[Propertalk] FW: Proper 27 b - part 2

[Joe Parrish]

Forwarded:

 

From: Robert P Morrison [mailto:robertpmorrison at charter.net] 
Sent: Friday, November 06, 2015 12:21 AM
To: 'JoeParrish at compuserve.com' <JoeParrish at compuserve.com>
Subject: Proper 27 b - part 2

 

  Part 2

 

          You and I don’t have to be widowed to know what it’s like to be as Naomi, trying to find her way back to some sort of a life. Nor do we need to leave Albany or the Willamette Valley. The demons of doubt, of uncertainty, of anxiety, of discomfort; the demons of having to make and live with our decisions, seems to strike wherever we are and whatever our situation. Whether we like the way that Naomi teaches Ruth to find their way out of this situation – and, since there’s no comment made about it, we have to assume that, for whatever reason, God didn’t condemn it; whether or not we like how Naomi and Ruth connived, neither of them gave up. Neither of them allowed themselves to fall into such a depression that they said or thought that there would be no point in going on. Neither scraped together enough food for one last meal and then laid down to die. Both were determined to live. Both were willing not only to face their demons, they were willing to confront them and to find a way to push them away.

            In Cassaude’s wonderful language, they “believed that the present moment is a sacrament from God.” They recognized that ever moment, every instant, is a gift from God which may be used to bring good out of ill. Every breath we take is, or can be, a revelation of the love of God for us and planted deep within us. What God seeks, then, from Naomi and Ruth and from us, is “self-abandonment”, total giving without holding anything back.

            If we spend time in God’s company – if we adopt a deliberate pattern of reading God’s gifted Word; if we use the written counsel of wise and trusted spiritual directors, counsellors and commentators; if we spend time looking and listening in God’s creation; and if we open our hearts and minds to God, letting all our desires our hope, our anxieties, our questions come out in conversation with God – if we spend time in God’s company then not only can we discover what’s in really important to us, but we can see more clearly what it is that’s pressing on our minds, what’s trying to control us.


            Much loved and respected “Stanford professor and eminent French theorist René Girard, member of the Académie Française, died on Wednesday last week.


            “Our desires, he wrote, are not our own; we want what others want. These duplicated desires lead to rivalry and violence. He argued that human conflict was not caused by our differences, but rather by our sameness. Individuals and societies offload blame and culpability onto an outsider, a scapegoat, whose elimination reconciles antagonists and restores unity.” 4

            If we can learn to think in terms of what God wants, not in terms of making sure that we have what our neighbours have in terms of their possessions or in terms of their approval; if we can learn to stop projecting our feelings on to God, as if God thought as we do, then we’ll be ready to respond to that sacramental moment, whether it be ensuring the immediate safety of two widows or the ultimate birth of the Son of God.

            And what we’ve said about these two pivotal women  of the Old Covenant so we can say of the widow whose actions burned themselves into the imagination of that very Son of God as He watched people move in and out of the Temple.

            We’d probably be the first to say that that woman was incredibly rash. Where did she get those coins? Sure she’d need them to get something for dinner, or for the next month’s bills, or for any children she may have had?

            Do we get so worked up because we’re afraid about how it makes us appear? Is she at an altogether different place in her life and her philosophy of resources than we are? If so, why should this bother us? Surely God will help us to get there and even if the ride is a little rough for a bit, we can trust God – and we can trust that at least someone will have learned the lesson of caring for one another so that no one starves, no one dies of thirst, no one will be cold tonight as the temperatures drop towards winterish temperatures.

            Still, no matter how long we spend with God, no matter how much we reflect on the sacramental nature of all of life in reflecting the love of God, still there are demons which catch us unawares, which sneak up on us and make us hold back, or keep us awake, or prevent us from letting our trust run to the full one hundred per cent certainty that God IS with us.

            YES, it IS hard to commit in that way. Naomi and Ruth must have wrestled with it from the moment Naomi’s husband and sons died, and as they journeyed through unknown territory in the darkness, and even as the conspired to take advantage of Boaz. It IS hard to believe, to trust as the widow in the Temple must have. Jesus Himself knows how often the demons came out of nowhere to challenge Him. Yet He persisted, He gave everything He had to those around Him and, somehow, He managed to do it without a frown, no matter how tough it was.

            It’s for days and nights when the demons seem to be uncomfortably close and persistent that one of the better known prayers from “Night Prayer” from New Zealand fills the bill:

                        “It is night after a long day.
                        What has been done has been done;
                        what has not been done has not been done;
                        let it be.” 5

            Let it be – another way of saying “Your will be done”! What we see today is nothing less than the faith that helps us to live out our baptismal covenant, such a faith as calms us, whether we’re trying to sleep or do anything else.

            I was talking with Ceal Babock this week and she mentioned a prayer she found comforting. I’m still looking, but I think it’s this:

                        “Support us, Lord, all the day long, until the shadows lengthen,

and the evening comes, the busy world is hushed, the fever of life is over, and our work done; then Lord, in your mercy, give us safe lodging, a holy rest and peace at the last.” 6

            In God’s company, with God’s resources, by God’s blessing, we can face any demon.

 

NOTES:

 

[1]           http://www.npr.org/2015/11/03/453986815/john-irving-always-knows-where-hes-going# <http://www.npr.org/2015/11/03/453986815/john-irving-always-knows-where-hes-going> 

 


2            <https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCQQFjAAahUKEwjw28CgpPrIAhVS3mMKHaAPAgY&url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FJean_Pierre_de_Caussade&usg=AFQjCNFgLsTO_AJokPhYyCFlhi9hIxa8iA> Jean Pierre de Caussade - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Pierre_de_Caussade


 

3           Jean-Pierre de Caussade 1675-1751 in “Abandonment to Divine Providence   (The Sacrament of the Present Moment)”, quoted by Suzanne Guthrie, in “At the Edge of the Enclosure: Soulwork Toward Sunday: Self-Guided Retreat Proper 27 (Year B) ‘The Widow in the Temple’ 2nd November, 2015” Suzanne Guthrie  http://www.edgeofenclosure.org/proper27b.html

 

4           Quoted in http://news.stanford.edu/news/2015/november/rene-girard-obit-110415.html

 

5           “Night Prayer” in “A New Zealand Prayer Book”, Collins, Auckland, © 1989 page 184.

 

6           Among other places - Additional Prayers: At Night :  <https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CBwQFjAAahUKEwjx3oW2_vrIAhVB52MKHdJNCYw&url=http%3A%2F%2Fjustus.anglican.org%2Fresources%2Fbcp%2F1928%2FFamily_Prayer.htm&usg=AFQjCNEVZfTP32onJr0nbd2W3M8pmQgYtA&bvm=bv.106923889,d.cGc> The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: Family Prayer  justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/1928/Family_Prayer.htm

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