I Am Already Against the Next War

Just saw a new bumper sticker and it hit a nerve:  "I Am Already Against the Next War".

CNN News had been reporting on a Pew Research Study regarding the attitudes of US Military Veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars in comparison to the attitudes of civilians about those wars and military service (CNN.com, 10.05.11).

The research suggests that “half of post-9/11 veterans said the Afghanistan war has been worth fighting. Only 44% felt that way about Iraq, and one-third said both wars were worth the costs.” 

“Most Americans remain supportive of their all-volunteer military. (Only one-half of 1% of the population has been on active-duty service in the past decade.) Nine out of 10 expressed pride in the troops, and three-quarters say they thanked someone in the military. But 45% -- higher than among military respondents -- said neither of the wars fought after the September 11, 2001, attacks have been worth the cost……Half said the wars have made little difference in their lives.”

I am not a pacifist.  I feel strongly that the use of deadly force for self-defense or the defense of others is justifiable and at times necessary.  It is an evil, of course, but to stand by and do nothing while we are aware of the real threat of violence by another makes us complicit in that violence.  I have the highest regard for those who serve honorably in our military services, police and first-responder services.  They daily put their lives on the line for others, which for me is a Christian calling (John 15:13).

Yet I am very anti-war.  As a student of history I question its value for anything other than self-defense.  As a Baby Boomer I remain highly suspicious of our nation’s use of war and support of proxy war since the end of World War II.

I suppose those attitudes put me squarely in the conclusions of the Pew research.  I honor and appreciate our military very much while questioning the way our government spends their valor and sacrifice. 

The fear of not being prepared to deter an enemy born at Pearl Harbor has continued and expanded long after Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  Cold War paranoia justified preemptive war in Vietnam, proxy wars in Angola, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, CIA covert disruption of Chile and direct military incursions into Laos, Cambodia, Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Grenada.  The justification for the preemptive invasion of Iraq in 2003 was contrived on misinformation and accepted by the public based on our outrage over 9/11 and our fears of future attacks. 

We can debate whether our world or our nation is better off as a result of our constant war footing since World War II but it would be hard not to argue that the United States is convinced that war is the answer to our security.  

As the Pew survey suggests our population is quite satisfied that fewer and fewer of our country men and women actually serve the military and pay the direct price for our militarism.  Few citizens question the morality or efficacy of the increasingly successful use of robotic weaponry to eliminate our adversaries in targeted assassination.  Few question the trade off in military strategy that has "only" lost 1,800 US combat deaths in the ten years of war in Afghanistan compared to the 58,000 in the eight plus years of official war in Vietnam.  The direct collateral damage to tens of thousands non-combatants has remained among the citizens of Iraq and Afghanistan while thousands of US families welcome home their wounded loved ones or bury their dead.

Is this peace? 

Why do we feel so afraid, suspicious and angry about our nation, the future...even our neighbors of different race and religion...if all this war was supposed to buy our security?

The Tenth Anniversary of the Afghanistan War motivated me to sit down and calculate.  In my 59.75 years our country has been at war for 22.75 of them….or 38% of my life!* 

I thank God for the men and women willing to defend me and our nation from the actual threat of attack.  And...I am already against the next war.

*I calculated the dates as follows:

Born in January 1952

Korean War                            

          June 25, 1950             -           July 27, 1953

Vietnam War                          

          July 30, 1964 Gulf of Token   -           April 30, 1975 Fall of Saigon

Gulf War I                              

          August 2, 1990            -           February 28, 1991

Invasion of Iraq:  Iraqi Freedom

          March 19, 2003           -           to date

Afghanistan:  Operation Enduring Freedom

          October 7, 2001          -           to date

[This reckoning does not include the covert wars in Latin and Central America, Africa and Asia supported directly and indirectly by the United States during my lifetime as well.]

Occupy Philippi

In the book of Acts while visiting the Macedonian city of Philippi the apostle Paul and his colleague Silas are beaten by a mob, whipped by city officials and thrown into jail.  Their crime was healing a slave girl of the demon possession that allowed her to tell fortunes in the market place (Acts 16:16-40).  Her owner objected to the healing of the slave girl because it took away from his profits.  

