Over the past twenty-four hours I have gone back and forth on whether to write something about the Supreme Court declaring the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional. With some trepidation, I think I need to say something about this historically important moment. I think it is particularly important for me, as a Pastor, to say something about this whole mess, but I'm challenged by the fact that I serve a diverse congregation, where some will celebrate the defeat of DOMA and some will mourn it's passing. So I'm not just going to vent my opinions, though I think you'll see where I stand.
What I would like to do is ask a couple of things from various interested parties. First, I would like to ask something from the "winners," the ones who have been fighting and praying for equality in the eyes of the law and who now feel vindicated and set free. Please be gracious winners. I know it's tempting to want to wave your rainbows in the faces of those who would deny you something you feel is a basic human right. I know that it feels good to finally have such a high and august court recognize that the boots that have been on your throat were unjustly sanctioned by the law of the land. Do not think you are fighting the people who disagree with you, and please do not start naming them villains. You are fighting the status quo, and the way we have "always done things," which as a Pastor, I will tell you is a very powerful enemy. Know that your struggle for recognition and equality is not over, and if you want to win more and more support from the American people: grace, not victorious strutting, is going to be a more powerful magnet.
Second, to the people who feel that the defeat of DOMA is another nail in the coffin of our already decaying society, I say what Jesus and Angels alike said to people in uncertain times, "be not afraid." Fear is the mind killer. And I know, you're saying you're not afraid, you're angry, you're frustrated, you're discouraged that our culture seems to be swerving away from Christian morals, but fear is underneath all of those emotions, fear of the unknown and the different, fear that we may be provoking God with our moral relativism, fear that we just aren't what we used to be. Christian ethics should be a line of strength that pulls us through the fear. I know what the Bible says about "a man lying with a man as he lies with a woman," and I know all about abominations of various sorts, but if you zoom out and look at the nature of the Law, and how it protects and includes the widow, the orphan and the alien in our midst, you might notice that the current debate over civil rights for gay people strikes a certain biblical ethical chord as well. If you are specifically Christian, you might notice that Jesus was always taking up with the sinners rather than the fearful religious types and angry mobs with stones in hand.
Look for the heart of a Living God, who holds faith, hope and love as the greatest forces in the universe (and the greatest of these is love). Have faith that God is with us through these questions, and that His mercy trumps whatever judgment you think might be hanging over our heads. If we act in love towards our fellow humans we cannot go wrong. Seriously, we can't go wrong loving our neighbors: gay, straight or otherwise.
Finally, for those of you who feel sort of in between and unsure, remember that wisdom will always be vindicated, even if her cries get drowned out momentarily. Heed the wise advice of Gamaliel in Acts 5. He was a man who was confronted with a cultural phenomenon that he did not fully understand and could not see the full consequences of: nascent Christianity. Instead of reacting with fear and violence, he simply said, "wait and see." If the word proclaimed by the apostles is true you won't be able to stop it, if it is false it will come to nothing. How's that for Christian ethics? Trust that God is still active in the world, even if the world does not know or acknowledge God. That's what I believe, and that's why I'm not afraid, and that's how I keep going: looking for the faith, the hope, the love and the grace, because I know that's where God is.
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Monday, June 24, 2013
Wizards of one kind... and another
Michele finally got her wish. We watched Oz, The Great and Powerful on Thursday night. It's a "prequel" that tells the story of how the Wizard, who we meet as an old man in the classic The Wizard of Oz, comes to Oz. Oz is a world of magic that is "over the rainbow," where good and evil are clearly delineated and Yellow Brick Roads lead people through all sorts of peril to their destinations. Oz, as a general rule, is not a place that inspires a great deal of thought, and Oz, the Great and Powerful, is not exactly the sort of movie that challenges or inspires the audience in any way, other than making you want to punch James Franco in the head at various moments.
What I found interesting though was the world and the ethos of the stories of Frank Baum, as compared to Tolkien. I am a bit biased, because Tolkien and Lewis are rather dear to my heart, and I have never even actually read Baum. Despite watching The Wizard of Oz more times than I care to remember, I can't say I can really judge Baum as an author; so I won't. What I will do is compare wizards.
The Wizard of Oz, is not really a wizard at all, he's a charlatan, which is pretty much the entire premise of Oz, the Great and Powerful. He's just a circus performer from Kansas, who gets in rather over his head when a tornado whisks him out of Kansas and into Oz. The "Wizard" tries to scam his way through a crisis and eventually realizes, in a world of magic, that the only real advantage he has is technology. Which, any conscious viewer sees coming from the opening segment where he waxes poetic about the "miracles" of Thomas Alva Edison.
