Interfaith Friendship — God Is Diversity
Wednesday, December 6, 2017 Richard Rohr

I have been drawn to the living heart of every spiritual tradition I have encountered. . . . What I found irresistible was the essential unity at the core of all that diversity; each faith tradition was singing the same song in a deliciously different voice: God is love. —Mirabai Starr [1]

As Thomas Merton reflected, “We are already one.” We just need to start becoming what we already are. —James Finley [2]

One of my favorite mystics, Lady Julian of Norwich (1342-1416), used the old English term “oneing” to describe what was happening between God and the soul. The divisions, dichotomies, and dualisms of the world can only be overcome by a unitive consciousness at every level: personal, relational, social, political, cultural, in inter-religious dialogue, and spirituality in particular. This is the unique and central job of healthy religion (re-ligio = to re-ligament). It is precisely the contemplative mind that can see things in their oneness instead of emphasizing their distinctness.

Jesus put it so powerfully in his great final prayer, “I pray that all may be one” (John 17:21). Or as Julian put it, “By myself I am nothing at all, but in general, I am in the oneing of love. For it is in this oneing that the life of all people exists.” [3]

Many teachers have made the central, but often-missed, point that unity is not the same as uniformity. Unity, in fact, is the reconciliation of differences, and those differences must first be maintained—and then overcome by the power of love! You must actually distinguish things and separate them before you can spiritually unite them, usually at cost to yourself (see Ephesians 2:14-16). If only we had made that simple clarification, so many problems—and overemphasized, separate identities—could have moved to a much higher level of love and service.

We must go back to the ultimate Christian source for our principle: the central doctrine of the Trinity itself. Yes, God is “One,” just as our Jewish roots taught Christianity (Deuteronomy 6:4), and yet the further, more subtle level is that this oneness is, in fact, the radical love union between three completely distinct “persons” of the Trinity. The three members of the Trinity are not uniform—but quite distinct—and yet oned in total outpouring! If we remain monotheists, we will try to impose a false oneness (uniformity) and never learn to love, honor, and respect diversity. Christianity must return to its Trinitarian foundations to fully rebuild itself from the bottom up.

God is otherness and diversity, a pluriformity. The basic problem of “the one and the many” is overcome in God’s very nature. God is a mystery of relationship, and the truest relationship is love. Infinite Love preserves unique truths, protecting boundaries while simultaneously bridging them. While these two tasks seem initially like opposites, and impossible to reconcile, oneing is God’s essential task and the goal of all authentic spirituality.

Gateway to Silence:
We are already one.

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“My Rainbow in the Cloud”
By Oswald Chambers

I set My rainbow in the cloud, and it shall be for the sign of the covenant between Me and the earth. —Genesis 9:13

It is the will of God that human beings should get into a right-standing relationship with Him, and His covenants are designed for this purpose. Why doesn’t God save me? He has accomplished and provided for my salvation, but I have not yet entered into a relationship with Him. Why doesn’t God do everything we ask? He has done it. The point is— will I step into that covenant relationship? All the great blessings of God are finished and complete, but they are not mine until I enter into a relationship with Him on the basis of His covenant.
Waiting for God to act is fleshly unbelief. It means that I have no faith in Him. I wait for Him to do something in me so I may trust in that. But God won’t do it, because that is not the basis of the God-and-man relationship. Man must go beyond the physical body and feelings in his covenant with God, just as God goes beyond Himself in reaching out with His covenant to man. It is a question of faith in God— a very rare thing. We only have faith in our feelings. I don’t believe God until He puts something tangible in my hand, so that I know I have it. Then I say, “Now I believe.” There is no faith exhibited in that. God says, “Look to Me, and be saved…” (Isaiah 45:22).
When I have really transacted business with God on the basis of His covenant, letting everything else go, there is no sense of personal achievement— no human ingredient in it at all. Instead, there is a complete overwhelming sense of being brought into union with God, and my life is transformed and radiates peace and joy

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