Tag: Newtown

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making our lists

We’re making our lists and checking them twice.  Maybe even 3 or 4 times.  There’s so much to do!

 

Yes, isn’t that the irony of the season?

 

As the holiday has evolved — knowing evolution often distorts meaning and potentially reality — perhaps our most significant progression of the meaning of Christmas is that we’ve centered so much of the meaning around what we are doing as opposed to who we are being.

 

What do we do?

 

Hang the stockings with care.

Fill them.

Roast chestnuts (ok, so maybe not really… remember the distortion of reality…)

Wrap presents.

Wrap more presents.

Cook.

Clean.

Call our mothers.

Dress up like eskimos.

Run to the grocery.

Stand in line at the post office.

Finish up work.

Purchase one more gift card.

Deliver those gift cards.

Eat.

Eat some more.

And more.

 

The point is that we focus on the doing.  Truth is, that seems our human nature.

 

As the events of the past week have unfolded — as we’ve grieved the horror of happenings in Newtown, Connecticut — in our passionate, admirable need to respond — we continue to focus on what we can do…  establish tougher gun control laws… put guns in every school… invest more in mental health… tinker with the 2nd amendment… etc. etc. etc.  The point is that it seems our innate human response is to attempt to do something… as if we, yes, we, can control it.  We can stop this from happening if we only do something.

 

It is a far more ambiguous, intangible — albeit rewarding, growth-oriented — practice to focus on who we are… who we are and what we were created to be.  It takes more time; it’s not as black and white; it’s less legalistic.  It also causes us to be still… to pause, reflect, and take both ownership and responsibility for our individual strengths and weaknesses, our right and wrongful thinking.  Newsflash, friends:  we each have all of the above.

 

That’s hard to wrestle with.  It is challenging indeed, for example, to actually wrestle with what caused that gunman to snap, mercilessly murdering those innocent children.  What was in his head?  Where was the wrongful thinking?  How has society contributed to that?  Where have we morally accepted what is not good and true and right?  Where is my wrongful thinking?  Where am I not acting and behaving and thinking as wisely as I should?

 

In order to answer those questions accurately, I need to be still, wrestling with the rawness of the answer.  Wrestling, though, often makes us uncomfortable.  Hence, we jump into doing — because doing is actually easier than being.

 

The coming of Christmas is not about candles and cookies nor even chestnuts nor children.  The meaning of Christmas centers around the incarnation of a God who loves us because of who we are — not because of anything that we do.

 

Who are we?  Persons with individual strengths and weaknesses, even right and wrongful thinking… persons tempted to do.

 

Respectfully,

AR

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a hope that lasts

Still 4 days later, it’s hard to focus on something else…

 

We could focus on the number of shopping days left, but they pale in comparison.

 

We could focus on solving the so-called “fiscal cliff,” but that, too — even with its almost unimaginable depth of debt — pales in comparison.

 

We could focus on all sorts of things; each would pale in comparison…

 

… except maybe…

… just maybe…

… the meaning of Christmas.

 

I realize to many the story is simply too old.  A baby, born in a manger, in swaddling clothes with no room in some ancient inn… what exactly are “swaddling” clothes, anyway?  Let’s face it:  the story is old.  The meaning, however, is timeless.  In the aftermath of Connecticut, when we continue to rush to justice — when we definitively aver that these horrific events must never happen again, when we find some solace in our own, at least perceived resoluteness — we need a lasting message… a truth that is timeless.  No speech nor warm wish, nor legislation, movement, or monetary investment compares to the lasting, old meaning of Christmas.

 

That babe — born some 2,000 years ago — is said to be the only being ever capable of fully and ultimately ushering in peace and bestowing goodwill to men.  Fascinating in the study of world religion, no other proclaimed deity has fulfilled the profound prophecies of Jesus Christ.  No other faithful figure has made the claims he’s made and been able to back them up.  For no other have the words come true.

 

Peace.  Goodwill to men.  Lasting.  Many have tried to find a solution, to offer healing, to keep bad stuff from happening again — seeking means, movements, and monies that would at least put a better-feeling Band-Aid on those evil, earthly events.  The motive seems somewhat pure; we don’t want to hurt anymore; we don’t want innocent others to hurt either.  But none are fully capable; none carry a lasting, effective meaning.  Hence, no movement or legislation, well-intentioned as it may be, is capable of being more than a so-called Band-Aid.

 

When I think of the 20 kids who died in Connecticut, I need to be reminded of something I know will work… that I know will be an authentic solution.  I think of peace.  I need to know it’s available.  I think of goodwill… to all men.  I need to be encouraged to generously offer that goodwill.  Hence, I need a lasting hope to hold on to.  Why?  Because nothing temporary makes sense.  Even though potentially good and well-intentioned, “Band-Aids” are temporary.  And while temporary may seem necessary and helpful and may appease our passions for the moment, we forget that underneath the Band-Aid only exists a deeper scar.  My desire for each of us is not to adhere what covers up the wound — but rather, what wrestles with the deeper scar.

