Hearing Another Story

Sunday, June 29, 2025

Father Richard Rohr explains how the Gospels impart a message of liberation, particularly for people pushed to the margins of society: 

The vast majority of people throughout history have been poor, oppressed, or in some way “on the margins.” They would have read history in terms of a need for change, but most of history has been written and interpreted from the side of the winners. The unique exception is the revelation called the Bible, which is an alternative history from the side of the often enslaved and oppressed people of ancient Israel, culminating in the scapegoat figure of Jesus himself. 

In the Gospels, the poor, people with disabilities, tax collectors, sinners, and outsiders tend to follow Jesus. It’s those on the inside and the top—the Roman occupiers, the chief priests and their conspirators—who crucify him. Shouldn’t that tell us something significant about perspective? Every viewpoint is a view from a point. We must be able to critique any winner’s perspective if we are to see a fuller truth. 

Liberation theology—which focuses on freeing people from religious, political, social, and economic oppression—is often dismissed by official Christianity. Perhaps that’s not surprising when we consider who interpreted the Scriptures for the last seventeen hundred years. The empowered clerical class enforced their own perspective instead of that of the marginalized, who first received the message with such excitement and hope. Once Christianity became the established religion of the Roman Empire (after 313 CE), we largely stopped reading the Bible from the side of the poor and the oppressed. We read it from the side of the political establishment and the usually comfortable priesthood instead of from the side of people hungry for justice and truth. Shifting our priorities to make room for the powerless instead of accommodating the powerful is the only way to detach religion from its common marriage to power, money, and self-importance. [1] 

When Scripture is read through the eyes of vulnerability—what Catholics call the “preferential option for the poor” or the “bias from the bottom”—it will always be liberating and transformative. Scripture will not be used to oppress or impress. The question is no longer, “How can I maintain the status quo?” (which often happens to benefit me), but “How can we all grow and change together?” We would have no top to protect, and the so-called “bottom” becomes the place of education, real change, and transformation for all. 

The bottom is where we have no privilege to prove or protect but much to seek and become. Jesus called such people “blessed” (Matthew 5:3). Dorothy Day said much the same: “The only way to live in any true security is to live so close to the bottom that when you fall you do not have far to drop, you do not have much to lose.” [2] From that place, where few would choose to be, we can be used as instruments of transformation and liberation for the rest of the world. [3] 

Liberation and Justice

The Liberation Journey

Monday, June 30, 2025

Father Richard Rohr understands liberation to be the underlying story of both the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures: 

The theme of liberation is the largest frame in which to understand spirituality. The term liberation theology has a negative connotation for some people. It sounds like something heretical, leftist, or Marxist, and certainly not biblical. In fact, liberation is at the heart of both the Jewish and Christian traditions from the very beginning. It’s amazing that much of Christianity has been able to avoid that truth for so long, probably because many of us read history from the top down and seldom from the bottom up, which is the recurring perspective of both the Hebrew and the Christian Scriptures.  

We see the beginnings of the liberation theme as early as fourteen hundred years before Jesus with the enslavement and exodus of the Jewish people. Something divine happened that allowed an oppressed group of Semitic people in Egypt to experience many levels of gradual liberation. This story became the basic template and metaphor for the entire Bible. The Exodus was both an inner and an outer journey. If our inner journey does not match and lead to an outer journey of liberation for all, we have no true freedom or “salvation.” That is what liberation theology is honest enough to point out.  

Moses is the historical character at the heart of the Exodus event and of the spirituality that grew from that experience (Exodus 3:1–15). The voice Moses hears from the burning bush immediately calls him to confront the pharaoh and tell him to let his people go! It does not tell him to go to a temple or to build one.  

Here we see a primary inner experience that immediately has social, economic, and political implications! Liberation theology shows that spirituality and action are connected from the very beginning and can never be separated. Some people set out to act first, and an inner experience may be given to them on the journey itself. Others have an inner experience that then leads them into action. It doesn’t matter on which side it begins. Eventually action and spirituality must meet and feed one another. When prayer is authentic, it will always lead to actions of mercy; when actions of mercy are attempted at any depth, they will always lead us to prayer.  

Very early in the Jewish tradition there is a split between the Exodus tradition—which I believe is the original tradition of liberation—and the priestly tradition that develops in Leviticus and Numbers. The priestly mentality invariably tries to organize, control, and perpetuate the initial mystical experience with prayer and ritual. It’s the Jewish prophets who bring together the inner God-experience and outer work for justice and truth. This connection is desperately needed and yet resented and avoided to this day. We always and forever need the prophets or else most religion worships itself instead of God. The pattern is persistent.  

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Sarah Young Jesus Calling

  I am involved in each moment of your life. I have carefully mapped out every inch of your journey through this day, even though much of it may feel haphazard. Because the world is in a fallen condition, things always seem to be unraveling around the edges. Expect to find trouble in this day. At the same time, trust that My way is perfect, even in the midst of such messy imperfection.
     Stay conscious of Me as you go through this day, remembering that I never leave your side. Let the Holy Spirit guide you step by step, protecting you from unnecessary trials and equipping you to get through whatever must be endured. As you trudge through the sludge of this fallen world, keep your mind in heavenly places with Me. Thus the Light of My Presence shines on you, giving you Peace and Joy that circumstances cannot touch.

RELATED BIBLE VERSES:

Psalm 18:30 (NLT)
30 God’s way is perfect.
    All the Lord’s promises prove true.
    He is a shield for all who look to him for protection.

Additional insight regarding Psalm 18:30: Some people think that belief in God is a crutch for weak people who cannot make it on their own. God is indeed a shield to protect us when we are too weak to face certain trials by ourselves, but he does not want us to remain weak. He strengthens, protects, and guides us in order to send us back into an evil world to fight for him. Then he continues to work with us because the strongest person on earth is infinitely weaker than God and needs his help. David was not a coward; he was a mighty warrior who, even with all his armies and weapons, knew that only God could ultimately protect and save him.
Isaiah 41:13 (NLT)
13 For I hold you by your right hand—
    I, the Lord your God.
And I say to you,
   ‘Don’t be afraid. I am here to help you.’

Individual and Collective Responsibility

Friday, June 27, 2025

Authors Ori Brafman and Rod Beckstrom reflect on the Alcoholics Anonymous community and the powerful lessons we can learn from them.   

Starfish have an incredible quality to them: If you cut an arm off, most of these animals grow a new arm. And with some varieties, such as the Linckia, or long-armed starfish, the animal can replicate itself from just a single piece of an arm.… They can achieve this magical regeneration because in reality, a starfish is a neural network–basically a network of cells. Instead of having a head, like a spider, the starfish functions as a decentralized network….  

Let’s look at one of the best-known starfish of them all. In 1935 Bill Wilson was clenching a can of beer; he’d been holding a beer, or an alcoholic variation thereof, for the better part of two decades. Finally, his doctor told him that unless he stopped drinking, he shouldn’t expect to live more than six months. That rattled Bill, but not enough to stop him. An addiction is hard to overcome….   

Bill had a huge insight. He already knew that he couldn’t combat alcoholism all by himself. And experts were useless to him because he and other addicts like him were just too smart for their own good. As soon as someone told him what to do, Bill would rationalize away the advice and pick up a drink instead. It was on this point that the breakthrough came. Bill realized that he could get help from other people who were in the same predicament. Other people with the same problem would be equals. It’s easy to rebel against a [counselor]. It’s much harder to dismiss your peers. Alcoholics Anonymous was born.  

The organization models how to be responsible for self and others:   

At Alcoholics Anonymous, no one’s in charge. And yet, at the same time, everyone’s in charge…. The organization functions just like a starfish. You automatically become part of the leadership—an arm of the starfish, if you will—the moment you join. Thus, AA is constantly changing form as new members come in and others leave. The one thing that does remain constant is the recovery principle—the famous twelve steps. Because there is no one in charge, everyone is responsible for keeping themselves—and everyone else—on track.… There’s no application form, and nobody owns AA.   

