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Psalm 113:1-9
1Praise the Lord!
Praise, O servants of the Lord;
praise the name of the Lord.
2Blessed be the name of the Lord
from this time on and forevermore.
3From the rising of the sun to its setting
the name of the Lord is to be praised.
4The Lord is high above all nations,
and his glory above the heavens.
5Who is like the Lord our God,
who is seated on high,
6who looks far down
on the heavens and the earth?
7He raises the poor from the dust,
and lifts the needy from the ash heap,
8to make them sit with princes,
with the princes of his people.
9He gives the barren woman a home,
making her the joyous mother of children.
Praise the Lord!
As the year passed from 2008 into 2009, Leisa and I spent a rare and uniquely rich time together in Albuquerque, New Mexico, at a spiritual retreat hosted by the Center for Action and Contemplation and its director, Richard Rohr. It was rare for us in that for the past couple decades, Leisa and I have taken turns attending continuing education events or spiritual retreats. Almost always, one of us would stay home with our children while the other travelled. But with our children having arrived at, or who are knocking on the door of their majority, their independence and maturity is now allowing their parents an element of independence as well.
Two New Years ago, Leisa travelled alone to Albuquerque for their annual New Year’s retreat of renewal, discovery, and rededication. This time I was allowed (and privileged) to join her for the rich – strikingly rich – retreat.
The paradox of spiritual retreat: simultaneous ascent and descent. The climbing up while crawling down. As the theme of this year’s retreat: Laughing and Weeping.
Consider popular spirituality. An image may come to mind of the deeply enlightened individual meditating – rising higher and higher into a union with God – with his or her soul lifting and rising into an eternal dance with the Creator. Entering into a higher consciousness. Like a candle dancing, illuminating the surrounding darkness. Like the ethereal ribbons of smoke arising from the burning incense in a still sanctuary. Like the deep, pure reverberations of a bell rung in the quietness of night.
Would that we could embrace such a spirituality and depth of soul – an image of spirituality sought after and popularized by the New Age seekers of our generation. We are drawn to the evading myth of a supposed pure spirituality, attainable by following the proper technique or the ascribing to the wisdom of the eloquent guru. Gain without pain. Ascent without descent. Laughing without weeping. Success through the power of positive thinking. Tempting. Even Jesus the Christ faced the temptations. The temptation to avoid the cross. The temptations in the wilderness to bypass the low road and declare himself the Messiah from the top of the Temple. Laughter without the tears.
But a year-end retreat lead by a Franciscan priest was not going to be just about laughing without weeping; it was not going to be only about ascent without descent. True to his vows taken upon entrance into the order of Saint Francis of Assisi, he led us toward God by leading us down – the path to God being a path of stripping away, of letting go, of trembling and hesitant steps toward the Dark Night of the Soul. To descend is to lose all of our life-lines – to abandon all of our life preservers – to walk away from our desperate longing for even ounces of control and security. Deep into the abyss of nothingness. Stripping away the ego – which so often is the only self we know – the only identity we cling to – deeper into the abyss – deeper and deeper into the nothingness – certainties and defining dogmas no longer certain and no longer defining. Seemingly impossible descent for most of us – we cannot allow ourselves to let go – but for those who have disappeared deep into the darknesses of their souls – it is they who have finally taken steps into the true enlightenment – where it is God who then defines who they have become – they are the ones who have encountered their true selves – the selves which are embraced in the compassionate arms of a loving God. Too often the seeking of enlightenment is the search for another shining badge to attach to one’s never-at-peace ego. To be enlightened is to lose enough of the self to allow the light of God’s presence to radiate.
