Prays Well With Others

I post this on Facebook a few days ago. When I encountered a friend I rarely see, the father of one of my oldest child's friends, he called me a "heretic" for posting this. He walked away when another friend I said God is bigger than the names we give Him.

Say not, "I have found the one true path of the Spirit!"

Say rather, "I have wonderfully met the Spirit walking on my path."

For the spirit walks upon all paths.

~Kahlil Gibran

(Richard Rohr adapted this from Kahil Gibran, The Prophet (New York: Alfred a Knopf, 1923), p. 55 in Rohr's book Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi.)

Feast Day of Julian of Norwich

"The place which God takes in our soul he will never vacate, for in us is his home of homes, and it is the greatest delight for him to dwell there. . . . The soul who contemplates this is made like the one who is contemplated."

~Julian of Norwich

(Quote found in Immortal Diamond by Richard Rohr on page 95)

Blogging Books!

My friend Linda sent this picture to me on Facebook. I liked it so much that I made it "my" icon for both FB and my blog. Sadly, it isn't seen too well in such a small square.

I have been reading a lot of books in the last month, although I must admit that I almost always read a lot. Going to Bellingham and Seattle, WA and to Salt Lake City, UT, I visited independent books stores and found new books and new authors at each one.

Plus, a FB friend has asked me twice to write about Richard Rohr's newest book, Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self. As you may have guessed from Rohr's quotes from that book in the post below, I really, really like this book!

So I am committing to write about books for the next few weeks, especially since I will write about each chapter in Immortal Diamond and there are nine chapters. I have read some new mysteries with new authors (to me), some fiction and some philosophy/religion books.

In the last year or so, my inspiration for writing to my blog has diminished, but writing about books will help me have a my jumping-off point.

Please check each day about books I recommend!

(I will start tonight.)

God, The Great Allower

After reading my cousin's questions for God on his blog, Me and Leuk, I had to look up the pages in Richard Rohr's newest book Immortal Diamond about "The Great Allower." These words make a lot of sense to me.

"In this regard, God is the Great Allower, despite all the attempts of ego, culture, and even religion to prevent God from allowing. Show me where God does not allow. God lets women be raped and raped women to conceive, God lets tyrants succeed, and God let me make my own mistakes again and again. He does not enforce his own commandments. God's total allowing of everything has in fact become humanity's major complaint. Conservatives so want God to smite sinners that they find every natural disaster to be a proof of just that, and then they invent some of their own smiting besides. Liberals reject God because God allows holocausts and torture and does not fit inside their seeming logic. If we were truly being honest, God is both a scandal and a supreme disappointment to most of us. We would prefer a God of domination and control to a God of allowing, as most official prayers make clear.

"Both God and the True Self need only to fully be themselves and generously show themselves. Then the major work is done. I would go so far as to define God as a 'deep allowing' to the point of scandalous 'cooperation with evil' both natural disasters and human evils. To allow yourself to be grabbed and held by such a divine wholeness is a dark and dangerous risk, and yet this is exactly what we mean by 'salvation.' We are allowing the Great Allower to allow us, even at our worst. We gradually learn to share in the divine freedom and must forgive God for being far too generous. This is not my 'liberal' idea; Jesus says the same thing (see Matthew 20:15), but we cannot hear it for some reason." (18-20)

Perhaps it is easier for me to say God is not "all powerful", though I believe Richard Rohr is saying here that God is so powerful that he gives it up to let us live however we choose. We may decide to believe God does not care or has no power or . . . . .any numbers of questions, as my cousin asked.

My simplistic faith is to try to remember to ask "WHO is with me? instead of "WHY?" The first is the only question that can be answered. God is with me. Even (and most especially) when I do not feel that God is here, GOD IS.

Your True Self is WHO YOU ARE

"Your True Self is who you are in God and who God is in you. You can never really lose your soul; you can only fail to realize it, which is indeed the greatest of losses: to have it but not have it (Matthew 16.26). Your essence, your exact “thisness,” will never appear again in another incarnation. . . .

"You (and every other created thing) begin with a divine DNA, an inner destiny as it were, an absolute core that knows the truth about you, a blueprint tucked away in the cellar of your being, an imago Dei that begs to be allowed, to be fulfilled, and to show itself. As it says in Romans (5.5), “It is the Holy Spirit poured into your heart, and it has been given to you.” . . .