Nobody owns AA. Bill realized this when the group became a huge success and people from all over the world wanted to start their own chapters. Bill had a crucial decision to make. He could go with the spider option and control what the chapters could and couldn’t do. Under this scenario, he’d have had to manage the brand and train applicants in the AA methodology. Or he could go with the starfish approach and get out of the way. Bill chose the latter. He let go.  

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John Chaffee 5 On Friday

1.

“I have come to think that care of the soul requires a high degree of resistance to the culture around us, simply because that culture is dedicated to values that have no concern for the soul.”

– Thomas Merton, Trappist Monk

There is something rebellious about taking faith seriously.

It is utterly counter-cultural.

This is NOT to say that it is against conservatism or liberalism.  It does, however, seem to be against a whole culture that wants to separate things into broad binaries.

Not only that, but care of the soul probably includes being passionately against hurry, noise, and crowds, which are the three main societal obstacles to spiritual formation.

To follow the Christian faith seriously is not for those who wish to fit in.  The Christian faith will put you at odds with everything that is not pulling humanity in the direction of health, holiness, compassion, welcome, forgiveness, hospitality, disarming nukes, putting down guns, ending violence, ending homelessness, caring for the orphan and the widow, treating the addict, hugging the leper and our cultural “lepers”, and so much more.

Merton is right.

To be Christian is to rebel.

2.

“God has a powerful thirst to draw all of humanity into himself.”

– Julian of Norwich, English Anchoress and Mystic

I have come to the position that the “powerful thirst” of God will one day be satiated.

3.

“He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world (Cosmos/Κοσμος).”

– 1 John 2:2

Here is yet another passage that I have never heard a sermon or a Bible study on.

As I have said elsewhere and before, there is an unconscious or even deliberate attempt to avoid these passages, which point rather overtly to a form of Christian universalism.

About two years ago, I was at a gas station when another member of the church pulled up whom I had not seen in a while.  He seemed a bit of a gruff guy, but would flash a smile that was so playful it was disarming.  While he was getting gas next to me, he asked me a question.

“You know, John, I’ve been thinking over that hell thing…”

Then, fascinatingly, he felt the need to whisper…

“It just doesn’t make sense.  Jesus forgives everything, but then he will send the majority of humanity from the dawn of time to hell?  He wouldn’t do that, would he?”

I smiled at him.

“Nope, it doesn’t make sense at all.  Infinite love and mercy have a limit?  That doesn’t make sense.  God is like a Divine Lifeguard who will draw or drag all people back to himself.  It is not that Jesus atoned for some; he atoned for the whole cosmos.”  Right there, I wrote up a few other passages to look up on a slip of paper and handed it to him.  “Don’t expect ever to hear a sermon or Bible study about these passages.  The real Good News is better than we were told.”

We shook hands, smiled, said our well wishes, and each headed off on our own way that day.

Now, every time I drive past that gas station, I think about that interaction: an impromptu Bible study next to a pump of unleaded gasoline.

If God has already reconciled everything, the entire cosmos has already been atoned for, and we have a God of infinite love and mercy…

Let’s connect the obvious dots?

4.

“Christians hunger and thirst for righteousness and justice, but we are not utopians. Failing to achieve their ideals, utopians and idealists too easily become cynics who, in their frustration, are willing to kill in the name of a good cause. Christians are revolutionaries, but we believe the revolution has happened and we are it.”

– Stanley Hauerwas, American Theologian and Ethicist

There is a great deal of work to be done to help the world become a better place.

The Christian faith is not an excuse to passively sit back and applaud God for doing what is necessary to save the world.

No, there is more grit and grim to it all.

To not get one’s hands dirty is the exact opposite lesson of the Incarnation.

The idea that God would take a vested interest in a particular planet, with a whole human race who struggle to be human themselves, and how that negatively affects things around them…  It is nigh unbelievable.

But if God chose to get God’s hands dirty, then it is probably past time for us to also put our hands to the plow.

5.

“For human beings, the most daunting challenge is to become fully human. For to become fully human is to become fully divine”

– Father Thomas Keating, Founder of Contemplative Outreach

This is relatively close to the teaching of Irenaeus of Lyons, who said, “The glory of God is man fully alive.”

Much of Western Christianity has little understanding of Theosis, or the process of becoming “like God.”  It has been a long-standing aspect of the Christian faith to believe that one day we will “share in the divine nature”  (2 Peter 1:4).  Instead, we focus on the part about being forgiven for any faults we might have, which to me is not negated by Theosis but happens en route to Theosis.  This means, I think, that we preach a truncated and smaller Gospel than we could. 

The brilliance of the teaching of Theosis is that the problem is not that we are human; it is that we do not know how to be human, and therefore would benefit from learning how to be human from the God-man Jesus of Nazareth.

Humanity and Divinity are not opposed; it might be more that when the seed of Humanity is fully blossoming, it becomes Divine by participating in the life of God.

 

A Collective Impact

Thursday, June 26, 2025

Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis considers how individual decisions create collective change:  

All of us must face and embrace the urgent need for deep social change—change that begins within, then spreads like ripples on a pond, and finally becomes a tsunami of love-inspired change. No matter your age, race, faith, gender, or sexuality, I hope … [to] give you a new sense of the power you have to be good and to insist on good; to care for others and insist on being cared for; to stand up for the vulnerable and stand against injustice; to love and be loved.…  

I know this to be true: The world doesn’t get great unless we all get better. If there is such a thing as salvation, then we are not saved until everyone is saved; our dignity and liberation are bound together. We must care for ourselves and the village around us. If we don’t, the village’s problems become our problems, and together our children will continue to hide from bullets in their classrooms. Our elders’ safety nets will be threatened. Our young adults will face mounting debt and earn less than their parents. Fear, xenophobia, racism, bigotry—these problems belong to all of us, and they will get better as we all get better!  

Father Richard points to the value of faithfulness to the common good: 

What’s the great principle of Catholic moral theology? The common good. What is needed for the common good, and not just my private good? That’s a very hard question for Western people to ask. In fact, many of us don’t even know it’s a question anymore.  

In our postmodern, secular culture, it can feel old-fashioned to be faithful to something. Sometimes people thank me for staying in community and faith, which feels like the best compliment. That doesn’t mean that I’ve done it perfectly all these years—I went down my dead ends. But faithfulness is being faithful to God, faithful to Christ, and faithful to the gospel that is calling all of us beyond ourselves.  

So be faithful! Go to the edge, find the beloved community, build the alternative, the parallel culture, in small communities. Václav Havel, the poet-president of the Czech Republic, is a good example. He was already building an alternative culture before the Berlin Wall fell. Through literature, study, poetry, ritual, and education, he helped create people who had a bigger vision and who thought in another way. When the system fell apart, they were ready to live with positive belief—not only clear about what they were against, but what they were for. [1] 

Lewis concludes:  

I can see a bold new path led by a vision of the sacred goodness of humankind and the abundance of the planet’s resources…. You and I are the ones we’ve been waiting for to create better lives for ourselves and our communities and to build a better world—together. All we need is the courage to imagine, and the will to make it be so.  

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Sarah Young Jesus Calling

I am all around you, like a cocoon of Light. My Presence with you is a promise, independent of your awareness of Me. Many things can block this awareness, but the major culprit is worry. My children tend to accept worry as an inescapable fact of life. However, worry is a form of unbelief; it is anathema (something. that one vehemently dislikes) to Me.
     Who is in charge of your life? If it is you, then you have good reason to worry. But if it is I, then worry is both unnecessary and counterproductive. When you start to feel anxious about something, relinquish the situation to Me. Back off a bit, redirecting your focus to Me. I will either take care of the problem Myself or show you how to handle it. In this world you will have problems, but you need not to lose sight of Me.

