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The Test is Rigged.

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The test is rigged.

There is no way you can win with the idea of original sin. If you say that humans are faulty from the very beginning, broken and sinful down to our very core, then there is a problem.

This mindset causes dependency. It creates in people a feeling of never being good enough. That they never will measure up.

Let’s go with the Adam and Eve story. They ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil before they even had the knowledge of good and evil. Thus they had no way of knowing that what they were doing was wrong. So it wasn’t fair to punish them.

Nothing that is from God is bad. So we were made with free will and curiosity. We are finite where God is infinite. We are mortal. We break. Things aren’t effortless for us. We need a little help. We can’t understand and follow all the rules.

So then Jesus comes along and tells us to love. He breaks down all the rules into two – love God, and love your neighbor. Seems simple enough. Then he pays our tab for us – our debt of sin is paid. Some people need to hear that. But perhaps what he really was doing was just saying that we are fine the way we are. We aren’t perfect and we never will be. We can’t ever win, because the game is fixed. He’s letting us know that we are ok. We aren’t to blame for our nature, because it is just the way we are.

Now would be the time that somebody will quote from Paul or point out that “whoever is without sin” gets to cast the first stone. Nobody gets to throw stones. Because throwing stones isn’t showing love. Thinking you are better than somebody else isn’t being loving.

Rather than load people up with guilt about their sin by making them say the confession every week, why not turn it around and teach people different ways they can be more loving and compassionate?

Every week, every day, every minute, we aren’t going to measure up to the idea of being perfect. We never will be perfect. We can’t be. That isn’t human nature. Focusing on our sin keeps us pointed in the wrong direction. We need to learn how to be better at what we can do, rather than on what we can’t do.

We say that Jesus paid for all our sins. So why do we keep pulling them out and focusing on them? This seems pathological.

How to pray – it isn’t the words or the ritual. It is a feeling.

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Prayer is communicating with God. God wants to hear from us, and for us to hear from him. But how do we do this?

Communicating with God is real. Everyone can do it. It isn’t for the chosen few. Not everybody can do it easily, but everybody can learn how. Hearing from God isn’t as easy as picking up the phone. It isn’t the same as turning on the television. But it is a skill that you can learn.

Consider a marathon runner. She doesn’t wake up one day and start running 26 miles. She may not even like to run to start off with. But she hears about a marathon and she thinks about it. She finally decides to start. She trains. She gets better. She may walk more than run at first. First it is a mile run around the block. Then two. Then five. It can take a long time and many setbacks and blisters to get up to 26 miles, but then one day she is there.

This is also true of hearing from God. It requires practice and effort and persistence.

First, it is important for you to know that God loves you. God made you. You are needed and part of God’s plan. This is why you were made. The fact that you are alive is proof that God needs and loves you. Right now. As you are. Warts and all. You may not feel worthy of God, but God thinks otherwise. So God wants to hear from you. God wants to connect with you. This is true communion, or union-with.

The book “The Isaiah Effect” by Gregg Braden says something very interesting about prayer. It says that prayer isn’t something you do, it is something you feel inside your body. This is very important. This totally turns our Western idea of prayer upside down.

It isn’t the vehicle that is the focus. It isn’t the how-to. It is the destination that is important. You have to get to that feeling in your body that indicates you are in the right spot. Prayer is a feeling, not a ritual.

Prayer isn’t the candle or the words or the gestures. It is the connection with God that is produced when you use those things, or anything else that helps you get there. The candle or the words or the gestures are like a car that you get in to go visit a friend. Getting to your friend is the most important part, not how you get there. Perhaps the car breaks down and you have to walk. That is fine. You got there. Don’t focus on the car.

But because we are physical beings, we often need props to help us. Just remember that the prayer isn’t the props.

C.S. Lewis says “You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.” Our bodies need reminders of our souls. I’ve written before about how I use prayer bracelets, tattoos, painted toenails, and going barefoot as reminders. There are many different ways to remind you to pray and nourish your soul with a connection with God.

