Southwest Conference Blog

…Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness

Back in the 1960s, I was the director of a summer camp for girls in the beautiful Adirondack Mountains in New York State. For eight weeks, a hundred and fifty campers would have three meals a day in the “mess hall”, and at every meal they’d sing:

If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands, clap, clap, if you’re happy and you know it then your life will surely show it, if you’re happy and you know it clap your hands, clap, clap.

I suspect that some of you might know the other verses. The song went from clapping your hands to stamping your feet, then your knees and on and on. Well, it seemed to keep the campers happy, but that’s not the type of happiness we are going to pursue in this blog. Not that there’s anything wrong with frivolous happiness, but that’s not what Thomas Jefferson had in mind when he wrote The Declaration of Independence.

My last blog, Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Stuff, described how “our obsession with Stuff is trashing the planet, our communities, and our health.” This blog will focus on Sustainable Happiness. Before we look at the Science of Happiness, I found it nostalgic and beneficial to briefly recall the ancient philosophers who were grappling with the concept of happiness over two thousand years ago.

First there was Socrates, a Greek philosopher and scientist who lived between 469-399 BCE. He held a unique place in the history of happiness “…as he was first known to argue that happiness is actually attainable through human effort“. He was also known for saying, that he was convinced that “…the unexamined life is not worth living”. Oh, and yes, there was the “Socratic method” (a process of questioning designed to expose lack of knowledge and clear the way to knowledge). The price he paid for his honest search for truth was death. He was convicted of corruption of youth and sentenced to die by Hemlock poisoning.

Aristotle lived between 384-322 BCE and was a student of Plato. He is considered to be one of the greatest thinkers in the history of western science and philosophy.

One of his most influential works is the Nicomachean Ethics, where he presents a theory of happiness that is still relevant today, over 2,300 years later. The major question that he seeks to answer is what is the ultimate purpose of human existence? Aristotle’s answer is “…that nearly everyone would agree that happiness is the end which meets all the requirements”.

Epicurus (341-270 BCE) was considered a renowned figure in the history of science and philosophy. He believed that “…the most pleasant life is one where we abstain from unnecessary desires and achieve an inner tranquility by being content with simple things”. His position was that our beliefs should only be those that could be verified by empirical evidence.

True to his philosophy, Epicuris spent the last few days of his life in pleasure. Although he was physically sick, he wrote this letter of his friend Idomeneus:

“I have written this letter to you on a happy day to me, which is also the last day of my life. For I have been attacked by a painful inability to urinate, and also dysentery, so violent that nothing can be added to the violence of suffering. But the cheerfulness of my mind, which comes from the recollection of all my philosophical contemplation, counterbalanced all these afflictions. And I beg of you to take care of the children of Metrodorus, in a manner worthy of the devotion shown by the young man to me, and to philosophy.”

Even in one of the most miserable conditions I can picture, instead of dwelling on his pain, he is able to achieve happiness.

Moving forward to the present era, John Locke lived between 1632-1704 CE. He was a major English philosopher, whose political texts, “…helped paved the way for the French and American revolutions. He coined the phrase ‘pursuit of happiness’ in his book An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Thomas Jefferson took the phrase and included it in the people’s inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the Declaration of Independence.

Locke writes: “The necessity of pursuing happiness is the foundation of liberty. As therefore the highest perfection of intellectual nature lies in a careful and constant pursuit of true and solid happiness; so the care of ourselves, that we mistake not imaginary for real happiness, is the necessary foundation of our liberty. The stronger ties we have to an unalterable pursuit of happiness in general, which is our greatest good, and which, as such, our desires follow, the more are we free from any necessary determination of our will to any particular action…”.

