Christmastime Is Here

July 21st, 2009
2:30 a.m.

It is seldom a nice occurrence when you wake up during a nights sleep; this is perhaps even more so the case when its only been two and a half hours after you first laid your head down on your pillow to drift off into dreamland. But this has just happened, and here I am with a pen in my hand. Of course the first thing that I did, as I suspect most people do when their sleep has been interrupted so rudely, is to use the facilities (by this I refer to the washroom, not a gymnasium or racquet-ball court that I have in my Kitchener apartment. ‘Using the facilities’ sounds so much better than ‘I’m going to pee.’ Anyways, I digress.) After I use the facilities, just as I’m about to make my way back into my pitch black bedroom, I smell something – okay, that sounds kind of strange since I just came from the washroom. But this was coming from the nearby bookcase in my living room, and I took the step or two to catch more of the scent. It was the hot chocolate candle that I received as a birthday gift earlier this month. I bent over and took a deep breath in.

And it was Christmastime.

I haven’t lit the candle much at all yet, as it seems to be more suited for the winter, but the scent is so strong that you smell it almost every time you leave the living room heading into another part of the apartment. But your senses can often be dulled or asleep, or you just get so accustomed to smells and sounds that you get to where you don’t even notice them anymore. However, this night at two thirty in the morning, I took in the scent of the candle and it is Christmas. You see, it’s a deep, rich hot chocolate, one that you’d sip as you cozied up under a blanket on the couch, just under the window. On the other side of the window the snow is falling heavy and hard, and you know that in the morning there will be a tonne of the white stuff that you’ll have to trudge your way through if the sidewalks haven’t yet been cleared.

But that’s tomorrow.

Tonight you’re inside, with Christmas lights as the main source of illumination in the room, along with the small candles on the bookshelves, on the coffeetable, and in the windowsills, and the bright black and white images of Alastair Sim or Jimmy Stewart coming as alive as they do each and every year. This day has been filled with running around doing some last minute gift shopping while listening to Bing Crosby sing “It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas” on your iPod, or perhaps Enya, which brings an entirely different feeling, one that is heart-breakingly beautiful, sort of like what you experienced earlier on in the night when all the candles were lit in the old church and the choir was making its way down the center aisle singing “Silent Night” with no other instrumentation.

It’s magic.

But now you’re inside, sipping hot chocolate in your pajamas on a cold winters night, and somewhere just beneath your skin you feel the anticipation and you have no doubt that tomorrow really is the most wonderful day of the year. Tomorrow there may be the joy of watching children with their pure innocence and awe-struck eyes as they gather with uncombed hair under a tree, ready to shred shiny paper off of their presents. But tonight you’re here with your mug of rich hot chocolate, and you could live in this moment for a very very long time.

Christmastime was here, on this summers night, if but for a moment.

Time to go back to sleep.

Of G-Strings, Geordi, & Goodness

May 11, 2009

This afternoon I find myself in a very nice coffee shop in the town in which I was born. It's a little cool, and it has clouded over since I took the walk in this morning. At the window-side booth directly behind me, two older ladies are having a conversation, which has included the topic of women's underwear, specifically G-strings.

"Well, they must be for the men, because they sure can't be comfortable!"

"I guess there's no pantylines."

Kind of an odd conversation to be listening to, particularly from two older ladies. Anyways, that's completely unrelated to what I want to write about.

The other night I came across the movie Star Trek: Insurrection on TV. The old Star Trek movies have been on everywhere, leading up to the release of the new film. If you're not familiar with Insurrection, which you can be excused for, in a nutshell it's about the crew of the Enterprise traveling to a planet with age-reversing qualities and trying to save the inhabitants from being re-located. Overall it's not one of my favourite Trek movies, but there's one scene involving Geordi Laforge that I really like. Now if you don't know who Geordi Laforge is, well that is unforgivable and I will promptly remove you from my Facebook friend list...But to provide a context, Geordi is the blind engineer who for years used a visor in order to see, and in the movie has upgraded to some sort of ocular implants. As the ship arrives in orbit of the planet, Geordi starts experiencing headaches and dizziness; obviously something is wrong with the implants. Or so it seems. The rest of the crew begins to experience age-reversing qualities. Captain Picard mambos in his quarters, Riker has new-found energy, which unsurprisingly raises his always high libido. But then there's the scene with Geordi. The screen shows him standing on a hill on the planet, breathing deeply and in wonder as he watches the sunset...with his own eyes. The captain approaches him, and Geordi tells him "it turns out there wasn't something wrong, there was something right." His ocular nerves had regenerated, he was perfectly fine. And there he was, enjoying his first sunset, drinking it up.

