Father Richard Rohr shares what Christ’s incarnation offers to all humanity:
Since the very beginning of time, God’s Spirit has been revealing its glory and goodness through the physical creation. Christians believe that this universal Christ presence was later “born of a woman under the law” (Galatians 4:4) in a moment of chronological time. This is the great Christian leap of faith!
We daringly believe that God’s presence was poured into a single human being, so that humanity and divinity can be seen to be operating as one in him—and therefore in us! Instead of saying that God came into the world through Jesus, maybe it would be better to say that Jesus came out of an already Christ-soaked world. The second incarnation flowed out of the first, out of God’s loving union with physical creation. [1]
Through his incarnated presence, Jesus offered the world a living example of fully embodied love that emerged out of ordinary, limited life situations. For me, this is the real import of Paul’s statement that Jesus was “born of a woman under the law.” In Jesus, God became part of our small, homely world and entered into human limits and ordinariness—and remained anonymous and largely invisible for his first thirty years. Throughout his life, Jesus himself spent no time climbing, but a lot of time descending, “emptying himself and becoming as all humans are” (Philippians 2:7), “tempted in every way that we are” (Hebrews 4:15) and “living in the limitations of weakness” (Hebrews 5:2).
Jesus walked, enjoyed, and suffered the entire human journey, and he told us that we could and should do the same. His life exemplified the unfolding mystery in all of its stages—from a hidden, divine conception, to a regular adult life full of love and problems, punctuated by a few moments of transfiguration and enlightenment, and all leading to glorious ascension and final return. As Hebrews 4:15 states, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but we have one who was like us in every way, experienced every temptation, and never backtracked” (my translation). Jesus’ life reveals that we don’t need to be afraid of the depths and breadths of our own lives, of what this world offers us or asks of us. We are given permission to become intimate with our own experiences, learn from them, and allow ourselves to descend to the depth of things, even our mistakes, before we try too quickly to transcend it all in the name of some idealized purity or superiority. God hides in the depths—even the depths of our sins—and is not seen as long as we stay on the surface of anything.
Making Room for God’s Presence
What if, instead of doing something, we were to be something special? Be womb. Be dwelling for God. Be recollected, and be surprised.
—Loretta Ross-Gotta, Letters from the Holy Ground
Author and CAC staff member Mark Longhurst writes:
Christmas is usually more than I prepare for and requires more space than I, as part of the overly-filled middle class, often have to give. That’s why the ancient hymn sings out, of Mary, “Hail, space for the uncontained God.” [1] God needs space to expand and contract, just as does the universe, and yet there’s so little space to breathe in our days. [2]
Spiritual director Loretta Ross-Gotta reflects on a deeper meaning of Mary’s virginity—being “recollected” through single-hearted love:
To be virgin means to be one, whole in oneself, not perforated by the concerns of the conventional norms and authority, or the powers and principalities. To be virgin, then, is in a sense to be recollected…. Because Mary is recollected, she is able to take hold of God….
We think we have to make Christmas come, which is to say we think we have to bring about the redemption of the universe on our own. When all God needs is a willing womb, a place of safety, nourishment, and love. “Oh, but nothing will get done,” you say. “If I don’t do it, Christmas won’t happen.” And we crowd out Christ with our fretful fears.
God asks us to give away everything of ourselves. The gift of greatest efficacy and power that we can offer God and creation is not our skills, gifts, abilities, and possessions…. Those are all gifts well worth sharing…. In the end, when all other human gifts have met their inevitable limitation, it is the recollected one, the bold virgin with a heart in love with God who makes a sanctuary of her life who delivers Christ who then delivers us. [3]
Longhurst invites us to expand our ideas about the meaning of Christmas:
Christmas is about a baby, but it’s also about the soul. Mary mirrors the soul’s yes to God. Christmas is about the soul, but it’s also about peace. Christmas is about peace, but not the comfortable peace of the privileged, or the sappy peace of holiday cards and church pageants, but peace as wholeness and healing of the seeds of violence. It’s also about justice, and not justice cloaked as the authoritarian abuse of power, or justice as righteous license to tear down every group but your own, but justice as compassion enacted in protection for the poor and vulnerable, which we still must believe is possible….
Mary says, “Yes,” and in saying “Yes” becomes the mother not only of Christ, but of all who say, “Yes” to birthing God…. The same vital presence pulsing within Mary is the same vital presence arising in our hearts, is the same vital presence we desperately need to dream and enact a new future together. On such silent and holy nights, God the Mother initiates us as mothers, too.
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| Learning from the Mystics: Meister Eckhart, OP |
| Quote of the Week: “A human being has so many skins inside, covering the depths of the heart. We know so many things, but we don’t know ourselves! Why, thirty or forty skins or hides, as thick and hard as an ox’s or bear’s, cover the soul. Go into your own ground and learn to know yourself there. “Reflection: “The Ground of the Soul” was Meister Eckhart’s favorite title and naming of the deepest reality within a human person. In most of his writings and sermons, he references this deep reality, the strangeness of that land, and the difficulty of finding it. During Meister Eckhart’s day and age, there was the rise of a form of capitalism that had not been seen before. It was voracious and constantly expanding, bringing new commerce but also a new type of person… The new type of person was not a foreigner or a traveller, but a kind of surface personality that was simply trying to make a sale. It was as if within Meister Eckhart’s own lifetime he noticed a decrease of genuine human interaction. With this also came the loss of authentic relationships between people, themselves, and with God. For Meister Eckhart, this was an absolute tragedy. No true friendship with oneself, others and God is possible when there are “thirty or forty skins or hides… covering the soul.” No authentic spirituality or even humanity is possible when there are so many degrees of separation from authenticity. Only rarely, and when there is sufficient trust to be vulnerable, will someone be willing to look out from behind the curtain and show their “true face,” the “face they had before the world told them to wear a mask.” It is difficult to even notice all the layers that one has built up, but we all know the tenacity, bravery, and welcome that we experience when we meet someone who authentically knows themselves and therefore can authentically know others and God. Shuck off all the skins and hides, thick and hard as wild beasts, and uncover your soul. It is suffocating to be buried under so much, and go to the ground of your soul and learn to sit there with Grace and Truth… and you may find that God has been there all along. Prayer Heavenly Father, we admit that we do not know ourselves, and this leads us to be unable to know others or even You authentically. Help us to cast off all the masks, facades, skins, hides, curtains, that keep us separated from ourselves. Grant that we might live in Grace and Truth toward ourselves as You already do, and may this process be one in which we find full freedom to love and be loved. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen and amen. |
| Life Overview: Who Were They: Eckhart von Hochheim, later to be known as Meister Eckhart, OP (Order of Preachers aka Dominicans). Where: Born near Gotha, Landgraviate of Thuringia (now Germany). Died in Avignon, Kingdom of Arles (now France). When: 1260-1328AD Why He is Important: Without a doubt, Meister Eckhart was misunderstood in his day and age. He was almost excommunicated but that was largely due to the Inquisition not being able to understand the complexity and paradox of his teaching. Over time, he has come to be known as an impressive figure of theology and spirituality. What Was Their Main Contribution: Meister Eckhart is most known for being a Dominican monk who understood the Christian faith with “an eastern mind.” He often taught through paradox and what has come to be known as “non-dual” thinking (rising above either/or conceptualizations). Books to Check Out: Meister Eckhart’s Book of the Heart: Meditations of the Restless Soul Dangerous Mystic: Meister Eckhart’s Path to the God Within by Joel Harrington Meister Eckhart, from Whom God Hid Nothing: Sermons, Writings and Sayings |
