Notes from Rolheiser Conference at King’s House, 2017. “From Paranoia to Metanoia”

 

June 16-18^th, 2017 Belleville, Illinois

King’s House Retreat Ron Rolheiser OMI

From Paranoia to Metanoia – From Self-Protection to Compassion

1. Introduction
2. Jesus’ Invitation to Metanoia

The concept of “metanoia”

Mark 1:15 – the first words out of Jesus’ mouth in the Synoptic Gospels – Metanoia, the word = Meta/Nous: – “the big mind and big heart”

 

The miracles of Jesus, The Church Fathers – re: each of us having “two” minds, Metanoia as the antithesis of “paranoia”, Henri Nouwen on this in With Open Hands.

Fleshing out the concept Biblically. What does it mean to live out “metanoia”?

1. Metanoia as an invitation to live in “Compassion”, to be compassionate as the Father is compassionate – Luke 6:36.
2. Metanoia as an invitation to practice a deeper virtue than the Scribes and Pharisees – Matthew 5:20-26.
3. Metanoia as an invitation to reach out to the poor – Matthew 25
4. Metanoia as an invitation to ponder as Mary pondered, to help “take away the sins of the world” – to “transform tension”
5. Metanoia as an invitation “to take the ointment”, to let ourselves be loved and to enjoy God’s life flourishing within us – Luke 7:36-50/John 12:1-8/Mark 14:3-9/Matthew 26:6-13
6. Metanoia as an invitation to a radical charity that reaches through ecclesial and cultural norms to touch the poor – Luke 10:25-37.
7. Metanoia as an invitation to a “wider understanding” that does not stone others in God’s name with the commandments – John 8:1-11
8. Metanoia as an invitation to leave judgment to God and let the wheat and the weeds grow to maturity – Matthew 13:24-30
9. Metanoia as an invitation to have an inclusive heart and to be content only with a “whole number” -Luke 15
10. Metanoia as an invitation to give voice to human finitude and let “our hour come” – John 2:1-11
11. Metanoia as an invitation to not be a “money-changer” who blocks access to the temple – John 2
12. Metanoia as an invitation to take off our “outer garment” so a to wash each other’s feet – John 13:1-17.
13. Metanoia as an invitation to charitably accommodate those whose faith is weaker – Romans 15:1
14. Metanoia as an invitation to move from being good to being a saint – Luke 18.

III.     The Deep Wellspring to Draw from to live out Metanoia

Living under God’s Unconditional Love

• The revelation in the Cross – of God’s unconditional love, the cross as rainbow, what is revealed?
• The revelation in Creation and Nature – of God’s prodigal and reckless character.
• The revelation in Jesus – God’s passionate, individual care for each of us
• Living in awe but in no false fears of God

Drawing Strength from Prayer

• Jesus as paradigm in Luke’s gospel
• Some biblical images for rootedness in prayer: Steven’s martyrdom, the three young men in the book of Daniel, Jacob wrestling with God in the dust
• Daniel Berrigan’s advice
• The need for a healthy practice of Sabbath
• To live by grace and not just by willpower: the baptism of Jesus vs. the baptism of John the Baptist

Never Straying from the Essentials: Commandments for the Long Haul

• Pray – make sure both that you are touching divine energy but not identifying with it
• Keep grounded inside of family, community, and church – remaining inside “schools of charity” that keep you de-fantasized, grounded, and sane
• Put yourself under obedience so as to live beyond the ego with its myriad needs, wounds, indignations, and inflations – Be the knight not the hero
• Become Post-sophisticated – go back to the time before hardness of heart.
• Accept the non-negotiables of life and faith
• Life is hard and sometimes you will have to live with pain and with unresolved tension
• You will make mistakes, sin, hurt others, and stand in need of forgiveness
• Your life is not about you – respond to the consecration within your vocation
• You will experience dark nights of faith and of love, and of meaning.
• You, like Christ, are a dying and rising reality
• As you age strive more for forgiveness
• As you age strive more to live out of the ground of gratitude
• As you age strive more to live in hope
• In your relationships with others, never bracket the essentials: charity, graciousness, respect
• In your relationship with God strive for patience, patience in darkness. Learn to understand more by not understanding than by understanding.

 

(End of class outline)

Following are notes from talks Friday, Saturday, Sunday, June 16-18, 2017, King’s House, Belleville, IL, Fr. Ron Rolheiser

 

From Paranoia to Metanoia: From Self-Protection to Compassion

 

Fr. Ron, born in 1947, Cactus Lake, Saskatchewan. 1983, doctoral degree from University of Louvain, Belgium. Taught many years at Newman School of Theology, Edmonton, Alberta. Since 2005 he has been president of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas. Author of many books, including Holy Longing, Sacred Fire, and The Passion and the Cross.

 

Silence: Meister Eckhart. Silence is God’s language.

