A story about "War and Peace"

On the Pratzen Heights, where he had fallen with the flagstaff in his had, lay Prince Andrew Bolkónski bleeding profusely and unconsciously uttering a gentle, piteous and childlike moan.

Toward evening he ceased moaning and became quite still. He did not know how long his unconsciousness lasted. Suddenly he again felt that he was alive and suffering from a burning, lacerating pain in his head.

“Where is it, that lofty sky that I did not know till now, but saw today,” was his first thought. “And I did not know this suffering either,” he thought. “Yes, I did not know anything at all till now. But where am I?”

I love this image of Prince Andrew, having been hit by a cannonball looking upward at the infinite sky sensing something he had never known before. Something above himself, something all embracing.
I remember the first time the infinite blues struck me. I was on a band trip to Kansas city. I was perhaps a bit of a loner. I felt out of place, I wasn’t that great of a sax player. I felt that I always was a detriment to the whole instead of apart of the beautiful sound that it produced. I wandered outside the hotel and sat myself under a tree on a patch a grass where some other kids were talking. I laid my head back, and there it was. For some reason for the first time I had a sense of perspective, I could see how the blue stretched for miles above me. It absorbed me. I stared at it, wondered at it. My breathing slowed and I savored that I was filling myself with that infinity. Infinity embraced me. I too must have been moaning a childlike groan. I remember my reverie being interrupted by a girl asking if I was all right, and if I wanted to join their group. I said, “no, I’m just looking at the sky.”
I wonder if Prince Andrew will catch the spiritual significance of that day like I did. Or like Switchfoot put it in their song 4:12,

You said,
“I’m so sorry I’ve been so down.
I started doubting things could ever turn around.
And I began to believe that all we are is material.
It’s nonsensical.”

So you walk outside and everything’s new
You’re looking at the world with new eyes.
As if you’d never seen a sky before that’s blue
As if you’ve never seen the sky in your whole life

“It would be good,” thought Prince Andrew, glancing at the icon his sister had hung round his neck with such emotion and reverence, “it would be good if everything were as clear and simple as it seems to Mary. How good it would be to know where to seek for help in this life and what to expect after it beyond the grave! How happy and calm I should be if I could now say: ‘Lord, have mercy on me!’… But to whom should I say that? Either to a Power indefinable, incomprehensible, which I not only cannot address, but cannot even express in words—the Great All or Nothing—“ He said to himself, “or to that God who has been sewn into this amulet by Mary! There is nothing certain, nothing at all except the unimportance of everything I understand, and the greatness of something incomprehensible but all important.”

We leave Prince Andrew to die, but I wonder if that is all we shall hear from him, all that he will find in the infinite blue.

A resource I do recommend is The Work of the People. It is a digital liturgy. They use the lectionary texts to come up with digital resources for worship.

VISUAL LITURGY is our new line of products inspired and shaped by the events of the Church calendar and the Scripture texts of the Revised Common Lectionary. We will create new Visual Liturgy pieces weekly. These films are contemplative pieces that reflect on Scripture and help create a time of meditation in preparation for worship, during Communion, before, after or during a sermon, or even as a benediction at the close of a service. These films can be used in many ways; the goal is that they would promote focus and reflection on the Word of God.

If a picture is worth 1000 .... Christianese

I received a link in my junk mail box to www.goodsalt.com. It looked interesting, my wife is always on the look out for stock photo sites. I was disappointed. This site was full of the inspirational fluff that fills the art section of the Christian book stores. What is more, they charge amounts that rival the high end commercial stock photo places. Ugh.

IMAGE DOWNLOADS:
SMALL 1024px 72dpi:
(local church projection use only)
** US $9.95

SMALL 1024px 72dpi:
(Nonprofit website use only)
** US $49.95

MEDIUM 5-6MB 300dpi:
(half page - print up to 5x7 inches)
** US $89.95

LARGE 28MB 300dpi:
(full page - print up to 8.5x11 inches)
** US $239.95

Even their free stuff you are restricted to only projections, not web or print. This ridiculous mix of greed and Christian sub-culture dismays me, but it is what I expect from the Christian sub-culture. To their credit they do have culturally relevant images, like a black Jesus.

For a decent stock photo site, use www.istockphoto.com.

The spectre of climate change

Today we had our first real snow of the season. I have to say I have found our pleasant weather ominous. I had it in mind that if it didn't snow, some dark catastrophe loomed.

directing self-disclosure

One of the things I've been trying to get my head around in my ministry is how to take ordinary situations and make them opportunities for spiritual direction. I agreed to teach a workshop on question asking for a peer counseling program at the high school. I've been doing some searching online thinking that maybe I'd run across what I'm looking for. The problem is I had to think about what I'm looking for. Here's what I've discovered.

I'm thinking the work of discipleship is moving into the realm unknown to yourself and others. What I'm looking for is how do I as a pastor, spiritual director or friend, encourage someone into their unknown?