Buddhist Monk and the Secret of Happiness

Matthieu Ricard is French writer and Buddhist monk. He has a Ph.D. in molecular genetics from the Pasteur Institute under French Nobel Laureate Francois Jacob. After completing his doctoral degree in 1972 he gave up his scientific career and concentrated on the practice of Tibetan Buddhism. He is the author of several books on Buddhism, including a dialogue with his father, Jean-Francois Revel entitled The Monk and the Philosopher, which was a bestseller in Europe and translated into twenty-one languages. He has been called the “happiest person in the world” by the media. He also volunteered as a subject in a study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on happiness, and scored above the average of hundreds of hundreds of volunteers. Here is one of his numerous TED Talks, entitled The Habits of Happiness.

The Science of Happiness

Martin Seligman was one of the first psychologists to convince his colleagues to investigate more positive moods with the same enthusiasm which they had for pathologies. At that time, in the late 1990s, there were only 40 books published on happiness. In 2008 alone, 4000 books were published on happiness. Seligman is credited “… as the father of Positive Psychology and its efforts to scientifically explore human potential. In his book Authentic Happiness (2002 p. 61) he explains his three dimensions of happiness: 1) pleasure and gratification, 2) embodiment of strengths and virtues, 3) meaning and purpose. Here is an article where he explains each dimension and gives much more information about positive psychology and happiness, than a blog can offer.

I also think this TED Talk by Seligman entitled The New Era of Positive Psychology will be helpful.

Shalom!

Slow Churches in the Lead

by Amos Smith

I just finished reading Slow Church: Cultivating Community in the Patient Way of Jesus by C. Christopher Smith and John Pattison (much of the writing below is paraphrased from the book’s Introduction).

The authors of Slow Church explain that the industrial revolution made us obsessed with speed—fast cars, fast food, fast computers, and “the fast track.” In resistance to this, an international “Slow Food” movement arose. The Slow Food movement has inspired other Slow campaigns. Cittaslow (Slow Cities) was launched by a group of Italian mayors in 1990 and now includes more than 140 communities in twenty-three countries, which are committed to sustainable agriculture, local food cultivation, local land use, and hospitality.

Other manifestations of wanting to down shift sometimes, rather than stay in high gear, are Slow Gardening, Slow Parenting, Slow Reading, Slow Design, and Slow Art. There is even a World Slow Day, which some playful Italians recently celebrated by issuing fake citations to pedestrians who were walking too fast or taking too direct a route.

Canadian journalist Carl Honore describes “the cult of speed.” Fast and slow, Honore writes, do not just signify rates of change; they are shorthand for ways of being, or philosophies of life.

“Fast is busy, controlling, aggressive, hurried, analytical, stressed, superficial, impatient, active, quantity-over-quality. Slow is the opposite: calm, careful, receptive, still, intuitive, unhurried, patient, reflective, quality-over-quantity. It is about making real and meaningful connections—with people, culture, work, food, everything.” (pg. 13)

Many church growth models come dangerously close to reducing Christianity to a commodity that can be packaged, marketed, and sold, instead of cultivating a deep, holistic discipleship that touches every aspect of our lives.

“Following Jesus has been diminished to a privatized faith rather than a lifelong apprenticeship undertaken in the context of Christian community.” (pg. 14)

Congratulations to churches that foster sustainable community that is primarily about relationship to God and relationships with each other. Congratulations to churches that understand that the quality of relationships is more important than the numbers of bodies in the chairs on Sunday and the number of dollars in savings.

Do the Little Things

by Kenneth McIntosh

Some years ago I and my wife were employed by a publisher producing a series of school books titled “North American Indians today.” We traveled around First Nations recording interviews. Doing so, we repeatedly heard traditional Natives say “Our sacred way involves all of life—not just Sunday mornings.” I always wanted to say “There are many white Christians who practice their faith throughout the week…” I never did say that, though. For one thing, I was doing journalism—certainly not doing missionary work of any sort. Furthermore, after the second time hearing this, it occurred to me that when someone holds a stereotype there’s often a good reason for that.

I’m afraid that for many Christians, faith is indeed compartmentalized. On Sunday morning we hear Jesus’ radical words to redistribute wealth, serve the poor, and eschew violence; but then we go with the flow of a profit-based, status-oriented, violence-ridden culture throughout the week.

