Category Archives: Spirituality

#20 God: only four short steps away

28 Tuesday Apr 2009

Posted by in God, Prayer, Religion, Spiritual Exercises, Spirituality

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

,

dreamstime_4843913Stuff in books can help us pray.   The monastics prayed through divine reading – in fact, a twelfth-century Carthusian monk by name of Guigo II worked out the four-step process that’s been in use ever since.

And what are those four steps? Reading, meditation, prayer and contemplation. 

You’ll want to select a passage—a paragraph from a book, a short poem, or a few verses from Scripture.  You can choose a favorite passage or one that you find challenging.    

Before you start, take a few deep breaths.  Now you’re ready to begin.

First, reading.  Read your passage slowly several times, paying attention to the words, how they fit together, their rhythms, their meanings, their themes.  If you’ve chosen a ‘secular’ poem or piece of prose, you may wish to rewrite it to turn it into a prayer.  If you’ve chosen a theological or scriptural passage, rewrite it (if need be) to make it fit your theology.  Or you can use the text as is—whatever works best for you.

Take this stanza from “Ode to the Table” by the Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda. The words in bold are Neruda’s originals; I added the italicized text to turn Neruda’s stanza into a prayer.

Oh God,
You made the world a table
“engulfed in honey and smoke,
smothered by apples and blood.
The table is already set,
and we know the truth
as soon as we are called:
whether we’re called to war or to dinner
we will have to choose sides,
have to know
how we’ll dress
to sit
at the long table,
whether we’ll wear the pants of hate
or the shirt of love, freshly laundered.
It’s time to decide,
they’re calling.”
Help us make the right choice, oh God.

Second, meditation.  Which words or passages catch your attention?  Sit quietly with them.  Let them sit in your mind like stones in your hand, smooth if comforting, rough if challenging.

How would this work?  If you used the Neruda example for your text-based prayer, you could reflect on the juxtaposition of honey/apple with smoke/blood.   Or you could focus on the image of the world as a table—what would it mean to imagine the world as a place where you eat, where life is a meal—what would nourish you, what would make you ill, what would make you hunger for more?  How about the idea that in times of war, we have to make a decision?  If you had to choose sides, which would you choose?  You could consider whether one side is always the side of hate and the other the side of love, as Neruda suggests.

Third, prayer.  Respond to the meditation by praying, not intellectually, but by speaking (aloud or in your head) your own words directly to God.  

Fourth, contemplation.  Set all words aside if you can and enter into the space created by the word-prayers.  This is a time of simple focus on God, a time of resting in God.

If you carry out the spiritual practice of divine reading at the same time every day, it will become a habit.   An hour is ideal, or half-an-hour in the morning and another at night.  This may sound like a lot but the mind often takes a while to settle into quiet receptiveness.  Also, you’ll want to choose comfortable clothes and a comfortable place where you won’t be disturbed or distracted. 

Four short steps.  Try them.  They just might work.

References:  Pablo Neruda, “Ode to the Table,” in Odes to Common Things, trans. Ken Krabbenhoft, 19-21 (Boston:  Little, Brown, and Company); Alister E. McGrath, Christian Spirituality:  An Introduction (Malden, MA:  Blackwell Publishing, 1999), 84-87.  (For more suggestions on how to turn texts into prayers, see Post #9, Build-a-prayer-workshop.)  

 

#19 Theology is to spirituality what honeycomb is to honey

20 Monday Apr 2009

Posted by in God, Philosophy of Religion, Religion, Spirituality, Theology

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

,

dreamstime_75720833

For some, spirituality trumps theology any old day.  For those who call themselves ‘spiritual’, the word ‘theologian’ brings to mind self-styled intellectuals who have stepped into a self-made ivory tower from which they engage in a fruitless search for knowledge of God.  Too bad these theologians look for God in abstract commentaries written by other bookish-types rather than in the vibrant, pulsing life so obviously going on around them (if only they’d look up from their books!).  The stereotypical theologian has a clear preference for the subtleties of his or her own imagination (theory) rather than for doing useful works among ordinary folk (praxis).  He or she relies on reason and distrusts feelings.  A sad head-shake for these poor theologians is appropriate right now—if you’re ‘spiritual’ that is.

Unlike theology, spirituality (the ‘spirituals’ explain) is interested in love and personal experience.  The reasons of the heart are closer to God, they say, than the reasons of the head.  Spirituality trusts love and distrusts logical arguments.  And anyway, the best ideas are the ones that help people, the more directly the better.

Although the tug-of-war between theology and spirituality may seem like a contemporary phenomenon (the word spirituality is an 18th century invention), the same struggle took place in Western Europe as early as the Middle Ages.  Elected Chancellor of the University of Paris in 1395, Jean Gerson, criticized theologians for lacking in common sense and failing to base their study in love.  That didn’t stop him from also making the case that as long as they didn’t ignore the world, they had valuable contributions to make.  He summed up the situation with this helpful analogy:  Just like viscous honey needs a honeycomb, spirituality needs theology.  Just like honey needs the structure of the honeycomb, spirituality needs to be structured by a thoughtful and organized mind.  On the flip side, theology needs to be filled by spirituality because “the ideas of the mind must also warm the heart and lead to activity in the world.”  Gerson tried to unify spirituality with theology while preserving the integrity of both.

