The simplicity of truth

Colossians 2:2-10

         Today the church remembers a person who arguably is the one responsible for a large chunk of my mature faith. At the very least, Thomas Merton seemed able to write and synthesize the thoughts and beliefs in my own heart and soul. Thomas Merton was a mentor and a kindred spirit.

         As I started to write this blog entry (yesterday) I was overcome by the quality of the day. I am once again on the bridge of the SS ManFish here in the North Atlantic. The rain is pulsing against the windows and the seas seem as if they will swallow what little stands between us and the frigid waters below.  It seems a limbo-like state of being. Stand firm at the helm, do not go out , just stay put. It's not like I have much a choice as I still am recuperating from major surgery 3 weeks ago. I have already been in a kind of limbo. 

         This limbo though acts as lens for me to view my life. What makes me a faithful person? What gives life meaning and purpose? Right now it certainly is not any kind of significant communication or actions on my part, I am very limited indeed.  Walking if not pacing, is my primary means of exercise and movement.  So, infirmed and in limbo, what do I have to say about my faith and God's love?  This is where today's passage and Thomas Merton call to me louder than the howls of wind and driving rain pelting the windows.

         Merton spoke to me in more than any treatise or a pattern of logic and arguments set forth by a doctor of the church or any ancient philosopher.  Arguments can be made, remade, falsified and bastardized for almost any belief. One need only look outside at some of the horrific uses of Holy Scripture ( in almost any faith ) to justify condemnation, hate and killing all of which seem to me to be anathema to the fundamentals of God.  This is one of the things that Merton spoke of, not rules and rubrics as I say but of core beliefs and the fundamentals that God reveals in the varied religions and faiths of the world. He had said that if we were to compare religions on a tenet by tenet basis we would never find solidarity or common ground. But the fundamentals that God reveals to us can be seen in every religion and those fundamentals are our common ground, the facets of God's love that we can all see and agree on. This vision allowed Merton to be accepted by the Buddhist, the Trappist, the Jew and the Muslim all at the same time. How simply beautiful, ahhh, the simplicity of truth.  There are no false arguments, no twisting of logic, no minutia that needs to be fulfilled in order for salvation or love to be offered or accepted.

           So today, sitting here atop the stormy seas of limbo, I know that it is not all those rules and rubrics that saves me or guarantees the love of my God, my creator. Nor do the small acts of faith or personal acts of piety make me holy. These things can help one's faith and bring us closer to God but these are certainly not guarantees. In the simplest form we are loved into existence by God and we are loved as we exist. Our goal is to accept that love and mirror that love back to God by loving others as God created them. That is, as uniquely as God created us. 

        I suppose I look at life like a labyrinth. It is a journey towards God. When people make like overly complicated they replace the labyrinth  (or mistake the labyrinth) for a maze. A maze is the surest way of getting lost, filled with twists and dead ends. So I would say settle in on the journey and do not let rules, rubrics and false logic make your life into a maze. Enjoy the simplicity of faith and life and allow life to be the joyful journey to God that it is meant to be. Uncomplicated, simple truth.

          Thank you Thomas. 

I want their hearts to be encouraged and united in love, so that they may have all the riches of assured understanding and have the knowledge of God’s mystery, that is, Christ himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. I am saying this so that no one may deceive you with plausible arguments. For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, and I rejoice to see your morale and the firmness of your faith in Christ.

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. 

See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ. For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have come to fullness in him, who is the head of every ruler and authority.

Good, Godly and genuine truths

Mark 16:15-20

          I can understand the arrogance of some believers as they feel they have thee answer to humanity set forth by God. The faithful are commissioned to go forth and tell all of creation. How valuable must this word be if they are to proclaim it to all? And then the problems began.

           How often do we hear words, any words, not just the word of God, and come away with assurety that what they have seen and heard is thee way?  Like a bull in the china shop then, they surge forward taking no prisoners. We know the right path, we know the truth. It becomes our way or the highway. Isn't that so often the truth? Whether it is in church, in our homes with our families and our relationships, in our entire lives?

           One of the things that I tend to rail about here is about the sins of humanity that have been perpetuated in the name of God, in the name of "the state" or in the name of our religion.  Today is the feast of St. Francis Xavier. He wrote a letter to the King of Portugal because the Portuguese soldiers were brutal in their treatment of the natives. Francis was compelled to inform the King that we could easily be held accountable for this, no doubt based on this very scripture passage and that God is the creator ( and lover ) of all.  God loves "them" at least as much as God loves us. I have found from history that churches and religions have not acted according to the very beliefs they profess. The Roman Church is notorious in their actions towards native Americans and Africans who were viewed as less than human and even without souls. 

          Part of any journey to proclaim the Good News to humanity, whether it is an individual journey or some kind of crusade, ( though I dislike that word), is to open one's eyes and to hear what the rest of God's creation says.  We can proclaim the Good News of life and in our lives but what is the Good News God proclaims through others? We, as a person or as a faith, may have truths to convey, good, Godly and genuine truths, but what truths does the rest of God's creation have to convey to us?

         A case in point is Genesis. It conveys the truth that God is our creator.  This book is not scientific and does not profess to be. It explained fundamental truths to a people in a way they could comprehend. They certainly would not have understood atomic particles or the big bang. Moving forward though, it took thousands of years for humanity to grasp some other fundamental truths. For example, the Earth was not the center of the universe. It is almost funny how the world revolved and accepted same sex relationships for so long and without specific names only to be bastardized by fundamentalists in a revisionist histroy way, again using Genesis as their guide.  What needs to happen is for 'the truth' to be tempered by cultures, existing history (accurately portrayed) and acknowledging God's revealed world which also speaks to us loudly. There are in fact scores of examples in God's creation of same sex attraction and relationships in the animal kingdom.  In our arrogance can we deny the messages God gives us from his very creation? Whether it is the movement of the planets and atomic particles or the reality of how we have been created, animals one and all, there are truths there as well that guides and compliments truths of Scripture. 

         All this this speaks sternly against our own arrogance and argues for listening, looking and learning with earnestness and zeal about all of God's creation. We are not smart enough, wise enough or holy enough to make proclamations for God. We simply cannot comrehend it all.  It seems the only message we can truly run rampant proclaiming is God's unending and unfathomable love for each one of us. 

And he said to them, ‘Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation. 

The one who believes and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes in their hands, and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.’

So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and proclaimed the good news everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by the signs that accompanied it.