IS GOD A FACEBOOK HOAX?

If there is one thing we Christians excel at it’s shaping God to our own purposes. 

We did it in the Crusades as we pillaged Asian cities, massacred Jews and Muslims and appropriated foreign property. We did it when we colonised ‘heathen’ lands, carrying a bible in one hand and a gun in the other. We did it when we kept quiet as our Jewish friends were sent to concentration camps and we did it when racial discrimination was legalised in South Africa.  

We manufacture a God who sees it all from our point of view and, when everything goes pear-shaped, we remould him, assuming our right to redemption and forgiveness. But we seldom make amends. 

I suspect that the worst shaping of God is not in cataclysmic historical events but in the daily detail of our lives. In what the nuns used to call our “besetting sins.”  It is also in the way we use religion.

Looking back on my previous blogs I realise I seem to have hurtled down the Anglican path at a great and fairly uncomplicated pace. Alpha, a spiritual director, an Open Door Retreat, Eucharist on Wednesdays and Sundays, two modules towards a theology degree, new Christian friends. (There must be a Brownie badge for all this). 

They should have put me on a TV so I could declare “I’ve found Jesus.” 

Fact is, I hadn’t really.

As an A type personality I am very competitive and self-critical. I’m always setting goals, my life lacks balance and I have to watch my blood pressure. Besides, you may remember, I’d emerged as an ENTJ on the Enneagram scale – a not so likeable ‘Commander’.

What I was doing, to a large extent, was jumping though the hoops and revelling in the spiritual and intellectual exercises - striving for A’s in my assignments.  I was also finding comfort in the close to Catholic ritual – my childhood comfort blanket and the God I was shaping was a mirror image of me and my opinions.

There was also my other life: my clients as well as a social and family circle that just wasn’t into religion.

There must have been a whole choir of angels groaning on my behalf.

Yes, I’d incorporated a spiritual dimension into my life. Much as I would have had I taken yoga seriously but I kid you and myself if I lay claim to a personal relationship with God at that stage. I was far more tuned into the adage “God helps those who help themselves”, than to total submission.

I still thank God for my exceptional Spiritual Director.  Trained by Fr Gerard Hughes, author of God of Surprises, she, never criticised, always gently questioned and very wisely suggested a three day retreat at a local Anglican Convent.  

My retreat director was a wonderful monk, Father Andrew Norton. He belonged to the Community of the Resurrection monastery across the road. 

Besides being wise and practical, he was a diabetic who loved to gobble the fluffy jam scones the sisters served for tea.

Deeply committed to the training and the supervision of Spiritual Directors, he was also responsible for introducing the Open Door Retreat in South African Anglican circles.  He was just what I needed at that stage.  Instead of gentle encouraging pats on the back he got me to take a long hard look at myself and at the Church. Fr Andrew was a realist not a romantic.  It was he who warned how deeply Church can hurt. He was right.

One of the exercises he gave me is one I still value and slip into today. I was directed to slowly walk around the beautiful convent garden five times. Each time focusing on one of my five senses – sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste.  Thanking God for what they had meant to me since birth and using them to appreciate the garden. It is a great way to meditate on the Creator and Creation.

The gateway to the beautiful convent garden

My Damascus Road moment was my meditation on my sense of sight – what it had meant to me since birth. On the walk I inspected an old tree, its shape, its leaves rustling in the breeze. Becoming aware of birds among its top branches, the sunlight peeping through. The bark was rough. I moved closer, the tiniest insects came into focus. And then it happened. As I peeped behind a fairly loose piece of bark I spotted a cocoon and watched spell-bound as a butterfly slowly emerged.

Now decades later, I can still draw on that wondrous image when I’m stressed or distressed. It draws me into the mystery of God the power of faith. That moment when you choose red or black and place your bet on a roulette table. You don’t have all the answers but you are willing to take a chance. It was the day I met the ‘God of Surprises’.

I wish I could tell you that I’ve never had a moments doubt since that meditation in the convent garden. But it is a compass point for me when I feel lost, in those moments when I wonder if God isn’t on a par with those awful Facebook hoaxes.

Have you had a defining moment in your faith journey?

IS GOD WHITE?

