Where abortion, and infanticide in general, is concerned, the Church's stance has always been very clear. It actually surprised me when I learned that it was a subject which had been brought up as far back as the first and second centuries because it had occurred to me that it would have been possible in the ancient world. It was something which, when they did discuss it, the Fathers condemned in no uncertain terms.
The Didache, also called the “Teaching of the Twelve”, one of the oldest manuals of Christian practice written between 80 and 140 AD says:
“You shall not murder a child by abortion nor kill one who has been born.”
Athenagoras, a Christian apologist writing in 175 AD, says this:
“We say that those women who use drugs to bring on abortion commit murder. And we also say they will have to give an account to God for the abortion. So on what basis could we commit murder? For it does not belong to the same person to regard the very fetus in the womb as a created being (and therefore an object of God's care)--yet, when he has passed into life, to kill him. We also teach that it is wrong to expose an infant. For those who expose them are guilty of child murder.”
Clement of Alexandria, a Catechetical teacher in Egypt, writes in 195 AD:
“What cause is there for the exposure of a child? The man who did not desire to beget children had no right to marry at all. He certainly does not have the right to become the murderer of his children, because of licentious indulgence.”
Tertullian, a priest from Carthage in North Africa, writes in 197 AD:
“In our case, murder is once for all forbidden. Therefore, we may not destroy even the fetus in the womb, while as yet the human being derives blood from other parts of the body for its sustenance. To hinder a birth is merely a speedier way to kill a human. It does not matter whether you take away a life that has been born, or destroy one that is not yet born.”
There are other more graphic descriptions which they bring up and unanimously condemn, but the point is made pretty clear. There is no excuse or reason for someone who professes to be a Christian to either have an abortion or kill the infant after it is born either by directly killing it or through neglect by leaving it to the elements by the side of the road.
The irony of the ancient argument for the practice fascinates me to no end. In Roman society, it was argued that the father had the right to choose which offspring lived and which died or was left to fate. Fathers strangled their newborn children if they chose not to accept them. Fathers could decide if their wives had abortions. Fathers could leave the new infant by the side of the road for anyone to pick up, and often did. If these children were picked up, they were usually raised as sex-slaves and prostitutes, and it is observed by one Church Father who abhorred the practice that fathers often had intercourse with their abandoned children unknowingly. “Pro-choice” in this case had nothing to do with the mother's choice, but the father's, and the ancient pagan Romans could be decidedly pro-choice.
I was reading an article online, as I often do, that mentioned the number of abortions of unwanted pregnancies in the world, citing a study done by the World Health Organization. Apparently, most, if not all, of such abortions happened in developing countries, and it said that 40% (near half) of all American women will have had an abortion by the age of 45. It also cited the study as saying that the abortion rates in countries with restrictive abortion laws was no different from the rates in countries. In other words, it didn't matter if abortion was outlawed, women still went to get them done regardless in the same number as women in countries where abortion was cheap and easy to get. The only difference is that the abortions performed illegally were done in unsafe and unsanitary conditions which threatened the woman's health and life.
What this information tells me is that it doesn't matter if a country completely outlaws it. People who want the abortion done will find a way to get it done, even if they have to take matters into their own hands. This tends to be true of “prohibition” laws regardless of what you're prohibiting, be it alcohol, drugs, tobacco, or even infanticide. If someone believes they should have the right to do something, they'll find a way to do it. An unwanted pregnancy has a way of making someone desperate enough to take those kinds of actions. Condemning the person for the actions which led to the unwanted pregnancy really doesn't help because it doesn't change the fact of the pregnancy, it only pushes them away and they go and get the abortion regardless.
The truth is that you can't legislate the Christian rule of life on those who don't profess Christ. The Roman Church keeps trying. Historically, the Roman See has continued to confuse the rule of the Church with the rule of the State. This has a lot less to do with being salt and light than it does with holding on to earthly political power. It started with the collapse of the western Roman empire when the Church had to take on the functions of the State because the civil government was weak, corrupt, and ineffective. The Bishop of Rome took on the role of the head of State in practice if not in name (at that time). The eastern empire, and hence the eastern Church, never had those issues (there was an eastern Patriarch that attempted to exert authority over the Emperor. He was deposed, and I think he was executed for his trouble, but that's another story). History uses the Roman Church's administration again and again as the poster child for not mixing Church and State. To this day, the Roman Church would like nothing better than to return to the place of political power it once held.
The Roman Church has decreed for its members that they can't use contraception of any kind. That is their prerogative. I even understand why, and don't fully disagree. But this prohibition extends to the members of the Roman Church as part of the religious rule of Roman practice. It should not be enforced or expected of those people who are not members of the Roman Church. Rome's misunderstanding here is that it tends to act as though everyone is a member of the Roman Church whether they want to be or not, they just don't know it yet.
Here's the argument that the person who wrote the article made, the best way to reduce the number of abortions is to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies. The best way to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies is to make contraception freely available. The counter argument being proposed by those who profess to follow Christ in some way is that the best way to reduce unwanted pregnancies is to prevent sexual relations. I don't think anyone would seriously disagree that fewer instances of sexual relations would result in fewer pregnancies, unwanted or otherwise.