RELATED BIBLE VERSES:
Luke 12:22-31(NLT)
Teaching about Money and Possessions
22 Then, turning to his disciples, Jesus said, “That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food to eat or enough clothes to wear. 23 For life is more than food, and your body more than clothing. 24 Look at the ravens. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for God feeds them. And you are far more valuable to him than any birds! 25 Can all your worries add a single moment to your life? 26 And if worry can’t accomplish a little thing like that, what’s the use of worrying over bigger things?
27 “Look at the lilies and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. 28 And if God cares so wonderfully for flowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith?
29 “And don’t be concerned about what to eat and what to drink. Don’t worry about such things. 30 These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers all over the world, but your Father already knows your needs. 31 Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and he will give you everything you need.

Additional insight regarding Luke 12:22-34: Jesus commands us to not worry. But how can we avoid it? Only faith can free us from the anxiety caused by greed and covetousness. Working and planning responsibly is good; dwelling on all the ways our planning could go wrong is bad. Worry is pointless because it can’t fill any of our needs; worry is foolish because the Creator of the universe loves us and knows what we need. He promises to meet all our real needs but not necessarily all of our desires. Overcoming worry requires: (1) Simple trust in God, our heavenly Father. This trust is expressed by praying to him rather than worrying. (2) Perspective on your problems. This can be gained by developing a strategy for addressing and correcting your problems. (3) A support team to help. Find some believers who will pray for you to find wisdom and strength to deal with your worries.

Additional insight regarding Luke 12:31: Seeking the Kingdom of God above all else means making Jesus the Lord and King of your life. He must control every area – your work, play, plans, and relationships. Is the Kingdom only one of your many concerns, or is it central to all you do? Are you holding back any areas of your life from God’s control? As Lord and Creator, he wants to help provide what you need as well as guide how you use what he provides.

John 16:33 (NLT)
33 I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.”

Additional insight regarding John 16:33: Jesus summed up all he had told them this night, tying together themes from John 14:27-29; John 16:1-4; and John 16:9-11. With these words he told his disciples to take courage. In spite of the inevitable struggles they would face, they would not be alone. Jesus does not abandon us to our struggles either. If we remember that the ultimate victory has already been won, we can claim the peace of Christ in the most troublesome time.

A Community of Care

Rabbi Sharon Brous places individual care and relationships at the heart of meaningful community.  

Relationships of mutual concern are rooted in both love and trust. These are people we know will hold our hearts with care. We’re prone to forgive them when they make mistakes, and we hope they’ll do the same for us. We feel accountable to one another. We want to share with them our important moments, both the hardships and the joys. We thrive when we’re together. Relationships of shared purpose are rooted not only in a commitment to one another, but also to a shared dream…. 

If the sweet spot … is the intersection of mutual concern and shared purpose, I want to root in a community that stands at that same intersection. Such a community sees every ritual, every service, and every gathering as an opportunity for a deepening of connectivity. It invests in people as complicated, multi-faceted, wounded, beautiful individuals, each one essential to the greater whole. This kind of community is fueled by questions like “Who are you, and what brings you here?” rather than “Where do you work?”… This kind of community establishes spiritual anchors—regular opportunities for people to pray, sing, grieve, learn, and reflect together. It recognizes the collective power of people of good will working to help heal the broader society and prioritizes creating pathways for the holy work to be done. It invests in the creation of sacred space that fosters not inclusion, but belonging, intimacy and authenticity, love and accountability. [1] 

Recognizing the collective loneliness and despair experienced by so many in our culture, Brous’s community made a deeper commitment to meeting people where they were.  

Our work is not only to preach a theology of love and belonging, but to ensure that our communities strive to embrace that mandate. I am certain that this is the most important work we have done. That is the amen effect—the sacred mandate to hear each other, to embrace each other, to love each other up, especially on the hard days. To say to one another, “Amen.”  

To take this mandate seriously means to do everything we can to free our sacred spaces of shame and stigma. It means to speak honestly and openly about disconnectedness and loneliness, depression, anxiety, and addiction…. Communities of love and belonging are spaces where even at our most vulnerable, we’re still willing to show up and start walking, trusting that our community, those circling toward us, won’t look away.  

The scientific data and spiritual insight here are in strong alignment. Disconnection is a plague on our society, a plague of darkness. The antidote is rich, meaningful connection. We all need an ezer k’negdo [2]—someone to meet our vulnerability with concern and care, to weep with us through the night, and to stand with us in the trenches, working with love to build a better world.

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From Andrew Lang:

Hey CO Few,You’re probably familiar with the Buddhist parable of the Two Arrows.It goes something like this: when we experience harm or pain, two arrows fly toward us. The first arrow we experience is the pain of the event: the physical injury or the initial feeling of loss, change, or challenge. The second arrow is the suffering we experience from how we respond to the pain itself: the narratives, stories, and behaviors we weave together or embody in reaction to it. As the parable states: the first is unavoidable; the second is chosen.This past week, my daughter lost her two front teeth at once – and she was ecstatic. It was a celebratory moment, for sure! But rather quickly, she started hearing less-than-congratulatory messages from friends and family around her:“Good thing picture day isn’t for awhile!”“Ooh – bad time for that with the wedding coming up.”The first arrow.And now, at the young age of 7, she has to navigate not only those responses, but her response to those responses (the second arrow.) Will she decide to start smiling with a closed mouth? Will she feel ashamed whenever a camera is present? Or will she say – in 7-year-old-language – screw that! and give a big smile nonetheless?To the extent that she is able, she gets to choose her response. Similarly, we also face “first arrows” almost everyday of our lives: both the personal and intimate as well as the political and expansive. The loss of loved ones, the stinging words of others, but also the impact on our bodies and communities of ICE raids, reading the news, challenges to reproductive rights, and rising authoritarianism – these are all “first arrows” that can pierce through us. Unlike the parable, however, I’m not so sure we get to “choose” whether or not we experience the second arrow – but I do think we have a say in how it lands.The Second Arrow: Two Types of Pain. In his book My Grandmother’s Hands, trauma specialist Resmaa Menakem details two types of pain: dirty pain and clean pain. We experience the second arrow as dirty pain when we turn away from the reality of the first arrow, seek to bypass its impact on us, or try to pin it on somebody else.In other words, we experience dirty pain when we never truly sit with and face how the first arrow has pierced us.Living with the dirty pain of this second arrow can look and feel like: Ruminating about who’s to blame for the situation. Getting stuck in our stories of why this happened to us. Blowing our pain and frustration through our communities. Reading news apps compulsively to avoid the impact of the first arrow Pouring ourself into work and activism rather without taking care of our bodies Refusing to acknowledge the impact of the first arrow or minimizing its significance On the other hand, the second arrow can land as clean pain when we feel that first arrow and stay with it.Instead of bypassing the hurt or casting it onto others, we opt for a second arrow of clean pain by naming the reality of the first arrow, feeling its impact in our minds and bodies, and from that space, identifying how to move in a way that is aligned with our values and sense of self.Menakem writes that it still “hurts like hell,” but that opting for this clean pain “mends and can build [our] capacity for growth.”Especially in our current political context, experiencing clean pain is vital for us in order to remain present without burning out or checking out.To that end, here are a couple ways we can practice choosing clean pain: Identify ways to soothe yourself. In the Gentle Change Collective, we use Menakem’s language of “primal reps.” These are practices and activities that help you stay grounded in the midst of challenge. A few examples: self-touch, deep breathing, tapping, singing, stretching, orienting, etc. Notice and name. Become accustomed to noticing your emotions and thought patterns and naming them, whether to a journal, your phone’s notes app, or to someone else. Engage community. When that first arrow hits and our defense systems activate, it can be extremely helpful (and sometimes life-saving) to have a friend or community of care that can hold you in the midst of it. Find your people and practice being open about your experiences. Safely metabolize with movement. While facing that first arrow, it’s also vital to move with it. Go for a walk, engage with dancing, exercise, or stretching. Push and pull heavy things, to your capacity and ability. Movement like this releases endorphins, serotonin, dopamine, and others chemicals in our brain, supporting our ability to be resilient and grounded. Safely metabolize with action. One of the results of metabolizing the impact of that first arrow is often a desire to take action for justice and healing. And paradoxically, one of the best ways to metabolize the impacts of that first arrow is to take action for justice and healing. It’s not a first-we-metabolize-then-we-act situation; taking action is one of the core ways we invite healing within ourselves and our communities.

