- Wisdom 2: 12, 17-20
- Psalms Psalms 54: 3-4, 5, 6-8
- James 3: 15-4:3
- Mark 9: 30-37
- Taking care of things
- In Semitic cultures, shame is a prime motivator. And it's not just fear of shame for one's own self, but the family, the entire village's name is at stake when one contemplates a shameful act, or a shameful outcome.
- I'm going to hazard a guess that perhaps the closest modern analog is success. The more open minded of us are willing to define "success" in broader, more generous terms, but we still cling to a desire to succeed by some measure.
- My father grew up (during the depression) with the goal to own a brick house, be married, have two kids, a dog, and a Buick, not necessarily in that order. What's your definition of success in life?
- What would you consider to be an abject failure in your life?
- If you no longer feared failure, how might you live differently?
- Would you be bolder, braver, holier?
- God's name
- What are you happy about these days?
- How much of that would you credit to God's unfailing love for you?
- Do you think that God would appreciate some gratitude?
- More than a passion fancy
- What are you passionate about?
- Do you think those strong feelings could be from God?
- To what extent are those passions evident in your life?
- If someone (like Matthew Kelly for instance) were to tell you that God delights in fulfilling your dreams because He gave you those dreams, what difference would that make?
- Receiving the marginalized
- John Flaherty used to try to comfort me by telling me that I'm a better liturgist and musician than he is an engineer. I never had the heart to tell him that I'm an Information Technology guy, not really an engineer. Sometimes differences like that just aren't the point.
- I think, in his own pithy way, John was trying to tell me to celebrate my own genius, my own talents, and not try to compare myself to others.
- And beyond that, move beyond the need for comparison with others to a place where one thing alone matters: drawing closer to God.
- Do you think that anything that really matters is not found in God?
- What do you think it takes before we really believe that in our hearts?
- How might we live differently if we really believed that?
- Am I willing to trust God to tell me what makes for success?
- Do I recognize God's help and support every time that God gives that support?
- Have I thanked God for my passions lately?
- Do I desire true humility?
Finding Myself
The problem with dreams is two fold: they may be too small, or they may be inauthentic.
Too small a dream, too small a departure from the day to day, and you find yourself settling
For something that seemed like the ultimate, the very best that you could be, could manage.
The inauthentic dream, the dream that someone else has given you, will rot you from within
Because it takes too much courage to admit that you sold everything for an empty field
With no pearl of great price in it after all. It's not the investment that hurts, its the embarrassment.
But the greatest fear is that pursuing your dreams, and falling short leave you with the question:
If I'm not a poet, a teacher, a prophet among my own, a ... then what, who am I? What now?
And so we don't risk exposing our dreams to the light. Better to brood on them, and risk nothing.
A coward dies a thousand deaths
A brave man dies but once
Freedom from fear is freedom indeed.
Leaving fear of freedom itself
As the last great frontier between who I am today
And who I was born to be.
Shalom!
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