J. Robin Whitley's Blog, page 8
February 13, 2019
Reclaiming Love on Valentine’s Day
Tomorrow is the day we all hope to celebrate love. Valentine’s Day for the divorcee, however, turns into another “bah-humbug”. I’ve heard grumbling that the holiday is probably one developed by Hallmark in order to sell more gifts. In truth, the celebration day of Saint Valentine is older than any U.S. trademark. Celebrated since 496, the Romans came up with the holiday in mid-February.
Any time we celebrate love, it should be good right? I know that as a romantic person, I’ve always wanted Valentine’s Day to be special for my beloved even if I was broke. The day isn’t always a good one because life doesn’t stop just because we want to celebrate love. Star-crossed lovers and mismatched couples can find the day frustrating as well.
Though I begin to move out of the depression caused by my divorce, I am extremely suspicious about romance now. In the weeks leading up to Valentine’s Day, I found myself wanting to skip over the date completely or delete all social media accounts for that day, so I didn’t have to look at other sappy proclamations of love. What is wrong with this picture? The truth is, I believe in the power of love.
As a result, I decided last week that somehow, I was going to “reclaim” the day of love in a way that is meaningful to me. I’m not the only person to have been divorced [image error]recently? I know I can’t be the only person who dreads the holiday either. How could I reclaim the day? I started with the kid’s Valentine’s Day cards available at Dollar General.
I found some with a message I could stomach that hopefully wouldn’t scare the recipients of those I wanted to share with. Where the card had the “To and From” I simply added To: you, From: me. Creativity gave me an idea to write a positive note on a few. On others, I like the message of the card itself say what needed to be said. My hope was that as I share them, at the very least they will give the inner child of each human a smile.
Going to church this past Sunday I meant to take my cards with me. The wonderful people at Holy Cross Episcopal have brought much healing into my life after the divorce. My dog, Birdie, always rides with me to church though she stays in the Fiat. I was so busy making sure she would be warm enough that I forgot the cards. Didn’t remember them in fact until a friend at church, Bruce, stepped up to hand me a frame wrapped up in a baggie. He knows I’m a lesbian, so I knew that he wasn’t giving me a valentine in the sense that men often do for women. When I arrived home, I opened to read this wonderful message as a powerful reminder:
Love doesn’t make the world go round, it makes the ride worthwhile.
It was as though Bruce had listened to my prayer. Or perhaps God put a bug in Bruce’s ears that I needed to be reminded of the value of love. Love has been the most important aspect of all my life, vocation, and music. After all these years of a beautiful life, why would I give up totally on love now?
There’s no reason, of course, other than grief. The stages of grief take however long they take. The longer a person has been in a relationship, the longer the grief may take. In my case, I thought we were happily married so it’s taking longer to get to a point of being interested in others. That doesn’t mean I need to harden my heart to love, however. Love at its very best is working for the well-being of another and I can do that even while I grieve.
Another way to celebrate Valentine’s Day after a divorce, separation, or death is to be gentle with yourself. Don’t expect great joy. Spend the day with your favorite book, person, or dog (or cat or bird). Take yourself out for dinner to a place you always wanted to go but your ex didn’t want to go and try. Treat yourself gently and kindly because grief is a strange process and though there are many ways of looking at the stages of grief, no one knows what you need but you.
If the day still fills you with dread or misery, I encourage you to talk to a priest, pastor, or counselor who will listen to you and be kind. Many are caught up in difficult relationships. Some may be abusive and if so, a support system needs to be built. Life’s tragedies and trials can also throw kinks into otherwise good and healthy relationships. With love and gentleness, you can find your way back to a love that reminds you of the goodness of life.
________________
How to Know if You Are Stuck
Signs of a Healthy Relationship
Getting out of an abusive relationship?