I was doing Morning Prayer and found in incredibly boring (still do most times). The best part was the daily Scripture readings. I often went way past the allocated verses, simply because I’d never read the Bible and wondered what came next.  Trust me, the juiciest parts are seldom in the lectionary.

The Open Door Retreat had drawn me into the dual discipline of praying and meditating. Moreover, we’d formed such strong bonds that we decided to meet for a 6.30am Eucharist on Wednesday mornings and to continue our sharing.

There was also those Old Testament and New Testament classes. They turned out to be official modules for a theology degree so my journey into Anglicanism had assumed a new dimension.

What a relief to learn that the Bible was not a direct dictation by God to various obliging scribes. There was no way I was ever going to take Jonah and the Whale literally. 

I would also quickly learn two more words to drop at cocktail parties – exegesis and eisegesis. The first is what brought the Scriptures and, eventually, Jesus sharply into focus for me. The second is what I believe makes it so easy for us Christians to be judgemental, self-righteous and downright cruel.

Exegesis literally means ‘to lead out of”. It requires careful and objective analysis of the Scriptures.  Who was the author? Why did he feel compelled to write? Who was his audience? What was the writer’s agenda? What was the social and cultural context in which it was written?

In short, exegesis requires careful, objective analysis that leads to a conclusion.

Eisegesis literally means ‘to lead into’. It involves subjective non analytical reading. It’s what enables us to make the Scriptures mean whatever suits us. Frightening stuff!  It has been used to justify, among other things, homophobia, gender discrimination, apartheid and slavery.

As we learned to exegete texts there was a natural progression to liberation theology and black theology. That’s when I knew I’d hit a home run. This stuff was really working for me. It was also when I realised that no matter how weird Anglicanism seemed at times it was also wonderful.

I’d also been taught Lectio Divina. A Latin term for ‘divine reading’ it is a way of reading the Scriptures whereby we gradually let go of our own agenda and open ourselves to what God wants to say to us. It is a wonderful way of listening with the heart and can be very calming when life is hectic. 

But let’s get back to exegesis and eisegesis. I am still gobsmacked at how a Church that claims ‘reason’ as one of its main pillars has allowed itself to be so divided by varying degrees of the two conflicting approaches to Scripture.  

Part of the problem in Southern Africa anyway is that we Anglicans dropped the ball on theological education. This is now being taken very seriously and technology is playing an increasing role. But we did have a very dry spell and too many of our preachers resort to eisegesis to make their point.

I digress. Back to my journey.  

I was living in three worlds. My ANC comrades used the term ‘liberal’ like a swearword. My upmarket suburban parish was primarily white and feeling unappreciated in our new political dispensation. My clients were over eager to capitalise on what they perceived as my political connections.

On the religious front I was increasingly bothered by how ‘European’ the Anglican Church in Southern Africa was. Yes we’d had Desmond Tutu as archbishop. His successor, Njongonkulu Ndungane, was also black but it was still a very long way to meaningful transformation.  Worship in the suburbs was worlds apart from the vibrant township services. Black Anglicans who relocated to the formerly ‘white’ suburbs, felt like foreigners.

But even in the townships I found a very white God and a Jesus who looked as if he’d been born in England. Clearly our early Christian missionaries - convinced that white was right and superior – had branded their product accordingly and imposed it on Africa. For them conversion involved Westernisation.

Years later, when I was ministering in Soweto I would ask kids in Confirmation class to give me a word picture of the holy threesome. This was invariably an old white man with a long beard seated next to a younger version of himself.  The Holy Spirit ranged between a bird and a white angel.  

(I’ve just carried out the same test on my Xhosa builder, my Malawian gardener and a black friend who manages properties and all in their late twenties, early thirties. It yielded almost the same result.)

 

 But.......

The BBC commissioned a picture of what the historical Jesus probably looked like

Back to exegesis. 

It was in those classes that I had my first inkling of how liberation theologians had used it to reinterpret the sacred texts in order to give preference to the poor, the marginalised and the oppressed. They had brought new meaning to sacred texts that had for too long been used to justify slavery, apartheid and gender discrimination.

It is an ongoing challenge.