Prayer does not have to be passive. It doesn’t have to be sitting in a chair with your hands in front of you saying a prayer that somebody else wrote. It can be active. There are probably as many different ways of praying as there are people. Painting, walking, singing, doodling, meditation, yoga practice can all be used as forms of prayer, for instance. Compassion in action is also good. Volunteering is a form of prayer.

How often should you pray? If you are Muslim, you are to pray five times a day. Some people pray before every meal. If you are Jewish, you are to give thanks to God at least 100 times a day. All of these practices are ways to remind you to pray. Constantly praying is constantly being in communion with God. The more you pray, the better the connection gets between you and God.

In order to hear from God, you have to put yourself in a place where you can hear from God. It is kind of like you want to get a phone call from a friend, but you don’t realize that your phone is turned off because you didn’t pay the bill. You’ll never hear from your friend with that kind of connection.

This is attributed to Saint Francis – “Pray constantly, and if you must, use words.” Prayer doesn’t have to be words, but it can. Part of my goal here is to open your mind up about what prayer is. It doesn’t have to be what you think it is. Trying other ways can be helpful.

Do you use a prayer book, or not? Do you find it helpful or stiff and canned? Jesus tells us that we are not to mutter the same words over and over again, but to pray from our hearts. We learn this in Matthew 6:7 “And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words.” (New American Standard Bible) But sometimes that is hard because we don’t know what to say. Then there is this helpful verse from Romans 8:26 “And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words.” (New Living Translation)

So you don’t have to use a prayer book. God knows what you want to say. But if you feel you need a prayer book, be sure to read every word carefully and feel them, so that the prayer becomes your own. It isn’t the words that get you there, but the feeling that happens when you read the words. A friend told me a Jewish story about a little boy who didn’t know what how to pray so he just recited the alphabet and let God pick out all the right letters. That works too – but again, it isn’t the letters. It is the feeling you get when you are there, talking to God.

Many different faiths use prayer beads. You can study how they use them, or you can make up your own ritual. They can be used to center you and focus you. Just handling beads can be very calming and centering.

When you pray, remember the feeling you get if you ask for something. Then see if your prayer is answered. Compare the feeling with the result. Journaling can help you keep track of the results. This is a way to learn how God is talking to you. God always answers prayers, but they aren’t always “yes”. With practice, you can learn to “hear” the “yes” from the “no” from the “not right now”. I often “hear” the reply as a feeling, rather than a word. This is often the first way that we hear from God, as feeling.

When I pray for a specific intention, I get a feeling of ease when the prayer is going to be answered as a “yes”. I get a feeling of resistance when it is a “no”. It took a while to learn the subtle difference of feeling between the two. It isn’t as easy as “this is hot” and “this is cold” – it was far more subtle. But it is there. It just takes practice to sort out where and how the feeling feels to you.

I think it is essential to always be ok with the idea that you aren’t in charge. Sometimes it is best you don’t get what you prayed for. God is not your waiter. You don’t always get to have it your way.

God can use anything as a way to answer. You can “hear” God all around you. Nothing is a coincidence. We are like fish who are unaware of water. We are surrounded by God, as everything is from God.

It is perfectly ok to pray for the ability to pray. It is OK to ask God for help in how to pray. Just like in the story of the prodigal son, when the son started back towards his Dad, his Dad saw him and went running to meet him. God wants us to pray, to connect with him. He’ll make up the difference in distance between us.

You’ll get stronger the more you do it. So pray constantly. Be patient with yourself if you slack off and get out of your routine. That is normal. Just start doing it again. Nobody is consistent at their prayers. But the more you pray, the better you’ll get at it, and the more you will connect with God.

Read the Bible, and pray beforehand for the Holy Spirit to help you understand. The Bible is the Word of God. If you want to hear from God, it is a good idea to start off with a known good. This way when you get to the point that God is talking to you in words, you’ll be able to measure up and know if it is God talking and not just your imagination.