Lesbian Relationships & Abuse
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January 18, 2019
Wonder
Wonder is a word with different meanings. I get caught up in word definitions. My mind gets caught up in words. My heart gets caught up in meaning, working together with my mind to parse out what this life is for me and how to live it best. Upon first recognition, wonder came to me in the form of questioning. Questions always swirl in my being as a divine koan whether or not it’s true.
I wonder what G-d has planned for me now? I had planned to preach over the weekend at the church where I had served as a pastor. Had worked to be careful and not over commit beforehand or afterward. My best-laid plans fell through of course. Life has a way of reminding us that we are not the ones in charge. Life itself is.
[image error]Rime Ice 2019
“Life has a way of reminding us…” That’s a phrase I remember writing in other reflections. Human beings are forgetful. We forget the important things of life all of the time. We forget to eat right or follow the instructions of the doctor. We forget this and that and before you know it, time slipped by. I was no longer young and invincible. Now it’s hard to believe that I thought I was ever invincible.
“There are all different kinds of voices calling you to all different kinds of work, and the problem is to find out which is the voice of God rather than of Society, say, or the Super-ego, or Self-Interest.” ~Frederick Buechner on Vocation
Standing to look out the door of my mountain home I pray about the days to come and what it means for me as a called person. In the past, I know I can say I was called to ministry. Through music, retreat leadership, word and sacrament, I followed that call. Even as I write I follow that call but in a different form. The standing still and quietly led me to be present in the moment. At that moment, the sun came out over the distant mountains and I was struck with wonder at its beauty.
Eureka! Wonder! That is my task in life. No. Wonder, that is my largest gift. Wonder comes to me as easily
[image error] 2018 Foxglove (digitalis)
now as it did when I was a child. As a child, youth, teenager, I often got in trouble for taking too many photos of flowers, fields, and trees. Film was expensive then and mama always wanted me to have people
in pictures. She said she didn’t mind me taking pictures but it was expensive to develop them. So, please get photos of people if you are taking an entire roll of film; at least get some people in some of them.
I chuckle at the memory now. I don’t have many actual photographs of my adult life because I couldn’t afford to have that many developed. My vocation choices have always been those that have meaning, but that didn’t assure a healthy bank account. In those times when it did include money, I was mired in college or seminary debt. I don’t regret that either. There were plenty of times then when I wondered how I would survive. Now I wonder at the beauty of the long life I have had thus far.
Yesterday, days after I started this writing, the dog and I walked out in the fluffy, new snow. She pranced as we walked to the mailbox. I may have danced had the snow not been so slick. I have yet to dread it like so many others do. Nature continues to inspire and heal me. It’s no wonder I am filled with awe and struck by joy.
[image error] My dog, Birdie loves snow as much as me. 2019
Wonder can even be found in death. That lesson was taught to me while a chaplain at the Baptist Hospital in Columbia, SC. I was blessed with the opportunity to be present as many passed from this life to the next. Death caused me to wonder in a different way than life but I cannot say that it was a sad experience. Being at those deaths proved to me that there is more to us than this life.
Technical difficulties caused this post to take me longer to write than normal. In the days that passed between the beginning and the end, Mary Oliver died. She remains one of my favorite poets. She understood wonder in many ways. The first poem I ever heard of hers was quoted in a small mountain church. It makes for a perfect end to this reflection as the poet lives on in wonder.
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?—Mary Oliver
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January 10, 2019
Preaching at Advent
This coming Sunday, January 13, I will be preaching at Advent Lutheran Church in Charlotte, NC. Advent is a lovely congregation and is where I received my call to parish ministry. There are two services. One at 8:30 and the other at 11:00. Please stop by if you are in the neighborhood.
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January 1, 2019
A New Year to Love – 2019
The same power that moves the universe exists within our lives. Each individual has immense potential, and a great change in the inner dimension of one individual’s life has the power to touch others’ lives and transform society.
—Daisaku Ikeda, “On Hardship & Hope”
Dear Reader,
I wish I knew your name as you read so that I could
personalize this message. Looking through my Facebook posts and Twitter, I
realized that it’s easy for me to love. Of course, I’ve always known this and
there have been too many times it’s been my downfall.
