Living Spiritually Alive: Wholeness, Health & Well-Being

Last Sunday was a long day, a full day, a busy day. I don’t just mean my usual duties, but all sorts of other things going on, folk contacting me, having to carry many different things in my heart, mind and soul. My phone didn’t stop pinging, nor did my interactions and conversations abate. Late in the day I found myself “ligging” out on my settee, eating and half watching a drama on tv. I felt satisfied, if exhausted. I found myself making all kinds of noises in my mouth and throat, beautiful soothing sounds. I like to do this when I am relaxing. I thought to myself I really do need to learn “Overtone” singing. I was creating some wonderful bottom end notes, just smiling at myself in a state of bliss. As I went to bed, I decided I would not set my alarm, I would wake “naturally”. Can anyone really awaken unnaturally?

Well, I was obviously exhausted as I slept through until almost 9am, this is unheard of for me. I began my day in the usual manner, this included sharing my “It comes in the little things” reflection on Facebook, a spiritual discipline I have kept up since early December. How I have delighted in so many other people joining in. I had much to do that day, including dealing with many of the pressing issues left over from the day before. That said despite these many challenges I felt in good spirits.

As I ventured into the day the following poem “Any Morning” by William Stafford” was singing in my heart and soul.

Here it is:

“Any Morning” by William Stafford

Just lying on the couch and being happy.
Only humming a little, the quiet sound in the head.
Trouble is busy elsewhere at the moment, it has
so much to do in the world.

People who might judge are mostly asleep; they can't
monitor you all the time, and sometimes they forget.
When dawn flows over the hedge you can
get up and act busy.

Little corners like this, pieces of Heaven
left lying around, can be picked up and saved.
People won't even see that you have them,
they are so light and easy to hide.

Later in the day you can act like the others.
You can shake your head. You can frown.

Any Morning Can Be a Little Corner of Heaven

I could feel that little corner of heaven that morning, as I had the night before, despite the very real concerns and worries close at hand and in the wider world. Worries and trouble that have been very much with me this week. Not that I have been downbeat at all this week. I have felt connected, in good shape actually, with a real sense of well-being. I’ve found myself humming and singing to myself a lot this week, particularly the line “Groovy times are here again” by The Clash

Later that day I found myself watching the BBC news. Now amongst the more troubling news stories this last Monday there was one that was heartening. I found a little piece of heaven if you like. It was a story about the life of the wonderfully named Mercedes Gleitze, who was the first British woman to swim the English Channel in 1927, she was also the first person to swim the Straits of Gibraltar, later that year. Two achievements that although they were celebrated at the time, were unknown to her own children and grandchildren. A film has just been completed celebrating her life and a “Blue Plaque” has been unveiled at her former Brighton seas-side home.

The news item was shot on Brighton beach, on a freezing cold January morning. On the beach were scores of people going for their daily dip in the freezing sea. They are not alone. It seems the be the “in thing” this winter. I know people that go “wild swimming” in Pickmere out in Cheshire, every week; I know a whole load of folk who went there on New Year’s Day. I am told it is incredibly invigorating and those who do it say it makes you feel “so alive”. I understand that there are many health benefits to cold water swimming such as, boosting the immune system, creating endorphins that lift the mood, improving circulation and libido, the burning of calories, reduction of stress as well helping create a sense of community in the sense it increases socialisation.

I have not been tempted to take a dip myself, at least not yet. I am probably too scarred by holidays in Scarborough as a child and the cold North sea; freezing cold even in the middle of summer. That said I know I have said I would never do things in the past and then got into them. So I ought to learn that you should never say never. So, we shall see. That said I do know that I am more one for a long hot bath, after exercising. I love to loll and listen to music very loudly post workout, before eating. It all contributes to a deep sense of connection and well-being and enables me to fully engage with a very busy life. The messages, the phone calls, the encounters and conversations haven’t stopped all week, there is so much going on. I need this time.

At the beginning of the year so many of us resolve to live healthier lives, gym membership sores, as does attendance at slimming groups and their like. General physical well-being is often on our minds during the winter months, especially early January.

Now while there is a great deal of talk of improving our physical well-being, which is of course vital, there seems to be less talk of taking care of our spiritual well-being, which actually may well be more important. If I have learnt anything in life I know that my emotional, mental and physical well-being rests on my spiritual health. I discovered that if I take care of my spiritual well-being, as a result, the rest just seems to take care of itself. I never forget the importance of first things first.

