"let us pause..."

"let us pause
in life's pleasures
and count its many tears;
while we all sup sorrow
with the poor..."

This James Taylor and YoYo Ma recording of Bob Dylan's "Hard Times," speaks to me on so many levels today. We are all being asked to pause from life's pleasure. We are being asked to sup sorrow with the poor -- to understand the isolation and uncertainty that they face, while we who have so much, move past with dry eyes and light hearts. I just love it.

One has to sit with the poor, to understand the depth of their hunger. And it is a hunger. A hunger that goes beyond the need for basic food, shelter, warmth and a sense of belonging. It is a hunger for peace. A hunger for freedom from worry and doubt. A hunger for a sense of one's self, that feels worthy of kindness, respect, dignity.

These are "hard times" for so many. Those of us who live in secure housing, and are blessed to have enough money to stock a pantry - have little idea of what it is like to watch your paycheck-to-paycheck resources dwindle - while the days of quarantine, and suspended work, turns into weeks. As our empathy for others increases, it might seem hard to stay awake to our collective spiritual reality.

My friend, Nancy, shared a story with me from her trip to the the grocery store early this morning:

“My husband and I ventured out to our neighborhood grocery store early today. When we first walked in, the atmosphere was so solemn. It was very busy, but No one was talking. It was almost zombie like.

I tried to make eye contact with other shoppers so as to greet them and give them a smile. But for the first 5 or 10 minutes, no one would even look at me.

Then the Father said, “love them”. So as I moved thru the aisles from there forward, and as I came to another shopper, I first thanked God for His dear child, and felt God’s love for that dear one.

The atmosphere quickly changed. I began hearing people greeting people they knew. Shoppers returned my smile. A lady who [we know] said, "Hi," and asked how I was. And when we got in line to check out, a gentleman who lives on our block came up behind us, and we had a wonderful opportunity to catch up."
 

I loved this story -- so much. It might have been hypnotic to walk into that grocery store. It might have easily felt like it all made sense in the context of this global crisis. "Why of course people are afraid, defensive, moving through their days with the weight of an unknown threat hanging like a storm in the air."

But no. Nancy did what Mary Baker Eddy encourages us to do in her textbook on spiritual healing, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures:

“Beholding the infinite tasks of truth,
we pause, — wait on God.

Then we push onward, until boundless thought
walks enraptured, and conception unconfined
is winged to reach the divine glory."
 

It is all in that pause. We can become so zombie-like ourselves. Just pushing through the hypnotic fog of despair and "well, this is just how it is for a while..."

But Nancy didn't do that. She paused. She waited on God. And to wait on God, is very different than waiting for God. Both are required. And Nancy did both. She waited for God to take hold of her thoughts, and direct her heart. But she also waited on God -- serving His purpose with the attention of the most skilled waitstaff, in the most posh restaurant. She was alert, awake, ready. And the effect of that alertness was deeply felt.

Which brings me to another point taken from this story. Nancy's willingness to pause and question what she was experiencing.  The tasks we face seem infinite.  How do we reach a global community? But the infinite tasks are not ours, but the tasks of truth -- and Truth has infinite resources for addressing them.

Nancy's willingness to pause, reminds me of another experience.  One that a friend shared some years ago during a Wednesday evening testimony meeting. She said that she had woken one morning feeling a bit "off." She decided to push through it, and go for a run. But somewhere along the trail, she started feeling worse.

She decided to take a moment to pray for herself and sat down on a log. It came to her that, even though she was up and running, she was not fully awake. In fact, if she could feel anything but the full presence of God, she was actually still asleep -- she was sleep-walking, or in this case sleep-running. She realized she needed to fully wake up. She claimed her right to be more fully alert to God's power and presence -- and soon she was feeling completely well.

This has been such a powerful example for me. Each morning -- and throughout the day -- I claim that I am fully awake, alert, and conscious of the Truth about everyone and everything. If I am seeing, accepting, feeling something that is inconsistent with my right to know the fullness of God's presence and power, I am sleepwalking and I need to wake up.

