steve jacobsen – Page 16 – Steve Jacobsen, Ed.D

God Rest Ye Ornery People

Music can be one of the many joys of this season as we hear familiar songs and carols. Some were composed by highly trained composers and others have more humble origins.

One of my many favorites is “I Wonder As I Wander.” As the story goes, a scholar of folk music, John Jacob Niles, found himself in the small Appalachian town of Murphy, North Carolina, in 1933. He came upon a modest evangelistic gathering on the outskirts of town. Onto the small platform stepped an unkempt young girl who smiled shyly as she sang:

I wonder as I wander out under the sky,

How Jesus the savior did come for to die,

For poor ornery people like you and like I,

I wonder as I wander out under the sky.”

Moved by the song’s haunting beauty, he paid the girl to repeat it several times so he could transcribe it. He took it with him, extended the lyrics and stanzas, gave her credit, and published it in 1934 in Songs of the Hillfolk. Since then, it’s been recorded by Fred Waring and the Pennsylvanians, Julie Andrews, Barbara Streisand, Joan Baez, Leontyne Price, Andy Griffin, Linda Ronstadt, Chanticleer, and many others; it’s included in countless hymnbooks and seasonal playlists.

I am drawn to it partly by its melancholy mood and simplicity. Composed by an untrained person living at the fringes of society, it’s like the blues – an expression of life’s hardships created by people who are living hard lives.

And my favorite line is, “…how Jesus the savior did come for to die, for poor ornery people like you and like I.” I love the word ornery.

There are two possible meanings of “ornery.” Some say it’s just the Appalachian pronunciation of “ordinary,” and many published versions use that option.

That may be correct. But I’m biased toward the other possibility — that it means “ornery” the way I heard that word used as I was growing up. Merriam-Webster’s definition: “Having an irritable disposition: cantankerous; difficult to deal with or control… (as in) ‘an ornery mule’…”

My dad would talk about people being “ornery,” and we knew what he meant. And when you sound it out, it sounds defiant, grumpy, and stubborn. Ornery.

I sometimes feel ornery. We are not supposed to feel that way. We are supposed to always be civil and kind, generous of heart, and looking out for the interest of others. But sometimes we don’t feel like we are supposed to feel. And the carol puts it right out there: the world is full of “poor ornery people like you and like I.”

Thinking about this message and mood led me to page through hymnals looking for other carols which suggest how living in this world can be disheartening:

“Disperse the gloomy clouds of night, and death’s dark shadows put to flight…Bid envy, strife, warfare cease..” (O Come, O Come Emmanuel)
“From our fears and sin release us…” (Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus)
“…And still their heavenly music floats o’er all the weary world…above its sad and lonely plains they bend on hovering wing, and ever o’er its Babel sounds, the blessed angels sing.” (It Came Upon a Midnight Clear)
“…and ye beneath life’s crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who will along the climbing way with painful steps and slow… “ (It Came Upon a Midnight Clear)
“No more let sin and sorrows grow, nor thorns infest the ground…” (Joy to the World)
“’Fear not,’ said he – for mighty dread had seized their troubled minds…” (While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night)
“Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume breathes a life of gathering gloom, sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying, sealed in the stone-cold tomb.” (We Three Kings)

If you collect these phrases and line them up, you get this: there are times when life can feel like we are living under “gloomy clouds of night,” haunted by “death’s dark shadows,” often having to deal with “envy, strife (and) warfare” as well as “fears and sin;” the world can be a “weary” place” as we make our way on “sad and lonely plains” hearing all these different voices with their “Babel sounds;” under “life’s crushing load” we can feel like our “forms are bending low,” that any progress we make is made with “painful steps and slow;” we have days when we are convinced that “thorns “infest the ground” we walk on, moments come when “dread” seizes our “troubled minds,” and we know that life, at its most difficult, includes times of “sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying” all leading to “a stone cold tomb.”

Not exactly Christmas Cheer. But life can be tough. No surprise that we get ornery.

Hard as life can be, and no matter how “ornery” we may feel, the gift of Christmas comes to us anyway. That’s what the young girl who created this song knew, and that’s what allowed her to sing it with a shy smile under her sorrows.

“God does not love as we love. God loves as an emerald is green.”

Image: “Sky Over Big Bear,” Shutterstock Photos

Ever Experience the Same Thing Twice?

In my inbox every morning is “The Writer’s Almanac,” which describes significant events in cultural history. A recent article noted it was the birthday of Claude Monet:

He and his friend Auguste Renoir were among the first European painters to take their canvases outside to paint directly from nature. They would often work as quickly as they could, so that their paintings looked like sketches, and that sketchy style became known as Impressionism. Monet spent the rest of his career exploring the idea that you can never really see the same thing twice. In a single day, he would often paint the same subject half a dozen times, from slightly different angles and in slightly different light, spending no more than about an hour on each canvas. In the last 30 years of his life, he painted almost nothing but the water lilies in his garden at Giverny. Monet bought the four-acre property in 1883, built the bridges, dug the lake, and selected all the flowers and plants himself.

