Faith & Life Inspirational Message

Recently I wrote about mapping the Spirit.  I was drawn to this idea by the two large maps I have on my wall.  One is the map of the United States and the other is a world map.  Frequently I stop by one of the two maps and look at it.  I often look at places I know so well---like my home state and at North Carolina where I went to college.  I often thought I might live in that state again, but that becomes increasingly unlikely.  I also like to look at places I have seldom been.  Occasionally, I look at a state like Alaska, where I have not yet been.  Some day… This exercise suggested to me that we can have a map of the Spirit.  This means to me that I have a picture in my mind which charts the places and times the Spirit might normally be with me.  Or maybe I should say I am with the Spirit---which probably is an issue of awareness.  And there are other places and times when I am less likely to be in the Spirit---or perhaps not at ...

I got the idea that it probably is possible to do a kind of mapping of our spiritual lives.  I then recalled a book on my shelf by James Fowler entitled, Stages of Faith, which he wrote at the end of the 1970s.  In some ways this is what Fowler does in that book.  I knew Fowler and appreciated his work, although I have not thought about it or used it for some time.  In the process of thinking about this idea of mapping the spirit, I also learned there are a couple other ways people are doing work by this name.  One group of people understand that spirits inhabit certain places and demons occupy other places.  They choose to map the spirit, which is trying to identify those places which are spiritual in order that they may live in those places and cultivate those places.  And obviously, they would want to know the demonic places in order to avoid those places or to battle the demons in those places.  While this sounds like a fascinating area of stu...

I am fairly certain people who only see the title of this inspirational piece will misunderstand what I plan to do.  Typically, we think about shelters in a two-fold way.  In the first place shelters are those designated places people can go to in times of danger.  Hurricanes and tornadoes will send people to shelters.  Often the shelters are schools, maybe the local YMCA or military building.  Shelters are designed to put us in safer places than our houses and work places.  The second meaning of shelters suggests places of incarceration.  It is where we send troubled teens in order to protect the community and the teen himself or herself.  In this piece I don’t have either place of shelter in mind. Instead, I recall the opening line of the Psalm used in the last worship of the day monks have in their Liturgy of the Hours.  The monks call this last worship Compline---which means to complete the day.  For centuries monks followed the su...

Recently, my daughter sent the latest version of their family pictures.  I appreciate having a chance to see countless pictures of her, her husband and the kids.  Probably only my wife and his parents will care about seeing that many pictures of four human beings!  Of course, they look much like last year’s pictures.  In fact, I probably could not tell you the difference between the parents from last year till this year.  But the kids are still young enough that one year makes a difference.  They are still cute, but I know the closer we get to being adults, the less cute most of us become. Fortunately, I have long since come to the place where I would rather see these pictures than pictures of me.  I am no longer cute!  That is assuming I ever was!  But I did use this occasion to think about pictures.  Naturally, pictures have been created by painters for quite some time.  And we know long ago painters painted pictures on the wall o...

A big part of why I continue to read as much as I can is how much it helps me be informed and figure out what I think about myself, God and our world.  I suspect reading is necessary to mental growth.  I know I am growing older---everyone is.  But I don’t want to get stuck or become content with where I am.  There is so much need for new perspectives, new answers and even new questions. I know this is true when I reflect on myself and what I know.  I feel pretty secure in some of the things I know.  I know I love my kids and can’t image anything changing that love.  I know I love my kids, but I also know I have to switch to language of faith when I talk about not being able to control how they think or what they do.  I have faith they will do things in the right way.  I have faith that they will be good parents to their own kids.  In this sense faith is different than knowledge. When it comes to God, I realize that faith is more prim...

In this country we find ourselves at Memorial Weekend.  Clearly, the description of the weekend is unambiguous: memorial means remembering.  It is the “Remembering Weekend.”  There will be parades to highlight the festivities.  The little parade in my suburban town is so quaint and tiny, it is hilarious.  Of course, there are the boy scouts and girl scouts.  There are all the Little League baseball and softball players.  The fire trucks gain attention because the siren going off in your ears at a distance of 15 feet is dramatic!  And finally, there are always the politicians! The other thing that is a staple for Memorial Weekend is the visit to the cemetery.  Now that I am living in a much larger, urban context, I am less aware of folks going to the cemetery.  When I was a kid, I did not really understand this ritual.  No one significant in my life had died.  There was no one “living in the cemetery,” as I once p...

From time to time, it is important for me to write about some standard issues in spirituality.  One of the most standard issues, surely, is prayer.  Certainly in the traditional Western religious traditions---Judaism, Christianity and Islam---prayer is seen to be central to the practices of the religion.  Prayer is commonplace to these traditions, and yet I am sure many followers within these traditions find it difficult to pray on a regular basis.  And many probably don’t even care. I recall the opening words of her chapter on prayer in her book, An Altar in the Word, when Barbara Brown Taylor says, “I know that a chapter on prayer belongs in this book, but I dread to write it.” (175)  I am sure she gets a laugh from her audience when she reads out loud the following couple sentences.  “I am a failure at prayer.  When people ask me about my prayer life, I feel like a bulimic must feel when people ask about her favorite dish.”  She follows this ...