I can do this dozens of times a day. And I do. This is what Nancy did this morning in the grocery store. She experienced something that didn't align with her clear sense of God's omnipotent love. She paused, waited on God. Then she "pushed onward until boundless thought walked [through that store] enraptured" with love for God's beloved community.

If we are feeling unsettled by what we are seeing in the grocery store, hearing on the news, or experiencing in our communities -- or our bodies, we can pause, ask God to help us wake up more fully -- and then walk enraptured with love for our neighbor.

Thank you Nancy, for refusing to sleep-shop.  Thank you for sharing your story, and for being willing to pause...

offered with Love,

Kate

"i was never the same…"

"the sun's not so hot
in the sky today,
and I can see summertime
slipping away..."

James Taylor's "September Grass," takes me to a time long before it was even written. A time when JT's voice was the soundtrack of my heart. September 1971 -- Sweet Baby James, a boy who played football, and a town as quaint as a Gilmore Girls episode.

Only I was the thing that didn't fit in. I was not the confident, charming teenager living in a quaint village.  I was a misfit character from all the shows that weren't even being written in those days. Stories about self-doubt, tears that fell in rivers, and feelings that were choked back in silence.

I didn't know that things could be different for me.  I was the girl who lived in a secret.  Until one day God dropped me into the arms of a sweet town and a lovely boy.  The town was a small village that I grew to love.  And the boy was kind.  He gave me hope.   Hope that someday I might actually be a normal girl.  A girl with a family that laughed loudly and fought openly. Because he was a normal boy.  He was all about fishing and football, olds car and hands that were strong and capable and fixed things. He was safe. And believe me, safe was everything to me.

Our family had only moved to the area that spring of 1970.  We lived in a small carriage house on an old estate just outside of town. I had attended the local high school for two months before we broke for summer.  Since then I'd endured three months of babysitting younger siblings, canning endless bushels of tomatoes, pickles, and beets, and searching for places to hide and read. My mother was ripe with twins, so I became her arms, legs, hands and feet. I would make breakfast, do dishes, hang laundry on the line, take it down, fold it, and put it away. Dinner, baths, bedtime stories. The next morning it started all over again.

I had circled the Tuesday after Labor Day on a calendar that hung on the wall next to my bed. The first day of school. I would be free of it all -- small children, and mind-numbing chores, the smell of tomatoes waiting to be canned, and the weight of wet laundry.

The first week of school was glorious. I was learning to type, my english teacher was young and eager, our civics class was interesting, and I wasn't new. I'd been at the school for two months in the spring and I actually knew a few other kids. This was a rare for me.  We moved constantly when I was growing up. That first weekend there was the promise of a youth group gathering at the local community center. Basketball, records, dancing, board games, and s'mores.

My dad agreed to let me go if I took my younger sister. That was easy. She was outgoing and popular. I was neither. But entering any social gathering on the trail of her Love's Baby Soft perfume had become my mode of operation in high school. I didn't mind. If I was going to be associated with anyone, my sister was the perfect companion.  In her company I had a chance of being included.

We'd gone to the opening football game of the season that afternoon and our team had won. The air was crisp and spirits were high when we arrived at the community center that evening. There was a group of guys shooting baskets in the gym, girls on the periphery talking, and other kids playing twister and monopoly on the raised stage at one end of the long room that was used as a combined gym, theater, and town meeting hall.

The music was loud and there were as many kids playing on the swings and playground equipment outside as there were inside. I stayed in my sister's orbit as she gravitated towards a group of girls she knew. They were nice girls. I knew some of them from classes we shared. When the conversation stalled I excused myself and went to the stage where a boy was waiting for someone to play chess. That would be me -- the game geek. Scrabble, chess, backgammon, Yahtzee -- I loved them all.

Some time later -- time filled with intense strategic concentration -- I noticed that the lights had been lowered and half of the kids had gone home. Those who remained were dancing on the basketball court. These were nice kids, I liked them. I wanted to be one of them. I left the game area on the raised stage and joined my sister on the sidelines. It was a sweet moment.