Living, Visible Models

Father Richard teaches that we can only practice new ways of being in the world if we maintain some degree of nonattachment from the systems around us:  

The foundation of Jesus’ social program is what I will call non-idolatry, or the withdrawing of our enthrallment from all kingdoms except the kingdom of God. This supports a much better agenda than feeling the need to attack things directly. Nonattachment (freedom from loyalties to human-made domination systems) is the best way I know of protecting people from religious zealotry or any kind of antagonistic thinking or behavior. While there are certainly things we are against, we must keep concentrating on the big thing we are for!  

Paul tries to create some “audiovisual aids” for this big message, which he calls “churches” (a term Jesus used only  twice, found in Matthew 16:18 and 18:17). Paul knows we need living, visible models of this new kind of life to make evident that Christ’s people really follow a way different from mass consciousness. They are people who “can be innocent and genuine … and can shine like stars among a deceitful and underhanded brood” (Philippians 2:15). To people who asked, “Why should we believe there’s a new or better life possible?” Paul could say: “Look at these people. They’re different. This is a new social order.” In Christ, “there are no more distinctions between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, but all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28).  

In Paul’s thinking, we were supposed to live inside of an alternative society, almost a utopia, and from such fullness “go to the world.” Instead, we created a model whereby people live almost entirely in the world, fully invested in its attitudes toward money, war, and power—and sometimes “go to church.” This doesn’t seem to be working! In Christianity, groups like the Amish, the Bruderhof, Black churches, and members of some Catholic religious orders probably have a better chance of actually maintaining an alternative consciousness. Most of the rest of us end up thinking and operating pretty much like our surrounding culture.  

Many people now find this solidarity in think tanks, support groups, prayer groups, study groups, house-building projects, healing circles, or community-focused organizations. Perhaps without fully recognizing it, we’re actually heading in the right direction. Some new studies indicate that Christians are not so much leaving Christianity as they are realigning with groups that live Christian values in the world—instead of just gathering again to hear the readings, recite the creed, and sing songs on Sunday. Jesus does not need our singing; we need instead to act like a community. Actual Christian behavior might just be growing more than we realize. Behavior has a very different emphasis than mere membership.  

Remember, it’s not the brand name that matters.  
It is that God’s heart be made available and active on this earth.  

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1 CORINTHIANS 13 IS ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL DESCRIPTIONS OF LOVE, A CHAPTER OFTEN USED AT WEDDINGS. SO, MOST OF US ARE FAMILIAR.

The chapter describes love as patient and kind and continues by laying out the stunning attributes of God. Tucked between “Love isn’t easily angered” and “Love doesn’t delight in evil” is a powerful world-changing truth:

“Love keeps no record of wrongs….” 

Jesus, Love in human form, hanging on a cross between heaven and earth, His body battered, the lie of separation a veil between Him and His Father, the myth of abandonment cutting Him off from sensing His Father’s affection; the fiction that God punishes screaming its message through the iron nails that tore His flesh and held Him fast to a cross, reveals the power of a free will submitted to love.

Jesus—fully God, fully Man, one with Father, intimate with Holy Spirit—forgives. And His forgiveness confronts the transactional, sin-counting, retributive justice payment system—“What seems right to a man.” (1)

Casting back to before the beginning and looking forward to after the end, Jesus keeps no record of the wrong humanity has committed. “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,” He said. And the power of that Greater Love saves the world.

Do you know what happened when Jesus kept no record of our wrongs?

He couldn’t justify His right to hold onto offense—and all creation was reborn in that powerful conclusion.

And we’ve been invited to live in that same powerfully transformative freedom!

All creation has been invited to awaken to that reconciling measureless revelation. Love doesn’t count sins; it keeps no record of wrong!

(1) Proverbs 14:12

This article is excerpted from my book, Leaving and Finding Jesus. Jason Clark. ReThinking God with Tacos

Reflecting on Matthew 5:1–16, Brian McLaren explores Jesus’ call to live by the collective values of justice and solidarity, becoming salt and light for the world:  

Jesus advocates an identity characterized by solidarity, sensitivity, and nonviolence. He celebrates those who long for justice, embody compassion, and manifest integrity and nonduplicity. He creates a new kind of hero: not warriors, corporate executives, or politicians, but brave and determined activists for preemptive peace, willing to suffer with him in the prophetic tradition of justice.  

Our choice is clear from the start: If we want to be his disciples, we won’t be able to simply coast along and conform to the norms of our society. We must choose a different definition of well-being, a different model of success, a new identity with a new set of values….  

If we seek the kind of unconventional blessedness he proposes, we will experience the true aliveness of God’s kingdom, the warmth of God’s comfort, the enjoyment of the gift of this Earth, the satisfaction at seeing God’s restorative justice come more fully, the joy of receiving mercy, the direct experience of God’s presence, the honor of association with God and of being in league with the prophets of old. That is the identity he invites us to seek.  

That identity will give us a very important role in the world. As creative nonconformists, we will be difference makers, aliveness activists, catalysts for change. Like salt that brings out the best flavors in food, we will bring out the best in our community and society. Also like salt, we will have a preservative function—opposing corruption and decay…. Simply by being who we are—living boldly and freely in this new identity as salt and light—we will make a difference, as long as we don’t lose our “saltiness” or try to hide our light.  

We’ll be tempted, no doubt, to let ourselves be tamed, toned down, shut up, and glossed over. But Jesus means for us to stand apart from the status quo, to stand up for what matters, and to stand out as part of the solution rather than part of the problem. He means for our lives to overcome the blandness and darkness of evil with the salt and light of good works. Instead of drawing attention to ourselves, those good works will point toward God. “Wow,” people will say, “when I see the goodness and kindness of your lives, I can believe there’s a good and kind God out there, too.”  

The way Jesus phrases these memorable lines tells us something important about him. Like all great leaders, he isn’t preoccupied with himself. He puts others—us—in the spotlight when he says, “You are the salt of the Earth. You are the light of the world.” Yes, there’s a place and time for him to declare who he is, but he begins by declaring who we are.  

Choosing Common Life

The community of believers was of one mind and one heart. None of them claimed anything as their own; rather, everything was held in common.  
—Acts 4:32 

Poet and CAC staff member Drew Jackson reflects on how the first Christians cared for one another:   

The book of Acts is all about the early community of Jesus’ followers that formed after Jesus’ ascension. Communities of followers of the Way—as they’re called—start to form and what we find in Acts 4 are descriptions of what started to happen in these communities. Another way to say it is that this is what it looked like when people began to experience transformation. 

The first thing it says is that the people are of one heart and one mind. The people begin to have a new way of relating to one another that is based on oneness and not separateness, which, in and of itself, is a radical shift in consciousness. This is a thread that continues throughout the book of Acts. Dividing walls between Jew and Gentile begin to get torn down in these new communities. Wealth gaps start to get bridged. Lines of kinship start to get redefined. There is no “us and them” anymore—there is only us. We belong to one another.   

This way of relating through oneness plays itself out in new ways of relating to money, property, and possessions. The text says, “No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they had everything in common.” This was a new economics—a shared economics.… The difficulty is we’re all caught up in a sophisticated practice of consumerism and hoarding, and we’ve been conditioned to it for so long that we can’t imagine other possibilities.  

What was happening in these communities was the work of Spirit-inspired reimagination. There was a radical redistribution of wealth, and what drove this was not any particular form of ideology—it was not coercion—but was the simple fact that, as people being transformed by the Spirit, they could not move forward with anyone in their community having need. They could not move forward with anyone being in a position over or under anyone else due to wealth, status, or class.  