For the Christian, this makes sense. Our goal in life is union with God, not our own indulgence in sexual pleasure. But it really doesn't make sense to expect those outside of the Church to accept chastity. They have neither the reason nor the ability to accept it. And like with every other case of enforced prohibition, they won't accept it. There was a point in time when Rome, while under the political rule of the Vatican during the middle ages, was known as the city of harlots because of the tens of thousands of harlots in the city. This is just the disorder in the human psyche at work. You forbid something, the psyche demands to find a way to do it. You forbid sexual intercourse outside of marriage, the psyche will find a reason why it has to do so. When alcohol was outlawed in the twenties, alcohol sales and use went up, not down. When sex was socially prohibited and looked down on in the fifties, the sexual revolution happened for the next three decades. So, if we attempt to enforce chastity on those who have no reason to embrace it, the number of unwanted pregnancies will go up, and so will the number of abortions.
If we really want to bring Jesus and demonstrate Jesus to those outside of the Church, and if we want to reduce the number of infanticides practiced, than we need to look at this thing from a practical standpoint. We need to show some compassion and help those outside of the Church avoid those unwanted pregnancies altogether without demanding they submit to a religious rule they have no reason to keep.
Someone here might bring up adoption. To this, I would say don't bring up adoption unless you are ready and willing to adopt right then and there. Adoption is prohibitively expensive in the US, and all too often adoption is encouraged in ignorance. In reality, the chances of a kid being adopted out of the foster system are slim to begin with, and they get worse the older the child gets. To make matters worse, it seems like most of the kids who go into the foster system get shuffled around so much, they have severe emotional problems if they reach adulthood (and I do mean “if”). Many of them are horribly abused, sexually and otherwise in the foster system. In reality, it's somewhat comparable with the Roman father abandoning his infant to the Fates on the side of the road.
Our goal towards these matters, as with anything we do in the pursuit of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus, needs to be to demonstrate the love and compassion of God flowing through us towards the other person no matter who it is. The question we must ask is how best can we love this person without submitting them to standards they can't hope to meet? The best way to avoid the slaughter of an unwanted infant is to allow for the reasonable prevention of the conception of that infant to begin with. Contraception isn't the absolutely best way for a person to go, but as we seek to demonstrate the compassion of Christ to those who don't know Him, it's the best compromise possible.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Saturday, February 11, 2012
A Ramble About Anger and Discipline
I realized today that I am angry. Nothing which happened today caused it, nor anything which happened yesterday. I've been struggling with this anger for a long time, and I didn't realize until today that I was still struggling with it. I think I've known about it for a long time, but have done everything within my power to ignore it and pretend it doesn't exist.
This anger is really about much of the way my life has gone, with one particular incident being the focal point. I realized today that I have never dealt with the anger that incident caused. I know now that I couldn't have dealt with it when it happened because of my Asperger's, and so it has just festered within over the last almost twenty years only to rear its head as jealousy, or inexplicably being put on edge.
This particular incident hurt me terribly. It felt like a betrayal, and like I was being thrown away. It completely disrupted my life and my future plans and was the cause of a great deal of personal humiliation. As far as the profession I had wanted to pursue, it trashed it entirely. It's been in my dreams more and more now, and I couldn't put my finger on why.
I think I now know why. I never dealt with the feelings it caused in any way. Having Asperger's means that your feelings don't process in real time, when the cause of them is happening. At least, that's one of the things it meant for me. It was only a couple of years ago that I was able to process through an event from my early childhood that caused me a great deal of pain, and this after my treatments.
What's worse is that this anger and pain has been coming in between the Lord and I, and, without understanding why, I had been pushing away from Him while at the same time wanting nothing more than for Him to be closer. When I would attempt to go deeply into prayer, I knew that He had not changed in His love for me, and yet I was fearful of approaching Him without knowing why.
To make matters more confusing, I have understood for a little while now as to why He allowed or caused those things to happen in my life, and I wouldn't go back to change them for anything. The best things that have ever happened in my life like my wife, my children, my service as a priest, and still other things have been either the direct or indirect results of those hurts and pains. It confused me as to why I would still be angry about it when I understood some of the reasons for it and that it was His mercy which caused it to work out the way that it did. He actually blessed me because of the painful things that made me so angry. But this undealt-with anger and hurt was poisoning my relationship with the Lord, and also poisoning how I saw some of my brothers and sisters in Christ.
Then today this thought entered my mind. The child who is disciplined by the parent tends to be angry with the parent for disciplining him or her at the time. Discipline can take many forms. There is the punitive side of discipline, where we've done something wrong and are punished for it. But that's not what I'm referring to. I'm referring to when a parent has to tell a child "no." Or when a parent has to make a child do chores or tasks that they loath. When a parent has to make the child go to school but forbid them to go to the party that they want to be at. This is also discipline. And unlike the punitive side, it is far more likely to make the child angry with the parent because they see the discipline as unfair.
There are times when God uses a punitive form of discipline. It is not as often as people like to think, but it does happen. But the kind of discipline He uses far more is this second kind as He tries to school us and raise us as the kind of people He wants us to be. In my case, it made me just as angry as the disciplined child because I saw it as unfair, but I had no emotional outlet at the time for dealing with it, and I think I have also not wanted to admit that I was angry with God for it; that I have wanted to shout at Him "it's not fair!" regardless of how I was actually feeling. How can you honestly accuse God of being unjust when you know that He is anything but? So, on top of the Asperger's, I buried it as deep as possible without knowing what I was doing, but in so doing like radioactive waste it leaked out of its container and seeped up through the ground to the surface of my feelings.