The story contains an extraordinary scene as the two missionaries, beaten and chained in the Philippi jail, are praying and singing hymns together.  Miraculously an earthquake breaks open the jail and their chains.   Before the jailer can commit suicide, due to his failure to keep the prison secure, Paul and Silas intervene on his behalf saving his life. Paul and Silas are freed, the jailer takes them home to clean and feed them; then he and his family are baptized.

Was this a first century version of "Occupy Philippi"?  Were Paul and Silas trying to make a public point of the inequality and injustice of institutional slavery?   Probably not.   Paul and Silas were more concerned about the evil possessing this young woman and making a public demonstration of the redemptive power of Jesus. 

Then again the proclamation of the Reign of God has always had economic implications. 

There are strong traditions of private capital and personal wealth in the biblical record. As there are strong traditions expressing concern for justice and equitable access to and control over the means of production.

The Hebrew traditions of Sabbatical set a 7-8 year cycle of land use by owners and insisted that the poor and disposed be given free access to harvest surplus (Ex 23:10-11, Lev 25:1-7, 20-22, Deut 15:1-6, 31:10-13).  The Jubilee set a 50 year cycle when land ownership would return to its original status and all people would have equal access to the means of food production, and all debts would be forgiven (Lev 25:10, 23; 27:2).   Both traditions assumed that a minority of people would use their time and talents to create wealth while the majority poor would be assured the basic necessities in dignity and fairness.

There is no historical evidence that the Jubilee tradition was ever practiced.

Yet as we listen to Jesus in the Christian scriptures, we can clearly hear the echo of these ideals.

   18 The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

   because he has anointed me

   to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners

   and recovery of sight for the blind,

to set the oppressed free,

   19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

(Luke 4, quoting from Isaiah 61:1-2; 58:6)

"The year of the Lord's favor..." refers to the Jubilee tradition which by Jesus' time also referred to the hope for the End of the World.  It was the expectation of the Hebrew people in the first century that at the End of Time God would liberate the Holy Land from Roman occupation as well as restore the fortunes of the oppressed and downtrodden.  That is why Mary joyfully sings of the impending birth of the messiah, "....the hungry shall be fed and the rich sent empty away...".

The story of Paul and Silas illustrates a central point in Jesus' teaching.  People are more important than profits.

-To illustrate the radical nature of grace, Jesus tells a parable in which a land owner pays a worker the same daily rate for an hour of work as the owner pays a worker who has labored all day (Mt 20:1-16).

-Irate that the money changers have taken over the courtyard of the Jerusalem Temple Jesus turns their tables over in a violent protest against the corruption that limits access to worship privileges by class (Mk 21:12-17).  

-Jesus invites himself to dine with Zacchaeus, who has grown rich by collecting taxes for the Roman occupation government (Luke 19:1-10).  The pious see Zacchaeus as a traitor and sinner yet Jesus is not only willing to eat with Zacchaeus but to forgive him, the result of which is a reversal of fortunes for the tax collector and the collected.

People are more important than profits.

In a pastoral prayer not too long ago Pastor Dirk Damonte said, "....oh God help us to imagine ourselves the way You imagine us....". 

For some reason the "Occupy Wall Street" scene flashed through my mind.  Here's a group of people, becoming a movement, that knows something is wrong in a society that allows, encourages and tolerates the enormous inequality in the distribution of its wealth.   And the Occupy movement feels empowered to say it.  What their dream is for the future, how they imagine it, doesn't appear clear at this point but they know it’s got to be better than the future that human society is producing now.

The God worshiped and adored in the Judeo-Christian tradition has a compelling imagination, especially for our future.

5 Every warrior’s boot used in battle

   and every garment rolled in blood

will be destined for burning,

   will be fuel for the fire.

6 For to us a child is born,

   to us a son is given,

   and the government will be on his shoulders.

And he will be called

   Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

   Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

7 Of the greatness of his government and peace

   there will be no end.

He will reign on David’s throne

   and over his kingdom,

establishing and upholding it

   with justice and righteousness

   from that time on and forever.

The zeal of the LORD Almighty

   will accomplish this.  (Isaiah 9)

   He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes,

   or decide by what he hears with his ears;

4 but with righteousness he will judge the needy,

   with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.

He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;

   with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.

5 Righteousness will be his belt

   and faithfulness the sash around his waist.

 6 The wolf will live with the lamb,

   the leopard will lie down with the goat,

the calf and the lion and the yearling together;

   and a little child will lead them.

