Children

“Childhood is measured out by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows.” John Betjeman

This week I don't want to write much but I do want to share with you some photos that I have taken of children. These are not children that I know personally but I felt each time I saw them that they represented a sort of 'childrenness' (I don't imagine this is a real word but you will understand what I mean). I guess the reason I wanted to share them is because I often feel as an adult how much of that quality I have lost. It isn't that childhood is all wonder or joy by any means but I do feel feel that what they experience, whether it be joy or fear or uncertainty or curiosity is much less guarded and protected than later in life.

Almost everything is an adventure and a learning.
 















 








 












 









 






The other thing that strikes me in many of these photos is that for most children trust is a totally necessary part of their lives. They must trust the adults in whose care they are placed. 'Life' tends to make us less trusting as we grow older- sometimes a good and necessary thing but sometimes a sad and hardening thing.

Courage

For several reasons I have been thinking about courageous people. One reason is that I have just finished reading a very special book called 'My Mother's Secret' by J.L. Witterick*. Ms Witterick has written a small but very powerful and poignant book about two brave Catholic women who sheltered Jews in their small farmhouse in Poland in WWII. The book is a novel but the two women did exist and have been honoured in Israel as Righteous Among the Nations.

Golda Meir compared the Righteous Among the Nations to drops of love in an ocean of poison, and said that "they rescued not only the lives of Jews, but had saved hope and the faith in the human spirit."     (this is taken from the website of Yad Vashem - the holocaust museum in Israel)

At the end of the book Ms. Witterick quotes from Sydney J. Harris " Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable".  I could see as I read the quote some of the things that hang over me that I did not do and should have done. I would guess that may be true for many of us. 

It is something to think about: the things we did not do and should have, because it isn't too late. We are still alive and we can change, we can choose to live differently. We know that we can't undo the past but we can certainly act in the present which will become the past.

The other reason I have been thinking about courageous people is because of a hymn that someone sang at church recently. The song was a Spiritual called, I think, Deep River and it was explained to us that not only were the slaves singing about their hope of crossing a river to heaven but that underlying it was also their hope to cross the Niagara River to safety in Canada.

There have been many books and articles and programs in the last few decades about slavery. I never ever fail to be almost overwhelmed by the strength of faith and courage that so many people had in the face of lives of horror and apparent hopelessness. How did they manage to cling to the hope that they were in fact important in the eyes of God and that somehow, life here or 'in heaven' would make up for it. I am so in awe of such courage. 
   

Ordinary people giving us all the hope that we too can be people of courage in the face of darkness, are such a gift. I am so grateful.

A new year's resolution?

So, we are starting a new year. And it has been a very cold beginning here in Toronto and in much of eastern North America. Thinking about this, I found my mind turning to what, if anything, the beginning of a new year means to the men and women who live on our streets - and there are many; or to the families who are living in cold housing. Does this seem a grim way to think when for so many of us it is the time when we look forward in hope, believing in the possibility of good things? 

Maybe I am thinking a bit more about this right now because recently I heard once again, one of the most powerful passages in the Christian gospel. This passage, found in Matthew 25 has Jesus saying to some people:  'I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me'. Almost every time I read these verses with their opposite verses which say things like 'I was hungry and you gave me no food'..have always made me feel badly. I feel badly I think because I understand the truth and the life-giving power of what is being said and I am very aware of my own many failings. 
   

I believe this passage outlines the key to human happiness. We are indeed meant to take care of one another. If I take care of you and you take care of me then we are both well and happy. If my city and my country also live by these words, then our world will be well on the journey to the wholeness that we are called to. It isn't of course a free journey or an easy one, but I am absolutely certain it 'works'.

The other thing that is being said here is that for those of us who are Christian - and I am pretty sure each other faith has had its own way of saying the same thing - Jesus is saying basically - this is what it means to be a follower of mine and when you do these things to and for one another, you are in fact, doing it to me. I believe that Jesus is also saying (though not in words) that this is more important than remembering dogma or rules. It is, he says, living faith.
   

I don't explicitly make New Year's resolutions but I do hope that this year to come will bring me and all of us closer to the realization of this costly gift of love.
 

Light and Dark

This Sunday is for many Christians the Feast of the Epiphany. The scripture that is read from the gospel is mostly about the magi/kings/wise men that came in search of the child Jesus. So, it is about following a light and about a journey. 

Another scripture reading comes from the book of the prophet Isaiah. It begins: 'Arise, shine out for your light has come, the glory of God is rising on you, though night still covers the earth and darkness the peoples'. That is very mixed sign isn't it? Light and darkness. The theme is carried forward in the gospel of Matthew where we see the men following a bright star but on the journey they are also faced with the dark ambition and fear of the rulers of the land. It is a journey then towards the light but which includes more than one confrontation with the dark.

In the story they reach the light most certainly, but it requires great perseverance and wisdom as they go. Theirs is a long and tiring journey during which they are not sure what they will find. They only know they must go on. 

All this made me think of life's journey for us all. Our days, our months, our years are surely that mixture of seeking light: what is good, what is true, what is loving and at the same time, constantly being confronted by the dark within ourselves and others. But we do, mostly, go on don't we? We are drawn towards something? Someone? or is it just well-being?  peace?  Light? or are those all the same?
                 

What is it that draws you forward? What is it that gives your life meaning? 

I wanted to share with you a TED talk I watched recently which isn't so far off the track of this meditation:http://www.ted.com/talks/maysoon_zayid_i_got_99_problems_palsy_is_just_one.html