2013.03.13 My First White-Smoke-Over-the-Vatican Viewing

The sheer volume and power of bold and bald hope that was evidenced today in St. Peter’s Square in Rome is a statement in itself.  Thousands of people gathered to await the announcement of the election of the next leader of the largest religion in the world.

Who knows the future?—but history was made today in this election. The man the cardinals elected as the next Pope is Jorge Mario Bergoglio from Argentina.

He is very conservative about most church practices, theology, and morality.
                                                  AND
He has chosen, for the very first time in papal history, the name of Francis.  He will be Francis the First!  I was hoping for Peter, but so far no one has had the courage to choose that name. St. Francis is one of the most beloved of church saints, known for his humility and his attentiveness to the needs of the poor, not just materially, but those who have been neglected and marginalized in church and society—those in fact who have suffered rejection like Jesus did.  Francis is also  known for his affection for all nature and all critters whom he called Sister and Brother. He’s the saint whose statue you often see in a garden next to the birdbath scattering food for the birds. 
     And there’s another Francis represented as well: Francis Xavier, the co-founder of the Jesuit Order: the Society of Jesus.  
                                                   AND
He is a Jesuit, another first.  That will be controversial, and also says much about this man’s intellectual grounding and his love for Jesus Christ. 
                                                   AND
He is a Latino, representing an area of the world in which the Roman Catholic population is strong and growing. Politics is in everything, but American Latinos/Latinas will feel proud and represented.

There were clear signs today of this new Pope’s humility:
He chose to wear his own simple cross, not one of the Vatican  bejeweled papal crosses.
He asked for silence from an enormous crowd—and got it.  In the silence he bowed to receive the prayers and blessings of the people upon him— BEFORE he gave them a papal blessing.  A first!
He spoke in Italian, except when Latin was required, and in a colloquial tone, calling people his brothers and sisters, and telling them he’d “see them soon”  and to “have a good evening.”
When he was a Cardinal in his native land, he walked among the people and took public transportation or a cab.
Francis has a winning smile and a clear-eyed gaze. I do believe that this man, while conservative in many ways will LISTEN and encourage dialogue about women in the ordained ministry, homosexuality, gay marriage and adoption of children, and many other issues people are clamoring about.

I doubt that he would give much priority about my soap box issue: theological language (pronouns again!)  but who knows?  But I bet he would listen to me.

So, as always, we wait and see, pray and hope— and stay open.

2013.03.10 Women of Guts and Glory

In honor of International Women’s Day, which was actually March 8, and my oldest granddaughter’s 17th birthday, which is today,  I honor all girls and women for their steadiness in a world that has not always noticed their presence. 

Oh Godde, you are not a man nor a woman, rather fully feminine and fully masculine (and everything in between) in the energy of your one holy life in which all creation has life, breath and being: Keep humanity one-in-you, and keep us holy-in-you; and please don’t let our mortal divisiveness hide from us the light of the love that is immortal. Big fat spirit-filled smooches from us all. AMEN.

Happy Birthday, beloved Gillian. You begin your 18th year today. Find out who you are and what matters to you. Stay faithful to yourself, for, in doing so, you will be faithful to Godde.

May I also recommend to you who read this blog a weekly series on Presidential Wives, ladies of power, wit and wisdom. It’s on Monday nights from 9-10:30 on CSpan. Very engaging—good story, good history.  

I confess I never remember exactly the list of male presidents, however, for, some quirky little reason, I now am ready to know who these men were— through their women.  That is good, because we're used to knowing the women through the men, not the reverse. The wives who loved them, and were beloved by them. Partners in marriage and politics, from Martha Washington onward.  

My mother was a strong though scared woman, but when she came through she’d hit it right on.  She told me once when I was whining about the fact that I might never develop boobs( and therefore get a boy) : “Lynnie, you come from a long line of boobs. You’ll get them!” She gave me guts.

So there you have it.  Honor the women in your life. And honor the men who have through history honored the women in their lives.

2013.03.06 A Red Shoe Rant

I’m so glad the retiring pope is leaving his red shoes behind.  I wonder if he knows that it used to be considered a scandal, or at least the sign of a “loose” woman afoot, when a woman wore red shoes—anywhere but most particularly in church?  