Is there an antidote to compartmentalized faith? I see one antidote in the spiritual practices of the Celtic Christ -followers. Their way of life, from the 5th to the 11th centuries, can provide valuable lessons for Postmodern Christ-followers. This is especially true inasmuch as they eschewed the Imperial (homogenous, globalized) branding of Christianity that held sway over the rest of Europe at that time. One of the most valuable perspectives of these ancient believers is that all of life was sacred—all day, all week, all through the seasons, in ever setting—just like Native American indigenous practices.

Saint David (AKA Dewi Sant) brought the Good News to Wales in the 6th century. He had a famous saying, which has made it into modern-day Welsh parlance, “Do the little things.” It was his constant reminder to disciples that becoming a saint, working for justice, and ushering in the Reign of God didn’t consist of big steps and dramatic actions as much as it was comprised of consistency in the every-day, every-hour routines. How they greeted one another, how they cooked the vegetables and how they milked the cow—these were the proof spiritual life. If all of life is sacred then little things matter greatly.

Another example of the importance of little things in Celtic Spirituality is a collection of old prayers and chants called the Carmina Gadelica. In this book there are chants for awakening in the morning, for washing one’s face, for milking, for farming, for fishing, for making a fire, for life transitions, and etc. Whatever a person might do in the day, there were simple chants to sing and prayers to recite throughout the day.

Could you try to connect prayer with “the little things” you do daily? Perhaps a brief prayer for every time you switch on a light bulb, “Light of the world, let me shine in my little part of the world today.” Perhaps a simple grace whenever you raid the cupboard or refrigerator or water cooler for a snack or a drink. Say a quick prayer whenever you encounter someone—in person or via computer—“Christ, may I see you in this person.” Prayers when you leave the home, the office, the car…and so on.

As we live out our faith in the little things, it could have a big impact.

Icon of Saint David at Saint David’s Cathedral, photo by Ken McIntosh

Consistency in the Spiritual Life

by Amanda Peterson

As I watch TV shows on parenting or even raising pets the most common challenge that I notice is inconsistency. Parents (myself included) know the importance of follow-through and a consistent message. Then there are the times, due to tiredness, guilt, or for some other reason, the consistency stops. The behavior increases and surprised the questions comes, “How did this get so bad?” I am currently working with my dog, Grace, who does not have good manners with other dogs. This is a polite way of saying she overwhelms them with her energy and if they are not a strong dog bedlam ensues. I now live in a neighborhood that has lots of dogs and she is getting lots of practice learning how to say hello.

Consistency in the Spiritual Life — Consistency, or a cookie?

The reality is that I am the problem, not Grace. I need to be honest about that and if I care about Grace, I will do what is best for her, not for me. I need to work with Grace. I have tried using one technique or another and guess what…as time goes on it gets better. Yet I find myself some days just wishing she wouldn’t be so aggressive and then pretending all is well now. Wishing and pretending doesn’t help. I can’t ignore it one day and expect a different result.

As I was thinking about this, I notice a similar pattern in my prayer life and in the prayer lives of others. Why does God seem so far away? Why does something that used to be so easy now feel overwhelming? The spiritual life takes just as much consistency as anything else that is important to us. We can’t expect to pay attention, develop a relationship with the Divine one day and then not pay attention the next day and expect a deep spiritual life. The spiritual life takes just as much consistency as anything else and honestly some days it is really hard work to show up. That is why community support is so important.

A contemplative life is an honest life and a consistent life. Not necessarily to the same practices in the same way every day. It is a consistency in the choice to show up to a relationship with God. It’s that easy and that hard.

Exercise

What is your spiritual practice? Are you consistent or does it go in stops and starts. Pick a spiritual practice and try to be consistent for 2 weeks. How did it go? If it didn’t, why? Do you need a different practice?

