Husbands: love your wives as Christ loved the Church . . .
I have heard this paraphrased as: Husbands: go the way of the cross for your wives.
Well, I am certainly not there yet. Bring it on!
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
From bondage to weakness
I've wanted to attend an Unbound conference since I first heard about them a couple years ago. We have an Unbound team which is associated with our CREDO Apostolate that has hosted several conferences in the area. I've wondered whether this deliverance ministry might help me in an area in which therapy, prayer, and sacramental Reconciliation have all ultimately left me feeling resigned and powerless. I have long understood that our behavioral choices are our own, but still I have repeatedly chosen what I want in the short term rather than what I believe is really best for me. Unfortunately, the conferences in the area have always conflicted with my already-busy schedule, falling when I already had plans either over several weeks or a busy weekend. My therapists from FSA might have insisted that this was simply another way of saying that I was too complacent about this, and wasn't determined to do whatever it might take to fix a problem area. That wouldn't be entirely unfair, as may be clearer below. Of course, they also wouldn't have necessarily thought this any big deal except insofar as I was uncomfortable with it. To their mind the danger would have been my willingness to decide to do what I shouldn't, as if this was not multiple orders of magnitude less dangerous than the reason that I was then in therapy.
A couple months ago I learned there would be a local training session for people who want to be involved in Unbound ministry. This was mostly intended for people who'd been through a workshop or two and wanted to serve on a team, neither of which applied to me. Also, it was scheduled for this past Saturday, on a weekend on which we already had commitments for Friday evening and late Sunday afternoon and evening (supporting a local Marriage Encounter weekend), so I was loath to fill up the remainder of the weekend with an all-day workshop that wasn't a good fit for me. But when the ME weekend was cancelled due to an insufficient number of registrations, my bride encouraged me to attend this training workshop instead.
The presenter was Matt Lozano, whose dad wrote Unbound: A Practical Guide to Deliverance and several related books. Matt and his dad are members of the Heart of the Father ministry team. The central premise of the book and of this ministry is that most people approach deliverance ministry with their attention somewhere other than on the individual's relationship with the one person whose ability and mission match our need. (This is - not coincidentally - the same wrong way that most of us fix our attention on the wrong things in our lives.) By focusing excessive attention on the negative spirits that might be affecting us, we end up underscoring their power over us rather than allowing Christ's victory to bear its full fruit in our lives. Too many deliverance ministries focus on the minister's ability to identify and then call out (in Christ's authority, of course) these spiritual influences, as if the heavy lifting were mostly up to us rather than already accomplished by Jesus. The Unbound model, a non-confrontational approach to deliverance, moves the focus back to the individual's relationship with Jesus Christ. While it spends some time identifying ways that inappropriate spiritual influences may have entered our lives, its main focus is on embracing Christ's authority and receiving the blessing the Father longs to bestow on us.
The biggest concern - fear, really; almost despair - which had me reluctant to submit to any deliverance ministry was rooted in all of the efforts that have not borne long-term fruit in me. I have suspected that the chief reason for this might be my hesitance to relinquish my right to myself, as I remained at least partly invested in the lies that were used to enlist my teen-aged conformance with my step-father's agenda. Even though I have long since turned my back on the worst manifestations of his attitudes toward sexuality, there were still some vestiges of his thinking in my ongoing failure to live chastely within my vocation, even as I have forsaken past offenses of a greater order. Impure thoughts and behaviors don't have to approach anywhere near the boundaries of infidelity or worse to undermine the life to which we are called. So I had basically concluded that I was the problem (mostly correct) and that there was nothing much that could be added to the efforts I'd already made (mostly wrong).
As I listened to Matt Lozano's first presentation in the morning, I heard him referring to the Five Keys to spiritual freedom and the success which Heart of the Father Ministries has had in helping people find freedom from bondage to behaviors that they had not been able to resolve in any other way. The non-confrontational approach of Unbound appealed to me, and I did not at all feel disadvantaged by not having previously been through an Unbound conference or prayer session. When Chris, the local team leader who served as emcee for the day, mentioned following the first presentation that they were looking for a few people who would be willing to participate in "demonstration" prayer sessions in the afternoon, I was aware of a confluence of truths: I was one of the few attendees who'd never been through a session, and I had definitely resigned myself to repeating some choices from which I was certain God wants his children to be free. I had before me a rare chance to bring a new tool to bear in my life, and my determination to trust God in this was stronger than my fearful reluctance to be open about this struggle. I was forthright with Chris about this fear when I told him I thought I should participate in one of the sessions that afternoon, and he encouraged me not to let that fear hold me back.