I know that God understands my anger and frustration. I think most good parents do understand their child's frustration with discipline. He doesn't love me any less. He's not so insecure that He can't take the juvenile anger. And I do now understand some of the reasons for all of it, not the least of which is my own growth and maturity and movement towards Him. Now, I just have to allow myself to be flawed, and childish, and honest with those feelings that occurred then, even if it's not how I'm feeling now about it.
This anger is really about much of the way my life has gone, with one particular incident being the focal point. I realized today that I have never dealt with the anger that incident caused. I know now that I couldn't have dealt with it when it happened because of my Asperger's, and so it has just festered within over the last almost twenty years only to rear its head as jealousy, or inexplicably being put on edge.
This particular incident hurt me terribly. It felt like a betrayal, and like I was being thrown away. It completely disrupted my life and my future plans and was the cause of a great deal of personal humiliation. As far as the profession I had wanted to pursue, it trashed it entirely. It's been in my dreams more and more now, and I couldn't put my finger on why.
I think I now know why. I never dealt with the feelings it caused in any way. Having Asperger's means that your feelings don't process in real time, when the cause of them is happening. At least, that's one of the things it meant for me. It was only a couple of years ago that I was able to process through an event from my early childhood that caused me a great deal of pain, and this after my treatments.
What's worse is that this anger and pain has been coming in between the Lord and I, and, without understanding why, I had been pushing away from Him while at the same time wanting nothing more than for Him to be closer. When I would attempt to go deeply into prayer, I knew that He had not changed in His love for me, and yet I was fearful of approaching Him without knowing why.
To make matters more confusing, I have understood for a little while now as to why He allowed or caused those things to happen in my life, and I wouldn't go back to change them for anything. The best things that have ever happened in my life like my wife, my children, my service as a priest, and still other things have been either the direct or indirect results of those hurts and pains. It confused me as to why I would still be angry about it when I understood some of the reasons for it and that it was His mercy which caused it to work out the way that it did. He actually blessed me because of the painful things that made me so angry. But this undealt-with anger and hurt was poisoning my relationship with the Lord, and also poisoning how I saw some of my brothers and sisters in Christ.
Then today this thought entered my mind. The child who is disciplined by the parent tends to be angry with the parent for disciplining him or her at the time. Discipline can take many forms. There is the punitive side of discipline, where we've done something wrong and are punished for it. But that's not what I'm referring to. I'm referring to when a parent has to tell a child "no." Or when a parent has to make a child do chores or tasks that they loath. When a parent has to make the child go to school but forbid them to go to the party that they want to be at. This is also discipline. And unlike the punitive side, it is far more likely to make the child angry with the parent because they see the discipline as unfair.
There are times when God uses a punitive form of discipline. It is not as often as people like to think, but it does happen. But the kind of discipline He uses far more is this second kind as He tries to school us and raise us as the kind of people He wants us to be. In my case, it made me just as angry as the disciplined child because I saw it as unfair, but I had no emotional outlet at the time for dealing with it, and I think I have also not wanted to admit that I was angry with God for it; that I have wanted to shout at Him "it's not fair!" regardless of how I was actually feeling. How can you honestly accuse God of being unjust when you know that He is anything but? So, on top of the Asperger's, I buried it as deep as possible without knowing what I was doing, but in so doing like radioactive waste it leaked out of its container and seeped up through the ground to the surface of my feelings.
I know that God understands my anger and frustration. I think most good parents do understand their child's frustration with discipline. He doesn't love me any less. He's not so insecure that He can't take the juvenile anger. And I do now understand some of the reasons for all of it, not the least of which is my own growth and maturity and movement towards Him. Now, I just have to allow myself to be flawed, and childish, and honest with those feelings that occurred then, even if it's not how I'm feeling now about it.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
A Ramble About Temptations and Attacks
I woke up this morning realizing that I had somehow allowed myself to drift too far away from God. It wasn't anything obvious. Anyone watching me on a daily basis might not have even noticed. They'd probably ask what I was talking about. But as I woke up this morning, I knew it was true.
Over the past month or more, I've been struggling with various thoughts, temptations, and temptations to thoughts assaulting my mind. They have ranged from the seemingly innocuous to the overtly perverse. No matter the extreme they were on they demanded my attention, wanting me to do something with them. They wanted me to insert my opinion, to act on them in some way. They wanted me to engage with them. Some I agreed with, others I vehemently rejected. Some were good, others were bad and, in my mind, some I fought alongside, while others I fought against in a vengeful holy war.
But I came to realize today that in the midst of my mental Jihad, I had left off my one task that was more important than anything. All of these thoughts aroused different passions and emotions within me, but kept me occupied away from my most important occupation of all, remaining in Jesus Christ, and keeping my love focused on Him.
Why did God permit this? Why does He permit this? I know why. It was because of my self-esteem. Because I was deluding myself by agreeing with the oh so subtle thoughts which entered my mind that sought to inflate my ego and tell me how spiritual I am.
God permits the enemy to tempt and attack us when we begin to drift from Him by our own ego, and He permits this attack to keep us from drifting too far from Him. The more we are attacked, the more we will cry out to Him. This is why He generally doesn't ever let the attacks fully stop. He may allow them to lessen, but never to fully cease altogether. This is a matter of His mercy towards us, saving us from our own ego.
