Surviving (Small Country by Gaël Faye)

Small Country by Gaël Faye is a difficult novel to read, not because of the prose, which is outstandingly beautiful, but because of the horrors within it, which are tragically ugly. Why in the world would I recommend the book to anyone? Let me answer that with a conversation in the book itself as the main character Gabriel asks Madame Economopoulos if she has read all the books lining the shelves on her walls.

"Have you read all those books?" I asked her.

"Yes, I've even read some of them many times over. They're the great loves of my life. They make me laugh and weep and question and reflect on things. They allow me to escape from myself. They've changed me, they've made me a different person."

"A book can change us?"

"Of course a book can change you. It can even change your life. It's like falling in love. And you never know when such an encounter might happen. You should beware of books, they're sleeping genies." (140)

There wasn't much laughing or escaping from myself in this book. Weeping, questioning, reflecting -- there were plenty of those times. I'm trying to think of how to explain those times without giving away moments in the book, moments so real and detailed that the story feels more autobiographical than fiction. A character named Donatien brings up God, but rather than asking where God is, he puts the blame on humankind. The question to reflect upon becomes how can one help? Do we allow two small countries to annihilate each other along with all the powerless ones trying to survive? Rwanda and Burundi are extremely small. It took me three times and a final Internet search to find them on my world map.

Follow the boy's first finger out horizontally and just a tad bit up, and you can see two tiny pieces as if they are small puzzle pieces of Tanzania. They also both touch the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Uganda sits above Rwanda. If you want to feel where prejudice can ultimately take you when it tears apart an entire country or two, this is it.

If you're willing to face the challenge of reading the book, you will have excellent writing to read. Kudos to both the author Faye and the translator (in my case, Sarah Ardizzove translated it into English). On Goodreads, reviewer Liberty Hardy had the best recommendation I've read for diving into this book: "Don't forget, books that break your heart also strengthen your soul."  It is one of those books that can be read quickly but sit long on your mind and heart.

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I don't have the answers for how we keep our children from being overwhelmed by tragedy, keep them from being inured to violence because they may see so much of it in media, and keep them from being without compassion. I'm not sure if I lived in that tension between all those poorly or well. I was surprised as 2011 came to a close by how many of my students (living in the West) grew bored with 9/11 stories. Yet some of the most vocal became caring medical professionals. Perhaps the expression of boredom was a way for a teenager to keep fear away. Feel free to comment on how to address this with children, students, teenagers, adults. Again, my apologies for making you wait before seeing your comment appear, but if it is on topic (and not trying to sell anyone something), I will add it to the blog.

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In the formation of spirit, a human navigates a variety of streams. Six that I am familiar with as a Christ-follower are as follows: 1) Incarnational -- practicing life every day living as Jesus would live my life if Jesus were me 2) Holiness or wholeness or virtuous -- practicing life aiming for good and thriving 3) Spirit-filled -- practicing life living and loving with passion and joy 4) Word-centered -- practicing life with a life-giving message (and when necessary using words, as St. Francis supposedly said) 5) Contemplative -- practicing a life of prayer 6) Compassionate -- practicing a life of compassion. All of these prepare my mind, body, heart, soul for both tragedy and joy. For more on the Six Streams, use this link here.

Day 14 -- Among on This Fourteenth Day of Advent

"The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us" (John 1:14).

The word "among" implies differences. Yet, it also carries with it a positive feeling, even when it is said of Mary: "Blessed are you among women." Somehow "among" is a word of inclusion rather than exclusion.

Religious authorities were not too pleased with Jesus's inclusive ways. Both the gospels of Matthew and Luke include the story of Jesus eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners. Jesus did not hold himself apart from people.

Recently I watched a television series The Crown. The episode I watched revolved around the monarch learning to get to know people from all walks of life. Jesus did and does this well...dwelling among us. When one stops to consider where he was born -- it was not even a homeless shelter. Today this word reminds me to be among people, all types of people.

In my last post, I included reverence in creation and quoted Barbara Brown Taylor. Here I continue her thoughts on reverence to include people:

"Reverence for creation comes fairly easily for most people. Reverence for other people presents more of a challenge, especially if those people's lives happen to impinge upon your own" (An Altar in the World 27).