The second presentation of the morning started with a Q&A time, and served both to help me feel more peaceful about my decision and to set my expectations at a healthy level. In response to a question from one of the participants, Matt talked about how a session often serves to move people move from an area of bondage to an area of weakness. The phrase took me by surprise, but I found myself reassured as I considered it. I wasn't being promised that I would never struggle again, or told that if I did that meant that there was something deeply wrong with me - or that there ever had been. It was just a simple acknowledgement that when we have an area in which we know we are weak, we can humbly ask God to provide us with strength that is not of ourselves.
Why am I inevitably surprised to see that God knows what he's doing? Of the three experienced Unbound prayer leaders who would each work with one of us who'd volunteered for sessions, I was paired with Matt Lozano. I had felt a kinship with him throughout the day, and sensed an odd symmetry because he was from Philadelphia, the town where my fateful Thanksgiving weekend had begun. When we did a case study together and he asked who had tried desperately to "get it right," I'd replied, "It's what I live for." He joked that he'd be praying with me later, and sure enough, that was how it worked out. Thus I found myself sharing in front of ten intercessors/witnesses/trainees about the worst parts of my life, including things I have long since previously dealt with that I thought were still relevant to this area. I felt nervous at first, and there was a lot of personal history that really needed to be covered because it was related, even though it wasn't central to my current struggles. It was important to present it as background to the things that I have already forgiven people for and the things I still needed to let go of.
Chief among the new things was that I realized that I wanted to forgive my mom and my biological dad for the circumstances of infidelity in which I was conceived, and my biological father for abandoning me to be vulnerable to all that came later. It was a revelation for me to realize in the morning session that the spiritual elements of sexual impurity were present in my life from my very conception. There were some other things and people who I mentioned in my interview that I had previously forgiven, but it was good to express that forgiveness once again. I also forgave my initial sexual abuser for the abuse I don't remember, that I only know about because my mom told me about it in the long-ago therapy session when I told her about what her husbands had done to me. (Can it really have been 17 years?) Finally, we prayed forgiveness for myself, for all the ways I have fallen short of God's dreams for me.
Matt also had me renounce the fear that I told him I knew I'd embraced, too, that being pure would mean that I would miss out on something. We didn't get into how this had been part of my step-father's indoctrination of me, but it clearly had been. Plenty of people believe this lie, though, without having had someone specifically use it against them in this way. Having talked about the role that same-sex fantasy was playing, we also came against its roots in my life. There were a couple areas that we didn't get into - the biggest was probably the suicidal thoughts I've been dealing with for some time - but without exception each one could be considered a related spiritual influence to one I renounced along with all of its related spirits. I find that the session has me more cognizant of what is of me versus what might be some sort of spiritual influence in my life. And Matt did a good job of focusing on the related issues of pride, self-condemnation and self-justification which had hindered me from fully receiving the forgiveness which God has freely and repeatedly offered.
It was a pretty incredible time of prayer. At the end I felt released but not elated; relieved but not spiritually high; and mostly thankful, blessed, and deeply loved. Pretty much everyone in the room affirmed me in some way afterward for my willingness to share.
The final presentation of the afternoon was on the vital role of the intercessor on the Unbound prayer team. From the sound of things, there have been cases of intercessors who end up unwittingly interfering and reducing the effectiveness of a prayer session because they didn't clearly understand the importance or nature of their role, to the confusion of the person being prayed for. It is a pretty special role, actually, and someone like me who tends to look for affirmation wherever he can find it might be better suited to serve as intercessor rather than prayer leader on an Unbound prayer team.
My past efforts have me reluctant to declare victory over my weakness too quickly. It isn't as if I haven't managed to go weeks or even months in the past without indulging in fantasy and impurity, only to lapse back into that dynamic. But I do feel that I have been set free from my bondage in a very different way from what I have known before. I seem to lack that nagging sense that it's only a matter of time until I fall again. At the first hint of such defeatist thoughts, I've been reminding myself of the untruths in the ways I have thought of this area of my life. I'm also reminding myself that the blessings that God wants for me are way beyond what I have settled for. I am a son of the King, granted privilege to enter into his presence whenever I need or want to, and granted authority and power in him over my enemies that I would never have on my own.
Greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world.
