In Search of the Holy Spirit

Part I:
     The Holy Spirit has filled the earth. I think this means we can find God anywhere. I haven’t been looking in the dark places because I have enough trouble finding him where the light shines brilliantly. But I know from stories that people have found God in some very dark places and times. The key seems to be able to look with simple eyes.
     We make ourselves too complex to see God. It hurts and we don’t know the reason why. We are made to see God; we are meant to see him. It is his will, what he wants, what he longs for. Jesus saw God in us, and when we nailed him to the cross he could not see the one he loved in our behavior. This is why he felt abandoned. Looking all around he could only see the pain of sin. If this is what he sees when he looks at us, then the pain of crucifixion continues. One gift of love that the Father gives to his Son, Jesus, is to see us abandon our sin and our darkness, our unnatural complexity, for the sake of love.
     I think sometimes in doing so we take upon ourselves some of his pain, at least for a little while. I have no other way to explain why, when we make up our minds to follow Christ, we are suddenly plunged into darkness…

Part II:
     At the end of prayers yesterday evening there was a note in our prayer book. It says, “The Easter season ends with the conclusion of Evening Prayer.” Boom. Close the book, it’s over. That’s how it felt. Easter Season isn’t just the seven weeks after Easter Sunday. For me it begins earlier on Ash Wednesday. Though that day marks the beginning of the Season of Lent, the whole journey anticipates Easter and the days following, where we walk in the light, a light that was kindled even earlier, at the very beginning of Advent, with a message from Paul, “May the God of peace make you perfect in holiness.” He wouldn’t have said it if it wasn’t possible. The whole journey throughout the whole year—indeed through our entire life on earth—is for that one purpose: to become holy. When I am sad, when I am lost in darkness, when I cannot see the love of God anywhere around or in me, I will remember that message, the message that drives our very lives: “May he preserve you whole and entire, spirit, soul, and body, irreproachable at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls us is trustworthy, therefore he will do it. “ 1 Thes. 5: 20-24
     He will do it. That thing we long for with unbearable intensity, that thing that burns us with the very passion of Calvary, it is God’s own work. What can I do to save myself? Nothing. What will God do to save me? Everything. And so I make a journey, from light into darkness into light again. Over and over, each time losing something to the cross, each time gaining something of the cross. God, it hurts!
     And if you asked me I could only tell you that I want it, want it, want it—for reasons I can’t put into words…

Part III:
     I think it all makes me a bit dysfunctional. How can we take care of the practical needs of life when we find ourselves walking the passion of Christ? Part of the solution is the necessary simplicity of faith in dark times. It makes us poor, yes, but there can be great freedom in both poverty and bondage, particularly the bondage of the heart in love with Christ our Savior.
     I went to the mountains for a weekend with my brothers and sister. When I arrived, those who had gone early had the camp ready, with tents pegged up and waiting. I just moved my stuff in under the cover and had an instant cell, a place to pray in privacy and wait for God to speak. I wanted him to speak so badly. But he sent wind. Three days and nights of it, unceasing, unrelenting, bending huge pines to the root. It was cold, dry, we weren’t allowed to have a campfire. I lit a small candle in my tent and prayed by the glow of a flashlight.
     It felt holy. I had a picture of my family, a small bit of incense in a pocket shrine I carry when I travel. I had holy water from Lourdes. And I had desire. I was ready. In the psalm it said, “Bless the Lord, all you winds!” So they did, heartily. As the days passed I divided my time between praying alone and being with my family. I noticed people peeking into my tent where the small altar was set out of reach of the wind. We ate (a lot!), told stories, laughed, played horseshoes. I missed JoAnne terribly, so much that I began to question why I had come or if I could ever go camping again.
     The campground is very high, nearly 8,000 feet, very beautiful and fun in its way, but I am not so young as I used to be. The thin air left me gasping and weak and now that I am returned, depressed from the extremes. It wasn’t as fun as I hoped. But God did speak to me in the very prayers I clung to for comfort. He told me that I don’t do it alone. I never do it alone. He never leaves me alone. Though I cry out with Jesus “Father! Where have you gone?” He isn’t gone. The Holy Spirit whom my heart was seeking, has already filled the earth. There is no place I can go where God isn’t already, and completely. That is what He wanted me to see, from the top of that high, windy mountain. The Spirit I seek has already been given to me. The journey in every season is already completed. All I have to do is be opened… Ephatha…