 

After 30 or 40 days of silence, we’d probably know each other as well as if we’d been speaking. Important inner work (and relational work) can only be done in silence. Spiritually, psychologically, spirituality is very important.

That is half of the equation. The other inner work is done by talking with others. We are going to be in heaven with other people. We are not born to be hermits. We are likely to go insane if we isolate and see/hear/speak to no one else.

Our kids, and us, use phones and other gadgets. They are sane as hell, because they are always connected and interconnected.

Silence gives depth. Communication gives you sanity. Not one without the other.

Introverts and extroverts gravitate toward silence and community. But both need both.

At these retreats, let’s handle silence like smoking. There are designated talking areas: the gathering room and outside. Meals and the rest of the retreat center should be in silence, until tomorrow night.

If you are on Rocking Chair Row, be silent. Quiet. Without words. Not without smiles.

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Brother Jeremiah, a monk, wrote our opening meditation. Famous line: “If I had my life to live over again …

“If I had my life to live over again, I would try to make more mistakes next time. I would relax. I would limber up. I would be sillier than I have ever been on this trip. I know very few things that I would take seriously next time around. I would take more trips. I would climb more mountains, swim more rivers, watch more sunsets. I would do more walking and more looking. I’d eat more ice cream and less beans. I would have more actual troubles and fewer imaginary ones. You see, I am one of these people who lived sensibly and sanely hour after hour, day after day. Oh, I have had my moments. If I had it to do over again, I would have more of them. In fact, I would try to have nothing else, just moments, one after the other, instead of living so many years ahead each day. I have been one of those people who never goes anywhere without a thermometer, a hot water bottle, a gargle, a rain coat, aspirin and a parachute. If I had it to do over again, I would go places, I’d do things, I’d travel lighter than I ever have. If I had to do it over again, I would take a lot more risks.”

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Metanoia. First word of Jesus in synoptic gospels. Translation REPENT and believe in the Good News. Not a great translation. Biblical meaning is more about turning than going from bad to good.

Meta means “above” Noia comes from nous – “mind”. High mind.

Early church fathers: every person has two minds and two hearts. A “pecky, petty” mind: wounded, defensive, irritated, racist, self-protective. Small heart. And we have a big mind, a grand mind, noble mind, saint-mind. Noble, wonderful. Big heart. We are BI-HEARTED. With less control than we’d like, we vacillate between the two.

Both of these are the true me. So much depends on the me I’m hooked to.

Jesus did not do miracles to prove anything. Never. He did miracles out of 1) straight compassion and 2) to show God’s power, over sickness or death (he raised two from the dead).

Eyes, ears, legs, mouths. Women are given back their power to bring life (hemorrhaging woman and 13 year old girl). Jesus wants to hook us to our big mind. metanoia.

Secondly, metanoia is antithesis for para-noia: excessively self-protective. para=irregular. noia=nous=mind

So many tried to protect Jesus. He just kept saying, “Let them come.”

Two cardinals about top priority: protect the church … save the planet.

Jesus’ manger was symbolic. It is the feeding trough. Jesus came to be “eaten up,” not to be protected.

Henri Nouwen, first book in English, With Open Hands. One image, metanoia and paranoia. Two postures to go through life with. Paranoia is a boxer with his fists up. Metanoia is Jesus-on-the-cross. Stretched out and unprotected.

Don’t protect yourself. Give Yourself Over. Jesus teaches us as an ethos, a whole way to think and live.

Our natural instincts keep us away from altruism and generosity. So we have our work cut out for us, if we are going to follow Jesus.

After the election of 2016, we are choosing to self-protect. America First.

Repent and believe. Trust. Move toward trust. All of Jesus’ teaching, Richard Rohr says, fits in one word: surrender.

The lines of good and evil do not go between us, they go through us. (American Covenant by Philip Gorski)

1. S. Lewis. The Great Divorce. The single condition that separates heaven from hell is the ability to trust another to lead you into heaven. Only 1 in 10 will do it. To go to heaven, you have to trust. Will you do it? Jesus asks it over and over, and then he does it himself on the cross.

 

Many Biblical texts on how to live in metanoia.

1. Metanoia is an invitation to live in compassion. Be in compassion as your heavenly father is compassionate.

Be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. Not “NO FLAWS,” as the word means in Greek. But in Hebrew, the word means “COMPASSIONATE.” In fact, Luke changes the word so we can translate it compassionate.

Last year Pope Francis called the “year of mercy.” Walter Brueggemann, OT scholar and scholar of prophecy, asked about the writers of the Bible, “What did they think was the essence of religion?” Three answers: a) proper belonging and proper practice – dominant until prophets came along, then b) the quality of your faith will be judged by the quality of justice in the land, measured best in three weakest groups: widows, orphans and strangers. Preferential option of the poor, then the wisdom figures go deeper to c) a compassionate, loving heart. Religion is about how you form your heart. If you form your heart well, you will serve the poor and you will have proper practice. I desire mercy, not sacrifice (Psalm 51). Beyond justice.

