God Calling

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Benedictine, coming home, fear, frailty, heart, Hosea, living deeply, new life, return, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Weston Priory

In the early 1970s the Benedictine monks of Weston Priory in Vermont began a music ministry that has enhanced the spiritual growth of innumerable people over the past half century. One of the most beloved of their early compositions that still appears in church hymnals and touches hearts of those who desire relationship with God, even while knowing human frailty, is Hosea. It is based on passages from the book of the prophet Hosea in the Hebrew Scriptures, which is one of the most tender texts in the Bible as it recounts the relationship of Hosea and his harlot wife, Gomer – a representation of God’s relationship with Israel.

Those words in this morning’s lectionary (HOS 2:16-22) float through my mind and call me back to the song. The music itself is full of longing while the words simply and directly present God’s desire for us. It sings in my heart this morning as I listen to it again on YouTube.

God calls: Come back to me with all your heart. Don’t let fear keep us apart. Trees do bend, though straight and tall. So must we to others’ call. Long have I waited for your coming home to me and living deeply our new life.

How can I resist?

 

 

 

 

 

Sinners All

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blessing. wisdom. humility, divine love, failures, frailty, Jesus, Mark, perfection, PopeFrancis, righteous, sinners, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, unconditional love, wholeness

In today’s gospel (MK 2:13-17) when he is asked why he is eating “with sinners and tax collectors,” Jesus answers that “those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do.” Just in case they don’t get the point he adds: “I did not come to call the righteous but sinners.” I always wondered how the people at the table felt when he announced to the Pharisees and the scribes (who were not the dinner guests) that he knew he was eating with sinners. Most of us would be horrified to be put in that category; we would much rather believe that our sins are well-hidden. My perspective has shifted on this point, however, as I’ve gotten older and practiced letting go of what I consider to be my failures. The recognition that perfection might be a goal for the end of life, but only if it means “wholeness” as some have come to define it, is much less anxiety producing. A more sensible way to be is to live in the present, accepting myself as I am and trying to accept others that way too.

Although this way of being is more easily said than done, Pope Francis has been quite helpful in the consideration. When he announced to the world, “I am a sinner,” some could have thought he was just trying to help the rest of us think better of ourselves. I have come to appreciate that what he was really doing was embracing the totality of the human condition and acknowledging that no one is exempt from failure to choose the good – and even to be downright mean on occasion. If this holy man who has electrified the world with his loving, expansive touch can admit his frailty with an honesty that makes me believe he means what he says, why would I not follow his example?

Today I pray a blessing on Pope Francis for his wisdom and humility and for the genuine expressions of love that he pours out in word and deed wherever he goes. And I ask God’s blessing on all of us who are, indeed, sinners – that we might know the embrace of a God who longs to lift us from our sins with the message that divine love is unconditional and that we are, indeed, enfolded in that love.