Encountering Divinity Through Community

Encountering Divinity Through Community (Or…. Is It The Other Way Around?)

January 10, 2010
by Rev Emma Chattin

Words of the Mystics -  Thoughts for Reflection

“The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere. They’re in each other all along.”
~ Jalal ad-Din Rumi (Persian Poet and Mystic, 1207-1273)~

“You are not a human being in search of a spiritual experience. You are a spiritual being immersed in a human experience.”
~ Teilhard de Chardin quotes (French Geologist, Priest, Philosopher and Mystic, 1881-1955) ~

“The trouble is that everyone talks about reforming others and no one thinks about reforming [themselves].”
~ Saint Peter of Alcantara quotes (Spanish Mystic and Founder of the Discalced (i.e. barefooted) Friars Minor. 1499-1562)~

Every natural fact is a symbol of some spiritual fact. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

“Your task is not to seek love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” ~ Jalal ad-Din Rumi ~

“(said of God ): If this is the way you treat your friends, it’s no wonder you have so few!”
~ St. Teresa of Avila ~

Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit.
( Bidden or not, God is present. )

A  statement that Carl Jung discovered among the Latin writings of Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536), who declared the statement had been an ancient Spartan proverb. Jung popularized it, having it inscribed over the doorway of his house, and upon his tomb.

The fault of others is easily perceived, but that of oneself is difficult to perceive.  The faults of others, one lays open as much as possible, but one’s own faults one hides, as a cheat hides the bad dice from the gambler. ~ (Buddha, Dhammapada, vv. 252, 253) ~

Reading

~ from Nevada Barr in Seeking Enlightenment Hat by Hat: A Skeptics Guide to Religion

Church is for finding and adoring God in community: with others, through others, because of others, in spite of others.  Only by finding this place of human interaction, focused around the need for the spiritual, was I able to recognize God in other people, and so in myself.  Without community, how would I learn to share?  Who would I help?  How would I learn to accept help? … Community is God rubbing elbows and passing the tuna casserole, a place where we can snuggle down with the Divine.  Though I’d never have suspected it when I began this spiritual journey, God is not separate from people.  Sure we’re hypocrites, liars, boasters, blasphemers, and cheats, but we are God’s hypocrites, liars, boasters, blasphemers, and cheats.  The spark is in each of us.  When we work together for what we sincerely hope is good, worship together in the belief we will touch God, sing together in the hope (God) hears our praises, then the spark is fanned, and God becomes as visible in us as God is in new snow, or a sunrise, or in a mountain lake.

Sermon

Good Morning.   And welcome on this very binary morning of 01 10 10.

My father would begin all of his Sunday morning services with “Welcome all who gather here today, this is God’s House”,  and I learned at an early age exactly what that meant.

We were stationed at Mt Carmel Methodist church in Covington, VA, and whenever I heard that phrase, I always took some pride in it.  After all, THIS was God’s house.  Our place.  Our little church was where God lived.

As I went to school, I had Jewish & Catholic friends, and while I knew some of the differences between us, I took a secret sanctimonious pride… that our little church was God’s place, God’s pad. This pride continued to swell in me, until one day, I blurted out to one of the church members that this was God’s house, Mt. Carmel was where God lived.  The member, I can’t remember his real name, but everyone called him Chestnut, looked down at me with that bristly burry flattop haircut of his (which my have been the source of his nickname), and pointed to the front of the church.  Behind the altar and pulpit, at the very forward part of the church, hung a HUGE burgundy velvet curtain as a backdrop.  Chestnut told me that God lived behind that curtain.

I should have paid attention at that point to his wife, Margaret,who slapped him disapprovingly on the arm, and told him he should be ashamed of himself.  But I just thought she didn’t want Chestnut giving out any big church secrets.  So the next time I was at the church with dad, while he went off to do something in the office, I wandered into the sanctuary.

Now … there is just something about an empty church space. I have walked through so many in my time.  Each different. All the same.  The stillness.  The fullness.  The emptiness.  I can’t explain it.  It’s like a beautiful flower vase… with no flowers.  The house of God… with no people.  It’s very Zen.

I made my way to the front of the sanctuary, and I crawled beneath the large table behind the pulpit, and set out to look behind the curtain, feeling a bit like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, and wondering just what God might look like.