 

Did we cross some sort of line on Friday?

Did society finally go too far?

Did we pass a point of accepted immorality that no longer we can stand?

 

And better yet, did Friday’s horrific act finally get our attention?

 

Ah, great discussion… one that no doubt we would each benefit from should we engage in respectful, listening-prioritized dialogue.

 

My sense is no new lines of morality were crossed.  Instead, arguably, our senses and souls have been heightened with a renewed awareness.

 

For Band-Aids?

 

No, for a hope that will last.

 

Thank God.

 

Thanks for the coming of Christmas.

 

Respectfully,

AR

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selective morality

As all times when we are so shockingly rattled, the race to reaction is furious and fast.  When scenarios and circumstance significantly disturb us, we immediately jump to the solution.  “If we only had tougher gun laws… eliminated the violent video games… cared more for the mentally ill… if we put an end to all the ‘war’ rhetoric…”  (note that the last of those suggestions seems oft hypocritically proclaimed, as violent rhetorical usage is often chastised until it’s convenient to employ for personal passion…)

 

The reality is, friends, that I understand the rapid reaction.  We probe possible cause and means of prevention.  We want justice.  The disturbance demands justice!  And when the victims are obviously, especially innocent — as in Newtown, Connecticut, where reportedly 20 of the victims are under the age of 10 — many of them kindergarteners — kindergarteners! — our need for justice is only magnified.

 

Thus, in our quest for justice, we attempt to find the way or the one thing that would solve the seemingly inherent problem, such as the gun laws, video game and rhetorical restrictions, etc.  “If we only had that!…”  Those are wise, appropriate conversations that we should have.  The challenge, however, is that none attack the root of the issue; none address the actual bottom line, and if we fail to tackle the bottom line, shocking scenarios will continue.  They may look a little different — possibly utilizing different weapons and words — but we will feel the same.  Still shocked.  Still rattled.  Still so disturbed.

 

“How could someone actually do this?!”  It doesn’t make any sense.

 

It’s sad.  It’s grievous.  But evil exists on this planet.  I recognize that such is not a popular thing to either say or believe.  In fact, I have been a part of many discussions where at some point in the conversation in order to press home a point, one person inserts their passionate perspective that “all people are inherently good.”  Some may be messed up or mentally ill or a ‘switch is off somewhere,’ but for the most part, we’re all pretty good.

 

Popular or not, the Intramuralist respectfully disagrees.

 

Each of us have witnessed friends and loved ones make some rather confounding choices.  We’ve known persons who’ve engaged in violent crime, salacious infidelity, and unfathomable professional wrongdoing.  Simply put:  we’ve known people who have made bad choices.

 

What we now identify as a “bad choice” has somehow changed.

 

The closer people are to us, the more likely we are to offer grace and potentially, possibly, even alter our moral standards.  We have become, it seems, as I like to describe, “selectively moral.”  The closer we are to the perpetrator, the more morally selective we’re tempted to be; on the other hand, the more emotionally distant we are, the easier it is for our need for justice to trump any extension of grace.  What could instead cause us to attempt to offer full justice and full grace — simultaneously?  The recognition that none of us are “pretty good.”  It’s about capability; we are each capable of becoming confused in our moral standards — thus each capable of making bad choices.

 

Ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky.  The invisible qualities of an omnipotent creator have been made manifest.  Yes, evidence of God is all around us.  But yet, even though we’ve known God, we sometimes refuse to worship him or even give him thanks.  We begin to instead think up our own ideas of what God is like — as opposed to seeking what he says he is like.  We craft our own ideas — our own solutions — perhaps ideas that fit better with our individual experience and thus passions.  As a result, our minds can become confused.

 

When a person’s mind becomes confused, they typically come to worship or value something far lesser than the divine.  And my sense is when that happens — not knowing exactly how things work here on planet Earth — that at some point God abandons them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desire.  It’s similar to a parent/child relationship; we teach and encourage obedience, yet over time and the repetition of wrongful thinking and poor behavior, at some point, we give our children over to their own desires, hoping that they learn wisdom the hard way, potentially via the consequences of their own behavior.

 

As a result, therefore, of the shameful things in some persons’ hearts, people will do vile and degrading things.  That’s what we witnessed in Newtown on Friday.

 

It’s shocking.  It’s tragic.  And it doesn’t make any sense… even with our admirable demand for justice.

 

Respectfully… and with an incredibly heavy heart…

AR