7 The cow will feed with the bear,

   their young will lie down together,

   and the lion will eat straw like the ox.

8 The infant will play near the cobra’s den,

   and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest.

9 They will neither harm nor destroy

   on all my holy mountain,

for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the LORD

   as the waters cover the sea.  (Isaiah 11)

   My soul glorifies the Lord

 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

48 for he has been mindful

   of the humble state of his servant.

From now on all generations will call me blessed,

 49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me—

   holy is his name.

50 His mercy extends to those who fear him,

   from generation to generation.

51 He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;

   he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.

52 He has brought down rulers from their thrones

   but has lifted up the humble.

53 He has filled the hungry with good things

   but has sent the rich away empty.

54 He has helped his servant Israel,

   remembering to be merciful

55 to Abraham and his descendants forever,

   just as he promised our ancestors.  (Luke 1)

These are but a few of an entire tradition in the Hebrew and Christian scriptures that imagines the future of the human society with recurrent themes:

-no war and violence

-the inequalities between the rich and the poor will be addressed and reversed

-social systems such as financial institutions, courts and government will be just, with access to all, not just the privileged

-those who have been marginalized will experience healing and hope

However we understand these traditions there is no escaping that within the biblical record at least, God imagines a future where human society lives in peace, equality and justice.   Although framed in metaphor with apocalyptic personalities and implications, this future is also historic, to be played out in this world, in human time.

On paper the world is a much better place than it was a century ago and positively ideal compared to a 1,000 years ago.   Today our wars "only" kill and maim in the thousands rather than the millions.   "Only" 24,000 mainly women and children die of hunger related disease each day now compared to 40,000 just 25 years ago.   Most of the world's governments are democracies or include democratic institutions to greater or lesser degrees compared to a handful just 100 years ago.   The global per capita income distribution has increased dramatically in the last century, especially with growing middle class populations in China and India, the two largest nations by population.

The world is a much better place than it was.

Yet as a member of earth's privileged class that is easy for me to say.   The statistical truth of such a statement gives me little comfort.   Admonitions to the "only" to be patient, to work harder, study more may be realistic but seem painfully trite if not outrageous when 20% of the world's 7 billion people live on $1 a day.   My conclusions about the state of the world must be framed within my social status.    I do not know what it is like to go to bed at night not knowing if my children will eat tomorrow...or if they will be collateral damage in someone else's war.

Jesus and the tradition on which he stood didn't condemn private wealth per se but the greed and corruption that restricts fair access to and control over the wealth that belongs ultimately only to God.   It is greed that has driven the global economy to the verge of collapse; as governments have set policies to ensure their power rather than sound economics; as the financial elite have rigged the system of capital exchange for their own benefit at the expense of others. 

And it is greed that allows a slave owner to keep a slave girl in the market place telling fortunes for his profits at the expense of her soul.

Paul and Silas were not in the Philippi marketplace to advance their version of the Occupy Movement.  Yet their miracle story confronts the spiritual reality of economic injustice.

Doesn't it confront ours as well?

Do we imagine a future of peace, justice and equality where all human societies have enough?  Do we share God's dream for us, God's imaging of what we might become?  Or have we reduced our dream to the boundaries of what’s possible for 'me and mine and forget the rest'?

Long Live God, Long Live God...

I am trying to make sense of three tragic deaths in our parish during a two week period; good people ages 55, 20 and 3.5 years are gone from family and friends who loved them, from lives full of accomplishment and potential.  And there is no sense to be found.

When an aged one dies of natural causes there is grief to be sure and celebration for lives well lived.  But when one dies too young, their lives swept away by accident, illness or crime, the platitudes of religion seem empty.  There is no sense to be found there either.

For some reason I have been listening to music of the Broadway play "Godspell".  Don't ask me why, I don't know why, but I've found this good old 1960's music so comforting right now.  In the Finale after the crucifixion scene the chorus sings softly in repetition, building into a crescendo, "Long live God, long live God...".  It's the musical's answer to the death of Jesus and the Easter resurrection.

As I struggle to deal with these parish losses, the cross is about the only thing that does make sense to me, not that making sense is all that important in the face of tragedy.  Yet somehow we seek it, maybe to reorient ourselves after being knocked off center? 

For me the cross rather than an altar of atonement speaks to me of God's response to the suffering of the world.

