Sharing the Journey

As we approach 2021, one tradition is making New Year’s resolutions – changes we want to make. Yet many of us seem to quickly revert to old habits or tend to forget the altruistic changes we intended. A colleague once told me that more gym memberships are sold in January than any other month and gym usage is highest in January and then quickly reduces to more normal levels.

It made me wonder if perhaps we might look differently at the New Year. We may begin by asking ourselves what attitudes, and values do I want to see more of in my life? Once you answer that you then are more ready to make decisions about how you will work to bring it about in our life and for those around you. We must remember that the only one I can change is ME. And even that can be difficult. But if these are heartfelt wishes I deeply value it will be easier to engage than if it were something that I think I “should” do.

If for example I want more cooperation in my life or community, who will I choose to cooperate with, and on what. Who else might I invite who might also be seeking cooperation rather than conflict? How might I choose a project that has great value to others so that cooperation is enhanced?

If I wish to grow in my faith what might I be willing to add to my schedule that helps that to occur? (e.g., setting a daily tine for prayer, joining the Sunday Book Study or the Spiritual Companionship Group, or take on a spiritual practice.) But it may also mean identifying what you are willing to take out of the your schedule to give you the time for what you are adding.

Make a contract with yourself that whatever it is you wish to do, you will continue to do until after Easter. This gives you time to make this a more natural part of your life. It gives time for any slack-off and time to recommit as necessary.

What this approach can create is a New Year’s revolution. Tgis increases the likelihood that something we value and desire can be implemented improving the quality of our life and hopefully in the world around us.

Nancy

I recall as a child wondering what I should get my Dad for Father’s Day? And the things I remember getting him seem so small and even a bit tacky now. World’s Greatest Dad coffee mug, a funny card, a key ring – you know the drill. As I got older the presents increased in quality and cost.

As a teen my Dad and I only sort of got along. He had developed ongoing medical problems and his response as I remember was to be a edgy and short tempered. The world had delivered an unexpected blow to him and his nuclear family constantly tried to protect him from his desire to prove he was still strong and capable. No wonder he was short-tempered with us. We didn’t hear what his actions were saying.

After I moved out of the house to attend seminary he began to write me letters (midnight specials I called them) usually written when he could not sleep in the wee morning hours. Not earth shattering letters or publishable compendiums of wise sayings He wrote about his life and mine, about his frustrations at work (he was in a profession he never enjoyed), and what was going on in the neighborhood and household. I spent the next decade in the Albany, NY area.

In August 1980 I moved to Toronto, Canada to a job I was sure would be a career changer for me (it was but not as I expected). In September Dad told me hewas not feeling well. In October he called to let me know he was going to have exploratory surgery. I waited with my sister and my mother in the surgical waiting room. And far too quickly we were called into the consultation room with the surgeon. And were told Dad had an aggressive form of cancer in his abdomen that was inoperable.

I was able to go into Buffalo most weekends to help care for him. He told me that he had worried about what he would do in retirement (he was 65 that November) but figured he could stop worrying about it. He dealt and coped with his worsening condition as best he could. As he got weaker. I had to help him with an improvised device so he could stand in the shower. (He wasn’t going to sit down in the shower! Until a week or so later he had no other choice.)

In early December we all talked about it made the decision to get him into Hospice Care and the paper work was reluctantly submitted by his physician. I drove home to Toronto Sunday night. The next day I received a call that Dad had died in the early morning hours.

I learned to get used to the idea my Dad had died, and accepted that as the fact of that matter. I noted when I turned 66 that I had outlived Dad and wondered what his retirement might have been like. And whether he might have lived longer if he had chosen a different career or changed careers mid-life.

In December 2020 it will be 40 years since his death. And today there is a lump in my throat. After all this time I still miss him. I still tell some of his jokes (and in memory hear my mother scold him for telling a few of them with her terse “Hilly!”)
I no longer worry about what I did or did not give him on Father’s Day. I came to realized that the gifts themselves did not matter to him. How can I be sure? Because in the case on the dresser where I keep cuff links, crosses, and clerical collars at the bottom is a 3 inch piece of blue felt with the letters DAD glued to it and a wire loop to hold keys. This was given to me in June 1989 when Christopher was 3. It then that I realized that all Dad really wanted was my love. So this is my Fathers’day gift this year.

HI Dad.
I love you!
Don.

There has always been some tension between the values of the Christian Gospel and the American ideal of individual independence and personal freedom. But we have seen this in new ways since the COVID-19 pandemic began. We have heard of choirs ignoring scientific warnings and government advice by rehearsing and infecting others, of churches opening in spite of state or local mandates to stay at home. We have recently seen new footage of demonstrations by people advocating for lessening restrictions and referring to their “God given rights”. But is it simply individual rights that matters in our religious traditions?

There seems to be diverse opinions on how to apply religious principles to our present societal situation. I write to commend one in particular which I have derived from the teachings of Jesus and of St Paul over my 50 years of active parish ministry.

In each of the Gospels I see that Jesus is quite clear that he understands love to be a way of being and acting (rather than a feeling) that puts the good of others as minimally being of equal importance – and ideally of more importance – than our personal preferences, desires and wants. Paul echoes this emphasis often in his letters to the fledgling congregations. “Do not cause any one to stumble” he writes in the first letter to the Corinthians. I cannot imagine that either of them would give us as pass on various ways to prevent spreading contagion and possible death to other people.

