St. George & Fr. Ron Rolheiser
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- the cult of St. George originated in the Middle East, among Eastern Christians in the Holy Land. Here's the bas-relief on the sarcophagus of his tomb in Lot, Israel
Nope, I'm not aware of any actual connection between St. George and Fr. Rolheiser, but wanted to mention both today .... George gets a picture, but Fr. Rolheiser speaks to a question I received in comments to a recent (deleted) post - a sort of "why religion" question. The person who asked seemed to say that people became Christian to be better people, to become good. That's not true for me, though, and when I read Fr. Rolheiser's post I recognized my reason - I need to hear, I'm waiting to hear, my name spoken by God in love. Here's part of his post ....
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Mystic or Unbeliever
A generation ago, Karl Rahner made the statement that there would soon come a time when each of us will either be a mystic or a non-believer.
What's implied here? ...... There has be a deeper source than outside affirmation to give us meaning, justification, and energy to continue to do what faith asks of us. What is that source?
In the gospel of John, the first words out of Jesus' mouth are a question: "What are you looking for?" Essentially everything that Jesus does and teaches in the rest of John's gospel gives an answer to that question: We are looking for the way, the truth, the life, living water to quench our thirst, bread from heaven to satiate our hunger. But those answers are partially abstract. At the end of the gospel, all of this is crystallized into one image:
On Easter Sunday morning, Mary Magdala goes out searching for Jesus. She finds him in a garden (the archetypal place where lovers meet) but she doesn't recognize him. Jesus turns to her and, repeating the question with which the gospel began, asks her: "What are you looking for?" Mary replies that she is looking for the body of the dead Jesus and could he give her any information as to where that body is. And Jesus simply says: "Mary". He pronounces her name in love. She falls at his feet
In essence, that is the whole gospel: What are we ultimately looking for? What is the end of all desire? What drives us out into gardens to search for love? The desire to hear God pronounce our names in love. To hear God, lovingly say: "Mary", "Jack", "Jennifer", "Walter".
Several years ago, I made a retreat that began with the director telling us: "I'm only going to try to do one thing with you this week, I'm going to try to teach you how to pray so that sometime (perhaps not this week or perhaps not even this year, but sometime) in prayer, you will open yourself up in such a way that you can hear God say to you - I love you! - because unless that happens you will always be dissatisfied and searching for something to give you a completeness you don't feel. Nothing will ever be quite right. But once you hear God say those words, you won't need do that restless search anymore.�
He's right. Hearing God pronounce our names in love is the core of mysticism and it is too the anchor we need when we face misunderstanding from without and depression from within ........
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posted by crystal | 11:22 AM
9 Comments:
Crystal, I think I saw a 'hint' of my comment in your post. You would know I would think your tendency is not in agreement with what I think the obligations of a Christian are. I believe B16 echoed almost word for word my position. Let's change that. I believe his message was very similar to what I said. We need to 'come out of ourselves to truly love God and to carry out his will.' I believe the quote you give is talking about one way we can find His will; not just a process and an end in itself. Does not the mystic desire to 'unite' with God for a purpose i.e. to know his will? And is his will only just to be concerned with ourselves? Jack
Crystal,
I think anyone who has read your blog for any length of time knows that you struggle mightily with the concern about whether or not you have been "good" enough to deserve being loved by God.
The Bible is full of demands for justice, and for us to act justly and lovingly towards one another, but in the end, it is about grace. For all of my differences with the reformers, they do deserve credit for bringing the principle of 'justification by faith' back into play. At the end of our lives, we'll all throw ourselves on the mercy of the court, and the question is, do we believe in a benevolent, loving God who means us well, or a wrathful God who means to destroy us?
You're referring in this post to another recent post about sexual abuse in which you pointed out that you had been a victim of sexual abuse yourself. We all know what that can do to one's psyche and to one's self esteem... Do you need to be challenged on whether or not you are a "good" person by the standards of Christian obligation? I think you challenge yourself on that more than anyone visiting here has a right to.
In my opinion, you don't need that.