Geordi's experience in this movie makes me think of how it can be with many of us. Various things happen to each of us from the time we are born, all throughout our lives, and often we can get that unsettled feeling. That feeling that something is wrong.

There are many reasons why we can have this feeling. One might be an unhappy or unhealthy home life while growing up, where we can feel that things just aren't the way that they are supposed to be. This is perhaps the most deep-seated reason for many people's ongoing feelings of trouble. For some children, this can continue as they become self-conscious and start comparing themselves to other kids on the schoolyard. They see that their peers have more "stuff" than they do - nicer clothes, more popular friends, the latest technological items, and they surmise that there is something wrong with them because they don't have them. These comparisons continue well into adulthood of course.

Something is wrong.

Yet another powerful reason that people can have this feeling has to do with religious belief. The origin of life story that is set out in the Bible tells of a man and woman who had it all, perfection in Eden, until they disobeyed God. At this time God banished them from the garden. The thought continued, and is still believed today, that every man and woman born into this world ever since are "sinful." It isn't much of a leap for many, I suspect, to go from "Humans are originally sinful," to "Humans are bad at their core," to "I am bad." This belief can greatly re-inforce a child's, or anyone's, already existing belief and anxiety that things aren't right.

Something is Wrong.

Whatever the reasons we have for our unsettled feelings, if they remain within us, I think we will always be looking for ways to make things right. This is different than healthy ambition, or striving to achieve new things or reach goals. This wondering, wondering how we can make things better, among other things it robs us of being in the present moment. But that's a whole other subject.

How do we try to counter this gnawing feeling that something is wrong? Children may try many things, from being as obedient as they possibly can at home, to running faster or achieving the highest level at anything they do, at school or during other activities. Religious people, of varying belief systems, try to obey the rules they believe they must obey in order to be good, or safe. In this particular case, in regards to religion, rather than believing something because it rings true deeply within themselves, they are doing something else. They are layering something which they are taught is good, over something that they believe is wrong, or bad, and that belief is a lie that is covering something else. Their - our - very core. For far too many, this all becomes a race that can never end, a struggle that can never be won. It leads to an unbearable life. It's like having a cake in front of you that is really quite delicious, but for some reason you aren't quite satisfied with it. So you, or someone else, adds another layer, which turns out to not taste very good. It continues. You, or someone else, adds another layer. And while that may make it taste better, now the cake is far too dense. Really, the original cake was absolutely fine. It was good. Nothing was wrong.

Nothing is Wrong.

You are not bad.

You are good, right at your very core.

So how do we achieve this? How do we get to this place, where something is not wrong? There are many things that can aid us on our journey. Meditation, music, good friends and a glass of wine, spirituality, ideas from religions and books, etc. But I think for a lot of people, the moment you try to "make yourself a better person" by listening to, or reading, or believing any of these things, that can become just another part of the endless race. I think maybe the most important thing is to stop.

Stop trying to become a good person. You are a good person. You have been since the very second you were born into this world. Stop the struggle, refuse to fight that which feels wrong because nothing is wrong.

Stop layering things onto yourself, instead strip things away, and see yourself at your very core.

It turns out nothing is wrong. Something is right.

God Rides Public Transit

Have you heard of the controversial ad-campaign produced by the Free Thought Association of Canada that simply states, “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” These ads are now appearing on Toronto transit buses and subway cars, while being rejected in some cities such as Halifax and most recently Ottawa.

When I first heard about this campaign I thought, “Good for you, you go get ‘em Free Thought Association of Canada!” What is the FAC about? According to their website, they are a “non-profit organization promoting education and outreach and the principles of various secular worldviews,” which include atheism, agnosticism, humanism, and skepticism. The goal of their “Atheist Bus” campaign (atheistbus.ca) is to “raise awareness of the presence of non-believers in our country, to make it okay for people to step out of the closet,” and also to “open up communication between faith communities and secular organizations,” a dialogue which Free Thought says is terribly lacking.