Bad Theology, Good Riddance

by Davin Franklin-Hicks

I have loads of bad theology. It’s rotten. It reeks. It’s spoiled. It’s bad. I came by it honestly, though. I wasn’t rooting around in another person’s garden to get it. I lived amongst it and couldn’t even tell that it was so rotten. I don’t think it would behoove us for me to display it here as though I am posting my lunch on Instagram. I think it would help to just say, “There is a lot of rotten stuff here and it needs to be cleared out for some new life.”

Back in 2008, I spent a week at Desert House of Prayer in Tucson, Arizona. I like to call it DHOP and borrow the tagline, “Come hungry, leave happy”. I chose to enter into silence for that whole week with not really any agenda besides an openness to God. I brought some books along, primarily Marcus Borg and Shelby Spong. Their words merged within me, creating space for questions I had long stopped asking. I prayed a great deal that week. I hiked, even getting on top of a huge rock that was next to impossible to get down from easily. This is indicative of how I have lived much of my life, actually, setting out for a stroll and encountering unexpected “adventure”.

Borg and Spong (who I lovingly blended into the word Bong for that week) made room for me to think, talk and explore who Jesus was to me. I had spent the seven years before unpacking who Jesus wasn’t and I really hadn’t done much more than that since. I thought the church that I came from, for all intents and purposes, owned Jesus. I thought they were right that I was unacceptable. I thought they had the ability to determine insiders and outsiders. I didn’t consciously think these thoughts, mind you, but I lived my life as if they were true.

Now, here I was, in silence, no external voices to tell me if I was right, wrong, or crazy. The last three days I only had silence as my companion. I even refrained from reading more of Bong (it’s growing on you, isn’t it?). I was aware of an aching, deep void that was left in the dissolution of friendships from the church I once adored. The aching deep void that God could not be accessed by me anymore. Here’s the beauty, though. It is in voids that God speaks and creates. It was in that void that I began to ask questions and seek Jesus once more.

Let me be clear that I do not have anything profound to say about who Jesus is after this soul searching. I don’t really think we need to have yet another voice on the topic entering into the “Nah-ah” and “Uh-huh” debate that gets played out all the time. This isn’t actually about the theology that I ended up embracing. This is more about the unexpected grace I experienced when I became willing.

Over the last three days of my time at DHOP, I cried a lot. I wrote letters to people I love and who love me. I wrote letters, too, to the people I loved who rejected me in the name of God. I held space for the really hard stuff and found that as I did, it started lifting. It wasn’t a tangled mess of anxiety, sadness and anger anymore. It was becoming just an experience that I had, not the only experience I ever had which is what it had felt like before. As this clearing happened, I was able to access love, goodness, forgiveness, kindness again. I prayed for the people who had rejected me and I actually, finally, meant it.

The last evening I was there, I sat on the front porch with my eyes closed, just enjoying the sound of the birds, the gentle breeze, the freedom from city noise. As I sat there, I heard someone gasp. I opened my eyes and not even a foot away from me was a beautiful, perfect deer. The woman who gasped was on the sidewalk about three feet away. Neither of us moved. The deer did not look at all frightened. She gazed back at me gently. I began to cry without realizing it, just silent tears pouring down my face. She moved on from us and went back toward the desert area. I looked at the stranger, made friend by a powerful moment we had just shared, and all she said to me was, “Wow!”

I have found that once I am willing to relinquish the places within that are causing decay and pain internally, there is not much else I need to do except be present with my God and present with creation all around me. When I am experiencing openness of heart, generosity of spirit, kindness of thought things just happen. I become the deer, I become the stranger, I become the silent one in waiting. It feels as though I am bearing witness to my own life in these moments rather than being the agent that controls and launches them.

I have been struggling again with parts of theology that are life-snuffing versus life giving. It comes in an ebb and flow for me, this realization of theology that hurts. A dear friend of mine shared his own experience with recognizing a bad theology he had that was impacting his choices daily. I relate to that, the underlying moral imperative that is neither moral nor imperative. In the spirit of willingness, I get to work on clearing the bad theology out. For me, this means honesty in prayer, honesty in writing and honesty in talking. This work is not easy, there are reasons some may never attempt it. For me, though, it just hurts too much not to work on clearing it out.

