Just Because

So I’ve thought many times about giving up. I’m sure what that really means though. Gving up on life? Love? Happiness? Fulfillment? Haven’t I given up already since I seem to just be going through the motions?

I don’t know. It’s Lent so it is the season of “giving up”. I’d like to give up a few pounds (ha!) so I’ve quit drinking Coke (again…) now succesfully for five days.

I sometimes wish I could just let go. Let go into nothingness for just a few minutes (months). Because as I might have mentioned before, I’m tired. And now I don’t even have the caffein to help me through the day.

I’m trying to read the Bible in its entirety. Even the uncomfortable parts. Even the “OMG. No He didn’t!!” parts.

However, I am having a hard time getting past the first chapter. Genesis 1:1 -2:1 It’s the first Creation story presented in the Bible. My (soon to be) spiritual director suggested that I read this and think about how God might have felt as God “created” me.

I remember how I felt when I realized my son had been conceived. After the initial, “No, No, No, NO!” which had more to do with how much my life was going to change, I remember a sense of wonder. I remember how much I wanted a child and then how much I wanted this child. As if this child been chosen for me. As if this was meant to be, that no matter what this child was wonderful. I thought of the verse from Jeremiah chapter 1,”Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart…” (v. 5a) or Psalm 139, “For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. ¹⁴I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”

And it stuns me that God or anyone would feel that way about me. We all know the sense of joy and wonder that can come with the birth of child. Can you imagine that someone (maybe many someones) felt that way about our births? Those feelings of joy and happiness and delight, because we were created, formed and brought forth.

As weary as I am these days, it’s a hard thing for me to imagine. So I read and re-read the “God saw that it was good…” creation story and I try to imagine being one of those things that God created and God being filled with a sense of wonder and delight and looking down on me and saying, “I have created Laura and she is good.”

I would have graduated from seminary this year – had I not gotten divorced. I would have graduated next year if I had not gotten pregnant. I’m responsible for my own actions so I’m not sad that I’m not a pastor right this moment and that I probably never will be a pastor. I’m actually quite ok with all of that. I just know that being in seminary and wanting to be a pastor kept me accountable to my spirituality. I let myself go when I stop paying attention, where there isn’t anybody there to remind me.

One of my problems, which I might have mentioned before, is my need to perfect everything that I do. So if I plan on praying, then I need to be a perfect prayer. Of course, that is not going to happen. No one prays “perfectly”. There really isn’t any need to. But I want to pray perfectly.

So I don’t pray because it cannot be perfect. And I feel the distance between God and me and my consciousness and the world around me.

I’m also one of those people that need to fix whatever is wrong. So I called the senior priest at my church wanting to find somebody to talk to. When I had been in seminary I had a spiritual director and she was wonderful though this time I was determined to find somebody who would teach me to pray perfectly. Because I felt an immediate need to speak to someone I agreed to meet with him thinking he was not a viable option as a permanent spiritual director. And really, I didn’t think a man would do.

Maybe it will work out though. The conversation we had was wonderful. However, I don’t think he will teach me to pray perfectly. But that’s ok because I don’t think that is ever the point, regardless of what I keep thinking I want. Maybe it might not still work out depending on how our conversation goes regarding what I think about God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit. But for now, Fr. B seems like a nice, old guy that challenges me and makes me a bit uncomfortable with his piercing questions and honest opinions. And after that meeting I felt peaceful. Maybe I’m finally accepting the path that I am on. We’ll see.

I have hesitated on writing about God (or my version of God) because… well, what if I got it wrong? What if God really was/is one of us? Just a stranger on a bus? What if Joan Armstrong was right? Or what if I was right? Plus, what if I would be ridiculed by atheists everywhere? I really do care what everyone thinks. I have a no discrimination policy regarding my insecurities.

The thing is, I’m not sure what I believe. God and I have had a tenuous (SAT word!) relationship at best. The reality is that most of the time I call God a he and that irks me. God is not a maternal figure for me, even though I do recognize the maternal characteristics of God. And I know, I know that God is not male or female or human for that matter, but God is still this Father Time, old man, skinny Santa Clause image in my mind. The Holy Spirit image for me is much more soothing, maybe because of the confusing nature of what exactly the Holy Spirit is (or is imagined to be) – nebulous air? wind? breath? whatever?

I like the God of the Old Testament not because I like everything God does in the Old Testament – I mean, really, God does a lot of shitty things in the Old Testament and just comes off as a mean tempered, violent and without reason. The God of the New Testament reminds me of a Bill Cosby joke about why grandparents are so much nicer to their grandchildren than their children- they are just old people trying to get into heaven now. SO, the reason I like the God of the OT is because he is fallible. Yes! God makes mistakes! Some will disagree with me on this point, but that’s ok. God loses his temper and throws fits and makes poor Job suffer for apparently no reason. He comes up with plenty of excuses for doing the things he does but still God could be a lot nicer – and he isn’t.

God does not make a very strong impression in the New Testament as Jesus seems to become the main character there. So who is this God we all profess to believe in as Christians? Just the father of Jesus, the main character? Or is God more than that?

I think Joan Armstrong is right and wrong… God is the stranger on the bus, and me and you and the air in between. God created all and is all. Can God evolve? Yes. Can God grow? Yes. Can God change? Yes. Is God within, without and beyond? Absolutely.

