Rohr talked today about confession and collective awareness of what was around, not just navel-gazing inside. He talked about his theology professor: early Catholic moral theology taught that there were three major sources of evil: the world, the flesh, and the devil. My moral theology professor always added emphatically: “In that order!”
It’s helpful for me to see that what impacted me negatively started somewhere and with a distortion of something good to begin with. This isn’t isolated to religion but religion has had a good run w/ it.
I get discouraged sometimes. It is a lonely path, the one I’ve chosen. I’m not surrounded by a lot of people any more all going in the same direction. There are many of us floundering along the way, trying to remember and embrace Jesus and the divine and stories, but that’s not easily reflected in a group setting.
Rohr goes on to talk about how Jesus and all the prophets focused on judging nations, cities, town and at the end, the individual.
What that reminds me again is how important it’s been for us to be good leaders. We’ve had this sense of morality about how we have conducted and run our company. At times, it’s felt extremely heavy-handed and burdensome, to be so concerned about people and ethics. I’ve never questioned it but again, it’s felt lonely and odd even at times.
If the mystics and prophets and spiritual leaders of old were judging and calling out entire nations, they were really speaking to the leaders of those nations and then the followers. They were calling out the strong, the powerful, the ones w/ talents that had no limit, the ones who had everything in life going for them, hadn’t had discrimination to experience of physical infirmities, the ones who could lead and we’re doing so well.
I’m glad that I don’t have to worry what side of that equation I’m on.
It also reminds me that our focus has been right on, worth the effort.
In contemplation this morning, this phrase: It’s hard to be strong when you’re fearful.
That seems like true wisdom right there.
How can you be strong when at your core, you are either afraid or scared or defeated or traumatized? how can you in those postures, muster up strength to move ahead?