The purpose of developing our spiritual well-being, is to improve our capacity to live in this life. I agree with my esteemed colleague Rev Bill Darlison who claims that the purpose of spirituality is to increase our sensitivity to life. Not so much transcend this life but to enable us to engage more fully in it. This is something that no one else can do for us, it is our task, our responsibility. Spiritual practice helps us to do so. As the Zen proverb says “no one else can eat your food for you, no one else can go to the toilet for you, and no one else can live your life for you. And, of course, no one else can do your practice for you.

Maybe this is something we could think about as we move into the year. To find ways to improve our spiritual well-being, to find a practice and stick with it, so as to increase our sensitivity to life and thus to live more spiritually alive. It doesn’t need to be anything drastic like cold water swimming, it could be something much simpler. I am continuing my daily practice of paying attention to and sharing the “little things”. It has made a huge difference. For every single day I am noticing more and more of these “little things” and I am finding so many other folk doing the same and sharing them with me and one another. It is a wonderful delight.

To live spiritually alive requires that we increase our sensitivity to life. In so doing it enables us to live more actively in the world and thus our lives will feel more meaningful, meaning filled. It is this that will give us a sense of well-being, of health. Health a word that has its root in the Old English word “haelp” meaning “wholeness, a being whole, sound or well” from the Proto-Germanic “halitho” meaning “whole, uninjured, of good omen”, from older words meaning holy, sacred or healed. In Latin it shared its root with salvation.

Healing, wholeness, health are about being in relationship with ourselves, one another and life. It is about increasing our sensitivity to all of this, this is true well-being. When we live this way we feel spiritually alive, as opposed to being estranged from life.

Spiritual well-being occurs in such relationships, relationships with ourselves, each other, life and whatever we believe is at the core of life, this is where true healing occurs. This does not mean that life does not affect us, there is no cure to life so to speak. If anything it will affect us increasingly. It does not mean the real troubles of life are taken away. What happens is that by being in relationship with all life, our sensitivity to life increases and we experience wholeness, well-being, health, and are thus touched by healing. We are filled with love, in life’s real challenges, and in so doing we know spiritual comfort and thus know what it means to be whole. We will feel wholly alive, we will live holy lives.

Health, well-being is not an absence of trouble of illness, instead it is a sense of being fully alive, like the feeling that those wild swimmers describe.

So, think about it. Can you think of one thing that can help improve your spiritual well-being and thus increase your sensitivity to life and to share it with those in your life. Can you attempt to stick at it day by day. Go on give it a go. I would love to hear about it, as I am certain others will too.

We each find our own bliss, our own groovy times, we rejoice in our own way…

So let’s go seek and discover, live wholly alive, live holy lives.

Below is a video devotion based 

on the material in this "blogspot"

Wholeness and completeness

In life there are many things that separate we human beings, often our beliefs and disbeliefs. Whether these be religious or anti-religious, political, social, cultural we separate ourselves through them and yet we are all human. We all love, we all long and we all grieve when we lose those we love. To quote Eugene Ionesco “Ideologies separate us. Dreams and anguish bring us together.” We are united by a common humanity; we are united by our shared hopes and despairs. We are each of us unique and complete as ourselves and yet we only truly know ourselves through our relationships with one another and with life. To quote Mark Nepo “It is a great paradox of being that each of us is born complete and yet we need contact with life in order to be whole. Somehow we need each other to know that completeness, though we are never finished in that journey.”

We are living in ever more dividing and divisive times. We do not see ourselves as one people. This is dangerous. Not only to ourselves but to our shared humanity. By separating ourselves we will never know wholeness, we will never truly be all that we can be. No one is an island. We need to be at one not only with ourselves, but with all of life and whatever it is we believe is at the core of all life to truly become completely ourselves, to touch perfection. Remember perfection originally meant completeness, I suspect perfect love is in a sense wholeness. This is one way to salvation by the way. To quote Forrest Church. “What I'm talking about…is salvation. The Latin root, salve, means health. The Teutonic cognates, health, hale, whole, and holy, all share the same root. Being an agnostic about the afterlife, I look for salvation here—not to be saved from life, but to be saved by life, in life, for life.

Such salvation has three dimensions: Integrity, or individual wholeness, comes when we make peace with ourselves; reconciliation, or shared wholeness, comes when we make peace with our neighbors, especially with our loved ones; redemption, in the largest sense, comes when we make peace with life and death, with being itself, with God.”

