Sing A New Song

My friend Margareta DIDN'T die! She came pretty close to it last November ( The Last Mile ), but she pulled herself back from the brink with the loving care of her son Loarne, who took leave from his Friary to watch  over her, encouraging her to eat, drink, move around, take her meds, and do everything else necessary to ensure a miracle.

So, Margareta and I embarked upon a longer journey.  

Margareta tells her story over and over. An authoritarian father who was disappointed in her, a sister who criticises everything she does. Even to this day, nothing Margareta does is good enough, she isn't clever enough, articulate enough ... On and on. I listen, I nod sympathetically, I make the right noises. Until yesterday, that is, when something in me woke up.

"Margareta, you have to stop this!"

I hold her hand and remind her of the wonderful things she has made with her hands, the beautiful home she has created that she shares so gererously with others, her kindness, steadfastness, intellect ...

I tell her how loved and appreciated she is, and I watch her shake her head in disbelief.

Is it possible to stop her carrying the disapproval of her father around, or to shut her ears to the critical voice of her sister? I don't know, but I'm not going to stop trying.

Oddly enough, when leading bible studies, Margareta would strive to make her students aware of who they really are. So much more than a finite creature in a decaying body.  She looked at me, aghast when I told her to stop her ears to the lies from the past, start listening to a new song, and sing it to herself.

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A Time To Grieve

I didn't attend my father's funeral, and I never regretted it. I sat by his side in his final days, he, too weak, too close to dying to want to talk, I, waiting with him, silently, or telling him how much I loved him, not trying to imagine a world without him.

I wrote his obituary, and read it to him the night before he died so he knew how precious he was. That was our farewell. Two days later, I flew to South Africa to complete the work in a village school he had sponsored. "You go!" He said, believing I would be away when he died. I went, and my Xhosa friends sang for him, and I went to this beach and cast into the ocean a wreath I made with vines and flowers from the rain forest.

I then scratched his name, along with my mother's, in a hidden place in the rocks nearby.

This thanksgiving for my father's life was a special and deeply meaningful ritual. Far away from home, I grieved for my father and there, in my heart, which was pounding with the ocean, I laid him to rest.

 

 

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The Reluctant Theist

I allow myself the luxury of an open mind. I probably wouldn't rate very highly on a scepticism scale, but I am an avid fan of good science and a fierce opponent of bad religion. Hence my title, "Reluctant Theist"
"Too much smiting" is my favourite comment from Bhuddist Jack Kornfield* on old-time religion. Couldn't put it better myself. For those of us reaching out to the concept of an Underlying and Benevolent Consciousness or "God", the 'smiter' of past generations doesn't do it for us. Neither does an emphasis on following rules when you're better off following your heart. Can't be doing with war, hell, revenge, cruelty, intolerance, bigotry, greed or self-agrandissement either. These afflict the good, bad and ugly, including, sadly, myself, and if this is what religion does, then we're better off without it.
That'll explain the 'reluctant' then. So why am I still a theist? Because there are some elements in the cosmos that are not discoverable by the scientific method. Goodness, philonthropy, gratitude, an urge to find a 'being' beyond ourselves, love, kindness, joy... . The list is as long as the first. Not quantifiable or predictable, but nevertheless essential to the well-being and survival of the human family.
My friend Margareta is dying. I sat with her yesterday and we talked of the approaching end. I read to her from a book by a renowned neuroscientist, Dr Eben Alexander, who died ( or his nuerocortex did, which is pretty much everything that makes us human), and on returning unscathed, tells a remarkable tale. A leader in his field, a Harvard professor,he had rejected all thought of Near-Death phenomenum as having other than a natural explanation. He now believes, with reseach to support him, that, "human consciousness is independent of the mind and the brain." Let him tell you the whole story himself. It could change your life by completely removing the fear of death. He emphasises what many Theists have always SAID, even if the living of it proved problematical for most of us:
You are completely and unconditionally loved.You have nothing to fear. You can do nothing wrong.
Here's the interview with Dr Alexander:
http://www.skeptiko.com/upload/skeptiko-154-eben-alexander.mp3
* Jack Kornfield source:
I'm listening to "Simplicity & Sympathy" by Jack Kornfield http://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/85/talk/20247/