“I am humble not because I want to be agreeable. I don’t accept being humble for tactical reasons. I am humble because I am incomplete. Just because of that. This is not because I need people to love me, though I need that people love me, but I don’t have to make any kind of trap for the love. Do you see?”
Paulo Freire
Showing posts with label Relationships. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Relationships. Show all posts
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Sunday, January 14, 2007
perichoresis
The model of relationships portrayed by the trinitarian dogma is neither hierarchical nor authoritarian. The relationship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is not subordinationist, but – to use the technical term – perichoretic: God is essentially a dynamic communion of equally and mutually shared love. And this fact implies social impetus. Being made in the image of God calls for ethical and social consequences, it nurtures the spirit of solidarity. Of course, these consequences cannot be simply, mechanically transferred to the areas of human relationships. But they lead, or should lead, the confessor’s heart in an unambiguous direction – toward guarding the faith in the communion of creative love.
Jan Milic Lochman
Jan Milic Lochman
Monday, September 11, 2006
Vision
Vision is cultivated in a context of Hope, and connects directly to Emotional Endurance [see table].
“Without a Vision is a people made naked”
Proverbs 29:18a (Young’s Literal Translation)
I had no idea that this was the literal translation! In the ancient context, nakedness meant poverty and shame; there was nothing erotically provocative about it.
In this proverb, vision obviously refers to something more than physical sight: it’s the ability to look into the future and see the prospect of joy, abundance, accomplishment, meaning…
This sort of vision has to do with attending to invisible things. I believe that every human is given something that only she/he can see; an internal treasure that needs to be externalized – the intangible made tangible. It relates to incarnation. Each of us is to champion what’s been entrusted on a spiritual level – sowing, cultivating, harvesting, distributing… to the enriching of our relational circles.
Copyright Scott Burnett 2006
“Without a Vision is a people made naked”
Proverbs 29:18a (Young’s Literal Translation)
I had no idea that this was the literal translation! In the ancient context, nakedness meant poverty and shame; there was nothing erotically provocative about it.
In this proverb, vision obviously refers to something more than physical sight: it’s the ability to look into the future and see the prospect of joy, abundance, accomplishment, meaning…
This sort of vision has to do with attending to invisible things. I believe that every human is given something that only she/he can see; an internal treasure that needs to be externalized – the intangible made tangible. It relates to incarnation. Each of us is to champion what’s been entrusted on a spiritual level – sowing, cultivating, harvesting, distributing… to the enriching of our relational circles.
Copyright Scott Burnett 2006
Saturday, July 15, 2006
soul-sized life
What are the dimensions of your soul? How far can she throw her light? How many close relationships do you have the capacity to honor?
How much art will you render? How many stories will be yours to tell? How many friends will you help to discover their own souls?
As I ask questions like these of myself, the tendency is to swing between overestimating and underestimating the size of my soul. Maybe the oscillation between big and small is what keeps me bending back toward a sane assessment.
For more on this topic, see the post inhabiting littleness, and the comments that followed.
How much art will you render? How many stories will be yours to tell? How many friends will you help to discover their own souls?
As I ask questions like these of myself, the tendency is to swing between overestimating and underestimating the size of my soul. Maybe the oscillation between big and small is what keeps me bending back toward a sane assessment.
For more on this topic, see the post inhabiting littleness, and the comments that followed.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
headwaters (river, part three)
Have you visited the headwaters of your defining dream? Have you made an inner pilgrimage to the birthplace of the vision that shapes your intentions?
It’s not an easy hike. Sometimes you come across dams you’ve built to block to flow of your own calling. Sometimes you encounter a culvert of pollutants you’ve allowed to empty into your passion.
But eventually you make it back to the simple source. A wellspring of clear water bubbling up from your soul-dirt... The Spirit flowing from your deep places...
Your family, your friends, your community need the living water that is meant to flow from you. You’re an integral part of a relational ecosystem.
It’s not an easy hike. Sometimes you come across dams you’ve built to block to flow of your own calling. Sometimes you encounter a culvert of pollutants you’ve allowed to empty into your passion.
But eventually you make it back to the simple source. A wellspring of clear water bubbling up from your soul-dirt... The Spirit flowing from your deep places...
Your family, your friends, your community need the living water that is meant to flow from you. You’re an integral part of a relational ecosystem.
Thursday, March 16, 2006
Inhabiting Littleness
I can only be this person, in this place, in these relationships...
Finite, temporal, limited...
I have instant access to the most superlative instances on the planet of anything I might attempt in my local sphere. So my efforts will necessarily pale in comparison unless I am the very best in the world.
Frankly, this does not inspire me; it freezes me. It could be because I’ve lost touch with the parameters of my own given context. I have misinterpreted my world as the world, which is far too expansive a playground for me.
Somehow, I have to rediscover the wonder of the littleness of my life. I must inhabit my actual sphere of influence (as opposed to the global sphere visible to me via the 12-inch screen of the iBook I’m using to type these words).
It is another facet of presence: to be here, fully incarnated and engaged within the littleness of my life.
Finite, temporal, limited...
I have instant access to the most superlative instances on the planet of anything I might attempt in my local sphere. So my efforts will necessarily pale in comparison unless I am the very best in the world.
Frankly, this does not inspire me; it freezes me. It could be because I’ve lost touch with the parameters of my own given context. I have misinterpreted my world as the world, which is far too expansive a playground for me.
Somehow, I have to rediscover the wonder of the littleness of my life. I must inhabit my actual sphere of influence (as opposed to the global sphere visible to me via the 12-inch screen of the iBook I’m using to type these words).
It is another facet of presence: to be here, fully incarnated and engaged within the littleness of my life.
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