Guns and an Evil Spirit

A young person purchased military style weapons in Nashville. This person shoots her way into a Christian school and proceed to kill 3 adults and 3 children before being killed by the police. The response of politicians seems to be that they can do nothing. Wasn’t it the politicians who made it possible for this person as well as many others to purchase these weapons? I am reminded of the 3rd century hermit monk, Evagrius, who taught about the eight passions. Those passions will be later interpreted as sins or the work of the Evil Spirit. Evagrius wrote that the first task of these evil passions is to blind the person(s) to their presence so that they will not be able to see the evil spirit that has inhabited them. Isn’t it ironic that the Evil Spirit is also named the Prince of Darkness in John Milton’s Paradise Lost. It seems to me that the Evil Spirit(s) are alive and very efficient today and our sense of “paradise” has surely been lost. There have been too many public evidences of the Evil Spirit(s) work although too many of our leaders seem to be blind to its presence.

Religion is to "bind back"

The word “religion” (from the Latin “ligare”) which means “to bind back” or to become whole. Religion is the means whereby we are being bound back to our original intent which is to love God, others, and ourselves, i.e., Jesus’ Great Commandment. At least this Great Commandment was what the early desert monks believed to be the definition of a mature faith or being perfect. Unfortunately, when we think of religion today what comes to mind for many of us is: buildings, Churches, denominations, clergy, money, doctrine/dogma, Sundays, songs, etc. There is some truth to that as religion frequently involves those activities and things. However, religion is about love and not merely the feeling or sentiment of love, but the commitment to genuinely care about God, others, and self. I fear many churches and denominations have also become lost with a preoccupation with buildings, programs, doctrines, dogmas, rules, ethics, etc. It seems that all of us, individuals as well as institutionalized religion, need to be bound back to our Divine purpose in creation. “Lord, bind us back to Your desires for us.”

Religions are Like Languages

I believe that all religions have a common source which is the Divine. Recently I read the following quote from Rabi Shapiro and immediately thought “YES! This is it.” My ‘mother tongue’ is Christianity, especially protestant evangelical, Baptist, white, and middle-class Christianity. I honor and respect my background and am grateful for the foundation which it has provided me. Nevertheless, my desire, which I attribute to God, is to grow beyond my Christian birth inheritance. I am grateful that God has given me the blessing or gift of an insatiable and wide curiosity. Our languages and concepts are but words pointing to the Divine, they are not the Divine. I share his quote with gratitude to Rabi Shapiro. “To me, religions are like languages: no language is true or false; all languages are of human origin; each language reflects and shapes the civilization that speaks it; there are things you can say in one language that you cannot say or say as well in another; and the more languages you learn, the more nuanced your understanding of life becomes. Judaism is my mother tongue, yet in matters of the spirit I strive to be multi-lingual. In the end, however, the deepest language of the soul is silence.” Rabi Rami M. Shapiro

God's Is Love

There is a theory that Jesus’ death on the cross was to pay the penalty of our sins. A penalty which God demands. That theory is labeled “substitutionary atonement.” Many of the Protestant “Reformers” taught this theory which may have first been taught by Anselm (1033-1109). That theory seems to make God to be an angry and punitive Deity. That is the concept with which I grew up. It was a significant part of my “imbedded theology” (what was imbedded in me from my up bringing in a Baptist church) or my “folk religion” (what my folks taught me). That idea has bothered me for a long time. The Bible teaches that God is love (I John 4:8). That section of I John also says that Jesus was our atoning sacrifice. The sacrifice was not because God was angry but because God was showing us a better way, a way of love’s redemption that will go to the utmost for our sake. God is love! Jesus’ parable of the prodigal son is about the father who lovingly and continual looks for his son, not to punish him, but to welcome him back to the family. I choose to believe a loving not a punitive God.

Fear, Trust and Faith

In Matthew’s gospel there is a rather dramatic story of Jesus walking on water. The disciples are caught on the lake and the wind is against them. They are not making any headway. Jesus comes by them walking on the water. When Peter recognizes that it is Jesus, he asks to come to him. Jesus invites him and Peter leaves the boat and begins walking on the water toward Jesus. When Peter sees the waves, he becomes afraid and begins to sink where upon Jesus reaches out to pull him up. Whatever else faith and trust could mean, it has something to do with not being so afraid even in difficult circumstances.