It seems he painted 250 scenes in his garden as a way of “exploring the idea that you can never really see the same thing twice.”

Can we ever experience the same thing twice?

We have grandkids that are 7, 5, and 1, and feel blessed to watch them grow and develop. This week the one-year-old made the evolutionary leap from being a four-legged mammal to two, ending with a smile confirming she knew that she had just taken a “big step.” In one sense she’s the same wee person she was the week before – but she’s not exactly the same.

A golf teacher once made the point that your body and mind are always changing, and every time you play, you’ll need to adjust to who you have become.

A yoga teacher said that every day we begin our practice, something in our body has shifted. We may be a bit less flexible or a bit more – it’s hard to predict — but it is something we should expect.

And what tennis, soccer, or baseball player can completely control time after time where the ball will go?

Modern science tells us there is no such thing as solid, unchanging matter — it’s all energy in varying states and forms.

Every day, countless cells in our body are dying and others are being created; biologically we “are not the person we used to be.” (As we get older, looking in the mirror becomes vivid proof).

So maybe this was what fascinated Monet as he created this “Impression” of the lily pond in his garden…

Nymphea, 1905

…and then sometime later he captured the same pond in a different light:

Nymphea, 1905

On the one hand, it’s exciting to think “you can never really see the same thing twice.”

But on the other hand, it can be a bit unsettling. It makes me feel like I’m being carried away on a river when I’d prefer to have my feet planted on solid ground, at least occasionally. Where do we find stability?

This is a central question for many spiritual traditions.

Hinduism assumes we all have an “atman” within us, an essence that is rooted in the divine; it’s like a “witness” within ourselves, observing our life as it ebbs and flows and will be the awareness that continues beyond death. Buddhism disputes that, at least in the most simplistic form. Western traditions have often spoken of each person having a “soul.”

There’s a beautiful old English hymn that used to be common at memorial services: “Abide with Me, Fast Falls the Eventide.” The English philosopher Alfred North Whitehead once said these words sum up the universal longing of humanity: “Fast falls the eventide” acknowledges that all life is passing, while “Abide with me” is a plea that our connection with the divine will be a constant.

Two stories from my hospice work come to mind.

Serenity House is a beautiful residential hospice here in Santa Barbara. I knew the Executive Director of the organization as it was being designed and built, and she shared with me some of her hopes during that time. One key theme was integration with nature: every room has a porch where the patient can enjoy the landscaping as well as a view of the city and the nearby mountain range. Sometime after it opened, she told me that one patient had asked the gardener to not remove the fallen leaves on her porch but let them remain where they had landed. The patient said looking at the fallen leaves gave her comfort.

A friend of mine is a longtime volunteer at Serenity House. He has often been with patients as they are dying, and it is common for them to begin to sense there is something “on the other side.” Never – not once – has he seen people in those moments experiencing fear.

“We are born in mystery, we live in mystery, and we die in mystery,” Huston Smith said. Maybe our whole life is just a series of “impressions” as we try to capture important moments in the changing light. What a gift to be doing so. And what amazing colors the light reveals.

Top Image: Nymphea, 1903

Water Lilly Pond, 1917-1920

Is Life All About Our “Highlight Reels?”

I sometimes find myself wondering if life is all about creating memorable “highlight reels.”

Highlight reels are excerpts from sporting events that capture dramatic and decisive moments. You don’t have to watch the entire World Cup soccer game to find out it ends in a scoreless tie – you just watch a few minutes of compelling footage that an editor has decided will hold your attention. You don’t have to sit in the stands at a baseball game for 3 ½ hours as it painstakingly unfolds – you just see 5 minutes that include the diving catch, the dramatic home run, and the last guy striking out. The folks who put the highlight reels together know how the game turned out, so they can create just the right script and a satisfying finish. The scenes include commentary by a skilled announcer and maybe even a dramatic soundtrack. Highlight reels can be much more engaging than the actual experience.

In this digital age, we can make our own “highlight reels” using our smartphone cameras. We can capture stunning sunsets, joyous birthday cake moments, and two friends smiling at the foot of a majestic waterfall — significant moments of inspiration, celebration, and affection. That’s what we want to remember. Who wants to watch real-time video of the drudgery we felt at work before we got home to see the sunset, the housework we had to do to get ready for the party, or the long hike that got us to the waterfall?

And in recent years, it’s common for memorial services to include a slideshow of the person’s life, tracing it through the decades with carefully chosen images. It’s always moving to feel like we are seeing pictures that each tell us a thousand words about someone’s life, especially when we know their life is complete.

So I sometimes wonder: maybe it’s only life’s highlights that are worth living for.

But then I consider the oak tree in our backyard.

The oak tree in our backyard (as seen in the above photo) is a “volunteer,” meaning it came up out of the ground unexpectedly. I remember first seeing the 18” sprout while doing yard work; I had a pair of pruning loppers, assumed it was unwanted, and was ready to snip it into oblivion. But my wife saw me and said, “Don’t cut it! That’s a volunteer oak. Leave it alone. Let’s see how it grows.”