Our own mind is the greatest weapon the enemy has to use against us because it is so easy to slip in a little thought here, a little opening there, and the next thing you know it's running rampant with delusions of grandeur, or debauchery. God knows this. He also knows our propensity to drift from Him even when we don't realize we've lost our moorings. These attacks serve to humble us by showing us how powerless we really are against them, and send us fleeing back to the safety of Him.
God has our best interests at heart even in permitting demons to assail us, because He knows that we may unknowingly throw our relationship with Him away if He doesn't allow it.
Over the past month or more, I've been struggling with various thoughts, temptations, and temptations to thoughts assaulting my mind. They have ranged from the seemingly innocuous to the overtly perverse. No matter the extreme they were on they demanded my attention, wanting me to do something with them. They wanted me to insert my opinion, to act on them in some way. They wanted me to engage with them. Some I agreed with, others I vehemently rejected. Some were good, others were bad and, in my mind, some I fought alongside, while others I fought against in a vengeful holy war.
But I came to realize today that in the midst of my mental Jihad, I had left off my one task that was more important than anything. All of these thoughts aroused different passions and emotions within me, but kept me occupied away from my most important occupation of all, remaining in Jesus Christ, and keeping my love focused on Him.
Why did God permit this? Why does He permit this? I know why. It was because of my self-esteem. Because I was deluding myself by agreeing with the oh so subtle thoughts which entered my mind that sought to inflate my ego and tell me how spiritual I am.
God permits the enemy to tempt and attack us when we begin to drift from Him by our own ego, and He permits this attack to keep us from drifting too far from Him. The more we are attacked, the more we will cry out to Him. This is why He generally doesn't ever let the attacks fully stop. He may allow them to lessen, but never to fully cease altogether. This is a matter of His mercy towards us, saving us from our own ego.
Our own mind is the greatest weapon the enemy has to use against us because it is so easy to slip in a little thought here, a little opening there, and the next thing you know it's running rampant with delusions of grandeur, or debauchery. God knows this. He also knows our propensity to drift from Him even when we don't realize we've lost our moorings. These attacks serve to humble us by showing us how powerless we really are against them, and send us fleeing back to the safety of Him.
God has our best interests at heart even in permitting demons to assail us, because He knows that we may unknowingly throw our relationship with Him away if He doesn't allow it.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
A Ramble About Useless Debates
I keep thinking about my recent clash with someone I didn't know on a friend's posting on Facebook. I'm not obsessing over it, but it keeps coming back into my mind on occasion like there's something else I need to look at. Without going into all the details, somehow it became a debate about law vs. grace when I was trying to post about the need to maintain our relationship with the Lord. My last attempt at reconciling with this person was a private message to which I didn't receive a response.
I keep thinking, what a grand distraction and waste it was. Instead of building each other up in Christ, somehow we got into this argument about doctrines and theologies which did the exact opposite, and did nothing to demonstrate compassion and love as Jesus taught. Instead of accepting each other's differing points of view and looking for points of agreement, we tried to beat each other into submission to our own.
How can we honestly profess to follow Jesus Christ if we're willing to sacrifice what He taught instead of sacrificing ourselves as He taught? How can we call ourselves His disciples if we see the need for everyone else to believe exactly as we do as more important than the need to show mercy and take people where they are at? How can we say that we're doing His work, when we refuse to accept our brothers and sisters as such because they see things a little differently?
One of the things I learned a long time ago is that, if you really look carefully at the major doctrinal differences between Protestant and Catholic Christianity, it's mostly a matter of semantics and viewpoints. The truth is that we disagree a lot less than most think we do, but we say things in such different ways, and put emphases in such different places, that it's almost like speaking a different language. It doesn't help that both sides more often than not go into the conversation looking to convert the other from their "heathen" ways. I know I can be accused of doing so on both sides having been both an Evangelical Protestant and a Catholic Christian at different stages of my life. The truth is that both sides speak two different dialects of "Christianese" and they seem to be unwilling to translate or really listen to what the other is saying.
The truth is that our only hope for unity is our focus on Jesus Christ Himself, and not on what we teach about Him. I am a Catholic Christian. I follow the teachings of the ancient Church. I am not a papist. I am not a Marianist, although I respect Mary greatly. But I am a Catholic Christian. I have friends who are Evangelical Protestant. I will likely never convince them to be otherwise, nor they me, and we really shouldn't necessarily be trying either. God has placed each of us in the Church tradition at the moment where He thinks His goal with each of us will be best accomplished. We need to respect that as much as we may disagree with each other on certain issues. I can honestly say that I have learned more and drawn closer to God through Jesus Christ in the Catholic/Orthodox tradition than I ever could otherwise. I know of people who are the exact opposite, who had to leave the Catholic Church in order to draw closer to Him.
This tells me that it's not the minute structure of our theologies which matter to God. He knows we don't really understand Him anyway and He doesn't ask us to. He knows we don't really understand the mechanics of salvation anyway, and He doesn't really ask us to do that either. The one thing He asks us to do is to draw closer to Him in love through Jesus Christ. If a Catholic theological framework accomplishes that goal, great. If a Protestant one does, just as good. And if we can somehow learn from both, that's even better. In the end, He's not going to give us a pop quiz on the intricacies of spiritual mechanics. His question is do we know Him?
