What do you really believe?

"What is it you REALLY believe?" a friend asked in her weekly e-mail. She posted the question two days ago and I am still pondering the thought. What does it mean to believe? Does belief come from within oneself, or from others? Does belief exclude doubt or does it include the choice to believe despite doubt?

Then there is that question of "Really." For me, "really" places the responsibility for belief on my shoulders. But does "really" exclude the acceptance of belief received from others and accepted as true. Does "really" require that we start from scratch to determine what it is we believe.

Are any of our thoughts really our own? Think of it, from the time you are a child, others are telling you what is true, what is right. They even tell you who you are, or who you ought to be. But, do you know who you "really" are?

Truth is, I'm not sure who I am but I'm trying to find out. And this partially "found" person can say right now, based on my own experience and on the experience gleaned from others and tested against this experience that I believe:

In gratitude. That Life is gift. That all that happens within Life is gift. That gift includes that which we might label good and/or bad because both are part of the journey toward Self-discovery. Self-discovery is good. Self-discovery means openness to Life and Life is that divine creative force I call God.

My friend sends me weekly questions like these. They are called "On the Waterline." If you are interested in receiving such questions just send an e-mail to mhyatt@boreal.org.

The self of fog and sun

We biked into the fog this morning and rode home in bright sunlight and I was reminded that just as fog does not negate the sun, neither does doubt and uncertainty obliterate our power to find the light. The sun keeps shining whether concealed behind clouds or hidden on the other side of the earth. To move ahead despite our doubts is to find the answer that was always ours.

These geese were hidden within the fog on Lake Superior one morning. When the fog lifted there they were -- not just one goose but a whole gaggle of them.

The Color of Good and Evil

Remember the days when color consultants popped up like mushrooms throughout the nation to coordinate skin tone for wardrobe and makeup. These Color-Me-Beautiful consultants analyzed clients’ skin as being spring-, summer-, winter-, or fall–toned. Don’t remember? Well I do. I fell for that fad and went for my own analysis (Fall, in case you’re curious).

This morning while reading the Spirituality of Imperfection by Ernest Kurtz and Katherine Ketcham, I was reminded of that Color Me Beautiful analysis when I came across a story adapted from Anthony De Mello’s Song of the Bird.

“A preacher put this question to a class of children. “If all the good people in the word were red and all the bad people were green, what color would you be?
Little Linda Jean thought mightily for a moment. The her face brightened as she replied: “Reverend, I’d be streaky.”

“Streaky.” Isn’t that a wonderful description of being human? Linda Jean knew she was neither all good nor all bad but was a mixture of both good and bad.

Despite the fact that we all play host to a similar combination of good and bad we seem more inclined to view things as "either/or."

For some reason, judging someone (something or some nation) as bad seems the more dangerous. Substitute “evil” for bad and we make seeing “good” almost impossible. We had the perfect example of such blinding to goodness the day President Bush slapped the term “axis of evil” onto Iran, Iraq, and North Korea.

Though we can be incredibly hard on ourselves, we are not quite so tough on the people we’ve already judged as good. When we see evil within them, we make excuses. They are only human we say.

The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of being streaky.

Am I not your Mother?

Today is the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the celebration of the Virgin Mary's appearance to Juan Diego, a humble Indian of Mexican descent in 1531 to assure him of her "love, compassion, help, and protection to all who inhavit this land and to those others who love me."

What a delight this reading was, especially when learning that Juan Diego, sent to fetch a priest for his dying uncle "went around the hill and passed on the other side . . . so as to arrive quickly in Mexico City and to avoid being detained by the Heavenly Lady."

Like Juan avoiding the Lady, we too have at times gone out of our way to avoid meeting God. Like Mary to Juan Diego, God does not remonstrate or accuse or punish but rather assures us of love, compassion and help.

Like Mary, God comes to meet us at the place where we have gone to avoid him. Like Mary to Juan who went to meet him on the other side of the hill, God says to us "Are you not under my protection ... are you not in my care?"

All over the world

While reciting the morning liturgy of Lauds this morning with my husband, I suddenly became aware that we were praying not as a unit of 2 but as one small note within a symphony of prayer rising from monasteries, cloisters, churches, homes, beaches, forests, and farms -- at every moment, somewhere in the world others are praying the same psalms and reading the same lessons and praying the same invocations with us. What a glorious, comforting, and hopeful thought.

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Finding joy in imperfection

It's taken me a lifetime to learn that pursuing perfection sets our teeth on edge. At every failure we berate ourselves. Why bother, we think. It's an impossible task. And that's exactly what it is -- an impossible task. We are human. We are not God. We fall, we get up again, we move forward, we fall, we get up again. What a journey. I have learned more from my falling than I ever learned from flight. More from failure than from success. More from suffering than from an absence of suffering. I've learned to keep my hand lifted so that God can raise me up. What joy to find that presence always there.

Prayer in a new place

We left within days of our return from Italy for Florida where for the first time we plan to spend the winter. The cold is getting difficult to handle living in a remote area and alone much of the time as my husband travels.

Here I have no special place to meditate as I do on Lake Superior. Daily I find myself moving to a different location -- a different side of a room, a different room, trying to find a place that feels right.

Waking around 3:30 most mornings I've tried to meditate in bed but always end up rising. I have a prayer shawl which has become my "place." I wrap it round me and feel silence envelope me.