Years later it’s a magnificent living presence. Our landscape designer is in awe of its structure and vitality. He told me the tap root can go 100’ feet into the earth, and that a wealthy person would pay $50,000 for a tree that looks like this one.

I find myself gazing at this tree and thinking how undramatic it is, how silent, how steady, how patient. It’s alive. It grows. It simultaneously knows how to send roots into the earth seeking water while sending branches into the sky seeking light, all the while breathing in carbon dioxide, breathing out oxygen, and manufacturing acorns to provide for future generations.

If I was to make a “highlight reel” of the oak tree, what images would I use? It does all its labor undercover. Meanwhile, I rush through my days hoping to do something that will qualify for my personal highlight reel.

Trees are prominent in spiritual traditions. The “Oaks of Mamre” is a place of divine encounters for Abraham.[i] Though they have never met before, Jesus tells Nathaniel he already knows him because “I saw you under the fig tree.”[ii] And, according to one tradition, Buddha sits for 49 days under the Bodhi tree, stands to thank it for its shade – and in that moment receives enlightenment.[iii]

Trees are a common source of shelter and safety, and therefore an ideal place for contemplation. But maybe there’s more to it than just protection from the sun. Maybe being in the presence of such creations subtly reminds us that life is more than just clips that qualify for a highlight reel. Maybe they instead teach us what it is like to be quietly immersed, moment-by-moment, in the miracle of life.

[i] Genesis 18:1

[ii] John 1:48

[iii] https://buddhists.org/the-bodhi-tree/

Empathy Means I Don’t Know How You Feel

“Empathy is not ‘I know how you feel,’ but ‘I don’t know how you feel.’”

I recently came across this quote in notes I’d kept from a retreat I attended some years ago. It was credited to Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury.

If we care for people, we want to know how they are feeling. Making the effort to do so is a genuine act of compassion. Sometimes we make the connection easily. But sometimes our assumptions about what another person is feeling can lead us astray.

I remember an older woman I visited after she began attending our services. She always dressed more formally than was the norm in California and was always very gracious. When I came to her apartment, she invited me to have a seat in her living room. I noticed the many shelves which were carefully arranged with shiny porcelain figurines and elegant China dishes. It all suggested to me she’d probably led a proper and sheltered life. I asked her to tell me about herself. She talked briefly about her life before coming to Santa Barbara. Then she calmly described how her husband had recently died after ten years of dementia. She said for the first five years, she had cared for him by herself in the apartment, needing to be more and more vigilant as his condition deteriorated. When she could no longer keep him safely, she transferred him to a facility and visited him every day for five years until he died. I was stunned. Where do people find the strength for such devotion?

I once went on a mission trip with teenagers in Mexico. We’d build homes during the day and return to the campground at night. I had unconsciously brought with me an assumption – shared with many fellow parents of the time – that teens were becoming so obsessed with digital devices that they must be losing their ability to make genuine connections with others. But as I sat with them at night around the fire and they talked about their lives, I realized I had misjudged them; they were much better listeners than many adults.

I got to know a woman in her 30s who’d been wheelchair-bound her whole life. Once she said something that made me think of Christopher Reeves, the Superman actor who had become paralyzed after a horse-riding accident. “He must be an inspiration,” I said.

“Not really,” she said. “He’s rich and famous and can pay for 24-hour care and do what he wants. But most of us don’t have his resources. We experience a lot of loneliness and depression. But no one wants to hear that. People like him because he’s always positive. If he’s feeling down, he can’t talk about it, or he won’t be popular.”

How little we know about the inner life of others.

When I began my work at Hospice of Santa Barbara, I attended a workshop focused on caring for families in which the death of a child or parent had occurred. The speaker had worked for twenty years in hospitals dealing with such situations. I was hoping for some handy guidelines for such situations. I was surprised when he said what he does before he walks into a room to meet a family: “I get in touch with my helplessness.” That confused me at first. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized this is a way to set aside that anxious, earnest, “I-want-to -fix-it” impulse within us to become truly open to whatever is present.

And I remember being at a conference where a prominent nursing educator from the City of Hope was speaking about how easy it is to misjudge people. She said she had once led a support group for women who were dealing with breast cancer. Each person in the circle was taking a turn describing what emotions they were experiencing. All the women in the group talked openly about how hard it was, and many shed tears. One woman, however, seemed unmoved and opted not to share. The speaker confessed thinking, “This woman is probably repressing her feelings; I’ll speak to her after the session.” After the session was concluded and the others left, she approached the woman, who agreed to sit down and talk. The leader shared her concern that the woman was perhaps not being forthright and encouraged her to share. The woman told her what she’d experienced in the last three years. First, her family had lost their home in Hurricane Katrina and couldn’t go back. Then a daughter died. Then she’d lost her husband. “This?” she said, motioning towards her body, “This is just breast cancer.”