Jack,
Ignatius of Loyola, who wrote the Spiritual Exercises and who's been kind of my mentor in religion, has people get to know and love God in relationship, and then that love prmpts them to help Jesus in his mission, doing good acts. Ignatius si famous for saying that love is best shown in deeds not words, so he does get the importyance of helping others.
So I'm not really disagreeing with you but rather putting the emphasis on the first part of a two part process, while you seem to be putting the emphasis on the second part. The twp parts go together, I think, but I'm still stuck in the first part.
On thing I don't believe is the idea that we need to diminish ourselves to be able to be good, to be loved by God and to love God. I think it's only when people have a healthy appreciation of themselves that they're very good at loving others. Or at least that's what I'd like to think.
Jeff,
I have felt like a bad person since I was a kid. When I was six my mother said I was so bad she was sending me to an orphandage - she packed a suitcase for me, a taxi came, only at the last minute did she say she was just trying to scare me.
I want to think that Jesus/God loves people as they are .... maybe that's what makes them good in a way, maybe they're loved into goodness. I read once in one of James Alison's books about people chosen by God. He said they were not chosen because they were holy .... they were holy because they were chosen.
But I think then that the authentic effect of that being loved/chosen is to love and help others - not out of duty or to not get in trouble, but as a genuine wish to share the good thing that's happened to you.
Hypothetically speaking :)
As usual, Crystal, well said. I happen to know a good deal about the effect of sexual abuse and its frightening damage. No, not me, but the closest person to me. So if the comment from Jeff was directed at me I say...well I won't say it. You meet all kinds on blogs. You are not afraid to have different perpectives (how apt) on your blog. Many blogs just want people who kiss up to them. Jack
Newman: We find God by being holy. We are not holy because we found God. Just another "Perspective." Which makes your blog so damn good.
Crystal, with apologies for intruding, upon reading your post I couldn't resist sharing the quotation below (particularly the 2 sentences that I've marked in bold). It seems very resonant with the view stated in your post that: "Hearing God pronounce our names in love is the core of mysticism and it is too the anchor we need ..." Also that this mystic awareness is best developed through prayer. The quotation:
"Indeed, the chief reason for the evils now rampant in society is a lack of spirituality. The materialistic civilization of our age has so much absorbed the energy and interest of mankind, that people in general no longer feel the necessity of raising themselves above the forces and conditions of their daily material existence. There is not sufficient demand for things that we should call spiritual to differentiate them from the needs and requirements of our physical existence. The universal crisis affecting mankind is, therefore, essentially spiritual in its causes. The spirit of the age, taken on the whole, is irreligious. ...
It is this condition, so sadly morbid, into which society has fallen, that religion seeks to improve and transform. For the core of religious faith is that mystic feeling that unites man with God. This state of spiritual communion can be brought about and maintained by means of meditation and prayer. And this is the reason why Bahá'u'lláh has so much stressed the importance of worship. It is not sufficient for a believer to merely accept and observe the teachings. He should, in addition, cultivate the sense of spirituality, which he can acquire chiefly by the means of prayer. The Bahá'í Faith, like all other Divine religions, is thus fundamentally mystic in character. Its chief goal is the development of the individual and society, through the acquisition of spiritual virtues and powers. It is the soul of man that has first to be fed. And this spiritual nourishment prayer can best provide. Laws and institutions, as viewed by Bahá'u'lláh, can become really effective only when our inner spiritual life has been perfected and transformed. Otherwise religion will degenerate into a mere organization, and become a dead thing.
"The believers, particularly the young ones, should therefore fully realize the necessity of praying. For prayer is absolutely indispensable to their inner spiritual development, and this, already stated, is the very foundation and purpose of the Religion of God."
-- Shoghi Effendi, Guardian of the Baha'i Faith, 8 December 1935 in a letter to an individual (Baha'i) believer
Hi John. Thanks for commenting :)
I guess prayer is the meeting between a person and God. Without that, religion would seem pretty dead to me, although I know that it isn't that way for everyone.
Crystal, I completely agree. :)
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