When we experience this wholeness we are as close as we will ever be to perfection, to completeness, although only for a moment as our lives go on. By becoming whole we begin to truly live our lives. Life is the greatest gift of all, the ultimate Grace. So choose life.

This brings to mind those words I so love from the Sermon on the Mount “Therefore be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect.” This is heaven on earth, this is the Kingdom of Love right here right now. This is the purpose of the spiritual life, this is the religion of love, of true communal spirituality. This is what it means to live in perfect love. Perfection is not flawlessness as we often think it is. Quite the opposite perfect love is sincere, it’s about showing our cracks, our flaws, our scars, showing who we truly are. The Latin root of perfection is “perfectus” which meant “completeness”, or wholeness, health in mind body and spirit, wholeness with self, others, life and God.

This is the purpose of spiritual community; this is the purpose of the free religious faith I am honoured to serve. This is what it means to me to be a minister of religion in the Unitarian tradition, in my view at least.

But how do we become whole, complete, perfect? How do we become at one with ourselves, one another, life, with God? Well it begins by being truly present in what we are doing; it begins by not being caught up in worry and fear, our own and others. It’s about not going into things hard, but rather by softly melting into what we are doing, by being who we are in what we are doing, by almost not focusing too hard, by looking through soft eyes. By being natural, who we are, by becoming what we are doing.

I remember when I was learning to drive. I did so late in life, when I was training for the ministry. I was never going to drive. I used to proudly proclaim it. The real reason was fear, fear of ridicule. When I was eleven years old I once had a go on a quad bike and I couldn’t handle it. I kept crashing and the man had to sit on the back of the bike and steer it for me. Everyone seemed to be laughing and I was so ashamed I vowed to myself that I would never allow that to happen again. I also remember another time when I worked in a warehouse and we were given forklift truck training. I was utterly hopeless, I just couldn’t do it. So I was never going to drive. Then when I began training for the ministry it became apparent that I had to learn in order to minister, to become who I am supposed to be. So I did.

Driving did not come naturally to me. I remember the instructor telling me that it would take time with me. I remember him saying “you are a thinker. I get some young men who just do it naturally, but you are a thinker, you analyse everything.” I did, every time I made a mistake I would spend time working out why and then I would make many more.

It took me a long time to learn and each time I had a lesson I would dread it. I got a sickly feeling in my stomach. Prayer alone did not take this away. Instead what took it away was walking and connecting and become one with life around me. Something that would come as I walked and connected to the people and geese in Platt Fields Park. It took my mind off my mind and helped me become more at one with what I was doing.

That said it didn’t help on the day I took my second test. I had failed the first time and the second time I was more nervous. I had to pass, my ministry was starting in two weeks time. I was putting intense pressure on myself. My left knee was shaking and it affected me. I made a minor error immediately. The examiner must have been in a good mood as he asked me to stop. He then said when ready I was to pull off. I checked properly and saw a car pulling out behind me, so I stopped and prepared. The car though pulled up next to me. I looked across and saw a car full of pensioners. One was waving at me to wind my window down. I looked at the instructor and he said to me “Tell them you are on your driving test and that you can’t talk”. I wound down my window, but before I could speak the woman said “Can you tell me the way to Manchester Royal Infirmary please?” I looked at the examiner and he repeated Tell them you are on your driving test and that you can’t talk.” I did to which the woman repeated “Can you tell me the way to Manchester Royal Infirmary please.” I again looked at the examiner, who repeated. It went on and the next time he remained silent, they weren’t going. So I paused, worked out where I was and gave them directions. They then drove off and when it was safe I drove off and completed my test and passed. My mind was no longer on my mind I was at one with the clutch and the wheel, the car and the task at hand. I was not at war with anything, I was at one, I was complete. By getting out of my mind I was better able to become what I was doing and to do so successfully.

Learning how to drive was the hardest part of my ministry training and yet it taught me more about how to live, serve and be. How to be whole and complete more than anything else I did in my time at college.

This brings to mind the following beautiful poem by Hafiz

“Each Soul Completes Me”

My
Beloved said,

"My name is not complete without
yours."

I thought:
How could a human's worth ever be such?

And God knowing all our thoughts — and all our
thoughts are innocent steps on the path —
then addressed my
heart,

God revealed
a sublime truth to the world,
when He
sang,

"I am made whole by your life. Each soul,
each soul completes
me."