Anyways, there’s a lot that I like about the ad. Firstly, the words could be speaking to adherents of the various religions that bicker back and forth about doctrine, challenging them to tone things down a bit, though I doubt that many will suddenly agree that there is no God at all. Or the words could speak to people who are trying to jump through the various hoops they jump through in attempting to please a separate, all-powerful deity who is keeping a close watch on them from above. You know, the sort of Santa-God: “He sees you when you’re sleeping, He knows when you’re awake; He knows if you’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake!” I think that more than a few people view God this way. ‘God has a standard, I fall terribly short, so I’ve got to find ways to shape up. Living this way, with a deep sense or belief that one falls short or doesn’t measure up seems quite unhealthy to me. God can become the ultimate projection of low self-worth, and activities such as church services and prayer can become means by which people try to assuage this belief. If it’s between this God and no God at all, then bring on the free-thinkers.

Now, in response to this ad campaign, the United Church of Canada has countered with their own version: “There probably is a God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” In a letter to clergy and United Church members, the moderator states that their campaign is also meant to encourage discussion. “Clearly, as Christians, we most definitely believe there is a God,” writes The Right Rev. David Giuliano. “ (We) see this as an opportunity to delve more deeply into what it really means when Christians say they believe in God. I would encourage you to bring your faith to this conversation wherever it arises.”

While the moderator states that it is the church’s intention to join the conversation, I think that more than a few people may see their counter-campaign simply as a defense of a deity who is more or less separate from humanity and life in general. Many people do not believe in this type of God anymore, including many United Church members. So I think that churches need to make attempts to present a different view of
God. If the counter-campaign leads to deeper conversation, it could be a good thing. There are a few other steps that I believe should be taken if Christians or any other religious adherents want to engage the world.

The first step is to take the “I’m the King of the Castle” belief and throw it on the scrap heap. For sure, most Christian churches and leaders have toned down or eliminated the damnation, or ‘dirty rascal’ language that was once prevalent, but the notion of original sin is unfortunately still believed in and taught. But any notion of “My religion is better than your religion,” or “My God is bigger than your God” has got to go.

Once this step is taken, sincere dialogue at the very least, and ideally co-operation and strong friendship between different faith groups can occur. This is more than tolerance. People of different faiths can see each other as equals, each on a unique path but fundamentally connected. One thing that turns people off from organized religion is the arguing that goes on between people of different faiths, and this would go a long way in having people take a second look at these religions.

But perhaps the most important thing is to present a view of God that does not involve an entirely separate deity. What kind of God is being offered to people? Is “He” solely seen in religious books or on Sunday mornings? Or is God the spirit behind and in all things, meeting us in the eyes of a stranger or in the fury of a thunderstorm, or in an embrace? I believe that God, or Life or Love or Spirit, is actually within each of us; the teacher, the waiter, the single parent, the imam. And this may be the message about God that many are looking for. What would the response be if we approached others with language such as, “You are important, and you already have God inside of you. Now let’s sit down, have a drink, and we’ll exchange our stories.”

That may not easily fit on the side of a bus, but it may do some good.

My, How You've Grown

There was a time when I thought I had you figured out. Or at least I had a good enough idea of who you were and what you expected, and I tried to live with you.

But You are more.

I thought I knew your name. Or make that names, all three of them. But now I am learning.

You are Father, Son and Holy Spirit. You are He, You are She, You are Mother. You are Love, You are Peace, You are Life.

I thought I knew where to find your words. But you have written in so many places. You are in the Bhagavad-Gita, You are in the Qu’ran. You are in aboriginal texts and stories. You are in the New Testament and You are in the Torah…I’m not so sure about Leviticus.

You are in my journal.

I thought I knew how to hear your voice. I tried very hard to hear it and to obey it… But I didn’t, I couldn’t realize that your voice and my voice sound remarkably alike.

My, how You’ve grown.

You are not confined to one name, one book, one path, one worldview. I see you when I see small babies with their little smiles and floppy heads and arms and legs. I see you in the unexpected smile of a complete stranger as I walk down the street.

You are all Power, with more might than a thousand storms and You are more thunderous than countless drums beating at the same time. Yet You are in a whisper, a glance, in the simple chorus of a song.

You dance through history, and have had thousands, millions of faces. Moses, Noah, Peter, Paul, Mary…Joni Mitchell. Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King Jr, Gandhi. The postal worker, the single Mom, the cashier, the doctor. Me.