Compare that to the Lord of The Rings trilogy, where technology is used mostly by evil, and the world of magic and the "human" spirit are victorious in the end. Tolkien was but a few decades later than Baum, but Tolkien had WWI in his rear-view mirror and WWII as a rather clear and present reality. Tolkien, as a soldier in WWI had experience the horror of "modern" warfare and was writing LOTR during the late 1930's and 1940's, and of course, you know what was going on then. Baum had in his mind that technology could be the thing that saves the world. Tolkien saw first hand that it was also rather likely to destroy the world.
Baum's characters are not ambiguous, their potential, the fact that "they had it in them all along," is really not a mystery to viewers of the movies (perhaps it is to readers, I just don't know).
Tolkien's characters give you the rather precarious notion that they are simply not up to the task, they fail, they get lost, they let the darker side of their nature repeatedly get the best of them, and ultimately they succeed through grace and dogged determination (yes, you can succeed through both of those at the same time).
I think Tolkien's work stands up better as literature (though again, Baum is certainly not a failure in that regard) because his underlying premise more accurately describes reality: technology is morally ambiguous. It is not good or evil in itself, it can be used for either with wonderful or terrifying results. I can use this blog to communicate my thoughts on everything from pilgrimage to the movie I saw Thursday evening and generally (I hope) my musings are helpful, entertaining or thought-provoking. Others may use their blogs to spew hatred and endorse ignorance. In either usage, the technology is only the medium.
Baum lived in a world where electricity and the new possibilities that it brought were just beginning to bear fruit. Tolkien lived in a world where technology had flowered into a mustard gas and atomic weapons, no wonder he made technology the tool of Sauron.
I think we ought to have room in our hearts for two kinds of wizard (not that I'm advocating for occultism). We should be able to appreciate both technology and magic. When I say magic, I mean principles that lie deep in the heart of creation, things that bring us face to face with mystery and wonder, things that science and technology, by their very nature, do not and cannot understand. Magic is in the human ability to love and appreciate and create beauty. Magic is in our sense of truth and in the depth of our ability to be something more than we seem to be on the surface (like Tolkien's Hobbits, or Dorothy Gayle).
That is where Baum and Tolkien get on the same page: we are more than we seem to be, and that is truly magical.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
As it Turns Out...
Summer vacation is upon us.
Which means that our children no longer get on that big, yellow school bus each day at 8:22 am and depart from us for most of the day. Which means that Michele and I have much more time to be in direct contact with the rather peculiar little people that cohabit our home. We are finding that, while our children each have half of our genetic material, they are persistently and often irritatingly different from us. So much so that we sometimes run into almost intractable arguments where we are operating on the assumption that they would like pretty much the same things that we would like. In the course of pursuing the ethic of treating others as we would like to be treated we appear to be horribly cruel tormentors to our children.
Case in point: Michele registered Caitlyn for a one week Girl Scout day camp, which Caitlyn is fully enthusiastic about, because she is fully enthusiastic about almost anything that strikes her fancy and involves friends and games. Michele has a deep rooted desire for fairness and equality, which manifests itself in many ways, but particularly when she is dealing with our children. So in the interest of fairness and equality she is trying to find a program for Jack to attend, you know, so he won't feel left out. Except Jackson does not feel left out of the summer day camp equation, in fact, I suspect that summer day camp probably appeals to him about as much as brussel sprouts. I base this conclusion on the fact that he is my son, and while we are different in many respects, I am observing a certain tendency towards constructing a rigid boundary between public and private time in my son. I understand it, because I had it when I was nine and I still have it at nearly 39. I can book my schedule chock full of stuff, but I always have my eye on some down time, because I need it.
This means that I often resist adding "one more thing" to my schedule, and if I have crossed a threshold, for instance the end of school and the beginning of summer vacation, I will react rather violently to someone trying to sign me up for something else before I have had the aforementioned down time. I strongly suspect Jackson has the same tendency.
Thus, about noon today, I get one of those "you need to have a talk with YOUR son" phone calls, because Jack was not at all cooperating with his summer camp coordinator (aka his mother). But I'm sympathetic to his plight, because the last thing I would want intruding into my two month stretch of blissful downtime is another school-like activity, even if it "might" be fun. While the activity "might" be fun, I am sure that whatever I find for myself to do WILL be fun. So, I'm not inclined to twist his arm into going to day camp.
However, Jack differs from me in that he has rather less fear of negative consequences than I did at his age, and he can be rather belligerent at times. In the last marking period, he decided not to do homework for math class because it cut into his downtime. I was compulsive about doing homework, not because I loved school or learning, but because I didn't want to get in trouble. So now I do need to have a talk with MY son, but I'm not sure how to get through to him on that end of things. Even though I understand the underlying issues of what motivates him not to do things, I'm not quite sure how to motivate him TO do things.