At that moment, I heard my name being called. It echoed around the church & boomed down from the arched ceilings.  
I nearly …. O…   Well… The second time my name was called it was much closer, and I recognized it as my father’s voice. He asked me what on earth I was doing, and playfully grabbed my shoe and pulled me out from beneath the table.  I somewhat sheepishly told him I was looking for God.  He just stared at me, puzzled.  I was an odd child and a mystery to him in so many ways.

I told him that Chestnut told me that God lived behind the curtain. Dad gave a little huff, a cross between amusement and frustration, and he reached over and pulled back the curtain.  I was stunned.   God looked like a brick wall.  A big huge red brick wall.  With really sloppy masonry work.

Dad saw from the look on my face that I was shocked.  He kneeled down and looked me in the eye… “Why are you looking for God?” he asked.   I said… “Well, this is God’s house…. where does God live?”

Dad smiled… he tapped my chest…. God lives here,….  and then he tapped his chest…. and said and God lives here….  and God lives in and fills in the space in between us…. I asked if God lived elsewhere… in Chesnut, for example.  Dad laughed, and said yes… and in our next door neighbor…. in the mail carrier….  We are all made in the image of God.  And God’s house is wherever God’s people gather together… In praise…. in worship…. in celebration …. in support…… and in love.  From that moment on, I began my journey of spiritual growth, moving beyond the walls that contained me, and I never saw communities or church structures in quite the same way ever again.

I think back to that moment now whenever I think about one of the central questions of my profession: Why do people come to church?  Why gather together in a spiritual context?  What are they searching for?  What are they seeking?  Are they, like I was, seeking God?  And do they find what they are looking for?

Why are you here this morning?  What have you come to find? What have you come looking for behind the curtain?   God?  Divinity?  Presence of the Spirit?  Truth?  Healing?  Wholeness?  Illumination?  Each other?  One, Any, or All of the Above?  And… instead of finding what you are looking for… do you sometimes encounter only a brick wall?  And I might ask… do you sometimes look like a brick wall to others?

I think the gathering of people who are seekers, and people who sincerely wish to be in authentic relationship with one another, is a sacred thing. Sanctuary. Sacred space.  Holy Ground.  In whatever way you might recognize or honor that.  And part of being in an authentic relationship is an awareness of the way our lives touch, impact, and change one another.

If the relationship that we have formed over the years, me and you, has touched you or moved you in some way,  know that I have been moved and changed by it as well. As a community, you challenge me, stretch me, encourage me to look at old things in new ways. You nourish me. Here I have met people here from so many spiritual paths…  and I cherish making connections… I treasure the places where our paths cross…. where our footprints meet.

A good example of how this community shapes me?  I could not find a scripture reading for this Sunday from the Bible, although I knew which way spirit was leading me. I was looking so hard, but nothing ever surfaced.  
When Martha, the facilitator for today said…. “Do you really need one?”  Well, I have always had one… and … I… you know…. Well…

Martha was right.  Hers was the voice of spirit speaking to me.  Do you really need one?  No.  Because the entire Bible is about two things…. Divinity and Community.  All the commandments.  The laws.  When Jesus was asked what was the greatest commandment he said: Love God with all your heart and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.  Upon these two hang all the law and the prophets.  Divinity and Community.

We come together.  We change each other. We transform.  We touch.  We create.  We are a spark of Divinity.  We are star stuff.  And together …… we stir truth among us.

Simple truth.  Complex truth.  And the beautiful truth of a child’s world. If a church is the House of God  (or, in other words: Divinity.  Truth.  Illumination.  Healing.  Transformation).  Then…. Here is the church, here is the steeple, open the doors, and look at the people.

We are linked, woven together… It’s about connection.

In his book, Guerilla Marketing, Jay Conrad Levinson tells of this legend from Australia. It is said that when two aborigines meet for the first time, their first task is to talk with one another until they find a common relative between them.  If they exhaust all possibilities and no link is found, they can’t be friends, and they must fight one another.  At times they have been known to search for days for this link!

There is a binding desire to connect, share, co-exist. Even in the process of talking with one another, of sharing, they come to form a bond.  They don’t want to be enemies.  They WANT to connect.

I think a desire to connect in some way, to find common points of connection, is very important in making a space where truth is uncovered, where Divinity is revealed.

