Faith & Life Inspirational Message

Out of my rather aimless thinking recently, an important idea moved to the front of my mind.   Recently, I was on a flight.   That is not unusual.   I am not one of those business folks who seemingly fly all the time.   But I do a fair number of flights in a year’s time.   So there was nothing unusual about this one. I began to think about the process of having moved on board the flight.   There are the usual instructions to fasten seat belt, what to do with the life preserver in the event that you go down in water, etc.   I wondered if I could remember any of this in the event of the real danger.   I fear my assumption that I have heard it all before and know it all would be severely tested!   I need to pay more attention. It began to dawn on me, as I thought about the process of flying, how much trust is demanded of the passenger.   Again if we were to think about it, we would realize how true that is.   And yet, like me ...

I know what to do with pride.   All the spiritual literature tells us to be careful about pride.   In the Christian list of sins, pride ranks right up there.   Pride is usually linked to our egos.   Pride typically is rooted in an egotistical attempt to have it our own way.   So I get it, when it comes to pride.             However it gets tricky, because that might imply the best way to avoid pride is to be a loser in life.   Don’t anything good or important and you will have no problem with pride.   Be a disaster and pride will never haunt you.   We can poke fun at this perspective, but it can teach us that aiming to be a loser in life is stupid.   And most people are not stupid.             As I thought about it some more, it occurred to me that an alternative to pride is confidence.   I would never argue they are syn...

If you live in an academic world like I do, commencements come around annually.   Actually, some bigger schools have more than one commencement per year.   By now I have done countless commencements.   It would be interesting to know how many students I have seen walk across the stage to shake someone’s hand (usually the President’s hand) and receive a diploma.   I am always happy for them.   Commencements have a great deal of ritual that makes the ceremony more interesting.   One of the obvious rituals is the school’s alma mater.   Not all of these songs are great music, but they do have interesting phrases about the history and hopes of the school.   There are also other distinguishing features that help the graduates feel a sense of connection to their schools.   I have “heard” too many speeches at commencements!   Many of those speeches were given by some rich people who would be given an honorary degree.   Of course, I un...

The title of this spiritual reflection is a direct theft!   It is the title of a wildly popular class at Stanford University in Palo Alto, CA.   Stanford is one of the highest quality colleges in the world---an elite school which sometimes must seem like that for the elite.   It is one of those places which almost never elicits the response, “Where’s that?”   And if you went there, you would never be asked, “Is that a good school!”                I found out about the course at Stanford from a tweet on some site I follow on Twitter.   The article that described the course was fairly long---certainly for a tweet.   Some of the material covered was interesting to me, but not really pertinent to this inspirational reflection.   But one focus I found fascinating and, in some ways, see it to be suggestive of the spiritual journey.   I would like deal with that focus.    ...

One of the journals I regularly read is the National Catholic Reporter.   While I am not a Roman Catholic, it is important to me to know what the Catholic Church is doing.   I know there are over one billion Catholics in the world---about one out of every seven people on the globe is a Roman Catholic!   Those numbers are staggering to this Quaker who is used to dealing with small numbers.            It is instructive to follow the Catholic Church through the lens of the NCR, as it is often called.   It routinely reports on the current Pope and current issues facing the Church.   Some of these issues are solely the issues of the Catholic tradition.   Some of the issues are also issues for Quakers and the rest of the Christian group.   And some issues are issues for every major religious tradition.             I have been reading this periodical...

It is hard for me to imagine anyone seeing the three words that form the title of this reflection---peaceful, happy and strong---not wanting a share in all three.   Can you believe anyone would say, “Nah, I prefer war to peace.   I prefer conflict to peace!”   Can you imagine anyone saying, “I much rather prefer sadness and despair to happiness!”   And it is just as difficult to hear someone saying, “Heck, I’d much rather be weak and hurting than be strong.”   Anyone in his or her right mind wants to be peaceful, happy and strong.            The real question is not whether I prefer these attributes, but how do I get them?   Is there anything I or we can do to make them come true?   Or do we simply have to wait, sit back and hope to become peaceful, happy and strong?   The good news is, there are some things we can do to bring peace, happiness and strength to ourselves and to others.  ...