  

Congratulations! Vivian Boyack, age 91, and Alice “Nonie” Dubes, age 90, who have been together for 72 years. They tied the knot shortly after same sex marriage was legalised throughout America. How sad they had to wait so long.!  http://bit.ly/1pI0wvE

A JACK- IN-THE-BOX GOD

The Open Door Retreat was drawing to a close. The two-hour weekly sessions, the commitment to 15 minutes of personal reflective prayer each day and the sharing of what we had experienced was a mind blowing experience. Over nine weeks I had interacted with my parish leadership and effectively been drawn into robust Anglican life. (A polite way of saying we didn’t agree politically, theologically, on what was right, what was wrong or the creative value of Freddy Mercury’s music.) 

The two leaders - my Spiritual Director and my rector – and we seven participants had bonded in a profound way.   It involved absolute trust and was pretty miraculous because we were such different personalities. I remember one woman saying she’d been told as a small child that Jesus was always sitting on her shoulder and she still sensed him there. One of the men shared how inadequate he’d felt most of his life. Yet another, believed he had the gift of healing the sick.

None of them seemed perturbed that I really didn’t care whether Mary was a Virgin or that I really hoped Jesus and Mary Magdalene had had a relationship. (I wanted him to be fully human)   

 

The ‘homework’ for the last week was to bring something that reflected what we’d gained from the retreat.  Now, with all the balls I was juggling at home, at work and at church, I’d invariably left my ‘show and tell’ homework to the last minute. I knew from previous weeks how creative the others would be. They would use flowers from their gardens, favourite paintings, music, a candle-lit tableaux and icons.  But I was in a different space. Sandton City had been my Cathedral for decades.  Besides, I was born to shop.

So I gave myself a day off from the agency and set of for South Africa’s most famous mall. There had to be something in that consumer paradise that would reflect what I had gained and how momentous it had been. 

By 4pm I’d literally shopped ‘til I dropped but I’d found nothing I could take to the rectory that evening. A coffee break brought true meaning to the term ‘arrow prayers’ – the kind of praying you do as you drive through a speed trap. I then calmed down to a panic and decided to treat the project as strategically as I would any corporate communication campaign.

What had been the prime objective in attending the retreat? To better understand God. Against that backdrop how would I brand the Creator? It came in a flash. My understanding of God, which already included the Holy Spirit and was slowly assimilating Jesus, was that God couldn’t be packaged. Mine was consistently proving to be a God of surprises, revealed in unexpected ways.  

That was it! I needed, one of those toy boxes that a figure popped out of – a Jack-in-the-box.  Not so easy.

At a toy shop the assistant explained that the line had been discontinued. When I explained what I was wanting to illustrate she suggested a pop out children’s book rigged with elastic bands from which images tumbled when you opened the covers.  I was convinced.

That evening my presentation seemed to go well. Far more importantly I had come to understand that what I loved best was how God had tumbled, helter skelter, into my life. 

Far from packaging my spirituality into an Anglican box that retreat had set me free.

Two huge God-incidences in the early part of my spiritual journey were to give me an irreverent Spiritual Director with a sense of humour and a rector who was a superb teacher. In fact I’m pretty sure that if he hadn’t ended up as a bishop he would eventually have headed up a theological college.

Bearing in mind that I had never read the bible, I signed on for two evening classes he used to give in the church hall. One on the Old Testament and the other on the New Testament. 

I was on yet another fascinating journey. One that involved a great deal of scriptural unpacking. 

NEVER CONFUSE CHURCH WITH GOD

So there I was, hurtling along my somewhat unusual spiritual journey. As I wrestled with concepts like unconditional grace and a Hollywood heaven (I’m still pondering that one) I was also learning not to romanticise the Church.

                                                     I'm still not certain what heaven is

Time was an issue. I was juggling a busy PR practice, participating in a nine-week Open Door Retreat, seeing my Spiritual Director, attending political meetings and keeping half an eye out for a decent man in my life. (It didn’t help that the sexiest guy in the choir was gay.)

Meanwhile, it was beginning to dawn on my caring friends that my ‘passing phase’ wasn’t as fleeting as they’d expected it to be. Their warnings not to give the church all my money were becoming more forceful. A reasonable concern since their only information about religion tended to be news items about TV evangelists with feet of clay. 

They were just being protective because my business was doing pretty well – 20 employees and clients that included the Lesotho Government. I was driving my fourth Merc and holidaying overseas every year. Those were what I now refer to as the ‘RODs’ (rich old days). 

