Religion is remembering; calling back something we didn’t know we knew that grounds us and lends continuity and meaning to our days. (re-“again” legere – “to read”) Violence is forgetting, denying, making discontinuous, or annihilating the past and stripping away identity and the security of the present. By stealing backstory we take away identity and belonging as well as livelihood and safety. What is left is the frighteningly transient quality of the Now,
Month: July 2014
Naked
Darn wife. It’s Monday morning, and maybe we haven’t slept quite as well as we wish, or maybe the weather is a little cloudy (surprising for a Colorado morning) or just maybe the psychic field is a little “under”…whatever. And she says, apropos of nothing, as we are showered and getting dressed for the day/week/rest of our our lives: “Get up, just go to work, again? That can’t be it…” And the “it” in her sentence is understated in delivery,
3 minutes to reflect
If you aren’t familiar with Spiritbath you might look it up. They are a reliable (and too frequent for my taste) source of inspirational videos and articles, and this brief but surprising vignette came across my desk today. Stretching out into the web can indeed be an edifying thing – not merely entertaining! You don’t need to be a runner to hear in this man’s story a remarkable invitation to listening in our own lives for health and growth. And for looking at others in new ways as well.
Freedom
Freedom to do just anything at all is not our goal. Freedom to act more humanly, more humanely, to act better, is. Freedom is only freedom when it doesn’t create more captivity somewhere else (like in another’s life). Freedom to do anything is mere anarchy, which takes too lightly our ties to one another and the allegiance we pledge to something larger than ourselves.