The best things come to those who dare

Without leisure, contemplation, reflection, and worship, society is impoverished. Aristotle commended those who dared to shift the practice of their vocation so they had space to step back and reflect; he named them vital for society. Leisure alone can sustain the wisdom we need. Hence the necessity of contemplation, rapt attentiveness, living in the present.  It's a path too few really try; they assume it's too difficult. It is difficult, but the best things come only to those who dare. There is an inner geography of utter freedom. Find it.

There's a glorious desolation of your falsehoods and attachments that comes with this abandonment.

Here, in this sheer nothingness and the absolute vulnerability of prayer, God comes and fills the yielded vessel with divine love and wisdom.

The way beyond the rising hatred around us

Hatred's making a come-back.  Across the board.  So easy to fall in behind this new bigotry and take part.  I ran across this today in my early reading--from Thomas Merton's New Seeds of Contemplation:

"Those who cannot love feel unworthy, and at the same time feel that somehow no one is worthy.  Perhaps they cannot feel love because they think they are unworthy of love, and because of that they also think no one is worthy.  The beginning of the fight against hatred, the basic Christian response to hatred, is not the commandment to love, but what must necessarily come before in order to make the commandment bearable and comprehensible.  It is a prior commandment, to believe.  The root of Christian love is not the will to love, but the faith that one is loved. The faith that one is loved by God.  That faith that one is loved by God although unworthy--or, rather, irrespective of one's worth!"

You may be sleepwalking and not know it

"Wake up, sleeper!" This same call came to me when I was at the midpoint of my life---married with children and successful in my career, but frankly, troubled by a gnawing sense within me that I'd lost something dear to me. Years earlier, I'd tasted God and that taste made me hungry for more.

But over the course of the next several decades I'd become dull to the hunger once awakened in me. Or maybe it's fairer to say I didn't know where to look to satisfy my hunger for the sacred, so I satisfied myself with lesser things and forgot the real taste of God.

You could say that I was sleepwalking and didn't even know it.

I can't describe how the call came really (who can describe such things?).   All I can safely say is that the call came . . . slowly. Less like lightening from heaven and more like the gentle dawning of a new day.

I'm sure the call had been coming to me for quite some time.

I'm also sure that I'd done very little about it; I wasn't looking for change, so change came looking for me.

Of course, I have no way of knowing how this call is coming to you. Nor do I know what you're doing about it. But this I do know: you might be sleepwalking and not even know it. And God's calling to you, whispering everywhere, "Wake up, sleeper!"

And I know you'll face a challenging decision: awaken to the mischief of God that's knocking at the door of your heart, or push it away, stop your ears, and keep keeping on with life as it is, trying to ignore the gnawing hunger within you for Something more.

How to keep from clobbering yourself and others

Nonjudgment requires humility. "Have no confidence in your own virtuousness. Do not worry about a thing once it has been done. Control your tongue and your belly" (St. Anthony). And it requires patience, a patience that trusts that God will work all things out and that you are rarely competent to judge the path rightly. In fact, it knows that you by your own presumption will usually screw things up.

Nonjudgment, therefore, is nourished by a contemplative nonattachment to the false self.

If you're attached to the many masks of your false or fallen self, you'll be unable to judge rightly when necessary and instead will probably end up clobbering yourself and others.

Severe depression: medication as grace

Here's important testimony from a reader who has lived through severe depression and offers some important advice regarding the use of medication.  Depression sufferers and their supporters, please listen to this!  (A response to my recent post: Light on Severe Depression.)

As a pastor who was hospitalized with clinical depression and anxiety and stress syndromes, I can add my personal AMEN to what you have shared, Chris.

The church certainly remains behind the eight ball on this one. In my congregation’s case (at the time), they carried out a better model. They teamed with my presbytery (regional governing body) to create a team to take care of both me and the congregaton’s ministry (liaison with the session [governing board]). The session granted me a three-month, paid leave of absence.

I had the grace, space and time to rest and get well, under the care of an excellent Christian psychotherapist and a quality psychiatrist, who found just the right medication.

Speaking of the latter–STAY WITH YOUR MEDS TO THE END OF THE REFILLS, my friends.

Thinking you’re better just because the symptoms go away is a BAD REASON to stop your meds without careful consultation with your physician(s). You’ll just dig a whole that ends up being harder to climb out of than before.

And depression sufferers: IT DOES GET BETTER. Indeed, it often takes a lot of time, hard work, and trial and error–but you’ll find God in the midst. That’s a promise fulfilled in my case!