Yet, in a world where it seems people are more and more
ostracized instead of embraced; shot instead of heard; somehow, I want you to
know I care more specifically about you as a person. Without hearing from you
directly though, it’s not possible. And because I have a large family, worked
in r attended large churches, it’s hard to keep up with the people I have met
in person.
That doesn’t mean I love you any less. There are so many
ways that love comes to us. It took me years to understand that love is more
than a warm, cozy feeling. No, I cannot say that I unconditionally love
everyone because I am human. Life has shown me time and again that I always
have more to learn about love.
However, God had different plans for my life. That is not to
say that God caused the end of my marriage because I don’t believe that one
bit. The frailty of humanity caused the end of my marriage. What saves me is
love.
Yet, the amount of love I have, however small, has made a
tremendous difference in my life and in the lives of those around me. When 2018
started, it was with the knowledge that my wife of 12 years was most likely
going to ask for a divorce. On the other side of 2018, had you asked me about
my life I would have spoken of my devastation. Since I thought I had found THE
ONE, it seemed that the rest of my life would be lived out in lonely misery.
The love shared with my wife through those years gave me a
good grounding in love. Not only love of her family but also a different
understanding of the love of self. My friends, family, and church were there
for me so that I knew I wasn’t alone. Of course, the sweet dog was my constant
and healing companion even as she grieved with me.
Because I could see the love in my past and the love that
surrounds me in the present, I often find myself continuing to say, “I
love my life.” That phrase was a constant phrase when I lived in Sylva
(the first town where I felt I really belonged). There is a belonging here too,
even though it’s different. Some part of me always felt I belonged in the
mountains even though I grew up in the flatlands. Belonging is a part of love
too.
As we start this new year, my heart is full of hope in you
and in my own life. I’m not one to make resolutions on New Year’s Day. Each day
is really a new beginning anyway. Each day I am alive, I pray for the strength
to be kind. How can I care for the earth and love my neighbor? How can I
disagree with a person but still treat the other with respect? There are still
questions of course.
“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.” ~Rainer Maria Rilke
It seems I’m learning to “love the questions” of my life. When I was younger, I loved asking questions because I wanted answers. At the very least, I wanted clues to the answers to life’s lessons. Rilke, the poet, was right that each answer only leads to another question though. If we don’t learn to love the questions of our lives, then we can be questioned to the point of madness.
When we can understand that no ONE person has all the answers, it empowers us to look at each other differently. No ONE human being can be all right and though we might think it, no one can be ALL wrong. I don’t think that a person who made only wrong choices would have survived to adulthood. I can be and often am wrong. Still, think about it.
Let’s think about how we can better live together in 2019. For me, that means how can we work for the well-being of others AS WELL AS work for our own well-being. It’s a both/and way of looking at life and it can be quite tricky to navigate. To live in such a manner requires that we LISTEN in love as well as talk of love.
My new year has started out with love, laughter, and friendship. I pray that yours has started with such gifts. Loss happens to a lot of us at this time of year. It can be a hard time of year. Still, hold on to the love.
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December 11, 2018
Flying years and poetry
New Cover for 2018 release.
It’s amazing how fast this year has flown. There have been beautiful moments, but also moments where you wonder what happened. I’m not alone in this either. Even some of the younger people I know are already talking about how time is flying. Of course, only us poets continue to talk of poetry.
Earlier this year, I had hoped to re-issue my poetry collection, More Than Knowing. It is a good collection. Life intervened to prevent me from retyping the entire book. I lost the manuscript or perhaps I thought I would never need it again. So there’s also been a bit of laziness in not wanting to have to write it all out again. I tend to write poetry with a pen and paper and then later type it. Since I had already done the hard work for the book issued in 2014, had hoped it would be easier to get this one released in a newer format.