Read the prayers of other faiths. There might be something that helps. Like buying a one-size fits all suit, sometimes prayer life needs to be altered and adjusted. I’ve found a lot of comfort in reading about other faith systems. There is a lot in Buddhism for instance that helps to inform my Christianity. I’m enjoying a podcast that is all Torah study as well.

Remember to make time for prayer. Turn off the television. Turn off the iPod. We fill our heads with a lot of noise. How can God get a word in edgewise if we are so noisy all the time?

Consider getting a spiritual director. A spiritual director can be a priest or minister, but doesn’t necessarily have to be one. She or he is trained to help you achieve intimacy with God. I consider such a person to be like a guru, but for Western faiths. I’ve learned more from my spiritual director than I’ve ever learned from any minister.

I’ll leave you with a little poem.

Make your life into a prayer,
and everything you do will be a love letter to God.
And God will answer back, I love you, I love you, I love you
from every rock and rainbow,
from every smile from every stranger.

Hail, Mary.

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I think Mary is far more approachable than Jesus. Just look at how she is depicted, for starters. She is so calm and nurturing. You can’t help but feel love when you look at pictures or icons of her. The opposite is true when I see a crucifix. I so dislike crucifixes. I hate to see Jesus in agony. I feel guilty and shameful, and I feel that is the intent of them. But Mary is different. She is all about love and humble obedience to God.

Mary is like many other saints who said “Here I am” when God called for help. The difference between a saint and an average person is that a saint lets the light of God shine through them. They choose to let God work through them to bring healing to the world. Saints aren’t just for way back when, saints are here right now.

I reject the Catholic idea of immaculate conception. This doctrine does not refer to Jesus being conceived immaculately. It refers to how Mary herself was conceived. It was a workaround to deal with the paradox of how Jesus could be fully human and fully divine at the same time. It says that because she was conceived immaculately, she is half divine. There is nothing about this in the Bible. It is made up.

To make Mary anything less than fully human takes away from her. I need her to be human. I need her to be human because if she is anything else then she isn’t a role model. Who could possibly emulate someone who is half God? The test is rigged from the very beginning. By her being human, she is more amazing to me.

Mary was a young girl who was engaged when the Angel Gabriel came to her and announced that she was chosen to bring forth the Messiah. She was alone. I can’t even begin to imagine how terrifying this experience was. Alone, young, inexperienced, and an angel talking to you. That alone would be huge. Then for the angel to tell you that the hopes and dreams of your entire community was going to need your help? Huge.

Jonah ran the other way when God called on him. I can identify with this. This seems like a normal thing to do. I feel like the normal reaction to being asked by God to do something really off the charts unusual would be to say “are you kidding, God?” And then maybe followed with a whine about how you are busy right now and that it would be so much better to do this later, and can’t you ask somebody else?

But Mary didn’t do that. She said yes. Right then. No asking her parents or fiance. She trusted God. I love this about her. I want to be that bold and that trusting. I want to be that fast in replying.

We are all called to be like Mary. We are all called to bring forth the light of God in the world. Every time we choose to help someone, to teach, to console, to love, we are letting God enter the world through us.

We are called to materialize the divine, to make it real. “Materialize” at its root is the word “mater”, meaning “mother”. We are to give birth to God every day, by bringing forth kindness and love.

Hail, Mary, full of grace.

It isn’t here.

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It isn’t about the tree that Buddha sat under.
You won’t find enlightenment no matter how long you sit there.
Go find your own tree.
Or a rock.
Or an island
in the middle of a freeway.

The birthplace of Jesus shouldn’t be a pilgrimage site.
It isn’t the place. The place doesn’t matter.
That it happened is what matters.

Don’t charge admission to truth.
Don’t sell tickets to joy.

Where any enlightened person walked or lived or taught should be forgotten.
You can’t learn from ghosts in places.