What does Jesus do with this? He infinitely complexities it. He ratifies all three. Follow the commandments. Do justice (Matthew 25). No religion, no proper practice in that speech. Jesus didn’t get called in the bishop’s office, but he did get crucified, partly for that speech.

Metanoia invites us to be compassionate as God is compassionate. In Matthew 25, Jesus says, “God is in the poor.” You are doing this to me. Be compassionate as God is compassionate. God lets his sun shine on the bad as well as the good, the righteous and the unrighteous. As the sun, God does not discriminate. He shines on vegetables and weeds evenly. This is the “most far-reaching text in Scripture.” God loves the saints in heaven and the devils in hell in exactly the same way. Mary and the devil in exactly in the same way. Nothing we do will change that way God loves us. WE HAVE TO DO THAT TOO.

God loves pro-life and pro-choice. Hillary and the Donald, evenly. Texans and … the rest of you, evenly. Just understanding this is difficult. There is still right and wrong, but love transcends that. Unequal moral positions are equally loved.This is the metanoia. Paranoia always gets in the way. Beyond the Abortion Wars, by Charles Camosy. 85% of us agree on abortion; the other 15% make all the noise.

Metanoia invites us into a deeper virtue than the scribes and pharisees. This is easy to misunderstand if we think of their hypocrisy rather than their sincerity. They were the ones who most sincerely practiced religion. Their virtue was the Ten Commandments, and the other commandments too. Secondly, they must be JUST, fair, not cheating anyone. What’s wrong with that? Jesus said “It’s still too easy.” Anybody can love those who love you, anybody can curse those who curse you. Can you bless those who curse you? Can you forgive a murderer?

Is there a litmus test for Christianity? Scholars say, and it makes sense, it is this text. Can you forgive a murderer? Justice gives back the energy it takes in. I love you, you love me. I hate you, you hate me. No virtue. Simply giving back. Love those who hate you. Forgive those who kill you and kill your kids.

John Paul II was the first pope in history to say, “We shouldn’t do capital punishment.” It’s not wrong. But we shouldn’t. Jesus calls us to something higher. To forgive murderers. Beyond little mind, just mind, fair mind. Beyond. Catharsis (revenge) is not the same as closure.

Redemptive violence allows us catharsis. But not closure. There is always another move in the game. Here is an example of closure. Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh had been a Buffalo, NY altar boy. One of the families went to Buffalo and befriended McVeigh’s family. While he was being executed, the two families were saying the rosary together.

We need to tell more of the good Catholic stories. When the dictator of Chile died, after killing many, one of his victims, now a leader in Chile: during his funeral mass, at the sign of peace, she walked over to her adversary’s side of the aisle, and extended the sign of peace. Don’t kill any enemy because it feels good. It does feel good, but you still “shouldn’t” do it. Asking us to go beyond the pharisees’ virtue is “one of the great morally-stretching texts” in the bible. And in any religion.

These are the first two of the points about metanoia. We’ll tease out the rest all day tomorrow.

7:30 mass tomorrow morning.

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Saturday morning, June 17, 2017 .

Poem. Today’s gospel … let your yes be yes and your no be no

A Ritual to Read To Each Other:

BY WILLIAM E. STAFFORD

If you don’t know the kind of person I am

and I don’t know the kind of person you are

a pattern that others made may prevail in the

world

and following the wrong god home we may miss

our star.

 

For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,

a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break

sending with shouts the horrible errors of

childhood

storming out to play through the broken dike.

 

And as elephants parade holding each

elephant’s tail,

but if one wanders the circus won’t find the

park,

I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty

to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.

 

And so I appeal to a voice, to something

shadowy,

a remote important region in all who talk:

though we could fool each other, we should

consider—

lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the

dark.

 

For it is important that awake people be awake,

or a breaking line may discourage them back to

sleep;

the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —

should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.

 

3. Metanoia is an invitation to reach out to the poor.

References to the poor abound in the Bible. In the gospels it varies from every 5th line to every 10th line.

We can’t be Christians and ignore the poor. Reach out, be non-self-protective, particularly to the poor.

“Nobody gets to heaven without a letter of reference from the poor.” – pastor in NYC

Charity and justice are not always the same thing. Good-heartedness living in silence in a culture of self-protection. What is at the heart of policy? If bodies keep floating down the river, what is up the river causing it? Charity handles the bodies; justice looks up the river.

Rich folks often give millions but don’t see how policy affects the poor. Social justice advocates see the policy problems but sometimes are just not very nice people.

4. Metanoia is an invitation to ponder. Mary. Mary pondered.

Greek – deep thoughts. Discernment. But in Hebrew – hold, carry and transform tension. Carrying the tension so as not to give it back to who/what it came from.

Example: as Jesus was dying, Mary stood beside the cross. She doesn’t speak; what is she doing? In the Hebrew verb for stand, Mary stood strong under the cross. She is pondering: holding the tension. “Today nobody can stop the crucifixion. Darkness will have its hour. But I can absorb, and not give back in kind.” She refuses to replicate the energy of violence.