Not so. The additional challenge is that though I type quickly, poetry is filled with emotion. More Than Knowing was written in the happiest time of my life. Going back through the book reminds me of the happiness that I get to keep. However, it also reminds me of the happiness I lost. Fortunately, much of the poetry is about nature and could also fit in here at Beech Mountain. That is the reason I am determined to finish this by the year’s end. Something good has to come out of 2018. Might as well be my book of poetry praising nature and love.
I always hope my poetry is descriptive enough that an actual photo is not needed. That you can create in your own mind a place that moves you. Yet, as I relive this poetry, I find that I want to share some of the photos I took with the poetry. I think you’re going to like this second edition even better. Take a listen to one of the poems I recorded for you today. It is a poem I mean as much now as I did when I wrote it. For each poem I read again, the message is only richer and deeper. I hope you will enjoy it again.
I Will Not Leave You
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November 22, 2018
Gratitude for You
“The greatest gift one can give is thanksgiving. In giving gifts, we give what we can spare, but in giving thanks we give ourselves.”
~Br. David Steindl-Rast
Families throughout the states celebrate thanks today. Though I do not want to proliferate the story we were told as children, I would be remiss not to mention my
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Books by Robin
gratitude for you. You, my friends who have read my books, listened to my music, and most of all, supported my dreams.
There are many ways the support has come. Words of encouragement, prayers, editing stories, taking pictures, and through your financial contributions. There are so many of you who have believed in me when I didn’t even believe in myself. Though confident in music, I am less confident in writing. I never thought I would be a public speaker; though I hoped to be a teacher.
©Rick Messina, Advent Lutheran Church, Charlotte, NC. Used with permission.
This morning, I think of a host of beautiful people I know. Most live on the East Coast of the U.S. from Maine to Florida and over to New Orleans. Then, there are other angels scattered around the world who have loved me through many difficulties and celebrated when I reached the other side.
I added photos below to just a few of the old and new friends who have changed my life. Working in churches means that I know a lot of people and many I am honored to call friends. Friends are a different kind of family. And family are also friends in their own way. Bless you. I can’t put photos of everyone because I don’t have enough time to thank all those who have made a difference in my life. Yet, I hope this post is the beginning of showing my gratitude for your presence in my life. Bless you.
[image error][image error] [image error]“Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy.” ~Thomas Merton[image error] [image error] [image error] [image error] [image error][image error] [image error]
“We are all travelers in the wilderness of this world, and the best we can find in our travels is an honest friend.”
~Robert Louis Stevenson
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November 20, 2018
Gratitude, A Way of Life
Gratitude is thankfulness, but without the gluttony, don’t you think? As we enter into the winter holiday season, my mind turns to the aspects of the holidays that we love about the holidays. Some of the holidays are religious, but others, like Thanksgiving were created by a President. These holidays have meaning for us all in different ways. Today I ask myself the ways we can celebrate family or community that aren’t filled with political incorrectness, materialism, or religious antagonism. That may be a monstrous task. Yet, our society has been in disarray to the point where we must look at our lives differently.
In my life, I always loved the Native Americans and their love for nature and the land. When, as an adult, I discovered the truth in our country’s Thanksgiving lie, I was torn. Torn because I didn’t want to celebrate what had happened to the Wampanoag, that both saddened and angered me. At the same time, Thanksgiving was the time it seemed my family got together and celebrated. The season was not as stressful as Christmas. Even as a child, I could feel the tension in family at Christmas that wasn’t there at Thanksgiving. At the Thanksgiving meal, everyone was merely peaceful and thankful.
My dear cousin married a Navajo musician and was the first to explain to me why she no longer celebrated the U.S. holiday. She is a kind woman who I know I can talk freely with and explore feelings, thoughts, and even dreams. Also, when talking with my cousin, I didn’t have to explain the tensions or dynamics of a big Southern family to her. She knew and lived a similar experience. Each year afterwards though, I think of the truth of how the Native Americans were treated, used, and then later, not only abused but massacred…some tribes to the point of extinction.
