Preliminary Notes and Musings on Truth, Theology and Ecumenism

1. Truth is absolute

2. Truth is infinite

3. This is a paradox

All infinite things not only advance infinitely, but also regress infinitely. So, as we aim to pursue Truth to it’s end, we must accept that we cannot arrive at its end. In doing this, we are finally enabled to live, and breath, and have our being in Truth.

But what we have tried to use theology too look at truth propositionally. But if truth is infinite, there are infinite true propositions. Thus, we will never come to full theology that is without affirmation of Truth’s infinity.

So, our history chronicles the construction of human intellectual towers. These towers are build up by theo-philosophical propositions. In our present time, Christianity, Protestant Christianity in particular, is disconnected from theological history. And so, we are more concerned with the final finished theological tower and less concerned with its actual construction. This is first dangerous premise for building any structure. We are rank with heresy, unaware that it is heresy, and further, we believe that the quest for heresy/orthodoxy is paramount to our existence. There are fundamental flaws with this thinking.

So we have built towers, not as vantage points but as trophies. With theology our independent elements for with to build independent towers on which we stand and partake in a ancient height-contest.

As the Body of Christ we have forsaken Naomi and Ruth in favor of Cain and Abel. We are rivals.

The fall of our first tower scattered us and we have taken to congregating in accordance with our tribes, tongues, and languages.

But our towers should serve as vantage points, for which to see the vastness of the Kingdom of God; to see the infinite truth that the Love of Christ is the land in which we all live as siblings; one Body.

So we cannot forsake the importance of theology. However, let us be wise in our pursuits, seeing that philosophy as idolatry consists of the love of knowledge, whereas philosophy as selfless pursuit consists of the wisdom of Love.

It is also possible for theology to consist of silence and images, just as it is possible for prayer to consist of wordless groans.

Christ’s prayer is not so that we might all agree, but that we might be One.

Fire

There is a depletion of prayer burning in the atmosphere of my life. I am not always honest with you. I simply refuse to open up to all that I am in you, to the things I do not even know are there. I need you to bury yourself in them, deep in my hear; bury yourself in the muck and dust and darkness of the unknown parts of my self and come crawling out with new skin, with my own skin, to show me who I am and what I desire. I cannot pursue what I want to pursue without you showing me what that is. And it is difficult to hear you. It is difficult to hear myself. It is difficult to know what to do and I am frustrated by that. And sometimes I project my frustrations on you because I do not know what to do with them. And as much as I am sorry for putting that on you, greater is my gratitude for the very fact that you allow me to do such a thing; that you say “yes, lay your frustrations on me so I can be frustrated for you and with you.”

You are good.

Burn me up at least to I can continue to feel you acting in my life.That is a terrifying  thing to say, but truly, take that and continue to work. I am frustrated with myself, but I do not know myself well enough to truly be frustrated with myself, so I must look at you to see myself. Can I see my imperfections and disabilities in you? Is that alright? If it is not, yell loud enough for me to know. Otherwise I give you thanks for being great, and good, and loving enough to take my shit sometimes. Most of the time.

Take my fears and my joys. My hopes and my despairs. You are good.

Lament for Joy

God, what I hold now is the source of my capacity for both despair and joyous, creative inspiration.

And I am told there are ways of controlling it. Of taking it away. But then I look at history. At the community of Saints. And I think that the miraculous thing about creativity and inspiration is that I have no clue where it comes from. The scary, terrifying thing is that I have no clue where it will come from tomorrow. And so, is the despair worth it? Worth the joy of inspiration?

I might have to say, contrary to our prozac-world that I would take a thousand despairs for a single joy…a single new song. A single poetic tabernacle of excellent words. An opportunity to love.

And maybe I really would sit in purgatory until all souls turned to you.

But do I really mean that? Could I ever truly be honest in coming to you with that from within me? That is too deep for me to know about myself. Search my heart and show me all willingness and resignation present there. Show me the source of these things, for You are good.

Father, forgive them, for they know not what they believe

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they believe.”

This attitude has kept the unity of Christ’s Body at bay for thousands of years, as if the gravest sin is to be unsure or to disagree. But of course, our understanding is certain and without question. And we let our belief drive us to convert, or argue, or defend…saying that we are defending God, as if God ever asked or needed to be defended, when in reality it is our deep, deep wound of uncertainty of all things outside of Christ that we are defending. We have built ourselves up as beings of ideas and doctrines.

There is nothing wrong with doctrine. There is nothing wrong with systematically coming to conclusions in what we believe. In fact, I would argue that we are not much without them, or rather, we have very little. But when those ideas, those conclusions that we ourselves have come to are held on the same level as, or even hold precedence over the reality of Christ being behind, above, in, and beyond all doctrine, whether that doctrine is right or wrong, we lose ourselves. We begin to fade…As if we were trying to take the deep laugh of joy and hold it in a jar, carrying it with us, forgetting that that laugh, that deepest thing, cannot be put in a jar, that jar can simply remind us of what is truly in, around, and beyond the jar and before we even dreamed up the process of understanding that deep laugh by trying to contain it.

There is something deep, and wonderful, and beautiful about the rhythm of the creeds. It holds us together.

