Beside Restful Waters

“The human person is created to see God in every aspect of life, charged with divine energy, and love what he or she sees.”

Fr. Richard Rohr

I find this statement to be a great challenge in the midst of mass shootings, great political animosity, the great financial divide between those who have and those who have not, the ongoing acts of trauma toward each other, the apparent absence of care and respect for the very earth that sustains us, ?????? Where is God, the Great Divine Energy, among all of our ills, angers, hostilities, and issues?

I have asked this question many times in my search for a Source of peace and wholeness. The wise ones would charge me with the task of looking within. “Greg, everything you need is within.” Yet, Fr. Rohr suggests that God is in every aspect of life. Are you puzzled and confused? I am!

Well, I am at times. I am when I spend too much time in my head trying to understand stuff. I read books and articles. I watch videos and Ted Talks. I listen to lectures and sermons. I discuss heady, spiritual topics with wise people. I do all these things in my quest for – peace? Purpose? Joy?

As I listen to the most frequent challenge – look within – I find my greatest challenge: BE STILL.

Be still, Greg.

It is becoming apparent that the search is a necessary act of humility which brings me to the state of stillness that allows truth to become, evolve and transform.

In the stillness I begin to recognize and appreciate the need for the questions, for searching, and for pondering. All of these lead full circle. All of these are the journey within. At some point along the way, there is an ‘aha’ moment that requires that I stop, be still, be vulnerable, and welcome the present.

I don’t do humility and patience well.

As I put these words to print, there is an apparent conflict: I cannot DO humility! I am either humble or not. I cannot DO patience. I am either patient or not. These are states of being, not doing.

I can wait. But in order to be patience, I must be still in my wait and welcome the outcome without expectation.

I can listen to a compliment or expression of gratitude, but in order to be humble, I must welcome these affirmations as an affection from the other person rather than an inflation of my ego.

I am hearing these words and thoughts lead me to Fr. Rohr’s creation story: I am created to see God. My creation is one of relationship, inter connection, inter dependence, mutuality, reciprocity. We become willing to be dependent upon, connected to, related to our mutual Divine energy. This is a reality that is independent of our actions (which really challenges my willingness to recognize Divinity in evil perpetrators).

WOW!

I need to rest, be still, and let this all sink in because these words do not make this all real to me. What I am hearing in these words takes me to the original challenge: see God in every aspect of life, AND love what I see.

I’ll start with seeing you. You are the Created ones who have shared your resurrection stories. You are the people who have been vulnerable enough to open the scars of the evils of trauma and addiction and found within sources of peace and healing. Fleeting though these may be, these sources, when shared, offer the hope of truth in our Divine presence. When shared, offer the hope of Divine presence in the depth of others’ wounds.

BE STILL

We will continue to be our Divine Source

We will continue to reveal the Divine Source

We will continue to see Divinity, and love it.

Namaste’