The story of Jesus' life, death and resurrection has left us pondering lots questions over the years.  Not the least of which is whether God is omnipotent, in control of each and every event in our lives, and in Jesus' life.  If so, did God plot the death of his only begotten son?  Did God temporarily abandon omnipotence on the cross?  Or did God never have it to begin with?   Godspell's answer is trust in God no matter what.  In the face of mindless violence and the suffering of the innocent we sing "Long live God, long live God...."

Is it a shout of naive arrogance in the face of unwavering fate?   A sad hope on which to cling?   The insistence that love cannot die and in the end all that really matters is love.  Overwhelmed with grief and confusion I find the music so compelling.  What's that about?

The Christology of substitutionary atonement suggests that the cross is God's final and complete act of reconciliation, paying our price for sin in the sacrifice of his son; the supreme scapegoat of atonement for the sins of humanity.  Nothing need stand in the way of our relationship with God anymore.  God has done something for us that we could not do for ourselves (Romans 5).  "Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world" says John the Baptist (John 1:29).

Citing the cross, orthodoxy offers that what we perceive as evil in fact God is using for a greater good to be revealed to us at the End of Time (Augustine).  The notion of an omnipotent God named "love" (1 John 4:8-f) requires some greater purpose in the suffering death of Jesus, or any innocent for that matter, if such a loss is going to make sense.

Over the centuries people of faith have found great comfort in these doctrines as they deal with the suffering of the innocent.  These doctrines give reason to the unreasonableness that so permeates our living. 

I find them hollow justifications.  These doctrines rely on notions of divine omnipotence that leave God the author of violence, tragedy and brokenness for "a greater good".  And we call this God "love"?!

The primary word used for "love" in the New Testament is "agape" or "the love that seeks the welfare of another", even at the expense of one's own.   On the cross we learn that God's nature is so completely love that God shares our destiny with us...death, even the death of senseless violence (Philippians 2:8).  

In so doing the cross reveals the illusion of death's hold on us.  Death is not the opposite of life. The opposite of life is fear, the fear that drives us to find false security in greed and power as if such could cheat death; the primal anxiety that moves us to settle for an existence of survival rather than abundant living. 

This is not to diminish the impact of death.  Death is a real enemy of living to be sure, the "final enemy" all too often capricious in its brutality (1 Corinthians 15:26).   But death is a part of life as inherent as breathing or sleeping.  If God seeks to share our life incarnate (John 1:14) then there is no escaping death for God.  The Jesus story would suggest that as God embraces life so God embraces death on the cross and in so doing transforms both with resurrection (Moltmann).

The process of life, death and resurrection is found throughout the created order as the tree decays in the forest to build the humus for the next generation, as the seed dies to be planted in the ground for the next crop (John 12:24, 1 Corinthians 15:36), as the stars die in space to generate the stuff of new ones.  Death and rebirth are organic to life itself.  As organic as the human drive to avoid it.

If we accept that divinity is at the heart of the natural order, then as cruel and real as death can be it would not be suspended even for God.  The death of Jesus of Nazareth on a Roman cross more than a sacrificial altar is then a testament to the God that shares life with us, completely.  The God that weeps with us in grief (John 11:35).  The God that laughs, and walks and talks with us.  The God willing to share his wounds with us that we might be in relationship (John 20:25-f).

This is not an idol of omnipotence, in control of all events with its followers labeling those that result in evil "for a greater good".   Rather this is an incarnate God revealed in the life and death of a carpenter from the backwaters of Israel 2,000 years ago, whose teachings and examples are still very much alive in spite of the failures to institutionalize the message.  This God is a Fellow Traveler, a "friend" (John 15:9-18), the one Jesus called "daddy", the one we can honestly call "love".

Vulnerable to everything that humans face and their freedom to choose, divinity's power resides in the yearning for the best in each moment, the lure to greater and greater complexities of life and enjoyment, the spirit that binds all of life and time together.  The natural order is organized for life affirming, expanding, extending agape/love that cannot be snuffed out by death even when it is present throughout, in fact death is and must be a part of its journey.

Does this "make sense" of the sudden unexpected death by accident, crime or illness?  In no way!  There is no sense or reason to be found in such loss, only sorrow.  Yet these very tragedies may be occasions for great love.   And it is in that love that we can find redemption; something much different than rationalization.  

