Jan

20

Jesus Freak

Christian mysticism

Jesus Freak: Feeding — Healing — Raising the Dead
By Sara Miles
San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2010
Review by Carl McColman

Sara Miles and I have something really cool in common. We are both excited about the radical social, political and spiritual implications of the gospel, and we are both flat out nuts in love with Jesus. And, if this book is any indication, Miles shares my experience of sometimes finding it tricky to put those two realities together. “You’re such a freakin’ Jesus freak, Sara,” her own priest tells her. And then he adds, “I mean that in the nicest possible way, of course.”

But Sara Miles understands that Christianity isn’t really about “the nicest possible way.” It’s about being odd, being mysterious, being ironic and revolutionary and passionate and always managing to color outside the lines. In many ways, Jesus Freak serves as a sort of sequel to her inspiring conversion story, Take This Bread. In Take This Bread Miles gleefully connects the dots between the Eucharist, the overall thrust of the gospel, the politics of food, and the pleasures of cooking, and the result is a book filled with miracles and a knowing, smart wonder. Her conversion story ends with her holding on tight as the Holy Spirit blows through her ministry of feeding the hungry, multiplying her original food pantry on a level reminiscent of that day Jesus fed a crowd with just a few loaves and fishes. Jesus Freak revisits the author’s haunts: St. Gregory of Nyssa Church and the Food Pantry — where a Friday afternoon giveaway sounds far more mystical than anything the priests do on Sunday morning. But where Take This Bread is more of a travelogue, as we tag along with Miles’ adventures in New York, the Philippines, and Central America before landing in San Francisco, Jesus Freak has more of a sense of Benedictine stability about it, as most of the action takes place right there in the Bay Area. And while her earlier book was very much a confessional work, this new outing, while mostly just a journey through Sara’s world, feels more relevant as an invitation to all of us readers — to go and do likewise.

Do what, exactly? Consider the chapter titles: “Come and See,” “Feeding,” “Healing,” “Forgiving” and “Raising the Dead.” These are, pretty much, the marching orders of Christ’s followers. And while religion “in the nicest possible way” pays plenty of lip service to these kinds of pious exercises, Miles isn’t very interested in being polite for Jesus’ sake: she’s a Jesus Freak, she’s on fire with the Holy Spirit, and she wants to feed everybody, heal those most in need, forgive even her enemies (!) and… as for raising the dead, I don’t want to give too much away, but let’s just say that there’s a five star pun hidden in that particular story.

What I love about Sara Miles is that she somehow manages to combine the savvy of a veteran political activist with the wide-eyed innocence and wonder of someone who has fallen nutty in love with Christ for the very first time. Indeed, she refers to the Jesus as the “Boyfriend” — a delicious twist on bridal mysticism that just might make you squirm a little bit (she admits that even she finds it really edgy). Like a wild and alluring lover who dares you to break through limits you didn’t even know were holding you back, Jesus — as celebrated by Sara Miles — keeps inviting her, and her priest, and the folks who work with her at the Food Pantry, to keep doing wild and outrageous things to celebrate God’s lavish love and the possiblity of a new world and a new economy that is based on grace rather than profit. Maybe it won’t inspire you to start a food bank, but I bet Jesus Freak will call you to live more passionately for the gospel, in whatever envelope-pushing way is right for you. And that, my friends, is a freaky good thing indeed.

N.B. The publishers have put a short little interview of Sara Miles up on Youtube, with a little bit of footage from St. Gregory’s and the Food Pantry. Here it is:

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Jan

19

Philosophy and the Trinity: From Thinking about Oneness to Experiencing God’s Love

Christianity / interfaith dialogue / silence / Spirituality / theology

In her introductory book on Neoplatonism, Pauliina Remes makes the following observation about the Neoplatonic conception of “the One,” the philosophical principle explaining the origin, unity, and ultimate end of all things:

The role of the One in metaphysics becomes threefold. We have seen that the One is an efficient cause of everything there is in the universe. It was also established that it is the ultimate explanation of everything’s unity and existence. Finally, since everything reverts back to its origin, the One is the final cause of everything that exists.