What this all boils down to is the peculiar task of being a parent. How do you raise little people who, while they might bear some passing resemblance to you in body, mind and spirit, have rather definite and sometimes infuriating personalities of their own? How do you try to indoctrinate them into the mores of our society without crushing their creativity and beauty? How do you get them to do what you think is best for them without simply being a bully?
It's hard work, and it takes some real thought, and most of us get absolutely no training in how to do it. Yet somehow our species has managed to muddle through for a rather long time...
I suppose we'll make it through this summer too.
Which means that our children no longer get on that big, yellow school bus each day at 8:22 am and depart from us for most of the day. Which means that Michele and I have much more time to be in direct contact with the rather peculiar little people that cohabit our home. We are finding that, while our children each have half of our genetic material, they are persistently and often irritatingly different from us. So much so that we sometimes run into almost intractable arguments where we are operating on the assumption that they would like pretty much the same things that we would like. In the course of pursuing the ethic of treating others as we would like to be treated we appear to be horribly cruel tormentors to our children.
Case in point: Michele registered Caitlyn for a one week Girl Scout day camp, which Caitlyn is fully enthusiastic about, because she is fully enthusiastic about almost anything that strikes her fancy and involves friends and games. Michele has a deep rooted desire for fairness and equality, which manifests itself in many ways, but particularly when she is dealing with our children. So in the interest of fairness and equality she is trying to find a program for Jack to attend, you know, so he won't feel left out. Except Jackson does not feel left out of the summer day camp equation, in fact, I suspect that summer day camp probably appeals to him about as much as brussel sprouts. I base this conclusion on the fact that he is my son, and while we are different in many respects, I am observing a certain tendency towards constructing a rigid boundary between public and private time in my son. I understand it, because I had it when I was nine and I still have it at nearly 39. I can book my schedule chock full of stuff, but I always have my eye on some down time, because I need it.
This means that I often resist adding "one more thing" to my schedule, and if I have crossed a threshold, for instance the end of school and the beginning of summer vacation, I will react rather violently to someone trying to sign me up for something else before I have had the aforementioned down time. I strongly suspect Jackson has the same tendency.
Thus, about noon today, I get one of those "you need to have a talk with YOUR son" phone calls, because Jack was not at all cooperating with his summer camp coordinator (aka his mother). But I'm sympathetic to his plight, because the last thing I would want intruding into my two month stretch of blissful downtime is another school-like activity, even if it "might" be fun. While the activity "might" be fun, I am sure that whatever I find for myself to do WILL be fun. So, I'm not inclined to twist his arm into going to day camp.
However, Jack differs from me in that he has rather less fear of negative consequences than I did at his age, and he can be rather belligerent at times. In the last marking period, he decided not to do homework for math class because it cut into his downtime. I was compulsive about doing homework, not because I loved school or learning, but because I didn't want to get in trouble. So now I do need to have a talk with MY son, but I'm not sure how to get through to him on that end of things. Even though I understand the underlying issues of what motivates him not to do things, I'm not quite sure how to motivate him TO do things.
What this all boils down to is the peculiar task of being a parent. How do you raise little people who, while they might bear some passing resemblance to you in body, mind and spirit, have rather definite and sometimes infuriating personalities of their own? How do you try to indoctrinate them into the mores of our society without crushing their creativity and beauty? How do you get them to do what you think is best for them without simply being a bully?
It's hard work, and it takes some real thought, and most of us get absolutely no training in how to do it. Yet somehow our species has managed to muddle through for a rather long time...
I suppose we'll make it through this summer too.
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Get On Your Way.
I'm done whining.
I'm done whining about how physically and spiritually difficult the pilgrimage was.
I'm done whining about how difficult reentry into "normal" life has been.
I have one last thing I want to say about pilgrimage: Go.
Everyone should go on some kind of pilgrimage in their life.
Some people stumble into theirs, others plan them intentionally, but you shouldn't let your life pass you by without going on at least one great journey.
Lot's of people travel, and sometimes that travel becomes a pilgrimage, but too often it remains tourism.
Lot's of people go on trips that they think are going to be fun and significant, but they still don't quite become a pilgrim.
So what are some criteria for "setting yourself up" to become a pilgrim? Here is some advice from my experience:
1. Don't try to be too comfortable;
I'm done whining about how physically and spiritually difficult the pilgrimage was.
I'm done whining about how difficult reentry into "normal" life has been.
I have one last thing I want to say about pilgrimage: Go.
Everyone should go on some kind of pilgrimage in their life.
Some people stumble into theirs, others plan them intentionally, but you shouldn't let your life pass you by without going on at least one great journey.
Lot's of people travel, and sometimes that travel becomes a pilgrimage, but too often it remains tourism.
Lot's of people go on trips that they think are going to be fun and significant, but they still don't quite become a pilgrim.