Watch two videos back to back: Robert Waller’s “Bridges of Madison County” and “Sense and Sensibility.” In the first, the protagonists do not carry tension. They are in bed together within a couple of hours. In the second, the main character carries the tension of her love for years.

Freud used the word “sublimate” to describe this. Sublime is a word from this family of words. The experience of holding tension is sublime.

Rather than conducting or transmitting, as often happens in a crowd, we “hold,” we “stand strong.”

A crowd often transmits and strengthens the poison, while a water purifier holds the poisons and returns only pure water to you.

The scapegoat mechanism, from anthropology and religion. Until you reach a high level of maturity, a culture can’t create community without scapegoating.

You can have a wonderful dinner by talking about people who aren’t there. But you’re afraid to go to the bathroom! This works. We form community; we don’t look at our own differences because we’re looking at others on the outside.

We do this individually. Projection allows us to scapegoat someone else we see has our bad traits.

This is not the highest form of mature community or mature individuality.

At the time of Jesus there were liturgies of scapegoating. A goat was brought into the temple, to invest the tension of community with a crown of thorns. Purple drape on the goat’s back, represents kingship (the leader of us all). Then the goat was chased into the wilderness and died.

Jesus became our water purifier. He took in hatred and gave back love, bitterness and gave back blessing, took in murder and gave back forgiveness. He “pondered.” He held the tension.

Richard Rohr: Whatever you don’t transform, you will transmit. Kierkegaard, the great Lutheran theologian: this is not something to admire; it is something to DO.

We are hard wired to give it back; “pondering” is something we do out of metanoia rather than paranoia.

5. Metanoia is an invitation to take the ointment. Are you taking enough pleasure in your life?

Texts that are in all four gospels are important. The text is the story of the woman anointing Jesus’ feet. It is intended that we be shocked by her lavishness, especially in her role as a prostitute (perhaps) who has wasted her love up to this point. She uses the most expensive, cries and uses her hair and tears to wash Jesus’ feet. Most are judgmental; Jesus is accepting. “Wherever my story is told, so her story will also be told.”

Three levels of interpretation: 1. Don’t put flowers on coffins; give them to people while they’re alive. 2. God wants you to be happy, wants human flourishing. These moments are what ready you for your death. Your “bucket list” prepares you to die. You can die because you’ve been loved. Fr. Pat Collins: “If I died tomorrow, I’d be OK with that. I have been a loved man.”

So often, we want that the most but still push it away. Neurotic vs erotic (life-force). Guilty while we enjoy life. Jesus says, “Don’t. Don’t. Enjoy human flourishing, that is part of discipleship. It readies you to die.” (Not hedonism: wine, women and song. Not exactly.) Honor your creator and honor your own life by “taking the ointment.”

You don’t have to program in suffering. It will come soon enough. Don’t be apologetic about pleasure; be grateful for it.

If you visit a dying person’s bedside, and then go to your daughter’s birthday party, don’t feel guilty … it won’t be long before they are walking away from your bed! We will all get there.

6. Metanoia invitation to radical charity … story of the Good Samaritan.

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Session 2, Saturday, June 17, 2017

Opening poem by D. H. Lawrence

“Healing” by D.H. Lawrence

 

I am not a mechanism, an assembly of various sections.

And it is not because the mechanism is working wrongly, that I am ill.

I am ill because of wounds to the soul, to the deep emotional self

and the wounds to the soul take a long, long time, only time can help

and patience, and a certain difficult repentance

long, difficult repentance, realization of life’s mistake, and the freeing oneself

from the endless repetition of the mistake

which mankind at large has chosen to sanctify.

 

7. Metanoia invites us to a wider understanding that does not stone others with the commandments. John 8:1-11

In John’s gospel, Jesus is always God, not much humanity. Who writes with his finger? God writes with his finger. Jesus wrote in the sand with his finger. God wrote the 10 Commandments with his finger. Moses came down and caught the people in idolatry (adultery, only one vowel different). He broke the tablets and stoned the people with the commandments. The second time Moses went up God told him, “Don’t do violence in my name.” And this time, the people got it.

And in the story of the adulterous women, Jesus wrote in the sand and then as he spoke, the people got it. Walked away. One by one.

God does not look at us in our shame. He gives us the clothing to cover our shame (Genesis). Jesus said, “Go,” using the Hebrew verb also used in the sentence, “Let my people go.”

The scribes quoted Moses. They wanted to follow Moses’ first experience with the tablets, and stone the woman with the commandment as Moses’ stoned the people.

Second story: Susanna, falsely accused by two old men, walking to her execution, when Daniel calls out the people. They interrogate the two men, discover their lies, and kill them instead of Susanna.

John wants to catch a couple points. Susanna is innocent; this woman is guilty. But it doesn’t matter. God’s compassion falls on the just and the unjust. Our love must not go to the innocent and not the guilty. Equal sympathy for all.

