Friday, May 29, 2009

Christology

I find it strange that I haven't posted anything on the blog lately given how much of my life has been spent writing. So here's a (small) portion of my Ordination Paper. These are my reflections on Jesus. Your thoughts??

I’ve heard that at some point in the ordination examination process I’ll be asked whether or not Jesus is my Lord and Savior. I’d like to answer that now so we can discuss other things later. While this question can often inspire the greatest internal revolt possible within my gut when asked by strangers, I must confess it’s a good question to address in this space. The question of Jesus’ lordship is foremost a question of power. Power is always constructed, in context, in relation and what is considered power/full changes over and through time. Hence, any honest discussion of power will include information about particular social relations formed by ideology, culture, and history. “Lord” became a signifier of and title for Roman emperors as Pax Romana extended its power geographically and politically up to and after the 1st century CE. These lords were objects of the “emperor cult:” they were worshipped and venerated as saviors who would heal, transform and restore the conditions of the people worshipping them. The basic notion informing this veneration is that political power is supreme power, the most efficacious power, the power upon which lives could be changed/saved. This notion of lordship rests on the assumption that any power at all is power over something else. The logic of this lordship sets up paradigms of sovereignty and dependency and perhaps what’s most destructive is that it requires people to surrender their own power with one another to maintain a top down system of ‘salvation.’ This kind of power was responsible for Jesus’ death. However… Jesus flipped this power script completely. He so radically over-turned imperial power that people began using the title “Lord” in reference to him. This wasn’t just a syntax transfer; it was a taking back of language, a signifying practice of dissent and resistance. By calling Jesus “Lord,” his people were deconstructing the prevailing political power of empire and proposing a new and better form of power. They were, in essence, saying no to top-down, power-over strategies of control and yes to the power of mutual relation. Jesus’ power came in the form of solidarity and “self-emptying.” He flexed his power by inviting his friends to journey with him, by feeding people, teaching compassion and forgiveness, healing hemorrhaging/out-cast women and smelly/dead men. He told silly stories and liked to party at a table full of rebels and radicals. He found his power in making old scriptures relevant to new circumstances. He found his power in long periods of prayer and meditation in nature. His ministry was one of power because it was not a solo enterprise: Jesus was able to accomplish the aims of agape because of his disciples’ willingness to engage with him in acts of gracious hospitality, acts of challenge, acts of reverent worship. His was a power with, a power of relationship, a power of love and it was in “diametrical opposition to the power of the emperor.” I revere and worship the embodiment of power made known in Jesus of Nazareth. Certainly any saving power I’ve known in my own life has taken the form of service, relationship and love. Would I call Jesus my Lord? Yes: if it meant saying no to military power, patriarchal power, white power, or economic power as the driver of my life. I must say though, the imperial connotations of the word “Lord” make it difficult for me to pronounce in any casual way, especially given my country of origin and its current strategies of foreign policy. “Savior” is a bit easier (though not effortless), especially as I understand it related to sin. Jesus saves me from “a life of aimlessness” by providing me with spiritual clues to the great ontological question how shall I live? There’s a different question I like much better than the “lord and savior” question, a question that’s more important to me. It’s what John Caputo calls the “question of the unhinged” and it descends from St. Augustine: What do I love when I love my God?

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Chaos & New Things

"There's a very interesting scientific insight which says that regions where real novelty occurs, where really new things happen that you haven't seen before, are always regions which are at the edge of chaos. They are regions where cloudiness and clearness, order and disorder, interlace each other. If you're too much on the orderly side of that borderline, everything is so rigid that nothing really new happens. You just get rearrangements. If you're too far on the haphazard side, nothing persists, everything just falls apart. It's these ambiguous areas, where order and disorder interlace, where really new things happen, where the action is, if you like. And I think that reflects itself both in the development of life and in many, many human decisions." --John Polkinghorne

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Pain, Healing and the Spiritual Nature of Exercise & Avoidance

I'm still "In Pain's Classroom" and I've learned more about healing through the physical therapy process. I want to share some of these lessons and connect it to the courageous work the vets are doing in Menlo Park.