Here’s what I do know to be true and it is the driving force behind the hard work of excavation: All it really takes is willingness. That’s really it. A recognition that it hurts and a willingness to simply just let it go. Because you see, dear one, there’s just something about willingness that grace can’t get enough of.

A Rat Pack Sabbath

by Ryan Gear

In July 2012, I was blessed to take a ten-day trip to Israel, and our tour group spent the Sabbath in Jerusalem. The Jewish tour guides on our bus dropped us off at our hotel on Friday evening, the beginning of the seventh day.

On the way to our hotel, our tour guide said, “Let’s turn on some Sabbath music.” I expected a dirge, something completely depressing, something that said, “Thou may no longer buy beer for 24 hours.” That was not, however, the music that fit the mood.

He turned on the tour bus radio, and the song began, “Da da da da da, Start spreadin’ the news.” It was Sinatra. Not exactly what I expected, and that was excellent. He explained, “On the Sabbath, we listen to relaxing music.” On that day at least, Sabbath music in Jerusalem was Rat Pack music.

He clarified further that Sabbath means “to stop, to cease.” It means to stop working and enjoy life without work for one day each week. He told us that he was going to go home, light candles, and enjoy dinner with his family. His kids and grandkids were coming over for dinner. They would say Sabbath prayers, talk about their week, play games, and have fun. His definition of the Sabbath is a day to enjoy life with your loved ones.

When we got back to our hotel, we discovered that a group of Ultra-Orthodox Jews had rented a ballroom with their families and were dancing and partying on the Sabbath. This wasn’t what observing the Sabbath looked like where I grew up in Ohio. When they were done, the hotel looked like Def Leppard had trashed the place.

In Jerusalem, the Sabbath is a weekly vacation day— a fun, relaxing, 24-hour celebration with the people you love. It’s not observed out of a sense of duty so much as it is anticipated and enjoyed. This makes sense for Christians too. In Mark 2:27, Jesus says, “Humanity wasn’t made for the Sabbath. The Sabbath was made for the benefit of humanity.”

Once or twice a week, my four-year old son and I walk to our mailbox to get the mail together. In our subdivision, our mailbox is about 200 yards down the street. If I walk to get the mail alone it takes me five minutes. When my son and I go together, it takes four times that long.

Our neighbors have some bushes next to the sidewalk. So, my son takes a few steps out of our yard, and then he stops to smell the bushes. There are no roses on the bushes. They’re just bushes, but he stops to smell them. Then we take a few more steps, and he stops to crouch down to watch some ants walk across the sidewalk. Then he takes a few more steps until he hears a birdie. He stops to listen for where the birdie is, and then he watches the birdie. Then we take a few more steps, and he hears a doggie bark. He stops to see where the doggie is. He explains to me that “Doggies say ‘woof woof.'” Then we take a few more steps, and so on.

Now that he’s four, he wants to “explore” the culvert where water runs off the street and into the rocks. We walk along the rocks and watch for bugs. Taking a few steps off the street magically turns us both into Indiana Jones.

He is absolutely filled with wonder, and he starts and stops according to whatever interests him. Then, eventually, after stopping and starting several times, somewhere along that fun, wonder-and-awe-filled journey… we get the mail.

Children do what comes naturally to humans. What if it really is hardwired into the human brain to live according to a rhythm, a rhythm of working and then stopping, and then working and then stopping?

We have lots of sayings to express this. We say, “The joy is in the journey” or “Life’s a journey, not a destination,” or “Take time to smell the roses.” I read an article recently finding that employees who have a little bit of downtime in their day are more productive. Go figure. We all know we need more rest.