It’s easy to see why the early church thinkers incorporated Neoplatonic ideas into their own emerging story about God. Christianity’s central “metaphysical problem” is how to reconcile its Jewish heritage of the oneness of God with the distinctions between Creator, Christ and Spirit that arose out of Jesus’ life and ministry and the experience of his followers. So is God one? or three? Is God a unity or a plurality? How does it all fit together?

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Jan

18

Quote for the Day

Quotations / Spirituality

You seek for God, beloved soul, and he is everywhere, everything speaks of him, everything offers him to you, he walks beside you, he surrounds you and is within you. He lives with you and yet you try to find him. You seek your own idea of God, although you have him in his reality. You seek perfection and you meet it in all that happens to you. All you suffer, all you do, all your inclinations are mysteries under which God gives himself to you while you are vainly straining after high-flown fancies.

— Jean-Pierre de Caussade, Abandonment to Divine Providence

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Jan

17

Contemplation and the Veteran’s Journey

Announcements / Contemplation / Spirituality

I’ve been a civilian all my life. But my father was a veteran of three wars, and I’ve watched as people just a few years older than me served and died in Viet Nam, and now those not too much younger than me are serving and dying in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Whatever your political — or spiritual — persuasion might be, I hope you’ll agree with me that the physical, mental and emotional trauma suffered by those who serve in harm’s way is not only a significant social and psychological issue, but a crucial spiritual issue as well.

Now, a friend of mine named Andy Farris, who served in Viet Nam and whom I met through a writer’s retreat at the Monastery of the Holy Spirit, is working on creating a healing retreat specifically for veterans. He and I spoke yesterday about ways in which I could be involved in this kind of work.

I’m honored that Andy would even consider me for work this important. As he shared with me stories of his and other veterans’ journeys, including dealing with feelings of guilt over having survived, struggling to find faith that was damaged or lost in combat, and engaging in the long slow process of finding healing after trauma (whether physical or emotional/psychological), I came to realize just how vital it is for veterans to claim (or reclaim) a spiritual dimension to their lives and their healing process.

This isn’t just a Catholic issue or a Christian issue. But I do believe it is very much a contemplative issue. When I consider how much I have to struggle to embrace silence and serenity even in the midst of my rather pampered life, I am humbled when I think of the challenges a veteran must face as he (or she) strives to open their hearts to such an elusive inner peace. It seems to me that those of us who have made contemplation a priority in our lives ought to be available for veterans, who probably in many cases don’t have much in the way of deeply contemplative resources readily available to them.

If you have a moment, visit Andy Farris’ website, HealingVeterans.org. It’s a work in progress, but I think there’s already plenty of good stuff up there. Excerpts from the book Andy is writing can be found there, along with some ideas for Andy’s vision of veteran’s retreats.

I’d like to hear from anyone reading this blog who are themselves veterans, and/or who have loved ones who served, and perhaps died, in military combat. If anyone has any thoughts on contemplation as a healing tool for veterans who are in search of spiritual growth and inner peace, I’d love to see your comments. I’m particularly interested in hearing from veterans who meditate and contemplate or who have struggled to do so. I’ll pass on your ideas and thoughts and reflections to Andy, who is looking for input as he works on his veterans retreats (hopefully we’ll have one at the Monastery as early as 2011).

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Jan

16

The ENDS of Prayer

Contemplation / Meditation / Mysticism / Prayer / silence / Spirituality

Recently a monk shared this with me. His is a markedly apophatic approach to spirituality, so this may not speak to everyone. But for the monk and I suppose anyone else who shares his approach to prayer, this little mnemonic is a tool to assist in remembering the contours of deep contemplation.

It involves remembering the “ENDS” of prayer, in this way:

Emptiness
Nothingness
Darkness
Silence

Of course, entering into the emptiness, nothingness, darkness and silence of contemplation is not to suggest that all we are going to find there is a void. Rather, we are approaching the frontier of Mystery (with a capital “M”). We seek the One who is hidden in the darkness, whose voice rings out in the silence, whose presence becomes known in the emptiness and the nothingness. Or, perhaps a better way to see this, we dispose ourselves to be found by the One who seeks us.