Here is my hypothesis. To encourage movement from left to right, from open to blind, I can engage the person with compliments. Positive information they may not know about themselves will both build relational trust and begin shared discovery. Here are some insights I found from an article "The Manager As Conversationalist"

1. Give Direct, Honest, and Personal Compliments:
   Positive observations about appearance, disposition, general responsiveness and accomplishments are usually easy to make and well received.
   
2. Ask people for information, for advice or merely for an opinion:
   Questions are one of the most subtle forms of compliment. They directly acknowledge the value/superiority of the other person by asking for assistance.
3. Tell your associates about their strengths, what they do well and their contributions to you.
   Frequently the people with whom we work are the last to know how we really feel about them. We assume they know and therefore never share with them our feelings.
4. Identify the most positive impression people make and share it with them
   This may require developing a personal list of strength words such as charming, poised, professional, competent, warm, genuine, intense, forthright, pleasant, etc. If you are not used to doing this, it will take some practice. The more accurate you are, profound the effect.

Another form of feedback useful in this movement to the blind spot, is clarifying repetition. By stating observations about what you are hearing in what your friend is telling you, may open a new realization to him as to what he is really saying, what he really believes.

In moving down the window, encouraging self disclosure (moving from open to hidden) I think that my own self-disclosure will encourage a greater reciprocal self-disclosure. Also the use of open questions encourages self disclosure.

I think by simultaneously using techniques to move deeper shared discovery can happen. Alternating questions and feed back, self-disclosure and compliment, moving more and more to the spiritual, the inmost hidden parts of who we are together. It this the essence of spiritual direction?

I know this is basic interpersonal communication stuff, but what is a new idea to me is using the johari window for some one else, eliciting response, rather than just understanding my own side. By opening my window actively with others I encourage them to open theirs and together we share spiritual discovery.

spiritual formation based congregations.

Foster has some great thoughts on how to build a congregation that is centered on spiritual formation.

My second point is simple enough to say though exceedingly difficult to practice: Spiritual problems demand spiritual answers. We simply can never solve a spiritual problem with a programmatic answer. It is vital in any congregational setting to be working with God on the spiritual nature of the community. Is pride pervasive throughout? Then spiritual disciplines of Service are called for. Is nervous, anxious over commitment evident everywhere? Then disciplines of Solitude and Silence can help. Is there a lack of trust in God? Then experiences of Prayer and Fasting are needed. Are we taking ourselves too seriously? Then multiplied opportunities for Celebration need to break forth!

Times come in the life of any congregation that in order for us to be attentive to God we have to become firmly anti-programmatic; that is, we learn to stop doing things. At such times we are to discover ways, as a people together, to follow the counsel of François Fénelon, “Be silent, and listen to God. Let your heart be in such a state of preparation that his Spirit may impress upon you such virtues as will please him. Let all within you listen to him. This silence of all outward and earthly affection and of human thoughts within us is essential if we are to hear his voice.”

Masters Update

Things aren't looking good for beginning my masters in January. My search for grants has yielded nothing yet. I said that I wouldn't take out a loan, nor could I, and that if it was proper time, God would provide. I am not seeing his provision. I am facing the disappointment of putting this opportunity off.

It is particularly disappointing since Richard Foster would be speaking at the intensive seminar in January. I received the reading list and it looks so good.

• D. Bonhoeffer, Life Together
• D. Willard, Great Omission
• T. Ware, the Orthodox Church

It is my happy birthday!

Leave me a greeting today, and I'll be even happier!

Search for Augustine

I had my library get a few different translations through inter-library loan. I have looked so far at Oxford university Press, World's Classics translated by Henry Chadwick; Signet Classic translated by Rex Warner and my copy which is Modern Library translated by Edward Pusey. I like Chadwick the best so far. This line from book 7 will show you why:

Pusey: "What were the pangs of my teeming heart, what groans, O my God! yet even there were Thine ears open, and I knew it not: and when in silence vehemently sought, those silent contritions of my soul were strong cries unto thy mercy" (one sentance).

Warner: "What agonies I suffered, what graons, my God came from my heart in its labor! And you were listening, though I did not know it. When in silence I strongly urged my question, the quiet contrition of my soul was a great cry to you for mercy."

Chadwick: "What torments my heart suffered in mental pregnancy, what groans, my God! And though I did not know it, your ears were there.
"As in silence I vigorously pursued my quest, inarticulate sufferings of my heart were loudly pleading for your mercy" (2 paragraphs).

It is the poetry that Chadwick provides that originally atracted me to the mystical Augustine.

Strining Christmas Lights

Next year I have it all figured out. I will wind a string of white lights tight to the trunk of the tree, to light the insides. Then I will swirl flashing lights up the tree like a candy cane, so that no single flash will black out the color of that part of the tree, those lights will be back into the tree a ways too. Then around the whole thing I will wind another layer of white lights to give the tree a continual shapely glow.