Part IV:
     “Deep in the darkest night, you kindle a fire that never dies away.”
     I didn’t understand that the Holy Spirit is fire. I heard the stories but I didn’t understand. The forest we camped in is under threat of fire. It was a hard winter with over five feet of snow. Some of it was still on the ground when we arrived. A large number of trees were broken off during the winter so there is a lot of heavy, dead wood laying around. One spark and the fire that comes will come hard. My brother swept the forest with his arm and said, “See how fires have opened up the woods!” A fire will come and the landscape will be changed. Perhaps I will see it again, perhaps not. I haven’t figured that out yet.
     The fire of the Holy Spirit was kindled in me long ago, when I was baptized. There is nothing more for me to do to “earn” this grace. If I am a dark night, the fire is with me, in me. I don’t need to search for it. It has already begun its work of opening me up, this blog is proof. I couldn’t have spoken to you so freely about God in the past. Everything that is weak in me, everything that is sick or fruitless is being burned away. That is not merely conversion, it is the whole life of faith. It is what I long for and pray for and cannot do for myself. The Spirit comes hard on the forest of my soul and opens it up to let the light in, to start new growth. It’s no fun right now, but I have been praying for faith, and the pain I feel is a sharing, yes, with the saving agony and the joy of Christ. The Season of Easter is over, but the grace continues. Like the great wind that sweeps across the Mogollon mountains, the Holy Spirit will not leave me alone. When the work is done, when the days of conversion are fulfilled, stillness and new life will follow. This is the springtime of my soul…

Giving Justice A Hand

     Last night JoAnne and I attended a convocation of the Valley Interfaith Project where we heard a variety of stories from the community on local issues and concerns. There were a thousand people gathered from groups and associations of many kinds. These groups are organized for community action, and they form a strong coalition working at the grassroots for positive changes. The excitement was real.
     It was the first time I can say I was being political. I could feel the underlying process, the real power of democracy. It reminded me of the activism of the Sixties and it gave me hope. I have been praying to be of use to God, as a Franciscan, to find my gifts and use them all while there is time. Change seems to be very important to God and time is the measure he uses, all for our benefit.
     One speaker said that "justice is not real unless it is embodied". To me that means it's not enough to talk about things. We must act for change to happen. All my life I've been a talker. Last night I signed a form to attend another meeting in June. The Valley Interfaith Project is building energy for September and will be making itself heard in Arizona. But they are associated by commitment to larger associations reaching beyond our local cities and borders to link hands across the nation. I know I am just beginning, but I feel the connection. I am not just a talker anymore. I am giving my hands to the work of the Spirit in Arizona. How this will turn out I can't even guess. Maybe I will need another blog!

Rain for the Spirit

     The days are turning dry. My cactus, after a fat winter, have bloomed and are beginning to shrivel down. The bursage and brittle bush once brilliant with Spring flowers are looking more like natural desert bushes, leggy and lean. By the time real Summer arrives, they will be dead, almost.
     It's called "estivation" and that means a strategy among plants that allows them to endure the tough desert conditions. They put their life into seeds and roots. The seeds scatter all over the land and wait, without changing, for conditions to be right. It may rain, it may even thunder and pour, but the seeds will not sprout if it is not enough. Among plants it might take twenty years or more for a seed to sprout.
     As for the roots, that's also a pretty nifty development. The roots endure underground, also waiting for the right conditions. They have enough food energy stored to restore what appears above ground, even after it has dried to a crisp. If fire should come by, or an S.U.V., or a cow, and the dry stems and leaves are taken, it can grow a whole new top. The creosote bush, I am told, does this with such skill and determination that researchers suggest some creosote plants are more than forty-thousand years old! We should be so viable...!
    
    So a person living in the desert has a lot to think about. One might walk out into the countryside on pale pink gravel and stand where there is nothing living at all--the whole land is bare. Another year, after a wet winter, go back to the same place and you can walk three feet above the surface of the land! The plants are so thick your feet don't touch the ground. Incredible!
     I am looking for this same effect in the Soul. Our faith is like the creosote root that endures many seasons waiting for God's grace. When it comes, no matter how bitter the past, faith is there ready to grow.

     I think whenever we pray, we should include a prayer for spirit rain...

Tradition

Someone told me this weekend that, by tradition, a blog typically has an entry every day, sometimes several.

Oh.

The problem I see with that (as a poet) is the ordinariness of such daily dialog. Who wants to hear the dull details of what my dog is doing?
So then we get to the heart of things.

Life is not always exciting. I do not always have “great thoughts”. Even the Spirit of God (once our attention is fixed) turns to drum at the dull details that, taken together, so often make up the fabric of our difficulties.

We know that Jesus noticed the daily details, the feathers on a sparrow, the fibers in a blade of grass, perhaps how many seeds there are in a blossom of wheat, which way the wind is blowing… I’ve been getting the message without noticing: God is in the details. So, I suppose that in the spirit of a correspondent sending back bulletins from the wilderness, I might be a little more dedicated to the daily job of keeping you informed. I’m going to work this morning. They will be serving Nachos as a way of showing their appreciation for teachers (and other staff) during Teacher Appreciation Week. My siblings are planning a camping trip in a couple of weeks. My friend, Brother Damien, O.S.B. had earned his Doctoral Degree. The garden waits for my attention. It is getting warm outside. I will leave the laundry on the line this morning to get some fresh air. I am building a bird feeder.
And like most people I worry about many things, definitely not a Franciscan charism, but what the heck… Here’s a news flash:



I’m not perfect.