A couple months ago I learned there would be a local training session for people who want to be involved in Unbound ministry. This was mostly intended for people who'd been through a workshop or two and wanted to serve on a team, neither of which applied to me. Also, it was scheduled for this past Saturday, on a weekend on which we already had commitments for Friday evening and late Sunday afternoon and evening (supporting a local Marriage Encounter weekend), so I was loath to fill up the remainder of the weekend with an all-day workshop that wasn't a good fit for me. But when the ME weekend was cancelled due to an insufficient number of registrations, my bride encouraged me to attend this training workshop instead.
The presenter was Matt Lozano, whose dad wrote Unbound: A Practical Guide to Deliverance and several related books. Matt and his dad are members of the Heart of the Father ministry team. The central premise of the book and of this ministry is that most people approach deliverance ministry with their attention somewhere other than on the individual's relationship with the one person whose ability and mission match our need. (This is - not coincidentally - the same wrong way that most of us fix our attention on the wrong things in our lives.) By focusing excessive attention on the negative spirits that might be affecting us, we end up underscoring their power over us rather than allowing Christ's victory to bear its full fruit in our lives. Too many deliverance ministries focus on the minister's ability to identify and then call out (in Christ's authority, of course) these spiritual influences, as if the heavy lifting were mostly up to us rather than already accomplished by Jesus. The Unbound model, a non-confrontational approach to deliverance, moves the focus back to the individual's relationship with Jesus Christ. While it spends some time identifying ways that inappropriate spiritual influences may have entered our lives, its main focus is on embracing Christ's authority and receiving the blessing the Father longs to bestow on us.
The biggest concern - fear, really; almost despair - which had me reluctant to submit to any deliverance ministry was rooted in all of the efforts that have not borne long-term fruit in me. I have suspected that the chief reason for this might be my hesitance to relinquish my right to myself, as I remained at least partly invested in the lies that were used to enlist my teen-aged conformance with my step-father's agenda. Even though I have long since turned my back on the worst manifestations of his attitudes toward sexuality, there were still some vestiges of his thinking in my ongoing failure to live chastely within my vocation, even as I have forsaken past offenses of a greater order. Impure thoughts and behaviors don't have to approach anywhere near the boundaries of infidelity or worse to undermine the life to which we are called. So I had basically concluded that I was the problem (mostly correct) and that there was nothing much that could be added to the efforts I'd already made (mostly wrong).
As I listened to Matt Lozano's first presentation in the morning, I heard him referring to the Five Keys to spiritual freedom and the success which Heart of the Father Ministries has had in helping people find freedom from bondage to behaviors that they had not been able to resolve in any other way. The non-confrontational approach of Unbound appealed to me, and I did not at all feel disadvantaged by not having previously been through an Unbound conference or prayer session. When Chris, the local team leader who served as emcee for the day, mentioned following the first presentation that they were looking for a few people who would be willing to participate in "demonstration" prayer sessions in the afternoon, I was aware of a confluence of truths: I was one of the few attendees who'd never been through a session, and I had definitely resigned myself to repeating some choices from which I was certain God wants his children to be free. I had before me a rare chance to bring a new tool to bear in my life, and my determination to trust God in this was stronger than my fearful reluctance to be open about this struggle. I was forthright with Chris about this fear when I told him I thought I should participate in one of the sessions that afternoon, and he encouraged me not to let that fear hold me back.
The second presentation of the morning started with a Q&A time, and served both to help me feel more peaceful about my decision and to set my expectations at a healthy level. In response to a question from one of the participants, Matt talked about how a session often serves to move people move from an area of bondage to an area of weakness. The phrase took me by surprise, but I found myself reassured as I considered it. I wasn't being promised that I would never struggle again, or told that if I did that meant that there was something deeply wrong with me - or that there ever had been. It was just a simple acknowledgement that when we have an area in which we know we are weak, we can humbly ask God to provide us with strength that is not of ourselves.
Why am I inevitably surprised to see that God knows what he's doing? Of the three experienced Unbound prayer leaders who would each work with one of us who'd volunteered for sessions, I was paired with Matt Lozano. I had felt a kinship with him throughout the day, and sensed an odd symmetry because he was from Philadelphia, the town where my fateful Thanksgiving weekend had begun. When we did a case study together and he asked who had tried desperately to "get it right," I'd replied, "It's what I live for." He joked that he'd be praying with me later, and sure enough, that was how it worked out. Thus I found myself sharing in front of ten intercessors/witnesses/trainees about the worst parts of my life, including things I have long since previously dealt with that I thought were still relevant to this area. I felt nervous at first, and there was a lot of personal history that really needed to be covered because it was related, even though it wasn't central to my current struggles. It was important to present it as background to the things that I have already forgiven people for and the things I still needed to let go of.