Many people in our workaholic culture feel like soulless machines, pressured to stay late and expected to not take all of their vacation. That’s not what it means to be human. Sabbath means that you can take control of your life and live life to the fullest, not as a production line machine, but as a real live human being. The Sabbath empowers you to be more than your job and more than money.

So, let me ask you, are you overly busy, trying to accomplish more than you’re physically or emotionally able to do? Are you spending more time at work than what is healthy for your family? Are you a people pleaser, over-committing by saying yes when you should say no? How good would it feel to stop, and take a vacation day once per week?

That is the primary meaning of the first creation story in Genesis:

“Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.”

The two creation accounts of Genesis do not explain the scientific origin of the universe, but they do convey a world of wisdom, wisdom that continually coaxes our evolution into more whole creatures.

The seven-day creation poem was likely inspired by parents trying to teach their children why they observe a weekly Sabbath day. Egyptians had a 10-day week. The Babylonians may have observed a monthly Sabbath on the new moon. Israelite parents had to explain to their kids why their schedule was different than everyone else’s.

Do you weekly remind your children to stop and enjoy life and each other? Sometimes a health problem tells us that it’s time to live a more balanced life. Sometimes our time-starved families remind us. Sometimes, in our more reflective moments, we clearly see the truth expressed by Frederick Buechner, “There are people who use up their entire lives making money so they can enjoy the lives they have entirely used up.”

Maybe this blog post is another reminder that you have nothing to prove. As we read in Genesis 1, you’re created in the image and likeness of God. You have dignity and worth because of that, alone, before you lift a finger do any work. Our Creator has given us a rhythm for experiencing the good life, a rhythm of working and resting, working and resting, working and resting. We’re created to be more than machines.

The Sabbath gives you permission to be human.

Brian Swimme and the Celebration of the Sanctity of Earth

by Amos Smith

Brian Swimme teaches cosmology to graduate students at the California Institute for Integral Studies in San Francisco. Swimme often reiterates that the underlying reason that people abuse the earth is that they don’t think that it’s sacred. Swimme’s emphasis is the marriage of Religion and Science.

Swimme says when we look deeply into our 13.7 billion year “cosmogenesis” that we cannot help but be filled with awe. The fact that the Big Bang happened is in itself a profound improbability. No known laws of probability can account for it. It is both a sacred and a scientific miracle.

Swimme has produced a twelve part DVD series called “Canticle of the Cosmos,” which has been distributed worldwide. His work is most influenced by the French Jesuit, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, who believed that everything in existence has a physical as well as a spiritual dimension… The Universe is in a deep process of transfiguration. Love, truth, compassion and zest—all of these divine qualities are embodied in the universe.

Swimme seeks to place scientific technology in its context of the infancy of the earth community as it struggles for reconnection to its sacred source. For Chardin and Swimme the human being is the current culmination of a still-evolving universe.

For Swimme the ecological disasters that happen on our planet take place because the cosmos is not understood as sacred. A way out of this difficulty is a journey into the universe as sacred. Swimme is a mathematician by training, who seeks a larger, warmer, nobler science story. The story of the Universe should not just be a collection of facts. It should sweep us into a grand world view, including meaning, purpose, and value addressed by world religions.

Swimme thinks that the popular view is that the earth is like a gravel pit or a hardware store, that the earth is just stuff to be used—that consumerism has become the dominant faith, which exploits the riches of the earth. His fundamental aim is to present a new cosmology that is grounded in contemporary scientific understanding of the universe but nourished by ancient spiritual convictions that the earth is sacred. “Indeed God saw everything that God had made and it was very good. (Genesis 1:31)”

I like Swimme because he offers a sacred understanding of the Universal Big Bang, which is the larger context of the Christian Big Bang. The Universal Big Bang is a miracle of science. The incarnation, which is the Big Bang of Christian tradition for me, is the miracle of faith. That through Christ, God is with us!

Your Hyphens

by Karen Richter

I am a woman-wife-mother-introvert.

multiple religious belonging - intersectionality — Whooo are you?

I am a democrat-progressive-child advocate.