While I have met people who begin conversations with things that divide, I am always drawn to those who seek connection, and I don’t think any one group embodies that desire to connect more than mystics.  What is a mystic? .  Wikipedia suggests (with some paraphrasing) that a mystic is one who seeks and pursues communion with, identity with, or a conscious awareness of an ultimate reality.. divinity… or truth.  Rumi, a Persian sufi mystic, said that the only religion of the mystic is God.  And it is true that mystics of various faith traditions have far more in common with each other than they do with those in their own faith tradition who are more conservative.  Mystics are blessed with a desire to connect, and would much rather spend time looking for those connections than sorting out any differences.

Beyond a desire to connect. I think another important characteristic of a sacred space is hospitality.  Creating a welcoming space. And I think another significant part is to recognize and realize that we are not in control here. That’s a powerful life lesson that I think spiritual community can teach us.  Should teach us.  We are not in control.

Father Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest, puts it like this: Sacred space is by definition liminal space (threshold space). Because we are not in control and not the center, something genuinely new can happen. When we surrender control, look beyond ourselves, step outside of our ego driven desire for control, amazing things can happen.

Racecar driver Mario Andretti puts it another way: “If everything seems under control, you’re just not going fast enough.”

It’s less about answers  .. and holding on …  and certainty, and more about questions, and letting go, and mystery.

Rhor goes on to point out that control is not our task. And yet the opposite of control is not non-control or giving up.  The opposite of control is actually participation. Or, in the words of Captain Jean Luc Picard of the Starship Enterprise: “Engage”. Engage your community!  Become a part of it!  Connect with others!   Participate!

And be aware that we often find the greatest growth at the edges… Where the edges meet… where sharp points meet sensitive places…. And where the places of someone else’s wounded-ness touch our own anxieties.  Listen to these things.  Know when you have encountered a brick wall.  And… know when you may BE the brick wall.

Welcome others, Participate in the process, seek to make connections… These are the things that create a space for Spirit to move among us and through us.

We search for ourselves, we wonder who we are…. We come to this place, we search for God… Truth… Illumination… Warmth… We sometimes crawl under tables seeking the face of divinity…

I want to share a bit of a poem by Hafiz, the Persian Sufi poet and mystic (d 1390).

You are the Sun, the light in disguise.
You are God hiding from yourself.
You are a divine elephant with amnesia
Trying to live in an ant
Hole.
Sweetheart, O sweetheart
You are God in
Drag!

We are all God in Drag!

I enjoy watching  a TV program called Big Bang Theory. It’s about four geeks – outcasts, socially awkward individuals – who somehow create community among themselves.   The series creator, Chuck Lorry,  usually flashes his vanity plate at the end, the name of his production company, but he also flashes a screen full of text… writings, musings, thoughts, (sometimes profound, sometimes profane, sometimes just plain amusing) flashing across the screen for a whole 1.5 seconds.  If you have a recorder, you can stop and read it, or you can visit a website on line.

Recently… one screen read:

“A wise man once told me that we are all God in drag. I like that. Sometimes when I’m in a public place or sitting at a stop light, I’ll watch people walking by and I’ll silently say to myself, “He’s God. She’s God. He’s God. She’s God.” Before long I always find myself feeling a warm sense of affinity for these strangers. The experience is even more powerful when I do this while observing a person who is clearly suffering.”

He goes on to break the mood of the moment with some off color joke about FOX News…. but still…. a beautiful reflection… and one that left me deeply moved, even more so for the fact that this beautiful bit of theological wisdom was being spread by the creator of a television comedy. Connections are often created in unlikely places.
Wisdom is where we find it.

Sometimes the things, the walls, the divisions, the things that divide us… the curtains … the brick walls….  are all of our own making…. our own creation…. by our own hand… the divisions are ours …  … the divisions  are us.

If we can begin to look beyond ourselves…. moving into the sacred space a space where we may encounter both the human and the divine woven together… … then not only are we creating space in which we might encounter Divinity….  but we are making space in which Divinity may create new things using us as the material ….

A space in which Spirit may work and create through community.

So perhaps some people gather in spiritual community seeking a glimpse of God, … Divinity, Truth, Illumination, Warmth, Healing, Wholeness… and then discover all of these wonderful people within each of whom resides a bit of they seek, OR … Perhaps some come here looking for community and human connection, and then discover something a bit more than meets the eye.

Why did you come here this morning? What were you looking for?

It is my hope and prayer that you found it and that you will continue to find it in each other.May it be so.