Jonathots Daily Blog
(1983)
As for me, I like my fireworks to be explosive, lighting up the night sky with beautiful colors. I am not interested in any kind of firework that has been diffused of explosion and can only muster muted tones of brown.
In our attempt to make everything safe, common, accessible and equal, we gradually have taken all the “presence” from the institutions and outreaches that make human life rich with experience.
Chief among them, to me, is the church.
An organism that should exude life, energy, jubilance and spiritual unpredictability has been disemboweled by caution, tradition, suspicion and judmentalism. It has become a Petrie dish for the study of prejudice or, at times, a sure cure for insomnia.
It is disappointing to hear those who have chosen a path of disbelief to win the day simply because the individuals who were meant to prosper and live abundantly under spiritual energy have decided to entomb their faith in the grave of repetition.
It is equally as disheartening to see a government that is “for the people, by the people and of the people” brought to a screeching halt, or maybe better phrased, a grinding cessation, by political stubbornness and arrogant posturing.
There are things that are meant to have a presence.
The word “church” should bring a smile to our faces and evoke memories of joy. And the utterance of the United States of America should put a chill of hope down our spines–for a world that struggles in tyranny and poverty.
Instead, we have surgically removed all the aspiration from our faith and our country, to whittle ourselves to a futile fussiness which we interpret as “adult debate.”
Jesus warned the Pharisees that they were concerned about the money and the organization of their religion, but had forgotten the weightier matters of judgment, mercy and faith.
Judgment: a decision to honor what is truly valuable instead of coins that can be counted.
Mercy: packaging what we evangelize to be appealing to human beings–our market.
Faith: being prepared to evolve toward greater understanding of God instead of diverse interpretations of scripture.
Until we put the presence back into our spirituality and our government, the absence will leave behind the anarchy of loneliness.
I am hopeful.
I refuse to be defeated.
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Jonathots Daily Blog 