Follow who they followed, back to the root.
Who is at the beginning?
Who is at the source?

You don’t have to go to the holy land.
Black Elk tells us that
the holy land is everywhere.

Right here, right where you are,
put a plaque. Memorialize it for future generations.

Have it say “I am here”

And then burn it down.

Sanctuary.

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I was in a chapel at a retreat center last November. It was a tiny chapel, very personal sized. It was big enough to hold maybe 20 people comfortably. There was an old carved wood altar with icons of Mary and Jesus on it. There were small votive candles and white linen altar coverings. The chapel had that warm musty smell that I associate with old hardback books and dusty buildings. I was alone, and it was raining and it was so late at night that it was early in the morning. I was likely to remain there, by myself, because of the rain and the time. I was doing something called an altar call, but I didn’t know it at the time.

I thought about how this room, this chapel, was different from the other rooms at the retreat center. There was something special about how this particular room was set aside for worshiping God and for no other purpose. Because I was by myself, I decided that it was OK to talk to God out loud, instead of quietly in my heart as I normally would do in a chapel.

I said, God, how come when we are in a place like this, we know that you are here? We feel different in a chapel. We feel calmer, more at peace. We feel at home in a way that we don’t usually feel at our own homes. How come we can’t have this feeling everywhere? How come we can’t have this feeling in the kitchen, or in the living room, or at work?

And I heard an answer back.

I heard “You are to make within yourself a sanctuary for me.”

And I thought, of course we are. When I heard this, it made perfect sense.

If we make ourselves into a living sanctuary for God, we will carry God with us, everywhere we go. Not only do we have that warm feeling of God’s presence with us, but we are then able to share that sense of calm and love with everyone we meet.

In the church I came from there are home Communion kits. They are small kits that enable Eucharistic Ministers (lay people who are licensed to distribute the Elements during Communion) to take Communion to members of the church who are unable to attend the worship service due to ill health. Such a kit has glass containers for the already-consecrated Bread and Wine, the Body and Blood, as well as linens and a tiny paten and chalice set. These kits are used just for this purpose.

With these kits, we are able to share Jesus with them, in a literal way. In this way, we are able to remind them that they are part of our family even though we are not able to worship together in the usual way.

By making within ourselves a sanctuary for God, we are becoming living home Communion kits. We are able to share the light and love of God with everyone. We are able to let everyone know that we are all part of one family where we are all brothers and sisters.

When I first started the discernment process to see if I was being called to be ordained I was asked to read a book by the Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor. I was asked to point out what parts spoke to me. The part that got my attention the most was when she talked about her desire to take Communion out of the building and take it out to the sidewalk. She didn’t want the joy of Communion to be kept inside a building. She wanted it to be brought out into the middle of the busyness and bustle of everyday life.

Church buildings can feel very private, very members only. The people who need the healing light of God the most are those who don’t feel able to go inside a church. She wanted to take away the barriers between God and people by bringing God to them, rather than making them come to God.

I want this too. I want this more than I can possibly explain.

My priest misunderstood when I told her this was the part I liked the best. She sent me to a church service called “Church in the Yard”. It is an inner-city ministry that celebrates the Eucharist with homeless people, but instead of celebrating in the church building, it is outside, in the churchyard. While this was an enlightening experience, this wasn’t quite what I meant.

I want more.

I think the beauty of God is that He comes right to us. He doesn’t wait for us to be perfect or beautiful or fixed. He comes to us exactly as we are, right now. He doesn’t need us to go to a special place to know that we are special. He comes to us in our brokenness and our pettiness and our hunger. He comes to us in the middle of our day, unannounced, unassuming. He comes to us to let us know that we are loved beyond our understanding.

I don’t know if I’ve done it right, this “making a sanctuary” within myself. But I know that it is the answer. Because by carrying God within me, rather than thinking He’s out there, in a building far away, I have a sense of freedom that no minister ever taught me.