We are never truly whole, complete, unless we are at one with ourselves, one another, life and whatever it is that we believe is the power that permeates all life. We can never truly become ourselves alone. This is why true community is so vital to the spiritual life. We need right relationship to become wholly who we are. To me this is the purpose of the free spiritual communities I serve. Yes it’s about becoming who we truly are, but this cannot be done in isolation. This is the purpose of free religion. It allows the birth of the true spirit in each of us, but no one can completely give birth to themself, by them self. To repeat those words of Mark Nepo: “It is a great paradox of being that each of us is born complete and yet we need contact with life in order to be whole. Somehow we need each other to know that completeness, though we are never finished in that journey.”

There is no end to any of this...We live in the thresholds of life...Becoming whole is just the beginning of the true journey...To where? Well God only knows...I certainly don't...

What would you have me "Be"?

During a recent conversation with colleagues there was much talk about what it means to be a minister. Not so much the specific aspects of our role, more the way that we should “Be” in the world. It got me thinking about how I am in the world. How I should be in the world? During the conversation there was also talk about what it meant to be a “Holy Presence”. We were asked to ponder the following quote:

“Whenever I meet a Buddhist I meet a holy man. Whenever I meet a Christian leader – I meet a manager.”

We were then asked to substitute the word “Unitarian” into the quotation and asked which one rings truest?

It really got me thinking about my role as a minister and how I am in the world. What presence do I project into the world? What do people experience in my company. While I may not be a holy man I hope to goodness I do not come across as a manager.

I am a minister and I know that to minister is to serve. This is not only a physical duty, the things I do. It is as much the way that these very things are done. It is about bringing the holy into the things I do.

It is not just about what I do singularly though. It is about what the communities I serve do together. For I do not minister alone. In my eyes a Unitarian community serves together as a whole. Ministry is something that the community does together.

The key I suspect is how we are in the world, actually it’s probably more about how we “Be”. I suspect it begins by being an authentic presence in the world in which we live. By being “Who” we really are. By doing so we become a source of light in our world.

Now being “Who” we really are is about authenticity. It’s about avoiding pretence, dropping the masks and being sincere. It’s not just about doing the right thing, but being the right thing. It’s not just about what we do, but how we “Be”.

Parker Palmer captures what I am trying to say near perfectly in the following quotation.

“Our deepest calling is to grow into our authentic selfhood, whether or not it conforms to some image of who we ought to be. As we do, we will not only find the joy that every human being seeks; we will also find our path of authentic service in the world.”

This got me thinking about a prayer that I use constantly throughout my daily life. It is a prayer associated with Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12 step fellowships. It is known as “The Fear Prayer” and goes as follows.

“We ask Him to remove our fear and direct our attention to what He would have us be.”

Now I adapt the wording to fit with my own theology and the situation I find myself in during the day. The key to it for me is that it is not so much seeking what I ought to be doing in a given situation, but how I should “Be”. The person I ought to “Be” in life. I do not personally believe that God maps out every intricate detail of life and will direct me to what I should do in every tiny situation of life. That said I have found that if and when I open myself up in any given situation I know exactly how I should “Be”. I believe that this applies to all of us. We can all be the open, loving, authentic, holy presence in life. In so doing we will serve life and the people around us. I believe that this is our gift to the world. which we can give and share in the way that we “Be”. In so doing we do indeed become holy men and women.

Now of course some of you who are reading this are doubt feeling uncomfortable with the thought of being holy, or being a holy person. You may well be asking what it means to be holy. You may feel deeply uncomfortable. Well please do not be. We can indeed all “Be” holy if we live authentic and open lives. We sanctify life and the people we share life with when we do so.

The word “Holy”, rather like the word “Salvation” and many others are often misunderstood. They are both linked to health and wholeness, they are really about how we live in the world, in the real world in which we find ourselves and not some distant realm or a way of being that is beyond humanity. At least it is if we explore the etymology of these words.

The Latin root “Salve” from which Salvation is formed means health. The Teutonic cognates (shared roots) for health, hale, whole and holy are the same. All these words share the same roots.

For me holiness is about salvation in the here and now, it is about being truly whole in the way that we live and breathe and share our being. It is about the way that we “Be”. It is about living with integrity and in so doing we will serve the world simply in the way that we “Be” It is the way that leads to authentic service in the world. It is the way to minister to ourselves, one another and the world around us. In so doing we become holy and we sanctify life.

