I love it
when one task leads to a place we love to be, but never would have gone there
on our own. Let me explain. Recently, I had agreed to do a little speech
for a group that I enjoy. When I agreed
to do it, I did not really think much about what I actually would say when the
time had come. Well the time came! And I had to come up with something.
The focus was
clearly going to be on a 20th century figure, who played a key role
in the adoption of spirituality into the Protestant world. In some exciting ways this Protestant
discovery of spirituality (primarily within Catholicism) coincides with my own
life. It has significant roots in the
1960s. It has something to do with
Vatican II, which opened in 1962. No doubt, there are elements of the
Vietnam War and the whole Civil Rights movement wrapped up in this
history. For me personally, it is a trip
down memory lane.
So as I began
to think about what I could do, it dawned on me that I could compare this
luminary 20th century figure to a Quaker whom I know interacted with
the luminary. Most people would not know
much, if anything, about the Quaker.
Everybody knows about the other guy.
This of course, drove me back into the writings of the Quaker, namely,
Douglas Steere.
Douglas lived
throughout much of the 20th century.
He was born in 1901 and lived until 1995. He was a philosophy professor at Haverford
College, a Quaker college outside Philadelphia.
He had a rich life as professor and social activist. He and his wife were very involved in the
reconstruction work after WW II. He was
involved in the Civil Rights movement.
And the best part was the fact that I knew Douglas personally. He and his wife had come a few times to the former
college where I taught. Both were
amazing people.
So for the
first time in a very long time, I had an occasion to go back into some of the
writings of Douglas Steere. He was most unusual in that, as a
non-Catholic, he had immersed himself in the world of spirituality. His doctoral work was on a 19th
century spiritual director. He traveled
to Europe in the 1930s and spent a month in a Benedictine monastery. Clearly, he was a non-Catholic pioneer into
the rich trove of spirituality.
I turned to
one of my favorite books of Steere, namely, Together
in Solitude. It is actually a
gathering of essays he wrote on special occasions. For example, one was written from Rome when
he was an official observer at Vatican II.
How cool, I thought, to be non-Catholic and be in the Eternal City at
the momentous occasion of Vatican II!
So I began
reading the first few pages in an essay entitled, “Common Frontiers in Catholic
and Non-Catholic Spirituality.” The
beauty and insightfulness of his words came back to me again and again. Steere suggests there are those common
frontiers and similarities for the Catholic and non-Catholic alike. For example, he says, both groups could agree
“that as creatures, our loving back to God is spasmodic, inconstant, and
anything but continuous, that we require infinite encouragement, and that there
must be countless occasions of restoration to an awareness of the constant
action of grace.” I could not agree
more.
Certainly my
“loving back” to God is haphazard. I
like the ways he puts it: spasmodic, inconstant, discontinuous. These ring true to my experience. On my good days, I do a decent job “loving
back” to God. Some days I make a good
instrument for the Divine incarnation.
But other days---too many other days---I am hopeless! That is why I was helped by more words from
Steere.
He continues
by saying, “I believe we could also agree in assuming that conversion is
continuous and, that, in spite of one’s intentions, there is no such thing as
the total commitment of a person to grace.
Instead there are ever new areas in one’s life, and in the life of one’s
time in which on is immersed, that call out for further grace.”
If conversion
is continuous, then I have hope. If
today I do not do very well, tomorrow is another chance. And with some grace, I have an even better
chance. And that leads to the final
words I want to share from Douglas Steere.
Steere nails
it when he acknowledges, “All of this means that we are unfinished creatures
and nodes of unfinished creation even when we have been drenched with grace, and
that we require all the skilled assistance that can be given us in the
continuous process of increasing self-surrender and inward abandonment to the
grace that the Christian life calls for.”
That says it
perfectly for me. I am an unfinished
creature. Actually, I am relieved. Life is the call to finish being a
creature. Spirituality is the promise
that grace abounds and will help in this finishing process. I’ll work on it today. And since conversion is continuous, tomorrow
I will have at it again. I will “love
back” all that I am capable of doing this day.
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