Showing posts with label Tradition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tradition. Show all posts
Monday, May 31, 2010
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Sweet December...Burma
I thought I was posting about Sweet December and Burma on this blog...but I had actually opened a window over at Bread on the Water so I hope you'll drop in over there and read a bit about Burma...a land where many of the rights we take almost for granted are seriously compromised.
The Burmese people it has been my privilege to meet are some of the sweetest folks I've met...well go on and read what I posted earlier and maybe you will even have a word to share with me in response. I always welcome your comments.
The Burmese people it has been my privilege to meet are some of the sweetest folks I've met...well go on and read what I posted earlier and maybe you will even have a word to share with me in response. I always welcome your comments.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Ageless as the Star and the Lily
In Praise of the Friendship of Books
Quotations from the writings of Oswald Chambers
(c) 2000 JPR
“Books…friends that are ever true and ever your own.” I certainly feel this way about some books and as for Oswald Chambers, the man who penned these words, I count him, through his writing, as such a friend. His days began in the year 1874 and ended in the year 1917, years before my days began. He had not himself rushed to publish, but after his death those who had known and loved him sought to preserve and share what he’d written, gathering his lectures, lesson notes, journal meditations and letters. Numerous titles were published posthumously and some remain in print.
I had made my first acquaintance with Oswald Chambers, as many people do, through the renowned collection of short readings, My Utmost for His Highest. My husband presented the slim volume to me. I had no idea what a challenge I was being given, nor what a friend I was about to meet. Morning after morning I let this man’s words encounter me, but it was not until seven years later that I discovered other writing of Oswald Chambers on the bookshelf of one of my generous friends.
Quotations from the writings of Oswald Chambers
(c) 2000 JPR
“Books…friends that are ever true and ever your own.” I certainly feel this way about some books and as for Oswald Chambers, the man who penned these words, I count him, through his writing, as such a friend. His days began in the year 1874 and ended in the year 1917, years before my days began. He had not himself rushed to publish, but after his death those who had known and loved him sought to preserve and share what he’d written, gathering his lectures, lesson notes, journal meditations and letters. Numerous titles were published posthumously and some remain in print.
I had made my first acquaintance with Oswald Chambers, as many people do, through the renowned collection of short readings, My Utmost for His Highest. My husband presented the slim volume to me. I had no idea what a challenge I was being given, nor what a friend I was about to meet. Morning after morning I let this man’s words encounter me, but it was not until seven years later that I discovered other writing of Oswald Chambers on the bookshelf of one of my generous friends.
Even though our homes were distant and our visits rare, my friend insisted that I borrow his entire collection of Oswald Chambers, including the 1959 out of print Oswald Chambers, His Life and Work. Knowing that I might never have my own copy of this treasure, or be able to borrow or read this book again, as I read (1996) I created a notebook of favorite passages from this work . That notebook has been tucked away on a shelf for the past four years. Tonight, I came across it and found that it is filled with quotes of a translucent nature that beg to have the light of additional sharing shine though them.
In the pages of Oswald’s biography, when I say I encountered a friend, I mean, to borrow his words, I encountered “a living mind competently expressed.” Oswald was willing to think vulnerably and strenuously. “To think is an effort; to think rightly is a great effort, and to think as a Christian ought to think is the greatest effort of a human soul,” he wrote in a paper he titled “Holy Patience.”
Stick to the Point
Oswald wrote and lived obedient to his own maxim to “stick to the point.” Listen to the pure poetry of his internal dialogue, the economy of his self-counsel, which is found scattered throughout his journal entries. “Be definite…Never lower the ideal…I refuse to worry.”
As I glimpsed how truly thinking this way could shape and energize otherwise lost time and energy of my days, I lamented. Oh the time that I have cast away in the billowing sails of the ship named “waste and worry.” My friend was ready with another word for me, “Arise and do the next thing…never let the sense of failure corrupt your new action.”
