Torah of the Heart

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Ancient Songs Sung Anew, conversation with God, covenant, joy, love, psalm 119, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, worship

Yesterday our Sophia Center gathering for “Lunch With the Psalms” was so deep and meaningful I wanted to give everyone the opportunity to share in the reflections on Psalm 119: 41-48. I invite you to find a friend and have that conversation. If you prefer, call on our Divine Friend and have the conversation with God.

For the sake of the covenant we keep between us, Lord, let your love descend and hold me fast. And let your word be that which speaks to all who taunt and follow after me. Allow my mouth to utter words of truth, this Torah of the heart, which I shall trust and keep forever. And then in freedom I will walk upon your path and know these precepts are yours alone. I’ll speak them as an overwhelming power to all the rulers of the earth and unashamed. I’ll bind them to my heart with deepest joy. For I love and worship all you love, my Lord; I meditate upon this inner bread. (Ancient Songs Sung Anew, p. 303)

I strongly suggest reading the text aloud as the words shimmer with a beauty that is deeper than words and approached only by heart-language heard in our own voice.

Just Love…

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Corinthians, God Is Just Love, Ken Whitt, love, reflect, St. Paul, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

If I were trying to give a definition to a being from another planet who asked: “What does the word love mean?” I could easily use today’s text from 1 COR 12:31-13-13 as an answer. This lectionary reading is known by some as an “ode to love.” It speaks not only of what love is but also what it is not. You have likely heard it at a wedding at least once. It is full of hyperbole, something St. Paul often used for effect. If we pay attention, however, and consider his words, stripped down and reflected in human (and “angelic”) behaviors, we might come to the conclusion that he is right in his assessment. (You know: If I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge…if I have faith so as to move mountains…)

If every day, in everything, love was the motivating force and manner of expression, we would be living as God created us to live and the world would be the creation that God imagined in the beginning. That presumes, of course, that everyone in the world would have to buy into this way of living and it would take some time for us to practice thinking and acting that way.

But what a concept! Can you even imagine it? Some time ago my friend T.C. had a poster created for her workshops on positive thinking that said, “If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it.” My friend Ken Whitt just wrote a book about it, entitled God Is Just Love, soon to be published.*

The first step, it seems to me, is to reflect deeply and often on St. Paul’s words. Next comes the willingness to find small ways in our thinking and our speech to put it into practice. Then more practice and greater “love projects” undertaken until it becomes who we are. Why not start (or re-start) today and, if necessary, every day, because, as I noted recently in this blog, what the world needs now is love, sweet love. It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of…

*I’ll keep you posted on the publication of Ken’s book. I’ve read it and would recommend it to everyone, especially parents and those who love children and want us to survive without destroying the planet for a long time to come!

Mother Teresa

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judge, love, Mother Teresa, Peace, saint, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today the world celebrates Saint Teresa of Calcutta, known during her life as “Mother Teresa” because of her tireless work of caring for the poorest of the poor and dying. Inspiring women and men not only in India but all over the world, she died on September 5, 1997 and was named a saint of the Roman Catholic Church in 2016.

This tiny woman who impacted the way the world saw care for the poor spoke often of the importance of small efforts toward love. Here are some of her words of advice. We would do well to allow the words to enter deeply into us because they come easily to mind but may take a long time to seep into the heart.

There are no great things, only small things with great love.

If you judge people, you have no time to love them.

If you can’t feed a hundred people, feed just one.

If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.

Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier.

Hero of Happiness

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compassion, Dalai Lama, kind, kindness, living saint, love, responsibility, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today is the birthday of the Dalai Lama, the revered world leader of Tibetan Buddhism. He is 85 years old today. It has been my privilege—along with large crowds of others—to be in his presence twice in my life. In spite of all the pain and struggle in his life, one cannot fail to notice the buoyancy and deep love that emanates from this holy world leader, affecting all in his path. I am grateful to live in a time that allows people of all nations and religions access to such a saint, such a down-to-earth model of how to live. It is my joy and privilege to share some of his “quotable quotes” in celebration of his birthday. We would do well to reflect on his words and follow his example today. (Remember to smile.)

♥ Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.

♥ When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive—to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.

♥ Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive.

♥ Today, more than ever before, life must be characterized by a sense of Universal responsibility, not only nation to nation and human to human, but also human to other forms of life.

♥ If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.

♥ My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.

♥ If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.