We never can assume we know what someone else is really feeling, or what it’s like to be “in their skin.”

A seminary teacher once made a reference to a painting that was probably in every Sunday School building in America: “Jesus Blesses The Little Children.” It’s very simple: Jesus is just sitting in the midst of a group of boys and girls. “You know,” the professor said, “People always assume that he is teaching them something. But maybe he’s just listening.”

Image: Portrait of a Peasant – Patience Escalier, Vincent van Gogh

Our Evolutionary Inheritance: Work, Sleep, and Campfire Wisdom

Several years ago, I read about an African hunting/gathering community that had virtually no prior contact with “civilization.[i]” For two years an anthropologist recorded daily conversations, coded them, and analyzed them. Some key findings:

Almost all the daytime conversations involved work, with approximately 37% consisting of people complaining others weren’t doing their fair share.
Tribal elders did not have much to say or contribute during the day.
At night, everyone gathered around the fire. The focus changed from work to spiritual topics, tribal history, and “subtle psychological insights.” Elders became central to these conversations. The conversations could last for hours, and the old ones might nod off. But after a rest, they would often rejoin the circle.

At the time I read the article, I was leading a nonprofit with 30 employees, and these themes resonated with what I was experiencing:

The hardest part of the job was dealing with “HR Issues” – people’s work performance and how people would fret about the performance of others (probably close to 37%).
Younger employees often had more energy and could work longer. They also had more skill and less anxiety dealing with IT issues and were invaluable for pointing out cultural changes that were occurring and how we might adapt.
While everyone might have insights into our work, it was the older ones who held the “tribal memory” of both the organization and the profession and were particularly helpful in offering long-range perspective.

Later I saw an article about how our evolutionary past might explain the way memory changes over time.[ii] As we know, older people begin having difficulty with short-term memory (“Where are my glasses?” “What’s my password?”) But even seniors with dementia can have remarkable recall of past events. When our ancestors were hunting or gathering during the day to survive, they had to rely on mental alertness and physical abilities. But as they became slow, creaky, and sore, their value to the community shifted – they were the ones who carried the valuable stories; short-term memory was less important.

Maybe evolution also explains our sleep patterns. During COVID, I read Why We Sleep[iii]. The author notes that some adults go to bed early and wake up early while a roughly equal number of people go to bed late and sleep late. He theorizes this may be an inheritance from our past: it would be advantageous to have people awake at different times of the night to act as sentries for the tribe. So maybe this is one reason older folks wake up more often at odd hours — they’re wired for sentry duty. (Of course, the seriousness of the danger has changed; instead of “Is that a lion I hear in the forest”? it might be, “Does the dog need to go out?”)

These ideas comfort me. I like to think some of the changes we experience as we age aren’t because there’s “something wrong” with us, but because of deeply engrained behaviors that were advantageous for our ancestors.

I’ve always been fascinated by how Rembrandt was able to document his aging process. He portrayed himself close to 100 times, 40 of which are complete paintings. Here is one from 1632:

This 26-year-old guy is on top of his game – no doubt staying up late, full of energy and confidence, and successfully adapting to the latest trends and techniques.

And here he is 31 years later at age 57:

He may not be not going out as much…probably frustrated with aches and pains…going to bed earlier than he used to and waking up at odd times during the night. Maybe you wouldn’t ask him to help you move furniture across town. But look into his eyes: wouldn’t you like to hear some of his stories?

[i] I wish had the citation for the article, but I can’t seem to find it.

[ii] I can’t find this article either. Do you remember where I put it? Did you move it? You didn’t throw it away, did you?

[iii] I found this one! Why We Sleep: The New Science of Sleep and Dreams, by Matthew Walker.

Top image: “White Mountains Moonlit Campfire,” Getty Images

What A Relief to Know Some of Us Aren’t Perfect

I recently read a review of a new book, Imperfection, by an Italian biologist, Telmo Pievani.[i] The theme is that some people expect nature to be “perfect,” but in fact, from the Big Bang to the present moment, imperfection permeates life:

“In the beginning, there was imperfection. A rebellion against the established order, with no witnesses, in the heart of the darkest of nights. Something in the symmetry broke down 13.82 billion years ago.”
“Mary Poppins congratulated herself for being ‘practically perfect in every way,’ but of course she wasn’t, if only because she bragged about it.”
“… being primates, our Pleistocene ancestors were naturally fond of sugars, which indicate ripe fruit, and of fats, present—albeit in generally small quantities—in game. Today, our culture provides us with excessive opportunities to indulge such fondness, which we overdo, benefiting only the confectionery and meat industries, along with dentists, cardiologists and morticians.”
…”Homo sapiens are marvels of unintelligent design, with their useless earlobes, their tedious wisdom teeth . . . the remains of their ancestral quadrupedal gait, and the corresponding ills and pains, backache, sciatica, flat feet, scoliosis, and hernias. Add the terrible structure of our knees, our lower backs…”
“Imperfection makes clear that ‘evolution is not perfect but is rather the result of unstable and precarious compromises,’ and that accordingly it isn’t a highway to excellence but a bumpy path that, despite potholes and construction delays, leads at least some travelers to the biological goal of survival and reproduction.”
“Readers wanting to get up to speed on imperfection would do well to attend to two little-known words with large consequences. The first is “palimpsest,” which in archaeology refers to any object that has been written upon, then erased, then written over again (sometimes many times), but with traces of the earlier writings still faintly visible. Every living thing is an evolutionary palimpsest, with adaptations necessarily limited because they’re built upon previous structures.” As a prime example, the author notes that we’ve evolved to have big heads, but the birth canal passes through the pelvis. This worked well when our ancestors had small heads but increasingly is a problem with our increasing hat size.
“Which brings us to our second unusual word: ‘kluge,’ something—assembled from diverse components—that shouldn’t work, but does. A kluge is a workaround: often clumsy, inelegant, inefficient, but that does its job nonetheless. Because we and all other living things are living palimpsests, we are kluges as well.”
The reviewer concludes: “Unsurprisingly, I’m imperfect, you’re imperfect, everyone and everything is imperfect. Mr. Pievani is imperfect—his writing doesn’t sparkle, but his ideas assuredly do, which makes Imperfection a perfect way to begin understanding our imperfect world.”

The fact that life is permeated with imperfection explains a lot: why our politics are such a mess, why the Dodgers (with the best record in baseball) didn’t make it past the first round of the playoffs, why we can’t live anymore with just one password, and why inflation and gas prices are high. It also explains my disappointment when I must forgo Toll House Chocolate-Chip Cookies, Gallo salami, and Costco hot dogs (well, most of the time). And it’s a logical way to look at what keeps doctors, surgeons, pharmacists, dentists, and psychologists in business.

It seems the Great Cosmic Designer clearly did not consult Martha Stewart before allowing the Big Bang to fumble us all into existence.

But I don’t find this a pessimistic perspective. I think it reveals why there is a poignant beauty in life.

A certain ancient book has two creation stories back-to-back.

The first one is a creation-in-seven-day story. Composed some 2,500 years ago before modern science, it’s an elegant account of light coming out of darkness, land out of the sea, and the emergence of plant life, sea creatures, and humans (created with gender equality). It ends with “And behold, it was very good” and a command to take a day of rest to savor it all. Aren’t there moments when we see the interrelationship of all life and sense it is beyond amazing? It feels like a kind of perfection.

The second story focuses on a man formed from earth who assumes he is the center of everything. He’s given lots of animal companions, but he’s still lonely. A woman is created. They discover a freedom to make choices. They get in trouble and are expelled from Easy Street. She’s cursed with the pains of childbirth, he’s cursed with the frustrations of hard work, and a poor serpent must be forever wary of someone stepping on his head. It’s a human story of promise, longing, hope, confusion, choices, regrets, and struggle — imperfection.

Between the two stories lies all the glories of this improbable life, right alongside the tragedies, heartbreaks, and back aches.

Maybe some people think this imperfect world is a just a cosmic mistake and would prefer to live in Martha Stewart World. But not me.

An art history teacher once pointed out that Dutch still-life paintings often depicted beautiful flowers, fruit, and beverages – but something is amiss. Something is beginning to decay, or there’s an uninvited fly on the peach or in the beer. The message: we long for a perfection that lasts forever, to have everything stay as we want it to be. But life isn’t like that.

At the same time, we can remember that the fruit, the beer, the light, the artist, the viewer — and the fly — all emerged from the same improbable process. And flies are pretty incredible creatures.

We can feel despair from seeing all the “imperfections” of life. And yet there is a transcendent, translucent, transformative sense of presence amid all the improbability. How unexpected that it’s all here after so many mishaps, “palimpsests,” “kluges” and stumbles.

It’s a relief to not expect perfection in ourselves, each other, or life. It’s a gift to look instead for wonder.

[i] https://www.wsj.com/articles/imperfection-review-unintelligent-design-11666735767

Top Image: A Still Life with Grapes, Peach, Cabbage-White and Dragon-Fly, 1665 Willem van Aelst (1627-c.1683).jpg

Bottom image: Still Life by Johann Georg Hinz (c.1660). German painter

What Gets Your Ghost?

This is a season of ghosts and spirits. Let’s imagine your “ghost” is out and about for a few hours. You find yourself walking in a neighborhood you’ve never been in before. You notice there are three houses side by side. As you approach the first one, the door opens. You enter.

House #1: You find yourself descending into an underground complex, and the door shuts behind you. You walk through an ancient gate, are ferried across a river, and are assigned a place on one of the nine floors. You realize this is a place where you will never have to pretend to care about anyone else. Instead, you have unlimited time to proclaim to anyone within earshot how other people and forces were responsible for all the disappointments in your life. There are other “ghosts” on the floor with you, but no one seems to even know you are there. But you don’t care. You start ranting about divine injustice, the influence of the stars, your terrible family, and all the people you encountered who did you wrong. Occasionally one of the other ghosts floats your way and pours out their own misery and outrage, but you don’t even pretend to listen to them – you just continue your diatribe.