Chief among the new things was that I realized that I wanted to forgive my mom and my biological dad for the circumstances of infidelity in which I was conceived, and my biological father for abandoning me to be vulnerable to all that came later. It was a revelation for me to realize in the morning session that the spiritual elements of sexual impurity were present in my life from my very conception. There were some other things and people who I mentioned in my interview that I had previously forgiven, but it was good to express that forgiveness once again. I also forgave my initial sexual abuser for the abuse I don't remember, that I only know about because my mom told me about it in the long-ago therapy session when I told her about what her husbands had done to me. (Can it really have been 17 years?) Finally, we prayed forgiveness for myself, for all the ways I have fallen short of God's dreams for me.
Matt also had me renounce the fear that I told him I knew I'd embraced, too, that being pure would mean that I would miss out on something. We didn't get into how this had been part of my step-father's indoctrination of me, but it clearly had been. Plenty of people believe this lie, though, without having had someone specifically use it against them in this way. Having talked about the role that same-sex fantasy was playing, we also came against its roots in my life. There were a couple areas that we didn't get into - the biggest was probably the suicidal thoughts I've been dealing with for some time - but without exception each one could be considered a related spiritual influence to one I renounced along with all of its related spirits. I find that the session has me more cognizant of what is of me versus what might be some sort of spiritual influence in my life. And Matt did a good job of focusing on the related issues of pride, self-condemnation and self-justification which had hindered me from fully receiving the forgiveness which God has freely and repeatedly offered.
It was a pretty incredible time of prayer. At the end I felt released but not elated; relieved but not spiritually high; and mostly thankful, blessed, and deeply loved. Pretty much everyone in the room affirmed me in some way afterward for my willingness to share.
The final presentation of the afternoon was on the vital role of the intercessor on the Unbound prayer team. From the sound of things, there have been cases of intercessors who end up unwittingly interfering and reducing the effectiveness of a prayer session because they didn't clearly understand the importance or nature of their role, to the confusion of the person being prayed for. It is a pretty special role, actually, and someone like me who tends to look for affirmation wherever he can find it might be better suited to serve as intercessor rather than prayer leader on an Unbound prayer team.
My past efforts have me reluctant to declare victory over my weakness too quickly. It isn't as if I haven't managed to go weeks or even months in the past without indulging in fantasy and impurity, only to lapse back into that dynamic. But I do feel that I have been set free from my bondage in a very different way from what I have known before. I seem to lack that nagging sense that it's only a matter of time until I fall again. At the first hint of such defeatist thoughts, I've been reminding myself of the untruths in the ways I have thought of this area of my life. I'm also reminding myself that the blessings that God wants for me are way beyond what I have settled for. I am a son of the King, granted privilege to enter into his presence whenever I need or want to, and granted authority and power in him over my enemies that I would never have on my own.
Greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world.
Monday, April 28, 2014
Friday, April 25, 2014
We all fall short
Sometimes people post well-meaning inspirational messages or videos that kill me inside just a little bit. I need to remind myself - more than most do, I suspect - that the idealized, flawless portrayal of someone's best moments as a person are not a complete picture. In fact, I'd have a pretty good montage of best moments, too.
Thursday, April 24, 2014
Today's word
I have some catching up to do, but today's is so new to me I figured I'd post it without trying to address any of the backlog.
fissiparous \fih-SIP-uh-rus\ - 1. tending to break up into parts 2. creating disunity or dissension : divisive
fissiparous \fih-SIP-uh-rus\ - 1. tending to break up into parts 2. creating disunity or dissension : divisive
Friday, April 18, 2014
Reflection, Good Friday, 2014
First of all, I felt a little cheated today by having not remembered to claim two hours on the adoration schedule instead of just one. I could have stayed longer, but I know the guy who comes after me treasures some time alone there as much as I do - though of course either of us would be glad for company by more participants who wish to keep watch for a while in the night. (Post-adoration additions are smaller and in parentheses.)
God's plan is not to rescue a religious elite from an otherwise botched creation, but to restore all things in Christ. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
Through him all things were made - Nicene Creed, 1975 ecumenical version (ICET)
Are made. We must be restored in Christ, are not whole until we are indeed fully restored in Christ, precisely because we are made in him. In him we live, and move, and have our being, as St. Paul professed to the Athenians (Acts 17, 28). Why do we expect to find ourselves in any way other than the Way, the Truth, and the Life?