Story from Rene Girard, from the diaries of Capt. Cook. Stayed in islands for four years. A man was killed for the gods. Cook was horrified. Said that in England, we would hang the chief for that! (Everybody laughs) Human sacrifice was done primitively by the ancients; we call it capital punishment. A sacrifice for God. Scapegoat for all our violence, our thoughts, etc.

But God is not interested. Be compassionate, as our heavenly Father is compassionate. Stop stoning people with the commandments. Instead reach out. It doesn’t matter if a person is personally guilty. Girard says the woman is “structurally innocent” as she stands against the “policy” of stoning. Standing against violence done in God’s name.

8. Metanoia is an invitation to leave judgment to God. (Matthew 13)

Matthew 13. Sowing of wheat and weeds (darnel, which looks just like wheat) in the same field. Should we pull out the darnel? No, you can’t tell the difference yet. We have to wait till the harvest.

Jesus told the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man. Its an old Jewish parable that continues. The rich man returns and is good for awhile, but then becomes selfish again. 10 minutes later he’s back in hell. The “unbridgeable gap” is our own problem. Not God’s.

Don’t judge. Leave judgment to truth and light. Go slow.

9. Metanoia is an invitation to an inclusive heart and settle only for a whole number (Luke 15).

Lost sheep, lost dime, lost son. For a Hebrew 99 is not a whole number; 100 is a whole number. The shepherd values completeness. All. Same thing with the lost coin.

Roman Catholicism, etc. is not a whole number. Ecumenism isn’t working at all on the pastoral level. Christianity is not a whole number.

10. Metanoia is an invitation to give voice to human finitude, and to “let our hour come.” (John 2, wedding at Cana)

Couple layers of meaning. Every fairy tale ends happily ever after, with a wedding. At the center of life, a wedding, Jesus comes with his mother to the wedding. They have no wine (not a protein, not a necessity, wine is an extra but it is part of the celebration). Don’t know why, but Mary notices this. She sees what is happening and asks Jesus to do something about it. She is giving voice to human finitude, human need. So Jesus’ miracle is a hospitality miracle.

Second level. Eve and God. Mother of humanity is standing at the center of life and telling God “It’s flat down here. No joy, nobody’s dancing.” The center of life, but it’s flat. Jesus/God says, “My hour has not yet come.” The “hour” always means the hour of his suffering and death. I haven’t suffered; I’m not sure can do it until I suffer. I haven’t put my life on the line yet.

This is key to the deep part of text. What brings joy/wine to the center of a community? Either there is joy/banter/wine in the house where you’re having dinner … or not. And business meetings are the same way. Are you going to eat shards of glass or drink wine?

In my childhood home we were poor, but there was always “wine” in the house. Mom and Dad brought joy. They put real blood on the line for this to happen.

As adult Christians we must give voice to human finitude, human need. At the same time, in the human family, we need to lay down our life, put blood on the line. If we do this, there will be joy in the house.

Jesus changes the washing water into wine, not the drinking water. There were many rituals of oblution. Six jugs at the door, 18 gallons apiece. That water was to wash yourself clean, especially to go eat at the table. That is the water Jesus changes into wine. “Replacement motif.” The mass is the sacrament of reconciliation (penance is secondary). Eucharist is primary. The water/wine purifies you so you can go to the table to eat (Eucharist). Jesus “replaces”, reconciles, our blood with his, our sin with his forgiveness. Also, Jesus was saying, “You did salvation this way; now it is changed. All previous religion is replaced by Jesus. – Raymond Brown, theologian, replacement motif.

So that is why it is the wash water that is changed to wine.

11. Metanoia is an invitation to not be a money-changer or block access to the temple (John 2).

More replacement motif. This is the story of the exchange of currency. Jesus’ upsetting this is what got him killed. It was the last straw. But Jesus was not upset with their cheating; he was upset about the exchange. There was something set between you and worship.

Remember John 4. Woman at the well asks where the true place is for worship. Jesus says, “In your heart.” We have direct access to God; we don’t need to exchange our currency for some other currency. We better not be the ones blocking anyone’s access. Be compassionate, as our Heavenly Father is compassionate. We are not the gatekeepers, or the money changers.

The Holy Spirit offered people on Pentecost the gift of translation. Not that everyone suddenly spoke Greek and Hebrew, but that the Greek and Hebrews were able to speak all the languages of the world.

Jesus is the gatekeeper; church is not. Theology is not. people are not.

12 noon. lunch and sabbath time. 3 hours of retreat. sun, rest …

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4 pm, session 3, Saturday, June 17, 2017

Opening, Poem by St. John of the Cross, part of The Ascent to Mount Carmel

To reach satisfaction in all,

Desire satisfaction in nothing.

To come to possess all

Desire the possession of nothing.

To arrive at being all

Desire to be nothing.