Then a boy I knew from our English Literature class came up and asked me to dance. The song was James Taylor's "Fire and Rain." I was sure he was talking to my sister. But no, he was asking me. I remember the clean scent of laundry detergent on his red and green plaid flannel shirt. I remember that he was a good foot taller than I was. I remember feeling something I'd never felt before -- at home.

We became friends.  Later, we were a couple within the safe context of a larger group of kids that spent Friday nights together at the local Methodist Church -- playing games, talking, and eating pizza. He was kind. He was gentle and quiet. He had a big family that laughed and fought and took me under their wing. His mom would scold me when I needed it. His dad would give me advise on all measure of issues from applying for jobs to changing the oil in my car. His brothers teased me and his sisters were my allies.

This isn't a particularly inspired or poignant post. But for me, this moment in my life was magical. For the first time, I felt like I belonged somewhere. Home felt like crisp September air. It tasted like apples and it smelled like woodsmoke and laundry detergent on a flannel shirt beneath my cheek. Home was a community center in the middle of a small town where my sister and I stood together without our parent or siblings -- and I wasn't afraid. Home was the promise of friendship and belonging.

So even now, when September sweeps in on the cool breath of autumn's promise, I feel safe. I am in the arms of a tall boy with kind eyes. I have just discovered what it might feel like to belong, and I never want to leave. I have a glimpse of my sister and I as whole people -- not just one tenth of a family. I have begun to realize that there is more to life than being small and scared -- the new girl who is awkward and bookish.

September is my reminder of that feeling.  It says, remember that you belong. Remember that you are not small and afraid of what you cannot see, or control, or understand. You know what home feels like. You know what it means to belong -- not to a place or a person - although those are lovely -- but to something so infinite and kind that it gave you the gift of a September evening in 1970.  It let you feel the promise of something you didn't even know you were aching for.

I believe that these moments of spiritual serendipity imprint themselves on our hearts.  They never leave us and they are always there to remind us to have hope, to persist, to be patient, and to trust. September does that for me. September is not a 30 day span on the calendar. September is a promise. A promise of home, and belonging, and discovering something you hadn't even known to hope for. 

We all have opportunities to make this kind of a difference in another person's life.  It doesn't always happen in big ways.  Sometimes it is the smallest act of acceptance that leaves the most enduring imprint on the heart.  That evening a boy simply asked a girl to dance.


offered with Love,

Kate

"never to let them fall…"

"they were true love,
written in stone,
they were never alone,
they were never that far apart…"
- James Taylor

This is the relationship I dreamed about, prayed for, gave my all to. And, I believe, it is the one that we all hope we will find, love our way into, grow up with, and be known for.

I first heard the lyrics to JT's,"Never Die Young," in 1988, and I just knew they were about "us." I thought we were that couple. I thought we could overcome anything. I thought we would be those cute little old people walking hand-in-hand, through town, at sunset.

But we weren't. And we aren't -- at least not with each other.  But I believe we are both a testament to the power of love and hope.  But I digress.  This isn't a post about our divorce. This is a post about Taylor's admonition to "hold them up, hold them up, never to let them fall…" This is an open letter to the residents of every "tough town" he is singing about. This is my plea, and my prayer.

A relationship is not a reality show, playing itself out in real time. It isn't meant to be subject to community Nielsen ratings. It shouldn't be the subject of Siskel and Ebert-like thumbs up/thumbs down assessments. A relationship -- whether it is a marriage, a domestic partnership, or a very good friendship -- is not there for our entertainment. No one is asking for our vote of confidence.

Sometimes, in the midst of the day-to-day, it is hard to separate what is our own reality, from the stories that are being projected onto us.  And sometimes, it is just plain hard.  It is especially difficult to navigate, when we begin to feel the weight of human opinions, speculation, or just the boredom-based chatter that happens when people aren't engaged in the kind of life-expansive charity, social-advocacy, and unselfed community service that keeps them from the chocolate cupboard of gossip.