And at what pace does one need to stride to keep in step with such a friend? “Unhasting, unresting…” How do two small words capture such dynamic balance?
“Unhasting,” it is a challenging word; laments about the fast pace of life these days are common. Oswald wrote of how he found it a blessed thing in life that “a man carries his kingdom on the inside, and that makes the outside lovely.” The cry of his heart was for the courage to rely on God’s provisions; redemption in Christ Jesus and wisdom of the Holy Spirit to avoid the world’s polarities of rationalism and common sense on the one hand or worry and fear on the other.
Oswald Chambers was known for urging others to recognize any experience that ought to be theirs but was not, and to promptly confess this before God and to put one’s self in the right attitude to make it one’s own. He thought of counseling and teaching as opportunity to experience holiness in human relationships. He prized “spontaneous moral originality.” He urged that organization must be seen “to be the scaffolding,” and that it not be confused with the body that erects it.
This focus on the essence and the essential is delightfully present in so many passages that may have been just the scribbles of some moment he claimed in quietude.
Oswald wrote and lived obedient to his own maxim to “stick to the point.” Listen to the pure poetry of his internal dialogue, the economy of his self-counsel, which is found scattered throughout his journal entries. “Be definite…Never lower the ideal…I refuse to worry.”
As I glimpsed how truly thinking this way could shape and energize otherwise lost time and energy of my days, I lamented. Oh the time that I have cast away in the billowing sails of the ship named “waste and worry.” My friend was ready with another word for me, “Arise and do the next thing…never let the sense of failure corrupt your new action.”
And at what pace does one need to stride to keep in step with such a friend? “Unhasting, unresting…” How do two small words capture such dynamic balance?
“Unhasting,” it is a challenging word; laments about the fast pace of life these days are common. Oswald wrote of how he found it a blessed thing in life that “a man carries his kingdom on the inside, and that makes the outside lovely.” The cry of his heart was for the courage to rely on God’s provisions; redemption in Christ Jesus and wisdom of the Holy Spirit to avoid the world’s polarities of rationalism and common sense on the one hand or worry and fear on the other.
Oswald Chambers was known for urging others to recognize any experience that ought to be theirs but was not, and to promptly confess this before God and to put one’s self in the right attitude to make it one’s own. He thought of counseling and teaching as opportunity to experience holiness in human relationships. He prized “spontaneous moral originality.” He urged that organization must be seen “to be the scaffolding,” and that it not be confused with the body that erects it.
This focus on the essence and the essential is delightfully present in so many passages that may have been just the scribbles of some moment he claimed in quietude.
“The thing that comes to me just now is that children, love,straightforwardness, simplicity, are all very old,so old that there is no time about them. They are ageless and they partake of the order of the star and the lily. The busy-nesses, the importance, the worrying, and the doing-goodness are all recent and passing.”
And so is my friend, Mr. Chambers, “very old, so old that there is no time about” him. He too partakes of the “order of the star and the lily” and the order of friendship that transcends time and place and is passed down and along to us in books.
Vincent Van Gogh's "Starry Night" Saturday, October 24, 2009
A Common Thread
I dislike having to categorize where one day's writing goes versus another. Organizing my journal feels like splitting hairs. There's just one of me, why did I sprout twenty-two labels on this blog and why do I have two blogs? As diverse as the thoughts, feelings and happenings are that prompt me to write, there's a part of me that resists categories and acknowledging divisions. I don't like politics of any kind. For years I managed to pretend politics were of no account, but there is no realm where they do not seem to penetrate. School yard, grocery, bookstore, doctor's office, church, where can one go? Yes, even my notebooks...but I long to just spin and weave with a common thread... I say...with my own embroidery in mind.
Don't get me wrong about wanting to ignore divisions, boundaries are good things. For your visual and mental convenience, I've even started a new paragraph here, hoping to protect all of us from blurry thinking. I see boundaries in nature....niches of functional richness, spatial and temporal and seasonal variations of an environment both allow and limit what grows, and who sings or crawls in any particular place.