Who is God? I don’t know but I’ll let you know if I ever find him/her/me/us.

Note: I am not writing a review on the second book that I read of my summer reading list, “The Changing Face of God”. It is a compilation of essays on God and it is good, light reading, good for reflection and an introduction to several, more liberal theologians’ views on God. If anyone is interested in it, I’ll ship the book to you for free via media mail. Just email me your address to justbecause81 (at) gmail (dot) com.

Thomas Merton was a Trappist monk of the Abbey of our Lady of Gethsemani in Kentucky. He was a prolific writer, who wrote about spirituality and was interested in inter-religious dialogue. I picked up this book because of my constant pursuit of the perfect way to pray.

Merton begins the book stating clearly that this book is intended for monks. He does not deny that this book can be useful for laity but the intended audience of the book are people in religious orders. Merton comes across as a bit crotchety in this book as if he were scolding all of us and our intentions when we pray. He states that there is no method or system for prayer – it is an attitude or outlook. He says “Meditation has no point and no reality unless it is firmly rooted in life.” (p.59) He also differentiates between private and public prayer though he says that both can feed into each other.

Part of my interest in reading what monks and nuns think about prayer is the idea that they have these organized lives organized devotion to God and organized prayer times and the idea that all of these things require a separation from the world or the “worldly”. But Merton says that prayer should not take us out the world but more firmly root us in it – it should connect us more to those around us and make us more aware.

Prayer does not blind us to the world, but it transforms our vision of the world, and makes us see it, all men, and all the history of mankind, in the light of God.

I enjoyed this book, particularly a mention at the end on the danger of religion when let it be superficial and dependent on political ideals. Merton describes very well back in the 1960s what is occurring today with the current administration.

Some of the chapters are boring as Merton goes through some prayer history in terms of the Benedictine tradition of prayer. However, this book is very accessible. This is not a systematic how to pray book but Merton has some very clear ideas of what constitutes sincere prayer. It also seems to be a very honest book of Merton’s personality. I think I would have enjoyed getting to know him, scolding and all.

I have always been fascinated with monasticism and prayer. As I have mentioned before, I once had a childhood fantasy of becoming a nun. I’m pretty sure the appeal is in the solitude and organized aspect of that kind of life. While for some that kind of regulation seems boring, for me it feels productive. If I could organize my life that way with the support of a community, I might get more accomplished. These days I have nothing much going on except entertaining a 16 month old who is oh, so close to walking. You’d think I’d get more done.

Anyway, back to nuns and monks. Even celibacy appeals, even now. With my firm belief that celibacy is not a choice but a gift, I wish I had that gift. To be able to channel all my sexual energy and all my real energy towards community living, social justice and loving the world as opposed to loving one person is one of the things I’ll never have. However, I can only hope that I will find someone who will love me – and Tomas – and who I – and Tomas – will love, and that our relationship will enhance and better us so that we can do our part towards community living, social justice and world peace. Oh, and a second kid. (I really, really want a girl!! I keep thinking of putting Tomas in a dress, taking a picture and pulling it out whenever the girl longing pains my heart.)

But because I can’t become a nun, and the world does not function in the measured time of a monastery, how can I live my day so that I take time out to center myself, ground myself enough so that I don’t become paralyzed and lost in my anxieties and depression? I have thought of creating my own hours with my own music and my own prayers mixed with some of my favorite psalms and readings. This might take me a while, but I realized that as my seminary days grow more and more distant, the less I read that inspires me and that motivates me. My passion for social justice has declined because I am no longer around people who are motivated by those things. Not that the people I hang out with aren’t motivated by legitimate things. Family worries and busyness is legitimate. I just wanted more for myself and I have let my seminary failure determine my life and that needs to stop. I need to find the old part of myself that I loved and update her to what my life is now. As I evolve, as God-lover, trendy non-granola semi-hippie and mom, as I figure out what it is that I really want and need (immediately, a shower – in the future, TBD), I will find an end to the run-on sentence that is my life and find some satisfaction and fulfillment even if I’m not happy all the time.

I asked God to spare me pain.
God said, No.
Suffering draws you apart from worldly cares and brings you closer to me.

I take issues with this statement. Many, many issues. But I’ll name just one.

This is the kind of statement that rich people can use as an excuse to say, “Well, it’s a good thing that the poor suffer because it brings them closer to God.” Okay, maybe two issues.

TWO: Suffering alone does not bring us closer to God. I do think that God is in suffering. Just because things are bad does not mean that God is excluded from it. Just like when things are good does not mean that God is there. HOWEVER, suffering does not equal good experience. Cross bearing SUCKS. It is meant to suck. It is not alleviated by the thought, “At least this will bring me closer to God.” Pain was not created to bring us closer to God. I am not in the God killed Jesus camp. Jesus did not die for my sins – he died because of them. Jesus would not have suffered had it not been for human crappiness – I can’t believe that is a word. Suffering is NOT a badge of honor. Suffering is BAD and should be eliminated. Will it be? No. That is not the point. The point is that statements like the one above make suffering seem like something holy and spiritual because it will “bring[s] [us] closer to [God].”

I think I’ll pass.