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Jan

15

Radical Forgiveness

How to Become a Mystic / Prayer / Spirituality

There’s a man here in the Atlanta area (I think he’s from Britain originally) named Colin Tipping who has written a book called Radical Forgiveness. I haven’t read it, so I can’t say too much about the book one way or the other. But I love the title, that alone makes the book worth considering. I thought about it the other day when I was flipping through a different book, one which we sell at the Abbey Store (alas, I can’t remember which one, but it was a garden-variety book on Christian prayer) and saw a paragraph about how important forgiveness is to prayer. That book said something to the effect of, “before you get deep into your prayer, take time to consider if there’s anyone you need forgiving — and do it. Forgiveness is essential to prayer.” I like Tipping’s idea of radical forgiveness since it suggests that true forgiveness gets to the root of our spiritual identity. If we forgive all the way down to the root of who we are, then we are cleansed and purified all the way down to the root as well. What a lovely thought.

This, of course, reminds me of one of Jesus’ teachings:

“Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you your transgressions. “But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your transgressions.” (Mark 11:25-26)

It also reminds me a bit of this snippet from the Sermon on the Mount:

“Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering.” (Matthew 5:23-24)

There seems to be, in Jesus’ teaching at least, a link between forgiving others and experiencing forgiveness, just as reconciling with others is a necessary prerequisite for worship. Forgiveness and reconciliation are forms of spiritual super-food. They cleanse us, they fortify in us virtues such as humility and hospitality, and they liberate us from the oppression of our own toxic resentments, bitterness, and unproductive anger.

So why don’t we forgive more? Why aren’t Christians (and other wisdomseekers) pouring more energy into reconciliation?

You know the drill. The ego doesn’t want to let go. Forgiveness feels weak and vulnerable, and we believe deep down inside that if we show our weaknesses and vulnerabilities, then we will get trampled on. We confuse forgiveness with condoning, and assume that if we forgive others, then they are getting away with their misdeeds. Then, perhaps it has to do with glamour: forgiveness is not showy or sexy; it doesn’t sizzle, it’s not going to get it’s own reality show anytime soon. Its rewards are so firmly lodged in the spirit that the ego is left thinking “what’s in it for me?” — and, concluding that all forgiveness does is starve the ego, it therefore will do all in its power to hold on to its righteous anger, its sense of victimization, and its bitter insistence that it holds the moral high ground.

So the ego wants to keep us separate from those whom we would forgive, but the terrible price to be paid for this is that it also keeps us separate from those who would forgive us — including God. Until we step out from under the self-defining construct/structure of the great “I” we will cheat ourselves of the possibility of experiencing the love and joy and peace of true forgiveness, true reconciliation, true re-union: with each other and with God.

I’ve written a fair amount in this blog over the last few days on such erudite concepts as theosis, kenosis, and gnosis. While those “osis” categories might make for interesting spiritual reflection and conversation, perhaps we need to bring the conversation back down to earth for a bit. Do you want real “jet fuel” for your spiritual life? Then take inventory of everyone in your life (including yourself) with whom you are not fully reconciled, and where there is need for forgiveness (to be given or received). And then get busy with the messy, get-your-hands-dirty work of making it happen. With God’s grace, of course.

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Jan

14

iMonk

monasticism

Michael Casey, a wonderful Trappist author from Australia, has begun a podcast on the Prologue of the Rule of St. Benedict. If you’re interested in checking out what contemporary monastics have to say about this ancient document, visit this page:

iMonk: Reflections on the Prologue of Saint Benedict’s Rule for Monasteries

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Jan

13

Concerning Gnosis and Gnosticism

Mysticism

Yesterday I made the following off-the-cuff remark in a comment to my post Theosis and Kenosis:

It’s less about knowing who we are (that’s the error of gnosticism) and more about simply a way of being, a way of doing life.

And in reply, a reader named Tomasis left a simple frowning (sad) emoticon:  :-(   To this, I replied,

I don’t know if it’s ever possible to affirm what one believes without sooner or later saying something that will elicit a “frowning face” from those who walk a different path… I struggle with the limitations of human language, and am continually challenged by the problem of how to express the teaching I’ve received from my own tradition in a way that refrains from attacking or dismissing other traditions. Clearly, my own lack of charity and wisdom works against me here.