Our efforts towards each other should be geared to fostering the achievement of this one goal He has for our lives, not winning arguments that don't matter.
I keep thinking, what a grand distraction and waste it was. Instead of building each other up in Christ, somehow we got into this argument about doctrines and theologies which did the exact opposite, and did nothing to demonstrate compassion and love as Jesus taught. Instead of accepting each other's differing points of view and looking for points of agreement, we tried to beat each other into submission to our own.
How can we honestly profess to follow Jesus Christ if we're willing to sacrifice what He taught instead of sacrificing ourselves as He taught? How can we call ourselves His disciples if we see the need for everyone else to believe exactly as we do as more important than the need to show mercy and take people where they are at? How can we say that we're doing His work, when we refuse to accept our brothers and sisters as such because they see things a little differently?
One of the things I learned a long time ago is that, if you really look carefully at the major doctrinal differences between Protestant and Catholic Christianity, it's mostly a matter of semantics and viewpoints. The truth is that we disagree a lot less than most think we do, but we say things in such different ways, and put emphases in such different places, that it's almost like speaking a different language. It doesn't help that both sides more often than not go into the conversation looking to convert the other from their "heathen" ways. I know I can be accused of doing so on both sides having been both an Evangelical Protestant and a Catholic Christian at different stages of my life. The truth is that both sides speak two different dialects of "Christianese" and they seem to be unwilling to translate or really listen to what the other is saying.
The truth is that our only hope for unity is our focus on Jesus Christ Himself, and not on what we teach about Him. I am a Catholic Christian. I follow the teachings of the ancient Church. I am not a papist. I am not a Marianist, although I respect Mary greatly. But I am a Catholic Christian. I have friends who are Evangelical Protestant. I will likely never convince them to be otherwise, nor they me, and we really shouldn't necessarily be trying either. God has placed each of us in the Church tradition at the moment where He thinks His goal with each of us will be best accomplished. We need to respect that as much as we may disagree with each other on certain issues. I can honestly say that I have learned more and drawn closer to God through Jesus Christ in the Catholic/Orthodox tradition than I ever could otherwise. I know of people who are the exact opposite, who had to leave the Catholic Church in order to draw closer to Him.
This tells me that it's not the minute structure of our theologies which matter to God. He knows we don't really understand Him anyway and He doesn't ask us to. He knows we don't really understand the mechanics of salvation anyway, and He doesn't really ask us to do that either. The one thing He asks us to do is to draw closer to Him in love through Jesus Christ. If a Catholic theological framework accomplishes that goal, great. If a Protestant one does, just as good. And if we can somehow learn from both, that's even better. In the end, He's not going to give us a pop quiz on the intricacies of spiritual mechanics. His question is do we know Him?
Our efforts towards each other should be geared to fostering the achievement of this one goal He has for our lives, not winning arguments that don't matter.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
A Ramble About God's Purpose for our Lives
If I had a nickel for every time I heard someone asking, "why is God doing this to me?" Or "what is the purpose God has for me?" I would probably be on the Forbes list of wealthiest men in the US. Books, sermons, and whole courses have been written to try and answer these very basic questions. I've asked them myself over and over and still over again. I don't know anyone who hasn't at least asked "why is my purpose in life?" whether they are a sinner or a saint, a Christian, Jew, Muslim, pagan, or Atheist.
The truth is that the answer is the same for each person individually. God wants us to know Him. He wants to bring us out of our disorder and into union with Himself. Like any good parent with a child who has a severe disorder, He arranges everything in our lives to accomplish this one goal of treating that disorder and asks us to cooperate with that treatment. Sometimes the treatment is enjoyable, even fun. Sometimes it is painful, and frightening. But in either case, the treatment is meant for a single purpose, to bring us to deification, union with Himself. He brings nothing into our lives which is not geared to this single goal. His is a single focus and purpose where we are concerned.
I spent a large part of my life chasing after involvement in professional ministry, but for most of my life God said "no" even though I was inexplicably and doggedly called towards it. I didn't understand then why He did, but I do now. It was because it would have caused more harm to me, and probably to other people, if He had allowed it. My ego and self-esteem would have exploded and I wouldn't have been at the point where I would have known that there was anything wrong. The truth is that this is a real spiritual danger for me, and a "demon" I must wrestle with daily either positively, as my ego gets stroked and built up, or negatively as I descend into an abyss of depression.
God knew what He was doing then, and I know that He still has my, and everyone else's, best interests at heart as He pursues this one goal for me, and for them. I have watched other friends as they have struggled with "demons" of avarice or physical appetites (be they sexual or stomach related). There are times I see the Lord allowing them to fail so that they can be shown their disorder in all its ugliness, there are other times the Lord doesn't give them the chance believing His purpose for them will be better served by avoiding the temptations altogether. Again, both paths are used by Him at times to further His purpose for them.