As I sit here today - listening to this much-loved song - my heart cries out for social self-restraint. For an end to the practice of "everyone used to run them down: 'they're a little too sweet, they're a little too tight…"

Please, please, please -- let's just stop it. Instead let's:

"Hold them up,
hold them up,
never to let them fall
prey to the rust, and the dust,
and the ruin that names us,
and claims us, and shames us
and ruins us all..." 

Because it does you know. When we participate in knocking down someone's relationship or marriage with the kind of so-called harmless comments, speculation, criticism, sarcasm that reality TV promotes as entertaining conversation, we name ourselves as unkind, we claim our sense of ourselves as small-minded, we shame ourselves with gossip and mischief-making, and we ruin our sense of identity as a loving, supportive community -- place to grow and thrive in.

It's time to stop looking for the first crack in a person's spiritual poise, the first fissure in a relationship, the first (or second) mistake -- and jump on it. It's time to stop saying -- to ourselves and others, "see, I told you so." It's time to stop celebrating the widening of relational fault lines with self-congratulatory silent (or audible) surprise, and disdain.

This is not an easy journey. We are all doing it, with as much grace, love, trust, and courage as we know how. The last thing anyone needs is to have the acid of gossip, speculation, and "i knew it all the time…" thrown in.

The Golden Rule is precious and practical. It keeps us safe from becoming another character in a reality TV show of our own making. When we think, speak, do unto (and about) others the way we would want them to think, speak, and do unto (or about) us -- and our partner, spouse, children, family, home, business, we are on safe, holy ground. 

 And in the course of living this Golden Rule, we may just find that leaving other people's relationships alone -- or supporting them by trusting them to Love's wise guidance and protection -- we improve our own relationships, foster new ones, and strengthen our ties to the source of all love.

I love this brief statement from Mary Baker Eddy's last published work, The First Church of Christ, Scientist and Miscellany:

"No mortal is infallible, 
— hence the Scripture,
“Judge no man.” 

We're all a work in progress. And, we are all in this together. We are all trying to find, and live, the kind of love that is a little too sweet, and not too tough. The kind of love that rises from among the detritus of human drama like a big balloon and soars over it with grace. I know I do. I want my relationships to inspire, not entertain.

offered with all my Love -- and prayers,

Kate

"Hold them up..."

"Hold them up, hold them up,
never to let them fall prey
to the dust, and the rust. and ruin
that names us and claims us
and shames us all..."

James Taylor's "Never Die Young" is one of the most sobering songs I've ever felt.  And yes, I really do mean "felt," rather than heard.  This song reaches me in a place that is tender and hopeful and sad all at once.

I used to feel that we were all just a bit like the people in this song: 

"...a little too sweet, a little too tight 

Not enough tough for this tough town.

Couldn't touch 'em with a ten foot pole

No, they didn't seem rattled at all. 

They were fused together body and soul. 

That much more 

with their backs up against the wall."

The bottom line is, that none of us feels immune to the kind of tearing down that these "tough towns" are sometimes so thoughtlessly engaged in.  And it can be so subtle that even when we passively participate -- just by listening -- we think it's harmless...or even deserved.

But it never is.

As part of his Thanksgiving Proclamation for this years (2012), President Barack Obama had this to say about how we might consider treating one another: 

"On Thanksgiving Day, individuals from all walks of life come together to celebrate this most American tradition, grateful for the blessings of family, community, and country. Let us spend this day by lifting up those we love, mindful of the grace bestowed upon us by God and by all who have made our lives richer with their presence."

I've been thinking about this portion of his proclamation, since hearing it in church that day.  And I can't think of any other one thing that would make a bigger difference in the lives of others.

I love the tradition of Hora.  An Israeli (among other cultures) custom often performed  at bar/bat mitzvahs and weddings, in which the honoree(s) are lifted up on chairs during a congregational dance.

Its symbology is similar to the western tradition of asking the wedding guest to vow their ongoing support of the couple --as they make their way in the world as a new family -- by replying, "we do."

But these symbols, traditions, and customs are only as good as our conscientious effort to follow through on these pledges.  