Gretchen Johanna at Gladsome Lights leaned on George Bernard Shaw to solve her dilemma of categories : "Crude classifications and false generalizations are the curse of organized life..." wrote Shaw and so G. J., acknowledging her debt, labeled her archive of posts "Crude Classifications." That helps me, remembering that many of our divisions are but "crude."
Here is an example of the ubiquitous nature of politics: I recently read an interview of a young author, editor, publisher who among other literary efforts, compiled and edited a book of birth stories. Here she is discussing feedback she's received.
I take her at her word, she either didn't have an agenda or was not fully conscious of it, but either way she has set out on an up hill battle. I see her desire; she's looking for a common thread and she, not a mother herself, chose to edit a book focused on something that we each and all do in fact have in common, being birthed. Other of her ventures reveal that she is neither unaware of nor ignores the divisive facts of life; it's more like she's willing to head into the eye of the storm in hopes of transcending them.
But of course it is very political to write about anything primal because the body politic wants control and claim over anything of the essence. That is a very old story. It does no good to proclaim our innocence, even if sitting home sewing crib quilts for peace, the critics, representing a full spectrum of goodwill to skulduggery are likely to come and point out how one's underlying assumptions are revealed by every choice, by what one has deigned to include or exclude. It is out of our assumptions that our more specific and concrete beliefs arise. And our beliefs do shape our methods and if we are worth our salt, so to speak, then our methods ought to line up and bring about our goals. Not to just circle about here, but those goals, in a life of purpose should be a practical reflection of the most primary assumptions, the foundation of our being. As tempting as it is to try and ignore politics, there is a war going on.
Divisions themselves are full spectrum, ranging from positive and purposeful to destructive and profligate. Within one side, one division, other divisions often occur; while occasionally ( and happily) reunions or offers thereof, also happen.
The wires of communication are hotly lit of late with news and opinions about the the recent offer that the Roman Catholic Pope has made to priests and parishioners fleeing the Episcopal Church. While some focus on the divisions that exist between these two ( three, four ?) bodies established over the last four hundred plus years, I read one analysis that explores some of the forces in the world that these entities struggle with. Richard Fernandez describes, in Lighting of the Beacons, some of the division and competition he sees this way: "From one side, there is the religion which pretends to be a political movement — socialism/communism. From the other flank there is the political movement which pretends to be a religion — Islam. Both religions have massive amounts of money, heavy weaponry and great cultural power."
It's an impressive essay, but I won't quote more of it here because it needs to be read in its entirety to be appreciated. Fernandez receives hundreds of comments within hours of posting on his web log. Many of the comments are essays unto themselves, some quite worthy of attention.
As I said, the thoughts, feelings and happenings that prompt me to write are diverse and as tempted as I am to resist nailing things down categorically, there is a difference between splitting hairs and seeing the real fissures in the world. It's a big conversation to enter and I never do so without trepidation but I trust that ultimately, whether in the wild or the civilizations of man, not one bird is forgotten and the hairs on our heads are counted. And I aim to lean into the word found in a letter to the Romans 12:18:
Don't get me wrong about wanting to ignore divisions, boundaries are good things. For your visual and mental convenience, I've even started a new paragraph here, hoping to protect all of us from blurry thinking. I see boundaries in nature....niches of functional richness, spatial and temporal and seasonal variations of an environment both allow and limit what grows, and who sings or crawls in any particular place.
Gretchen Johanna at Gladsome Lights leaned on George Bernard Shaw to solve her dilemma of categories : "Crude classifications and false generalizations are the curse of organized life..." wrote Shaw and so G. J., acknowledging her debt, labeled her archive of posts "Crude Classifications." That helps me, remembering that many of our divisions are but "crude."
Here is an example of the ubiquitous nature of politics: I recently read an interview of a young author, editor, publisher who among other literary efforts, compiled and edited a book of birth stories. Here she is discussing feedback she's received.