But when we use doctrine, which so often turns to dogmatism (which is in itself a perversion of what was once the greatest “positive knowledge”), to mask our deep, deep wound of disunity, we are picking at scabs on the Body of Christ, trying to heal it, trying to heal ourselves and our own uncertainties, which we fearfully have no desire to admit to, and in doing so inhibit the Body from healing and functioning as the beautiful, magnificent and holy thing created for God and the world and each other. Not for us, but for our neighbor.

So, what truly holds us together is not anything we have the ability to make up, but something that created us. I am reminded of Rich Mullins singing, in reference to the Creed, “I did not make it, no it is making me.”

Father, have pity on us, for we know not what we believe. Forgive us, for we know not what we do to you and to each other and to ourselves. Heal us, for we cannot heal ourselves.

Train to Assisi – 8:30, 8. May, 2009

In the Vatican I was struck by all the stuff. All the maps, all the postcards, all the books. Yes, this is a museum. But is it also not a holy place?

But then again, what of holy places? What of holy things? Are not holy deeds what the prophets extol?

I was frustrated and distracted. As I walked into the Basilica, I saw a sea of people. Pictures. Flashes. Maps. Talking. Pointing. And then a curtain.

Behind this curtain was silence. No pictures. It was a room for prayer. I walked in and saw a few people kneeling, sitting, ans praying. It was stunning. It was beautiful.

But the young Argentine couple sat in front of me, the man praying with his hand on his wife’s back. Maybe they had come far. Maybe they were in trouble. But they were praying. And so I did the same. I asked God to help me focus and to reveal why He had brought me here. I revered it. I revered it all because it was Rome. But still, frustrated, I prayed and in the silence looked around at the others doing to same. And in that moment, all of Rome was made holy. All the money, all the tourists.  All the pub crawls and prostitution. All the vanity and destruction of the Church. All the holy and vain history. It was redeemed in prayer and silence. The citta del Deus is a place in time.

Love and Planets

Love is the unlimited sustainable resource that exists both in the physical and non-physical realms…something simultaneously manipulated and untouchable. Love is both choice and inevitability. I choose to love my neighbor without a say in whether or not I am loved. And my duty in being loved is to love the other.

And is my duty to trade, or account for, or distribute love? Or am I simply to uncover love, revealing Love herself to other by taking what I have been given and showing it to the world? For love is a sustainable energy…the only true energy…a pro-atomic essence that goes deeper than our reactors and our bombs. It itself holds together the bond that holds the fabric of the Universe together.

I am bound to it and in being bound to it am freed because it takes me with it wherever it goes…on its infinite, eternal journey, permeating life and the Universe. In the heart of Christ I enter every atom and subatomic particle. I become in so much as I let myself be defined by love.

In the meantime…

In the endless pursuit of some end, we find ourselves chronically forward thinking. Even on the escalator we choose to continue walking up. But what of now? The audacity that I would spend my whole life searching for the future and forget about the present!
God has promised me something. I am not even sure what it is. I often feel like Abraham, a promised son along the way, but my eagerness gets the best of me. I take the present into my own hands as a means to reaching the future. What of patience? What of waiting? Even more so, what of hope? For hope cannot exist unless it is unseen and distant. Hope cannot exist without patience and waiting.
So, God, you have told me to be patient and wait for what you have promised. Hope for that which I am not sure of. Hope for something unknown. But I cannot sit and twiddle my thumbs. Hope will not allow it. Patience will not understand it. So, what do I do in the meantime? What do I do now?

Love.

God, give me the wisdom to see when and how to love in every opportunity you set before me today. And give me the will to do it.

Confusion

Blessed Mary, you understand that in me which I cannot understand in being a man. But may I have the willingness and humility you had to surrender to God you whole life. Oh that I should ever despair in my confusion! You, chief of all confused, you went on. You saw and listened to the voice of God and, without stopping to rationalize, accepted it, bringing to us salvation.

Meditation on the Middle East

Yeshua, free us.
Isa, speak to us.
Jesus Christ, have mercy on us.

Nation

Barack Obama was elected as 44th President of the United States today. This is a momentous occasion, not only for people of color, but for all Americans. We are in the process of redefining “The American Dream” and our very essence as a nation. We are also one step closer to completely confronting our past and letting our history become our history. The scars on the backs of generations of Americans are being healed and possibly redeemed. Honesty, integrity, and unity, above all virtues, seem to be on the verge of making a comeback, taking their place once again at the head of this nation.
Father, I ask that your will be done in this. I thank you for what I see to be a great victory in American and world history. If I am wrong, reveal yourself to me. Bless us as a nation and compel us to bless others, even our enemies. Bless President Obama with your wisdom and your grace. Give us the strength to bless him with grace and patience.
It is a momentous occasion for me. I took part in my first major election. It happened to be quite possibly the most historical election since that of George Washington, and you just so blessed me to play a significant part and for it to play a significant part of my life.
It is also a momentous occasion for the world at large. May we not see ourselves as police or rulers, but as brothers and sisters. When “genocide” is spoken, compel us to act, not out of governmental obligation or financial incentive, but out of reaction to the bits of evil present in our world as well as Your Image present as well.
Let us remember that peace begins in the heart. Let us remember that evil begins and ends in the soul of humanity.
Free will grants us a choice between selflessness and selfishness. Humility and pride. Love and evil. May we look to you always and make the TRUE decision.