These stories are learned through reading the histories of Black Elk, Tecumseh, and The Trail of Tears. When I lived in Oklahoma, my favourite thing about living there was to see signs saying that the person was entering the Sac-Fox Nation or the Pottowatomie Nation. I was excited to be able to live among such noble people. Yet, they were treated as outcasts. The Native American there was treated like the blacks of the South were treated when I grew up in the 60s.
Years passed and I continued to learn how unmerciful the whites were to the tribes. In the book, 1491 (Charles C. Mann) a history is laid out about how the tribes welcomed the white man or the Spaniard, and then were exploited through the Americas. They were not immune to smallpox brought here by the Europeans. We stole their land and moved them to reservations or Oklahoma. In the comedy show, Latin History for Morons Netflix says, “John Leguizamo won’t rest until every moron becomes less of a moron.”
Usually, in writing blogs, I like to have plenty of photos to break up the words. As we enter the “holiday season” I exhort you to change the holiday. Let’s take a holiday from bitterness, greed, and strife. Let’s choose to love one another and care for our world and our neighbor so that each day we live a practice of gratitude. Gratitude does take practice too.
Human beings that we are, it is easy for one to focus on the negative aspects of life. We forget the beauty and gratitude of merely waking up. Grief does not rest during these times either and can even be exponentially triggered. Can we take a holiday from the rush-a-holic business of this time of the year to pay attention to feelings: both the feelings of self as well as the other? Can we practice that each time we think something is wrong with a person to try and find what is right?
Even writing that paragraph was a hard practice for me. Why? Because I know that if I ask another to practice something, I must also look in the mirror at my choices and my actions. This practice of gratitude doesn’t have to be vocalized and in fact, vocalization can mask a dark reality. Look deep inside of yourself. What do you see there? Can you give thanks for all that you are? I know I can’t. Yet, I can give thanks that I have friends who love me just as I am.
My dog sits at my right foot watching me as I write the end of this blog. She thinks I sit at the computer for too long. Pets teach us the true meaning of gratitude, so does nature. Turn your Black Friday into a green one by going for a hike in nature with a loved one. There are many ways that we can practice gratitude that include all of humanity and our world. Let’s start this year.
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November 9, 2018
When I Am Not Writing…
[image error]When I’m not writing, I am creating something else. Or in the case of this blog, I’m also creating as I type because I’m listening to new musicians (at least new to me). The world is big and our souls even larger. In addition to valuing the creative spirit, I believe in the power and value of learning from others.
There are many ways we can learn. For me, it’s a mixture of listening, reading, and doing. Though my hope was to finish a book about dogs before year’s end, I’ve gotten engaged in painting again. Also, I’m working to bring two CDs to fruition. One is ready for mastering and it’s a CD of English Country Dance music played on guitars. The second is going to be a surprise I will tell you about when it is further fleshed out. This video is a kind of hint…
Painting is not something that comes to me as easily as music or writing. As a result, it takes me a long time to paint. I’m better at sketching, but there’s something rewarding in painting that is similar to writing. Just as I enjoy the feel of pen to paper, the feel of a brush painting color and bringing a thought or expression into being is healing.
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We are all a work in progress.
“As we listen more deeply to suffering, we begin to notice non-suffering. The heart realizes its innate courage, strength, and invincibility. This journey through pain and suffering burns away the impurities, and what is revealed is something pristine, clear, and beautiful, like a moonlit pearl: the tender, merciful heart, and its infinite ability to receive the cries of the world.”
—Thanissara, “The Grit That Becomes a Pearl”
The past year has been challenging as me and my dog, Birdie adjust to this new place and living without my wife…or ex-wife now. Divorce is hard on everyone. Moving is hard on the one who has to move. Death never gives us a break. Then, there’s always the world of politics. Everywhere we turn as humans, there’s something challenging happening even if others don’t always see what’s happening in our life.
