URBANarmy

Something to mull over this week... "What is the relation of [contemplation] to action? Simply this. He who attempts to act and do things for others or for the world without deepening his own self-understanding, freedom, integrity, and capacity to love, will not have anything to give others. He will communicate to them nothing but the contagion of his own obsessions, his aggressiveness, his ego-centered ambitions, his delusions about ends and means, his doctrinaire prejudices and ideas. There is nothing more tragic in the modern world than the misuse of power and action."   --Thomas Merton via Richard Rohr

I'm looking forward to our next 'Explore'. Note the change of time to  7:30pm Ever wondered about how and why your faith develops and matures? Often people think they are moving away from God when in fact, their faith is maturing. The irony being that while people feel they are losing their faith they are actually finding it! So together using Janet Hagberg's The Critical Journey, a closer look at Faith Development is an opportunity to for us to explore this together. Nothing intimidating just a short presentation, a bit of conversation and a picture of a tree! To whet your appetite here is a quote... “In each of us a wide mixture of behaviour both wise and unwise, healthy and unhealthy, appears.... when that behaviour begins to dominate or when we become obsessed with how we need to behave or how others need to behave, then we have a clear sign that we are becoming caged. Another sign of stuckness is having to be right and convincing others of our rightness...

Here's a bit of a Richard Rohr challenge on perspective... "In country after country that I've spoken in over the years, the laity have come to accept that the bishops and priests look out at reality from the side of management and seldom from the side of the laboring class, where Jesus unquestionably resided. When and where we did have servant leadership, the church flourished; where they didn't, we often experience, to this day and with good reason, a virulent anti-clericalism."

Richard Rohr on Faith Development... "There are many models of human and spiritual development. We could describe three stages as Simple Consciousness, Complex Consciousness (both "fight and flight"), and Non-Dual Consciousness ("the unitive way" or "third way"). More recently, I have been calling the developmental stages Order; Disorder & Reorder. In short, I see this pattern in the Bible and in human lives: 1. Order: We begin with almost entirely tribal thinking, mirroring the individual journey, which starts with an egocentric need for "order" and "self." Only gradually do we move toward inclusive love. 2. Disorder: We slowly recognize the invitation to a "face to face" love affair through the biblical dialogue of election, failure, sin, and grace, which matures the soul. This is where we need wisdom teachers to guide us through our "disorder." 3. Reorder: Among a symbolic few, there is a breakthr...

Here's something I should have said on Sunday! "God even creates the desire within us to do the desiring for love and for God. So all we need to do is to keep praying for the desire to desire, especially on those many days when the well feels dry, ordinary, or boring." (Richard Rohr) Psalm 42:1

"Accept you to be no other than your self Loving what I know of you  Trusting what I do not yet know With respect for your integrity  And faith in your abiding love for me"  Moses and Zipporah's vows.   

Just parking this quote "Once you know there is an implanted and positive direction to creation, you can go with the primary flow (faith); eventually you will learn to rest there (hope); and you can actually live this outflowing life with gracious trust (love)" Richard Rohr Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self (Jossey-Bass: 2013), 85-86