May: Religion, Connections

May: Other Religious Traditions

“We are all rooted together in the ground of consciousness that is God’s gift to all of us.. and our joining is absolute. When the Islamic mullah prays with true and quiet heart, I believe that the souls of the Iowa farmer and the Welsh miner are touched. When the gong sounds in the Japanese monastery and the monks enter the timeless silence of Zazen, their quiet nourishes the Brazilian native and the Manhattan executive. When Jews and Christians pray with true willingness, the Hindu scientist and the Russian policeman are enriched. Thus, when you struggle with your own mind…, you do this as much for others as for yourself, and you help the struggles of others in ways beyond all understanding.”

Gerald May, Will and Spirit. p. 319-320. HarperOne 1982.

 Many authors remind us of our connection to Nature and to the world around us. Others remind us of our connection to the poor, the weak, the sick, the lonely. Gerald May reminds us of our connection to other religions, how the Spirit moves in so many different paths that we do not understand, too deep for words. 

There is more here, though than just recognizing God at work in so many different ways. May is also telling us that we are intimately connected by this Spirit. What we do to further the Spirit, to connect to God, in our own day, in our own way, makes a difference across the globe in some distant rain forest.

Again, this relationship is a deep mystery beyond our knowing. Sometimes when I read this passage from May, I can sit and  almost feel the Iowa farmer working his black dirt since we spent four years in Iowa City in training. Then I try to cross the Atlantic to England. I can connect to the shepherd and his dogs and sheep striding along green pastures since we have made several trips to England and Scotland.

Because of our political scene, I am having more difficulty connecting to the people in Russia. I have never been there, but always wanted to go to St. Petersburg to see Rembrandt’s  Return of the Prodigal Son in the  Hermitage  Museum. The next time I watch a newscast from Russia, I will look and try to image the people there. I think this could make a difference. I hope they are doing the same for us.

Joanna  joannaseibert.com

Guest Writer: Chris Schaefer, Ragamuffins all are we!

Guest Writer: Chris Schaefer, Ragamuffins all are we!

“The gospel portrait of Jesus is that of a person who cherished life and especially other people as loving gifts from the Father’s hand…The living presence of Jesus awakened joy and set people free. Joy was in fact the most characteristic result of all His ministry to ragamuffins.”  Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel

Yup, that’s me!  A long time ago!  It was Halloween a few days after my Confirmation. My mom and I decided I would dress as a hobo, a ragamuffin if you will.  With an old dress shirt and tie of my dad’s, a candy cigarette, some well placed eyebrow pencil for my moustache and beard and a funny hat, I was ready to go. But wait I wanted to take something more.  The bouquet of flowers I had received from my mom and dad after my confirmation was going to go with me.  The flowers were special to me.  At 12 did I understand how special?  Not a chance!  But after reading Brennan Manning’s Ragamuffin Gospel, I see just how symbolic my youthful gesture was.  I realize I am the ragamuffin of my youth and I always will be because it is to the ragamuffins that Jesus brought joy, to us through His love and forgiveness.

Luke in his gospel says, “But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.  I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (5:30-32) I am one of those sinners but that is okay because I am loved for who I am, not in spite of who I am. I am a card-carrying ragamuffin and proud of it.

 I look at this picture of me and see so much.  I see me, the ragamuffin standing there, but I also see myself carrying the bouquet of Jesus with me and that 12-year-old that is still within me, like the picture, is joyful.  I am joyful in that I know that I am loved and there is nothing I can do to lose that love nor was there anything that I did to earn that love.  I will always be a ragamuffin because no matter how hard I try I will sin again and again.  I will cry to Jesus my sorrow and ask for His forgiveness. Because as Louis Evely said in That Man is You, “If we weren’t sinners and didn’t need pardon more than bread, we’d have no way of knowing how deep God’s love is.”  So, I am a joyful ragamuffin walking in His eternal love.  Swinging the bouquet of Jesus around for all to see.  This ragamuffin says come smell my beautiful bouquet.  It is the sweet smell of a loving and forgiving Jesus.  And I want to share my joy with you!

Chris Schaefer

Joanna joannaseibert.com

Darkness and Light and Candles and Prayers

Darkness and Light and Candles and Prayers

“ If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will cover me, and the light around me turn to night,’ darkness is not dark to you, O Lord; the night is as bright as the day; darkness and light to you are both alike.” Psalm 139: 10-11.

At the five o’clock contemporary service every Sunday night at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church the nave is darkened and almost only illuminated by tealight candles on the altar in front of a large icon. After the usual Prayers of the People with a Leader and People response, members of the congregation are invited to come up and light a candle in front of the altar as they say a silent prayer of intercession. Tonight’s pianist plays music from the Taize community as almost all the members of the congregation come forward.  

While I remain in the chair behind my harp, I experience the scene as  a spirit filled synthesis of corporate and individual intercessory prayer.  I watch men and women and sometimes children walk silently up to light their taper and put it in a large earthenware bowl filled with sand. I know a few of the prayers that may be on some hearts.

There are many others I do not know who they are or what they are praying for, but I see faces with earnest emotion and even sometimes tears in their silence. Even when I do not know the silent prayers, I can feel their power and maybe even their connection. There is a stream of people connecting to God in prayers for others and certainly sometimes for themselves.

The light from the many candles now brings brighter light to the nave of the church.  The scene has become its own icon for seeing and teaching us what happens when we pray. Out of the darken nave prayers are germinated and born which transform the darkness into light.

I keep remembering that CS Lewis once wrote that “he prayed not to change God, but to change himself.” These silent prayers being transported by candlelight are changing the appearance of the church  and the pray-ers, and certainly they are changing me.

Joanna  joannseibert.com