In a recent funeral for the murder of an innocent 20 year old college student Rev. Dirk Damonte answered the question on many minds, "Where was God when Kristina was murdered?  Where is God now as we are left with broken hearts?"   The Pastor said God didn't cause or allow her death for some mysterious "future greater good". 

The Pastor said God was with the community first-responders who did everything in their resources to assist the victims and their families and protect the public from the violence of the perpetrator.  To dedicate your professional life to serve and protect the public, whether police, fire, paramedic or hospital personnel is an act of agape.

The Pastor said God was with the community that gathered to support and comfort each other in the face of such tragedy, for it is in such community that we see the face of love.

To make sense of the senseless is certain human folly.  Yet to embrace love and affirm it in the face of suffering and death may be the only thing that can redeem the madness of this world.

There are things worse than death.  To never know love certainly is one of them.

"Long live God, long live God...."

"God is Great, Beer is Good, People are Crazy"*

Billy Currington's hit country and western song describes a fictional encounter between a "good old boy" and an aging millionaire at a honkytonk bar.  They are strangers to each other but fall into an intoxicated friendship.  After reviewing their lives, all the ups and downs, loves and losses, the wise old man says to the young one, "God is great, beer is good, people are crazy".   The cynicism and irony of such wisdom may be funny but it speaks volumes about our times; maybe one reason this song is still popular.

For example:

20% of the American population controls 84% of all its assets (Federal Reserve). 

The top-earning 20 percent of Americans receive 49.4 percent of all income generated in the US.  (Census)

Yet 52% of Americans think it is wrong to suggest that the United States is divided by class, by economic differences between "the haves" and the "have nots"; if they had to choose 48% would identify themselves as "the haves", 34% as "the have nots" (Pew Research Center, San Jose Mercury News, 09.30.11, p.A-3).

Or:

64% of Americans support the death penalty in cases of murder; 70% in California.  A majority of Americans agree that innocent people have been put to death by capital punishment.  A majority also say that the death penalty is not a deterrent to murder.  People know the facts about the death penalty and they support it anyway.  Religion makes little difference when it comes to capital punishment; as an example, the poll cites statistics showing death penalty support among the majority of Roman Catholics in spite of a long held tradition by its hierarchy against it (Gallup Poll, NPR,"Its All About Politics", 09.23.11).

Or:

At a recent Republican Presidential debate, FOX News arranged for an openly gay Army officer to ask the panel of candidates what they thought about the end of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy that discharged openly homosexual members of the military services.  When members of the audience booed the service man, stationed in Iraq, not one of the candidates objected...until it was brought to their attention the next day by the media. (09.23.11)

Currington's song suggests that in the end all that one can really count on in life is God and "beer"=the personal experience of pleasure.   People can't be counted on; in fact all you can count on is their irrationality.

I wouldn’t question his conclusion about beer or necessarily the irrationality of human beings but what does such a conclusion say about the nature of God?   What does it mean to "count on God" when it would appear that God is irrelevant or ignored by the majority of God’s people?

Where is God in the lives of a consumer nation, the most blessed among all on earth, which is so seduced by materialism that we don't even recognize our own marginalization? 

Where is God in a nation which affirms revenge and retribution as social policy, ignoring our own religious traditions? 

Where is God when those seeking elected office, all quick to assert their religious convictions, refuse to stand up for military volunteers when it isn't politically popular to do so?   Or are they asserting their religion by condoning such ridicule?

This God is either so passive as not to interfere with human history, content to watch it spin on its own (Aristotle) or so impotent as not to be able to affect the behavior of its followers.

How can one count on a God like that, let alone affirm "God is great"?!

It’s unfair of course to make too much of this song's theological assumptions but you have to wonder if they are not accurate.   Are we as a nation comfortable embracing God as long as the Divinity doesn't interfere with our preconceptions….as long as we keep God on our terms?

The God that Jesus of Nazareth calls “father” promises a future when the fortunes of the “haves and have-nots” will be reversed and everyone will have enough (Isaiah 11:4, Luke 1:52-53, 4:16-21), when justice will be tempered with forgiveness (Luke 22:42-43) and when the social outcast will be welcomed as an equal (John 4).

That’s a God that is great, One that can be counted on.