Gerson’s analogy illustrates the fact that spirituality without theology is a puddle of sweet goo; it can’t be handed over (except in extremely messy form) to other people or to the next generation.  Likewise, theology without spirituality is a lovely structure made of bland wax most people don’t want to eat.   

The Renaissance humanist, Pico della Mirandola, agreed, pointing out that although “we can live without language, although not well, but we cannot live at all without the mind. “  For him, the person who is untouched by poems and novels and other people’s stories may not be humane, but the person who is untouched by logical inquiry and understanding is no longer a human being.  Sounds harsh, maybe.  But Mirandola was on to something. 

We can’t be spiritual in a generic way.  Our spirituality is tied to our beliefs about the human being, about ethics, about meaning, about God.  To understand what those beliefs are takes more than a contemplative practice; it requires mindful reflection.  Questions like “does God care about me?,” and “what did God mean by the command to love one’s neighbor?” call out for our attention.  They call out for us to try to answer them, at least provisionally, by studying alone, or in groups, or in conversation with great thinkers through their books.  Theologians ponder the most fundamental of the fundamental questions about the human and the divine.  At times, these questions may appear overly subtle and specific but that’s going to the case any time answers are being pursued in the most serious way.  And besides, to learn to love, we need not give up logic; to lead a life of simplicity and good deeds, we need not trump every question put forth by the intellect . 

Spoken like a true theologian, don’t you think?   

HNFFT:  Must we choose between spirituality and theology?  Or can the two be integrated?  

Reference:  Steven Ozment, “The Spiritual Traditions” in The Age of Reform 1250-1550:  An Intellectual and Religious History of Late Medieval and Reformation Europe, 73-134 (New Haven:  Yale University Press, 1980). 

#8 Prayer: getting intimate with God

31 Saturday Jan 2009

Posted by in God, Prayer, Religion, Spirituality, Theology

≈ 1 Comment

dreamstime_6064669For most people of faith, religion is more than a philosophical discussion.  And for most,  “God is the God of religion only when He is our God and we can speak to Him.”  Rabbi Leo Baeck wrote those words.  He ministered to Jews imprisoned in Theresienstadt before they were shipped to Nazi death camps. He also wrote that “The deeper God’s love [is] felt, the more human [is] its form of expression…One cannot pray in concepts; one cannot hope in definitions and in the abstract.”

When we reach out, in prayer, to the God Whom Baeck calls the God of religion—the God Who is our God—our prayers reflect our intimate relationship with God.  We pray to God Who is always here and everywhere, the God Who is with us in all places and at all times, the God Who is as close to us as our own breath.  When we pray, we talk to God without any need to catch God up on what’s happened in our lives (unlike a friend we’re meeting for coffee).  We talk to God without preamble, sure that God has traveled with us every minute of the day, aware of our thoughts, our worries, our triumphs.  We lift our voices to God Who’s been with us at every step, and Who is still here, right now.  We lift our voices to God, the most intimate of intimates. 

The Christian Reformer, Martin Luther found it significant that Jesus called God, not Father, but Abba, the Aramaic word for Daddy (see Mark 14:36).  For Luther, the Lord’s Prayer might rightly be prayed like this:  “Our Daddy, Who art in Heaven… “

At one time, English-speakers had pronouns that captured the intimacy we bring to prayer—Thou, Thee, Thine.  These pronouns disappeared in the 17th century, folded, for good or for ill, into the formal pronouns, You, You, Yours.  However, European languages like French, Spanish, and German retain the informal, intimate pronouns English-speakers have lost.  Prayers in those languages show the tender and personal way in which people of faith often speak to God.  The informality of these pronouns underscore how we presume a personal God whenever we turn to God with trust and openness.   

This prayer (lightly edited) appeared on a poster in the Cathedral of St. Denis.  It was written by Brother Roger; until Brother Roger was murdered in 2007, he led a Christian ecumenical community in Taize, France, that is dedicated to peaceful reconciliation.  Rabbi Baeck and Brother Roger had very different Gods but they could have prayed this prayer together.  The Naked Theologian’s English translation appears below the original.  Note the words “toi”, “tu” and “te” in the French version—these are pronouns used when speaking to close friends, loved ones, and children.

Toi, [Dieu], tu vois qui je suis,                       
            j’ai besoin de ne rien te cacher                       
de mon cœur, tu m’accueilles avec                                   
            mes peines et mes inquiétudes                       
                        tu comprends tout de moi.           

Thou, [God], Thou seest whom I am,
             I need not hide anything from Thee
of my heart, Thou welcomest me with
            my sorrows and my worries
                        Thou understandeth all about me.

Baeck taught that we have faith in God before we have thoughts about God.  What do you say when you pray?  The way you talk to God may be different from the way you think about God.  Listen in on yourself—see what you think.  