On the Minnesota lawmaker who was “heartbroken” about gay marriage.

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A Minnesota representative is heartbroken over the fact that gay people can now marry in her state.

Heartbroken.

I’m sad that she’s sad that other people in her state are now happy that they can marry the person they love.

Representative Peggy Scott said “It’s a divisive issue that divides our state. It’s not what we needed to be doing at this time. We want to come together for the state of Minnesota, we don’t want to divide it.”

But, we are coming together, as a nation. We are opening up the definition of marriage. We are showing people that love is love, regardless of who is doing the loving.

Love between two consenting adults should not be an issue that has to be decided by the courts. I really can’t get why people are opposed to it. This should be a non-issue. So I’m going to try to work out some of the points that I’ve heard brought up.

Why are people so threatened by the idea of gay people getting married? If you don’t want to be married to a gay person, don’t get married to a gay person. That’s easy.

Then there is the idea of marriage being a Christian institution. There are plenty of people who aren’t members of any religious organization who are just as legally married as those who are members. You don’t have to worship God to get married. It is a legal contract between two adults.

So maybe there is a fear issue. How does allowing someone who is gay get married affect you?

Some people who say they are Christian are saying that God will judge America over the fact that we are allowing gay people to get married. If God hasn’t judged America over how we treated the native people who were living here when the Pilgrims came, over the whole slavery issue, over the fact that we put Japanese people in internment camps during World War 2, over how we treat the poor and immigrants today, then I’m pretty sure He’s not going to worry about letting gay people get married.

In fact, I’m pretty sure that God is cool about gay people getting married.

There are certainly those who will quote from the Old Testament book of Leviticus where it says that gay people are an abomination and you shouldn’t allow them to live. And there are those who quote from the letters of the apostle Paul that are equally negative.

Now, my take on being a Christian is that I follow Jesus, not Paul. Jesus threw out a bunch of rules from the Old Testament. This is why it is OK to eat bacon cheeseburgers and wear cloth that is woven with fiber from wool and cotton. He realized that there were so many little rules that were getting in the way of the big rules, the ones that really mattered. He gave us only two that we had to follow. Love God, and love your neighbor.

I know this is hard to handle for most people. I used to think in the same way as those people, because that is what I was taught. But this is a really important point to get.

The whole message from Jesus is about love. Jesus said absolutely nothing about homosexuality, and a whole lot about loving people and not judging them.

I saw a photo recently that said “Bigotry wrapped in prayer is still bigotry.” A bigot is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as “a person who is obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially : one who regards or treats the members of a group with hatred and intolerance.”

To enact or support laws that prevent gay people from getting married is bigoted. It is a rule directed against another group based simply on an intolerance of their way of life. This is a human rights issue, not a religious issue.

To use your religion, which is for love and against judging others, as an excuse for your bigotry is terrible. It gives a bad face to a good thing. It turns people away from the message of Jesus. It is bad witness.

There are a number of people who say that Christians are being persecuted for their beliefs.

They aren’t.

If someone is being hateful and judgmental about people, then they really haven’t absorbed the message of Jesus yet. So they aren’t really Christian.

I’m not being very nice here. I’m tired of being nice. I’m tired of people using Jesus as an excuse to be hateful. I’m tired of people being spoon-fed what to think by their church. I’m tired of people not reading the Gospels for themselves and using the brain that God gave them to understand there is nothing in there about hate. I’m tired of every week hearing another story about a prominent person who makes it hard for me to publically admit I’m a Christian because of their publically aired intolerant view that uses Christianity as an excuse.

I feel like my belief system has been hijacked.

When people are confronted with their hate, they always insist that they aren’t hate-filled, and they aren’t judgmental, in the same way they say they aren’t racist and they aren’t homophobic. And they are just lying to themselves. It’s understandable. This is a normal human defense mechanism. But it is dangerous to be self-deluded.