This new relationship and redistribution are what it looked like as people were pulled into the vortex of the Spirit. It was an intensified giving, an intensified belonging, and an intensified loving. This is what loving action practically looked like in these newly formed and forming communities.  

And so, as the wealth gap is only increasing in our world—because those in power want to make it so—we need a radically new way of belonging to one another. We need people who are not okay with the status quo of ongoing economic injustice, exploitation, and inequity, but who are freed from the tyranny of power, prestige, and possessions into a radical belonging and a radical love.  

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Quote of the Week:   “To be a contemplative is therefore to be an outlaw.  As was Christ.  As was Paul.” – from Raids on the Unspeakable, p.14. Reflection  Raids on the Unspeakable is a collection of essays and reflections that Merton wrote in response to various other writings and poetry of the 20th century. With piercing insight, he responds to and evaluates the wisdom of various authors in light of and in connection to the Christian faith.  For Merton, the call to be a Christian is inevitably tied to speaking the truth.  If Christ is the truth, and the truth sets us free, then to live in a manner that consciously or unconsciously allows for deceit, untruth, and fabrications to rule the day is a titanic tragedy. If to be a contemplative means to “look deeply” at something, to uncover the truth within, is disruptive then that means to be a contemplative is inherently disruptive to the status quo.  Modern society wants each of us to skim just the surface of life, to live shallow lives that are profitable for someone else but not prophetic for the kingdom of heaven.  To be a follower of Christ is to live beyond the laws and the expectations of the land and to submit in love to a higher authority, one that can challenge and hold accountable anything and anyone to the truth of a situation.  It is the child, who proclaims that the Emporer has no clothes, who is the innocent contemplative and keeps all of society from falling into further disarray by simply telling the truth when it is not in fashion to do so.  This is why Christ was crucified. This is why Paul was eventually beheaded.  And this is why the contemplative is an “outlaw.” Prayer  Heavenly Father, allow us the courage to see the world around us truthfully.  Grant us the love to want to speak up and speak out.  Permit us the gentleness to do so in a way that someone might hear and be liberated from their untruth.  Give us the grace to step into being outlaws with you.  We pray this in the name of the carpenter from Galilee.  Amen and amen.

Life Overview:  Who is He: Thomas Merton, OCSO (Order of the Cistercians of the Strict Observance)  When and Where: Born in Prades, France on January 31, 1915.  Died in Samut Prakan, Thailand on December 10, 1968.  Why He is Important: Merton is one of the clearest examples of action and contemplation of the 20th century.  Most Known For: Merton was a prolific writer and commentator on the contemplative life and global issues.  He was good friends with the Dalai Lama, Mother Teresa, and Thich Nhat Hahn, all while living as a Trappist monk in the cloistered monastery of Our Lady of Gethsemani in Trappist, Kentucky. Notable Works to Check Out: No Man is an Island New Seeds of Contemplation The Seven Storey Mountain Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander

Pathways to Joy

Friday, June 20, 2025

Dr. Barbara Holmes describes how we can find joy through practice and surrender:  

Joy is a choice. Our lives are so short; to live with joy seems to be a no-brainer. Why waste time on issues that we can’t control? Your body holds memories of both joyful and difficult moments in your life. Think about something that made you angry, and your body will supply the distress and angst to go with the memory. Think about joy and happy moments in your life, and your whole body smiles. Joy offers a peace that surpasses all understanding. Once you experience joy, once you find those inner pathways, it leaves markers toward those inner resources so that you never lose sight of them again…. 

So, how do we foster embodied presence and joy? I believe we do it through practice and through meditation. Left to your own devices, the natural state of the human brain is a wandering and critical mind. Meditation helps bring that chaos into a more peaceful state. If it’s difficult, begin with sitting in silence. Let your mind do what it wants before slowly bringing it into the present moment. Use music if it helps. The second thing I would suggest is to awaken to the joy in nature. Purposely pay attention to sunsets and sunrises, to the sounds of nature, and other expressions of joy in the environment. Third, I would suggest that you develop an appreciation for the everyday graces, the sound of children playing, the traffic that won’t let us get home when we want to but allows a pause in our frenetic going. 

Fourth, I would suggest that we begin to ritualize transitions, such as births and deaths, transitions from child to teenager, and from teen to adult. Mark these events as special moments of joy. You may be surprised at the numbers of incidents of joy during the ritualization of sad occasions. As Thich Nhat Hanh says, “Be peace,” I’m suggesting that we “Be joy.” You may not feel it, but embody it. Live it. Smile it. Is that being fake? I don’t think so. I think it’s holding space for the joy already given and received that you may not be aware of yet. It’s helping your body to express an inner state of being. 

Finally, don’t forget the power of community to create spaces of joy when you cannot engender the joy yourself. That joy comes during worship, during fellowship, and even during crisis. Civil rights workers found their joy in music as they came together. I’ve always said, the greatest antidote to depression and oppression is joy. There’s joy coming together of one accord. In the upper room, preparing to grieve the loss of the Savior on Calvary, suddenly there are tongues of fire and joy with the impartation of the Holy Spirit. When you feel alone, look at those who are with you in the struggle, and those who have gone before. No matter the circumstances, it was community that empowered the justice movements in this country and in others. It was a momentum of like minds focused and trusting in God that gave activists the energy to face their fears.  

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John Chaffee Five on Friday

1.

“Where can I go from your Spirit?
    Where can I flee from your presence?

 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
    if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
    if I settle on the far side of the sea,
 even there your hand will guide me,
    your right hand will hold me fast.”

– Psalm 139:7-10, Ancient Hebrew Spiritual

This is one of the most famous passages in the entire Bible about the universal presence of God, also known as the “omnipresence of God.”

What strikes me about this passage is that there is nowhere we can go that God is not already.

For many, the Gospel is that humanity once had union with God, became separated from God, and therefore must seek to be reunited with God (or do X, Y, or Z to make God willing to be reunited with us).  This approach leaves many with uncertainty, anxiety, and an unfulfilled trust that God will still want to be reunited with us.

As a result of that traumatic assumption of disconnection, we fall into grave sin and self-destructive habits to distract or numb ourselves from that assumption.

BUT…

If we were always with God, even amid our rebellion, and that God was not willing to ever allow something to separate us from the love of God, then the Gospel is reframed as “In Jesus, God is always intimately and infinitely present with and to us, and that no amount of our own mistakes or missteps will ever change that reality.”

As David says in the Psalms, nothing can separate us from the presence of God, and wherever we are aware of God’s presence, we are already at the threshold of heaven.

2.

“In this [stage of spiritual maturity], the soul discovers how all things are seen in God, and how He contains all things within Himself.  This is of great benefit because, even though it only lasts a moment, it remains engraved upon a soul.  And it also causes great confusion in showing us more clearly the wrongness of offending God, because it’s in God Himself – I mean, while dwelling within Him – that we do all this wrong.”

– Teresa of Avila, Spanish Carmelite Reformer

One of the absurdities that flows out of the idea of the omnipresence of God is that God sustains us even as we commit terrible mistakes against ourselves and one another.

It may be part of one stage of the journey to believe that God departs from us either during or immediately after we commit a terrible act.  However, Teresa of Avila teaches us that at another stage of the journey, we come to realize that God never leaves us or forsakes us, even if we act in ways contrary to health and holiness.

This is a mindboggling thought.

Moreover, Teresa is correct in that the experience of oneness with God then colors everything else we experience in life from that point forward.

3.

“There is no space where God is not; space does not exist apart from Him. He is in heaven, in hell, beyond the seas; dwelling in all things and enveloping all. Thus He embraces, and is embraced by, the universe, confined to no part of it but pervading all.”

– Hilary of Potiers, 4th Century Bishop

If anything, I believe the early Church worked out its theology in light of the omnipresence of God, rather than we today, who work out our theology in light of the semi-absence of God.

4.

“The soul that is united with God is feared by the devil as if it were God himself.”

– St. John of the Cross, Spanish Carmelite Reformer

Union with God is so complete that Paul’s words finally become true…

“I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live but Christ lives in me.” – Galatians 2:20

5.