So what are some criteria for "setting yourself up" to become a pilgrim? Here is some advice from my experience:
1. Don't try to be too comfortable;
- I don't mean you have to dress in burlap, or crawl on your knees, or carry a big wooden cross while flagellating yourself with cords, but I think you need to consciously leave some of your worldly comforts at home.
- I do think it should involve walking. Walking gives you time to soak in the journey. It connects you with the world you are passing through and unplugs you from the "modern" world of combustion engines and isolating metal boxes.
- Walking also forces you to consider carefully the physical burdens you will bring with you, you can live with less than you think.
- If there is one thing I will do differently on my next pilgrimage (and I'm sure there will be another one) it will be that I will not lock myself into a return date. I'm going to give myself the grace to slow down if I need to, or speed up if I want to.
- The knowledge that there was a flight out of Madrid with my name on it, that I absolutely had to be on, was one piece of "baggage" I just could not put down.
- Know that you just can't, and probably shouldn't, prepare for every eventuality. Boy Scouts and Pilgrims are different things.
3. The destination isn't everything, but it is something.
- There is something about a sacred destination like the Cathedral of St. James that helps, but it's not the actual goal that really makes the journey a pilgrimage, it's the sacred company you keep. It's the presence of other pilgrims: past, present and future, which helps keep you aware of your progress as a pilgrim. Little reminders: piles of stones, pictures of loved ones, wooden crosses woven into a chain link fence, these remind you that many have traced that path; each with their own story, but sharing a common destination. That is sacred.
- Sometimes the destination can offer a counterpoint to the sacred journey. I felt that way about my first few hours in Santiago, the shocking return to a modern city, the tourists and the marketing of the "pilgrim experience" left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. Worship in the Pilgrim's Mass the next day, helped ease that wound.
- Don't expect too much from the destination, but don't think it won't matter at all.
- Remember that one of the things pilgrimage teaches you is that the journey is never really over. It should leave you with a holy hunger for more.
- patience is a virtue, but if you're too patient, you will never take the first steps
- there will never be a "perfect time"
- you will never be truly prepared
- part of becoming a pilgrim is to have the faith to walk out of your door.
Monday, June 17, 2013
You can't always get what you want...
It has been almost three weeks since I got back from Spain, I have really just finished processing the narrative. I have told and retold the stories of things that happened, but I'm still fumbling a little bit when it comes to explaining exactly why pilgrimage is such a powerful experience. And there's also this thing that happens at least a couple times a day, where I want to just load up that backpack, which I spent four days sincerely resenting, and just start walking again.
I'm back in the swing of things, I've been through two weeks of "normal" church stuff, I've been in my office, I've had a Session meeting, I've preached and counseled and cared for people. Everything is rolling along just like it should, except when I get that little itch, except when I notice that I'm losing that pilgrim's balance where I knew when and what I NEEDED to eat and drink; where I knew exactly what to do with myself at all times: walk, walk, walk.
It's rather difficult to explain why that sort of balance and clarity is such a blessed experience. A lot of people sort of smile and nod when I describe the experience, and I can tell they're being nice and polite, but I'm not really sure they get it. It's one of those things you have to experience for yourself.
By my nature, I want to explain it. That's why I'm writing this, that's why I keep talking about it, even when my own understanding of what I experienced fails to translate well into words.
I was fairly critical of some of the books I read in advance of pilgrimage; either they were too theoretical, or they were just too full of squishy emotion. Now, I'm discovering that pilgrimage really lives in tension between those two chasms. There were times when I thought profoundly about the nature of my journey, with such focus on the spiritual walk that unfolded with every physical step, and there were other times that I lived in a cloud of intense emotions. There were moments of indescribable beauty and moments of nearly crushing suffering, and several times those moments overlapped.
There were times when I needed to put my burden down, and times when I needed to pick it up, and that's what I think I miss the most about the simplicity of the journey, knowing what you need and when you need it, and knowing the difference between what you want and what you need.
I've thought a lot about that over the past several years; what you want and what you need. I suspect that somehow or other, the difference is more than just the subject of a Rolling Stones song. I have thought about all the times when I have faced a challenge that I did not want, but somehow found that it was what I needed to go through. I thought about the times I prayed for something and ended up getting something rather different. I thought about all the times I prayed for comfort in grief, but ended up having to go deeper down into the pit. I remember the times I prayed for the storms to cease, but ended up with more wind and waves.
In those moments, I thought I needed to put my burdens down, but God was telling me to keep carrying them, not because I needed the burdens, but because I needed to get where I was going, and the burdens needed to get there with me. That was the rather unexpected, sacramental aspect of carrying my physical burden into the cathedral of St. James and plopping it down in a pew in the cool, dark, incense tinged sacred space. I have written already about the sense of finally being able to put things down, but the more I reflect on the whole process, the more I realize I have not so much put those things down, as I have learned how to carry them much better than I did before.