I am a Christian-universalist-meditator-educator.

We all have many layers of our identity, different roles emphasized at different times or in different settings.

Later today at Shadow Rock UCC, people interested in the idea of people identifying with more than one religious tradition will be gathering. Some will be folks who themselves identify as Christian-Buddhist or church-attending Jew or Muslim-Christian or Sikh-Wiccan. Other participants will be religious leaders who want to prepare their faith communities to better meet people of faith who claim a variety of backgrounds. Some – like me – will be curious and eager, coming with questions and assumptions about what this might mean to the future of faith.

Yesterday, I saw a video online about a Palestinian woman who is striving to be an active participant in the struggle for Palestinian identity and liberation as a woman. Activists often call this ‘intersectionality.’ I found this definition (thanks Google!) of intersectionality quickly, but I didn’t really need it. It’s one of those things that you know when you see it.

Intersectionality (or intersectionalism) is the study of intersections between forms or systems of oppression, domination or discrimination by examining the complex multiple facets of identity of an individual such as race, gender, class, sex and age.

My best understanding of intersectionality is that society often appears to ask people to choose and prioritize from among their identities. Are you advocating for families or union workers? Are you representing African-Americans or women? Intersectionality pushes back against this phenomenon, instead recognizing that people crave space to be their whole selves… bringing every bit of their identities and experiences to bear on issues and decisions.

So, why are we even a little bit surprised when this idea of wholeness and recognition and valuing unique experiences breaks into religious communities? Maybe a Christian-Hindu should surprise and challenge us no more than a Native American feminist. Don’t we want churches to be places where people can be their whole selves and be welcomed? Don’t we want more genuine people in the world?

These kinds of developments remind me that as a species we are still growing, maturing, evolving. It’s exasperating! And it makes me hopeful for the future.

The gathering begins at lunch today. Join the conversation.

Noah as Metaphor

by Q. Gerald Roseberry

When I was a kid growing up in Georgia, in a small village outside Atlanta, my parents were leaders in a small fundamentalist congregation. All six of us kids attended the Sunday School and Vacation Bible School. One of the things I enjoyed most about those early educational experiences was the teachers’ use of “flannel graph” art as a teaching aid in illuminating the Bible stories. Pictures of people and significant objects in the story backed with flannel adhered to a lightweight board covered with flannel which helped make the story come to life.

One of the stories I loved was “Noah and the Flood.” So I was fascinated to hear that Hollywood was producing a movie on the subject, and I intended to see it. Unfortunately I was unable to see the movie. Many years ago I stopped believing that the stories were literally true. In my imagination, however, I would like to have a heart-to-heart conversation with Noah. The really big question I would ask Noah is, why did God send such a terrible flood to destroy the people and animals and everything else in the land where you lived? But, of course, my interview with Noah doesn’t go well because we live in such different worlds. Everything is different. They are said to have lived unbelievably long lives, such as Noah’s 950 years. Different times, cultures, languages. Even to talk of faith and beliefs would be a difficult at best.

Setting aside a preoccupation with all the species of animals, birds, and insects being rounded up and adequately housed as totally impossible, I am left with the most important question of all: Why did God send such a terrible flood to totally destroy people, animals, and everything in the land were Noah lived? The ancient text gives the explanation:

God saw that human evil was out of control. People thought evil, imagined evil, evil, evil from morning to night. God was sorry that he had made the human race. . .it broke his heart. God said, “I’ll get rid of my ruined creation, make a clean sweep: people, animals, snakes, bugs and birds—the works.” – Eugene Peterson’s translation, The Message, chapters 6-7.

So what can we learn from Noah’s story? One possible lesson is that when human beings forget their origin in God’s creation, neglect their responsible stewardship of the earth, God’s gift, and forsake their due care for one another, then bad consequences follow. Pope Francis, a scientist himself, has caught the attention of the world, and one thing he said reverberates in our thoughts: “Destroy the earth, and the earth will destroy us.” In his encyclical, On Care for Our Common Home, Laudato Si, he referred to “integral ecology” which means that everything on earth is connected, and implies that our actions can and do upset the delicate balance of our environment, disrupting the intricate web of life supporting everything existing on earth.

