a Saturday, and it lasts us all week). It read: "Teenwatch: How to spy on your children."

The article, which I read with mounting horror, explained about new technology that parents can use, to "keep kids under surveillance 24/7", including software that can monitor their online lives, including monitoring and reading calls and texts and e-mails, looking at their browsing history online, hidden CCTV cameras around the house (even in the teenagers' bedrooms - ewww!), electronic wristbands that they have to wear when they are out of the house in the evening (like tagging prisoners) and an app called Ignore No More, which "disables their phones remotely if they do not answer me." There is even a device marketed by Teenwatch, which you attach to your teenager's car, and can monitor if he/she brakes sharply or swerves. (I've checked on Google, and these apps are Real!)

Oh. My. God. Even Orwell could not have dreamt this stuff up. What in God's name is going on? I shared some of the article with my husband, and he was as shocked and horrified as I am. I mean, what the blimmin' heck happened to respect for privacy? To trust? Do these parents *really* not realise that all they are doing is making their children hate them, and wish to deceive them? If we had ever tried any of this on our two (not that I would ever have dreamed of it) I am *sure* they would have left home / tried every way possible to get round the devices (for example, by buying a cheap pay-as-you-go mobile for use, and not sharing the number).

Or if the children are accepting this, because they too have bought into the lie that we live in a terrifying world in which nobody can be trusted, then that is even worse. I tremble for the future, if this is what it is going to look like ...

Trusting the System

It has been an eventful week! On Wednesday, my children-no-longer-children and I spent the day at Alton Towers, enjoying a last family day out together before they both go off to university this weekend.

And I was persuaded by my daughter to have a go on the new attraction, a fourteen-loop rollercoaster called The Smiler. From the ground it looked terrifying. But, not wanting to appear a wuss, and not wanting to disappoint her, I joined the queue, which lasted for 50 minutes. During that period, I had plenty of time to regret my decision, as we could watch the ride from below, and people were spending a lot of time upside down, from what I could see. My stomach was full of butterflies, and I really wasn't happy.

image: dailymail.co.uk

Then our turn came. The harness was secured and the ride - which lasted nearly three minutes, which is quite long for a rollercoaster - began.

And yes, I was frightened. As we looped over and under, and round and round I had oodles of time to wonder what would happen if something broke. The only thing that got me through without screaming was the mantra "Trust the system." In other words, I realised that at a place like Alton Towers, safety is paramount, and this was a new ride, which would be maintained to the highest standards. And that therefore I was Quite Safe and in No Danger At All.

And the recognition at the end that the fear is generally worse than the reality, and that I had survived.

This recognition is holding me in good stead now, as I help the children to pack their worldly belongings, in preparation for their departures for university - my daughter on Saturday, my son on Sunday - both freshers. I am, of course, thrilled and delighted that both of them have got into their first choice of uni, and am so happy for them as they start a new phase in their lives.

But my goodness, I'm going to miss them. And of course I'm going to worry about them endlessly in the early days. But I'm hanging on to the knowledge that I can only give them two things - roots to grow and wings to fly (to coin a cliché). And that like when I was on the rollercoaster, I need to trust the system, and have faith that their future reality will be life-enhancing and good, and that I will survive missing them, and look forward to them coming home full of stories about their new lives.

And I know that I am so very lucky - I won't be alone - my beloved husband and cat will still be here. My new reality will be quieter, but not lonely. So I give thanks.