Givens Creative

Life at the intersection of faith, nature, history and art

Scripture

You’re in the Right Place If…

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Washed ashore. Freeport, Grand Bahamas. SJG photo

Tonight on our drive from St. Louis north to Des Moines, Iowa (en route to visit friends in Minnesota) we listened to Krista Tippett’s “On Being” interview with Fr. Greg Boyle, SJ, of Homeboy Industries, who has worked with gang members in some of the toughest neighborhoods in LA for decades. During the interview he said this:

“I read once that the Beatitudes’ original language was not ‘blessed are’ or ‘happy are’…but that the most precise translation is ‘You’re in the right place if.’ I like that better. It turns out the Beatitudes is not a spirituality. It’s a geography. It tells you where to stand.”

Which got me thinking…

You’re in the right place if you can stand and embrace your poverty and that of others, for one day you will stand very close to God. Maybe you’re already standing there.

You’re in the right place if you can stand before coffins and graves and cry, weeping for those now beyond your sight, for you will feel the arm of God around your shoulders.

You’re in the right place if you can stand behind and beneath others and let them go first and receive the best of everything, for you have much coming to you in the end.

You’re in the right place if you hunger and thirst for what is right, if justice brings you alive and injustice moves you to action, for you, someday, will be satisfied.

You’re in the right place if you speak words of mercy instead of aggression and accusation, for mercy will find its way back to you and make its home in you.

You’re in the right place if your words and actions are pure love, for you will see God in your own reflection.

You’re in the right place if you can make and embrace peace with those around you, no matter their faults, their addictions, their histories, their origins and leanings and orientations, for then you are accepting your given place as a child of God.

You’re in the right place if you’re ruffling a few feathers, if you’re hated for your hatred of injustice and your acceptance of the little, the weak and the oppressed, for you will find yourself sitting in the lap of God.

Today’s Word: Available

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Chronos. St. Louis Cathedral, New Orleans. SJG photo.

Evidently, the vast majority of Americans believe that the phrase “God helps those who help themselves” comes from the Bible. In fact, it was uttered by the wise old founding father Ben Franklin who, although clever and all that, is hardly a reliable source for Christian social teaching. For Franklin’s witticism is not only non-biblical; it’s counter-biblical. Indeed, it could not be further from the call to service and love that we find in the gospels.

For if we profess to be Christian, we have no choice but to love and care for those around us. And who is “around us?” Who is our neighbor? As the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10) teaches us, our neighbor is anyone who is in need. So we must ask ourselves today: Is there anyone in need around us? If we say no, we’re either looking with half-closed eyes or our world is far too narrow.

We are called to make ourselves available to others. In Ignatian spirituality, this is referred to as “apostolic availability.” We must be there for others. We must be the healing and comforting Christ for others. We are called to bring the “good news” of the Gospel to others, but with the knowledge that salvation comes in different forms. We tell of a Jesus who saves and promises life to come, yes. But we are also called to bring the good news of the here and now. I love this from Dean Brackley, SJ:

Jesus proclaims “Good News to the poor.” What is this Good News? Ask 
the poor — you will get clear and immediate answers: health, shelter,
food, opportunity, jobs, education.

The challenge of responding to this call to service is that our lives often make us so UN-available. We fill our lives with so many things — including many good things — that we leave no time to just be available if someone needs us, no time to go looking for someone who might need us, no time to call someone up and say, “do you need anything?”

Kairos. Jackson Square, New Orleans. SJG photo.

This is the difference between the Greek ideas of chronos time and kairos time. Chronos time rules our days. It is ordered time — seconds, minutes, hours — and it is a demanding taskmaster from the moment the clock goes off in the morning. It’s necessary, of course. But it is not all. Kairos, on the other hand, lies outside of this sequential time of clocks and calendars. It is the time that slips by in moments of quiet contemplation and prayer. It passes without notice in moments of service to others. It is fleeting in moments of creation and joy, when time seems to stand still. It is time outside of time.

We need chronos, of course, or nothing would run on time and the world would run amok. But we need times of kairos in a chronos world. We need big chunks of time when we’re not watching the clock, when we’re not worried about the next appointment. We need this time to be available to God and available to others. This availability — this love — doesn’t come free or even cheap. It will cost us something. As Sarah Thebarge, author of The Invisible Girls, writes:

Love will cost you dearly.
And it will break your heart.
But in the end, it will save the world.

Ask yourself in silence: To whom can I be available today? What will it cost me? Will it be worth it?

The Creative Spirit: Mary’s ‘Yes’

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Williamsburg silversmith shop. SJG photo.

Today I begin a new series of reflections about the role of the Spirit and of spirituality in the life of the creative person. Whether you are a professional artistic type, an occasional poet/artist/craftsperson or someone who just thinks that maybe there’s something deep inside them waiting to come out, I hope you’ll find in this series some inspiration that will move you toward recognizing the ideas germinating within you and putting down words and images that will enable you to share them with others.  For that’s the role of the artist, to bring ideas to life.

I am up before the sun today, waiting to greet a busy day in these waning days of December, trying to latch on to an early-morning idea that will spur my brain into its creative mode. I’m trying to conceive, looking for a spark of something.

The gospel reading for today is one we all know. We’re only a few days from Christmas here in 2014, but this story from the very beginning of Luke’s gospel finds Mary before her child has even been conceived, confronted by an idea and a voice saying:

“Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you. Do not be afraid, for you have found favor with God. You will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus.”

And she replies: “Really? I don’t think so. I’m not really prepared for that and, by the way, I’m a virgin, so…thanks anyway.”

