tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post6749068911996212172..comments2023-10-05T06:20:40.173-04:00Comments on Quaker Pagan Reflections: Pieces of an NEYM MosaicCat C-B (and/or Peter B)http://www.blogger.com/profile/10002916434676859262noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post-29434866388475443932010-09-06T13:28:59.335-04:002010-09-06T13:28:59.335-04:00"The Holy Spirit is a helluva translator.&quo..."The Holy Spirit is a helluva translator." Now *that's* a quote to keep written down and handy, esp. for those whose practice crosses traditions. Awesome. <br /><br />Cat, I'm so accustomed to your thoughtful composed prose, it was hard to imagine the scenario where you felt uncertain in speaking. But having recently had my own feelings hurt badly from an unlikely source, I relate to being in that space of surprise and throbbing disappointment. <br /><br />Thanks for this. I just wrote an entry a couple of days ago about the virtue of Hope, and the particularly Christian lineage of that specific virtue (although I've since found it cited as an ancient Roman public virtue, the only non-Christian tradition I've seen it in yet). I concluded that combatting despair requires being open to the Infinite Possibility of the Unknown. Maybe monotheisms have an easier time relating to the Divine as ineffable vastness that way.Rick Loftus, M.D.http://www.tenthousandvirtues.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post-46773975479833237012010-08-24T13:39:24.847-04:002010-08-24T13:39:24.847-04:00Cat, I think I see what you mean now. I have some...Cat, I think I see what you mean now. I have sometimes concluded that God is not taking care of some situation and therefore I have to do something, anything, about it, now, or what goes wrong (because it's almost certain to go wrong anyway) will be my fault...a very unhelpful place to speak or act from. The volcano-virgin principle, I guess, though I'd never thought to name it so livelily before. I think despair is the word I use for the state in which I end up after one of these attempts has obviously miscarried, when I'm smacked back up against the realization that I can't do what needs to be done. <br /><br />I don't seem to be temperamentally capable of ironic detachment/cynicism. If I was that would probably require a whole new set of tests and spiritual practices. So far if I just stop manufacturing false hopes I do find myself, after a longer or shorter dark time, sinking back to the root, to the true hope.Joanna Hoythttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13447960126998692419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post-15422247502145915212010-08-23T13:42:57.482-04:002010-08-23T13:42:57.482-04:00Thomas Kelly wrote (as quoted by Catherine Whitmir...Thomas Kelly wrote (as quoted by Catherine Whitmire in "Plain Living"):<br /><br />"The last fruit of holy obedience is the simplicity of the trusting child, the simplicity of the children of God. It is the simplicity which lies beyond complexity. It is the naivete which is the yonder side of sophistication. It is the beginning of spiritual maturity, which comes after the awkward age of religious busyness for the Community of God - yet how many are caught and arrested in development, within this adolescent development of the soul's growth! The mark of this simplified life is radiant joy... Knowing sorrow to the depths it does not agonize and fret and strain, but in serene, unhurried calm it walks in time with the joy and assurance of Eternity".<br /><br />I am not a Christian, so the part about Eternity has a somewhat different meaning for me than I imagine it had for Thomas Kelly, but that last sentence really resonated with me nonetheless. We need to do the work that we are called to do... but we also need to trust that when our work is done properly, by faithfully following our own measure of the Light, we need not despair. Small though my efforts may be in relation to the needs of the world, I can be filled with a joyful peace and calm... even though "knowing sorrow to its depths". <br /><br />Thank you for this post, Cat.<br /><br />-Lynn.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post-86933088243816108032010-08-22T21:28:11.212-04:002010-08-22T21:28:11.212-04:00Thank you Cat.Thank you Cat.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post-90235225047242381452010-08-22T15:17:03.268-04:002010-08-22T15:17:03.268-04:00@ Hystery, @ Joanna,