As a graduate of a couple schools, I get my share of alumni magazines.  Additionally, I get the magazines from some of my two girls’ various universities.  Rather than toss these, I am actually intrigued by what the different universities are offering for my reading.  Clearly in the case of my two girls, I was not the intended audience.  But I am interested in what some of the nation’s best schools want their alums to read.             In my own case I clearly am the targeted audience.  Certainly the Divinity School I attended is assuming people like me are reading this material.  I am old enough now and far enough away from the intellectual epicenters, I am not on the cutting edge of religious scholarship.  I am ok with that.  I appreciate scholarship, but also find times when the scholarship is too far out there---too arcane---for the kind of ministry I am doing.  I also am reminde...

Sometimes it seems those of us who strive to live some kind of spiritual life, try too hard.  Saying such does not mean I believe the spiritual journey is so demanding that we need to see it as a herculean effort that only strong folks can manage to do.  Actually, I think the journey may be fairly simple.  Theology can become quite complex, but the spiritual walk itself is relatively simple.  I think that is probably true in all the major religious traditions.  I am convinced it is for Christianity.  I suspect it is also true for my Jewish friends, my Buddhist colleagues, etc.             There are some basic components to the journey.  Faith is surely a beginning point.  Somehow we need enough trust to begin the walk.  There has to be some commitment to develop along the way or we would not continue.  Commitment is formed through a process of discipline.  Surely any journe...

I enjoy getting a new book and diving into the ideas contained in it.   Sometimes I have a fairly good idea of what I will get; other times I have little to no clue what I will read.   A recent read is a book suggested by one of my favorite columnists, David Brooks.   I read Brooks in the New York Times online.   One of his columns mentioned a book by an editor of a poetry journal.   It was a book that was intriguingly religious in Brooks’ estimation.   I became intrigued, too, and jumped into My Bright Abyss by Christian Wiman. I had never heard of Wiman, so I had no idea what to expect.   The book is very engaging, but not an easy read.   The are ample examples of poetry, which is fun for me, since I don’t know that much about poetry and probably don’t understand and appreciate it like I could.   I feel like I am growing.   I feel like I am learning and being challenged.           ...

The story of Thomas, as we find it in the New Testament, has always been one of my favorites.   Today is the feast day for Thomas, so I bumped again into the story.   If you are not familiar with the story, let me share it.   We find it in John’s Gospel.   The time frame for it comes after the resurrection of Jesus.   The resurrected Jesus was in Jerusalem on Sunday evening appearing to some of the gathered disciples.   As it turns out, Thomas was not with them.   When Thomas comes, the disciples told him they had seen the resurrected Jesus.    Thomas’ reply is classic.   He says, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.” (20:25)   With these words Thomas expresses what so many of us surely would have exclaimed.   I can certainly sympathize with Thomas.   After all, Jesus had been his friend.   His friend had been horri...

I sometimes wonder what would have been my journey if I had taken the other fork of the road?   I am not being flip.   I assume that we all have come to numerous forks in the road.   We have to choose and when we do choose, heading down one particular way, we know the other road at the fork that we did not choose is lost to us.   We will never know what life would have been like if we had chosen that other road.   I don’t lament lost choices.   I don’t regret any of my choices---although they certainly have not all been good choices!   But I do wonder. One of the good choices I made was to continue being a reader.   Clearly there were choices in my life, where if I had made them, would effectively have meant that I would have quit reading.   Oh, that does not mean I never would have read anything.   There probably are many jobs that people do that entail no reading.   But most people working those jobs are literate.   They c...

From time to time, I return to something I have read years before.   I guess that is one good argument for a library!   In our technological culture I am sure there is less book buying than I did.   That is not a bad thing.   But I still do like to have a book to hold in my hand, to underline and place back on a shelf in the hope that some day in the future, I will again pull it off the shelf and re-read parts of it.   I did that just yesterday.   I am working on some guest lectures for the near future.   It is a topic that I have given some thought to, but have never actually lectured or spoken publically about this theme.   This is an odd place---a place where I have been many times.   The topic given to me to address is one that I am quite happy to do.   I have many, many thoughts, ideas, and half-baked suppositions running through my head.   On one hand, it feels like I know quite a bit and could stand up right now and speak ...