Go Deeper

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coronavirus, injustice, Jesus, love, love your neighbor as yourself, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today’s gospel reading from Matthew (5:43-48) is one that many of us could probably recite from memory, do a cursory survey of all the people in our lives and come at the end to a conclusion of our innocence. But what if we expand the search for enemies to people we don’t know personally but of whom we have heard through the media or in some other way? Jesus is clear in his directive about relationship. It’s all about love. Have you guessed the text I’m considering?

Jesus said to his disciples, “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. If you love those who love you, what recompense will you have?…“

These are difficult days in our country and around the world. Protests of racial injustice are continuing everywhere and police brutality seems to increase daily. Republicans accuse democrats of all manner of collusion with the enemy and the democrats vilify republicans for their unwillingness to compromise on any of the Congressional agenda. Good people are swept up in crowds of looters and fights break out over the refusal of some to wear a mask to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

I have read this gospel many times and although I get to a place of sadness for all the dissension and enmity in the world, I never end up thinking that I lack a degree of love for everyone, abstract as it may be. Today I know that to be the point of what Jesus is saying. Love is never an abstraction. It’s the ability to dig deep down and consider why people act as they do. What are their life circumstances? (Were they abused as children? Are they starving for food? For love?…) Who has loved them in their lives?

Until we have faced our own lack of love for even one person, we are not “perfect” in God’s eyes. It isn’t about being perfect in our work or our talents. It’s about perfection in our willingness to love even the most unlovable. The good news is, I believe, that God does love all of those striving toward that love. We may never reach perfection in it. Quite frankly, I doubt that we ever will, perfectly. But it’s our effort toward the goal that seems to count the most. And right now, we need to put more effort into that goal than ever before and look to ourselves rather than to our enemies as we live into each day. (But don’t forget to pray for those whom you call “enemy.”)

Love Expands Us

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generosity, jealousy, love, Meg Wheatley, perseverance, Sisters of St. Joseph, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Because I lingered in the kitchen with my coffee this morning, it’s already 9:30 and the day is in full swing. Lots of activities await. How to go about everything is the question. I will likely need to make a list! On days like this I just try to breathe—especially if everyone else is about their own tasks and seeming focused. It is a luxury to sit looking out my window at a gloriously fresh morning, hearing the birds all across the expanse of our property and beyond. They are perhaps the busiest of all, if not the loudest!

Needing help, I turn to Meg Wheatley and am stopped on the quote that introduces a page entitled “Jealousy.” Scientist Humberto Maturana says:

Love is the only emotion that expands intelligence.

I was about to leave it at that and let you fend for yourself but then I thought about our weekend and the wonderful experience of our leadership selections. The generosity of the Sisters who offered themselves to us in service for the next five years was extraordinary. Most universal and important in their presentations were their expressions of love for our Congregation. It gave me pause to consider Meg Wheatley’s reflection on jealousy and generosity that expanded on the Maturana quote.

She says: When something good happens to someone else – another organization wins a grant, a friend gets a promotion, someone else gets the opportunity we wanted – we can activate either emotion. We can question whether there’s enough to go around. We can wonder whose need is greater, or just assume that we needed it more. We can be happy for their good fortune, or bemoan the loss of ours.

As closely as jealousy and generosity are, they create very different consequences. If jealousy dominates, we turn inward, shrivel our hearts, and lose strength. If generosity grows, we grow also. Our world expands. We realize there’s enough to go around. We realize we don’t need everything we thought we did. The world in general feels more reliable, more trustworthy, more enjoyable.

The world expands from the inside out – it’s our hearts that have enlarged. We not only feel more loving, we’re also more open and aware. We see more, we take in more, we let in more.

Jealousy is such a waste of a good human heart. (Perseverance, p. 74-5)

So on we go, Sisters of St, Joseph, founded to be “the Congregation of the Great Love of God.”

The Power of Intention

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enlighten, fire of faith, Holy Spirit, intention, Joyce Rupp, love, Peace, Pentecost, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Another Saturday…perhaps a good time to take a breath, to put to rest all the troubles of the week now ending and to pray for more peaceful days in the weeks to come. We began the week with the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. We might ask ourselves how we have kept the fire of faith alive – even just during this week. How will we do so going forward? Here’s a brief prayer from Joyce Rupp to encourage us:

Flame of Love, Enkindler of Hearts, enlighten my mind to recognize where my love has grown dim. Spark renewed desire in my heart to give myself ever more completely to your service. Beam your grace through my being so I respond freely. May the fruits of your love be harvested through me. I will share them generously. Amen. (Prayer Seeds, p. 174)

This prayer reminds me that it is not always what we achieve that is important but how we go about the doing – our intention and motivation – that is key to “success.”