“The notion that God is absent is the fundamental illusion of the human condition.”

– Thomas Keating, Trappist Monk

I have shared this quote before, but I recently finished Thomas Keating: The Making of a Modern Christian Mystic by Cynthia Bourgeault, and Keating has been on my mind since.

There is a joke that goes: “A Christian mystic was walking down 5th Ave in New York City and stopped at a hot dog cart.  ‘Hey fella, what kind of hot dog do ya want?’ asked the vendor.  The Christian mystic replied, ‘Make me one with everything.'”

Many people misunderstand the Christian mystics because of the word “mystic.”  For many, the word “mystic” carries immediate baggage associated with New Age spirituality, esoteric teachings that lack grounding, and the assumption that all religions are essentially the same.

However, the Christian tradition maintains that Christian mysticism is like a central golden thread running through all the centuries and weaving its way through all the Christian denominations.

It centers on two basic tenets: a sincere devotion to Jesus of Nazareth and his teachings, and the experience of intimate oneness with the Divine.

The first tenet isn’t particularly dangerous, but the second is.

To maintain that God is intimately present in all things, in such a way that there is never separation from God, but rather the illusion of separation, causes all kinds of trouble for theologies built around the concept of separation.  This is why I thought it would be interesting to share quotes this week from Scripture and Christian history that relate to union with God.

Protest, Pain, and Joy

Thursday, June 19, 2025

Juneteenth

Reflecting on the protests in the United States after the murder of George Floyd, writer Danté Stewart shares how, when watching video footage of protest marchers, he witnessed joy and hope amid suffering:  

I saw scores of young folk, fists held high in the sky, their lungs exhausted from all the screaming they did. I saw scores of old folk, some with canes, some in wheelchairs pushed by another, their lungs exhausted from all the screaming they did. I saw scores of gay folk and straight folk, Muslim folk and Christian folk, American folk and global folk, rich folk and poor folk, all lungs exhausted from all the screaming they did…. 

I looked again at … the videos of millions marching in solidarity, and I saw so much more. I saw joy. I saw intimacy. I saw bodies let loose. I saw tears of strength in the face of danger. I saw heaven smiling as love was cast on Earth’s threshing floor. I saw so much joy. It was not simply resistance; it was power. I saw the good news. I saw a better story than the story we were offered. The beauty of this moment showed that suffering is not the total image. This is a moment of faith, flying one would say. I see an unexpected glimpse into public bravery, the willingness to rise again. There is something about these images that calls out to me to sit still; to ponder, to anticipate life beyond brutality.  

This joy is love dancing with reality, humanity. I saw the complex and complicated relationship with hope, a tragic but necessary one if it is to become what it can become— beautiful. [1]  

Essayist Ross Gay connects sorrow, joy, and solidarity:  

What happens if joy is not separate from pain? What if joy and pain are fundamentally tangled up with one another? Or even more to the point, what if joy is not only entangled with pain, or suffering, or sorrow, but is also what emerges from how we care for each other through those things? What if joy, instead of a refuge or relief from heartbreak, is what effloresces from us as we help each other carry our heartbreaks?…  

My hunch is that joy is an ember for or precursor to wild and unpredictable and transgressive and unboundaried solidarity. And that that solidarity might incite further joy. Which might incite further solidarity. And on and on. My hunch is that joy, emerging from our common sorrow—which does not necessarily mean we have the same sorrows, but that we, in common, sorrow—might draw us together. It might depolarize us and de-atomize us enough that we can consider what, in common, we love. And though attending to what we hate in common is too often all the rage (and it happens also to be very big business), noticing what we love in common, and studying that, might help us survive. It’s why I think of joy, which gets us to love, as being a practice of survival. [2]  

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Sarah Young Jesus Calling

 I speak to you continually. My nature is to communicate, though not always in words. I fling glorious sunsets across the sky, day after day after day. I speak in the faces and voices of loved ones. I caress you with a gentle breeze that refreshes and delights you. I speak softly in the depths of your spirit, where I have taken up residence.
     You can find Me in each moment, when you have eyes that see and ears that hear. Ask My Spirit to sharpen your spiritual eyesight and hearing. I rejoice each time you discover My Presence. Practice looking and listening for Me during quiet intervals. Gradually you will find Me in more and more of your moments. You will seek Me and find Me, when you seek Me above all else.

RELATED SCRIPTURE:

Psalm 8:1-4 (NLT)
1 O Lord, our Lord, your majestic name fills the earth!
    Your glory is higher than the heavens.
2 You have taught children and infants
    to tell of your strength,
silencing your enemies
    and all who oppose you.
3 When I look at the night sky and see the work of your fingers—
    the moon and the stars you set in place—
4 what are mere mortals that you should think about them,
    human beings that you should care for them?

Psalm 19:1-2 (NLT)
1 The heavens proclaim the glory of God.
    The skies display his craftsmanship.
2 Day after day they continue to speak;
    night after night they make him known.

1 Corinthians 6:19 (NLT)
19 Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself…

Jeremiah 29:13 (NLT)
13 If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me.

Additional insight regarding Jeremiah 29:13: According to God’s wise plan, his people were to have a future and a hope; consequently, they could call upon him with confidence. Although the exiles were in a difficult place and time, they need not despair because they had God’s presence, the privilege of prayer, and God’s grace. If we seek him wholeheartedly, he will be found. Neither a strange land, sorrow, persecution, nor physical problems can break our fellowship with God.

Mystic and theologian Howard Thurman (1899–1981) writes of faith as the most secure foundation for joy: 

There are some who are dependent upon the mood of others for their happiness…. There are some whose joy is dependent upon circumstances…. There are some who must win their joy against high odds, squeeze it out of the arid ground of their living or wrest it from the stubborn sadness of circumstance…. There are still others who find their joy deep in the heart of their religious experience. It is not related to, dependent upon, or derived from, any circumstances or conditions in the midst of which they must live. It is a joy independent of all vicissitudes. There is a strange quality of awe in their joy, that is but a reflection of the deep calm water of the spirit out of which it comes. It is primarily a discovery of the soul, when God makes known [God’s] presence, where there are no words, no outward song, only the Divine Movement. This is the joy that the world cannot give. This is the joy that keeps watch against all the emissaries of sadness of mind and weariness of soul. This is the joy that comforts and is the companion, as we walk even through the valley of the shadow of death. [1]  

Catholic priest Henri Nouwen (1932–1996) writes of the joy we experience through the love of God:  

Joy is a gift that is there even when we are sorrowful, even when we are in pain, even when things are difficult in our lives. The joy that Jesus offers is a joy that exists in very, very difficult situations….  

What we have to start sensing is that in the spiritual life, joy is embracing sorrow and happiness, pain and pleasure. It is deeper, fuller. It is more. It is something that remains with us. It is something of God that is very profound. It is something we can experience even when we are in touch with very painful things in our lives. If there is anything the church wants to teach us it is that the joy of God can be with us always—in moments of sickness, in moments of health, in moments of success, in moments of failure, in moments of birth, in moments of death. The joy of God is never going to leave us…. 

When we can face our own painful situation, we will discover that hidden in the pain is the treasure—a joy that is there for us to experience here and now. It is very important that we get in touch with this. That is what the spiritual life—the life with God—is about. It is being in touch with that love that becomes joy in us…. Underneath all our fluctuations is a deep solid divine stream that is called joy.

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Cognitive Dissonance (Part 2)
June 18, 2025

Yesterday, we looked at how the religious leaders tried to reconcile their strongly held beliefs with compelling evidence that contradicted those beliefs. The Pharisees believed that blindness was a punishment from God for sin and that anyone who violated the Sabbath by working was both a lawbreaker and a sinner and therefore not from God. And yet, in John 9, they are confronted by two troubling facts. First, a man born blind had his sight miraculously restored by Jesus, and Jesus performed this healing on a Sabbath by mixing his saliva with dirt and wiping the mud on the man’s eyes—a clear and flagrant violation of their interpretation of the law forbidding any work on the Sabbath. The conflict between these facts and their beliefs is what psychologists call “cognitive dissonance.”