I cannot get why “Christians” feel that they are obliged to force their narrow view of what is right on others. To insist that other people follow the rules of your religion even though it is not their religion is exactly what Americans freak out about in regards to the Muslim idea of Sharia law. So why do it here?

Julie Burt, gay marriage opponent who was at the Minnesota Capitol for this vote had her opinions about the legislation. “I feel sorry for our world. But the world has turned,” Burt said. “The world has turned to a place that wants immediate gratification. And it breaks my heart. Breaks my heart for my children and my grandchildren.”

I’m not heartbroken. I’m happy for her children and her grandchildren. Her children and grandchildren are going to grow up in a country that doesn’t discriminate about love.

Because love is what it is all about.

The journey of a thousand miles.

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I have a tattoo that wraps around my left ankle that is a quote from Lao Tzu. I was inspired by a book I read called “Body Type” by Ina Saltz. The entire book features tattoos that are words, and often they are in meaningful fonts.

Like any self-respecting tattooed person, I was on the quest to get another tattoo after reading that. But what? What words would be worthwhile to get permanently marked on my body? What do I need to remember that much? What would be helpful to others?

I found something that answered those questions in the quote “The journey of a thousand miles begins beneath one’s feet.” I’d always heard it as “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” but when you are going to get something permanent, you might as well make sure of the exact wording. When I looked it up, I found this alternate translation. I like “… beneath ones’ feet” much better.

Both quotes help to remind us to not look at the goal. Just get started. There is another Chinese saying that is like this. “The best time to plant a tree is a hundred years ago. The second best time is today.” Both refer to starting. You have to dream, but then you have to make those dreams real. And making dreams real is composed of a lot of tiny steps. When you first start it feels impossible, that you will never get there. Just keep going. Just keep taking tiny steps. The quote also reminds us to break up a big, difficult project up into manageable parts. Do a little here, and a little there, and you’ll get there.

But we all know that just starting is the hardest part. This is why I like the alternate translation so much better. The start is right now, right where you are. Here’s the secret – just thinking about it, you have already begun.

That is worth savoring. You want to write? Many people would say then just write. That is easier to say than do, because you want to make it perfect. You won’t. It won’t be perfect. It will be really ugly and clunky and dull at the beginning. But then you write more, and it gets easier, and clearer, and better. This applies to anything creative, not just writing.

But you still have to start.

I had a problem getting started. Sometimes the problem was stopping a bad habit and starting a better one. I know I’m not alone in this. Sometimes the inertia was too great. Sometimes I couldn’t achieve enough escape velocity to get going.

These words inspire me, and I hope they do the same to you. Just thinking about it, you’ve already started. You’ve already taken the first step.

Hearing voices in the closet.

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If I have to be in the closet at church about the fact that God talks to me, then there is something profoundly wrong going on. Church should be the one place where you can safely and unselfconsciously talk about how God interacts with you. You walk on a thin edge if you talk about God at work or at the dentist office or at Wal-Mart, but church? You should be safe there. You shouldn’t be silenced there.

Yet that is exactly what has happened to me. Now, perhaps the priest was concerned because I’m bipolar. Perhaps she is afraid that I’m not in fact hearing from God. I understand this concern. I wrestled with it for years. For many years I doubted what I heard and knew. I doubted my experiences. I doubted God. And yet it was proven to me again and again that I wasn’t making this stuff up.

The Biblical test for prophets is to see if what they say God told them was going to happen actually happened. I passed that test. Repeatedly. God proved himself to me. God was far more patient with me than I ever would imagine.

It is very important to me to not lead people astray. The church has enough loonies. I didn’t need to add to their ranks. So I understand the priest’s fear. I had it too. And I worked through it. But she didn’t know the stories of when God talked to me and how He proved Himself. She hadn’t been there.

She told me that talking about God was “a conversation stopper” because “other people weren’t having that experience.” This should have been my cue to leave. This was in November, when she told me the deacon discernment process was put on hold for me. Hopefully you catch the irony here. If you are in the deacon discernment process, it is because you believe you are experiencing a call from God.