During our recent denomination annual meetings at Birmingham many people spoke to me about my column in the “Inquirer”, which goes by the title “From Nothing to Everything”. I was deeply moved by what everyone said to me about how it touched them deeply. I do not seek approval in my writing but it is encouraging to be told by so many people that you have a positive impact on their lives. Several people mentioned their admiration for my openness. This led to several conversations about openness and wholeness actually. I suspect that the key to being whole and therefore holy is openness.

Openness is no easy thing. It truly is a process. I am far more open than I ever was and I am becoming more open as time goes by. That said there is always room for improvement. After all isn’t the “room for improvement” the largest room in our lives. Another subject of conversation were the physical changes in me. Now one rather astute person commented on the changes in the way I am, in my being. I have to say that this comment touched me the most deeply. They noticed that my persona was more open than it had been in the past.

This is so true and is something I am becoming increasingly aware of. It is something I’ve been working on these last few months. How we are, how we “Be” is not just about the words we speak or the spirit in which we live, it shows in our deportment too, in how we carry ourselves. Yes there has been many physical changes in my life this last year, but it is not just about the weight loss. I am working on becoming more physically open. I am learning to become freer in my physical being. It is helping me to become all that I can “Be”.

Oscar Wilde said, “Be who you are (because) everyone else is already taken”. If only it was as easy as it appears to simply be, in this quotation. How many of us waste so much of our lives trying to be something we are not, instead of trying to “Be” who we truly are. Now all this brought to mind a poem that recently came to my attention by May Sarton "Now I Become Myself”.

“Now I Become Myself” by May Sarton

Now I become myself. It's taken
Time, many years and places;
I have been dissolved and shaken,
Worn other people's faces,
Run madly, as if Time were there,
Terribly old, crying a warning,
"Hurry, you will be dead before—"
(What? Before you reach the morning?
Or the end of the poem is clear?
Or love safe in the walled city?)
Now to stand still, to be here,
Feel my own weight and density!
The black shadow on the paper
Is my hand; the shadow of a word
As thought shapes the shaper
Falls heavy on the page, is heard.
All fuses now, falls into place
From wish to action, word to silence,
My work, my love, my time, my face
Gathered into one intense
Gesture of growing like a plant.
As slowly as the ripening fruit
Fertile, detached, and always spent,
Falls but does not exhaust the root,
So all the poem is, can give,
Grows in me to become the song,
Made so and rooted by love.
Now there is time and Time is young.
O, in this single hour I live
All of myself and do not move.
I, the pursued, who madly ran,
Stand still, stand still, and stop the sun!

To “Be” who we truly are, who we were born to be, is no easy task. Sarton wrote this poem when she was 83 years old. It would seem that it took her a long time to truly “Be” who she really was, something she wrote of in her memoirs and journals. I commend them to you, they are worthy of exploration.

It is no easy task to “Be” who we truly are, to live openly, to live whole and holy lives. To “find our path of authentic service in the world.” You see we learn by following others from the day we are born. We learn to “Be Like” rather than to simply “Be”. It takes a long time to let go of the stabilisers of others and become wholly ourselves. For May Sarton it only really began after the death of her parents during middle age, actually about the age I am now.

Forrest Church had similar experiences it was only when he stopped living in his father’s shadow that he found the courage to truly “Be”. As he said:

"I found my calling. I answered a call that was mine, and not someone else’s." And went on to say "To envy another’s skills, looks, or gifts rather than embracing your own nature and call is to fail in two respects. In trying unsuccessfully to be who we aren’t, we fail to become who we are."

The key he said of course was to always “be who you are.”

This is the key of course. This is what it means to live holy lives. This is how we become a holy, an authentic presence in the world. This is how we serve the world by our presence and you know what it is never too later. It can begin right here right now. May Sarton was 83 years old when she wrote “Now I become myself”. Maybe, we only truly become our true selves at the end of our physical being. That said we need to begin some where and the only place to begin is right here right now. Right here, right now is the only place we can “Be”

Imperfecting Perfection

A friend recently messaged with something that he thought I would like. It was the advertising tag line for the on-line dating website “Match.com”. It read “If you don’t like your imperfections, someone else will”. He was right I did like it and had noticed it popping up on adverts everywhere, a very clever bit of advertising I thought. It also tapped into that sadness that I see in us at times, our worries and concerns over our seeming imperfections.