To come to the knowledge of all

Desire the knowledge of nothing.

 

To come to enjoy what you have not

You must go by a way in which you know not.

To come to the possession what you have not

You must go by a way in which you possess not.

To come to be what you are not

You must go by a way in which you are not.

 

12. Metanoia invites us to remove our outer garment, so as to wash each other’s feet. John 13

In John’s gospel, he doesn’t institute the Eucharist during the last supper. He institutes it in chapter 6, when he talks to the people about eating his body and drinking his blood.

When John was 90 he wrote the gospel (if he wrote it). 70 years of church life preceded his writing, and it wasn’t much different from today; they fought about everything.

In his gospel he has Jesus bringing peace through serving, through washing his disciples’ feet. In John’s community they had daily eucharist; the bread of life. You had to eat every day.

At the supper, Jesus knowing he was from God and going back to God, knowing all was possible for him, took off his outer robe, and began to wash their feet.

John would ask Donald to wash Hillary’s feet, Republicans to wash Democrats feet and vice versa, have pro-life and pro-choice people to wash each other’s feet. Eucharist means coming together beyond differences.

The outer robe is much more than clothing. It is all the necessary clothing we wear, all our preferences, all our habits. What we do. When we remove that, we are left with what came from God and will go back to God.

Jesus asks us, as he did, to remove the mantle of privilege and put on the apron of service.

But after he is finished, Jesus’ puts his identity back on. At the Eucharist, though, take it off. Be the essence that came from God and will go back to God.

13. Metanoia invites us to charitably accommodate those who are weaker in faith.

They might be right, but they should not be arrogant. Instead they should be patient.

14. Metanoia is an invitation to move from good to becoming a saint (Luke 18).

There is a long section on this idea in Sacred Fire.

The rich young man asks how he can possess eternal life. Jesus says, you can’t. You must receive it; you can’t possess it. It’s like breathing. Completely free. No sense storing it. Just keep breathing. Keep receiving. Since you are already doing so much, you need to give up everything.

He had already given up almost everything. So now had to give up the rest.

We have, inside us, two places. One is where God lives, the other is the place where we keep what we think we need to live. Unfortunately, we usually head for the second place when we’re in crisis, instead of the first place. Where God lives.

The rich young man’s sadness comes from … “When you reach a certain age of adulthood, you realize in life there is only one true sadness. It is the sadness of not being a saint. God settles for it as we give over more and more, but he always wants it all.

Jesus says to the disciples, “It’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven.” But it is not impossible for God.

This is the essence of the 12 steps. Impossible to do it, except through God. Will power has no strength, God does.

How do our possessions block our move into heaven?

Luke is most socially conscious gospel, but he doesn’t condemn the rich. Actually, he says it is good to be rich so you can be generous.

One group goes to heaven naturally, easily: little children. Not because of their innocence, but because they are helpless. They have no illusion about self-sufficiency.

The years of 18-40 are the years when we feel immortal. We don’t need God; we’re rich. The richness of self-sufficiency.

Parable of landowner and workers. Peter asks what are we gonna get, since we gave up everything to follow you. Rich landowner, God, hired people all day and paid all of them the same amount, no matter how long they worked.

Friend, didn’t you agree to this? It is addressed to all good Christians. Don’t watch what everyone else is getting. Enjoy the hundredfold, even if others get it too. Because they will. Be compassionate, as your Heavenly Father is compassionate.

Tomas Halik (Patience with God and two other books in English) Czech theologian, won Templeton Prize. The danger for all Christians is that we will become embittered moralizers. Like the older son in the Prodigal story.

Peter Fransen, professor at Louvain, wrote about grace. Ron is grateful to have had him as a teacher. Died soon after.

Drawing strength from prayer.

Jesus drew strength from prayer; his disciples asked them to teach them how.

Stephen, as he was about to be stoned, looked away and up, and saw God. He was praying, not so much for relief as for praise.

The three men in Nebuchadnezzar’s fire were praising God. Glory be needs to be said about God, so we don’t say it about ourselves.

Jacob wrestling with God. All night they wrestle and nobody wins. But God puts out Jacob’s hip, and he limps the rest of his life. You will wrestle, and in the end you’ll lose. But don’t stop wrestling.

Halik: our life is a struggle between our energy and God’s patience.

DAN BERRIGAN: Jesuit, died about a year ago, in his 90s: one of the places we can ground ourselves besides prayer is by working with the poor. He said he did care about the poor, but he also realized how much he needed to do it. After his last prison term he spent the rest of his life working in NYC cancer ward.

The only way to save ourselves from ideology is through prayer/gospel. Connect to something deeper. Compassion, universal love the way God loves us.

Now some Questions and answers …

How do I answer the question from John 8 (there is no way to God through Jesus). How do I understand this ourselves? Even stronger in Greek than it is in English. The only way, the only truth, the only life.

Balance it with other things in scripture. God has no favorites. Heaven is open to all.