Your love has no limits, even when my understanding does. It is there between mother and son, between sisters, between husband and husband. You raise your hand enthusiastically as to say “Present!” whenever barriers are broken, prejudices are abandoned, and when equality is fought for and realized.

You inspire me to push beyond the limitations I see today, yet you are not ashamed of them. Your gale-force power gently nudges me, encouraging me to move forward.

When I try to hand over the reins of my life to You, You hand them back to me, calling me to a new level of trust.

You are at the heart of me and You are beautiful.

I am You and You are Me.

My, How You’ve Grown.

Two Tables Over

I haven't been to Starbucks in quite awhile, but here I am, drinking a cup of Pike Place Roast. A few minutes ago, before I popped in my earphones and began listening to Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson, I intermittently listened in on some of the conversation going on two tables over from me.

My ears tend to perk up whenever surrounding conversations turn religious. They were talking about a few things, including a Bible college, possibly even the one I went to several years ago. Another topic that came up was church planting. I have varying thoughts on this, and evangelism in general.

My initial thought when I heard them talking about church plants was that perhaps they are like bunnies; they can't really help themselves, and spend all of their time reproducing or at least trying to (I'm talking about churches, not the couple having the conversation. I don't think they were married, therefore they weren't having sex, of course.) Maybe churches reproduce because they simply think that's what they're supposed to do. After all, there's the great commission that has Jesus telling his followers to go out into all the world and make disciples of everyone. So people go out into the whole world, trying to bring people into the Christian family, sort of like Angelina Jolie goes out into the whole world and brings children into the Jolie-Pitt family.

Let me start out by being positive (no, don't call a doctor.) I have no problem with evangelism if the goal is to help people realize their full potential and to genuinely want to see people live fulfilling lives. There is a while lot of good accomplished by Christian people - many mouths are fed, scores of homes built, many bracelet manufacturers' bottom lines are improved.

I believe that many, if not most Christians have good intentions when setting off on evangelistic work.

A big problem I have is when doctrine becomes involved, when well intentioned people assume that they know the exact road to a more fulfilling and whole life, and then proceed to try to graft these doctrines onto every soul and mind, even if they are completely foreign and incompatible with the other person.

It is no one's job to be the bringer of some packaged truth to another who does not have truth within them. It is no one's job to bring goodness to another who does not contain goodness within them. For each person alive contains truth, as well as goodness within them. Because of this, I believe that any religious dialogue that takes place between people should be just that, a dialogue. It should be a conversation between two equals, both of whom contain God within them and are on their own spiritual journeys. Together they, we, can learn form each other, and we can bring thoughts and ideas that can help the other to lead a more fulfilling and whole life. Some of our experiences and thoughts will resonate with others, some will not. That's absolutely fine. Truth, unlike the scarf that I wrap around my neck, is not one-size-fits-all.

In closing, again, I'm sure that many Christians and those of other faiths who evangelize have good intentions. I just think that it is vital to remember that the person sitting across the table has plenty of goodness within them as well.

Two Truths

Sometimes it seems that things are moving at a fast pace. For instance, back in the summer I bought a Blackberry, and since then several new models have come out, making mine seem just a little out of date. Yet with all the progress we make, all the technological advances, we’re still very much the same people. We are people who often yearn for love, wrestle with fear, and lash out as we try to maintain a place of higher importance over the people around us.

But now we are being called, called to a new understanding, a new thought.

You are meant for more. You are meant to learn lessons and take wisdom from the past as well as to learn from what you have experienced in your personal history, and then to push unstoppably forward. You can learn and walk forward into new understandings, new wisdom, new truth. What is this new understanding, this new wisdom, this new truth? There are two of them in particular to focus on at the moment. Let's start with the second.

The second truth is something that we are being called to realize and to take part in. This truth is like a little child standing at the edge of a majestic forest, looking over her shoulder and reaching her arm back towards us. She waits for us to take hold of her hand and to walk. This truth is that we are one people, that one by one boundaries are being torn down. They crash to the ground as we focus on our commonalities with our fellow humanity, rather than on the ways in which we differ. Even more, those differences which once were obstacles to our unity, now they are opportunities to learn. As we realize this truth more fully, the more we shake our heads at the images that we see on TV, images of people living even side-side who are killing one another. Gaza and Afghanistan come to mind. Don’t misunderstand me, these are life-altering and tragic conflicts for those directly involved. But as we more fully realize the truth of our unity, these conflicts, or at least the reasons for them, seem to grow smaller and smaller.