*(Bobby Braddock, Troy Jones 2008)

Baseball & Kids

Jesus said, "Let the children come to me for to such belongs the Kingdom of Heaven." (Matthew 19:14)

I was reminded of this truth at a recent San Francisco Giant's baseball game.

The church organized a group to attend the August 26 game against the Houston Astros.  Group tickets are inexpensive but notoriously "less than prime".  We were seated in Section 331, Upper View Box, way down the left field foul pole.  In order to see home plate the only view possible was to turn 45 degrees in one's seat.  Never-the-less, it was still fun to sit with 40 church friends, root for the home team and tell the stories of games past.

Anyone in the Bay Area with a modicum of interest in the Giants must know that they have struggled mightily since the All Star break in mid-July.   Victories have been few and far between.  Injuries to their All Star players have been devastating.  I came to the game with an attitude of fatalistic cynicism about that evening's game, determined not to let the current disappointments take away from the glow of last year's World Series.

I was fortunate to sit next to Kevin, 10 years old, son of a friend and colleague.  Kevin plays catcher in Little League.   He is an exuberant baseball fan, cheering for every player.  He was very knowledgeable, funny and totally into the game.  He told me about some of his experiences in Little League.  I told him some of mine.  By the end of the game we were clapping together in the rhythms prompted by the organ music, shouting and yelling as the Giants won 2-1.

I really enjoyed sitting next to this kid!  He reminded me of why baseball is so fun.  And I needed that reminder with the way things are going for my team this year.

We tend to romanticize children as if all enjoy an idyllic life of innocence.  The reality for all-too-many kids is anything but that.  Even those children born in privilege face all the challenges life can bring.     

Jesus illustrates that pride can be an obstacle to faith when he contrasts the lack of hubris in children compared to his adult disciples.  It’s not that children are perfect.  In their vulnerability children need to trust and follow the one who offers authentic loving kindness in order to survive, to thrive.  One such source can be God, as Jesus welcomes the children into his embrace. (Mark 10:13-16)   It is a blessing indeed when that love is found in one's parents, family, teachers, neighbors and friends.    Without such warm and loving arms, a child's life is difficult if not destined to be tragic.

I have no idea what Kevin has faced in life or what his challenges will be, but that night I met a ten year old with a confident sense of self, a relaxed sense of play and a willingness to share a fun baseball game with a stodgy, aging stranger.  

Children can remind us of life without an adult's conditioned pretense and posturing; being in the moment, unashamed to enjoy.

Is that what Jesus was suggesting about God's loving embrace?

Thanks Kevin!  Go Giants!

Respect the Clay

To a potter time is one of the most essential tools.  One must have the right amount of time available to work with the clay in order to fashion anything useful or use the medium for self expression....or both.  The potter has to invest time into the clay as well as creativity, skill and intention.

Potters work with all sorts of clay.  From the finest white porcelain, as slick and sticky as cream cheese, to the roughest stoneware, dark from iron and as course as sandpaper, to plain and primitive terra cotta, the red earth from which most bricks are made.   There are as many types of clay as there are sources of the material.  Each clay has its own personality.   Plasticity, strength, color and maturing temperature when fired vary greatly.  Potters will develop affinity for certain clay bodies depending on technical requirements and subjective choices.   Over the course of a career a potter will often experiment with a number of clays but choose favorites to come back to again and again. 

From the time a clay is mined as chunks of the earth to the moment it is removed from a kiln firing as a finished piece of ceramic ware the clay is transformed.    Clay is mixed and refined in water then dried to a plastic state.  Only then it can be useful to a potter.   Once the craft person begins work with the clay, he/she has a set window of opportunity, within the parameters of the clay itself, to manipulate and shape it to their purpose.  If it is too wet it will not hold a shape.  If it is too dry the clay becomes brittle and cracks.

There are a number of stages during which the artist can form and texture the clay unique to that stage alone.   To center the clay on a moving wheel it must be its most plastic, but in that state the vessel cannot be pulled higher than its base can support the piece's total weight.  One cannot fix a handle on a coffee mug until the clay is "leather hard", i.e. it has dried to the consistency of leather.  The potter will learn quickly by trial and many errors what is each clay's cycle, its strengths, and its weakness according to the purpose intended.

The potter must respect the clay.  Respect its limitations as well as its potential.  The potter has to put aside his or her agenda and learn the cycle of the clay unique to its properties.