I still have the little red party shoes I adored as a young child. They are dirty and have lost all their luster, but they sit at the foot of my home altar—not for me to worship but for me to remember my spunk, and the God who gave it to me. I have adult red shoes, too, and have worn them to church.

The papal red shoes are supposed to symbolize the blood of the martyrs. It’s a nice gesture to stand in “pools of blood” once shed by people who would not deny their devotion and faith in Jesus Christ, or was it their faith in Christianity itself, or something else?  I think their hearts were true and the culture of the day supported such sacrifice, but I think it’s time the Vatican itself sacrificed LOTS of its excessive wealth and power, perhaps some of the accumulated papal wardrobe and regalia— red shoes and all.  Ya know, all this Pope as almighty demi-deity isn’t that old— wasn’t part of the original plan.  

Time to Occupy Vatican City.

My protest isn’t just about wealth and power, it’s about theology, ideas and words about God and religious practices that amount, in my book, to God-abuse—advertising a God whose immortal love gets hidden from us by the sins of the Church. I mean ALL Christian churches, not just the Catholic one because it’s the biggest, richest, and loudest. 

I reject the theology that says Jesus Christ died for my sins, or anyone’s. He didn’t die, he was
    killed!
I reject the theology that ordains the votes of men-only as the will of God.
I reject the theology that insists that God has a plan and a candidate in mind. Guys! Just pray     and vote, but for Christ’s sake don’t politik or lobby. Can a nun self-nominate?
I reject the theology and the language that consistently names Divinity as He, Him, His,     Himself—a sinful way to imprison Divinity in masculinity.
 I reject a church that protects men who abuse, and other men who cover up.
 I reject a church that will not ordain women to celebrate the Holy Eucharist. Either include     women in priestly ministry, or stop ordaining men.

I suggest all women wear red shoes to church—if you still go to church. Click those heels together three time fast, and PRESTO! all the non-avian cardinals will vanish. Look for them in Kansas—or not. 

2013.03.03 Meet Maud

Girls at eight are often at their most engaging, creative, uninhibited best.  Eight is great!

One such girl, the niece of a good friend, regaled her family with her own personal theology.  It went something like this: “God is Maud. Did you know that?  Yes, God’s name is Maud.”

Curious adults wanted to hear more, so the child continued with her theology, quite obvious to her: “Well, when I take a bath or a shower, I wouldn’t want some man-God watching me, would I?”

Would you?

So much for the omni-present, omni-masculine deity. Bring me Maud. And seriously, as far as I’m concerned, most of our highfalutin ideas about Divinity could be eliminated in favor of Love.

Take omniscience, for example: would a loving Godde not respect everyone’s need for privacy, even secrecy at times, especially teen-agerish times? Some argue that God is all-knowing, but waits (cunningly?) for us to reveal, knowing we will. I doubt that very much.

As to omnipotence, it’s quite obviously errant, unless divine power is only that of Love with no conditions.

Omnipresence might work, but only if that means that Godde is available and accessible from within—something like, give us this day our daily strength. 

How about All-Seeing? Perhaps Godde is a futurist, massaging souls gently, lovingly, and slowly forward into new and mysterious experiences that enlighten, and awaken, and refresh. Like the unexpected (and wise) resignation of the present Pope? Who knew?  There may be pink smoke over the Vatican yet. 

All kinds of holes can be punched in my ideas. They’re just offerings to query by. It’s really not about who God is, but how God is experienced. And there’s more commonality in such experiences than most would imagine.

Recently, a friend and sister Godde-buff and I had to agree, after batting around different images, needs, words,  and concepts about God, that we both were talking about the same thing, basically a Mystery we knew nothing—and everything—about.  A Mystery for  whom we both long and linger over lunch about.

Meet Maud.

2013.02.17 Why Heaven Now? A Modest Proposal

Reading Eben Alexander’s book Proof of Heaven, and finding it as engaging as his talk, but with much more detail, both personal and scientific, including some fascinating backstory, I sort of wish I’d nearly died and had such a glorious taste of the spiritual realm.

I wondered, why now? Why has this book come out just now?  I predict it will be a bestseller, and Eben Alexander will promote it with all he’s got, because he is earnest about the message of ultimate eternal love he calls God. 