The Psalmist says in Psalm 24, “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world and those who dwell therein. For it was He who founded it upon the seas and planted it firm upon the waters beneath.” Poetic to be sure, but it points to our problem: we have forgotten that earth is not ours to do with as we please. We mortals hold the earth in trust for future generations. In one way or another, we have participated in bringing the earth to the point of rebelling and crying out against the harmful effects of hubris and technology which destroy human community, and disrupt, poison, and pollute the oceans, our atmosphere, water, and soil. This, I venture to say, is the world-destroying “evil” which has brought us to this critical point in human history.

The nations of the world, their leaders and representatives, will meet in early December in Paris to make commitments to reduce and eliminate greenhouse gases from their combustible energy systems. Solutions are at hand. We need to find the political will and the moral courage to apply them. Obviously, the change cannot be overnight, but we must act now with all deliberate speed in ways that enable the essential transitional changes to begin and continue without undue obstruction. That meeting of the nations should be in the prayers of every community of faith and in the hearts of all believers, beginning now and continuing until a just and healing solution is reached.

The Cluttered Table

by Teresa Blythe

Would you look at that? An old 50’s style Formica kitchen table with matching chairs squeezed into a one-car garage–set aside, deemed useless, reduced to nothing more than a plant stand.

That table has a story. It used to be someone’s dinette set. I can see it sitting in any number of kitchens waiting for the family to gather around it and have a meal. I can see a little boy with his schoolbooks spread out on it, doing homework until late at night. Mom probably used it at times to hold her sewing machine so she could make a costume for Halloween. I see cats and dogs begging from underneath it and friends drinking coffee and sharing stories around it.

The kitchen table is an American icon representing our belief in familial love and fellowship. It is so iconic it has been preserved in Norman Rockwell paintings, honored in films like Soul Food and Babette’s Feast, and regularly serves as a set for family based situation comedies on television (think of black-ish, Modern Family, or The Middle). For Christians, the ultimate family table is the site of the Eucharistic banquet — the divine fellowship of God’s children.

Oh, the blessed table. And here this one sits, jammed up and set aside like so much of yesterday’s news. Just taking up precious space.

Why does this image grab me so as I take my daily walk? It must remind me of something in myself that is jammed up, junked up and set out to rust and gather dust.

Maybe it’s a symbol of my own complicity in a culture that collects so much stuff that we become victims of our own affluence. We start to feel like that garage. Or, rather, our lives start to feel like that table and the world like that garage. We are squeezed into jobs that don’t necessarily fit but they pay the bills so we can buy more stuff. We are packed so tightly because we’ve been sold this update and that upgrade and now we don’t have room for it all.

That garage is also how my mind feels after binge-watching television. Story after story after story. Then I fall asleep and dream these cluttered dream-stories based on stories I collected all day long. Where is my story in the midst of all this? My story. Did I inadvertently put it out to the garage to gather dust?

Now is a good time to free that symbolic table. Perhaps loosen up the space between the table and chairs, letting the table breathe in the confines of the garage or move it somewhere less crowded. Give it away to someone whose family needs a table. We can remember the sacramental nature of the table. Gather friends around to laugh and enjoy one another. Tell our stories.

Since finishing seminary 15 years ago, my vocation has been that of a spiritual director–helping people recapture and appreciate their stories and then spotting God’s handiwork in them. Some of these stories are of their life. Some are stories they have heard from popular culture and find illustrative of their life. Some are dreams and visions. But they all say something real about spirituality—that is, our faith lived out in everyday life.

I may never know the facts about that cluttered table I noticed in someone’s garage. But what it evokes in me is eternally true. I need to make space so that my own story will emerge. Unclutter to see how God is living out God’s story in the world.

image credit: Christine Jackowski