When I first injured my back, I wanted to avoid all pain because the intensity of the initial injury hurt so ridiculously bad. Any position that caused the slightest shock to my spine or discomfort in the lower back region was to be avoided all together. I couldn't take any more physical suffering; I'd hit my limit. I had been hurt enough and by God, there would be no more of that. For the next month or so I ritualized my life attached to the goal of pain avoidance. I made a discipline of stillness and holding my breath. I mentally recorded every possible and impossible posture and made decisions about where I could go and what I could do in accordance.

And then avoidance stopped working.

The positions that saved me from the primordial pain gave way to new aches and disfigurations. The muscles overcompensating began to cramp and swell. I was tired all the time from holding myself in unnatural positions. I couldn't stop taking the muscle relaxers because something hurt all the time. The muscle relaxers made me tired. The tiredness annoyed me. Vicious, stupid cycle. (I'm going somewhere spiritual with this...stay with me)

So I went to physical therapy. I opened to the idea that someone might have a better way and plan for my healing. This gentle, beautiful soul retrieved me from the waiting room. His degrees from Santa Clara University hung on the wall next to pictures of his baseball playing sons ages 4 and 7. He stood at 5'2, 2 inches shorter than me; he was quiet and methodical, asking questions about how it all happened, what hurts now, what I wanted to gain from PT, etc. He had me lay down on the table. He showed me a 20 minute regimen of stretching and strengthening techniques. "Do it everyday" he said with soft assertion. "Okay" i said, and then added "anything to relieve the pain." I left his office and noticed, when walking to my car, that my back hurt worse after doing that 20 minute practice session than it did when I walked into Kaiser. Damn. But the next day I felt worlds better.

Did I say "anything to relieve the pain"?

For the last 3 weeks I've been trying to stick to the routine. Truth be told: I can't stand holding those poses or the immediate physical sensations that follow. It hurts like hell. Some days I flat refuse to do them. Here's the kicker: the day after the day I chose not to do my PT, I pay a big price for my negligence. If I refuse to do my strengthening and stretching not only do I lose healing momentum but my primordial injury pain rears its ugly head.

Now begins the sermon...

I work at the National Center for PTSD. Every week I hear stories of primordial injuries and the aftermath. When people first experience a traumatic event life changes its ritual structure. Whatever ritual structure folks pick up, whether its pain avoidance, controlled pain exposure, or something else, there's a way in which the event drastically alters perception/behavior/relations/etc. Some people develop PTS, some don't. Those who do often find that what enabled them to move in the wake of trauma stops working. For instance many folks drink in order to decrease PTS symptoms but eventually self-medication turns into alcohol-dependence regardless of symptomology. Vexing and perplexing cycles. It's hard, once you've been injured or experienced trauma, to admit that your own coping mechanisms have turned against you. In fact, every time we get a new patient I'm astounded by the courage it takes for them to admit they need help. In essence, they are admitting someone else might have a better way and plan for their healing.

And it hurts worse before it gets better. In order to heal (which is a life long process) one has to drop coping mechanisms that have held life together and pick up new behaviors/actions heretofore unexplored. Risk. It takes risk. And it takes daily practice. Name your feelings instead of repressing them. Communication and socialization instead of isolation. Pray and meditate instead of engaging adrenalin-enhancing behaviors. "Do it everyday" we say with soft assertion. Those who do find reward. Those who don't usually feel relief in the moment and find drastic consequences in the near future.

Before this 3rd unit of CPE I knew little about the spiritual nature of avoidance. Avoidance of the good, even when it feels comfortable, leaves one wide open to the prolonging of pain. Exercising the good, even when it hurts a little, invests in a future of healing. Do it everyday and perhaps more importantly, make sure you have friends that praise your persistence.

Monday, May 4, 2009

Something does the immaterial equivalent
of sad laughter when mortals interpret things
coincidental instead of recyclical,
and label them new and troubling
instead of old and patiently persistent.
It comes around, comes close
time and time again, often with a different face,
whatever this "it" is for you,
waiting until you're ready,
collecting until you're empty,
desiring your participation in a healing need
that began before your birth,
hoping for your seed of willingness
that will bear fruit long after you have gone.
You can pretend, for moments or years,
in obsessive and catatonic states, that it has left you
but the aggressive whisper never fades to silence.
For you to arise and to awaken, her raison d'etre;
to receive and respond righteously, yours.
If transcendence makes a come back,
we will have realized the importance of honoring history
by giving back generously to the future.