When I was very young I had a similar experience, though not as grand. I called it God because I’d seen God in a book and figured God was the right name for feeling so utterly affirmed and accepted without question.  I have spent most of my life trying to preserve, protect, even simply remember and retrieve, this experience of pure being-loved. I have wanted to shield it from my own doubts. I also it hasn't magically made me a perfect person!

My sister remembers me under the table a lot, but I have no proof of my own small but ultimate experience. All I can do is trust it, and write about it, and try not to get preachy-insistent about it.

To me, the most resonant thing Alexander wrote about God was: “One of the biggest mistakes people make when they think about God is to imagine god as impersonal. Yes, God is behind numbers, the perfection of the universe that science measures and struggles to understand. But—again, paradoxically—Om (means One and is another name he uses for Divinity) is “human” as well—even more  human than you and I are. Om understands and sympathizes with our human situation more profoundly than we can imagine because Om knows what we have forgotten, and understands the terrible burden it is to live with amnesia of the Divine for even a moment.”

That’s like what I felt as a child and I can’t go abstract with it, no matter how much I think I should, and no matter how much I know God remains Mystery to be grasped occasionally by sheer grace. Believe me, however, I’m in no hurry to die.

Alexander  doesn’t refer to God as He. Okay with me. Might the Holy Eucharist be, for Christians,  a ritual of anamnesis, a state of no amnesia about Divinity?  Could the “human” God have many identities, like Jesus, Buddha, Moses, and how about Betty Friedan, or Anita Hill, or Gloria Steinem, Julian of Norwich, Pope John XXIII, or you, or me—and so many more. 

So, why now?  I think it is because most of the world has made science an idol. There is lots of evidence, biblical and beyond, that God finds a way to insert a “punctuation mark” into this universe to remind people that science, as necessary and wondrous as it is, is not God.

2013.02.24 BIG FAT UNMANAGEABLE THEOLOGICAL WORDS

Most people today palaver on about our tendency to use too many words, especially in the Church.  It’s true. We do.

Talk is cheap but words are precious—and remain our primary symbol system for communication and formation.

Words are also spiritual. I love languages, even Latin, and majored in Spanish. I clearly recall the moment when I suddenly realized that I was actually reading Spanish words in my head without first translating them into English.  You wouldn’t call my feeling ecstasy, but you would call it awe.

Christians use a lot of loaded words. But we have lost the meaning and truth of many of our words. Rather than throw our ancient words out, perhaps we need to reclaim and re-understand, our precious vocabulary. Here is an invitation to join me as you wish.

BIG FAT UNMANAGEABLE THEOLOGICAL WORDS—BROUGHT TO HEART

Saturday March 16, 2013, 10 to 3, a quiet retreat day offered by Episcopal priest, author and spiritual director, the Rev Lyn G. Brakeman, at Miramar Retreat Center in Duxbury, Massachusetts.  Retreatants will be invited to explore, through meditations, conversations, journaling, and personal prayer, some basic Christian vocabulary, words we often use without really knowing what they mean in lived experience. Little things like grace, sin, salvation, the holy are not cereal brands, but rooted in ancient and biblical contexts. What do they mean to you?  Individual spiritual direction will be offered for anyone who desires it. The goal is to enrich and enliven Christian spirituality in a beautiful space with lots of places to rest in God and pray, and enjoy a good warm lunch.

You may register on line at Miramarretreat.org, email at miramarma@aol.com, call 781-585-2460. Check website for more information.  Fee is $39 with a deposit of $15.
 

2013.02.19 Proof of Heaven?

Hearing Eben Alexander, author of the book Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey Into the Afterlife, speak was a moving experience for me—not because I needed proof of heaven or bolstering for my religious faith. In fact, I’d pretty much decided to wait till I was much older to worry and wonder about resurrection theology—and never have fretted about “getting in.”

Nor was I interested in hearing one more, albeit from a medical scientist, testimony about near-death experience. 

No, I was moved because Dr. Alexander was NOT charismatic. That is not meant as an insult. 

Alexander spoke almost casually and in a low-key way about the exhilarating, exotic, colorful, yes, heavenly according to age-old religio-spiritual imagery, experience he had while he was in a week-long coma induced by bacterial meningitis (inflammation of membranes that line the skull and enclose the brain and spinal cord).