So it is OK to get a call from God. Just don’t answer, and certainly don’t tell anybody if you got a reply.

I waited, and watched to see how others in church communicate about their experiences with God. And I realized in the three years that I have been there, not a single person has talked about how God talks to them. Not a single person has mentioned that they even prayed to God.

Maybe they do talk to God in prayer, and in prayers of their own words rather than the pre-written prayers of the prayer book. Maybe they do hear from God, and in more than just the already recorded words in the Bible. But they sure don’t talk about it. Why not? Church should be a safe place to talk about such things. Church should be a place where we can have a conversation with God, not a monologue about God. And it should be a place where we can share our experiences with others.

Perhaps they forgot that the entire faith started with Abraham talking to God. Perhaps they forgot Samuel, David, Gideon, Elijah, Elisha, Isaac, Moses, Jacob, Solomon, Noah, Joseph, Mary, and Jesus all talked with God. If the entire religion is based on a person talking to God and so many following people doing the same, then why are we discouraged from being part of that?

God is real. God is constantly communicating with us. We just are too distracted to notice. We fill our heads with the noise of television and iPods and videogames. When God is somehow able to get a word in edgewise we ignore it as a trick of our minds or we think we are going crazy. Or worse, we are told to ignore it by the very people we should expect would be experts at knowing how to deal with it.

I’m not special. I’ve just learned how to cut out the noise. God wants you to hear from Him too. I’ll try to write further about how to hear from God. But I know that the first thing you must do is give God a space. Make some silent time. Be alone with God.

It is crazy to follow God. And it is beautiful and amazing. God knows so much more than I could ever know. My life has changed dramatically since I started trusting that voice. It is calmer. I trust that God is in control. I know that whatever happens is meant to happen.

But to not be able to talk about God in church, aside from what is scripted in the prayer book or in the Bible? Now, that really is crazy.

Handshake

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Have you ever listened to the odd sound that a fax machine makes when it is trying to connect with another fax machine? There is a weird series of sounds and whirs and chirps and whistles. This series of sounds is called a handshake. Machine number one is trying to figure out what frequency machine number two is on so it can send the fax correctly. When they are able to properly connect it is the same as two people shaking hands.

When people shake hands they are communicating in a basic way. At a primal level they are saying they don’t have any weapons in their hands. Simply to touch another person is a big deal. We have a lot of rules about personal space. It is seen as rude to get too close to someone. People stand about a foot and a half away from each other in line. But to shake hands you have to get within that space.

Just offering to shake someone’s hand is a big deal. They can refuse. They could want a hug instead. There is a bit of jostling about to figure out where the other person is coming from, and what they want out of that interaction.

What about a wave, or a smile? Have you ever noticed that if you wave “hello” to a stranger they will invariably wave back? The same is true for a smile. The saying is “laugh, and the world laughs with you, cry, and you cry alone.” Substitute “smile” for “laugh” and you are on to something.

When I was at Cursillo I cried a lot. It was overwhelming. Symbolically it was Christmas and Easter and my birthday and my wedding day all together. It was a lot to a take in. I cried out of surprise and joy and relief. Towards the end I knew that we were going to be standing in front of a huge crowd of friends and strangers and we were going to be welcomed into the Cursillo family. We were going to have to stand up in front of them and answer the line “Christ is counting on you” with “and I am counting on Christ.” I had a pretty strong feeling I was going to cry, because I’d cried the whole weekend anyway. I prayed that I wouldn’t cry, but while I prayed I heard the answer.

Sometimes it is important to cry, because it lets other people know it is ok to cry.

It is as if we need permission to have feelings. By leading the way with a difficult emotion, it frees up others to have that emotion too. There is a sense of relief. Nobody wants to be the first to cry, but they definitely need to and want to.