Gossip, rumors, talking about others behind their back -- picking away at the details of someone's personal decisions and choices --  never lifts up those we love, care about.  It never elevates our concept of man.  It never blesses those we are in relationship with as friends, family, neighbors, colleagues or even as fellow citizens of a global community.   And it always leads to tearing someone down.

Even when it is done in the circumspection of our own silent reverie, those negative thoughts about others, begin to tear down our sense of ourselves -- as loving, generous, merciful beings.

I believe that it is especially critical that we "hold up" those who are working so hard to be "in relationship."  Mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, siblings, fathers and sons, neighbors, colleagues, sisters, friends, in-laws, blended families.

These relationships have the potential for being the most amazing laboratories for demonstrating the consistent, enduring, persistent kind of love that seems miraculous to society these days.  This is where unselfishness breeds, where unconditional love blossoms, where forgiveness is given wings.

We can never -- ever -- know what others are facing in the sanctuary of their relationships.  But we can refuse to speculate, wonder, or imagine.   We can walk away from the mental invitation to "be concerned."  We can turn away from society's desire to "know the details." We can hold them up to the sunlight of God's warming Love.  We can hold up -- in our own heart, and to everyone around us -- the best in our fellow beings.  That gentle glimmer of grace, a shimmering slice of something sublimely sweet. 

And we can gently, but firmly, "hang up" when someone is sharing of another person's news.  Wouldn't you rather hear it from them anyway. 

As my friend Carol once said, "I don't share other people's news, it's not mine to share, it's theirs."  Refreshing isn't it!

Holding one another up.  This could just be the best Christmas gift we give eachother this year!

with Love...always,  

Kate

"...you can stay as long as you like..."

"...No one's gonna take that time away,
you can stay as long as you like...
so, close you eyes
you can close your eyes
it's alright..."
- James Taylor

Sometimes, when the world seems to be spinning faster than I can navigate...while trying to stand upright on my feet...I go to a quiet place, lie down, and close my eyes.  I imagine my Father-Mother God saying, "It's alright, you can 'Close Your Eyes'...it's alright, I'm watching." 

So, I surrender to Her voice,  and once again:

I
enter
the nucleus of prayer

that
sanctuaried silence
where
earnest longings
meet
the
splayed form
of a
repentant heart...

and steps over
the discarded,
scattered,
sun-bleached bones
of the
ego's
carcass*

here
in this place of
deep margins,
white space,
and
unpaginated moments
of conscious
streaming

there are
no words....

there is
nothing but the
heartbeat
of
a divine Mother,
Her bosom at my cheek...
cooing,
a lullaby
sung
in the nursery of
human hopes


the
orchestrated
rhythm of
the universe..

spiritual
grace-notes
thrummed
softly
on
an infant humanity's
small
shoulders

it is
an ordered
hushing
of the earth, earthy

the tender stroke
of Her
cool fingers
on the
brow of a child...
the
toddler... who's finally
dropped off
from
edge of
fighting

fallen from
the
precipice of
control,
into the
canyon of
letting go
and trusting
Her
deep arms

released from
the fitful thrashings
of the self
and
quieted
beneath
Her
calming
touch

the lavender
scent of Her promise
calming,
stirring,
soothing,
drifting across
bare questions
of innocence...
through
the window of
gratitude...
rustling
the bedcovers of
the heart
and
resting on
holy
ground...
the
waiting
petals
of
unfurled hopes...
warmed
by
what lies waiting
for you
in
the nucleus of
prayer

For those of you who love rare moments of music history, here is a lovely clip of James Taylor and Joni Mitchell singing "Close Your Eyes"...precious...

"We must close the lips and silence the material senses.
In the quiet sanctuary of earnest longings,
we must deny sin and plead God's allness."
- Mary Baker Eddy

with Love,
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS


* this section is inspired by an excerpt from "Living Like Weasels" by Annie Dillard

"I can see summertime slippin' on...slippin' away..."

