Category Archives: Peace and Justice

Holy Spirit, Rain Down!

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If you then, who are wicked,
know how to give good gifts to your children,
how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit
to those who ask him?” (Lk 11:13)

I have read the ask and you shall receive stuff so many times. This part jumped out at me like I had never read it before. This again represents the value of lectio divina—reading the scriptures slowly and thoughtfully.

We, who are at times wicked, usually know how to give good gifts to our children. How much more does God know how to give us the greatest gift—the Holy Spirit, the image of God in whose very likeness we exist? What to we have to do to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit? Just ask for it! The One Who Is, the Creator, gifts us with the very life breath of the Holy One if we but ask for it.

I am asking right now, “Come, Holy Spirit.”

I now sense and feel the very life of God within me in a new and powerful way!!!!! Like our rector, Fr. John, I am ready to break into song, “Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!”

Wake up and chant with me, “Come, Holy Spirit, fill our hearts, our minds, our very lives with the power of Infinite Love unfolding in the cosmos and within each one of us.” “Rain down the Son of justice who heals us and makes us whole, makes us divine!”

 

Imam–Good Samaritan

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Sometimes I like to re-imagine Gospel stories by putting them in a contemporary perspective. When asked who was neighbor, Jesus told a story—the story of the Good Samaritan. Religious officials passed by and ignored the wounded man in the ditch. A despised Samaritan—a member of a religious sect despised by mainstream Jews—tended to the man’s wounds and took him to an inn for treatment and recuperation for which he paid the inn keeper out of pocket.

Many Christians and Jews, after a long history of crusades and inquisitions, do not look favorably upon Muslims, do not perceive Muslims as neighbors. Perhaps today, Jesus would tell the story in this way:

A certain man was traveling from Atlanta to Macon when he was carjacked by thieves who beat him, left him half-dead in a ditch along the highway, and sped off in his Cadillac Escalade. A Catholic priest, driving by, saw the man but kept on going. Likewise, a Jewish rabbi saw the man and stepped on the accelerator. Later, a Muslim imam saw the man in the ditch and stopped his car. He rendered first aid and, unable to raise 911, he loaded the man in his car and took him to the emergency room. The man’s wallet had been stolen so the hospital could not ID him nor determine whether he had insurance. The imam gave them his business card and said, “If he does not have insurance, our mosque will foot the bill.

Then, Jesus would ask, “Who was brother to his man?”

Islamophobia is running rampant. Two years ago I was preparing to teach a class on Islam through the Institute for Continuing Learning at Young Harris College. I was telling a person I considered to be a devout Christian about the course. When I said the course was entitled, “Islam—Can We Live with It?” The person immediately retorted, “I should hope not!”

Writing in Creighton’s Daily Reflection (http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/100311.html ), Dick Hauser, SJ, asks, “Who are the individuals or groups in our lives for whom we lack compassion? For whom have we not yet become neighbor?” This is the question we, as Christians, must ask ourselves. Do we believe Muslims are and can be merciful, compassionate neighbors? Do we see them as brothers and sisters in Christ? Or, do we let our fears overwhelm our Christian responsibility to love our neighbors?

Consider All as “Dung”

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The One Who Is Speaks Beauty

For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead. (Philippians 3:8-9)

Paul reverts to slang in this passage in order to shock his readers into attention. Paul thought nothing was more important than Christ crucified and resurrected. His courage in proclaiming the Gospel is obvious. He is proclaiming to the world that a man conidered a criminal by the Romans was crucified and is now Lord and Messiah—a most radical claim. For Paul nothing is more important than faith in the Risen Christ whom he proclaims as Messiah, the One who fulfills the promise of Israel.

The translation above says he counts all things as rubbish. Fr. Thomas Keating, Trappist monk from Snowmass taught us long ago that the Greek word for rubbish is really a slang word for fecal matter—dung to put it more politely. The NET Bible translator’s note reads:

The word here translated as “dung” was often used in Greek as a vulgar term for fecal matter. As such it would most likely have had a certain shock value for the readers. That may well be Paul’s meaning here, especially since the context is about what the flesh produces.(2294)

We must also remember, as Paul shocks us, that “flesh” is not our bodies. Flesh is all that is not of God. Merton changed the terminology to bring out its true meaning. Flesh is the false self—again, all that is not of God. All that is of the flesh is s___, to use the English vulgar term. Continue reading →

Contemplation and Creation

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Lake Chatuge Morning

I have just finished reading Monica Weis’ book, The Environmental Vision of Thomas Merton. The book is thoroughly researched and gives great insight into Merton’s growth into ecological consciousness. Careful study of Merton’s journals charts his progress.