I like the above comment because it speaks of the power of creativity. We can let the pain and suffering of life grind us to pieces, or we can be like a grain of sand and become something beautiful. To write this is not to spout Pollyanna crap. Life is just damn hard sometimes and I’m not going to make it sound like a positive attitude can make things turn out as we want. However, with a positive attitude and determination, we can make the best of a situation.
Not all of us can paint, sing, or play an instrument. That doesn’t mean we are not able to create something good out of the strife around us. Regardless of what life brings or what humanity does, we can all choose to be the best of self. Leo Buscaglia in his book, Love, says this: when we go to meet our creator, we won’t be asked why weren’t we the best artist, musician, mathematician, teacher etc. Instead, we will be asked, “why weren’t you the best you?” Don’t focus on perfection. Just be you.
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November 1, 2018
Community of the Beloved
Last week, I was invited to speak to students at Pfeiffer University about faith and sexuality on Tuesday evening. Then, on Wednesday morning, we talked about living the life of the beloved. The Francis Center for Student Leadership co-sponsored my talk with the Pfeiffer Chapel.
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©2018 Casey Habich, Pfeiffer University. Used with permission.
The events planned for that week were ones to address diversity. Yet, they were also about the meaning of being a beloved community. In talking with The Rev. Maegan Habich (HA-bick), we decided to focus on the text from 1 John 4:7-8
“Beloved, let us love one another. For love is of God and the one that loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love, knows not God for God is love. Beloved, let us love one another.”
1 John 4:7-8 (paraphrase is mine)
I was pleased to discover that the Imam Atif from Charlotte was going to speak to the students about Islam. His talk was informative and one that helped all who were there to get a realistic view of what it means to be Muslim. If you would like to hear his talk on Islam, please visit the page on Robin’s Radio: Imam Atif and Food for the Soul
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©2018 Photography by Casey Habich, Pfeiffer University. Used with permission.
It was exciting to have the opportunity to hear an Imam talk. My friend, Cary and I joined the talk. Since my talk is readily available for everyone, I recorded the Imam’s talk on Tuesday instead of mine.
Pfeiffer’s campus in Misenheimer is set in a rural community and was the main campus when I was in college in the 80s. Now, the Charlotte Campus has grown exponentially and Pfeiffer is preparing to expand more into the local communities. As the university grows, the school continues to reach out to the surrounding community with the students. The new programs through The Francis Center are teaching the students the value and importance of knowing the diversity surrounding us and that they have something to offer the community.
My talk to the students on Tuesday evening dealt with the challenges of being a lesbian and a Christian. They had thoughtful and serious questions and comments. The next morning brought back copious memories of life at Pfeiffer. The college was a beloved community when I went there in the 80s. It is more beloved to me to know that they are reaching out to the community to embrace diversity. The video below is my talk.
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August 21, 2018
Catching Up with Life – Practicing Faith
[image error]Beech Mountain, NC ©2018 JRobin Whitley‘When the powers of nature are the focus of your awareness and your thoughts, you come near to spirit, near to the source of all life. This is why most people love to walk in the woods or by the sea: they come close to the original source, and it is healing just to be in its presence. It cleanses you, brings peace of mind, touches your heart and brings you home to your soul.’
~ Chris Luttichau
The past few weeks I’ve been out of town. I was only gone for two weeks and it’s summer so I wasn’t worried about my condo. The dog went with me, so no worries about that either. Yet, here it is a week later and I’m still catching up on getting my home back in shape.
While gone, nature didn’t stop being nature. The bills and emails all those things that make up “daily life” at home, still happened. I don’t have a personal secretary (though my dog Birdie thinks she is my boss). There’s no maid that comes to clean.
I left my condo clean and in order so that when we came back, we could just pick right up where we left. My hosts and family allowed me to wash my clothing too so that when I got back, all I had to do was unpack. Sounds perfect doesn’t it? We go on a trip, have fun, see family and come home and everything works out perfectly. We might as well laugh at ourselves when we think anything in life works out perfectly.