On-line dating does not have a very good reputation. I have lost count of the number of tales of woe I have heard from friends who have tried to meet someone through such avenues. That said I know of some really lovely success stories too. My sister “Our Mand” met her husband through this avenue, he is a great guy. Last Saturday I conducted the wedding a dear friend who met the woman he was marrying through the same avenue. They met through one of the less reputable sites too. It worked for them though, after many previous seeming disasters.

Looking for love or the person that fits you and you fit them is no easy thing in the modern age, maybe the problem is that so many of us are looking for the seemingly perfect person, who fits the right profile, who ticks all the boxes. Maybe such a person doesn’t exist, I am fairly certain that they don’t. Even if they did exist, maybe they are looking for mister or miss perfect too.

Brings to mind one of my favourite stories from the vault of Mulla Nasruddin

One afternoon, Nasruddin and his friend were sitting in a cafe, drinking tea, and talking about life and love. “How come you never got married, Nasruddin?” asked his friend at one point. “Well,” said Nasruddin, “to tell you the truth, I spent my youth looking for the perfect woman. In Cairo, I met a beautiful and intelligent woman, with eyes like dark olives, but she was unkind. Then in Baghdad, I met a woman who was a wonderful and generous soul, but we had no interests in common. One woman after another would seem just right, but there would always be something missing. Then one day, I met her. She was beautiful, intelligent, generous and kind. We had everything in common. In fact she was perfect.” “Well,” said Nasruddin’s friend, “what happened? Why didn’t you marry her?” Nasruddin sipped his tea reflectively. “Well,” he replied, “it’s a sad thing. Seems she was looking for the perfect man.”

I am more like Nasruddin than I would like to be at times.

Perfectionism increasingly plagues our age. This need to get everything right. This need to escape criticism. We put too much pressure on ourselves and on one another. We see it in schools, in the work place, in public services. We have this growing expectation that celebrities and sport stars have to be whiter than white and not fallible humans like the rest of us. People also seem increasingly obsessed with body image and the like, this cannot be good for us. Increasingly we live in an age where all we do is pick at the seeming imperfections in our human make up. I wouldn’t mind but who exactly are we trying to live up to and whose approval are we seeking?

I fall for it myself from time to time and I know it doesn’t do me any good. I am a perfectionist in some areas of my life, but not in others. In the areas where I am I can put far too much pressure on myself and it is not healthy. It is not just about doing a good job either, which is a positive thing, it is about appearing perfect, doing things perfectly and therefore seemingly transcending criticism.

I know this is crazy and un-achievable, but I still put myself through it when locked away researching or writing. Thankfully when I’m out amongst the beautiful people I serve the clown in me takes over somewhat and I am set free from the chains of perfectionism.

"Perfection" is a subject I explored when I candidated for the two congregations I serve, although it was done in a very different way back then. I lead the same service at both congregations. Now things went fairly well at Altrincham,the first service, except when it came to the collection and I froze as I did not know what to do. Thankfully the lovely couple who had received it gently pointed me in the right direction.

Things though went a little bit wrong a couple of weeks later as I lead the service at Urmston. I got a little too engrossed in what I was doing and carried away with it and completely forgot one of the hymns. I only realised what I had done when we got to the third hymn. So I gave them an option, made a joke about it and we sang them together. I was then able to keep on referencing this throughout the sermon which was on "perfection" and that I was far from it myself. Strangely enough we’ve had problems with hymns from time to time their ever since. although thankfully they have accepted me as their Holy Fool.

I was taught many lessons that day…One of them being that people aren’t looking for a perfect worship leader, well they certainly haven’t got one in me…A real one yes, and one who isn’t afraid to appear as a Holy Fool.

I have been reflecting a lot on the "Sermon on the Mount", found in the fifth chapter of Matthew's Gospel in recent weeks. I have made several references to aspects of it in recent "blogspots". These last few days I've been reflecting, once again on verses 43-48 often referred to as "Love for Enemies". Here are the verses below:

43 "‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.” 44But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. 46For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same? 47And if you greet only your brothers and sisters,* what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect."

These words come at the end of "The Sermon on the Mount". Verse 48 reads “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” As I understand it Jesus is speaking of perfect love specifically here, love without prejudice love for all, whoever they are and wherever they have been. I believe that this is the love that the communities I serve are built upon. It is certainly the foundation upon which my ministerial mantra is built “Come as you are, exactly as you are…but do not expect to leave in exactly the same condition.” I believe this is echoing Jesus’s belief in humanity that we are the "light of the world", that I explored in a previous blog You are the light of the world He is highlighting what we are capable of being when we remember who we are and the perfect love from which we are formed. What really gets me here though is the realisation that we don’t need to be perfect in all areas of our lives in order to offer perfect love. In fact if perhaps we thought we were we would not be able to offer perfect love to those who need it the most, for we would perhaps possess a false sense of superiority.