There are times that God allows us to work with Him in ministering to other people. He does this only so long as it furthers His purpose with us. When he allows the missionary to go overseas, He has His goal with the missionary in mind just as much as He has the people the missionary speaks to, and it is equally important to Him. Sometimes this means the missionary is very successful in his efforts, sometimes it means he fails utterly. Both are useful and necessary to bring that person closer to union with Him. Sometimes the pastor is allowed to be successful in growing his congregation til it numbers in the tens of thousands, sometimes the church he presides over disbands. Sometimes the mega-church pastor is allowed to have his self-image destroyed by his own actions and plastered all across the news programs to get his attention about the "demon" that has enveloped him. Sometimes the small church pastor is allowed to minister quietly and faithfully to his congregation of less than a hundred until the end of his life. In every case, God is tactically choosing to let the person stand or fail depending on what would be best to accomplish His single purpose for him or her.
A good friend of mine once said, "God is not so much concerned with the work of a worker, as He is with His work in a worker." It is a quote I don't think I will ever forget, and I will always appreciate. God loves each and every one of us that He tailors His treatment program individually for us, and doesn't ever give up no matter how much of a hard case the person might be.
When we want to know God's purpose for our lives, we usually want to know what great thing we're supposed to do or be a part of. What should we shoot for so we leave our mark on history? God's single purpose for each one of us is union with Him, and He'll put us through anything and everything He can to accomplish it. The one thing He will not do is force us. We must cooperate with Him freely through His Grace given through Jesus Christ. This is just as true for the person who's been a Christian for years as it is true for the person who has not.
The truth is that the answer is the same for each person individually. God wants us to know Him. He wants to bring us out of our disorder and into union with Himself. Like any good parent with a child who has a severe disorder, He arranges everything in our lives to accomplish this one goal of treating that disorder and asks us to cooperate with that treatment. Sometimes the treatment is enjoyable, even fun. Sometimes it is painful, and frightening. But in either case, the treatment is meant for a single purpose, to bring us to deification, union with Himself. He brings nothing into our lives which is not geared to this single goal. His is a single focus and purpose where we are concerned.
I spent a large part of my life chasing after involvement in professional ministry, but for most of my life God said "no" even though I was inexplicably and doggedly called towards it. I didn't understand then why He did, but I do now. It was because it would have caused more harm to me, and probably to other people, if He had allowed it. My ego and self-esteem would have exploded and I wouldn't have been at the point where I would have known that there was anything wrong. The truth is that this is a real spiritual danger for me, and a "demon" I must wrestle with daily either positively, as my ego gets stroked and built up, or negatively as I descend into an abyss of depression.
God knew what He was doing then, and I know that He still has my, and everyone else's, best interests at heart as He pursues this one goal for me, and for them. I have watched other friends as they have struggled with "demons" of avarice or physical appetites (be they sexual or stomach related). There are times I see the Lord allowing them to fail so that they can be shown their disorder in all its ugliness, there are other times the Lord doesn't give them the chance believing His purpose for them will be better served by avoiding the temptations altogether. Again, both paths are used by Him at times to further His purpose for them.
There are times that God allows us to work with Him in ministering to other people. He does this only so long as it furthers His purpose with us. When he allows the missionary to go overseas, He has His goal with the missionary in mind just as much as He has the people the missionary speaks to, and it is equally important to Him. Sometimes this means the missionary is very successful in his efforts, sometimes it means he fails utterly. Both are useful and necessary to bring that person closer to union with Him. Sometimes the pastor is allowed to be successful in growing his congregation til it numbers in the tens of thousands, sometimes the church he presides over disbands. Sometimes the mega-church pastor is allowed to have his self-image destroyed by his own actions and plastered all across the news programs to get his attention about the "demon" that has enveloped him. Sometimes the small church pastor is allowed to minister quietly and faithfully to his congregation of less than a hundred until the end of his life. In every case, God is tactically choosing to let the person stand or fail depending on what would be best to accomplish His single purpose for him or her.
A good friend of mine once said, "God is not so much concerned with the work of a worker, as He is with His work in a worker." It is a quote I don't think I will ever forget, and I will always appreciate. God loves each and every one of us that He tailors His treatment program individually for us, and doesn't ever give up no matter how much of a hard case the person might be.
When we want to know God's purpose for our lives, we usually want to know what great thing we're supposed to do or be a part of. What should we shoot for so we leave our mark on history? God's single purpose for each one of us is union with Him, and He'll put us through anything and everything He can to accomplish it. The one thing He will not do is force us. We must cooperate with Him freely through His Grace given through Jesus Christ. This is just as true for the person who's been a Christian for years as it is true for the person who has not.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
A Ramble About Cold Buckets of Water
Recently, I had the unpleasant experience of reopening a comment thread which I thought had been closed for a week or more. It was started by a status update by a good friend of mine that sounded good, but for some reason didn't quite sit well with me, so I responded with my slight disagreement. He responded back, to which I responded with "no arguments from me." I thought that was the end of it, and didn't see any more comments directed at me, so I believed it was over and done with.
Then, very late at night as I was getting punchy and way past ready for bed, another person whom I did not know commented on the thread. This person directed their comments solely at my previous post from the week prior and took issue with it. My wife warned me against responding, and I should have listened, but I responded anyway. This morning, I awoke to two more comments, to which I responded four more. Then, my friend jumped in taking issue with my statements, and the person with whom I was now arguing also posted two more. The last I saw of the comment thread, two other people started arguing about something else entirely. I am now regretting not listening to my wife.