Just like my body got a little bit stronger and tougher as I walked, I think too, my soul grew into the burden as well, though I would not describe it as a toughening. Rather I would say it was the opposite, where my legs and feet grew harder, my soul grew more supple and able to absorb the beauty of the Way. Lifelong protestant though I am, my spirit was ready to hear the songs in Latin and soak up the smell of the incense, and understand that I was present in a holy moment despite all the barriers that would have normally kept me at arm's length as an interested bystander.
For the first time in my memory I was able to watch as other's approached the altar to receive the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper in a Roman Catholic Church, without feeling the slightest bit offended that I was not welcome. I probably could have gone, I could have set aside the differences and been safe in anonymity, but I didn't. I didn't feel I needed to, my whole life had been a sacrament of sorts for several days. There was none of the sort of grumpy bitter taste that I had felt at Catholic services where I knew I should not receive the Sacrament. There wasn't even really any inclination to just go. I knew where I was, I knew who I was, I didn't feel at all left out or excluded, they were not excluding me from the Presence, I was choosing what I needed, and I didn't need that.
It's rather amazing how quickly that sense of balance and peace begins to fade. I think that's why I keep wanting to go walkabout again. When I'm surrounded by food, I eat when I don't need to. When I can drive wherever I want, I go places that aren't important. When I have all the comforts and conveniences, I quickly settle in and forget what's really important. When I have too much of what I want, I loose track of what I really need.
I'm back in the swing of things, I've been through two weeks of "normal" church stuff, I've been in my office, I've had a Session meeting, I've preached and counseled and cared for people. Everything is rolling along just like it should, except when I get that little itch, except when I notice that I'm losing that pilgrim's balance where I knew when and what I NEEDED to eat and drink; where I knew exactly what to do with myself at all times: walk, walk, walk.
It's rather difficult to explain why that sort of balance and clarity is such a blessed experience. A lot of people sort of smile and nod when I describe the experience, and I can tell they're being nice and polite, but I'm not really sure they get it. It's one of those things you have to experience for yourself.
By my nature, I want to explain it. That's why I'm writing this, that's why I keep talking about it, even when my own understanding of what I experienced fails to translate well into words.
I was fairly critical of some of the books I read in advance of pilgrimage; either they were too theoretical, or they were just too full of squishy emotion. Now, I'm discovering that pilgrimage really lives in tension between those two chasms. There were times when I thought profoundly about the nature of my journey, with such focus on the spiritual walk that unfolded with every physical step, and there were other times that I lived in a cloud of intense emotions. There were moments of indescribable beauty and moments of nearly crushing suffering, and several times those moments overlapped.
There were times when I needed to put my burden down, and times when I needed to pick it up, and that's what I think I miss the most about the simplicity of the journey, knowing what you need and when you need it, and knowing the difference between what you want and what you need.
I've thought a lot about that over the past several years; what you want and what you need. I suspect that somehow or other, the difference is more than just the subject of a Rolling Stones song. I have thought about all the times when I have faced a challenge that I did not want, but somehow found that it was what I needed to go through. I thought about the times I prayed for something and ended up getting something rather different. I thought about all the times I prayed for comfort in grief, but ended up having to go deeper down into the pit. I remember the times I prayed for the storms to cease, but ended up with more wind and waves.
In those moments, I thought I needed to put my burdens down, but God was telling me to keep carrying them, not because I needed the burdens, but because I needed to get where I was going, and the burdens needed to get there with me. That was the rather unexpected, sacramental aspect of carrying my physical burden into the cathedral of St. James and plopping it down in a pew in the cool, dark, incense tinged sacred space. I have written already about the sense of finally being able to put things down, but the more I reflect on the whole process, the more I realize I have not so much put those things down, as I have learned how to carry them much better than I did before.
Just like my body got a little bit stronger and tougher as I walked, I think too, my soul grew into the burden as well, though I would not describe it as a toughening. Rather I would say it was the opposite, where my legs and feet grew harder, my soul grew more supple and able to absorb the beauty of the Way. Lifelong protestant though I am, my spirit was ready to hear the songs in Latin and soak up the smell of the incense, and understand that I was present in a holy moment despite all the barriers that would have normally kept me at arm's length as an interested bystander.
For the first time in my memory I was able to watch as other's approached the altar to receive the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper in a Roman Catholic Church, without feeling the slightest bit offended that I was not welcome. I probably could have gone, I could have set aside the differences and been safe in anonymity, but I didn't. I didn't feel I needed to, my whole life had been a sacrament of sorts for several days. There was none of the sort of grumpy bitter taste that I had felt at Catholic services where I knew I should not receive the Sacrament. There wasn't even really any inclination to just go. I knew where I was, I knew who I was, I didn't feel at all left out or excluded, they were not excluding me from the Presence, I was choosing what I needed, and I didn't need that.