We need to evaluate our decisions about recommended actions not on the scale of the inconvenience it causes us but rather what is the overall effect on our neighbors – using Jesus’ definition of neighbor as being ALL whose lives interact with ours – even those with whom we disagree or with whom we are at enmity.

With government, business owners and investors wanting to reopen our economy we now have the ability to freely choose what we will do, and how we will do it. With the COVID 19 case curve steady or in a mild decrease we may be tempted to relax and skip the ongoing recommendations. (Especially continuing to stay at home unless absolutely necessary, to wash our hands regularly, when going out to wear a face mask, keeping social distances, etc). In truth our present decisions, actions and response will determine the future of this pandemic not just in our area but across a very mobile nation and world.

We have rights but Jesus and other prophetic teachers remind us that with them comes great responsibility to use them for the common good. A Christian colleague of mine used to tell his congregation that JOY comes from the hierarchy of our love Jesus, Others, Yourself. .
Let us be JOYfully responsible in continuing to do what is needed to contain this contagion and the prevent illness and death of the most vulnerable. Jesus also told his followers “In as much as you have done it for the least of these, you have done it for me.”

Don

I have never liked waiting. Even as a child waiting for minutes seemed like hours. Waiting, while necessary, seemed like such a waste of time as I fretted and fidgeted. So it always seemed strange to me that we begin the Church year with this Advent season that is all about waiting. Jesus was born in Bethlehem and almost 30 years later he began his public ministry. We have only one gospel story about his youth. But it tells us this long period of waiting was preparation for him to fulfill his God given purpose.

In this era of minute rice, quick cash, express lanes and a desire for instant gratification waiting seems so much more difficult. It requires patience and, as Nancy has observed, my usual prayer about patience is “Lord, I need patience and I need it today. Amen.” Waiting and patience require practice to be done to good effect.

My grandmother, a clergy widow, was always highly active in her parish. But in her last few years health problems decreased her ability to be as active as she wanted. Her rector (a friend of mine) visited her and she began to complain about how useless she felt, and that she was simply waiting to die. Bruce began by reminding her that she has always taken a bus to work and that sometimes the bus would be quite late. “What did you do while you waited for the bus?” he asked. She told him she read. We don’t have a choice about waiting her reminded her but we do get to choose what we do as we wait.

Advent is about the wait to see the fulfillment of the transformation of God’s people and creation to become as God would have it. Humanity has waited long as each generation has had to learn to seek what it is that they really thirst and hunger for to fill that God shaped hole within. So what will we do as we wait? How can we better prepare ourselves to receive and live out that transformation – that scripture refers to as new life?

That we are waiting for all of creation to be transformed to that vision that Jesus and the prophets foretold is definite. What we will do as we wait is a choice we make day by day. Let us choose wisely and well to prepare ourselves to receive and share with others that new life we are offered.

Don

After only a handful of pieces were added to the board, I watched in astonishment as all the pieces were swept off the board, and a puzzled look surfaced on my son’s face. His mother-in-law then recreated the game board and showed him how, in the next three moves, he would have lost their game of Go, no matter what he had done. (Go is an ancient Chinese game of strategy played with black and white pieces on a grid of lines.)

When our Granddaughter started first grade this past April, she signed up for the Go Club, which meets weekly after school. Recently she mentioned to her father that she wondered why the boy she was playing against hadn’t taken some specific moves that would have guaranteed his win. Her father realized that she could “see” several moves ahead. He also realized that her opponent couldn’t do this yet, and that Granddaughter didn’t understand she has a capacity that her opponent did not have.

Not everyone has the ability to “see” the outcome of “moves” as they are made. The ones who do are often called prophets. Do they foretell the future, or is it really something more like some individuals have the capacity to “see” what will happen if we stay on the path we are on?

As I write, it’s the time of year for Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Built around three Spirits – of Christmas past, present and future – this tale is one of presenting the great biblical exhortation to choose life. Scrooge, living in a world of bah-humbug, is shown how his life will end (a lonely funeral) should he remain on the path he has chosen (having turned away from his generosity, his family, celebrating Christmas, and the needs of others including his faithful bookkeeper). A reminder of what his life could have been was shown to him by the Spirit of Christmas past.

This is what the biblical prophets do – they see the outcome of past and present choices we make (as both individuals, usually society’s decision makers, and as a culture) which they set in the context of God’s desired future for God’s creation.

God desires wholeness for Creation, signs of which include entering into right relationships, reconciliation, and care for the earth and her creatures. In this understanding, there are prophets among us who tell us what to expect if we stay, for example, on our current ecological path (continued indiscriminant use of plastics and non-renewable energy sources leading to severe strain and change on the earth).

Such sight is a blessing (a call to life), and a challenge (who will listen and turn to a different path?). There is also the difficulty of discerning who is the true prophet and who is the false prophet. Whose sight is true, and whose isn’t? As with today, in the Hebrew Scriptures there is mention of false prophets, people who told what those in power wanted to hear, what supported the rulers’ own self-focused desires. Discernment is not easy. Our biggest clue is how consistent a voice, or “sight”, is with God’s desire for Wholeness.

Go is a challenging game, and is easily set up to begin again. This too is a reminder that we can learn new ways of seeing, start new habits, and make different choices as we continue in our life journeys. Adjusting our choices for the benefit of others (“live simply so that others may simply live”) so that Wholeness may reign happens one step at a time. As the Season of Advent draws you into examining your preparedness, may you also see ahead to where your path is taking you.

Nancy