I have been asking myself this question since this morning, "why did I feel the need to respond in the first place?" I'm not sure I like the answers. They involve my own sense of self-importance, my own sense of pride, my own ego running unchecked. The further the comment thread went, the more I realized that the person wasn't going to consider or listen to anything I said, and turn what I did say around to mean something I didn't intend, and yet I still felt impelled to win my case against an adversary who would not listen in the first place. I had already lost my case before I really had a chance to present it and the only person that wasn't convinced of that fact was me. Because of my ego, I took the bait and reopened a friendly disagreement and it exploded into an argument about faith vs. works or law vs. grace.This was something I was trying to avoid to begin with especially because these arguments are pointless and miss the point entirely.
I spent most of this morning frustrated, on edge, and near anger because the person wouldn't listen to what I was saying. That wasn't this person's fault. It was my choice to be frustrated with it. It was my choice to allow my ego to demand to be seen as something important. It was my own delusion which I allowed myself to fall into. It had nothing to do with this person. I allowed what this person thought of me to dictate how I see myself, and when this person wouldn't play along, I became frustrated.
The truth is, it was a cold bucket of water kind of reminder that I still have this disorder as well. I am not immune to it, and the more I may believe myself relieved of it, then the more I am coming under its illusions. I suppose I should be thankful to this person who baited me. It's hard to be thankful for something like this, but then I have to consider how much more deluded I may have become and how much more painful of a wake up call it might have taken to get my attention. It wasn't the first of its kind, neither will it be the last. These kinds of wake up calls are part of the Lord's mercy towards us to show us our failings and humble us and they are healthy for us, even if we hate when they're happening.
So, to the person who gave me this cold bucket of water on my ego this morning, I say thank you. To the people who may have been hurt by my taking the bait, I am deeply and truly sorry.
Then, very late at night as I was getting punchy and way past ready for bed, another person whom I did not know commented on the thread. This person directed their comments solely at my previous post from the week prior and took issue with it. My wife warned me against responding, and I should have listened, but I responded anyway. This morning, I awoke to two more comments, to which I responded four more. Then, my friend jumped in taking issue with my statements, and the person with whom I was now arguing also posted two more. The last I saw of the comment thread, two other people started arguing about something else entirely. I am now regretting not listening to my wife.
I have been asking myself this question since this morning, "why did I feel the need to respond in the first place?" I'm not sure I like the answers. They involve my own sense of self-importance, my own sense of pride, my own ego running unchecked. The further the comment thread went, the more I realized that the person wasn't going to consider or listen to anything I said, and turn what I did say around to mean something I didn't intend, and yet I still felt impelled to win my case against an adversary who would not listen in the first place. I had already lost my case before I really had a chance to present it and the only person that wasn't convinced of that fact was me. Because of my ego, I took the bait and reopened a friendly disagreement and it exploded into an argument about faith vs. works or law vs. grace.This was something I was trying to avoid to begin with especially because these arguments are pointless and miss the point entirely.
I spent most of this morning frustrated, on edge, and near anger because the person wouldn't listen to what I was saying. That wasn't this person's fault. It was my choice to be frustrated with it. It was my choice to allow my ego to demand to be seen as something important. It was my own delusion which I allowed myself to fall into. It had nothing to do with this person. I allowed what this person thought of me to dictate how I see myself, and when this person wouldn't play along, I became frustrated.
The truth is, it was a cold bucket of water kind of reminder that I still have this disorder as well. I am not immune to it, and the more I may believe myself relieved of it, then the more I am coming under its illusions. I suppose I should be thankful to this person who baited me. It's hard to be thankful for something like this, but then I have to consider how much more deluded I may have become and how much more painful of a wake up call it might have taken to get my attention. It wasn't the first of its kind, neither will it be the last. These kinds of wake up calls are part of the Lord's mercy towards us to show us our failings and humble us and they are healthy for us, even if we hate when they're happening.
So, to the person who gave me this cold bucket of water on my ego this morning, I say thank you. To the people who may have been hurt by my taking the bait, I am deeply and truly sorry.
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
A Ramble About Thoughts in Prayer
There is a scene in one of my favorite movies, "Peaceful Warrior", that is one of the best I've seen. In it, the main character, Dan, come up to meet his mentor, Socrates, in a park. Socrates was supposed to teach him something new. Dan is in a hurry, so he asks him if he could hurry it up so he can make it to a gym tryout. Socrates shrugs his shoulders, says "ok," and then pushes Dan off of a small bridge and into the water below. Upon recovering himself from the water, Dan marches up to Socrates and demands an explanation for throwing him off of the bridge. Socrates then asks him what he was thinking about when he was falling. Flustered Dan says, "I don't know... I..." Socrates then fills in the blanks for him, "Nothing. You were thinking about nothing. You were focused, in the moment. You even had a word word it, 'ahhhhh!'" Dan replies, "you're out of your mind!" Socrates replies "it's taken a lifetime of practice."
In the writings of the ancient Fathers of the Church, one of the things which tends to stand out is their insistence that you can't trust the thoughts and images which come into your mind during prayer. They insist that the demons will try to pull your mind this way and that with any distraction possible during prayer so that you will lose focus on the Lord and go chasing after some tangent. These distractions don't have to be anything particularly harmful or sinful, they can even be images of good things and good works done, but regardless of the content they all accomplish the same thing. They all pull your awareness away from God and back to your own thoughts.