House #2: In the blink of an eye, you find you have left the first house and are in front of the door of the second. You enter and join a group of fellow spirits. You are all standing at the base of a mountain. Everyone seems glad to have arrived, and they sing a song of gratitude. The group begins a long hike up a mountain. You can’t travel alone – you must stay with your group and support each other. From time to time, someone will start singing a familiar song and everyone joins in. You have a guide who seems very knowledgeable and ready to answer any questions you might have. You find yourself taking time to make a personal review of your life. As each important experience comes up, you take responsibility for your actions and learn something new. As you do this, you feel burdens of regret that you’ve been carrying for a very long time being lifted. You get to the summit and enter an enchanted garden; personal guides come to welcome you. In an instant, you find yourself back on the street in front of the third house.

House #3: As you walk through this door, you feel weightless and buoyant, and realize you are ascending through the atmosphere toward the heavens. You find yourself on the moon. You feel refreshed and renewed. You realize you can remember details of your life, but you’re no longer preoccupied with yourself. Instead, you are fascinated by the other people you are meeting along the way – some you know from your life, and some are new acquaintances. You can’t help but marvel at their essential goodness. You’re also enraptured by seeing the moon, planets, and stars with amazing clarity. You notice that some people are positioned above you, closer to the source of light. But you don’t care because you are no longer comparing yourself with others, and you know that to be anywhere in this dimension is to be filled with wonder, appreciation, and freedom. Then, suddenly, you’re back on the street.

These are, very roughly speaking, characteristics of the three dimensions of the afterlife described by Dante in 1300 in his masterwork, The Divine Comedy. It reflects his personal understanding of the universe, human behavior, and spiritual truth. It arises out of his own beliefs and biases and is a product of its time. But, like all great imaginative works of literature, it contains great insights into human behavior. House #1 is a sample of what it’s like to be in Inferno, where you are endlessly immersed in your own self and your prejudices and don’t give a damn about anyone else. Destination #2 is “Purgatorio,” where you have the chance to work through whatever has burdened you, aided by being in community with others. And Destination #3 is an imaginative glimpse of Paradiso.

I don’t know exactly what happens when we die.

What I do know is that Dante captures what we can experience in the here and now.

To be constantly engulfed and isolated in anger and resentment is like existing in a living hell.

To be on a spiritual journey is like being on a long trek where we learn more and more about ourselves and life every day and, as we make the journey, we learn the importance of friendship and caring for one another.

And having moments when we forget ourselves and, instead, catch glimpses of the beauty of the natural world and other people is like finding heaven on earth.

Image above: “Piccarda Donati meets Dante and Beatrice on the Circle of the Moon,” Canto 3 Paradisio; Salvador Dali

Image below: “Beatrice Shows Dante the Fixed Stars,” Boticelli

Waking Up on A Train

“At some point we look out the train window and realize we are in another country.” — David Brooks, commenting on his spiritual journey, “Lead Where You Stand Conference,” June 2022

If you take the Coast Starlight Amtrak from Santa Barbara to Seattle, you’ll board at noon and arrive 30 hours later. You never know what you’ll see.

Traveling by train is much less stressful than traveling by air. Seatbelts are not required. You don’t watch an instructional video telling you what to do if the plane begins falling into the ocean. You can walk up and down the aisles. You can bring your own food or purchase some onboard. You can choose where to be — the dining car, the café, the observation car – and, if you book a sleeping compartment, you can be in your own private room.

When night comes, the conductor makes your bed. You get a real pillow and stretch out. Sleeping on a moving train is far easier than having to become a pretzel on a plane.

Unlike driving, you don’t have to stay alert, deal with traffic, or stop for gas.

The scenery on the Coast Starlight route is always changing. You pass along ocean cliffs, in and out of small towns, by farms and vineyards, and through forests and mountain ranges.

If there are delays, instead of being bound to your seat on the tarmac, you are free to roam; you don’t have to plead for special dispensation to use the facility.

The conductor periodically reminds you where you are and what’s coming next: “Portland. Next stop, 10 minutes. Portland.”

But sometimes you suddenly realize you don’t know where you are.

Maybe it’s in the middle of the night and you wake up because you sense the train is not moving. You pull the curtain aside and wonder, “Where am I?”

During the day you might fall asleep, daydream, or become immersed in a good book or conversation; you find you’re looking at unexpected scenery.

Moving through life can be like being a passenger on a train. Sometimes you arrive on time at a planned destination. Other times, you are surprised.

I remember the first day I drove my 1963 Plymouth Valiant to high school by myself. I was short and my father had to install a wooden platform under the drivers’ seat so I could see over the wheel. But I was licensed and independent. I pulled out of our driveway, turned on the AM radio, and headed to school. “I’m really doing this,” I thought.