Baltimore catechism. 3 kinds of baptism. water, desire, and blood. Desire for the truth. Blood, not just a martyr, but anyone’s self-sacrifice.

Contemporary theology: Rahner, Tillich, etc. Distinction between Jesus and Jesus Christ. Christ was not Jesus second name. It’s a title. Jesus the Christ. Christ = God’s anointed one. God’s “flesh” on earth.

Jesus said we will be saved through Christ. Not necessarily through Jesus. Christ is bigger than historical Christianity. We don’t control the mystery. There is a visible body of Christ and an invisible body of Christ.

Our intimacy is with Jesus. The person.

Henri Nouwen taught Ron, don’t pray to Christ, pray to Jesus. Until 1990, Ron’s writings were about Christ, after 1990 they were about Jesus. Jesus is person. Personal.

We are the body of Christ. Just as real as Jesus was. Tomorrow’s feast: corpus christie. The body of Christ. Eucharist is body of Christ, church is body of Christ, Jesus is body of Christ.

Texts about God shutting the door to heaven after death … God doesn’t shut the door, we do. Kairos, opportune time. If you miss it, you probably won’t do it later.

I think of Theo Epstein of the Cubs in 2016: “if not now, when?”

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Sunday, June 18, 2017, morning session. Final session 9-11 am. Followed by mass, lunch, departure.

Question about reconciliation and eucharist.

Mark 5. Woman. Two encounters with Jesus, she touched his hand and was healed. The second encounter came when Jesus spoke with her afterward. “Who touched me?” After this she was “completely” healed.

You are the body of Christ. Someone touches you; they are healed. But there is the sacrament of reconciliation. Imagine a day when you just snapped out of frustration. Everyone is suddenly quiet. You leave for a bit, but then you come out of your pout room and just sit there. Sit at the table.

There is something unfinished, but everyone in the house even when you just sit knows you are moving back toward them. The unfinished business is the 5th step. Say out your sin and apologize, to God and to a person.

The sacrament of penance is the sacrament of the mature. They apologize, they don’t just let their actions say it. If you’re not strong enough to say you’re sorry, you might be nice to the person you’ve hurt, and they know what it means. Saying it is better yet.

The primary sacrament is “touching the hem of the garment,” which just means going to church, or taking the eucharist. We are the body of Christ, so your family … just be being with you … is forgiven.

The secondary sacrament, of confession, is the place to “finish.” The more mature movement from sin to apology, through confession.

Mortal sin means you have cut yourself off from the body. That is different from “invincible ignorance.” “Culpable ignorance” is like Dobson’s willful disobedience. It’s a step deeper and further from forgiveness. But even when the guards knew they were crucifying Jesus, they did not know what they were doing at the deeper level. They didn’t know how God loved them.

Mortal sin is the “unforgivable sin” Jesus mentions in Mark. It is not a behavior, other than the self-cutting off myself from the body. The body of Christ. Behaviors, sins of omission and commission, are all held under the umbrella of God’s compassion.

I’ve been with a few folks who think they have committed the unforgivable sin. Their response to God is the response of the unloved. They will not accept God’s love, unconditional is not OK. They must earn something they cannot earn. The armor around them thickens and hardens, and they feel alone. Even a bit of admission/confession begins to break down the armor. But there is no hurry. God’s in no hurry. The armor will gradually dissolve. Word by word. Moment by moment. Love by love.

Now … we will look at sabbath and some of the commandments.

Rooting yourself in prayer. Concept of sabbath.

Sabbath is meant to be part of the rhythm of life: work for six days, one day of rest. Seven years and have one year of sabbatical. Forty-nine years and then the world goes on sabbatical for a jubilee year. Then you live all your life working and then go into the eternity of rest.

Sabbath. Ordinary work is supposed to stop. What constitutes servile work? Can you cut your lawn on Sunday? The lawn guy can work on his computer; the computer guy can cut his lawn.

Rest is number 2.

Celebrate is third. And most important.

Roll back the clock 60 or 70 years. Look at Sunday.

Saturday night bath. Put on your Sunday best. (Anthropologically, very healthy) CHURCH – high mass on Sunday, low mass during the week. Sunday dinner. Ice cream mid-afternoon. Lounge around the rest of the day.

This celebration is meant simply for the sake of enjoyment. Not for any other reason. Truly enjoy … once a week …

Orthodox church – if you’re a married couple, you are obliged to make love.

We have lost this, and we are paying a heavy price for it. There is nothing right about this. Celebration is lost. Rest is lost. Rhythm is lost.

Young woman in Austin, Lauren Cox, Jungian scholar, talk on acedia. The noonday devil. You don’t know why you’re depressed. You have a right to be depressed when it’s dark, but NOT WHEN IT’S LIGHT. Kathleen Norris’ book on acedia (Acedia and Me: A Marriage, Monk’s, and a Writer’s Life.)