"John Duns Scotus (1265-1308), the Franciscan philosopher . . .called each soul a unique “thisness” (haecceity), and he said it was to be found in every act of creation in its singularity. For him, God did not create universals, genus, and species, or anything that needed to come back again and again to get it right (reincarnation), but only specific and unique incarnations of the Eternal Mystery—each one chosen, loved, and preserved in existence as itself—by being itself. And this is the glory of God"

Richard Rohr, excerpted from Immortal Diamond: the Search for Our True Self (due for publication February 2013)

Tuesday Trivia

For the first time in four years, I do not have two classes on Tuesdays. EFM is over, so there is only the Wisdom Class (book study) on Tuesday mornings. I thought I'd have a lot of extra time without EFM, but I am filling up mornings and some afternoons with water aerobics classes at the YWCA.

Today I went to two water exercise classes; tonight I am tired. It is good that it is almost time to go to bed. The annoying thing is that I still have one ear plugged with water from this morning's time in the deep end.

For whatever reason, I have had several days without my hands hurting. On Sunday I was finally able to write some notes to friends. (I never seem to write letters anymore.) Some of the positive steps I have taken in the past month or two:

1. reducing intake of artificial sweeteners
2. taking salmon oil capsules
3. started methotextrate last Wednesday (1 X a week)
   
4. getting more exercise regularly
5. eating cherries, an anti-inflammatory food
6. meditating 2 or more times a day

Husband CB has been taking salmon oil capsules daily for several years. In this time, his blood pressure and cholesterol readings have gone down significantly. Supposedly, salmon oil benefits one's joints, too.

And here is the Wisdom Class meditation today from Richard Rohr's newest book, Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life:

“True religion is always a deep intuition that we are already participating in something very good, in spite of our best efforts to deny it or avoid it. In fact, the best of modern theology is revealing a strong ‘turn toward participation,’ as opposed to religion as mere observation, affirmation, moralism, or group belonging. There is nothing to join, only something to recognize, suffer, and enjoy as a participant. You are already in the eternal flow that Christians would call the divine life of the Trinity.”

Richard Rohr

Falling Upward, pp. x-xi

Have a good Tuesday!

Let prayer happen!

"Mary’s understanding of her nothingness is also saying something about you. Your worthiness is given. It is not attained. It is God in you searching for God. It is God in you that believes and hopes and cares and loves. There is nothing that you can take credit for. It is something you just thank God for! "Eventually you will not be inclined to say, “I prayed today.” Rather, you will want to say, “Prayer happened today—and I was there!” Whatever you do in communion is prayer. When your mind, your heart and your body are all present; that kind of full presence is automatically prayer. At that moment God is able to use you and speak to you. "I believe Mary is the model for being used by God. And we, like her, are just standing here saying, “Let it be done unto me” (Luke 1:38). All we can do is let it happen." ~~Richard Rohr Adapted from an unpublished talk given in Tucson, Arizona

Monday Minutia

Sometimes the minutia/details of life overwhelm us and so we do not pay attention to other more pertinent factors! So here goes with my Monday minutia that may then be relegated to lesser positions of priority:

• A dead possum lay in the middle of the street in front of our house when we awoke on Saturday morning. It lay there all day until that night my practical husband put it in three plastic sacks and deposited it in our trash can. Unfortunately, now that same trash can reeks with odor, which is why it is sitting on the street. Garbage pickup is on Wednesday, and so the "summer" temperatures (in the spring) in south TX will ripen the contents even more.

• Our interim priest started on Palm Sunday and is a welcome addition to All Saints Episcopal Church. He is a retired priest who is also my age (60!), and is humble and authentic. I really like the way he expresses his own wonderings. When I told him that yesterday, he said he was wary of people with certainties. I like that!

• I have been chosen to be a member of our parish's search committe for our new priest. I am honored.
  

• I am boggled by the downloaded file of 641 pictures taken in Spain! I really want to post about my trip, but need to label all those images. . . .before I forget, which is already occurring.
  

• Since returning from Spain three weeks ago, I suffered through a week of jet lag, followed by gradually decreasing the dosage of prednisone that had been upped in Spain for joint pain. I felt really good until I stopped the prednisone completely--then joint pain started to slowly return and seems to be increasing each day, even though I went back to taking the small dose of 5 mg. daily. Here I go again. . . .

• I am really pleased that my daughter-in-law and son asked us to spend Mother's Day with them in Austin--with their 5 month old daughter, Avery. This will be AA's first Mother's Day, and I am so happy that she will share it with me.