(Oh, there is so much more to be said about this! I could not capture it all in the moment nor, I suspect, in a hundred lifetimes!
Why do we insist on viewing our existence as something outside of or independent from God? Earlier Fr. Neuhaus has lamented that even those who serve God with their lives have this tendency to think of our corporeal world as the real one and our spiritual world as, well, something less than real.
Knowing that we would reject him in the Garden of Eden and repeatedly throughout history, God nevertheless loved -- I should say "loves," as God is eternally in the present tense -- us so much that he created us anyway, along with the plan for our deliverance back to him. So we are made through the eternal Son and restored in him. There is nothing else for us to be restored to! Yet we insist on keeping "our" stuff -- our family, our career, our finances, our entertainment, our recreation, our "real lives" -- to ourselves and seeking God to what we consider the minimal degree necessary to accomplish our goals: being rescued, becoming the people we think we ought to be. Anything beyond this and we begin to think that we are the ones being crucified by God's unreasonable demands of us.
God longs to fully restore us in Christ, and is waiting only for us to want to be truly and fully restored.)
(That Christ is the only way of salvation:) Many Christians are embarrassed by this claim. They are intimidated by a culture that decrees that all truths are equal. Who are you to claim that you have the truth and others do not? That is indeed an intimidating question, unless we understand that we do not have the truth in the sense that it is ours by virtue of our having discovered it; we do not have the truth in the sense of it being a possession under our control . . .
But Christ is not my truth or your truth; he is the truth. He is not one truth among many. He is the truth about everything that is true. He is the universal and cosmic truth. Everything that is true -- in religion, philosophy, mathematics or the art of baseball -- is true by virtue of participation in the truth who is Christ. The problem is not that non-Christians do not know truth; the problem is that they do not know that the truth they know is the truth of Christ. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
What is truth? - John 18, 38 (Pontius Pilate)
(This passage is so stunningly complete that I can add only a prayer:)
Lord, help me to stop chasing the world for a truth that accommodates me (and my desires, my vision). We each have a truth, or understanding(, to which we cling). Let mine no longer be more important to me than you are. Help me to see that the biggest obstacle to all things being restored to you -- the biggest for which I have responsibility, at least -- is my selfish, stubborn insistence that I have been "restored enough," so that I might cling to my sinful unrestoredness.
A certain cognitive humility is in order at this point and at all points in our talking about God and his ways . . . . Now all our talk about God, including the God-given talk of the Bible, is by analogy. That is to say, the mind of God infinitely surpasses the human mind, the Creator infinitely surpasses the creature. Analogy means that we can draw inferences and make comparisons. We can say, for instance, that God is to the world as the artist is to his or her work. But in saying that we should not think that we thereby understand God or his relationship to the world. The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 put it very nicely: "No similarity can be found so great but that the dissimilarity is even greater." God is always infinitely "more" and infinitely "other." . . . Therefore it is rightly said that all theology is finally doxology. That is to say, all analysis and explanation finally dissolves into wonder and praise. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
Cognitive humility indeed. Yet we insist that our minds are individually -- or, at least, collectively -- capable of (comprehending and) containing all truth. Could there be a prouder concept? And Christians are -- I am -- as guilty of this as anyone. "The truth is nothing other than I understand it to be," we think in our conceit. Even as revealed by God's very Word in sacred Scripture, the sum of all that all of our minds know about God is still infinitely less than God himself, and will be for all time, for God is beyond time. But Jesus restores us to himself in time so that all of his creation may enter into a God and an eternity that we cannot otherwise begin to even conceive.
(How timely relative to my rereading of this relationship of theology and doxology is Pope Francis' reminder this week to the theologians of the Church to remain rooted in prayer, and especially of the dangerous effects of theology that is not thus grounded. In Christian circles we often refer to the difference between knowing about God and knowing God personally, in a relationship that can only be made possible by the Holy Spirit's -- God's -- presence and movement within us. When we spend too much time studying and analyzing and not enough time praying, we become foolishly proud of what we think we have figured out about God. We scorn the humble simplicity that must form the foundation of a right relationship with a God who is utterly unreachable except by his grace-full condescension to his beloved creatures.)