And now, his lengthier (somewhat edited here) response, with further thoughts from me interspersed.

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Jan

12

Theosis and Kenosis

Christianity / Spirituality

What is the relationship between “participation in the Divine Nature” (II Peter 1:4) and the self-humbling of Christ (Philippians 2:7)? Part of the splendor of Christ, as described by Paul in his letter to the Philippians, is that Christ, “being found in appearance as a man, humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death.” Humility and obedience: self-emptying. Christ divested himself of the privilege of his Divinity, taking human form, entering so fully into the human experience to the point of becoming “obedient” to death.

Theosis, or deification, or divinization are all concepts that crop up again and again in the Christian mystery. We are not just called to be God’s servant or slave, but indeed to become “partakers” in God’s very nature. We abide in Christ as Christ abides in us. It is very tempting to see this “theosis” as getting in on how cool it must be to be Christ. To experience love like Christ loves; to be immersed in the wisdom of Christ; to know the joy that only Christ knows. It all sounds sweet and good.

But I think, perhaps, the real, ultimate, most important key to this mystical notion of theosis likes in this scriptural concept of  kenosis. We are invited to participate in Christ’s self-emptying. We know Christ through adopting his freely chosen humility (down-to-earthiness).

What does this mean? We become partakers of the Divine Nature by surrendering all claim to our own “divinity.” The wisdom of Christ comes to us through the humility of our own unknowing. The joy of Christ is ours when we surrender our own claim to joy (which means — eek — being available to suffering). To experience the love of God, we must simply, lavishly, prodigally give it away.

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Jan

11

The Two Faces of Restlessness

Art / monasticism / Spirituality

Yesterday at the Lay Cistercian Gathering Day we had a class on the monastic vow of stability (Cistercian monks have three vows: Stability, Obedience, and Conversion of Life). The brother who taught the class spoke at one point about restlessness as a tendency within us to undermine stability. I shared with him and the class that I wasn’t entirely comfortable with this idea, because, it seemed to me, that restlessness comes in more than one flavor. Certainly, there is the kind of restlessness that does not help us. It’s born out of low self-esteem or un-faced anger or grief, and it does seem to impel us to make choices that we often later regret. This is the restlessness that causes the practicing addict to reach for his or her fix, or that can drive a married couple apart after only a mild season of conflict or challenge. I agree with the monk that this kind of restlessness is the enemy of stability, which is the vow designed to help the monks to face (and hopefully heal) their own inner resistance to love.

But I believe there is another kind of restlessness, that does not necessarily lead to challenges to our commitments or our own highest good. This is the restlessness of an artist or other creative person. I read somewhere once where somebody (can’t remember who) said, “An artist creates a new work because he was dissatisfied with his last work.” True words indeed. Art is all about facing our imperfections, and then struggling against them, by creating again. In this sense it is like religion with the ongoing struggle against sin. Nobody beats sin, at least not on this side of eternity. Nobody once and for all defeats the capacity to choose selfishly even when it hurts others or violates the integrity of love. We fall down, and we get back up again. Likewise, an artist creates, and discerns all that is wrong with the creation. I can’t hear it, but I know that guitarists of a certain caliber can point out the mistakes in a recording by someone like Jimmy Page. Man, if Jimmy Page makes mistakes, doesn’t that mean everyone else playing the guitar is doomed? Of course. We all make mistakes, whether in a religious sense (the word sin basically means “mistake”) or in a creative sense. It is out of that mistake-making that our restlessness happens. Toxic restlessness then wants to destroy all that is good and true and beautiful in our life: it wants to enlarge the beachhold of sin. But creative restlessness pulls in the opposite direction. It impels us to get up and try again. If the opposite of toxic restlessness is stability, the opposite of creative restlessness is complacency. It’s a good thing to pray for more stability in our lives, but I think we also need to pray for less complacency. So we might be asking God to take away one type of restlessness. But the other type will always be with us, and will always impel us to create and create again.

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