• Despite the terrorist bombing in Marakesh last Thursday, MJ's IES group went on to Morocco on Saturday. I am impressed with IES' prudent organization for all their trips. This has been an excellent semester for MJ abroad. She will return home on May 31.

• Thanks to going to Spain, I read various good books. (The first two are fiction.) I've meant to post about them, but for right now will just list them below as highly recommended:

1. A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness (I am suspecting that this will be the first in a series.
2. Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese (I was told that the first 200 pages were rather boring and to forge ahead as it kept getting better. I agree that it kept getting better, but I enjoyed the entire book.)
3. Grace and Grit: Spirituality and Healing in the LIfe and Death of Treya Killam Wilber by Ken Wilber (This is Ken Wilber's most accessible book and it is profound and personal.)
4. Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life by Richard Rohr (Richard Rohr's typically simple writing brings forth validation and new knowledge.)
5. The Hope: A Guide to Sacred Activism by Andrew Harvey (This is such a good book that I have considered giving a copy to each of my children, as it is not strictly a Christian book.)

• I got an Ipod touch for my trip to Spain. I really like it, especially playing a game called Words with Friends, which oldest son DC told me about. He is faithful about playing with me, but always wins! I used to think I was good at Scrabble, but not so much with Words with Friends. It is fun, and if you ever want to play with me, my name is "janintx."
  

Ash Wednesday: Richard Rohr

"It seems that we need new beginnings, or everything eventually devolves and declines into unnecessary and sad endings. You were made for so much more! So today you must pray for the desire to desire! Even if you do not feel it yet, ask for new and even unknown desires. For you will eventually get what you really desire. I promise you. It is the Holy Spirit doing the desiring at your deepest level. Therefore you will get nothing less than what you really desire, and almost surely much more. "You are the desiring of God. God desires through you and longs for Life and Love through you and in you. Allow it, speak it, and you will find your place in the universe of things. Now let me tell you something: You cannot begin to desire something if you have not already slightly tasted it. Now make that deep and hidden desire conscious, deliberate, and wholehearted. Make your desires good and far-reaching on this Ash Wednesday of new beginnings. You could not have such desires if God had not already desired them first—in you and for you and as you! Remember finally, that the ashes on your forehead are created from the burnt palms of last Palm Sunday. New beginnings invariably come from old false things that are allowed to die." Richard Rohr: From Wondrous Encounters: Scripture for Lent, p. 13

Christ, Cosmology and Consciousness

Today I received this two-cd set in the mail from the Center for Action and Contemplation. I urge you to listen to it somehow. Go here to read more about it.

I am still pondering Richard Rohr's introduction where he replaces "word" and/or "logos" in the beginning of the gospel of John with "blueprint." Listening to this section merits buying the cd set (for $15).

My New Mexico Trip

Jan and Nancy by the chapel behind the Old Town Albuquerque Hotel
at the Richard Rohr conference on "Emergent Christianity"

I downloaded 336 pictures from my digital camera today, all taken in New Mexico. I have not labeled any yet. There is so much organization to do! And Nancy downloaded 550!

60th Birthday Trip!

Since I was born in 1950, it is always easy to figure out how old I am. 2010 is the year in which I will turn 60. My friend NKE was also born in 1950; we met as seventh graders while living on the Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan in 1962 and have been friends ever since, mainly because we both were good letter-writers. (Not so much now, but we talk once a week when cell phone minutes are free on Sundays.)

NKE and I are celebrating our 60th birthday year by going on a trip to New Mexico! We'll only be gone for eight days, beginning this Thursday. We are traveling while NKE is on her spring break from school. AND we're participating in TWO programs, including our first Exploritas (formerly Edlerhostel) trip.

On Thursday afternoon we will meet each other in the Alburquerque Airport. We will stay in Alburquerque for three nights and attend Richard Rohr's conference on "Emerging Christianity." The speakers for this conference are: Diana Butler Bass, Brian McLaren, Cynthia Bourgeault, and Richard Rohr.

When that conference concludes, we will drive to Gallup for the Exploritas trip, which is entitled "From Chaco Canyon Past to Zuni Present." We'll visit a Zuni village, cliff dwellings, and see petroglyphs.

In a little over six months, I'll be 60. NKE already is. We both have white hair, so we should fit into the Exploritas crowd!