I thankfully find myself, at the end of this hour, dissolving into worship and praise. May it always be so! You are so worthy, Lord! Help me to trust in you, to entrust my life to you, to know that you are the only Way, Truth and Life that ever matter, and to be the only One that I ever desire.
God's plan is not to rescue a religious elite from an otherwise botched creation, but to restore all things in Christ. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
Through him all things were made - Nicene Creed, 1975 ecumenical version (ICET)
Are made. We must be restored in Christ, are not whole until we are indeed fully restored in Christ, precisely because we are made in him. In him we live, and move, and have our being, as St. Paul professed to the Athenians (Acts 17, 28). Why do we expect to find ourselves in any way other than the Way, the Truth, and the Life?
(Oh, there is so much more to be said about this! I could not capture it all in the moment nor, I suspect, in a hundred lifetimes!
Why do we insist on viewing our existence as something outside of or independent from God? Earlier Fr. Neuhaus has lamented that even those who serve God with their lives have this tendency to think of our corporeal world as the real one and our spiritual world as, well, something less than real.
Knowing that we would reject him in the Garden of Eden and repeatedly throughout history, God nevertheless loved -- I should say "loves," as God is eternally in the present tense -- us so much that he created us anyway, along with the plan for our deliverance back to him. So we are made through the eternal Son and restored in him. There is nothing else for us to be restored to! Yet we insist on keeping "our" stuff -- our family, our career, our finances, our entertainment, our recreation, our "real lives" -- to ourselves and seeking God to what we consider the minimal degree necessary to accomplish our goals: being rescued, becoming the people we think we ought to be. Anything beyond this and we begin to think that we are the ones being crucified by God's unreasonable demands of us.
God longs to fully restore us in Christ, and is waiting only for us to want to be truly and fully restored.)
(That Christ is the only way of salvation:) Many Christians are embarrassed by this claim. They are intimidated by a culture that decrees that all truths are equal. Who are you to claim that you have the truth and others do not? That is indeed an intimidating question, unless we understand that we do not have the truth in the sense that it is ours by virtue of our having discovered it; we do not have the truth in the sense of it being a possession under our control . . .
But Christ is not my truth or your truth; he is the truth. He is not one truth among many. He is the truth about everything that is true. He is the universal and cosmic truth. Everything that is true -- in religion, philosophy, mathematics or the art of baseball -- is true by virtue of participation in the truth who is Christ. The problem is not that non-Christians do not know truth; the problem is that they do not know that the truth they know is the truth of Christ. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
What is truth? - John 18, 38 (Pontius Pilate)
(This passage is so stunningly complete that I can add only a prayer:)
Lord, help me to stop chasing the world for a truth that accommodates me (and my desires, my vision). We each have a truth, or understanding(, to which we cling). Let mine no longer be more important to me than you are. Help me to see that the biggest obstacle to all things being restored to you -- the biggest for which I have responsibility, at least -- is my selfish, stubborn insistence that I have been "restored enough," so that I might cling to my sinful unrestoredness.
A certain cognitive humility is in order at this point and at all points in our talking about God and his ways . . . . Now all our talk about God, including the God-given talk of the Bible, is by analogy. That is to say, the mind of God infinitely surpasses the human mind, the Creator infinitely surpasses the creature. Analogy means that we can draw inferences and make comparisons. We can say, for instance, that God is to the world as the artist is to his or her work. But in saying that we should not think that we thereby understand God or his relationship to the world. The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 put it very nicely: "No similarity can be found so great but that the dissimilarity is even greater." God is always infinitely "more" and infinitely "other." . . . Therefore it is rightly said that all theology is finally doxology. That is to say, all analysis and explanation finally dissolves into wonder and praise. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
Cognitive humility indeed. Yet we insist that our minds are individually -- or, at least, collectively -- capable of (comprehending and) containing all truth. Could there be a prouder concept? And Christians are -- I am -- as guilty of this as anyone. "The truth is nothing other than I understand it to be," we think in our conceit. Even as revealed by God's very Word in sacred Scripture, the sum of all that all of our minds know about God is still infinitely less than God himself, and will be for all time, for God is beyond time. But Jesus restores us to himself in time so that all of his creation may enter into a God and an eternity that we cannot otherwise begin to even conceive.
