awful coffee and a Lorna Doone

Bleary-eyed and hours from home, struggling to stay awake... Awful coffee and a Lorna Doone cookie at the rest stop... Okay, I think I can make it for another chunk of miles.

Thank God for the Rotary and Kiwanis people who cheerfully host those simple oases.

Maybe that’s what weekly church services are for: offering simple, spiritual hospitality and helping souls stay awake to their faith journeys.

economics

"I think we're miserable partly because we have only one god, and that's economics. Economics is a slave-driver. No one has free time; no one has any leisure. The whole culture is under terrible pressure and fraught with worry. It's hard to get out of that box."
James Hillman

legalism and grace

Legalism is easier than grace. Or at least it has a heavier gravitational pull. Most religions and ideologies seem to bend that way.

Law is legislatable and grace is not. That’s why attempting to politically impose Christian morals on a society is a dalliance with the devil: it necessitates a shift away from the heart of the Gospel.

We prefer to create systems of thought and behavior to which we can adhere, or against which we can rebel. These are the polar extremes portrayed in the parable of the Prodigal Son: the older brother versus the prodigal. Whether in compliance or defiance, law sells itself as simpler to manage than grace.

The way of grace traverses a different grid altogether than the compliance-defiance continuum.

prophetic contradiction

“The most powerful thing you can hear, and the only thing that ever persuades any of us in our own lives, is if you meet somebody whose story contradicts the thing you think you know. At that point it’s possible to question what you know, because the authenticity of their experience is real enough to do it.” Ira Glass

The gift of prophecy is not always expressed in words about future things. Sometimes it means living out the story God is writing into you and me... Being present to Presence in a manner that clarifies aspects of the Spirit’s narrative... Becoming human renditions of new ways of being...

dis-illusion

“They say to the seers, ‘See no more visions!’
and to the prophets,
‘Give us no more visions of what is right!
Tell us pleasant things, prophesy illusions.
Leave this way, get off this path,
and stop confronting us
with the Holy One of Israel!’” Isaiah 30:10, NIV

Oh boy... this is a tough one. My illusions have been very dear to me, and I’ve mourned each one’s passing. Certainly, there are many remaining -- including the illusion that I’m relatively free of illusions!

A world cobbled together with denial is a rickety affair. It won’t hold up against the blasts of reality. It lacks depth of foundation and openness to light. How can relationships find health in a place like that?

Disillusionment is a strange friend, never welcome but often bearing excellent gifts.

Tell me the truth
Show me what is right
Confront me with holiness

silent

I recently posted a quote on my other blog that celebrates the gift of shutting up. More quotes extolling silence appeared in the comments section. The conversation (yes, it is slightly ironic to have a conversation about not talking) brought to mind one of my favorite Hebrew proverbs.

Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent,
and discerning if he holds his tongue. Proverbs 17:28

I love the confluence of commonsense and comedy in those words!

holy curiosity

“The important thing is not to stop questioning.
Curiosity has its own reason for existing.
One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates
the mysteries of eternity, of life,
of the marvelous structure of reality.
It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend
a little of this mystery every day.
Never lose a holy curiosity.”

Albert Einstein

Trinity

The Trinity illuminates perfect relationality, showing the simultaneous, interpenetrating, and ongoing processes of communion and differentiation. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit submerge within the One Triune God, and emerge as distinct, unique facets of the Trinity they create.