Lauren Cox said we are depressed because we don’t have sabbath. Phones prevent sabbath. Always always connected. That’s good. And it’s bad. There is no sabbath. Never shuts down.

Practice a cyber-sabbath. Once a week, shut everything off. Example: priest’s family, 4 pm Sunday we unplug everything. For 29 hours we are un-contactable. At 9 pm Monday night we symbolically come off sabbath.

Rumi wrote, 700 years ago, “I have lived too long where I can be reached.”

We need the rhythm. 6 days a week of connection, 1 day a week – unconnected.

Women … Sunday might mean more work for her. We had a Saturday night-Sunday night sabbath for a couple years, but it got too hard for Margaret. She had to do so much to prepare, and her family (me) didn’t help enough.

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What is the difference between baptism by water and baptism by fire. Water can wash things clean. But it can’t change the thing essentially. Fire changes things. From wood to charcoal to coals to fire.

Diagnosis is easier than curing/prescription. What do we do in our moral lives? It’s easier to see what’s wrong with you (or myself), than it is to know how to change.

So John could wash, but Jesus could transform.

Catholics claim the power of will. I can do this! Evangelicals/calvinists are much less enamored of our will power. But for all of us, grace allows us to do what we cannot otherwise do. A lot.

Other people. Community of grace. Devotion to God, worship, congregation. Community of grace.

On retreat with Robert Michel, mid-80s by now, a retreat for priests. Very gentle man, he sits when he speaks. “I am going to try to teach you how to pray a certain way. Sometime in your prayer, open yourself up to hear God say, ‘I love you.’ When you hear that inside you, you will be transformed and you will begin transmitting exactly that.” God loves me. God loves you. I don’t just say it; I know it. The words don’t distract us from something else that’s more real; the Words are spoken OUT OF truth.

In the academic world we have done 60 years of amazing deconstruction. What is wrong here, what is wrong there … diagnosis par excellence. But we can’t even fix a toilet! The change, the transformation, eludes us.

What do we do about it? See Jesus. You don’t even need an appointment.

TEN COMMANDMENTS FOR THE LONG HAUL.

Become post-sophisticated.

Three words. Forgiveness, gratitude, hope.

Never bracket essentials of charity, graciousness, and respect.

Strive for patience, patience in darkness. Learn to understand more by not understanding than by understanding. (John 21 – when you are old, others will lead you where you do not want to go)

1. Pray to get connected. God working through me. Mother Teresa and her huge ego. Janis Joplin and her huge ego. One is a transforming power for us, the other catches on fire and is destroyed.

Cults: 220 plug, stick in your finger. Many cult followers die in fires.

For most of us, we are too afraid of inflation, so we never do great things.

Robert Moore introduced a San Francisco conference, “If you are here and over 25, you probably feel chronic depression a lot. Most folks who aren’t depressed, are assholes. Can we find a balance between passive and aggressive. The problem is we are so afraid of becoming what we shouldn’t be, we don’t go after it.

Enneagram 8’s, the healthy ones, lead the rest of us.

MBTI … ENTJ, INTJ. They lead the rest of us.

And the rest of us … we can go much further toward assertive spirituality than we do. Do Not Be Afraid.

2. Let the family/community/church knock the edges off. Like a rock polisher. Solitary spirituality is dangerous; you don’t have to answer to anyone. You are not able to spur one another on unless there is “another.”

In Toronto, Mordecai Richler, great Jewish writer, he gave a commencement speech. Why am I here? Not because I’m a writer, journalist … but because my adult children live in Toronto, and you’re the add-on. A free trip. Here is what I want to say: stay close with your families. The world will invite you to be an asshole. You don’t have to go there to be a good writer Stay close to those who help you rub off your rough edges. Don’t become an idiot messiah. Don’t listen to the world; it is wrong. Listen to your family. Let them help you grow.

3. Move beyond hard-heartedness. Become post-sophisticated. Jesus responded to question about divorce because of “pornea” or adultery, by asking, “What did Moses say?” He said Moses spoke as he did because of the hardness of your heart. It was not that way in the beginning. Pointing to a little child, Jesus said, “Become like this.” Go back to your original blessing, your original innocence.” And then answer your own question from that space.

But that original innocence cannot be retained. “The secret of life is to come to your second naiv-ete,” says Paul Ricouer. “Become post-sophisticated.” James Hillman asks us to imagine a two-year old asking about the sun’s evening setting. Don’t pull out the atlas and the globe. But at six or seven, pull out the globe. 15 or 20, pull out Stephen Hawking … ever-more sophisticated. But when we are age 70, go back to the first explanation, in the context of all that later knowledge.

Allan Bloom said his University of Chicago students were “more sophisticated than I am.” So what I want to do is help you relearn how to believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, and thereby restore you to the possibility of happiness.

We sophisticate ourselves into a lot of unhappiness. You know everything but can’t do anything. Move beyond liberal enlightenment.

Time’s up. Thank you! See you in the chapel in one hour.

 

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