To attend the retreat in Albuquerque involved an inescapable additional dynamic – that of travel. Two flights going and four flights coming, including a extra number of hours in Seattle as a snow storm grounded all flights for a time. In the going and the coming, I entered into another kind of retreat: I read a book. I often read in my study, but there are certain books which I save for long flights – books which make more sense read over a span of a few hours rather than in fifteen minute installments between phone calls and appointments. History books tend to become my companions on flights. This time it was a book of pre-history. The history of our ancestors which precedes the advent of writing has been pieced together over the past centuries by researchers of a variety of disciplines: archaeologists, anthropologists, primatologists, climatologists, linguists, geologists, and even paleontologists. Theories have come and gone. Others built on and grown. Often bitterly fought over. Another discipline has made a grand entrance in the past couple decades: the geneticists who have been making immense strides in the study of the human genome. The book I traveled with last week was fairly recently published. An analysis of the current theories of human pre-history, primarily using the results of genetic research to verify or question assumptions of the story of our ancestors from before the dawn of written historical records. Naturally, the name of the book is Before the Dawn (by Nicholas Wade). A fascinating read. I read the first half enroute to our retreat in Albuquerque and completed it on the return. I was enjoying it and tracking with it. Then a bit beyond half-way through the book, shortly after I began my trip home, I turned a page and found this heading: The Evolution of Religion. Ah, he was meddling. The author’s thoughts are that in the evolution of human social groupings from the ancient hunter-gatherers into settled communities, it was necessary for there to be a strong glue for developing a trust and a unity to hold the larger settled communities together. It was considered to be necessary to have a shared belief in order to unite one group against other groups as means for survival. By appealing to beliefs which were both unverifiable and unfalsifiable, a unity could be sustained and enforced. The role of the religious leaders, then, was to be the sustainers and enforcers of the community’s unity and purpose. As societies grew, it was believed that the role of the religious leaders evolved to control society and maintain the powerful elite – to give justification to the powerful’s right to dominate society and eliminate any competing attempts for control of society. Religion turned out to be very serviceable for the purposes of warfare and economic exploitation – that religion has uniquely persuaded individuals to subordinate their immediate self-interests to the interests of the group.
Should the author of that book be completely right (that religion was a necessary evolutionary adaptation within our ancient ancestors for the purpose of controlling people) then, on behalf of the Carrick family who have been of the clergy class for the past one hundred eighteen years in the Presbyterian Church, I should make a formal apology for my family’s role in controlling generations of peoples for the purposes of being dominated by the powerful elite. But, I don’t think I will apologize – at least not to the people who have been in this community during the time I have been here – I’m not sure that you are a group who would willingly allow yourselves to be controlled by the pretenses of religious authority and power and dogma, because I know you know better.
Quite the contrast. Such a book, essentially read in two sittings, but interrupted by a spiritual retreat. A book focusing on the elevation of humanity into an ever higher form from the distant past and progressing into the future with the analysis of the role of religion being essentially a useful tool which allowed the growth of settled communities and countries, but now no longer being necessary because the role of the modern state has essentially eliminated the need for religion. But then, the spiritual retreat. The contrasts and the similarities. For both, the role of religion was essentially viewed as a tool, and only a tool. For the author, the role of religion as a tool in the evolution of human society. At the retreat, the role of religion as a tool in the encounter with God.
When religion becomes a collection of dogmas and duties, it can feel so dead. When in the name of religion hatred and violence is perpetrated and spread, it can feel so dead. When religion is only a tool for the dominance of society, it can feel so dead. When religion become the ultimate self-help program for the growth of the ego, it can feel so dead. When one is seduced into believing that true religion is the continual ascent into the holy and ethereal realms of spirituality – moving one closer and closer to enlightenment, it can feel so dead. When it becomes all about what I can do through my wisdom and my discipline and my beliefs and my personality and my intelligence, it can feel so dead.
Our collective enlightenment and intelligence has made God seem more and more distant – further away – much less interested – impersonal. It used to be that some of our ancestors saw the divine presence in things so close by – in an oak tree or a bonfire or a lake. But we know better. Those are merely oak trees, bonfires, and lakes – no need to make them into gods any more. We know that the aurora borealis is essentially created by charged particles from Earths magnetosphere colliding with atoms and molecules of Earth’s upper atmospheres in reaction to the stimulus of solar wind. It doesn’t need to be mystical any more. The more we know – the more we learn – the more we understand, with each step, we tend to push God further and further into the distance. We have even reduced the charm of a shooting star to an explanation of a piece of space debris from the size of a grain of sand to the size of a small boulder entering into Earth’s upper atmosphere and burning up. Nothing much to get excited about – not, unless, it is big enough to make it all the way to the ground for it to be found to research or to be made into a piece of jewelry. Oh well.
