peace vs. ( )
is everything that is not peace violence?
because finals week and/or recovering from thanksgiving and trying to cram too much into too few people in too little time feels to me like....
...a kind of violence.
and it seems helpful to think about busy-ness as violence because it reveals (to me at least) how much i really did choose (am choosing?) violence...
and it allows me to catch a glimpse of (1.) the cultural patterns which promote busyness/violence, but much more helpfully (2.) the moments (so long ago! what was i thinking!?) where i have hooked my cart to this train. where i said "Yes!" & "I can do that!" (and worse) "I could do that better!", and hopefully (3.) the question: is there a way for me to get off of the *busy* train (or whatever train it is for you: the ambition train, the worry train, the confidence train)? I know I can't go back and unmake my choices, but can my future choices ripple backward through time and redeem my then? my now? my next?
You know the strain of Christian thought that suggests that we don't so much get saved / completely redeemed in a moment or at a time during our life, but that ALL the choices that we've made (and are making) give us the capacity to ultimately say "Yes" later / eventually / finally? It's a theme of Lewis' The Great Divorce -- and the implicit subject of my favorite lines from his sermon / essay, The Weight of Glory. He asks -- why bother to think about (the scriptural concept of) Future Glory?
“I can think of at least one such use. It may be possible for each to think too much of his [or her] own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too much of that of his neighbour. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.”
Does anyone know if there's a theological name anywhere for this way of thinking about salvation / redemption / sancttification?
In our heart of hearts, we hope and pray that God remembers us, that when we die, God will notice and call us by name...and yet day by day we forget, overlook, and neglect God's many handiworks in our lives, assuming that Divinity only happens in lightning and tempest, in great raging flood or firestorm.
In my mind, this present world is our proving ground, a practice place where we show God our true stuff. [...] day to day God looks down on this world, waiting and wondering: when will someone stop, look, and notice the works of my hands, and when will someone--anyone--turn their eyes toward me and Love?
Lorianne's words in this post at Hoarded Ordinaries resonated deeply with me...
Because if I (/we) cultivate our vision to recognize Action! and Growth! and Strategic Priorities! and Implementation Timelines! and New Products! and Trends! --
it makes sense to me that ultimately:
that's what we'll see. that's what we'll recognize. and...
that's what we'll Be...?
so training our eyes to look for peace wherever we can find it: here, now, today...
seems a worthwhile vision...
because finals week and/or recovering from thanksgiving and trying to cram too much into too few people in too little time feels to me like....
...a kind of violence.
and it seems helpful to think about busy-ness as violence because it reveals (to me at least) how much i really did choose (am choosing?) violence...
and it allows me to catch a glimpse of (1.) the cultural patterns which promote busyness/violence, but much more helpfully (2.) the moments (so long ago! what was i thinking!?) where i have hooked my cart to this train. where i said "Yes!" & "I can do that!" (and worse) "I could do that better!", and hopefully (3.) the question: is there a way for me to get off of the *busy* train (or whatever train it is for you: the ambition train, the worry train, the confidence train)? I know I can't go back and unmake my choices, but can my future choices ripple backward through time and redeem my then? my now? my next?
You know the strain of Christian thought that suggests that we don't so much get saved / completely redeemed in a moment or at a time during our life, but that ALL the choices that we've made (and are making) give us the capacity to ultimately say "Yes" later / eventually / finally? It's a theme of Lewis' The Great Divorce -- and the implicit subject of my favorite lines from his sermon / essay, The Weight of Glory. He asks -- why bother to think about (the scriptural concept of) Future Glory?
“I can think of at least one such use. It may be possible for each to think too much of his [or her] own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too much of that of his neighbour. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.”
Does anyone know if there's a theological name anywhere for this way of thinking about salvation / redemption / sancttification?
In our heart of hearts, we hope and pray that God remembers us, that when we die, God will notice and call us by name...and yet day by day we forget, overlook, and neglect God's many handiworks in our lives, assuming that Divinity only happens in lightning and tempest, in great raging flood or firestorm.
In my mind, this present world is our proving ground, a practice place where we show God our true stuff. [...] day to day God looks down on this world, waiting and wondering: when will someone stop, look, and notice the works of my hands, and when will someone--anyone--turn their eyes toward me and Love?
Lorianne's words in this post at Hoarded Ordinaries resonated deeply with me...
Because if I (/we) cultivate our vision to recognize Action! and Growth! and Strategic Priorities! and Implementation Timelines! and New Products! and Trends! --
it makes sense to me that ultimately:
that's what we'll see. that's what we'll recognize. and...
that's what we'll Be...?
so training our eyes to look for peace wherever we can find it: here, now, today...
seems a worthwhile vision...
posted by Redbaerd at 7:44 AM
1 Comments:
Strange. I have been thinking about this very thing myself lately. But in a different way. I was looking at the act of "busy" as a good thing from the persepctive that it keeps one from claiming boredom. It's your line trying to cram too much into too few people in too little time, however, that perhaps gets to the root of why certain kinds of busy-ness can be detrimental. I have to think of it in relation to my job, which is where I've tended to spend the most time spinning my wheels in a rut. Where busy became this kind of violence you describe. Anger and frustration and tiredness - the cramming of too much into too little. Suddenly, though, here I am in the same job, yet everything has changed. I am just as busy, but it is directed. It is effective. And not just from a business level, but it's that "personal development" thing too. Where satisfaction tempers the labor. Where the human within the cog of the corporation feels validation. Reading this post has got me thinking, now, about the grades of "busy."
Years ago while working with a writing mentor, she gave us an exercise wherein we made a list of what she called Abstract Nouns ("Love" "Glory" "Sacrifice" "Beauty" "Pride" etc.) We chose one of the nouns (I chose "Love," inviolate idealist that I be...) and then we had to put the word "atrophied" behind it. So it became Love, atrophied. I began thinking of a number line, of negatives and postives, and how the notion of love would be on one end and its opposite (I chose Hatred) on the other. A bit like your Peace vs ( ). I conjectured that the atrophying of a thing could make it its opposite, where love atrophies to hatred, for example. The withering away of one thing into another. So it seemed to follow that Hatred could wither away to become Love.
So just a bunch of new and old ideas flying around after reading your post.
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