Tim Keel's Blog

Spiritual, But Not Religious

I was invited to be a guest on a radio show of our local NPR affiliate KCUR. The show is called "Up To Date with Steve Kraske." Once a month Kraske hosts a religion roundtable. Today's topic was "Spiritual, But Not Religious."

I had a great time, and I think the discussion was a good one. If you would like to listen to the show, you can do so here: The Religion Roundtable discusses "Spiritual But Not Religious."

What is a Pilgrimage?

I am reading Paul Elie's "The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American Pilgrimage." Elie traces the journey of four 20th century American Catholic writers: Flannery O'Connor, Walker Percy, Dorothy Day, and Thomas Merton.
At the beginning of the book Elie gives as compelling and descriptive definition of a pilgrimage as I have read:

"What is a pilgrimage? A pilgrimage is a journey undertaken in the light of a story. A great event has happened; the pilgrim hears the report and goes in search of the evidence, aspiring to be an eyewitness. The pilgrim seeks not only to confirm the experience of others firsthand but to be changed by the experience. Pilgrims often make the journey in company, but each must be changed individually; they must see for themselves, each with his or her own eyes. And as they return to ordinary life the pilgrims must tell others what they saw, recasting the story in their own terms. "

Further Pentecost Reflections

Last Sunday we celebrated Pentecost. If you are aware of what Pentecost is, then like me, you probably know Pentecost as the day which God gave the Holy Spirit to the church. The account of this event is recorded in the first two chapters of the New Testament book of Acts. Beyond that basic information, however, often not much more is known.  

We took the opportunity on Sunday to dig a little deeper, to explore the Old Testament roots of Pentecost, the festival that is celebrated fifty days following Passover. In preparing for the message I learned quite a bit about what Pentecost both celebrates and commemorates: it is a agricultural festival that is celebrated at the beginning of the wheat harvest, and it also commemorates the giving of the Law to Moses on Mount Sinai. After the Jews escaped Egypt following the Passover (where Jews were spared God's judgment on Egypt by marking their doorposts with lamb's blood), they passed through the Red Sea, entered the Sinai desert, and then 50 days later came to the mountain where, in the midst of a storm, God gave the Torah to his people. In the same way, after the Passover (where humans were spared God's judgment by being marked with the Lamb of God's blood), 50 days later God gives his Spirit to his people in the midst of a storm - fire and a violent wind. In the same way that the giving of the Law birthed Israel and marked them as God's covenant people, so the giving of the Spirit births the church and marks this new community as God's new covenant people.

There is a lot more to be said about this, but not here. If you want to learn more you can listen to the message here: A New Body and A New Spirit.

The reason I am rehashing this is to set up an email I received in response to the message from a woman in our community who is a self-confessed math-nerd. She had some cool reflections that I received her permission to share. I love it when people's imaginations get cut loose by the wonder of God's Word and Spirit.

"DUDE. I did not have a chance to tell you how much I was affected by the scripture, by the message, by the Spirit today. When you set the scene, talking about how the disciples were celebrating the feast of Pentecost and remembering Moses receiving God's law, I could see where we were going a little bit and I almost couldn't stand how cool it was. How we have this "amazing" God who speaks to us in stories that have rhyme, events that resonate with each other. So here's my math-nerdy thought..

- X = The first chosen few individuals, hearing God, following him.

- X^2 (X-squared) = The Exodus, receiving the law on Sinai - God taking things up to another level exponentially, forming His chosen people, giving physical freedom and giving His law.

- X^3 (X-cubed) = Christ's incarnation, death, and resurrection, and the indwelling of the Spirit - Again, God takes things up exponentially, expanding his chosen people to encompass all peoples, giving spiritual freedom, and law written in our hearts.

- X^4 = .........? That's the next step, I think. Whatever heaven is, maybe it will be God adding another dimension to the stories we already know, bringing us up to a whole new level of freedom and law that we can't even fathom right now. I love the thought that we are like the disciples - faithful to the religion that has been handed down to us, celebrating feasts & fasts every year - with the knowledge that someday, sometime, when we don't expect it, God is going to take us, creation, everything, up to the next level. And then again and again, and that's eternity. I think God just has to be eternal because He's just thought of too many cool riffs on His stories to fit them into a finite universe.

So good. Thanks for sharing your math-nerdiness, Katie. And yes, come, Holy Spirit. Come quickly.

Cultivating Loneliness?

Yesterday I picked up an old issue of Conception Abbey's seasonal magazine, Tower Topics, from a magazine rack in my office. It was opened to an article I had been meaning to read for a while - okay, since fall 2006 - by Catholic theologian and writer, Father Ron Rolheiser. It is a short little column, but the thrust of the essay, titled "Cultivating Loneliness," really struck me.

In the essay Rolheiser discusses the Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard and how throughout his life he refused to avoid suffering. In fact, at key points in his life he knowingly and intentionally leaned into suffering, specifically loneliness. Why? Because he believe that by entering his loneliness he was able to touch the suffering that exists at the heart of human life. His ability to identify with what is common to all human experience, namely pain, is what makes his writing so exceptional and touching.

Rolheiser references Albert Camus' idea that "it is in solitude and loneliness that we find the threads that bind us together in community." For Kierkegaard, loneliness gave his soul depth. If we are willing to be present to ourselves in loneliness, refusing to anesthetize ourselves, then we will learn something of who we are. Rolheiser writes that "...by being introduced more deeply to ourselves we are also introduced more deeply to each other...[Kierkegaard] felt that what he had to give to the world came a lot from his own loneliness and that he could share more deeply in other peoples' loneliness only if he felt that loneliness himself."

I believe it is only when we are willing to enter our pain and stay there that any measure of true healing can take place - both our own and that of others as well. Why? Because I believe that it is often in our pain that we come face to face our limitations and maybe, for the first time, look beyond both ourself and our pain to find God there with us. I believe that is pain/suffering/loneliness where true compassion is birthed. I think this is what the Apostle Paul is up to when he writes that God is the God of all comfort, "who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves received from God" (2 Corinthians 1:4). But not just that. I also believe that pain/suffering/loneliness is also where true creativity is birthed. Rolheiser says as much, quoting Kierkegaard, then opining beyond that quote towards what is to me a hopeful conclusion:

"'What is a poet?' Kierkegaard once asked. His answer: 'A poet is an unhappy person who conceals deep torments in his or her heart, but whose lips are so formed that when a groan or shriek streams over them it sounds like beautiful music.' Loneliness is what makes us poets, mystics, artists, philosophers, musicians, healers, and saints."

You can read Rolheiser's original article here, as well as a subsequent article he wrote about discerning when cultivating loneliness becomes not a fertile sadness that benefits others but instead an unhealthy, "sterile sadness that drains energy out of the world."