It is very healing to let others know they can have feelings, that it is OK for them to let them out. Our society is really heavily into the idea of keeping a stiff upper lip. “Boys don’t cry” – yes, and then they grow up to be abusive and have heart attacks. Boys should cry. Girls should get angry and yell. When girls get angry, they are told they aren’t “ladylike.” Our society tries to shape our emotions as to what is OK and what isn’t. And then we have huge rates of depression and addiction and emotional disorders.

Let them out. Let others know it is OK too. If you stuff emotions in you get out of shape. Pressure builds up. Go ahead. Cry. Yell. You’ll feel better. Then go for a walk and maybe some yoga and a nap and have some decaf tea with your teddy bear.

Another take on “The Way” verse

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There is one verse that is attributed to Jesus that I just cannot stand. It is so exclusionary, and everything I know about Jesus is all about welcome and love. The words are from John 14:6 “Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Perhaps you’ve heard them spouted at you by a person who used it as their final statement in a religious discussion that became an argument. It is the Christian version of “I told you so!” and “Because!”

Those words don’t allow any wiggle room. They don’t allow any discussion. They don’t allow any love.

You have to forgive the Christians. This is what they are taught. But it sure seems that some Christians are taught the “no one may come to the Father” verse more than “thou shalt not judge” and the “love your neighbor” ones.

They are taught these lines so that they feel a sense of “I’m right.” It makes them feel like they have made the right choice. They are in the club.

The only bad thing is then they use that line as a club.
That line becomes a weapon.
It becomes a division sign rather than a plus sign.

For me, being Christian should mean that you take that club and turn it into a hammer to build a Habitat for Humanity house. Or you turn it into a shovel to dig up land to grow vegetables for Second Harvest. It means you stop being selfish and start to become self-less.

It doesn’t mean that you should beat people over the head with your religion. If you have to attack people to prove your faith is right, you are doing it wrong.

You have to forgive these Christians. This behavior is very human. People like to feel like they are on the winning team. And they hate to think of their friends as being out in the cold. So really, they are trying to get you to join their team. They think they are being helpful.

The more I think about it, the more that line doesn’t sound right. It sounds really mean. I keep hoping it has been mistranslated. The “Lord’s Prayer” retranslated from the original Aramaic is a lot more mystical and beautiful – so I’m hoping that this is the same way.

I have wrestled with that line for years. When I read it, I come to a full stop. I hit a wall that I just don’t know how to deal with. It just goes against everything else that Jesus said. When I read it, I got stuck on the word “through.” Nobody can get to God without going through Jesus? Why is he standing in the way? Is he a bodyguard?

I think I’ve come up with a solution.

It means that people need to serve God in the same way that Jesus did. It means that they need to be submissive to God. It means that they need to put their own wishes and wants second and God’s will first. It means that they need to obey God even if it means giving up their lives. It means that they recognize that everything they have in life, even life itself, is a gift from God, so if He wants it back, they have to give it up.

In Living Buddha, Living Christ” by Thich Nhat Hanh said on page 55-56

“When Jesus said,”I am the way,” He meant that to have a true relationship with God, you must practice His way. I the Acts of the Apostles, the early Christians always spoke of their faith as “the Way.” To me, “I am the way” is a better statement than “I know the way.” The way is not an asphalt road. But we must distinguish between the “I” spoken by Jesus and the “I” that people usually think of. The “I” in His statement is life itself. His life, which is the way. If you do not really look at His life, you cannot see the way. If you only satisfy yourself with praising a name, even the name of Jesus, it is not practicing the life of Jesus. We must practice living deeply, loving, and acing with charity if we wish to truly honor Jesus. The way is Jesus Himself and not just some idea of Him. A true teaching is not static. It is not mere words but the reality of life. Many who have neither the way nor the life try to impose on others what they believe to be the way. But these are only words that have no connection with real life or a real way.”

I find it interesting that a Buddhist monk has a better grasp on Jesus than many Christians.