Weis makes a distinction which is critical for us today. Merton thought about millennial consciousness and ecological consciousness. To me, millennial conscious is the old “eat, drink, and make merry for tomorrow we die” approach. A contemporary iteration of this trend of thought is encapsulated in “Drill, baby, drill” or “Drill now!” It is all about reaping (raping)the earth’s resources without regard to the consequences such as the dire consequences of environmental destruction in the tar sands oil venture. People who espouse, “Get it and get it now” would be more comfortable with Ronald Reagan than with Al Gore. People who are uninformed often attribute the downfall of Soviet Communism with Reagan’s stand down. Those who know the facts realize that the Soviet empire collapsed under the weight of its rapacious pillaging of natural resources. When these were depleted in Germany and other Eastern Block countries, the empire collapsed. Continue reading →

Technology and Contemplation

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We participated in a conference sponsored by the Merton Center at Bellarmine University in Louisville last weekend—“Contemplation in a Technological Era: Thomas Merton’s Insight for the Twenty-First Century.” I am still trying to digest what was presented at the conference. The papers will be in the next edition of the Merton Annual which comes out next spring. In the meantime, it will be back to the drawing board with study of what Merton has to say about the topic. Continue reading →

Hummingbirds and Contemplative Photography

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John Howard Griffin loaned Thomas Merton a camera and that began Merton’s exploration of contemplative photography. Two years ago, I co-led a retreat on Merton with Father James Behrens at the Monastery of Our Lady of the Holy Spirit in Conyers, Georgia. Father James, like Abbot Dom Michael, is following in the footsteps of Merton’s contemplative photography. I am learning form them and I recently taught a course on The Zen of Photography at the Institute for Continuing Learning at Young Harris College.

Contemplative photography teaches me how to be present to what is happening here and now. It does not fall in the mode of travel photography where you shoot numerous pictures of places you have never really been (You have been too busy just taking pictures.)

My latest rich experience of contemplative has been photographing hummingbirds as they come to our feeders. Sometime I get sneak shots of them through the kitchen window. Most of the time, I sit in a folding chair in the front drive with my camera on a monopod and armed with a 400 mm or 300mm lens. To get the pictures you have be in a contemplative mode—sitting quietly and patiently waiting for the hummingbirds. They hum back and forth. They spot me and fly away. Soon, however, they get used to me sitting there and come to the feeder. Their little hearts can beat as much as 1260 beats per minute. They can hover. They can fly backwards. Their main food is insects; however, they love the nectar in the feeders. They manifest the glory of their Creator.

9/11: Remembered, Revisited, Redirected

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Jesus is Lord!

The question of the week is, “Where were you on 9/11?” There is another question to be asked but we will hold that for a moment.

I had recently retired as a public school educator in Gwinnett County, Georgia and I was fortunate to get a post-retirement consultant’s job with a company in Cambridge, Massachusetts; however, I would be working with schools in Georgia. Having been offered the job, I was invited to a training session for all the company leadership and consultants in Boston. I boarded a Delta jet in Atlanta on 9/9/01. It is the only time I have been on a plane that was returned to the gate because of mechanical problems. Repairs were made and we took off for Boston. In hindsight, the delay may have been an omen of things to come. Continue reading →

Prayer

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[Our church has a weekly soaking prayer service. I led the meditation at last night’s service. I wanted to share this reflection on prayer with you. The quotes from Richard Rohr come from daily messages he sends to subscribers.]

One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God. (Lk 6:12)

Jesus went to pray. Look at the events leading up to Lk 6:12.

  • He forgave the sins of the paralytic.
  • He chose Levi, a tax collector, and then went to a party at Levi’s house.
  • His disciples plucked grain as they walked through the field on the Sabbath
  • He healed the withered hand of the man in the synagogue on the Sabbath

No wonder Jesus went to be with Abba God. His enemies were on his case. They confronted him on each of these occasions. Continue reading →

“En Christo”

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God's Beauty Flares Forth over Lake Chatuge as the Sun Rises

Where is God? This question continues to drive me to search for “answers.” This weekend I saw a football game; the player scored and raised his hand toward heaven. He must think God is up there. Then, at church on Sunday, I saw people raising their hands skyward as they sang praises to God. They too must think God is up there. Continue reading →

The Tar Sands Pipeline Project

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Hubbard Glacier, Alaska

The cosmos is a delicate web. As Christians, we are to care for creation. Problems arise when profit meets commitment to environmental preservation.

The tar sands project to reclaim oil from bitumen embedded in sand is just one example of the rape of our nest. We continue to recklessly destroy our environment. Now the Obama administration  wants to issue a permit to build an oil pipeline from Albert, Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. This week Jesus and Paul and their followers would be at the White House fence protesting the government’s

pipeline.

A brief description of the destructiveness of the tar sands reclamation of oil from bitumen embedded in sand reads:

Environmental Defence just released a new report on the Alberta Oil Sands, calling it the most destructive project on Earth. DeSmogblog gleaned some facts from it:

-Oil sands mining is licensed to use twice the amount of fresh water that the entire city of Calgary uses in a year.

-At least 90% of the fresh water used in the oil sands ends up in ends up in tailing ponds so toxic that propane cannons are used to keep ducks from landing.

-Processing the oil sands uses enough natural gas in a day to heat 3 million homes.

-The toxic tailing ponds are considered one of the largest human-made structures in the world. -The ponds span 50 square kilometers and can be seen from space.

-Producing a barrel of oil from the oil sands produces three times more greenhouse gas emissions than a barrel of conventional oil.

All to keep up the happy motoring! PDF of report here via ::DeSmogBlog (http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/02/tar-sands-most-destructive-project.php )

The complete report on the environmental destructiveness of the tar sands project can be read at http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/TarSands_TheReport%20final.pdf

The September 2009 issue of National Geographic Magazine has a feature article on the tar sands project  (http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/03/canadian-oil-sands/kunzig-text )