Tag Archives: New Testament

Imprisoned With Ideas!!!

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Jungian cage cartoon

“Woo-hoo, we’re Jungians!!!”

This cartoon beautifully illustrates the fate of ideologies which captivate lost souls who thus become “ideologues.”  Posted in a Carl Jung facebook discussion group, it demonstrates the necessary role of irony in dealing with ideas and avoiding their imprisonment, including the caption, “Woo-hoo, we’re Jungians.”  This cartoon reflected knowledge of a lesser known but profound quote from Carl Jung himself, “Thank God I’m not a Jungian!”  Jung knew that his teachings were captivating to some who did not exercise what the New Testament calls as, “discerning Spirit” and used his teachings to create a shallow ideological identity in which they could hide and avoid the gut-level wisdom that his teachings offered.

I facetiously toy with writing my copy of the Gospels someday, clearly identified as, “fictional,” and in them I would toss in at some point Jesus saying as he fled the hordes of “mindless” escape-oriented seekers, “Thank God I’m not a Christian.”  For Jesus’ teachings clearly recognized the entrapment of taking spiritual tradition and teachings only on the superficial level and he used the world, “hypocrites” to describe them, people who were simply actors offering to their community merely the “performance art” of spirituality.

This phenomenon which is so egregiously conspicuous now in my country takes the teachings of Jesus only as “ideas” without ever bothering to explore them in depth to the point of discovering that, “the idea is not the thing” and that ideas have value only when they open-up into a region beyond themselves.  The ability to understand this includes getting to the point where one realizes that buried in his heart is a hidden region that can be found only by opening oneself to it, an opening-up which is not a simple rational undertaking resulting from a moment of revivalistic fervor.  This “opening up” is the discovery of the mystery of life, buried far beneath the conscious edifice of one’s persona, related to what T.S. Eliot described as, “a condition of complete simplicity, costing not less than everything.”  Jesus put it this way, “You can find your life only by losing it.”  This is really difficult if you are a “cradle Christian,” one who has been enculturated into the Christian faith as it will often feel as if one is losing his faith.  In a sense, one will be losing his “faith” but possibly only its ideological dimension, allowing the freedom to venture into the, “substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

 

 

An Atheist “Schools” Christians on Faith

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I never thought I’d come across such a mature and honest expression of faith as I found here, coming from the heart of an atheist.  (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/oct/24/atheism-does-not-make-me-superior-to-believers-its-a-leap-of-faith-too) The author has the integrity and honesty to recognize that even her atheism involves premises with which it is very easy to demonstrate great arrogance and rudeness.  She recognizes that accepting these premises involves a faith in some subtle way.  I have spent most of my life as a very arrogant and smug Christian, carrying this “work of the flesh” to extremes of which I’m not humble enough to admit.  And I have no hope of ever “getting it right,” now realizing that is not the point.  And I look around at other religious people, especially Christians, and I see so much incredible smugness, arrogance, and unkindness.  I certainly understand why there are atheists and understand that it might take more courage to be an atheist than to be a rigid, dogmatic Christian who refuses to jettison the doctrinaire dimension of his faith in favor of the “Spirit of the Law.”

Be Here Now!

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This admonishment used to make no sense to me and even used to perturb me for I knew it came from “one of them there damn hippies” though at that point in my life it was probably “dang” rather than “damn.” And, of course it is so meaningful to me now because it is not about “sense” (or reason run amok) but is about “presence” which is a more fundamental dimension of existence than reason. Most of my life has been spent in absence, in not “being here now”, but being immersed in my own little cognitive grasp of the world, a self-imposed prison like the one most people spend their whole lives in.

At present moment I think I “be here now.” I have just awakened and have taken my perch for “bird theater” with my cup of coffee, awaiting my three puppies to join me—two dachshunds and my wife. The darkness will lift shortly and I will again watch the birds engage in their ritual frenzy at the feeders and will be taken with the beauty of the moment. I will “be here now.” I often think of the words of Jesus at this moment, and apply a bit of literary license to his description of “the birds of the air,”  noting that they do not fret and stew but merely go about each day of their life “birding” the world. And I also often recall a beautiful poem by Wendell Berry who described finding “peace in wild things” when beset by despair, wild things who do not “tax their lives with forethought of grief.”

Be here now.

The Power of Gratitude

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I awoke this morning with a powerful sense of gratitude in my heart.  First, I had slept pretty well, my lovely wife was next to me as were my two dachshunds. I When I awoke this morning, I was intensely grateful for some reason for so many things. stirred and felt my hand on one of the lovely puppies. I got out of bed and paid attention this time to the simple pleasure of my mobility, knowing that as I age that will probably be more of an issue. I ambled into the kitchen, took pleasure in the fact that it was clean and organized, and made my coffee. Moments later I was grateful for the aroma and taste of this morning brew. I looked outside and could see the day breaking, noting the bird feeder where “bird theater” would be convening shortly. I turned on the television and found CNN where I could again watch the rest of the world, already spinning and weaving through the course of its day.

This gratitude is a new dimension of my life and has even been a discipline of sorts for the past couple of years. I read a book back then which noted the value of gratitude even for the simple things of life and I started to practice gratitude myself. I feel it has been a powerful influence in the spiritual direction of my life since then. By making this effort, I awakened a “gratitude muscle” in my heart which had long lain dormant and I have cultivated that muscle since then.