A great deal of impinging happens during the last shopping days before Christmas. I decided after my morning grocery shopping trip that I would not go back out; nonetheless, I will be journeying to the stores next week, and my intent is to practice reverence while I do. I am among the people with whom I cross paths, and it is my hope that each senses in my life: the Word become flesh and dwelling among us.

Day 9 -- Messenger on This Ninth Day of Advent

If you're wondering about the strange title, I am referring to the word for the day of #adventword2017. The words seem more challenging to me this year than last year. However, I find that each is leading me into great meditation time. After pondering various experiences and feelings associated with "messenger", the verse that came to me was Matthew 10:29 from the New Living Translation: "What is the price of two sparrows -- one copper coin? But not a single sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it."

Each bird is a messenger to me of God's love. This past week, a gorgeous hawk flew right in front of my kitchen window and landed on the branch of a nearby tree. I ran to find my phone to take a picture (of course, I could not find it before the hawk flew away), but the beauty of the hawk stayed with me even though I did not have a photo. (This also explains why I'm putting a picture of a bird that came to visit us outside our living room window.)

It turns out (oh, how I love these types of coincidences) that a friend gave me a book to read: An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor. The cover has a bird on it.

I have not finished the book, but I have found a passage that resonates with me as I think about messengers during this Advent season, or any season. It resonates with the type of messenger I want to be.

"Many years ago now, a wise old priest invited me to come speak at his church in Alabama. 'What do you want me to talk about?' I asked him.

"'Come tell us what is saving your life now, ' he answered...All I had to do was figure out what my life depended on. All I had to do was figure out how I stayed as close to that reality as I could, and then find some way to talk about it that helped my listeners figure out those same things for themselves" (xvii).

What is saving my life now? God, Divine Presence, Gentle Whisperer, Holy One, Healer, the One Who loves me and delights in me sees me, strengthens me, sustains me by continuing to show me love by way of the Word, by way of creation, by way of people and community among many other ways. Today I was loved by the team I work with. Scripture words and words in a new book encouraged me. The lights on a little tree brightened my evening. Thankfulness for a group of women who thought of me during a tough time and gave me little handcrafted Christmas tags enabled me to share that gratitude with another group of women. God who sees me opened my eyes to see all that I have to be thankful for. My hope is that in my every day life I can be a messenger of good news.  

Don't Read This Book If You Are Easily Offended

Do an Internet search for images, click on the page where the images are from, and you get to read some rather interesting articles, like the article for this image above on book clubs. 

Yesterday I attended the monthly meeting of a local library book club. I have been part of the group for at least four years now. They were excited when I came because I was someone younger joining the group. I was excited because I was not the oldest person there. The group has definitely expanded my reading list. After a brief stint with Nancy Drew mysteries during my elementary school years, the number of times I have chosen to read a mystery or detective novel has been less than one every ten years. (My apologies to former student Elaine who writes detective/ mystery novels -- I promise to read hers.) Since joining the group, I have read from every genre. Last month's book (so this month's meeting) was The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt. 

Don't read the book if you believe in God and you are easily offended. Greenblatt's thesis (not a spoiler, and even if it was, unless you are heavily interested in textual scholarship, you are going to want to get to the point) that the re-discovery of Lucretius's poem On the Nature of Things caused the world to become modern (i.e. Epicurean). Okay, so maybe that is a simplistic description of his thesis, but I just want to get to what I was practicing yesterday. I shall, however, return to this book from time to time. 

It might be helpful to know that possibly 95 percent of the members agree with Lucretius's poem (as summarized by Greenblatt): 

• The universe has no creator or designer 
• Human society began not in Paradise but in a primitive battle for survival
• The soul dies 
• There is no afterlife 
• When you are dead, you will not care because you will not exist; you just go back to being atoms 
• All organized religions are superstitious delusions 

There's more, but I think you get the picture. You probably figured out that I am the 5 percent who believes in God. So, I'm practicing the with-God life, did I go in armed with apologetics (a defense of the faith)? I did not. Not because I was afraid, but because I wanted to bring Jesus to them. 