Shall we close with the Hebrew word for “so be it”?  Let’s.  Amen.

References:  Albert H. Friedlander, Leo Baeck:  Teacher of Theresienstadt (Woodstock, NY:  The Overlook Press, 1991), 80-1.

#5 Martin Luther King, Jr., More Exposed

13 Tuesday Jan 2009

Posted by in God, Spirituality, Theology

≈ 4 Comments

dreamstime_2946477

For Martin Luther King, Jr., God didn’t become a living reality until he discovered the presence of God in his everyday experience. Not until he had felt an inner calm (that he believed was not his own) and had discovered resources of strength (that he believed were not his own) did King conclude God was at work in his life. Not until he had felt a sustaining hope (that he believed was not his own) in spite of threats to his life, discouraging setbacks, and the hardships of a bitter struggle, did he conclude God was at work in his life.  

Some call the calm and strength and hope King felt, salvation.  Others, resurrection.  They experience tranquility in the face of tragedy, the whence of which they can’t explain.  They experience courage in the face of danger, the whence of which they can’t explain.  They experience hope in the face of failure, the whence of which they can’t explain.  They become convinced the whence is God.  God has saved them.  God has resurrected them. 

Is God at work?  Although we can argue about the whence of such experiences, the experiences themselves cannot (and should not) be denied.

Before he discovered God’s active presence in his life, King had believed that God was a metaphysical category, a remote form without content.  Many persons, not just King, have a God who seems remote, removed from our everyday lives, removed from our ordinary problems and concerns, removed from our deepest sorrows and greatest triumphs, ‘out there’ somewhere, seemingly unreachable, seemingly unconcerned.  

The technical term used (not just by naked theologians) for this kind of God is ‘transcendent’ because that God lies outside or transcends the human realm.  

If a quick glance at our history can serve as a reliable guide, most human beings have little tolerance for vast distances between themselves and a transcendent God.  Even a theologian like King who enjoyed and excelled in abstract thinking could not leave God in the heavens—God did not become a ‘living’ reality for him until he perceived God as present in the commonplace–in the human realm.

The technical term used (not just by naked theologians) for this kind of God is ‘immanent’ derived from the Latin, in manere, ‘to remain within’.  

The history of human theological ideas shows that human beings who believe or have faith in a transcendent God often find ways to ‘reach up’ to God or to understand God as ‘reaching down’ to them. This human-God distance has been breached in creative ways—think of Moses who sees God’s backside.  Is prayer not also a way to breach the distance?  Contemplation?  Reading Scripture?  Practicing Kabbalah?  The list is long.

When King writes, “in many instances I have felt the power of God transforming the fatigue of despair into the buoyancy of hope,” he reveals that, for him, God ‘reached down’ and transformed him personally.   King’s God has a loving purpose and controls the universe; God is a cosmic companion in the struggle for righteousness; God is a benign power with feeling and will; God is responsive to the deepest yearnings of the human heart (though King does not say how).  

Is King’s God still too distant or too immanent?  

Whether too distant or too immanent, King’s God sustained him in his work to secure a different, better world. 

How do you bridge the distance (if any) between yourself and the divine?  How does your God sustain you?  How does your God sustain you in making the world a better place for more people? 

It’s your turn to expose yourself.  

#1 Skeptical? Some bare facts about theology

25 Thursday Dec 2008

Posted by in God, Religion, Spirituality, Theology

≈ 1 Comment

Skeptical young man

 

Here’s a test.  Have you asked yourself any of these questions:  What is my purpose in life?  What counts as a good life?  Do I (fill in your name here) matter?  Do I have a soul?  What is a soul?  Why is there so much suffering in the world?  Why have I suffered so much?  To whom am I speaking when, filled with gratitude, I find myself whispering “thank you, thank you”?  Where can I find comfort when I can’t take another piece of bad news?  What exactly IS my relationship to the divine?  Does that relationship entail any special responsibility on my part?  What are my moral principles and what am I willing to sacrifice to live by them?  Why should I be moral, why should I even be kind?  How can I love my neighbor—what exactly does that mean in practical terms?  What can I know of God?  

Okay, so you’ve got the picture.  Some of these questions could be considered philosophical because they’re asking basic questions about life.  Still, if you’ve read this far, then the God-dimension, or the vertical dimension, enters (or sneaks) into your questions and into your in-progress answers. 

Although you may not have known it, you’ve been theologians all along.  If you’re a dogmatic atheist and you discount the idea of God altogether, then you might consider yourself a philosopher, in the contemporary sense of philosopher anyway.  Because in the ancient world, philosophers like Plato and Plotinus considered ‘doing’ theology a key part of their work.  The idea of God was at the core of their musings—Plato called God, ‘the Good,’ and Plotinus called God, ‘the One.’  Now, while you may be theologians without knowing it, ‘doing’ theology means being intentional about asking questions like the ones above, and intentional about looking for thoughtful, rational answers. 

‘Doing’ theology is a kind of disciplined inquiry.  And that’s what this blog is all about.