In my twenties, I found myself on an unexpected spiritual journey. The faith tradition I had discounted most of my life was now calling to me, drawing me, along with my doubts and questions, like a force of gravity. My girlfriend (who became my wife) asked if I wanted to help chaperone the church’s youth group that was going caroling. We got onto the back of a flatbed truck and were handed mimeographed song sheets with “Joy to the World,” “Angels We Have Heard On High,” and all the rest. As the group started singing, the lyrics that had been routine and familiar to me all my life now seemed vivid, amazing, and inspiring. In that moment I realized I had crossed from skeptic to “believer.” “When did that happen?” I wondered.

A few years ago, I made an appointment at the Social Security office to submit my Medicare paperwork. I gave it to the clerk who reviewed and approved it. I walked out wondering, “When did I get to this stage of life?”

How many times have you looked in the mirror, or at changes in society, or what’s happening to friends and loved ones, and think, “When did I arrive here?”

Maybe what’s going on “outside” is always going to be changing. In one sense, that’s a bit scary. But in another sense, what a mystery and privilege to be alive and watching it unfold.

And I wonder: Will we all, at some point, suddenly find ourselves thinking “I am no longer in my body?” Will we look out our window and realize we’re headed someplace we’ve never been before?

Top image credit: philly.com

Two Questions, Two Art Works, One Life to Live

What’s going on inside you?

What’s going on because of you?

Last spring, I attended a leadership conference at Westmont College. The president said he often asks students these two questions. They struck me as excellent questions to ask ourselves from time to time.

Reflecting on them this week brought to mind two art works I saw in Europe in January 2020. In Leipzig it was “The Kneeling King,” a wooden sculpture from 1500. In Vienna, it was “The Large Path” from 1962 by Friedensreich Hundertwasser. Different eras, different artists, different media, different themes. But somehow, they help me reflect on how we can view our life through these two questions. I’m inviting you to look at them with me with the questions in mind.

Let’s start with the older one, “The Kneeling King.”

*Knieender Konig*, Michel Erhart, c. 1500, Zentrum Museuem, Leipzig

This is piece of religious art, and the “King” with his opened treasure box is one of the Magi. He has been on a long journey, led by signs and prophecies to a distant land. He’s come to pay homage to a newborn child who promises to bring peace to the world. He’s arrived and is kneeling in humility and hope. But as I look at his facial expression, I sense an inner weariness. Grateful he got to this point, but not assured his longings will be fulfilled. In my imagination it seems likely he will return home and eventually die without knowing if his hopes will be realized. But he’s done his best. He’s made the journey and offered something of his own that could be valuable to benefit others.

What’s going on inside of him? I sense a desire to help the world become a place of greater compassion and justice. At this late stage in his life, he wants to offer something of personal significance to benefit humanity.

What is happening because of him? A poor family is being given a gift to help them raise their child. His inner journey leads to an outward journey — a giving away rather than just a gathering in.

Let’s turn to the contemporary piece, “The Large Path” by Hundertwasser.

*Der Grosse Weg*, Friedensreich Hundterwasser, 1962, Belvedere Palace, Vienna.

I don’t know anything about theories of color and design, but this piece made me pause and study it with fascination and curiosity.

I read the descriptive plaque next to it: Hundertwasser’s art combines Far Eastern philosophy and abstract art, the unconscious and the rational, nature and culture. He discovered Zen Buddhism in the 1950s and traveled subsequently to Japan. He sought to put an end to the lust for money and power and to find inner peace. The spiral represents the long road towards this goal. The center of the picture promises tranquility.

Our current culture is often described as one in which we are searching for our “authentic self.” For some, Western spirituality has become dry and dogmatic. Eastern paths offer an opportunity for finding inner peace. Popular psychology and self-help also reflect this hunger. Will I ever know who I really am? Will I ever be able to find peace and tranquility? Like the subject in “The Kneeling King,” the artist went on a long journey. Looking back, he felt his search had been like a long spiral coming closer and closer to a meaningful center, which he represents as a patch of blue — like a warm and welcoming window to deep inner space.

What’s going on inside of this him? It seems the answer could be a long search for inner peace. And the painting suggests he found something at one point.

What’s going because of him? I did not know until I read more about him.

It turns out Hundertwasser became an early pioneer in environmental activism. He bought land in rural New Zealand and lived self-sufficiently using solar panels, a water wheel, and a biological water purification plant. He made a trip to Washington, DC, to oppose the growth of nuclear weapons. It seems his inner search didn’t end with him finding a state of personal illumination but became a path turning outward to make a difference in the world.

There may have been times in my life when I hoped I’d find some permanent place of inner tranquility within myself. But the older I get, the less I feel a need to find such a place. I am more curious about what I can offer to the world beyond myself, even if I don’t know how it will turn out. Maybe the best way to find ourselves is to give ourselves away.

What’s going on inside you?

What’s going on because of you?

What do you see in these works of art?

