The Daily Disciplines
Everything we do is practice for the next time. When we cease to practice, we lose our fluency, and memory becomes imperfect. Some things are practiced by default- when did you last consciously practice eating? Other things require conscious effort. My handwriting is slow, laborious and has lost its fluency. I type without thinking.
When we took our young children back out to the desert where we had lived, they were profoundly uncomfortable with the open spaces. We noticed our son was happier and less fractious whenever we went walking in the enclosed space of mountain gorges. We become used to, and are affected by our environment. Years before, leaving the desert, my wife and I were depressed, dislocated and disoriented by urban life. A day out walking in the hills begins to resurrect memories and instincts which have been lost to our consciousness.
As urban westerners we live in a profoundly artificial environment. It is possible, even easy, to avoid the outside world for days at a time! Enter the garage by an inside door from the house, drive out using the automatic door opener, drive to the underground car park, and take the internal lift up to work. Leave before it is properly light, and return home after dark. We live in a world which we Australians especially, think we control. In truth, we are irradiated with uncontrolled advertising and other stimulation, rarely alone enough to be in silence, and uncomfortable if we are. We live in a noisy, crowded and driven world, which is the anathema of all that our spiritual ancestors learned is necessary for health. We have stepped out of reality into an artificial place.
The spiritual disciplines are designed to bring us back into the real world from our artificial place. They create time, silence and space for us to re-engage with the depths of life. They patrol the corridors of the mind, as someone has said, re-minding us of what is really important. Religion without practice becomes merely an idea, caught in the currents of the ideas round about, without the anchor of reality.
Becoming a little child
We know the verses from the New Testament. ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.' Matthew 18:3
Gordon Atkinson (Real Live Preacher) writes on the Christian Century blog page
Yes, you can become a child again. But do not think it is something you will recover from quickly. When you become vulnerable and allow your life to rest in the hands of others, you live only in the present moment. Your eyes are open to the world around you. In that moment you begin to understand what it means to live in the kingdom of heaven.
This is a profound insight into the way discipling ourselves to Christ will gnaw into our vitals and change us. It is worth reading the full post from Gordon, who in his usual deceptively simple story telling, shines a light on our calling.
As I walked to the train this morning, I remembered, for some reason, that night we spent over an hour discussing at Elders' Council, whether the parish should discuss the new Uniting Church Report on Alcohol! In a church with a strong Methodist heritage of abstinence, this was a contentious issue. The debate was a little prickly at times. I chaired the meeting, and my clergy colleague, Cliff Birch, provided input. At the end, I noted our strong opinions and suggested we should perhaps vote formally in deference to people's opinions. I asked for those "in favour," and those "against." Then with my best deadpan, which normally alerted people I was up to something, politely asked if anyone "wished to abstain." Cliff beamed a wide smile at me from the body of the meeting. No one else showed the least sign of noticing. As he said to me later, "How can we be so serious?!"
It's a problem in a busy life. We get so focussed we don't see what's happening around us. For many of us our inattentiveness is so self focussed it becomes destructive. I noticed Sojourners blog quote of the day when I arrived at work this morning: Selfishness ... feeds an insatiable hunger that first eats up everything belonging to others and then causes a creature to devour itself. Dom Helder Camara Serendipity indeed.
It is easy to judge the unconscious, hedonist Australian who's off to the Royal Show this week in Adelaide. Inattentive, selfish, apathetic- just give me enough money for ice-cream and iPods. For we who consider we are attentive and discipled, it's harder to see that this attentiveness, can also become selfish.
What protects us from inattentiveness, I wondered on the train? I thought about purposely stepping outside of our norms; making this part of our disciple. For me that means standing out in the middle of the backyard late at night, looking into the sky. It means walking slowly down North Terrace in the mornings, and watching the people around me. It means being concerned with the lives of the people in my parish, and getting outside myself; letting me be challenged and frightened as I try and talk with refugees only a month in the country, and with little English. And of course, laughing at the ridiculous, and remaining playful with words and ideas.
Finally, we need to let life talk back to us, instead of doing all the talking. Gordon has been to the Dominican Republic. He has let the experience talk to him, and break into his thinking. He has been playful, reflective, and contemplative of the experience. This is the essence of the spiritual life. We do the daily disciplines of faith, we watch and listen, and let life talk back and lead us further.
Gordon Atkinson's Article
Andrew Prior. Andrew is the Web Minister at Scots Church Adelaide
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