Looking back, one of the biggest God-incidences was that retreat.

Probably because it was the first to be conducted at my parish the other six participants were all part of its leadership – lay ministers and council members.

A key element of any Open Door retreat is that each week you share your thoughts, angsts and experiences in absolute trust – a bit like a spiritual alcoholics anonymous. 

The level of honesty and self-appraisal was impressive. Surprise, surprise, those church heavies also had crises of faith. They were, by their own admission, imperfect at best. 

It was a wake-up call. Church wasn’t an exclusive club for saints, mostly just people trying their best.

At another level, Carl Jung’s theory of a human collective unconscious was working for me. It made belief in God a lot easier and helped me understand the importance of traditions and how symbols can trigger worship.

I was beginning to appreciate that seeking God is a never ending journey, that religion is not the destination. It’s a vehicle. And, just as some people are into Mercs and others give their Toyota’s names, so there are different religious strokes for different folks. 

Anglicanism was beginning to work for me. A nice mix of the high and hazy and less formal worship. Instead of being asked to shelve my brain I was encouraged to approach the bible with a healthy dose of suspicion.

Of course by then reality was kicking in. I was learning how people are hurt by the Church and how very human priests are. There was more. During the retreat coffee break I listened to in-house concerns about issues that ranged from rampant male chauvinism, particularly among priests, to whether tithing should come before or after tax. 

It was the beginnings of my understanding that one should never confuse the people-driven Church with God. 

SORRY HELL’S ANGELS BUT….

 Okay, so Alpha ended with me barely noticing. I was hurtling towards a destination I wasn’t sure I wanted to arrive at. After all, I was happy, successful and single. Why rock the boat?

But curiosity killed the cat. It can also change your life.

By the time Alpha ended I’d recovered from the shock of turning 50. The crematorium was fading into the distance. The urgency for taking out a heavenly insurance policy was fading.

At least at this stage I knew what I didn’t want. Topping the list was a chocolate-box Jesus looking like an Englishman in a nativity play. The model for soap powder ads. The ultra-white version who still holds sway in many township churches. (Tell some folk the historic Jesus had an olive skin as well as a prominent nose and they cringeJ.)

Fortunately my avid reading revealed a Jesus I was warming to.  I liked the man who knew the difference between quality and lousy wine. (Remember I was in PR, that first miracle was invaluable branding.) I was impressed by a guy who spoke truth to power, got seriously irritated, wept and attended dinner parties. I loved that he ignored class and cultural differences. 

Mind you, I wasn’t ready to go the ‘Jesus on a Harley’ route – it was only when I became chaplain to a bike club many years later that that image could work.

With Alpha behind me I finally hit the main road to Damascus.

At that time my spiritual director and her husband launched the first Open Door Retreat at the parish and invited me to participate. I’d got used to giving up one evening a week for Alpha so I reasoned ‘what the hell’ and signed on. 

Introduced to South Africa by Father Andrew, a CR monk, the retreats were designed for people too busy to actually take time out at a retreat house or with a religious community. They are based  on the spiritual exercises of St Ignatius  and  the format is very much about finding God in the hurly burly and realities of your own life. Praying as one can, not as one can’t.

For me it turned out to be much praying in the bath and not worrying about what Jesus could see.

Open Door groups range between 12 and seven and the retreat runs for nine consecutive weeks. You are given 15 minute daily spiritual exercise. For example, in the first week we were asked to take special notice of God’s loving creation. While the others took walks, gardened and made trips out of town, I invested in a pair of binoculars and checked out the large tree at the bottom of my garden – wine glass on hand. 

It worked for me. As did experiencing religion/spirituality within a real life context. It says something that of our group of seven 3 became  priests (including me!)

This brings me to something I come across quite a lot. The perception that God needs to be approached like an eastern potentate - crawling on our knees, beating our breasts. An extrovert bishop once shared with me how he felt far holier at a school assembly of 1000 boys than in solitude. I can identify. Felt it at a U2 concert in Cape Town.

Of course it’s imperative to make space and time for prayer and self-audits. As Dag Hammerskjold, former UN Secretary-General, pointed out, ‘an un-reflected life is a wasted life.’  But time is a precious commodity which makes the gym, the loo and your local coffee shop all okay. Whatever rocks your boat.

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