I think it may be that we are...@ Hystery, @ Joanna,<br />I think it may be that we are using the word despair differently; that eases my mind a bit, because if I'm understanding you both correctly, what you are saying is a thing I can eagerly agree with.<br /><br />There is, I think, a need to abandon false hopes and delusions before we can hear the Voice that we need to hear. And I think that you are right, Hystery, that grief can be an important gate into that Presence; and that you are also right, Joanna, that we often need to stand in the darkness, not rush to kindle false lights of our own.<br /><br />But to me, despair is about abandoning true hope, not just the false hopes we use to lull ourselves into comfort. Having no hope, I see many people slouch into attitudes of ironic detachment from the wrongs we do in the world, or into a kind of armor of cynicism that teaches them there's nothing to be done. Or it teaches us to live in fear, approaching the universe as if it were an angry god, and throwing desperate actions into the world as if we were throwing volcano virgins into the lava--hopeless sacrifices and meaningless actions, just to keep us busy, just to convince us we can placate a justly angry god.<br /><br />It's a helluva place from which to approach mending the world! And I thought I heard some of those tones in some of the messages I heard in Sessions, and that grieved me and made me wonder if I was wrong, if I shouldn't be committing myself to blind action after blind action. <i>Is this what God wants?</i> I found myself wondering.<br /><br />I don't think it is, though. Will T's message spoke to me, and reaffirmed for me that God is ready this very second to lead us forward, if we can manage to be willing rather than self-willed, listening rather than shouting in our fear.<br /><br />After ten years as a Quaker, I still don't see any way that human beings can ever create a world without war. I have no idea how to shape a world of peace.<br /><br />Instead, my peace testimony is rooted on an understanding that I don't have to know how to do it; I can leave that to God to figure out, and just follow where She leads us. Not that that's easy, exactly, but it is a thought that gives me great hope: trust, really.<br /><br />What I mean by despair is letting go of that trust. And I think that happens when we think we are responsible for doing Spirit's part in healing the world.<br /><br />(Hooray! Officious and compulsive Fixer that I am, I am incredibly grateful to know that it actually is not my job to fix <i>everything</i>!)<br /><br />But you are both right--to get to that place of real hope, real trust, you sometimes have to stand in some very dark places indeed, before you stop feeling like it's your job to do it all on your own. Or at least, so it is for me.Cat C-B (and/or Peter B)https://www.blogger.com/profile/10002916434676859262noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post-46789714946799620142010-08-22T12:23:29.355-04:002010-08-22T12:23:29.355-04:00Thanks for this rich post. it's helping me ma...Thanks for this rich post. it's helping me make sense of what I experienced. <br /><br />I think for me despair is a necessary beginning place--probably because I spend so much of my life's energy on illusions. It might be a semantic thing; despair is the word I use for the dark heavy place where I end up when my false securities get broken up again. I spent a lot of NEYM thinking of this bit from Isaiah (50:10-11:<br /><br /> “Who is among you that feareth the LORD, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light? let him trust in the name of the LORD, and stay upon his God. Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks: walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled. This shall ye have of mine hand; ye shall lie down in sorrow.”<br /><br />So when I speak of despair I guess I mean stading in the dark.<br /><br />But this might not contradict the insight that despair is a sign that a message is not from Spirit. I think Spirit can speak in a way that shatters illusions and leaves us in the dark. And in a way that brings the dawn. But while I have to go through despair in order to reach a place of faithfulness. it might well be that I need to have come through the darkness back into the light before I speak.<br /><br />I need to think more about this.Joanna Hoythttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13447960126998692419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25987874.post-59190163004192256952010-08-22T07:42:46.644-04:002010-08-22T07:42:46.644-04:00Perhaps for some, despair is evidence that a messa...Perhaps for some, despair is evidence that a message is not authentic. However, for me, connection to the Divine deepens out of my despair. In the existentialist sense of the word, it is my death to my old, well-loved self and the grief that accompanies that, that leaves me open to transformation and communion with the Sacred Presence.Hysteryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02044678910937934731noreply@blogger.com