Of course this truth is something we can not walk into unless we learn the one that comes before it. And that is that a key part of the answer to one of the biggest questions of life – the meaning of life - is much closer than we may have previously realized.

Who is it that we are to worship? Who will give us the answer? What are we to do to be acceptable to God?

These questions, and the anxiety that they produce, lose so very much of their importance and grip on our lives when we realize that the reason for living is to live.

While we are all connected as part of existence, we are each unique. There is no one like you. That is a good thing.

You are a good thing.

Isn’t it time, my friend, to lay down your arms that you’ve had aimed at yourself and your seemingly outlandish, lofty dreams, and instead crack the door open to the notion that you are an irreplaceable part of life, a gift. You contain a perspective and wisdom within you that needs to break out into the world, into life. Keep being curious, keep acquiring knowledge that will help you to understand life, but be sure to use your own voice and realize that you aren’t meant to be a copy of anyone who has ever lived.

I pray joy for your journey today as you continue to discover and to step forward into your own new truth.

Before, When I Had A Saviour

Toronto, Ontario

The other night I had one of those moments. You know, one of those. The kind of moment that shakes your soul from its slumber like a bear in a wintry forest shakes the snow from its fur. One of those moments that says, “Come back to life,” and inspires you to rise above the dreariness that can so easily cloud your day. What does it for you? Maybe it’s sharing a good conversation with a friend while sipping on a cup of hot cocoa. Maybe it’s an unexpected warm smile on the face of a stranger as you pass them by in the mall. For me, on this occasion, it was a song.

I was walking to work listening to music and the song “The Roar of Love” came on. It’s part of a 1980 concept album of the same name and is based on The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe. The performing group is The 2nd Chapter of Acts, an old Christian group. I’ve loved Narnia for a long time. This particular song speaks of the moment when Lucy and Susan see Aslan alive again after they had watched him being killed by the evil White Witch. Overjoyed, they embrace the great lion and then jump on his back and they all ride off through the forest. The song brings to me a deep feeling of happiness.

Of course if you’re familiar with Narnia you’ll recognize that Aslan is Jesus, the Lion is the Saviour of that magical world. So while the song brings to me happiness, it also makes me nostalgic, well as nostalgic as a relatively young man can be. And this is because I remember back to when I too had a Saviour.

I had known about him from as far back as I can remember, decided to have a closer friendship with him when I was still a little boy, and said a long goodbye to him about 6 years ago.

This time of the year you hear about Jesus more than at any time of the year. Of course this is decreasing as years pass, with the increasing religious (and non-religious) pluralism, and Holiday trees replacing Christmas trees, but you still see Jesus in nativity scenes in front of churches, and you still hear about him in the old carols.

The idea of having someone come alongside you to be your Saviour is an appealing one, particularly when you’re facing some difficult challenge. You can reach out for help, and they are there to lift you out of your situation, or at least help lighten the burden.

But eventually I had to say goodbye to my Saviour. You see, when you spend so much time reaching out for a Saviour, you can forget what it’s like to look inside yourself. You forget, that is if you ever knew it in the first place, that you have the power inside of you to rise above every situation that comes to you. When you call out to your Saviour, I think something else can happen. At the same time that you’re calling out, that power within you that is waiting to rise up goes back to sleep, now that you’ve given the job to someone else.

As I write this, I want to say that I recognize and deeply understand that this works for many many people. Many who call on Jesus in this way are sincerely happy and fulfilled.

But for me, I couldn’t keep my friendship with my outside Saviour.

However, this does not mean that Jesus means absolutely nothing to me now. I still listen to the traditional carols and I still make it out to a service every Christmas Eve. But it can be even more than that. You can read the Christmas story and you can see Christmas in a new light. For me, rather than seeing Jesus as someone who was born into the world to die for our sins and therefore make us acceptable to God, I see Jesus as an example. In my mind there is a place for Jesus as an example that divinity and humanity need not be separate. Here is an example of someone who realized the power within him, and with that knowledge he did powerful things.

Whatever your beliefs are this December, I wish you a very Merry Christmas. May you have moments in the coming days that help you realize much joy and peace.