Broken not Perfect

During Ash Wednesday's Lectio Divina, we meditated upon Psalm 1:15-17. I was struck by the need for a "broken heart." During the contemplation, I remembered how many pieces of my Ken Edwards Mexican pottery were broken early in December.

Soon after that, CB ordered me some pieces from E-Bay, but when they arrived, two bowls were broken. Here is one the photos I took as proof to send the seller:

You can see that one was broken into three pieces. After a few days, I glued it back together. This bowl sits on the kitchen counter; I put my used tea bags in it. I always re-use each bag, because I do not like strong tea. I feel a lot of pleasure when I look at that bowl, seeing the butterfly and bird.In contrast, the unbroken or perfect pieces of pottery are put away, out of sight, behind cupboard doors. Perfect pieces are put away and not seen or used often. Out of sight, out of mind.

How many things I do not do because I/they will not be perfect. Over the years, I seldom invited people over to my house, because it was not perfect. How perfection closes us off from use--and from others.

This reminds me of the story of the shattered vase that God reassembles using gold as the mortar between the fragments. The vase is more beautiful with all its cracks than when it was unbroken or "perfect".

God desires me to be used in relation to others, not closed off, isolated. The invitation is go out NOW, mindless of mistakes, just keep going--Not to be afraid to show my lack of perfection, but remembering always that God loves me in my brokenness, right now. (This is something I must live in to with my paper for my degree.)

Further emphasis comes from Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation from February 12:

"In the process of transformation ('conversion' if you prefer), as we learn to face the contradictions that we ourselves are, we become living icons of both/and. We find the hidden wholeness of God underlying our weaknesses. Once we can accept mercy, it is almost natural to hand it on to others. (See the story of the unforgiving debtor in Matthew 18:23-35.) We always become conduits of what we ourselves have received."

Falling In Love With Creation

Hieroglyphic Stairway

it’s 3:23 in the morning
and I’m awake
because my great great grandchildren
won’t let me sleep
my great great grandchildren
ask me in dreams
what did you do while the planet was plundered?

what did you do when the earth was unraveling?

surely you did something
when the seasons started failing?

as the mammals, reptiles, birds were all dying?

did you fill the streets with protest
when democracy was stolen?

what did you do
once
you
knew?...

---by Drew Dellinger

This is from Richard Rohr's Center for Action and Contemplation website

They are sponsoring an online Lenten series:

Falling in Love with Creation/ Creation and Francis: A Love Affair

There are reflections and experiential practices, such as:

1. Watch the film on the life and conversion of St. Francis titled, Brother Sun, Sister Moon with the following in mind:

   Care for Creation, a new book on Franciscan Spirituality and Earth Care by Franciscan Sr. Ilia Delio, Franciscan Friar Keith Douglass Warner and Pamela Wood, tells us that St. Francis recognized the interdependence of human beings with one another and with the rest of creation; he experienced God in creation; and, he encountered the pain of the world, which inspired him to pray, to act with compassion and to proclaim gospel values. There is no doubt that Francis discovered his interrelatedness to the cosmos through compassionate love by which he came to experience a unity of all things in Christ.

   How is God inviting you to experience what Francis experienced: that all of creation is God speaking to us?

2. Take your contemplative practice outdoors for at least one 20 minute period per day during lent. If it isn’t possible to go outdoors, situate yourself near a window or find some other non-human being to join with you in your time of prayer.

Today is Tuesday!

Cisco and Maisie

We think Maisie grew during the four days in NM! She is so busy that it is hard to get a picture, but here she is with Cisco, whom she harangues. I am surprised at how long her ears are becoming.

When I was at the dentist today, he told me how his three granddaughters received a yellow lab puppy on Christmas morning as a surprise from Santa and they named her Maisie, just like our puppy!

(I was pleased with my dental appointment, because I did not have to get a crown. My wonderfully conservative dentist said I could choose between a crown and a filling, which would last for an unknown amount of time. Since we no longer have dental insurance, I chose the latter.)

near Albuquerque

This picture was taken on Sunday when it was only 34 degrees F. with a windchill of 24 degrees F. and we walked a short distance in the Petroglyph National Park.

I'll write about the Richard Rohr/James Finley conference soon. It was especially nice to be there with my husband, plus three other members from our church. James Finley talked about the progressive "narrow gate crossings" on our spiritual journey. The overreaching message was that God loves us overwhelmingly into being and into each moment.