Now for a long time I wrongly believed that there was something fundamentally wrong with me and all humanity for that matter. I believed we were broken or “fallen” people who occasionally do something decent. I believed this when I had no religious belief by the way. Actually when I lost faith in the humanism I once had and descended into total nihilism this became even more deeply ingrained. I no longer see things this way I do believe in “Original Goodness”, or “Original Blessing”. I believe that our problem is that we forget we fall short of what we can be at our best. Sadly some people seem cut off almost completely from this, but I always live with hope. We are not perfect it would seem.

Now perfect, perfection and imperfection are very interesting words to me. I do believe our desire to transcend these states has a lot to do with this fundamental belief that at the core of us there is something wrong. This seems to have intensified in our increasingly secular time as we increasingly worship the God of self or even worse the God of public opinion, perhaps the most jealous of any man made God and certainly one that is impossible to please. That critical voice never stops, whether it is imagined or real.

The problem is that we equate imperfection with there being something wrong with us at our core, when actually what it really means is that we are incomplete. That we are looking for wholeness, with ourselves, our world and God.

The thing about life is that nothing is ever wholly complete, but that does not mean it isn’t any good. Life is constantly, changing, moving and bending into new shapes, it wouldn’t be life if it wasn’t.

When we hear the word perfect today we tend to think of something without blemish, being absolutely 100% pure. Yet the word for perfect in those verses above from Matthew was originally “teleo” which really meant fulfilment, or wholeness or completion. It does not mean what we understand as moral perfection today. Some version of the passage have translated it as goodness.

Now of course none of us are wholly complete. Well this is where love comes in, where God comes in. By returning to God I have learnt that I can better offer perfect love to those who need it. I believe that we can all be like the father in the Prodigal Son parable and offer perfect love. This is an example of perfect love, open to everyone.

I believe, stronger than ever that it is our imperfection, our incompleteness that makes us better able to both give and receive love as it opens us up to the love present in life itself. So maybe those folk at “Match.com” have it right when they say “If you don’t like your imperfections, someone else will”.

The truth is of course we don’t need something or someone to complete us; the truth is that there is nothing really wrong with us at all. We are human beings we all have our gifts and talents and things we don’t do so well and that’s beautiful. We are after all the the light of the world, we just need to remember this. We have to let all that love light shine for our world needs it.

I realised a while back that in order to imperfect our perfection all that is required of us is that we learn to just be at ease with who we who are, just to delight in our very being and to allow others to do the same. I learnt this from observing two very important people in my life. One was from my nephew Johnny who just happily and confidently delighted in who he was. No fear, no self-consciousness he has not yet learn about all that, sadly no doubt he will soon. The other was my granddad who over the years just accepted me as I was, without ever once criticising that I can recall. My sister has said something similar, he loved us without condition. I think that is perfect love. I see it also in people who are just at ease with themselves. The kind who don’t need to prove anything to anyone else, who just get on with the work and life they are given. These are the people who teach me how to imperfect my own perfection.

Who are the teaches in your lives? Maybe that’s something you could think about. Who shows or has shown you that it is ok to be you and have helped you show that perfect love to others.

Remember perfect love is about accepting those we meet exactly as they are and perhaps that begins by first of all accepting ourselves as we are, exactly as we are, warts and all and beauty spots too.

I'm going to end this little chip of a blogspot with the following "Passing Through" by Robert Walsh. I suggest that they are read in a prayerful state...You may notice something familiar in the pattern of these worlds…

“Passing Through” by Robert Walsh

O Spirit that creates us, sustains us, transforms us, and judges us, may your many names be hallowed.
May there come a world that sings with your justice and mercy, your beauty and truth, and may we be your faithful partners in creation to bring that world about.
Accept us in our brokenness, even as we would accept our mortal sisters and brothers, parents and children, spouses and partners, neighbours, and enemies.
Tempt us with life. Try us with growth and change and loss. But help us at last to find the path, through temptations and trials, to wholeness.
For we are but passing through this world. Yours is the creation, and the power, and the glory.

Amen