It's rather amazing how quickly that sense of balance and peace begins to fade. I think that's why I keep wanting to go walkabout again. When I'm surrounded by food, I eat when I don't need to. When I can drive wherever I want, I go places that aren't important. When I have all the comforts and conveniences, I quickly settle in and forget what's really important. When I have too much of what I want, I loose track of what I really need.
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Reentry problems of the Transcending Self
This is the title of one of my favorite sections of Walker Percy's Lost in the Cosmos:
The Orbiting Self: Reentry Problems of the Transcending Self, or Why it is that Artists, Writers, Some Technologists, and Indeed Most People, have so much Trouble Living in the Ordinary World.
Also referred to as: Why Writers Drink.
I have been a Walker Percy fan for years, and I have read Lost in the Cosmos several times, and this problem of reentry is a real thing. Particularly when you do something that is self-consciously seeking transcendence like pilgrimage, you need to be prepared for reentry problems. Reentry, in the best possible scenario, is a controlled crash; in the worst case it's an all consuming ball of fire.
The warning lights started flashing while I was still in Santiago. As I mentioned yesterday, the reality of a modern town, with people going about their ordinary world business, and tourists going about seeing the sights, was a bit of a shock to my system that had been regularly transcending physical, spiritual and emotional boundaries for over four days (I can only imagine what it's like after a month).
As badly as I wanted to get home to see Michele and the kids, I wasn't sure that I was going to be able to just snap back into Dad and Husband mode. I really wondered how I was going to put my shoulders back in the yoke of being a Pastor. Aren't things like this supposed to make you better?
From orbit, the realities of the ordinary world seem small and insignificant, without a focused mental effort, you tend to forget that they are, in fact, the dominant reality of your life. Pilgrimage puts you in orbit, as do most intense spiritual practices, or engaging in art or another focused exercise of human expression.
You would think getting into orbit is the hard part, it's not though.
A few years ago, I heard an interview with a man who had climbed Everest several times, I forget his name now. The interviewer asked him about the rather peculiar fact that many people die on the way down from the summit. He said something to the effect that successful mountaineering is not just about climbing, if you don't get back down, it doesn't really count.
Indeed, somehow you have to get back from orbit. I was already wondering how I was going to successfully negotiate the reentry process.
Unfortunately, my body was going to give me some rather unpleasant assistance. Mechanical failure of the waste processing system, aka a kidney stone, that began it's own pilgrimage to my bladder the morning we were leaving Madrid. I made it home, spent two nights sleeping in my own bed and then began my pilgrimage to Civista Medical Center, where I was pumped full of fluids, antibiotics, morphine and percoset.
I had gone from being a Peregrino, walking the Camino, covering 25 miles in one day, to a man whose major challenge was making sure his IV tube didn't get tangled up as he moved five feet from the bed to the bathroom.
Cue the shot of a fireball burning through the stratosphere, thank the Lord for morphine.
Now that I'm back to health, I'm beginning to be able to process the effects of my time in orbit, but I still find that, when people ask me how it was, I can usually only come up with a rather insufficient: "good."
I don't exactly know how to tell people about the transcendence of self and the nature of pilgrimage without sounding flaky or downright frightening.
If you read this blog in the coming days you are going to have to put up with me processing the experience. I'm done with the narrative of the journey, now begins the analysis, and the adjustment to living in the ordinary world.
The Orbiting Self: Reentry Problems of the Transcending Self, or Why it is that Artists, Writers, Some Technologists, and Indeed Most People, have so much Trouble Living in the Ordinary World.
Also referred to as: Why Writers Drink.
I have been a Walker Percy fan for years, and I have read Lost in the Cosmos several times, and this problem of reentry is a real thing. Particularly when you do something that is self-consciously seeking transcendence like pilgrimage, you need to be prepared for reentry problems. Reentry, in the best possible scenario, is a controlled crash; in the worst case it's an all consuming ball of fire.
The warning lights started flashing while I was still in Santiago. As I mentioned yesterday, the reality of a modern town, with people going about their ordinary world business, and tourists going about seeing the sights, was a bit of a shock to my system that had been regularly transcending physical, spiritual and emotional boundaries for over four days (I can only imagine what it's like after a month).
As badly as I wanted to get home to see Michele and the kids, I wasn't sure that I was going to be able to just snap back into Dad and Husband mode. I really wondered how I was going to put my shoulders back in the yoke of being a Pastor. Aren't things like this supposed to make you better?
From orbit, the realities of the ordinary world seem small and insignificant, without a focused mental effort, you tend to forget that they are, in fact, the dominant reality of your life. Pilgrimage puts you in orbit, as do most intense spiritual practices, or engaging in art or another focused exercise of human expression.