A Familiar Voice

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Good Shepherd, I love you., love, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, virtual hugs

Every once in awhile now, if I need a happy moment before I go to bed, I watch video clips of babies who are listening to their parents speak — or really croon to them. If the adults are not urging their babies to say “Mama” or “Daddy,” the desire of each is to hear their child say “I love you” in response to hearing the words from the parents themselves. These are very young children – generally probably from 3 to 9 months old. When anything remotely akin to the sounds of those three most precious words come out of the baby’s mouth, the stunned joy of the adult is priceless. It’s a beautiful exchange and clearly can be seen as a conscious effort on the part of the baby. (You probably have to see it to get the full effect of such an exchange.)

“I love you.” How we long to be the recipient of such a phrase! Sometimes it is our actions that can transmit that reality and sometimes someone we love only has to say our name for us to get the message. Sometimes it only takes a look and, in some cases, love is an energy that flows from a person to an entire group gathered. That’s the “trademark” of a person who understands that love is a consistent practice, sometimes hard-won but never failing. Think of people you know like this. What comes to my mind is the love on Pope St. John XXIII’s face and the tears in his eyes on the day that the Second Vatican Council began. I can see my father’s pure gaze as he saw me emerge from the crowd once at the airport. I clearly see my mother in the depths of Alzheimer’s disease, smiling as I waited for the best greeting in the world each time I saw her: “I love you, Honey! I love you best…” (which she said often to anyone that came to visit her).

In John’s gospel this morning we hear Jesus say that “he calls his own sheep by name and they recognize his voice.” Unconditional love: that’s the way sheep know the one who loves them best, as do those babies, as do we. Often, as now, we long for their voice, their touch – the totality of their presence to us. I’ll wager that we can, if we try, sense what it feels like in this season when we need to count on virtual hugs. If you sit very still and try very hard (or not at all) can you hear the voice of God calling you with those words that mean the most? That look that tells you all you need to know? May it be so on this Sunday.

Zooming Along

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communication, consciousness, gratitude, information, love, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, virtual connection, Zoom

Each day now it becomes more apparent to me how much life has changed. As I say that, phrases come flowing forward from the recesses of my brain, like “in the twinkling of an eye.” That one isn’t really accurate because the change has been incremental and continues as the virus has spread but sometimes it seems as if “the rug has been pulled out from under us.” That seems a more accurate assessment because it is about the recognition and/or the acknowledgement of the shifts that has reached each of us in similar (but probably not matching) ways.

For many of us, the greatest change is in the way that we receive and share information. While there are many relatively new platforms for connecting, one that seems simple and therefore quite accessible to many people is ZOOM! I have been personally grateful for this way of virtual connection for about five years now as it allows me to join “nun” meetings in Albany, New York that would otherwise necessitate five hours of driving to and fro. In addition I am now connected with my Sisters and other people all across this country and even sometimes across the world.

While still not as satisfying as a “face-to-face” encounter, technology has facilitated connections that would be impossible without it. Paying attention to that fact reminds me to give thanks for the great minds that have created the programs now available to us. From that consciousness I am led to celebrate those scientists who are working diligently to find new ways to heal us of this pandemic and those who care for our sisters and brothers infected by the virus.

I could spend my days now zooming from one thought stream to another! It does seem that “everybody’s doing it!” What I hope will always be my companion on these journeys is a huge amount of gratitude and love for those I encounter along these virtual pathways. I wish the same for all of us.

Of Sun and Snow

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accepting, Asian Journal, love, present, spirit, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

On a morning like this when the sun is shining, accenting the beauty of an April snow, I look for words from Thomas Merton, having nothing of my own worthy of this glorious scene. From his Asian Journal here is the prayer I found:

O God, in accepting one another wholeheartedly, fully, completely, we accept You, and we thank You, and we adore You, and we love You with our whole being, because our being is in Your being, our spirit is rooted in Your spirit. Fill us then with love, and let us be bound together with love as we go our diverse ways, united in this one spirit which makes You present in the world, and which makes You witness to the ultimate reality that is love. Love has overcome. Love is victorious. Amen. (Thomas Merton: A Book of Hours, p.156-7)

And I would add on this Thursday in the Octave of Easter, ALLELUIA1