Ritual, Power, and Spirituality

I love spectacles.

In 2017, I took $1,200 out of my savings to buy a ticket to the 7^th game of the World Series at Dodger Stadium. I’d been a fan all my life but had never been to a World Series game. The mood of the crowd, the pregame ceremonies, and the singing of the national anthem were all thrilling. The Dodgers were favored to win. They lost.

In January 2020, I flew to Vienna to begin a two-week pilgrimage focused on music, art, and history. A few hours after my plane landed, I entered the historic Vienna Opera House to see Richard Strauss’ Salome. I had bought a seat in one of the side balconies so I could be close to the stage. The music began and I thought, “I am at the opera in Vienna!” As it turned out, there was a pillar on the side of the balcony that blocked my view of the right side of the stage where the climactic final scene took place. Oh well.

In September I joined over 4 billion people who watched the funeral of Queen Elizabeth. The pageantry! The precision! The history! The crowds! I was totally engaged. I watched the coffin brought into Westminster Cathedral and was in awe. But when the elaborately dressed archbishop began eloquently reciting a passage from the Gospel, I felt uneasy. I wasn’t sure why. And then it occurred to me: He’s reading the words of a Palestinian peasant and prophet who spurned any signs of status, constantly challenged authority, and identified with people at the margins of society.

Later in the day, the coffin was taken to the chapel at Windsor Castle. On the coffin were the crown, an orb, and a scepter. I was fascinated as I watched each item carefully transferred from the coffin to the altar, signifying the Queen’s time of authority and service was completed. I looked for information about these items:

“The crown is made of gold and set with 2,868 diamonds, 269 pearls, 17 sapphires, 11 emeralds, and four rubies.”[i]
“…. the orb is a 30cm-wide hollow gold sphere, mounted with nine emeralds, 18 rubies, nine sapphires, 365 diamonds, 375 pearls, one amethyst and one glass stone.”[ii]
“The scepter is “comprised of three sections, with the magnificent Cullinan stone atop, supported in an enameled heart-shaped structure. This structure is surmounted by enameled brackets mounted with step-cut emeralds, and by a faceted amethyst monde…set with table and rose-cut diamonds, rubies, spinels and emeralds, with a cross above set with further diamonds, with a table-cut diamond on the front, and an emerald on the reverse.”[iii]

Historically, these items are reminders that the monarch is God’s chosen instrument on earth. I couldn’t help but think, “Is this the same God that chose to identify with the slaves of Egypt? The same God who, Jesus taught, comes to us in the faces of people in need?”

Don’t get me wrong. I have complete respect for Queen Elizabeth. She served her country for 70 years with grace, forbearance, and dignity. I remember well when the COVID pandemic was threatening us all. While the American head-of-state was generating confusion and discord, she delivered a wonderful message encouraging all the people of the UK to come together in mutual support and caring. An honorable person, an amazing Queen.

And I know my history. I know that the “divine right of kings” has been a principle accepted by many societies throughout human history. None of us are perfect, and to be in a position of great authority and responsibility, always in the public eye, is a formidable task.

I’m still trying to figure this out.

In 1982, we were living in Santa Paula and heard that Mother Theresa was coming to give the commencement address at nearby St. Thomas Aquinas College. A friend got us tickets. We were sitting on folding chairs when the opening procession came down the center aisle, 50 feet from where we were. The first prominent person visible was a cardinal from somewhere, dressed to the hilt. A bit behind him was the barely visible bobbing head of this small nun, dressed in a simple habit. When it was his turn to speak, he invoked his status to encourage everyone to respect the authority of the church. When she spoke, she said what counts in life is love and prayer.

I remember as a kid watching President Kennedy’s coffin being carried on a horse-drawn caisson down Pennsylvania avenue with nothing on it but an American flag:

A few years later, Dr. King’s coffin lay on a share-croppers wagon drawn by two mules:

I am a fan of spectacles and rituals and theater. The British do it well. But the older I get, the less impressed I am by mansions, palaces, and jewels.

There was a remarkable priest here in Santa Barbara who served the local Mission and greater community for more than 50 years – Father Virgil Cordano. He was “beloved by the community as a whole for his humanity, humor, erudition, and readiness to reach out his hand in friendship to all.”[iv] When Queen Elizabeth visited Santa Barbara in 1983, it was Father Virgil who gave her a personal tour of the Mission. I was privileged to serve alongside him on the boards of Hospice of Santa Barbara and La Casa de Maria Retreat Center, and we became friends. At meetings, I’d often sit next to him so I could ask him what’s on his mind. One time he answered, “I read something by a theologian that I keep thinking about. When we see God, what will we be most amazed by? God’s humility.” And he smiled.

Lead image: BBC American

[i] https://inews.co.uk/news/orb-sceptre-what-meaning-queen-royal-jewels-what-happens-after-funeral-1866599

[ii] The Crown Chronicles

[iii] The Crown Chronicles

[iv] https://www.independent.com/2008/05/22/father-virgil-cordano-dead-89/