No Babbling!

Tags

Lent, Matthew, Our Father, prayer, The Lord's Prayer, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I find myself sometimes in conversation—more often as I get older—saying to whoever seems to be listening: “I’m babbling, so I’ll stop now…” I smiled, therefore, when I saw the gospel reading for today from Matthew 6. Listen:

Jesus said to his disciples: In praying, do not babble like the pagans who think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them. Your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

What follows is The Lord’s Prayer, a great example of how to be concise yet meaningful. No wonder it is prayed by people all over the world who are of all Christian denominations. Today may be a good day to take apart the prayer and reflect on each of the thoughts, to go deeper in considering what they might mean for your life now. A lovely reflection for a Tuesday at the beginning of Lent, don’t you think? Think of how many people in the world are saying this prayer today. Why not join in virtually to that great throng?

Isaiah’s Punch

Tags

abstinence, fasting, homeless, hunger, Isaiah, Lent, oppressed, poor, response, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

In a contest of people who “tell it like it is,” the Prophet Isaiah would always (it seems to me) win hands down! The words “fast and abstinence” had great meaning when I was a child who always knew that there were rules about eating during Lent. We understood that our two smaller meals – usually breakfast and lunch – could not equal, or at least not be larger when put together, than our main meal and we worked hard at making sure of that. And there was also the question of dessert…when to have it and when to pass it up. This was serious business and whether we knew Isaiah or not, we knew that God meant business.

I doubt we ever heard the scathing criticism in Chapter 58 of Isaiah’s prophecy that we read today. He speaks for God in his estimation of the people’s fasting, saying: Lo, on your fast day you carry out your own pursuits and drive all your laborers. Yes, your fast ends in quarreling and fighting, striking with wicked claw. …Is this the manner of fasting I wish? Had we been truly awake when we heard the next part, we might have wondered if God was speaking to us or if it was some mean taskmaster! But listen and see if you can find yourself in this kind of attitude and action. Did we ever wonder whether the practice of controlling our eating had anything to do with our consciousness during the rest the rest of our day?

This, rather, is the fasting that I wish: releasing those bound unjustly, untying the thongs of the yoke; setting free the oppressed, breaking every yoke; sharing your bread with the hungry, sheltering the oppressed and the homeless, clothing the naked when you see them, and not turning your back on your own…

Things seem much more dire now when there are so many hungry and poor people in our midst, more homeless and oppressed people…What do we do for them? Do we notice? How do we help? How is it that our light can shine in response to such great need? All God asks is our best. What is that for you?

Renewal

Tags

40 days, Corinthians, forgiveness, Joel, Lent, Lenten journey, psalm 51, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

It seems strange to say that today is a day that people long for – make themselves ready for even – when the Scriptures are full of commands. Listen:

*Blow a trumpet in Zion! Proclaim a fast, call an assembly. Gather the people, notify the congregation; assemble the elders, gather the children…” (Joel 2)

* A clean heart create for me, O God, and a steadfast spirit renew within me… Give me back the joy of your salvation and a willing spirit sustain in me…(PS 51)

* Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation! (2 Cor 5)

Taking each of those statements at a time – one after the other – from today’s lectionary readings – should bring us to a place of longing…an interior “heart space” where we can hear God say to us, “Even now, return to me with your whole heart, with fasting, and weeping, and mourning; rend your hearts, not your garments, and return to the Lord, your God. For gracious and merciful is he, slow to anger, rich in kindness…even now.”

It’s as if we’re being given a “Get-out-of-jail-free” card…as if we’ve won the lottery and all is forgotten…as if we a as clean as new-fallen snow and innocent of all our faults and poor choices – sins even of the most grievous kind…because our God is a God like no other, the one who forgives, and forgives, and forgives again.

Today we start over, as if we were just born. What will you do with this gift? How will you spend these 40 days of Lent? Are you up to the challenge of Divine Love?

Always Another Chance

Tags

frustration, Jesus, Lent, Mark, one more chance, pandemic, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

It seems – in light of recent events – that there is no normal in our world and yet we continue to survive. We are in the midst of the most horrific pandemic our age that is taking lives wantonly…and yet now, less than a year into it, we have not one but at least three different vaccines that seem able to stem the tide of the disease. We have had four years of a government that had no preparation for governing, whose members floundered and then got replaced with others equally unqualified…and yet now we have a president prepared by almost four decades in national politics to repair what has been undone because he understands how to govern and is, in addition, a humane, upright individual who knows suffering and love and is willing to do his best for us all. It is as if we have been given “one more chance” and, when we fail to recognize it or to step up to the challenge, God says, “All right, I’ll give you another chance at paying attention…just one more time…”

When will we learn? The frustration of Jesus is seen this morning in Mark’s gospel (Ch. 8) when he says: “Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear? And do you not remember?…”

Lent begins tomorrow. Today is Mardi Gras…Will there be wild dancing, eating and drinking – regardless of the rules about masks and social distancing? Will we pay attention and perhaps take the forty days to come asking ourselves the questions that Jesus asked today? Do you not understand or comprehend?…Will this time be different?

Early and Late

Tags

Lent, perspective, psalm 90, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I started up the stairs with the intention of an early post this morning but – as often happens – many things intervened. I had, however, already read Psalm 90, the lectionary psalm for the day, so a melody was already on replay inside me as I walked. Whether good fortune or not I am often “gifted” with a song in my head for a day or more when that happens. Today was no different but today I know it to be good fortune, just the kind of reminder I need in the run-up to Lent. Here’s the refrain (even though it took me till 1:00PM to say it!). See if you can accept and affirm it perhaps as a mantra for the entire six weeks.

