Tag: Wonder

Holding the Truth Lightly?

There was a time in my life when I would argue my side of a question or fact until anyone with another point of view gave up and walked away. There weren’t many things I would hold fast to, but with those few ideas or issues, I was sure my view was the correct one . . . the ONLY correct one.

Oh, the certainty of that time of life. It embarrasses me now. . . thinking that I could know what was true and what was not, what was right and what was wrong, what was of highest value and what was junk.

I still have opinions and values and ethical standards now. But I think I am more reflective these days, less willing to attack with righteous vengeance the ideas and positions others hold. Now, don’t get the wrong idea about me. I am an unapologetic progressive who isn’t afraid to say what I believe. And I loathe the stance of the current Senate minority leader when he trumpets that his only goal for the next 4 years is to “100% oppose” the current administration in every bill proposed or budget proffered. That stand will take us down as a country if it holds.

But I am more opposed to that “100% opposition no matter what the policy is” stance because of the blindness to how we can strongly disagree with a person’s ideological stand and yet listen to their hopes, their goals, their ideas, and look for places we can agree so we can craft something together worth agreeing upon. In this divisive moment (I still hope it is only a moment), however, that may need a whole lot of retirements before working together across the aisle is ever possible again.

I choose to try to live a different ethos these days. I try to “hold the truth lightly”. I first heard this phrase when I joined the Episcopal Church. I was drawn to this denomination because it doesn’t require dogmatic beliefs but focuses on practices — being community, serving others, living and practicing love. The assumption is that we are all interconnected and are spiritual beings walking a human path. None of us has a better hold on truth than anyone else so we can learn from (not fear) others. And we “hold the truth lightly” knowing that life changes us and therefore our view of “truth” may change.

To live this way requires humility (which I have to work at), curiosity (approaching situations and people with wonder rather than mistrust), and a belief that we can find multiple interconnections that are lifegiving.

I’m not expert at living this way, yet it has become more natural as I’ve practiced it. And wondering about the world and those who live in it is much more joy filled than believing all is threatening.

Yes, you are probably correct . . . I’m likely a Pollyanna. Join me?

Have I been here before?

Have I been here before? The Advent scripture readings on Sundays are familiar. . . I know the cycle of preparation for the birth, the dressing down by John the Baptist, the scary predictions of the end times in the OT . . . I’ve been here before. Or have I?

I come to this 2019 Advent season carrying different burdens and celebrating different joys from the year past. Every year at this time I feel a mix of familiarity and newness. Always, wonder fills me with amazement at the ancient story of the shepherds and Jesus birth and the angels singing “Do not fear”. Do these angels know that in a few nights Joseph, new to parenthood, will have a nightmare that feels all too true and that he will awaken his wife and child and lead them into another country where they will settle in until the crisis in their home territory has passed. Do the angels know this?

Wonder fills me, too, as I look at my tree full of memories. Lit with warm LEDs, nearly every branch holds an angel or a star. There is the angel we brought back from a college visit to Boulder CO. There’s an angel with a violin that a family at my father’s second parish gave me as a child because I had just started lessons on the violin. There are capiz shell stars from my first husband’s ornament collection. There are Moravian star ornaments that Jessie and I made years go. Homespun angels, handmade paper angels, embroidered fabric angels, stars of rusty tin, stars of fancy gold-embossed glass, a Haitian angel with broad hips and colorful wings made from a recycled metal can.

Wonder. Surprised by angels of light in a dark sky, the shepherds’ wonder triggers in them both awe and fear. “What does this mean? What is this for? Why to us? What should we do?” Curiosity wins out over fear and the shepherds go to look for a child in the middle of that strange night. Down the road in a quiet, private space used for sheltering animals, they find a young family and a newborn baby suckling his mother’s breast. I wonder what sense did they make of the angels’ message then? And what about me? What sense have I made of this? Haven’t I been here before?

Yes . . . and no. Yes, I have followed the path of Advent to Christmas Eve many times before. Yes, I have heard (and read) the birth story countless times and imagined myself at the baby’s birth. But the story of the shepherds and angels and baby and his life on earth continues with challenges and dangers that the young parents could not have imagined. We who have traveled their story know very well what is to come in their lives . . . . but not in our own. Although I may know their story, I have no idea of my own to come in 2020.

So yes I’ve been here before. And yet no I haven’t been here before. I am about to step over a threshold into a new year that holds as yet unknown joys and challenges. And I am filled with wonder . . . both awe and a bit of fear.

I am listening for angels who will sing “Fear not” to me. I bid them to come close and sing loudly so I cannot miss the message. “Fear not, Jane. You are loved. You are not alone this year or any year. The one who is born in Bethlehem is with you always.”

Thanks be to God!

P.S. Oh, and angels . . . please sing your “Fear not” message with a catchy tune so (like an earworm) I can never forget it :^)

Mountains

I always thought it odd that the Poconos (in northern Pennsylvania) were called mountains. In actuality, they are no more than hills and have a highest elevation of 2200′ +/-.

When I was growing up, my family lived for awhile in central Washington state — sagebrush country and desert. But we had to travel to visit relatives by going through real mountains — the Rockies — and did that several times over the 4 years we were out west. I remember in my mind’s eye the amazing view of the Rockies as we drove west on the flat prairie of eastern Colorado.

At first, the tops of the Rockies looked like small hills, but the further west we drove, the higher they rose in front of us until — miles out from the foot of the mountains they became riveting in their height and hazy blue color. We were a day’s journey from them as we watched with wonder at the height and sharpness of their peaks. And then, we knew, we had to drive through them.

I remember dark tunnels bored out of rock and twisty roads and a hairpin curve that scared my eight year old self. I remember my mother (and me, too) turning from the window and not looking down at the drop of thousands of feet to our right.

The Rockies. Those are mountains — 14,000′ plus! I would love to see them again!

I just got back from a retreat I led in the Blue Ridge Mountains. These ridges deserve to be called mountains as well, although the highest peaks among them are just over 6,600′. They are older than the Rockies and time has ground them down to slightly rounded tops (unlike the jaggedness of the Rockies) and lesser heights. But their valleys are narrow and the sides of the mountains rise steeply from the valley floors. The summits are often shrouded in mist and wind-raked. And blue (see picture above). The Blue Ridge nickname is earned by the isoprene (a product of tree metabolism — beyond that, I don’t know . . . ) given off by trees that reflects blue light. The color is spellbinding and captures one’s attention because of the unusual color. And the shades of blue are multihued giving depth to the scene of multiple ridges layered into the distance.

Whether you are a flatlander or a mountaineer — or perhaps a hills and valleys person — I hope you will delight in looking around you after you read this and wonder in the God-created geography that surrounds you.