I practiced listening because that's what Jesus did.  I let other members explain how bored they were with Greenblatt's endless historical perspective. When the discussion leader read Greenblatt's biographical information and spoke out words that had everyone in a quandary, I could explain what New Historicism, textual, and contextual meant. Jesus is intelligent; I can be intelligent. I practiced asking questions kindly. Afterwards I went to lunch with those going to lunch because Jesus loved to eat meals with people, people who did not believe in Him. Jesus was accused of eating with sinners.

And, this is where my practice time did not go so well. Oh, no, I neither made enemies, nor fell into gluttony, but I failed to practice blessing. Three of us, in great humor, poked fun at the differences between us and our husbands. I suppose we could be excused for our rather gentle jokes, but we did not notice that our eldest member, a dear soul who had been married for thirty-seven years and widowed for twenty-six had fallen quiet. As we got up to leave, tears filled her eyes and she told us to cherish every moment we had with our husbands. The holidays had been extremely difficult and lonesome for her. We comforted her, of course, as best as we could. But, I realized, I still have some practicing to do when it comes to being as present as Jesus was and is to people. Lest you think I am going to mentally whip myself, I am not. I am going to continue to practice. 

Side note: Greenblatt goes to great lengths to explain how early Christians, even those like Thomas More, wore hair shirts and physically whipped themselves, etc. The apostle Paul clearly writes in Colossians that God never called anyone to do those types of activities; whipping oneself, either physically or mentally is a human invention. So, no, I am just going to continue practicing the incarnational life -- living as Jesus would have lived if he was Debbi going to a book club meeting. I can not do it completely, but I can do.

Wow. Never do an Internet search on a topic if you want to write easily and quickly. I searched the word "incarnational" prior to writing this post.  It turns out that some people, who do believe in Jesus, do not believe in living an incarnational life. The main argument against living an incarnational life or carrying out an incarnational mission is that Jesus as God became human. We're not God. Point taken. I still like the term because I know those of us who use it do not actually believe we are God. We just want to bring the presence of God with us wherever we are, wherever we go. Maybe I will just call this tradition, virtue, thread of life (all words that if I do an Internet search are going to come up with criticisms…sigh…): the With-God Life. 

9th Day? 10th Day? Failure Leads to Success

Ironically, I am posting about contemplation and wholeness just as the twelve days of Christmas move into a whirlwind of activity (ten lords a-leaping, eleven pipers piping, and twelve drummers drumming). No wonder most of us do not try to emulate the song. For those of us who have already celebrated Christmas Day (many Orthodox Christians will not celebrate until January 7), we are ready to take down the decorations, put the tree out with the trash, and be done with the holiday craziness.

I am persevering until Monday, January 6 which I have just found out is the 12th Day of Christmas. I have been off by one day apparently this whole time. Christmas Day is…well…Christmas Day, all on its own. I should have started counting on the day after Christmas Day. Now that I know, I can improve for next year's celebrations. Growth and improvement is what I am going for this year. The word I am keeping in mind is "Practice."

Practice one day; write the next. If all goes as planned (I write those words even though I know full well that events rarely go as planned), I'm going to practice six traditions or virtues.

On Sundays, I am going to practice Contemplation, specifically contemplation with God. Contemplation without God does not tend to lead to growth and improvement for me. On Mondays, I will write on how contemplation works out (and maybe I'll even keep practicing), but I will practice Wholeness on Monday. I think of these two streams of life as more internal.

Tuesday will be for practicing an Incarnational life where the inner life mingles with the outer life, while Wednesday if for Compassionate practices, practices that include social justice. So these two days are external.

Thursday and Friday will be for the distinctly spiritual practices. All streams or traditions are spiritual to me, but that is for another day and another blog. Thursday, I practice the Spirit-empowered life, and Friday is for the Evangelical life; although, those practices may surprise some readers.  

This year's adventures await me. Failure awaits me. I practice because I have never learned something perfectly the first time I did whatever I was doing, and basically practices are an accumulation of failures that help me learn until I succeed. (Look back up at the first image. Putting it into this blog did not go smoothly. I lost count on how many times I failed, but finally the moment came when the picture was here, without 5 inches of blank space and without gobbling up three other paragraphs.) As always, I am not practicing alone. I have a Helper. I have Emmanuel, whose birth I just celebrated, whose life I celebrate every day.