antler

Sure, social media gets a bad rap for all sorts of reasons, but if it weren't for facebook I would not have met Dave Harrity, director of a blog called antler.  Immediately after "liking" antler, he asked me to write a piece for the blog.  I've since started to work on antler's social media team, helping to promote the incredible vision of bringing together creativity, imagination and faith.  Take some time to check out antler's mission statement and check out my recent post here:

http://thisisantler.com/2012/10/messy-as-hell/

Engaging spirituality

A few weeks ago I made the last minute decision to attend a retreat called "Engaging Spirituality."  It's a spin-off from Just Faith, which is a 30-week program that challenges people of faith to reflect on their obligation to help bring about greater justice in the world, especially for the most poor and vulnerable.  I was so fortunate that the facilitator was Joe Grant, the person who actually developed this program.  He  had such a calm, peaceful demeanor and spoke with the most wonderful Scottish lilt. The retreat was aimed at deepening awareness of the intersection between prayer and Gospel justice and gaining exposure to wisdom from spiritual writers, such as Madeleine Delbrel (who is a new favorite of mine!), Oscar Romero, Catherine de Hueck Doherty, Mohandas Gandi and many others.  In the course of the two day retreat, stories and personal reflections were sprinkled throughout his presentation.  There was so much that we covered that I could spend several weeks unpacking all that was discussed, but I'll simply summarize some of the main highlights that struck me most.  What follows below is a summation of the notes I took, and although many of the words are verbatim, this brief summary will fail to do justice to the actual experience of the retreat.  

1. Spirituality is not dualism. Too often we think of ourselves as divided persons.  We think that prayer is something that happens at a certain time when we are of a certain frame of mind.  We tell ourselves that we will work at becoming more spiritual persons when life slows down and we have time to meditate.  Of course, life doesn't ever just slow down of its own volition (unless you're stopped in your tracks by some tragedy).  Rather, spirituality requires an intentional integration of your doing with your being.  Prayer is a way of doing everything and isn't above life's mundane activities--whether you're going to the bathroom, washing dishes, getting dressed or undressed, starting your car or turning on your computer.   Prayer should be the pulse, the refrain of your day.

2. Spirituality is eminently practical.  One of the spiritual practices Joe suggested that we try was something marvelously simple.  He said that each morning when you wake, the first moment you put your feet on the floor you should sit with your hands open, palms facing up on your lap and thank God for resurrecting your body another morning.  At the end of the day, the last thing you should do is sit at the edge of your bed and thank God for everything that happened that day--and not just the things you liked or enjoyed--but everything, even the really sad or frustrating parts.  Another spiritual practice he mentioned is an ancient custom called benevolent glancing.  That is, blessing each person you see when looking them in the eye, because "there is Christ in everyone...even if sometimes you have to squint to see him" (Flannery O'Conner).  

3. Doing vs. Being In our culture, those who don't "do" are marginalized persons.  Think about it.  Children, elderly, handicapped, or unemployed.  All are essentially voiceless in our culture, because we valorize the "do-ers" of the world who produce or "earn their keep".   It's important to remember that it's okay to simply "be".  You don't have to be anyone but yourself, a child of the earth.  There are no accolades that you need to receive or people you need to impress.  Only be a child of God.

4.  Love and letting go.  "The problem with letting the world in is that it breaks your hear and there's no way to fix it."  Those words struck a chord within me.  When you open yourself up to the world, you open your heart up to be stretched and broken.  Love so often hurts because love is a process of letting go.  A mother letting go her daughter, a cancer patient letting go of his hair, a child letting go of a childhood attachment.  But the pain of letting go leads us into a deeper embracing of life.  That includes letting go of God, the god we've whittled and carved into our own image.  There is also consolation in knowing that if your heart is not breaking, you are not fully awake.  The world is filled with both pain and love.

5. Cynicism and self-righteousness  These attitudes are two sides of the same coin.  There is the temptation to turn from one to the other.  There can be the temptation to turn the Church or our cause into our god and once you've done that, there's only one antidote.  Darkness, lamenting, groaning, and finally a catharsis that allows us to be joyful as children, throwing off our heavy burdens.

6.  Reconciliation.   Lament leads us to desire reconciliation with others and with God.  And in order to love you have to relinquish the need to be right.

7.  Spirituality.  What is spirituality?  It is a remembering of who you are, a remembering of who we are as a people of God.   We so quickly forget, and we need reminders.  Even simple reminders like the sound of a bell calls us to remember our call to worship God.   A good litmus test of spirituality is this: how does it bring good news to the poor? Also, any spiritualities that don't deal with the realities of brokenness aren't worth their salt.

8.  Gratitude and blessings.  If you don't know how blessed you are, how can you bless others?  Gratitude is the best antidote to cynicism and it comes from a wonderment.  It comes from an unwavering belief in abundance over scarcity(think loaves and fishes).  We must always presume providence, proclaim peace, practice sabbath, radiate joy, seek beauty and imagine possibility.