Murphy’s Law is something most of us are taught at an early age. Yet, even at this age, I remain the idealist. If I plan it, it is so or will be so. No, that’s not really working for me for those who may ask. It means to continue facing disappointments. I remain hopeful nonetheless. Not hopeful that the world will turn as I plan or that life will stop with disappointments. My hope is in something hard to describe. Many call it faith.
As I write, my heart and mind are aware of the many who no longer want to talk about God or the church. It’s understandable because as a lesbian, there are those around me who still discuss my sinfulness. The irony of it all is how boring my life is when compared to most folks. That’s not to say we can’t be boring and commit sins. I just wonder how they know so much about the state of my soul.
Faith. We use the word willy-nilly at times in the Christian tradition. I say that because it’s one of those words all Christians are supposed to use. Perhaps we use it too quickly. One of my spiritual directors told me never to pray for patience or faith. We laughed about it because I had been praying for both. Why did she say what she did? Because in order to have patience, one has to learn to wait. In order to have faith, one must learn to endure trials.
Oddly enough, the writing that helped me embrace a more realistic way of looking at faith is Herman Hesse’s book, Siddhartha. If you’re curious, the link is an open source PDF for reading the book. I always prefer a real book rather than its electronic version. I like being able to hold it in my hand. That’s beside the point. What helped me look at my faith differently by reading the book happened BECAUSE it was outside of my tradition.
As I try to summarize what helped me in the book, I find that the BBC’s description of Buddhism best summarizes both the book and what I could see in Hesse’s writing:
“Buddhism is a tradition that focuses on personal spiritual development. Buddhists strive for a deep insight into the true nature of life and do not worship gods or deities.”
BBC Religions
This sentence, in particular, strikes me, “…Buddhists strive for a deep insight into the true nature of life.” This blog started out with a quote about nature and it’s because I think the natural world is one that best teaches about the blessings of
[image error] A tree with prayer flags.
faith. A tree does what it does and it’s neither right nor wrong, but it just is a tree. The beauty of a tree reaching to the sky never ceases to amaze and inspire me.
Sometimes it seems that those of us who grew up in the church (and the South perhaps) think that if we have faith, nothing will go wrong in life. Some of the more fundamental Christian churches will preach that way. Perhaps it’s something that is the undercurrent in all of the churches in the South. I can’t speak for anywhere else.
Yet, we all know so many good people who have horrible things happen to them. Faith won’t make us be something else. Real faith as I now begin to see it means to accept what is and know that there’s a way through the trial. The way may not be fun and most likely won’t be pretty. When we have a community of loving and kind people, then we can have faith to get through the challenge.
In two or three weeks, life really threw me some curveballs. Nothing that means the end of the world for me, but there are trials with no clear way through. There are things happening to beloved family members and all I can do is be here and be me. I have no magic and I cannot take the pain of life away from them. It’s hard to watch someone you love suffer. My thoughts return to the tree. All we can do is remain a steadfast presence for those who need us.
Many of us know Shel Silverstein’s book, The Giving Tree. I first heard of the book at some event in college. Some group was doing a skit of the story. I’ve read it and told the story many times throughout the years. I think of it when I walk among the wonderful trees in my neighborhood. There are many gifts the tree “gives” but the essence of the book throughout is the power of presence.
Faith does not try to make us something other than that which we are. As I talked with my priest about the challenges my family is facing right now, he said, “Just be you Robin. Just be you.” As my beloved aunt fades, my nephew and his wife walk through a dark valley, as my niece and her husband seek hope, I am helpless to DO anything. Yes, I can pray, but the larger part of praying is learning to BE PRESENT to the holy. Only once we are present can we know the act that is necessary.
Life is holy, sacred, and good. Yes, it can also be pernicious and in the worst of times, feel like hell. The power of presence is that our loving and kind presence can transform those hard times into gold. Not the gold we can sell, but the golden light of the soul. The light of the soul that comes from being present to yourself in life, being present to nature, being present to the Other.
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