“My neocortex was not running at all,” he told us. It was dead, or more graphically, a “neocortex soaked in pus.”  In such a condition, the physical organ we call brain, could not manufacture  consciousness such as Alexander experienced.

Does human consciousness exist outside the brain? It would seem so. The brain, in fact, actually limits consciousness, according to Dr. Alexander.  

Alexander came out of the coma and back into life, armed with a life-transforming experience, and a memory. His son, a physician studying neurosurgery himself, told him not to talk to anyone or read a thing before he wrote everything he remembered down. He wrote 20,000 words in six weeks. 

Medical doctors, who had all but pronounced the case hopeless, called his recovery a medical miracle. Alexander called it the result of being in heaven. The publisher chose the book's title to promote sales, but it's really about Divinity. He described his vision of divinity (his word) in great detail, including a perfect mystical melody, a beautiful woman, swirling colors, an infinitely knowing presence, and a powerful message of unconditional love. All the ingredients of a perfect first date, I’d say.  

No stranger to religion, in part because of a physician father with a strong faith, Alexander, nevertheless, looked to science to answer life’s questions. But after his spiritual awakening he testified: “I knew what happened to me was beyond science, and that if I said anything at all as a scientist ever again, I had to say this.”  

Science and theology are not at odds, as many in both camps have maintained.  They are soul mates driven by similar quests and using different methodologies.  Such an interface, to me, is not “brain” (or rocket)  science!  Still,  for such a conversation to succeed, both camps must be motivated by respect, accord the project the dignity it deserves, speak with mutual respectful, and have no attachment to agenda or outcome.  

I will not describe more of Alexander’s compelling details, save to add that he left us with a tantalizing  cliff-hanger, the final discovery that, for him, secured the truth of the heavenly realm as he experienced it.

Do I find this witness credible?  Yes. Why?
    -I didn’t feel the impulse to argue with him or critique, one of my favorite resistances.
    -He never used the word resurrection, or tried to pump a Christian agenda. 
    -He was humble, far from culture-bound celebrity, although he has achieved media fame.
    -He did not point to himself, but beyond himself. When asked if he thought God “arranged” all this with a higher purpose, Alexander said, “No. I was not chosen.”
    I was glad to hear that theological line of thinking dispelled. God doesn’t choose anyone, make anyone special, or manipulate human freedom, even for a godly agenda  (That’s our specialty.) We are all called, and chosen. 
    -The message of Love was clear, as was the message that Alexander would go back and be a messenger—the job of “angels.”
    -When he, against all odds, awoke, his first words were: Thank you.
    -His second words were: All is well.
    -All “near-death” accounts are consistently the same at the core, though there may be descriptive imagery from earthly culture or religion ie. seeing Jesus, Buddha, etc. Atheists would leave it abstract, Alexander noted, but made no fun of that approach. 
    -One does not have to almost die to have such experience.
    -If you have such an experience you will never forget it, although you may question it and try to understand it by many means.
    -Images sync with biblical and other ancient and modern mystical witnesses.
    -Extended consciousness is not a new topic.
    -All things are one in God.

I felt affirmed in my own spiritual experience and pleased that Alexander’s witness answered some of my questions:  Why, in spite of being exposed to lots of traditional negative God images, even in the Bible, have I never believed a single one? Why have I never believed that God created goodness, and therefore must also be the author of evil?  Why have I never thought God was judgmental or controlling, never? I was never afraid of God.

My theology comes out of my own spiritual experience and often has made me feel out of step, although, thankfully, I didn’t have to get pregnant, exiled, crucified, or nearly die for it.

Oh, I’ve been hurt and lost connection with the God I early experienced, and I’ve doubted my self and my own memory, but I NEVER forgot what happened. And yes, I’ve felt angry at patriarchal images and language, plenty, but, from my beginning I knew it was NOT God—not simply, not MY God, but NOT God at all.    

I write about the talk I heard with some trepidation, because I may have heard some things wrong, and I haven’t read the book, only reviews and articles. But I will read the book, then keep on writing my own book. As Alexander said, it’s good timing for this message—and its source.