The past few weeks have been particularly challenging. I found out two weeks before graduation that my thesis (2 of 7 credits for my degree) was rejected. After months of working on this project alone my advisor thought it wasn't good enough. This has been traumatic for me. Thankfully, I was working with a spiritual director who is AMAZING and I have been able to process quite a bit over the past few weeks.
I took a week to sit in the disappointment, anger, and sadness. I did nothing, I couldn't do anything. I didn't know how to do anything. I found out quickly that my general coping mechanisms would not work. I couldn't bury myself in work, I was cemented to my couch and couldn't face the failure. I couldn't ignore it and swallow the pain, I had to confront it. I couldn't talk about it too much, it just resulted in my sobbing. I had to sit and be, I had to go through my mess. A lot of other things surfaced and I spent a week trying to feel life as it happened. Which sounds ridiculous, but it's amazing how many walls I have created to prevent feeling. It was miserable, and I cried, a lot.
I feel like I'm through the worst of it, there are still residual effects. I still feel vulnerable and hurt, but its manageable. I am trying to be more present in my own body, feeling things as they come and trying not to control my feelings.
I've learned a lot about myself and this could go on forever about what I can take away from this experience. Today, I will focus on relying on others. I cannot go it alone. There are people around me who love me and can support me. I am trying to get my life in order and look for jobs and I am overwhelmed by the whole process. I am reaching out to others for help and I will ask for help. Life is a team sport and we cannot live on our own.
Wednesday, May 14, 2014
Wednesday, January 29, 2014
The Foolishness of Israel
Many of you may know that I have recently returned from a trip to Israel and Palestine. Initially I was going to blog along the way of my journey, but shoddy internet prevented that dream from ever becoming a reality. I still may blog about it as I digest what I saw and how it has impacted me.
For right now, I am left clueless on how to answer people when they ask me, "How was your trip?" It was life changing, it was insightful, it was horrible, eye-opening, disheartening... the list could go on and on and will most definitely contradict itself. I'm glad I went, but I'm also not happy that I went, because I cannot unsee what I've seen. My perspective has changed, on a lot of things.
The biggest change has been my perspective on religious people. I can say, without a doubt, the universal truth is that religious people are the worst in the world. Whether they are claiming land given to them by God 2000 years ago, or fighting over who has Jesus' real tomb, they're all the same, terrible. I have never been so upset in my life about how the message of God, particularly that of Jesus Christ, has been distorted and used for one's own benefit more than in the 'Holy Land.' While the scenery was beautiful and I certainly had my God moments while I was there, this was one of the most unholy places I have ever been.
The simple fact that the 3 Abrahamic religions cannot live in peace is a disgrace to God. Let alone the infighting among Christians that literally trample all over Jesus' tomb. It is all contrary to the God I know. God does not love one people over another and no people are holier than another. We are ALL made in the image of God, and to treat anyone as less than holy, is treating God as such.
I am angry at how God is represented by the people of all faiths in Israel. Not everyone in Israel has it wrong, there are certainly people there spreading the message of love and justice to those who need to hear it. However, these people are a minority and are climbing Mt. Everest trying to rid Israel of it's ridiculousness.
I am not alone in my animosity towards the religious who get God wrong. This week in the lectionary, we hear from Paul, who was also upset about similar issues, and in that I find great comfort. 1 Corinthians 1:18-31:
"For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart."
Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block for Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength.
Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, but many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, "Let the one who boasts, boast n the Lord.""
For right now, I am left clueless on how to answer people when they ask me, "How was your trip?" It was life changing, it was insightful, it was horrible, eye-opening, disheartening... the list could go on and on and will most definitely contradict itself. I'm glad I went, but I'm also not happy that I went, because I cannot unsee what I've seen. My perspective has changed, on a lot of things.
The biggest change has been my perspective on religious people. I can say, without a doubt, the universal truth is that religious people are the worst in the world. Whether they are claiming land given to them by God 2000 years ago, or fighting over who has Jesus' real tomb, they're all the same, terrible. I have never been so upset in my life about how the message of God, particularly that of Jesus Christ, has been distorted and used for one's own benefit more than in the 'Holy Land.' While the scenery was beautiful and I certainly had my God moments while I was there, this was one of the most unholy places I have ever been.
The simple fact that the 3 Abrahamic religions cannot live in peace is a disgrace to God. Let alone the infighting among Christians that literally trample all over Jesus' tomb. It is all contrary to the God I know. God does not love one people over another and no people are holier than another. We are ALL made in the image of God, and to treat anyone as less than holy, is treating God as such.
I am angry at how God is represented by the people of all faiths in Israel. Not everyone in Israel has it wrong, there are certainly people there spreading the message of love and justice to those who need to hear it. However, these people are a minority and are climbing Mt. Everest trying to rid Israel of it's ridiculousness.
I am not alone in my animosity towards the religious who get God wrong. This week in the lectionary, we hear from Paul, who was also upset about similar issues, and in that I find great comfort. 1 Corinthians 1:18-31:
"For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart."
Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block for Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength.
Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, but many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, "Let the one who boasts, boast n the Lord.""
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