To resolve this cognitive dissonance, the religious leaders had two options. They could either rethink their strongly held beliefs or they could reject the evidence that challenged them. Valuing their certainty more than the truth, the Pharisees chose the latter option. Consistent with what research has found about how most people respond to cognitive dissonance, first, the religious leaders denied the evidence as fake. They said the man wasn’t actually born blind. The whole thing was “fake news.” When that didn’t work, they tried to discredit the messenger. Rather than dealing with the evidence, they simply called the blind man an uneducated sinner who couldn’t be trusted.

Researchers have found that when denying the evidence and discrediting the messenger isn’t enough, we will try one last desperate measure to avoid cognitive dissonance—distance. In John 9, the Pharisees do this by banishing the blind man. Verse 34 says, “They threw him out.” The language here is more technical. It means the man was excommunicated from the synagogue community. Not only was he barred from joining others for worship, but the other Jews were forbidden from engaging with him. He was to be considered an outcast, a heretic, and no better than an unbeliever.

The religious leaders did not take this drastic action because the man had done anything illegal or sinful, but simply because he represented a threat to the certainty of their theology and authority. As long as he was part of the synagogue and shared his story of behind healed by Jesus on the Sabbath, he would cause others to question the correctness of the leaders’ teaching and interpretation of Scripture. The blind man was what psychologists call a “carrier of dissonance.” And if his story could not be denied, and if his credibility could not be destroyed, then the only option left for the religious leaders was to put as much distance between themselves and the source of the dissonance. Sociologist Peter Berger describes it this way:

“People try to avoid cognitive dissonance. The only way to avoid it, however, is to avoid the ‘carriers’ of dissonance, both non-human and human. Thus individuals who hold political position X will avoid reading newspaper articles that tend to support position Y. By the same token, these individuals will avoid conversations with Y-ists but seek out X-ists as conversation partners. When people have a strong personal investment in a particular definition of reality—such as strongly held religious or political positions, or convictions that relate directly to their way of life…, they will go to great lengths to set up both behavioral and cognitive defenses.”

Today, we see this happening on both the individual and national levels. Increasingly, people will switch what groups they belong to, what church they attend, and even where they live, in order to be surrounded by like-minded people and avoid anyone who might challenge their beliefs. It’s why over the last 20 years red states have become redder and blue states have become bluer. Sociologists call it the “Big Sort.” Today, it’s increasingly rare to live near, work with, or worship beside someone who votes or thinks differently than you do. This polarization is driven by the same insecurity that motivated the Pharisees—our deep desire to avoid the discomfort of cognitive dissonance. We don’t want to have the certainty of our beliefs challenged in any way, and if we can’t banish those we disagree with we will banish ourselves into a safe enclave of news and neighbors that will affirm what we want to hear even if it’s not what we need to hear.

[Note: I’ve decided to keep all of John 9 as the Scripture reading as we examine this chapter. I encourage you to read or listen to the full chapter every day and internalize the story. By meditating on its themes, my hope is that you will come to see yourself in some of the characters, and ultimately be drawn closer to Christ.]

Jesus Heals a Man Born Blind

John 9

1As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. ² His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

³ “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. ⁴ As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. ⁵ While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”

⁶ After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. ⁷ “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing.

⁸ His neighbors and those who had formerly seen him begging asked, “Isn’t this the same man who used to sit and beg?” ⁹ Some claimed that he was.

Others said, “No, he only looks like him.”

But he himself insisted, “I am the man.”

¹⁰ “How then were your eyes opened?” they asked.

¹¹ He replied, “The man they call Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes. He told me to go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed, and then I could see.”

¹² “Where is this man?” they asked him.

“I don’t know,” he said.

The Pharisees Investigate the Healing

¹³ They brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind. ¹⁴ Now the day on which Jesus had made the mud and opened the man’s eyes was a Sabbath. ¹⁵ Therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. “He put mud on my eyes,” the man replied, “and I washed, and now I see.”

¹⁶ Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.”

But others asked, “How can a sinner perform such signs?”So they were divided.

¹⁷ Then they turned again to the blind man, “What have you to say about him? It was your eyes he opened.”

The man replied, “He is a prophet.”

¹⁸ They still did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they sent for the man’s parents.¹⁹ “Is this your son?” they asked. “Is this the one you say was born blind? How is it that now he can see?”

²⁰ “We know he is our son,” the parents answered, “and we know he was born blind. ²¹ But how he can see now, or who opened his eyes, we don’t know. Ask him. He is of age; he will speak for himself.” ²² His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders, who already had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. ²³ That was why his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.”

²⁴ A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. “Give glory to God by telling the truth,” they said. “We know this man is a sinner.”

²⁵ He replied, “Whether he is a sinner or not, I don’t know. One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!”

²⁶ Then they asked him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?”

²⁷ He answered, “I have told you already and you did not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples too?”

²⁸ Then they hurled insults at him and said, “You are this fellow’s disciple! We are disciples of Moses! ²⁹ We know that God spoke to Moses, but as for this fellow, we don’t even know where he comes from.”

³⁰ The man answered, “Now that is remarkable! You don’t know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes. ³¹ We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly person who does his will. ³² Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind. ³³ If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.”

³⁴ To this they replied, “You were steeped in sin at birth;how dare you lecture us!” And they threw him out.

Spiritual Blindness

³⁵ Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, and when he found him, he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”

³⁶ “Who is he, sir?” the man asked. “Tell me so that I may believe in him.”

³⁷ Jesus said, “You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you.”

³⁸ Then the man said, “Lord, I believe,” and he worshiped him.

³⁹ Jesus said,^[a] “For judgment I have come into this world,so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.”

⁴⁰ Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, “What? Are we blind too?”

⁴¹ Jesus said, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.

What Is the Source of Your Joy?

Mystic and theologian Howard Thurman (1899–1981) writes of faith as the most secure foundation for joy: 

There are some who are dependent upon the mood of others for their happiness…. There are some whose joy is dependent upon circumstances…. There are some who must win their joy against high odds, squeeze it out of the arid ground of their living or wrest it from the stubborn sadness of circumstance…. There are still others who find their joy deep in the heart of their religious experience. It is not related to, dependent upon, or derived from, any circumstances or conditions in the midst of which they must live. It is a joy independent of all vicissitudes. There is a strange quality of awe in their joy, that is but a reflection of the deep calm water of the spirit out of which it comes. It is primarily a discovery of the soul, when God makes known [God’s] presence, where there are no words, no outward song, only the Divine Movement. This is the joy that the world cannot give. This is the joy that keeps watch against all the emissaries of sadness of mind and weariness of soul. This is the joy that comforts and is the companion, as we walk even through the valley of the shadow of death. [1]  

Catholic priest Henri Nouwen (1932–1996) writes of the joy we experience through the love of God:  

Joy is a gift that is there even when we are sorrowful, even when we are in pain, even when things are difficult in our lives. The joy that Jesus offers is a joy that exists in very, very difficult situations….  

What we have to start sensing is that in the spiritual life, joy is embracing sorrow and happiness, pain and pleasure. It is deeper, fuller. It is more. It is something that remains with us. It is something of God that is very profound. It is something we can experience even when we are in touch with very painful things in our lives. If there is anything the church wants to teach us it is that the joy of God can be with us always—in moments of sickness, in moments of health, in moments of success, in moments of failure, in moments of birth, in moments of death. The joy of God is never going to leave us…. 