For this reason, to a man they all taught and wrote that you couldn't trust anything your mind threw at you especially during contemplative prayer. As a result, they highly encouraged the use of a single verbal prayer or word to keep the thoughts occupied and focused so that when they began to break free of their restraints they could be reigned back in.
I have experienced this more than once and I'm coming to understand why they said what they said. It's too easy for your thoughts to masquerade as something good and spiritual. You may be seeking to listen for the Lord's message, and your own thoughts disguise themselves as His voice. Sometimes, they can be very good at it. This is bad enough, but the worse problem is when unseen powers start influencing your thoughts masquerading as His messenger. There is practically no way to truly distinguish the good from the bad, and they are masters of deception. The best thing which can be done during prayer is to ignore all thoughts that enter your mind.
"But then how am I to know when the Lord is speaking?" I am coming to understand in my own prayer life that He doesn't generally speak through your thoughts. The first priority in prayer is to focus on being aware of His presence. This is hard enough. It is often like trying to look at someone out of the corner of your eye. When you turn to look directly at that person, there is no one there. The author of "The Cloud of Unknowing" says that God cannot be known by the thoughts or the mind. He can only be known through love, and that we must extend our love towards Him. Since He is not directly observable, the author calls this a "cloud of unknowing." Other authors have called it a "holy darkness." It is dark because it is unknown and unseen, like wandering through a room that is pitch black and you can't see anything. God will not be known by extending your thoughts towards Him. You must extend your love for Him out into the darkness and He will respond to it. "He who does not love, does not know God, because God is love." And when He does respond, you will know, and you must be paying attention, focused, in order to receive it.
The simplest prayer for keep your awareness centered on Him is just "God." Another prayer which has been used by the Church since the earliest of times is "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner," or more simply just "Lord Jesus Christ," or more simply still just "Jesus." One useful technique that I have learned from Buddhist books is simply to focus on your breathing, not trying to influence it but just each breath as they come in and out. Once you've centered your awareness on your breathing, then extend it with your love for Him out towards Him with one of those two prayers, or some other prayer that is short and simple. Don't worry, you don't have to wait for Him to arrive. He's already there, and always will be. You're not trying to get into the presence of God as though you were calling Him towards you. Your objective here is to just recognize and be aware of His continuous presence around and within you. You don't have to get His attention. You're trying to give Him yours.
Our thoughts can be our worst enemies as they yell for our attention and must be brought into submission to our love for Him. When we pray, we must learn to do so out of our minds.
In the writings of the ancient Fathers of the Church, one of the things which tends to stand out is their insistence that you can't trust the thoughts and images which come into your mind during prayer. They insist that the demons will try to pull your mind this way and that with any distraction possible during prayer so that you will lose focus on the Lord and go chasing after some tangent. These distractions don't have to be anything particularly harmful or sinful, they can even be images of good things and good works done, but regardless of the content they all accomplish the same thing. They all pull your awareness away from God and back to your own thoughts.
For this reason, to a man they all taught and wrote that you couldn't trust anything your mind threw at you especially during contemplative prayer. As a result, they highly encouraged the use of a single verbal prayer or word to keep the thoughts occupied and focused so that when they began to break free of their restraints they could be reigned back in.
I have experienced this more than once and I'm coming to understand why they said what they said. It's too easy for your thoughts to masquerade as something good and spiritual. You may be seeking to listen for the Lord's message, and your own thoughts disguise themselves as His voice. Sometimes, they can be very good at it. This is bad enough, but the worse problem is when unseen powers start influencing your thoughts masquerading as His messenger. There is practically no way to truly distinguish the good from the bad, and they are masters of deception. The best thing which can be done during prayer is to ignore all thoughts that enter your mind.
"But then how am I to know when the Lord is speaking?" I am coming to understand in my own prayer life that He doesn't generally speak through your thoughts. The first priority in prayer is to focus on being aware of His presence. This is hard enough. It is often like trying to look at someone out of the corner of your eye. When you turn to look directly at that person, there is no one there. The author of "The Cloud of Unknowing" says that God cannot be known by the thoughts or the mind. He can only be known through love, and that we must extend our love towards Him. Since He is not directly observable, the author calls this a "cloud of unknowing." Other authors have called it a "holy darkness." It is dark because it is unknown and unseen, like wandering through a room that is pitch black and you can't see anything. God will not be known by extending your thoughts towards Him. You must extend your love for Him out into the darkness and He will respond to it. "He who does not love, does not know God, because God is love." And when He does respond, you will know, and you must be paying attention, focused, in order to receive it.
The simplest prayer for keep your awareness centered on Him is just "God." Another prayer which has been used by the Church since the earliest of times is "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner," or more simply just "Lord Jesus Christ," or more simply still just "Jesus." One useful technique that I have learned from Buddhist books is simply to focus on your breathing, not trying to influence it but just each breath as they come in and out. Once you've centered your awareness on your breathing, then extend it with your love for Him out towards Him with one of those two prayers, or some other prayer that is short and simple. Don't worry, you don't have to wait for Him to arrive. He's already there, and always will be. You're not trying to get into the presence of God as though you were calling Him towards you. Your objective here is to just recognize and be aware of His continuous presence around and within you. You don't have to get His attention. You're trying to give Him yours.
Our thoughts can be our worst enemies as they yell for our attention and must be brought into submission to our love for Him. When we pray, we must learn to do so out of our minds.
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