Despite the fact that I didn't have a political agenda when I edited the book, I've noticed that people do have a political response to the book. I didn't have any criteria for the essays except that I wanted each essay I selected to reach the highest literary standards. I've found Christians who like the pro-natal aspect of the book but object to the fact that I've included a couple of essays by lesbians. Natural or home birth proponents have objected to the fact that I include hospital births in the book. And hospital birth proponents have argued that the book is biased towards natural birth. Whatever. About half the births in the book are hospital births and half are natural births so I don’t see how there could be a “bias” from either side. And I included essays by Christians, Buddhists, atheists, agnostics, and who knows what. I honestly didn't care about that part of it. I just wanted to show that whatever TYPE of birth a person experiences, and no matter what spiritual persuasion a person has, the process of giving birth is life-affirming (even when a baby dies, as happens with one of the birth stories in the book) and that process changes men and women in profound and measurable ways.
I take her at her word, she either didn't have an agenda or was not fully conscious of it, but either way she has set out on an up hill battle. I see her desire; she's looking for a common thread and she, not a mother herself, chose to edit a book focused on something that we each and all do in fact have in common, being birthed. Other of her ventures reveal that she is neither unaware of nor ignores the divisive facts of life; it's more like she's willing to head into the eye of the storm in hopes of transcending them.
But of course it is very political to write about anything primal because the body politic wants control and claim over anything of the essence. That is a very old story. It does no good to proclaim our innocence, even if sitting home sewing crib quilts for peace, the critics, representing a full spectrum of goodwill to skulduggery are likely to come and point out how one's underlying assumptions are revealed by every choice, by what one has deigned to include or exclude. It is out of our assumptions that our more specific and concrete beliefs arise. And our beliefs do shape our methods and if we are worth our salt, so to speak, then our methods ought to line up and bring about our goals. Not to just circle about here, but those goals, in a life of purpose should be a practical reflection of the most primary assumptions, the foundation of our being. As tempting as it is to try and ignore politics, there is a war going on.
Divisions themselves are full spectrum, ranging from positive and purposeful to destructive and profligate. Within one side, one division, other divisions often occur; while occasionally ( and happily) reunions or offers thereof, also happen.
The wires of communication are hotly lit of late with news and opinions about the the recent offer that the Roman Catholic Pope has made to priests and parishioners fleeing the Episcopal Church. While some focus on the divisions that exist between these two ( three, four ?) bodies established over the last four hundred plus years, I read one analysis that explores some of the forces in the world that these entities struggle with. Richard Fernandez describes, in Lighting of the Beacons, some of the division and competition he sees this way: "From one side, there is the religion which pretends to be a political movement — socialism/communism. From the other flank there is the political movement which pretends to be a religion — Islam. Both religions have massive amounts of money, heavy weaponry and great cultural power."
It's an impressive essay, but I won't quote more of it here because it needs to be read in its entirety to be appreciated. Fernandez receives hundreds of comments within hours of posting on his web log. Many of the comments are essays unto themselves, some quite worthy of attention.
As I said, the thoughts, feelings and happenings that prompt me to write are diverse and as tempted as I am to resist nailing things down categorically, there is a difference between splitting hairs and seeing the real fissures in the world. It's a big conversation to enter and I never do so without trepidation but I trust that ultimately, whether in the wild or the civilizations of man, not one bird is forgotten and the hairs on our heads are counted. And I aim to lean into the word found in a letter to the Romans 12:18:
In as much as it is up to you, be at peace with all men
In other words, while standing among clear distinctions, it's also up to us to find a common thread.
~~~~~~~~
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Why Do We Tell Stories?
Sometimes what wants to come out wants to be handwritten...here are four pages. If you click on the image it will enlarge and should be legible. Please tell me if it is not. When you finish a page, you can use your browser's back button to return to the post and then click on the next page. 
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