When we can face our own painful situation, we will discover that hidden in the pain is the treasure—a joy that is there for us to experience here and now. It is very important that we get in touch with this. That is what the spiritual life—the life with God—is about. It is being in touch with that love that becomes joy in us…. Underneath all our fluctuations is a deep solid divine stream that is called joy. [2] 

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Cognitive Dissonance (Part 2) Yesterday, we looked at how the religious leaders tried to reconcile their strongly held beliefs with compelling evidence that contradicted those beliefs. The Pharisees believed that blindness was a punishment from God for sin and that anyone who violated the Sabbath by working was both a lawbreaker and a sinner and therefore not from God. And yet, in John 9, they are confronted by two troubling facts. First, a man born blind had his sight miraculously restored by Jesus, and Jesus performed this healing on a Sabbath by mixing his saliva with dirt and wiping the mud on the man’s eyes—a clear and flagrant violation of their interpretation of the law forbidding any work on the Sabbath. The conflict between these facts and their beliefs is what psychologists call “cognitive dissonance.”To resolve this cognitive dissonance, the religious leaders had two options. They could either rethink their strongly held beliefs or they could reject the evidence that challenged them. Valuing their certainty more than the truth, the Pharisees chose the latter option. Consistent with what research has found about how most people respond to cognitive dissonance, first, the religious leaders denied the evidence as fake. They said the man wasn’t actually born blind. The whole thing was “fake news.” When that didn’t work, they tried to discredit the messenger. Rather than dealing with the evidence, they simply called the blind man an uneducated sinner who couldn’t be trusted.Researchers have found that when denying the evidence and discrediting the messenger isn’t enough, we will try one last desperate measure to avoid cognitive dissonance—distance. In John 9, the Pharisees do this by banishing the blind man. Verse 34 says, “They threw him out.” The language here is more technical. It means the man was excommunicated from the synagogue community. Not only was he barred from joining others for worship, but the other Jews were forbidden from engaging with him. He was to be considered an outcast, a heretic, and no better than an unbeliever.The religious leaders did not take this drastic action because the man had done anything illegal or sinful, but simply because he represented a threat to the certainty of their theology and authority. As long as he was part of the synagogue and shared his story of behind healed by Jesus on the Sabbath, he would cause others to question the correctness of the leaders’ teaching and interpretation of Scripture. The blind man was what psychologists call a “carrier of dissonance.” And if his story could not be denied, and if his credibility could not be destroyed, then the only option left for the religious leaders was to put as much distance between themselves and the source of the dissonance. Sociologist Peter Berger describes it this way:”People try to avoid cognitive dissonance. The only way to avoid it, however, is to avoid the ‘carriers’ of dissonance, both non-human and human. Thus individuals who hold political position X will avoid reading newspaper articles that tend to support position Y. By the same token, these individuals will avoid conversations with Y-ists but seek out X-ists as conversation partners. When people have a strong personal investment in a particular definition of reality—such as strongly held religious or political positions, or convictions that relate directly to their way of life…, they will go to great lengths to set up both behavioral and cognitive defenses.”Today, we see this happening on both the individual and national levels. Increasingly, people will switch what groups they belong to, what church they attend, and even where they live, in order to be surrounded by like-minded people and avoid anyone who might challenge their beliefs. It’s why over the last 20 years red states have become redder and blue states have become bluer. Sociologists call it the “Big Sort.” Today, it’s increasingly rare to live near, work with, or worship beside someone who votes or thinks differently than you do. This polarization is driven by the same insecurity that motivated the Pharisees—our deep desire to avoid the discomfort of cognitive dissonance. We don’t want to have the certainty of our beliefs challenged in any way, and if we can’t banish those we disagree with we will banish ourselves into a safe enclave of news and neighbors that will affirm what we want to hear even if it’s not what we need to hear.[Note: I’ve decided to keep all of John 9 as the Scripture reading as we examine this chapter. I encourage you to read or listen to the full chapter every day and internalize the story. By meditating on its themes, my hope is that you will come to see yourself in some of the characters, and ultimately be drawn closer to Christ.]

Weekly Prayer from St. Gertrude the Great (1256 – 1302)

Lord, in union with your love, unite my work with your great work, and perfect it. As a drop of water, poured into a river, is taken up into the activity of the river, so may my labor become part of your work. So, may those among whom I live and work be drawn into your love. Amen.

Jesus Heals a Man Born Blind

John 9 

1As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man who had been blind from birth. ² “Rabbi,” his disciples asked him, “why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents’ sins?”

³ “It was not because of his sins or his parents’ sins,” Jesus answered. “This happened so the power of God could be seen in him. ⁴ We must quickly carry out the tasks assigned us by the one who sent us.^[a] The night is coming, and then no one can work. ⁵ But while I am here in the world, I am the light of the world.”

⁶ Then he spit on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and spread the mud over the blind man’s eyes. ⁷ He told him, “Go wash yourself in the pool of Siloam” (Siloam means “sent”). So the man went and washed and came back seeing!

⁸ His neighbors and others who knew him as a blind beggar asked each other, “Isn’t this the man who used to sit and beg?” ⁹ Some said he was, and others said, “No, he just looks like him!”

But the beggar kept saying, “Yes, I am the same one!”

¹⁰ They asked, “Who healed you? What happened?”

¹¹ He told them, “The man they call Jesus made mud and spread it over my eyes and told me, ‘Go to the pool of Siloam and wash yourself.’ So I went and washed, and now I can see!”

¹² “Where is he now?” they asked.

“I don’t know,” he replied.

¹³ Then they took the man who had been blind to the Pharisees, ¹⁴ because it was on the Sabbath that Jesus had made the mud and healed him. ¹⁵ The Pharisees asked the man all about it. So he told them, “He put the mud over my eyes, and when I washed it away, I could see!”

¹⁶ Some of the Pharisees said, “This man Jesus is not from God, for he is working on the Sabbath.” Others said, “But how could an ordinary sinner do such miraculous signs?” So there was a deep division of opinion among them.

¹⁷ Then the Pharisees again questioned the man who had been blind and demanded, “What’s your opinion about this man who healed you?”

The man replied, “I think he must be a prophet.”

¹⁸ The Jewish leaders still refused to believe the man had been blind and could now see, so they called in his parents.¹⁹ They asked them, “Is this your son? Was he born blind? If so, how can he now see?”

²⁰ His parents replied, “We know this is our son and that he was born blind, ²¹ but we don’t know how he can see or who healed him. Ask him. He is old enough to speak for himself.” ²² His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders, who had announced that anyone saying Jesus was the Messiah would be expelled from the synagogue. ²³ That’s why they said, “He is old enough. Ask him.”

²⁴ So for the second time they called in the man who had been blind and told him, “God should get the glory for this,^[b] because we know this man Jesus is a sinner.”

²⁵ “I don’t know whether he is a sinner,” the man replied. “But I know this: I was blind, and now I can see!”

²⁶ “But what did he do?” they asked. “How did he heal you?”

²⁷ “Look!” the man exclaimed. “I told you once. Didn’t you listen? Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples, too?”

²⁸ Then they cursed him and said, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses! ²⁹ We know God spoke to Moses, but we don’t even know where this man comes from.”

³⁰ “Why, that’s very strange!” the man replied. “He healed my eyes, and yet you don’t know where he comes from?³¹ We know that God doesn’t listen to sinners, but he is ready to hear those who worship him and do his will.³² Ever since the world began, no one has been able to open the eyes of someone born blind. ³³ If this man were not from God, he couldn’t have done it.”

³⁴ “You were born a total sinner!” they answered. “Are you trying to teach us?” And they threw him out of the synagogue.

Spiritual Blindness

³⁵ When Jesus heard what had happened, he found the man and asked, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?^[c]”

³⁶ The man answered, “Who is he, sir? I want to believe in him.”

³⁷ “You have seen him,” Jesus said, “and he is speaking to you!”

³⁸ “Yes, Lord, I believe!” the man said. And he worshiped Jesus.

³⁹ Then Jesus told him,^[d] “I entered this world to render judgment—to give sight to the blind and to show those who think they see^[e] that they are blind.”

⁴⁰ Some Pharisees who were standing nearby heard him and asked, “Are you saying we’re blind?”

⁴¹ “If you were blind, you wouldn’t be guilty,” Jesus replied. “But you remain guilty because you claim you can see.