You would think getting into orbit is the hard part, it's not though.
A few years ago, I heard an interview with a man who had climbed Everest several times, I forget his name now. The interviewer asked him about the rather peculiar fact that many people die on the way down from the summit. He said something to the effect that successful mountaineering is not just about climbing, if you don't get back down, it doesn't really count.
Indeed, somehow you have to get back from orbit. I was already wondering how I was going to successfully negotiate the reentry process.
Unfortunately, my body was going to give me some rather unpleasant assistance. Mechanical failure of the waste processing system, aka a kidney stone, that began it's own pilgrimage to my bladder the morning we were leaving Madrid. I made it home, spent two nights sleeping in my own bed and then began my pilgrimage to Civista Medical Center, where I was pumped full of fluids, antibiotics, morphine and percoset.
I had gone from being a Peregrino, walking the Camino, covering 25 miles in one day, to a man whose major challenge was making sure his IV tube didn't get tangled up as he moved five feet from the bed to the bathroom.
Cue the shot of a fireball burning through the stratosphere, thank the Lord for morphine.
Now that I'm back to health, I'm beginning to be able to process the effects of my time in orbit, but I still find that, when people ask me how it was, I can usually only come up with a rather insufficient: "good."
I don't exactly know how to tell people about the transcendence of self and the nature of pilgrimage without sounding flaky or downright frightening.
If you read this blog in the coming days you are going to have to put up with me processing the experience. I'm done with the narrative of the journey, now begins the analysis, and the adjustment to living in the ordinary world.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Compostela
Our final day on the Camino showed me, once and for all, why people have been doing this for over a thousand years. It started with the simple physical reality of getting my legs back. For day two and three, my legs had felt heavy, and there were long stretches, particularly during climbs, that I had to focus every ounce of energy just to put one foot in front of the other. On day four, the load seemed lighter, my legs had life, my feet, despite the blisters, weren't yelling at me with every step. We had a couple of good climbs, and about half way up the first one, I knew some threshold had been crossed. My body was a little harder, my mind was a little more determined. I spent a good portion of day four on my own, not because I had grown tired of the company, but simply because my body was telling me what pace to keep, and it was a little faster than the others.
I felt in balance with my body, I was eating to live, just what my body needed to keep going, drinking plenty of water, my muscles had adapted to the load, and I scaled those last two mountains at a good pace. At the top of the last rise, I stopped and waited, because I knew, particularly after going it alone for a good couple of hours, it was time to get back with the group for the final descent into Santiago de Compostela, the completion of the Pilgrimage.
There was one last physical and spiritual hurdle to overcome, coming down the mountain. From the high places you could see the town, but you were detached, a creature of the open road, a Peregrino. When you entered the town, you immediately had to face the reality that you were a stranger to this world. People going in and out of banks and stores, tourists with cameras and fanny packs, normal, modern life.
It was oppressive.
So close to the goal, my legs got heavy, my shoulders started to ache, my soul began to want to turn around and head back out to the road. I've been back for two weeks now, and my soul still wants to head back out to the road, I fear I have been infected.
When we finally wound our way through the modern city of Santiago and into the old section, we caught a glimpse of the spire of the cathedral, and tears came. I knew why we were there, I knew that there was a place that welcomed the stranger, the Peregrino. A few of the group started singing the doxology as we walked down the crowded streets, I couldn't sing with my voice, but my heart was singing loud.
As we entered the courtyard in front of the cathedral of Saint James, I realized momentarily that my pack was no longer heavy. As I climbed the steps of the church and entered into high vaulted sanctuary, into that space where ancient stones played wonderful games with the sunlight that came streaming through the high windows, I felt a sense of quiet come over me. The tourists ceased to exist in my world, all my critiques of the excess of a church like this, with so much gold and ornamentation, were silent.
I walked around the whole perimeter of the cathedral before dropping my pack in a section roped off for prayer and meditation, and I knelt down and wept. I don't know why I wept, but it was a deep and cleansing process. I looked at my pack, laying there on the pew in front of me, and I realized that it was not the only heavy burden I had carried to Santiago de Compostela. I was still carrying my brother, grief and absence. I was still carrying Christine, Amanda and Sara, and I was still carrying their father, their killer. I was still carrying all the people I had said goodbye to in Plumville and Atwood. I was still carrying all the new people in Maryland that I'm just getting to know. I realized that perhaps I will always carry them. I realized that there are some burdens you shouldn't put down.
As I looked around at the ancient sanctuary, I thought about all the burdens that had been brought to this altar over the last 1500 years, all the people who were hoping that their pilgrimage would get them, or someone they cared about into heaven. I thought about how, after days of wanting nothing more than to be rid of the backpack in front of me, what I wanted, more than anything, was to put it back on and keep walking, to embrace the simple way of the Peregrino, to travel the roads and the high places...
