Richard Rohr, Adapted from Preparing for Christmas with Richard Rohr, pp. 31, 11-12.
We tend to manage life more than just live it. We are all overstimulated and drowning in options. We are trained to be managers, to organize life, to make things happen. That is what built our First World culture. It is not all bad, but if you transfer it to the spiritual life, it is pure heresy. It is wrong. It doesn’t work. It is not gospel.
If Mary was trustfully carrying Jesus during this time, it is because she knew how to receive spiritual gifts, in fact the spiritual gift. She is probably the perfect example of how fertility and fruitfulness break into this world.
There is a great banquet that utterly relativizes and situates all our daily emotions, hurts, addictions, and plans. When you abide in your true Godself, as Mary did, the small self is always seen as limited, insecure, and surely good—but still passing away. We must eat from this big table to know who we really and finally are.
2 comments:
“We tend to manage life more than just live it.” That is such a good description of what happens when I tell myself that things are fine, pushing down my real feelings. I don’t want my real feelings to impinge on my illusion of happiness and peace.
Once upon a time I thought religion was all about managing and controlling myself so that ugly feelings would not break in upon reality. Now I see that real living requires that I feel everything, which is a kind of receiving. If I don’t let myself feel, then I don’t receive everything that God gives me. When I open my arms to receive it all, then life becomes a big banquet. What once seemed to be monsters become part of the richness and splendor of the banquet table.
Let us feast together at the banquet of the Spirit. Huzzah!
I too want not to feel monstrous emotions, especially not to experience negativity from or for people I love. Yet there it is. I do. And this too is God's gift. Not necessarily what I ask from Santa Claus. My Higher Power is quite different from Santa -- feminine, for one thing; present year-round, daily, for another.
O how grateful am I to feast at the banquet of Godess's making, even though I'm uncomfortable with all the guests I find there.
Merry Christmas, holy Christmas. And thank you, Mother Mary, for such an incredible example you set for spiritual journeying.
Post a Comment