Perhaps the ancients had it easier than us – perhaps in a way, ignorance must have been bliss for those who had the luxury of sensing the presence of God all around them all the time. But now it is so different. How many times have people used the expression of the rest of life outside of the narrow confines of the Church as being the real world? Implying, perhaps, that that which goes on within the Church as being a fake world?
This morning we read a psalm, written several thousand years ago by someone of faith. Words about God. Words about humanity. Can those words be a letter to us from the ancient past – words to penetrate into and through the analytical intelligence we are surrounded with? Or, like seemingly everything else, are they just merely deluded thoughts – the wishful thinking of some superstitious ancestor?
Perhaps many of our ancestors feared God or were made to fear God. Perhaps the vast cumulative knowledge which surrounds us can make many modern humans believe that God is irrelevant. Perhaps some in the social sciences will have us believe that the role religion has played in the shaping of human societies is no longer necessary, and that it might even be an impediment to the progress of humanity. Perhaps the dominant culture we find ourselves in has us believe that the real world is found outside of the walls of the church. If so, the words of the Psalmist we read a bit ago are not really a message to us from the ancient past, but rather ramblings of just another ancient dreamer.
But, then, I wonder. I wonder. Should God really be real, and should God really be present, what would God be feeling about us? Angry? Hurt? Dejected? Lonely? Somehow I don’t think so. I believe God is bigger than that. I believe that God enjoys the Creation and humanity more than that. I believe that God is much more secure than that – after all, aren’t the hurts and angers caused by rejection a sign of insecurity? God? Insecure? I don’t think so. Instead, I wonder if God isn’t having a grand time with us? And just when we think we have it all figured out, I wonder if God doesn’t just give us a wink. “Hey, you are having a bad day, how about a little surprise.” Wink. Of course we are smart enough to explain any wink away, and we probably usually do. But then, just when we aren’t expecting it: Wink. “Surprised? I thought you would get a kick out of that.” Wink.
Okay, time to get analytical again. What is a wink? The simplest of signs – kind of a secret communication between one person and another. I know. And you know. And I know you know. And you know that I know. We are in on the secret. And, by the way, I really like you. And I know you like me. And I think you’re cute. Such power in just the littlest gesture. A wink. It’s more than all that, but what’s the point of explaining it to death? It just feels awfully good to be winked at. Suppose God occasionally gives us a wink? I wonder.
A month ago, for some variety of reasons, I dropped into the lowest funk of my recent memory. It was the season of Christmas. I should have been at my most cheery – the most joyful. But for some reason, despair crashed over me like a huge wave, with the undertow tugging me further and further down. On a cold and very clear night, I took a long walk, wondering about it all. In a woods, I lay down on some tree branches and looked at the stars. There was just a small clearing directly above me while all around the clearing were a tangle of tree branches. I lay there for a while, just looking up. Perhaps feeling quite sorry for myself. You know, it’s not nice to interrupt a guy feeling sorry for himself. But then, something completely explainable happened – it happens all the time – no big deal in the world of science – in the so-called real world. I think it was a wink. A very bright shooting star flashed its light for just a fraction of a second. It started right at one side of the clearing above me and burnt out just at the other side of the clearing, perfectly framed directly above me by the circle of tree branches. Just a grain of sand or a small pebble which had been floating around the Solar System for a billion years, by complete chance, entering earth’s upper atmosphere at that exact time and that exact place to burn up in a flash, and my eyes happened to be opened right at that moment looking up. A wink? Is God big enough and secure enough and powerful enough to have anything at all to do with that moment?
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky!
As your bright and tiny spark,
Lights the traveler in the dark, –
Though I know not what you are,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star.
Perhaps the Psalmist does have a message to pass on to us through the distance of time:
5Who is like the Lord our God,
who is seated on high,
6who looks far down
on the heavens and the earth?
7He raises the poor from the dust,
and lifts the needy from the ash heap…
Cool!