And then I thought of home, and family, and I realized that pilgrimage is valuable as a contrast, as salt of the earth, as a way to set yourself apart, temporarily, from all the things that clutch and grab at your soul. It is a parable that illustrates life, but it is not life itself. It can be addictive, it can put a claim on you, and it will pull at your heart.
But there are burdens that you should not put down, or walk away from. Things that are every bit as sacred as the Way, or the Cathedral. Living people who are every bit as holy (more holy really) as the bones of the Apostle in their ornate silver sepulcher.
For doing at least 100 km of the Camino, you get a certificate called a Compostela, which is a verification that you have completed your pilgrimage and become a Peregrino, but the journey isn't done, not by a long shot. I don't know how many specific sacred journeys I'm going to take in my life, but I know now that my life as a whole is a sacred journey. I am, and I always will be, a pilgrim, a Peregrino, whether I'm on the Way or at home with my family, whether I'm trekking through the wilderness, or sitting in my office.
I am a Peregrino, and this journey is not done.
I felt in balance with my body, I was eating to live, just what my body needed to keep going, drinking plenty of water, my muscles had adapted to the load, and I scaled those last two mountains at a good pace. At the top of the last rise, I stopped and waited, because I knew, particularly after going it alone for a good couple of hours, it was time to get back with the group for the final descent into Santiago de Compostela, the completion of the Pilgrimage.
There was one last physical and spiritual hurdle to overcome, coming down the mountain. From the high places you could see the town, but you were detached, a creature of the open road, a Peregrino. When you entered the town, you immediately had to face the reality that you were a stranger to this world. People going in and out of banks and stores, tourists with cameras and fanny packs, normal, modern life.
It was oppressive.
So close to the goal, my legs got heavy, my shoulders started to ache, my soul began to want to turn around and head back out to the road. I've been back for two weeks now, and my soul still wants to head back out to the road, I fear I have been infected.
When we finally wound our way through the modern city of Santiago and into the old section, we caught a glimpse of the spire of the cathedral, and tears came. I knew why we were there, I knew that there was a place that welcomed the stranger, the Peregrino. A few of the group started singing the doxology as we walked down the crowded streets, I couldn't sing with my voice, but my heart was singing loud.
As we entered the courtyard in front of the cathedral of Saint James, I realized momentarily that my pack was no longer heavy. As I climbed the steps of the church and entered into high vaulted sanctuary, into that space where ancient stones played wonderful games with the sunlight that came streaming through the high windows, I felt a sense of quiet come over me. The tourists ceased to exist in my world, all my critiques of the excess of a church like this, with so much gold and ornamentation, were silent.
I walked around the whole perimeter of the cathedral before dropping my pack in a section roped off for prayer and meditation, and I knelt down and wept. I don't know why I wept, but it was a deep and cleansing process. I looked at my pack, laying there on the pew in front of me, and I realized that it was not the only heavy burden I had carried to Santiago de Compostela. I was still carrying my brother, grief and absence. I was still carrying Christine, Amanda and Sara, and I was still carrying their father, their killer. I was still carrying all the people I had said goodbye to in Plumville and Atwood. I was still carrying all the new people in Maryland that I'm just getting to know. I realized that perhaps I will always carry them. I realized that there are some burdens you shouldn't put down.
As I looked around at the ancient sanctuary, I thought about all the burdens that had been brought to this altar over the last 1500 years, all the people who were hoping that their pilgrimage would get them, or someone they cared about into heaven. I thought about how, after days of wanting nothing more than to be rid of the backpack in front of me, what I wanted, more than anything, was to put it back on and keep walking, to embrace the simple way of the Peregrino, to travel the roads and the high places...
And then I thought of home, and family, and I realized that pilgrimage is valuable as a contrast, as salt of the earth, as a way to set yourself apart, temporarily, from all the things that clutch and grab at your soul. It is a parable that illustrates life, but it is not life itself. It can be addictive, it can put a claim on you, and it will pull at your heart.
But there are burdens that you should not put down, or walk away from. Things that are every bit as sacred as the Way, or the Cathedral. Living people who are every bit as holy (more holy really) as the bones of the Apostle in their ornate silver sepulcher.
For doing at least 100 km of the Camino, you get a certificate called a Compostela, which is a verification that you have completed your pilgrimage and become a Peregrino, but the journey isn't done, not by a long shot. I don't know how many specific sacred journeys I'm going to take in my life, but I know now that my life as a whole is a sacred journey. I am, and I always will be, a pilgrim, a Peregrino, whether I'm on the Way or at home with my family, whether I'm trekking through the wilderness, or sitting in my office.
I am a Peregrino, and this journey is not done.
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