Person-hood

Nouwen suggests that a healthy soul will have a hidden place. Solitude, he says, is the place that hiddenness is cultivated and hospitality is the space given to others to have a hidden part of themselves.

He cautions against a too facile openness. This seems difficult to my mind. How can this closedness foster community? Perhaps an easy openness belies a shallow unexamined soul.  In solitude, in that hidden center, we find God and experience God in us.  We deepen the well within us. We find who we were created to be - our solitary uniqueness that we offer in intimacy to God.  Then we are free to share what we can with others.  From that well, we can offer the stores of our person-hood to those with whom we are forming communion. Yet there will remain much that cannot be verbalized, and more yet that the discipline of Silence bids us to keep cherished and within.

From the center

I began to pray a centering prayer in the solitude of my basement office, literally warmed by candlelight.  I could see out the small window, near the ceiling, the brooding gray sky, snow flakes falling and wind a howl. There is God, hidden behind the cloud of unknowing. I hurl my love at the cloud, focusing all my love on the otherness that is the Divine Mystery.

My meditation turns to Haiti, and the thousands and millions of solitary souls hurting there. Faintly, carried on the breeze of the Spirit a song wafts up from my heart. It grows in strength and I begin to sing, “Ubi Caritas…” Live in charity, God will dwell with you. I play and sing for a time with my guitar and then I take my prayer walking around the sanctuary.

Our church is in the middle of our annual missions convention and hung on the walls are posters of various mission fields. As I pass by the images on the poster for Latin America and the Caribbean, I place my hand to the cheek of a woman who could very well be from Haiti. Love wells up wells up within me as I realize again the reality of her personhood. She is unique, not simply an image on the periphery of my life, but a real child of God, uniquely and fully loved by God.

Thoughts on Amazing Grace: Contemplation in the dark

As Wilberforce grew in his contemplative desire, so too was he drawn to the dark places.  The mystic who wrote the Cloud of Unknowing calls the place of highest contemplation a dark cloud, where all that we think we see and know about God falls away. As Wilberforce sees the light of God in the beauty of spider webs and dandelions, so too does he see through them to the abyss of God's nature, where no image or thought is lofty enough to express God in who God is.

It is a similar cloud that captures Wilberforce as he gazes into the injustice around him. The film presents his explorations of the slave trade simultaneous to his exploration of God's creation.  The Spirit seems to be drawing him to contemplate human suffering and inhuman action of degradation at the same time.  William Pitt comes to him with abolitionists because he knows Wilberforce has already been touring the East India Docks and been staring at the injustice in the face. Even though he admits that for him "it's like arsenic.
Each new tiny dose doubles the effect," (Amazing Grace, 14:30) still he looks and suffers with God.  His body is wracked in sympathy with the pain of his soul.

It is suggested to Wilberforce that he can do both the work of God and the work politic.  From that time on the film demonstrates Wilberforce finding God through contemplation and action.  His passion for abolition provides him a window on the nature of God and his contemplation of God's nature fuels and refuels his commitment to action.

Deep Reality

The Active Life: Wisdom of Work, Creativity and Caring by Parker J. Palmer

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars

Summary
Palmer posits that contemplation is connecting with reality and proper action must flow from and be true to that reality – the reality of who are, how the world is organized and the deeper reality of the Kingdom of God. In this way action and contemplation are inseparable. Each story or poem in turn shows the danger of action in conflict with reality or the beauty of action deeply embedded in reality.

Belief
Palmer believes that this reality is deep stuff. It is more complicated and varied than a cursory inspection may lead us to believe. To touch reality we must be prepared to wrestle and to suffer. With Annie Dillard, we believe we must “ride these monsters deeper down,” and there find the bedrock reality (30). The elements Palmer holds as true come from this bedrock place of depth. We are invited to take truths such as the necessity of suffering, the unknowing and weakness of God, the naturalness of the miracles of the Woodcarver and Jesus, truths that blow our minds – we are invited to take them and wrestle with them. This is important to Palmer because he believes that only by riding these difficult truths down into the darkness can we be lead to the bedrock that will provide foundation for our action.

Doubt
In my doubt I ask not, “Are these ideas true?” but “In what way might they be true?” I have a hard time wrapping my head around a God who doesn’t have it all figured out but hopefully acts. This view of God seems contrary to the declaration of scripture, that God is all-powerful and all-knowing. Tozer would suggest that a God who is not the superlative in all things, cannot by definition be God (Knowledge of the Holy). Palmer’s treatment of the Loaves and Fishes also draws some questions. He says he “does not demand a naturalistic explanation for the ‘miracle’ in this story,” like liberal theologians demythologizing the gospel (130). He is content with the mythos of the story, but his hermeneutic demands a naturalistic explanation (129). Palmer and Mark are slightly cross-purposes. Mark is developing his theme that Jesus demonstrates the breaking in of the Kingdom of God by the miraculous, where as Palmer wishes to show the breaking in of the reality of the Kingdom of God in the ordinary actions of people.

Synthesis
In terms of how we approach reality, the paradox between belief and doubt explored above can remain in tension. It is as we explore other angles of looking at God, scripture, Jesus and life that we see more facets of reality. While it is true that God is sovereign and wholly other, unbound by time and space, it is helpful in understanding the deep truth of his reality to explore God’s action in terms we can understand. In some mysterious way God’s knowledge outside of time and power over space is best understood by our finite minds as unknowing and weakness. In our contemplating the reality of the Kingdom coming to bear on the earth it is equally important to stand in awe of Jesus as wonder worker and recognize the presence of the Kingdom in ordinary action. The deep reality is difficult to explore and requires much stretching of the brain.

Application
Palmer provides a compelling matrix for discerning right action. I find myself more geared to contemplation just as Palmer found himself wired for action. He challenges me to find reality and disillusionment in my contemplation and carry that to action. I feel the conviction that my actions don’t often enough flow from that source. To often I am Chaung Tzu’s professional, working from reaction, creating places to show my stuff. I keep busy to have a sense that I am alive, laziness stalks me, I crave the intentional action flowing from reality.

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