The New Testament teaches us to “Give thanks in all things.” Now, I do not think Paul had in mind compulsively “thanking God” each and every minute of our life, trying to earn “suck points” with a God who has nothing better to do that sit “up there” and offer “atta-boys” to those of us who follow His commands. I think he was suggesting that exercise this “gratitude muscle” from time to time in our life and discover that it can help us orient our life to the good that is present in this world, even in the midst of things that are often not so good. This discipline also has value as a cognitive behavioral therapy strategy as a deliberate focus on something positive when things are not going so well can be a powerful antidote to stress or even despair. And, it can be a powerful step in the direction of “getting over ourselves” from time to time, taking the focus away from our tendency to view the world through the narrow prism of our own self-interest and needs. I am currently reading a book by an evangelical Christian, Ann Voskamp, (One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are) in which she describes keeping a “gratitude journal” as a way of coping with difficulties in her day to day life.

Nature in Hopi Prayers & Wendell Berry Poem

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Let me walk in beauty, and make my eyes ever behold the red and purple sunset. Make my hands respect the things you have made and my ears sharp to hear your voice. Make me wise so that I may understand the things you have taught my people. Let me learn the lessons you have hidden in every leaf and rock.
I seek strength, not to be greater than my brother,
but to fight my greatest enemy —Myself—
Make me always ready to come to you with clean hands and straight eyes.

(Asquali, Kawquai)

Someone recently sent me an Hopi prayer and I was taken with its wisdom and posted it yesterday.  That prayer and this one today reflects a sensitivity to nature that I greatly admire.  The Native Americans saw the unity of man and nature, not having been taught the Western subject-object distinction to the same degree that we European “invaders” had been.

And I really appreciated the insight into the “real” enemy—“myself.”  This reflects the “discerning spirit” spoken of in the New Testament.  Emily Dickinson described the absence of this quality as “the mind too near itself to see itself distinctly.”  That “discerning spirit” is often missing in our culture, leaving us without “self” awareness.

These two Native American poems emphasis of nature makes me think of a beautiful poem by Wendell Berry.  A friend of mine last spring, who was dying at the time, asked me to define grace for him.  I paused only briefly before telling him, “Let me quote you a poem by Wendell Berry.”  Here it is:

THE PEACE OF WILD THINGS

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

My friend was greatly comforted by this poem, immediately agreeing, “Yes, this is about grace, the same grace offered by Jesus.”  The beautiful phrase, “I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their thoughts with forethought of grief” often comforts me when I’m stressed, bringing to mind the words of Jesus, “Let not your heart be worried.  Ye believe in God, believe also in me.”

 

Metanoia Strikes Deep

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Repentence became caricatured at some point in my life into the epithet, “Turn or burn.” That phrase had an aire of facetious over-statement to it even then but conveyed the angry, harsh, judgmental intent of many of my fellow believers.

Repent merely means to have a change of mind, a change of heart, a reorientation of one’s outlook on life. It means a turn about in word and deed but also in attitude and orientation. I think one could summarize the teachings of Jesus to say, “Hey, you guys been looking at things this way; take a break and look at things differently.” Just one illustration from the New Testament illustrates this. In the story of the “Woman at the Well”,(John 8) Jesus noted that he knew that she was an adulterous woman and he knew that the law called for her to be stoned to death. But he looked at things differently, did not view the law so rigidly on that occasion, and told her to “to go and sin no more.” He demonstrated a repentant point of view by approaching an individual with a mindset contrary to the conventional wisdom of his day.

In terms of today’s world, I think repentance can be illustrated in many ways. But a fundamental feature is that people who have truly repented…in the depths of their heart…have found the temerity to view the world in a different manner than they were taught, in a different manner than the prevailing culture would have them think. Repentant people, perhaps, will have come to see the glass half full whereas before they always say it half empty. They will see the world as offering hope whereas before they saw it as grim and ugly, bereft of any hope, with only apocalyptic doom in the offing. One who has repented might find the grace to see himself/herself has having intrinsic worth whereas before he/she saw only worthlessness and self-loathing. One who had repented in the depths of his heart may no longer see homosexuals as less-than-human, worthy of scorn and contempt and even violent persecution. One who has repented might see the other political party is more human terms, seeing them no longer as the personification of evil or devoid of any intrinsic value

“Meta-noia” is the word. Check it out. It is a rich concept.  An old rock tune included the lyric, “Metanoia strikes deep.”

Get Over Yourself!

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Jesus spent thirty years roaming around the little corner of the globe he happened upon, noting the complete insanity of its inhabitants, and then spent three years admonishing them…and I summarize (and use my “literary” license)…to “get over yourself!” And then he provided specifics about how to accomplish this self-abnegation, which are eloquently described in the New Testament and then later summarized by W. H. Auden (or was it Leonard Cohen?), “Climb the rugged cross of the moment and let your illusions die.” Yes, dying to self ultimately means being disillusioned and seeing yourself as you really are, just a “poor bare forked creature” (King Lear) “pelted” by the same “pitiless storm” that has pelted us for eons.

In that moment of humility, i.e. humiliation, one can then choose to affirm with belief/action what his/her ultimate value is and then be guided toward that end. But one is then shorn of his/her grandiosity and realizes that he/she is a mere human, a human be-ing, and has that station by virtue of the simple but illimitable and marvelous grace of God. For, “by him all things cohere”; yes, even the simple be-ing of my day to day life exists and “coheres” by the grace of God. Therefore, I don’t have anything to prove, I don’t have to persuade you to subscribe to my creed, I merely have to be. And as I “be”, the Grace of God will flow through me; and the universe…and His will…will unfold. But if I stubbornly adhere to my own agenda, to my own ego-driven demands….”enlightened” and “Christian” as I might assume them to be…then the “flow” cannot take place, at least through me.

Yes, the meaning of the Cross is to “get over yourself.” It is easier to invest in the gore of the Cross and to self-flagellate with an emotional anguish. It is much more difficult to “get over yourself”, to die to the ego and do so daily as Paul admonished, and then engage more fully and maturely in the human enterprise.