But this voice is calm and insistent and is having none of her initial hesitance: “Ah, but this isn’t about you. This is about God in you. It may seem impossible, but nothing is impossible with God.”

And Mary answers with a simple, “yes.”

Smith's shop in Williamsburg. SJG photo.

It’s the beautiful beginning of the story of the Incarnation, and as I read and reflect on it this morning I am reminded that Mary’s “yes” to this conception serves as the perfect model for the creative process, for all of us who sense something moving and growing inside us. I will never conceive and bear a child, and yet I must be willing to accept and nurture the fruits of the Spirit that have been planted deep within me. The creative and artistic process requires a willingness to move beyond “I’m not really equipped for this and don’t yet have all the right experiences” to a simple “yes.”

The incarnation of Christ in the form of a child wrapped in swaddling clothes and born to a virgin is the ultimate metaphor for all who create. It’s unexpected and new. It’s a bit dramatic and filled with poetry and startling images. It’s unbelievable and yet contains the truth. As we sometimes say when astonishing things happen in real life: “You just can’t make this kind of stuff up.”

That the nativity is a great metaphor for the creative process doesn’t make it any less real, and the incarnation (the word becoming flesh) of Christ didn’t stop when Mary gave birth. The incarnation continues in all of us, and it’s a particularly vivid reminder of the responsibility of all who create.

As we arise each day and search for ideas and meaning and insights, as we face empty screens and journals and canvases and sketchbooks, the Word (co-present with God since before the creation of the world) moves around inside us and kicks us like an unborn child aching and yearning to see the light of day. We give birth because of his birth. We create because we have been created.

Speaking of light, it’s starting to fill the world around me. I’ve turned an hour or so of darkness into something new. That’s all God asks of us.

Ask yourself in silence: What’s inside me that’s aching to come out?

Today’s Word: Plant

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Basil-pesto-pasta-party. All in good time.

As a child, I watched my father plant his annual vegetable garden in our backyard in urban north St. Louis. It wasn’t a big garden (perhaps 15×30 feet), but he went about the whole thing methodically and with a sense of hope for what the garden would bring. For that’s what planting a garden is all about – it’s about hope and faith, about knowing that when we plant a seed or put a small plant in the ground it will eventually become so much more.

I’ve never been much of a gardener, although something within me desperately wants to be. But about a month ago I planted a tomato plant and some herbs (basil and oregano) in containers on our back deck, the place we most like to spend time during the summer. And as I planted and watered, I realized that what I was most looking forward to was the feast – I looked ahead to that day when I would turn the basil into pesto, make one of my favorite pasta dishes, and then cut open a beautiful ripe tomato and garnish it with some fresh oregano. I saw beyond the plants to a table surrounded by friends savoring the meal. That’s the beauty of growing your own food, even on such a small scale. What we plant, we get to enjoy and share.

And so it is with all good things we bring into our lives. We get to choose these things. We decide what goes in our favorite places and how much time we will give them. But it’s our responsibility to choose well, to select things that bring long-term joy, that do no harm, that create life and shared experiences with others. On numerous occasions in the Gospels, Jesus uses the metaphor of the seed to remind us of all that is good and all that comes from him. The kingdom of God ­­— which lives in our hearts right now and extends into our eternal future — is a seed that must be planted and cared for. It is the word of God and the body of Christ in all its forms (scripture, family, community, Eucharist) that lives and grows around us, moving us always toward a feast that we cannot quite imagine and yet continue to hope and long for.

Ask yourself in silence: What am I planting in my life that will lead to a feast?

Between the Lines: Holy Week, crucified.

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Stations of the Cross at La Salle Retreat Center, Glencoe, MO. SJG photo.

Last night, sitting in church for the Good Friday service, what kept running through my mind were those words we are asked to shout out, as if we, too, bear some responsibility for his death: “Crucify him! Crucify him!” And I wondered what it must have felt like to hear your own death proclaimed, your fate sealed by a mob…

I suspected it was coming, I suppose, but I kept silently hoping for a reprieve, for them all to come to their senses and realize what they were doing to an innocent man. I kept hoping for the best that was in them to come out, for the spirit of God to come alive in them so they could see the truth before them. But I heard instead my death sentence, a proclamation that resonated within the people and echoed off the stone of the city.

I looked up at them as they cried out and wondered where the fear and hatred came from. What is it in me that threatened them so? These were my people — God’s chosen ones who had been promised a Messiah — and yet they were unwilling or unable to believe because I didn’t fit their expectations. When the truth of the promise stood before them, dripping with sweat and blood, they decided it was easier to fall back on what they knew for sure. Perhaps I cannot blame them for that, so I will not. Perhaps I was to them just one more failed and false prophet, threatening their relationship with a God who had seen them through some very dark and difficult times. Why rock the boat? Why believe in me?

But that word — crucify — is so vulgar and cold and harsh, so filled with a hatred that I could not imagine, so foreign from the idea of a powerfully loving God, so opposite of what I had been trying to teach them all. But even in that moment I knew that this evil and violent way would be the way for many, that the cry of “death” and “kill” in many different languages and cultures would echo down through history, depriving so many of simple joy and peace of mind and existence.

This day is so far removed and so estranged from the love that my Father has for all of these people. It is the absence of God in their hearts — even though God can never be truly absent — that fills them today, for the absence of God will always be filled by some other thing, a void that demands response, an itch that must be scratched.

O Jerusalem, I weep for you and your children.

Ask yourself in silence: What do you put in God’s place in your moments of confusion or weakness?

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