New.

If you cannot have it new do you weep?

Seriously? How conspicuous is your consumption? 

I am not talking about socks and underwear, I am talking about the big ticket items. The conspicuous, everybody can see them items – houses, cars, dresses, suits, shoes, tech, furniture, cabinetry, windows, vacations, decks, and the size of things.

Have you ever wept because you might have to settle for a previously built house instead of building your own? Have tears welled up because you might have to purchase your kids clothes that are not necessarily in season this year? Has the thought that you might not be able to go on a tropical vacation this year sent you spiraling into depression?

I am guilty of some of these things (most of these things…ok maybe all of these things). 

I have to say if any of this is true of you than you need to know that something is wrong.

Why do we feel that larger, shinier, more costly items are somehow on par with breathing and food? That something inside of us will die if we have to settle for normal or, maybe more aptly, what is needed?

Is it possible to be satisfied with 800 sq. feet instead of 1,000? Is it possible to be satisfied with 1,000 sq. ft. instead of 1,500? Is it possible to be satisfied with 1,500 sq. ft. instead of 2,000? You get the idea.

Can we live with a used car for 15 years or do we need to purchase a shiny new one every four? Are we capable of being happy in a house that we did not design and build or will the thought keep us awake at night?

These are important questions because they get to the heart of where our hearts are. I had a very wise seminary professor once tell me a deep theological truth – he said that if you want to know where the heart of a church is look at its budget. Where it is spending the most is where its heart is. I believe this statement is true of all organizations, especially the family.

Where are you spending the most money? This is where your heart is. You may deny it up and down and cite all forms of necessity etc. but this is the truth.

So where is your heart? Where is my heart?

If my budget is accurate my heart is wrapped up in my external payments. It is my largest expense, then my mortgage, then food, then the kids (various and sundry items), then various utilities expenses (read house here)…and so on and so forth.

These things are realities. I look at them on a pie chart in my head and wonder if I am managing appropriately. Perhaps. I would like to shift things around a bit but I am rather comfortable with the split. 

My goal is very simple…do not spend more than I earn. As simple as that goal is it can be very difficult because the heart can get in the way. My heart would like to spend more on technology than would be wise. I have to guard against it and I often fail.

I have to teach myself daily, hour by hour, minute by minute, second by second, that my happiness cannot be based upon the tangible things of the world, upon stuff and ownership and size etc. It must be based ultimately upon love (but not love of money).

What do I love? This is a bad question…rather the question should always be whom do I love? If I can keep it there than I will be ok…over time I hope that my budget reflects the whom more than the what.

When it comes to love in your life is it a question of what or whom? What do you love? Whom do you love? The latter is infinitely more than the former.

 

who is drained, is dead?
why nearly all walk cold
in the wild, wide world
consuming the warmth
and drinking sunlight
till it is gone and gone again
a shambling fog-eyed people
a diseased dark-eyed people
lost but for the beating of one heart

it starts with music
notes that tangle
they draw her dancing out
she is moving to Morrison
LA Woman makes her sway
and my muse is there
she takes my eyes and the world
the world is hers for the moment
while i
i am along for the ride

What would this look like today in the world?

I feel that we need to soak in these verses until we are pickled through and through with the essence of Christ…my sense today is that the deep desire of Jesus that echoes strongly here has been largely lost:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  – Matthew 38-48

Ashokan Farewell
weeps from strings
like pain drawn
from a widow’s well
cries cold in the air
sad wounded waltz
for the left behind

there’s a burning
behind the best of art
a deep and scarring fire
that marks a beaten heart
proclaiming in darker times –

“i bring my passion with me
to light this lost and lingering way”

words are hiding
they run from me
to a place
i cannot go
leaving me
with this motley mess
sacrificed
to my avarice
sacrificed
to my hubris

in the darkness
we seek light
but
do we look for the night
when the sun has set

I have been reading about the silliness of the Toronto woman who is taking a Muslim barber to the Ontario Human Rights Commission for refusing to cut her hair because it is against his religion to touch a woman other than his wife/mother/sister.

It is interesting reading the waste of time comment wars at the end of various news articles. Interesting because a very simple reality is bleeding into the discussion that few people seem to be noticing. 

Neither “side” seems capable of empathy. There is no sense that those in support of the woman have a clue what it might be like to be a Muslim barber put into this situation. It is clear that most do not even care simply determining that his perspective is unfair and wrong. 

Sadly the same is true for those who support the barber…what must it be like to be a woman refused service because of her gender? How must that feel?

Still there are pragmatic facts to consider – the Muslim barber has a choice – renounce his faith and cut her hair. The woman also has a choice – go to another barber shop.

We do not yet live in a society that outlaws religion in favour of secular humanism…but since it worked so well in the Soviet Union perhaps we will one day.

Part of the problem is the unhinging of the western world from any form of absolute and transcendent arbiter of values (aka God). Those in favour of such unhinging would argue that God was never really there and we have been worshiping human values all along in the guise of religion. If this is the case how will humanism improve anything? What change will it bring?

This is a tough subject the more one thinks about it. 100 years ago in Atlanta a black man might have walked into a barber shop to get his hair cut and have been refused on the basis of a moral conviction. He might have been told that there were a dozen other barber shops run by black barbers where he could get his hair cut so go there.

Well that’s different, we say. That was racism and this, this is simply religiously inspired sexism. Hmmm…that does not look so good when it ends up in print.

So what is the solution? Do we force Muslim men to cut women’s hair? Do we tell them they must stop being barbers if they don’t like it? It opens a huge can of worms…because if barber shops must be equal what about the NHL? What about the NFL? Should women be forced to use washrooms separate from men? Is this sexism? What would happen if a man walked into a women’s shower room at the gym because he thinks it is unfair that they segregate the sexes that way?

What we are slowly becoming aware of is that human rights as we have been defining them logically can only lead to one conclusion – each person has there own unique set of human rights completely different and in opposition to every other person’s with only compromise and humility keeping anyone alive.

everything a shadow
of finger painted smudges
in grey and sick sulpher
yellow wisps of once-life
now smokey eroding entrails
drifting through thoroughfares
empty but for the pressing presence
of a thousand could-have-beens
achingly intangibly invisible
while hope is a tilted head
seeing that the charcoal strokes
all go up