Sounds odd, doesn't it?  "Respecting" an inanimate object, especially one so common, so cheap, so simple.  Yet, if anything useful is to evolve out of the clay, if human beauty and expression are to be added to the clay, respect is an absolute requirement.

In the second creation poem of the Hebrew book of Genesis (2:7), Yahweh, God, breathes life into a handful of "dust" ("dirt", "earth", "clay") to create the first human being.  Other cultures offer similar myths of the creation of humanity from a divine handful of clay.    Spirit animates the most common of physical materials to become life.  Modern science confirms that when broken down to the molecular level human bodies are made from the most common elements in the universe; the same stuff as the stars.

Is the clay artist mimicking the divine process of creation?  Aren't we all when we address any relationship, animate or inanimate, with respect, acceptance, creativity and intention?

Mantra Mantras

While a sophomore in college studying cultural anthropology in South India I was introduced to a Brahman form of meditation by professor Ram Chandra Rau of the University of Bangalore.   He taught us the introductory meditation breathing and posture common for all adolescent Brahmans.  One aspect of the discipline is the recitation of a "mantra", an phrase repeated to the rhythm of the breath as a means to focus one's mindfulness and chase away distractions.  This phrase can be spoken out loud or in the silence of one's mind.

We were encouraged to adopt our own individual mantras.    I chose an ancient Christian prayer of confession, "Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner."  It fit for me in so many ways, including the rhythm of my breathing.   I have practiced this form of meditation, in varying degrees of commitment, since 1972.   The mantra usually begins or ends my personal prayers and has become like a dear friend.  By taking a few deep breaths and repeating my mantra I physically relax and refocus in almost any situation.

For the last eight weeks I have been taking the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation (PAMF) campus.   MBSR is offered nationally in hospitals and medical centers for pain management and a host of physical/psychological challenges.  Mine is the struggle to get a good night's sleep!   Sharing my struggles with a trusted friend, she referred me to the MBSR program at PAMF having taken the course herself.  She found it a blessing.  It has been one for me as well! 

Research confirms the health benefits of MBSR practice.  The class offered participants many new practices of mindfulness, new resources on the subject and has encouraged us to adopt and adapt a daily practice.  I've added yoga to my regular meditation discipline as well as some other fascinating options including a walking meditation.

After a yoga and breathing "warm up", a participant is asked to walk at a normal pace in sync with one's breathing rhythm and the silent recitation of a mantra.   As a non-sectarian program based on ancient Buddhist spiritual practice, MBSR suggests generic mantras.    Such as silently counting steps or repeating such phrases as " Breathing in....breathing out" or "I am arriving, I am at home, right here, right now".   A walk can become a moment of attention to the stimulus of sun, wind, sound and our connection to the world around us;  it can help us tame the distracting thoughts that recycle again and again in the mind; it can "ground us" in the here and the now as we move to the rhythm of our bodies in motion.

I've been experimenting with walking meditation during my almost daily 4:00pm excursion from the church office to Starbucks across the street for my afternoon tea. [After living over 5 years in former British colonies...India, Kenya and Malaysia...I am a committed tea drinker, especially as my energy wanes at the end of the day!]  Its an easy walk, only 10 minutes each way.

In class I liked the instructor's introductory mantra for walking, "I am arriving, I am at home, right here, right now".  It worked for my stride and my goal of connectedness with the moment. 

From the very first day my walking mediation mantra has evolved into "Jesus Christ, Son of God, right here, right now".   Quite unconsciously I have melded my 40 year Christian tradition into my new MBSR learnings.

Which for me is a perfectly natural and good thing to do.

In the wonderful prayer attributed to the Apostle Paul we hear, "I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breath and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God." (Ephesians 3:18-19)  

Can you hear the paradox?  "I want you to know that which cannot be known; this reality we call the love of Christ."

Prayer is that dialogue in all its myriad of forms that draws us to the presence of the Divine in each and any moment, to know that which can never be fully known.  The practice of mindfulness, which does not claim or require the articulation of such divinity, never-the-less opens one to it.  

Mary Oliver, in her poem, "The Messenger", writes of those who would open themselves to the spirit found in all of creation "...and this is our work.....to remain astonished".  Prayer, mindfulness practice, worship, compassionate service, acts of justice and so much more can be means to do just that.

What would your mantra be?