(How timely relative to my rereading of this relationship of theology and doxology is Pope Francis' reminder this week to the theologians of the Church to remain rooted in prayer, and especially of the dangerous effects of theology that is not thus grounded. In Christian circles we often refer to the difference between knowing about God and knowing God personally, in a relationship that can only be made possible by the Holy Spirit's -- God's -- presence and movement within us. When we spend too much time studying and analyzing and not enough time praying, we become foolishly proud of what we think we have figured out about God. We scorn the humble simplicity that must form the foundation of a right relationship with a God who is utterly unreachable except by his grace-full condescension to his beloved creatures.)
I thankfully find myself, at the end of this hour, dissolving into worship and praise. May it always be so! You are so worthy, Lord! Help me to trust in you, to entrust my life to you, to know that you are the only Way, Truth and Life that ever matter, and to be the only One that I ever desire.
Friday, April 04, 2014
Our faith is not the means of our salvation
"Today you will be with me in paradise." Jesus does not reject any who turn to him. At times we turn to him with little faith, at times with a mixture of faith and doubt when we are more sure of the doubt than of the faith. Jesus is not fastidious about the quality of the faith. He takes what he can get, so to speak, and gives immeasurably more than he receives - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
I can't speak for anyone else. As for me: I am almost always certain of my doubt, and am almost never so certain about my faith. Every word of encouragement I offer others in the faith is also an encouragement for me.
Fr. Neuhaus is going to go on, in these next few pages, to encourage us not to look to our faith, but to our Lord, and that is exactly right. My faith will always be insufficient to save me, except insofar as it is a gift of God that is sufficient in his mercy and grace. Yes, God is eternally in the business of making poor exchanges. He takes our meager, flawed offerings and gives us his perfect infinite self. So yes, I will continue to be more aware of my doubt than certain of my faith, and I will continue to trust completely in God's grace. After all, it is time to be done with the illusion that we are in any way deserving of what God wants so much to give us despite our inability to deserve it.
I can't speak for anyone else. As for me: I am almost always certain of my doubt, and am almost never so certain about my faith. Every word of encouragement I offer others in the faith is also an encouragement for me.
Fr. Neuhaus is going to go on, in these next few pages, to encourage us not to look to our faith, but to our Lord, and that is exactly right. My faith will always be insufficient to save me, except insofar as it is a gift of God that is sufficient in his mercy and grace. Yes, God is eternally in the business of making poor exchanges. He takes our meager, flawed offerings and gives us his perfect infinite self. So yes, I will continue to be more aware of my doubt than certain of my faith, and I will continue to trust completely in God's grace. After all, it is time to be done with the illusion that we are in any way deserving of what God wants so much to give us despite our inability to deserve it.
Cause for hope
First one home is a thief. Jesus is not very fastidious about the company he keeps. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
Thank God. Perhaps there is hope, after all, for one such as I.
A serious question is raised about those who will be with us in paradise - assuming, for the moment, that we will be there. - ibid.
I know I must have reflected on this before: what if the biggest obstacle to our entering into paradise is our unwillingness to spend eternity with the others who have received God's mercy?
Thank God. Perhaps there is hope, after all, for one such as I.
A serious question is raised about those who will be with us in paradise - assuming, for the moment, that we will be there. - ibid.
I know I must have reflected on this before: what if the biggest obstacle to our entering into paradise is our unwillingness to spend eternity with the others who have received God's mercy?
Thursday, April 03, 2014
Truth for life
Here, through the cross, we have come home, home to the truth about ourselves, home to the truth about what God has done about what we have done. And now we know, or begin to know, why this awful, awe-filled Friday is called good. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
This conclusion seems oddly distant after a couple days here with way more beach time than prayer time. I can feel Lent slipping away from me.
In a way, the result has been for me to see this truth from the perspective of those who do not agree with it, who have not arrived at this conclusion fresh from the reflection that leads to it. So many of us are oblivious to the vast void in our lives that results from not knowing the truth about ourselves that leads leads to the greater truth about God, and who we are in him.
This conclusion seems oddly distant after a couple days here with way more beach time than prayer time. I can feel Lent slipping away from me.
In a way, the result has been for me to see this truth from the perspective of those who do not agree with it, who have not arrived at this conclusion fresh from the reflection that leads to it. So many of us are oblivious to the vast void in our lives that results from not knowing the truth about ourselves that leads leads to the greater truth about God, and who we are in him.
Wednesday, April 02, 2014
A non sequitur reflection?
To those who are accustomed to living in a world turned upside down, setting it right cannot help but appear to be turning it upside down. With our first parents we reached for the power to name good and evil, thinking to assert control, but thereby we lost control. With the prodigal son we grabbed what we could and ended up impoverished and alone in a distant country . . . . because God is love, he sent his son to the far country to share our lot, to bear the consequences of our folly, to lead us home to the waiting Father.
