Wednesday 27 October 2010

Bridging the abyss, an early attempt

Yesterday I get out of weekday mass at Leeds cathedral.
It's about 6pm and my head is spinning full of grand theories about our lives should be living sacrifices, permanent outpourings of love in endless unspeakable gratitude. That like the seraphims, we would cover our eyes and find ourselves unable to do anything else than shout "Holy" all the time, except it wouldn't be a vocal "shout", it would be our lives doing the shouting.
I should really give up those funny-smelling cigarettes at some point...
But it being Leeds we're talking about, you can't walk around with your head full of that stuff without being woken up by the poverty and destitution right under your nose, most of which you can't fix durably on your own. If you're lucky it won't be right opposite the cathedral by the entrance of the holy cards shop whith a guy shivering in the winter rain, a rosary round his neck.
I end up giving a couple of quids to a guy who's begging on the pavement (next to a busy cash machine) and asking whether he would like to come up for a pint with me. I hate it that it's me having to take the initative, talk of dodgy subject positions... But it's that or walking past, so I choose that.
He says: "I can't come to the pub, not in those clothes, they're grubby and all, I can't come out to the pub with those clothes and I love pints, but I'm trying you know, not to, I can't I really can't". I'm worried about his sleeping arrangements so I ask: Where do you sleep? He says in the passages under the train station. I ask if there's anything I can do for him. He replies: "You're alright love, unless you could like put me up, you're alright". I said I don't really live here, but 200 miles further North on the train and I slip him a couple more coins.
Lame, as ususal.
With cognitive dissonance of this magnitude I think I'm going to end up banging my head on the walls of an asylum sometime soon. But I can't give up my theologising without feeling like jumping in a river. So I keep the theologising, and the cognitive dissonance stays too. It's the mental health that's going...
Funny that "clothes" thing thought. I'd walk into a pub with smelly Glastonbury clothes without thinking twice about it, I know they don't care. I think about puting Tony (not his real name) up in a hotel, but I'm not sure that's helpful given I can't really afford more than one or two nights.
I walk to M&S to see of I can get clothes, but the shop is closed. So I walk into a supermarket to get some cool food (not all of it is what I would get for myself, but I rely on my past observations to get warm pasties, Mars bars and the like). I know full well that Mark might very well have walked away but I don't care.
And yes, it's nighttime and he's walked off...
Fine with me, I walk towards the station to catch my train and at some point I stop right in track to daydream for a minute or so. I do that quite a lot, I just stand there and think, trying to catch the next idea before it escapes. I look up and half a yard from my face on that really busy street is Mark waiting at the same crossing I'm at. It takes me a couple of seconds to realise and then I say: "Hey, I've sort of bought that stuff for you. I've written my phone number on the receipt, but you'd walked off and I'd given up and now the receipt is all crumpled but you can still read it if you want". He has a quick look and seems to like the stuff.
I ask what's the plan now? What are you up to tonight? He says well I've got this place, it's a hotel, they keep my stuff all the time but they only let me stay there when I can pay twenty pounds. I say, If you only need twenty pounds that's really easy, I can give you that.
Mark is delirious with joy and can't stop saying "you are good, you are beautiful, you are so good, after the day I've had, you are so good, you are good" and he hugs me for ages. I protest that I'm not good, and that he would do the same. "It's true I would do the same, I would, I would".

Saturday 23 October 2010

Fun with Jesuit.org

While browsing the Penguin History of the Church series, I read a passge that I've thought about maybe a hundred times since. It's about despair and our response to it.
The authors basically states that two of the most moving figures of Christianity, Luther and Loyola, were basically confronted with the same issue: no matter ho hard they tried to be relevant Christians, they failed pretty badly and freaked out.
And then our two guys came up with two separate answers. Luther's was: "So what you fail? That will never stop God from loving you. You are saved by grace through faith. The life open to you is one of gratitude". Loyola's answer was: "So what you fail? That does not stop God from loving you, just give the Christian life your absolute best shot".
I can't help but loving both answers. I believe they are both right but also, somehow, lacking without one another.
So anyway, while I've spent my twenties revelling in the simple and beautiful Lutheran piety to be found in the work of Bach (and the Schemelli songs in particular*), I've just got into Loyola. Most websites are quite defensive about the Spiritual exercises, shying away from publishing them online because apparently you really need to do them in a rereat and not just read them online.
But here there are anyway. It's too bad I spend two thirds of the time reevaluating them for consumption by the wishy-washy liberal universalist that I am. The passion and the commitment to be found in them is stupendous.
So that leaves me wanting to be a quasi Lutheran, married, female, wishy-washy liberal, universalist Jesuit. And why not?

*Here's just one example, not the best, just the first I could find. I credit these songs for instantly soothing me in every situtation I've ever been in since first coming across them. German is the true language of love!












Friday 22 October 2010

Co-opted by the Big Society

I've been meaning to post about this for a week or two but wasn't really sure how to start, or if I had that much to say beyond the feeling of being utterly co-opted by politicians I heartily dislike.
The new ConDem government we've got here is forever rambling on about the Big Society, as in: people doing things for free out of the goodness of their heart.
There are lots of issues with this. To begin with, if you're the parents of young children and you work full time, how the hell are you supposed to volunteer on top of that? Then, the jobs we do as volunteers could easily get done by someone who would get paid for it. In an era of high unemployment, wouldn't it be a good idea to give someone a job rather than abandon them on the dole and relying on volunteers who, for whatever reason, can afford the time commitment?
I volunteer at the local prison one half-day a week, providing a centre for the visitors. I absolutely love it. There's always lots of kids and the vistors are delightful (apart from the odd really scary one of course). It's largely a weekly exercise in shyness. I make it a point to be more humble, shy and deferential than the users because I am here to serve them.
For a start you would not believe how hard it is, even if your bloody religion has beaten humility into since you were six. And then you wouldn't believe the response you get. You've got to try it for yourself I'm afraid, it's hard to put into words the surprise, the bursting joy and the all-embrassing welcome you get from someone who's not at all used to being consistently deferred to. Some of the most hands-on liberation theologians have written about that stuff, if you know where to look.
Finally, there's the completely unlikely mix of volunteers, ranging from the card-carrying Tory old ladies, the dreadlocked anarchist, the retired cop, the crazy-assed heathcare worker who already works 6 days a week on minimum wage helping the elderly with personal hygiene but volunteers on the seventh day, the burntout Christian dogooder, the criminology student who needs something on her resume, you name it... One thing they all have is their own brand of awesomeness and otherwordly brilliance.
But at the end of the day, there we are, loved and endorsed by a government that is also obsessed with cutting public expenditure. We're running essential services for free so we can enable that government to continue to suck up to capital and to reward the rich at the expense of the poor. Is there a way out?

So close you can't "feel" it.

It's one of my bad days... I'm tired of sending ardent heartfelt prayers into the stratosphere and feeling nothing back. I start thinking in terms of "complete waste of time" and "cosmic emotional child abuse", you get the picture.
But is God out in the stratosphere?
-Uh oh, yes and no, but for the purposes of that question the answer is a "no". God is closer.
How much closer?
-Well like somewhere within you.
You mean among all the other random stuff that's "within you"?
-Nope, closer still, God's not an item amongst my dozens of neuroses and petty concerns, it's not an "item" at all, God is closer. God lives as we live, loves as we love, laughs as we laugh, fails as we fail, dies as we die. So God's not even distant enough to be detached from the action. I lose sight of that. Then I think God's out there not freaking answering while God's been crying my own tears.