In every age, O God, You have been our refuge. In every age, O God, You have been our hope.

If said repeatedly each day when reviewing happenings, it might put a new spin on things, helping to find a new perspective sometimes, or a new level of trust in the events of the day. Even if none of that happens, you may grow more positive, knowing that God is present in every event of every day.

Unconditional Acceptance

Tags

acceptance, enemies, forgiveness, Jesus, Lent, love your enemies, Matthew, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Beginning with yesterday’s readings, the Lenten path grows more challenging. Not only are we to “make for ourselves a new heart and a new spirit” (yesterday’s challenge). Today calls us to reach out even further when we encounter others — especially those others whom we would never wish to meet. Here it is from the mouth of Jesus:

You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for He makes the sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust. (MT 5: 43 –>)

Who are your enemies? Even if it is likely that there may be little chance of you ever meeting an enemy face to face, can you really say there is no one on earth that you could not welcome into the circle of your embrace? How might you move toward acceptance? And, with steadfast love of God, might you hope to come someday to the forgiveness that bespeaks the love of God for all creatures?

A New Moment

Tags

a new heart, a new spirit, consciousness, Lent, Psalm 130, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I sit here wondering if I need to recant my words of yesterday about asking for help from other people in our journey of life. It’s today’s gospel acclamation that stopped me. I had just read the verses of one of my favorite Lenten psalms, savoring the best line that acclaims: “My soul waits for the Lord more than sentinels wait for the dawn.” (PS 130) I was even amazed as I looked out my bedroom window to see the sun totally up and blazing already, underscoring the fact that my waiting for God’s action in my day is true and ongoing…Then I read the following:

Cast away from you all the crimes you have committed, says the Lord, and make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit.

That slammed into my brain with a force that wiped out every other thought…for about 30 seconds, and then the questions started flooding in. “Wait a minute,” I said. “I thought that was God’s job! Haven’t I always read that God would make a clean heart in me, washing away all my sins?” (etc.) And then: “How does that score with yesterday’s post about letting people help me?” (Sigh…)

The answer seems to be my willingness to suspend my ordinary way of thinking and move to a different kind of consciousness where all is one and God is all in all. I would like to simplify by using images like all the ingredients that go into a cake to make the one cake delicious…but that seems to cheapen the experience somehow. So I will leave it there and hold the mystery of the moment in the knowing of something that became clear in this graced morning in the sunshine.

Small Things

Tags

do small things with great love, Easter, Lent, Saint Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

A good reminder today in this early stage of Lent comes from today’s “Saint of the Day” page of the franciscanmedia.org website. Like St. Theresa of Lisieux, known as “the Little Flower,” St. Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows contracted tuberculosis and died at the young age of 24 years. Like her, he had a burning desire to enter a religious community from childhood and, as Mother Teresa would say, “to do small things with great love.” Rather than planning a rigorous program of Lenten practices – and perhaps falling short in the long run – we might do better to follow the wise counsel of these saints.

Blessings on your conscious effort as we walk this path toward Easter.

Beginning Again

Tags

Ash Wednesday, Lent, Scripture, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

So it begins…six weeks of traveling toward Jerusalem with Jesus. It seems that we just celebrated the welcome of “the baby Jesus” into the world – and so we have. Our attention to the seasons of our faith ought to keep up with the speed of what seems an accelerate passage of time, but really the calendar is still the same. It’s just that the acceleration of change in this world and our consciousness has increased. Science can barely keep up so it isn’t so strange that we have difficulty doing so.

The readings for today have many encouraging words for how to move through the season of Lent. Here are my favorites that simply call us to attention to our own lives and actions while asking God for help. Think on these things.

>A clean heart create for me, O God, and a steadfast spirit renew within me.

>Brothers and sisters, we are ambassadors for Christ, as if God were appealing through us. We implore you, be reconciled to God!

>If today you hear his voice, Harden not your hearts.

>When you pray, go to your inner room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret.

>(My personal favorite) Even now, says the Lord, return to me with your whole heart…Rend your hearts, not your garments, and return to the Lord. For gracious and merciful is he…even now!

Mardi Gras

Tags

abstention, Ash Wednesday, fasting, Lent, Mardi Gras, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, transformation

New Orleans is a great city to visit. The best thing about it, in my opinion, is the music. My best memory of the only time I visited “The Big Easy” is sitting on the curb in the French Quarter (because there was no possibility of squeezing one more person inside) listening to the best jazz music possible where the instruments themselves speak a language of life in all its joys and trials. I wouldn’t want to be there today, however, as it is Mardi Gras (“Fat Tuesday”) and a million guests are expected in the French Quarter for today’s celebrations.

I did some “surfing” this morning to see if I could find anything about the real meaning of this day when revelers follow the dictum of “eat, drink and be merry…” but there isn’t much attention given to the “morning after” where the revelry ends and the meaning lies.

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the season of Lent, when Christians traditionally turn their attention to fasting and prayer, good deeds and sacrifice in order to reflect on the sufferings of Jesus in the lead-up to Easter. These days the strictures of the season have been relaxed. Rules of “fasting and abstention” from meat apply only to two days instead of every Friday and meal size restriction isn’t generally talked about any more. Giving up candy for Lent doesn’t seem as relevant; doing good deeds has become more the norm. Maturity seems to hold sway these days in our Lenten living.

The goal of any Lenten practice should not end with the celebration of Easter. Transformation is (and always has been) the goal. We pray and reflect more deeply during this season to follow the example of Jesus, loving more universally, living more honestly and giving more generously of ourselves.

Would that these weeks of practice would be so powerful that we would never “go back” but always move to deeper and broader living in God. It is possible. Why not make that the goal this year?