Such a way of love violates our sense of justice. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
Well, of course it does, because our sense of justice is rooted in our decision to name good and evil for ourselves. Some parts of this we get right, when we judge actions that clearly do harm to others and embrace heroically altruistic actions that are free from immorality. Other parts we get completely wrong, such as when we promote the freedom that has been entrusted to us ahead of the holiness to which all are called. But there is nothing we get so wrong as our insistence on judgment when we ourselves have been so needful of mercy. So of course our warped, upside-down sense of justice is violated by God's insistence that love is mercifully selfless.
I read a sharing today from a dad who I know is getting things wrong, as we all do, so I don't conclude that his on-the-mark sharing is all that accurate a reflection of his reality. I share his desire to not wear a mask, but in my case it seems that even not-wearing-a-mask can be deceptive, as I seem to invariably apply it in ways that celebrate what I've been delivered out of yet still hide the things I struggle with, creating an illusion of openness that is often itself a lie.
My Lenten virtue stone continues to call me. Gentleness. I see the harshness that was too often a characteristic of my parenting carried forward in the lives of my daughters and their husbands as they raise their own children. I long for them to know how wrong I was in how I often dealt with them, how my motivation was so often how I thought they reflected on me or how to make my own existence easier. My heart breaks to see my grandchildren struggle to live up to what is expected of them while they also deal with their own emotional issues.
Gentleness. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. He prays gently for me, and I must find a way to receive this mercy.
There is more I hide behind my mask, of course. How love and judgment still clash within me. How I struggle to know how best to live the life to which I am called and whether simply going about doing so is itself deceptive. How recognizing my past brokenness sometimes causes me to question how I go about the things to which I believe I am now called.
The truth is, sometimes I am afraid that a mask is the only way to protect others from me.
Such a way of love violates our sense of justice. - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon
Well, of course it does, because our sense of justice is rooted in our decision to name good and evil for ourselves. Some parts of this we get right, when we judge actions that clearly do harm to others and embrace heroically altruistic actions that are free from immorality. Other parts we get completely wrong, such as when we promote the freedom that has been entrusted to us ahead of the holiness to which all are called. But there is nothing we get so wrong as our insistence on judgment when we ourselves have been so needful of mercy. So of course our warped, upside-down sense of justice is violated by God's insistence that love is mercifully selfless.
I read a sharing today from a dad who I know is getting things wrong, as we all do, so I don't conclude that his on-the-mark sharing is all that accurate a reflection of his reality. I share his desire to not wear a mask, but in my case it seems that even not-wearing-a-mask can be deceptive, as I seem to invariably apply it in ways that celebrate what I've been delivered out of yet still hide the things I struggle with, creating an illusion of openness that is often itself a lie.
My Lenten virtue stone continues to call me. Gentleness. I see the harshness that was too often a characteristic of my parenting carried forward in the lives of my daughters and their husbands as they raise their own children. I long for them to know how wrong I was in how I often dealt with them, how my motivation was so often how I thought they reflected on me or how to make my own existence easier. My heart breaks to see my grandchildren struggle to live up to what is expected of them while they also deal with their own emotional issues.
Gentleness. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. He prays gently for me, and I must find a way to receive this mercy.
There is more I hide behind my mask, of course. How love and judgment still clash within me. How I struggle to know how best to live the life to which I am called and whether simply going about doing so is itself deceptive. How recognizing my past brokenness sometimes causes me to question how I go about the things to which I believe I am now called.
The truth is, sometimes I am afraid that a mask is the only way to protect others from me.
Tuesday, April 01, 2014
Old friends, and newer
I had a really nice surprise phone call from an old friend of my mom. Bessie was older than mom, and is about 90 now. But mom had so much love and respect for her, and she frequently got together with her even after she moved to Georgia. Bessie's son Jerry was probably my best friend in junior high, and reconnecting with him via Facebook has let me get back in touch with his mom, too. It has been nice.
Yesterday morning while we were trying to figure out our strategy for the day, my wife was on the phone with her closest friend in Dayton. "She said she was just missing the sound of my voice." I'm so glad for her to have a friend who feels that way about her.
Yesterday morning while we were trying to figure out our strategy for the day, my wife was on the phone with her closest friend in Dayton. "She said she was just missing the sound of my voice." I'm so glad for her to have a friend who feels that way about her.
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