Friday Five: Travel

Songbird at RevGals proposes thoughts about transportation and travel for this Friday Five:

And I am participating in it because our flight to DFW was cancelled this morning. Possibly we will be able to catch a plane in three hours, thus arriving in Albuquerque right when the conference begins, though we'll be far away at the airport. So this is a very opportune FF for me!

1) What was the mode of transit for your last trip?
For Thanksgiving, it was our car--going to Austin to spend the holiday with our married son and his wife, plus DC's two siblings.

2) Have you ever traveled by train?
When I was a child, that was one of the main ways of travel between my dad's base postings when we visited relatives. The last time I was on a train was when I rode it from Seattle to Bellingham decades ago.

3) Do you live in a place with public transit, and if so, do you use it?
There is a limited bus service, but I do not use it.

OOPS--the last time I was on a train was when I went to Minneapolis in 2008 for an ERD conference and rode the train between the airport and downtown, which is where I met Diane and her husband!

4) What's the most unusual vehicle in which you've ever traveled?
Probably a DUCK this past summer in Seattle on the Duck Tour. That's a WWII amphibious vehicle.


5) What's the next trip you're planning to take?
To Albuquerque for the Richard Rohr conference TODAY!! (I hope)

Off to Albuquerque!

Tomorrow CB and I fly to Albuquerque to attend the conference there: "Following the Mystics Through the Narrow Gates." It is exciting to attend that, especially with my husband coming along with me!

• We leave in the morning, when it will probably be foggy. We hope to get to the conference by the time it starts at 2 pm.

• A friend is staying at our house to take care of the dogs, especially puppy Maisie. That is a great relief to have someone here who will nurture them for the four days we are gone.
  

• I am pre-posting some inspirational quotes for the days that I am gone, so I hope friends will stop by to read these short thoughts each day. In that way, I'll still be connected to you all.

• I am looking forward to buying a cd set another friend recommended, which is about the theology of Duns Scotus, who was first recommended by my old spiritual director.

• Even with the Kindle, I am taking a "real" book along--The Eye of Spirit by Ken Wilber. Between the two, I should have enough to read on the plane rides.
  

Be the change!

Our weekly book group at church, The Wisdom Class, is almost finished with our reading and discussion of The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See by Richard Rohr. We've been meeting since September on this book and have had lively sharing each week.

The last chapter of the book is entitled "In the end, it all comes down to this" (159-162). As Rohr writes at the beginning of this section, "Be the change you want to see in the world" by Mohandas Gandhi. So here are some of the changes that Rohr suggests:

• If you want others to be more loving, choose to love first.

• If you want a reconciled outer world, reconcile your own inner world.

• If you are working for peace out there, create it inside as well.

• If you notice other people's irritability, let go of your own.

• If you wish to find some outer stillness, find it within yourself.

• If you are working for justice, treat yourself justly, too.

• If you find yourself resenting the faults of others, stop resenting your own.

• If the world seems desperate, let go of your own despair.

• If you want a just world, start being just in small ways yourself.

• If your situation feels hopeless, honor the one spot of hope inside you.

• If you want to find God, then honor God within you, and you will always see God beyond you. For it is only God in you who knows where and how to look for God.

Rohr, Richard. The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See. NY: Crossroad Publishing, 2009. 161.

Now these points can sound like platitudes. At times, wisdom looks like that. I remember viewing Al-Anon sayings during one period of my life, such as "Live one day at a time" or "Let go and let God," as old sayings that didn't really mean anything nowadays. But they do! Anything looked at superficially or dismissively seems insignificant; looking slowly in concentration reveals much more.

So I challenge you to choose one point of Rohr's and sit with it for a few minutes or hold it in your mind for awhile longer.

January NaBloPoMo postings of BESTs

Well, since I've posted every day in January so far, I thought I might as well commit to posting every day for the rest of the month. That may only be difficult when CB and I go to the January conference in Albuquerque of "Following the Mystics" with Richard Rohr, James Finley, and Cynthia Bourgeault speaking, but I'll try to stay committed.

I still cannot believe that CB agreed to attend the talks with me. The last time he came with me, he would not pay or go to any of the lectures on the enneagram. So that is one of the BEST things that is happening: the Richard Rohr conference with CB!

Of course, one of the other BEST things is Maisie, the new (lost and found) puppy!

Resting in God

"Only when we rest in God
can we find the safety,
the spaciousness,
and the scary freedom
to be who we are."

~~Richard Rohr, OFM