"Well, the sun's not so hot in the sky today
And you know I can see summertime slipping on away
A few more geese are gone, a few more leaves turning red
But the grass is as soft as a feather in a featherbed..."
-     James Taylor

Summertime is no longer "slippin' on, slippin' away"...it's pretty much gone.  The girls will register for middle school tomorrow, get their photos taken for ID cards, and put their school supplies in new lockers.  The sun, filtered through the lazy, late August air, casts a golden light on everything it touches, and the "September Grass" JT sings about is a softer shade of green and even softer to the touch. 

As we say goodbye to the summer of 2009, and turn our faces towards all the newness of September, I can't help but recall the year I moved from third grade into fourth.  I had really loved third grade.  I'd had a wonderful teacher that was sweet and snuggly.  She would bring in cookies and could play the piano while teaching us Red River Valley and Home on the Range.  I thought Mrs. Hanson was the nicest grandmotherly person I had ever met, I wanted to live, and learn, in the warmth of her softness...forever.

I didn't want to go to fourth grade.  I did everything I could to convince my parents that I wasn't ready.  Wasn't I already really, really little for my age...I really, really was.  Hadn't I been really good at third grade? I had.  I had aced third grade.  In fact I had done so well at spelling, times tables, long division, and plant science that I just KNEW I should stay there.  Didn't ace-ing something mean it was your right place.  I sure thought so.  And if you got along really, really well with your teacher, didn't that mean that she should be your teacher forever and ever? 

Fourth grade was unfamiliar.  I didn't like the idea of having a man for a teacher...that was something I just couldn't get my head around.  Teachers were women.  They were soft, and kind, and they baked cookies sometimes.  That's the kind of teacher I needed.  That's the kind of teacher that worked for me.

And fourth graders ate their lunch in the lunchroom instead of in their classroom.  Fourth graders had to carry their books back and forth from home in a bookbag.  I wasn't sure I could do that.  Like I said, I was really little.  I didn't know if a bookbag would make my bicycle basket too heavy and make it hard to steer. 

I spent most of the month of August worrying about all of this.  I was so sure that I should be allowed to stay in third grade, that I refused to say that I was a fourth grader when people asked me what grade I was in.

Labor Day weekend was my last chance for convincing mom and dad that I shouldn't have to "move up".  We were doing some last minute "back to school" shopping for a blue cloth-covered three ring binder, a clear plastic ruler, a cello-wrapped package of 200 sheets of notebook paper, a new petticoat, and a pair of saddle shoes, when my mom suggested that I consider a red and black plaid bookbag with two leather buckle closures on the front.  I burst into tears and told her that I was not going to be tricked into going to fourth grade.  I didn't need a bookbag for third grade. 

She took me outside of the store and we sat in the shade on a concrete wall.  She asked me if I ever wanted to be able to read fat books with no pictures.  Now this was sneaky.  I loved, loved loved books.  I practically lived in the local library all summer.  I'd worked my way, first, through all the books in the "young reader" section on horses and dogs, and then moved on to stories about medieval castles, knights in shining armor, and damsels in distress.

I wanted to read every book in the entire library.  Mom suggested that there would be new vocabulary words in fourth grade, new periods of history I couldn't even imagine, new math games that I might find even more exciting than the times tables I had already memorized.  She said that we were going to get the bookbag, just in case I wanted to have a place to put all the new books I would be able to read, and understand, once I started fourth grade.

That night I sat in my bunkbed looking at the collection of books that filled the bookcase, that was my headboard.  The books were all skinny. And although the illustrations weren't on every page, like when I was in kindergarten, they still had some pictures.  I was beginning to think illustrated books were for babies who didn't have any imagination of their own.  I wanted to read books that let me come up with my own ideas about what a princess looked like, or the color of the sky over Narnia.

I got up in the middle of the night and quietly moved most of my books to the bookcase in my sister's headboard above me.  Before long I had made space in my bookcase, and in my heart, for fourth grade and all the new ideas that would come with it.  I found my new bookbag and took the little piece of paper out of the clear plastic window on the front and wrote my name and "grade four" in pencil...then slipped it back in to it's little leather frame with the plastic window.  It was mine...and I was going to fill it.

By the next morning I was ready.  Mom had helped me realize that, as wonderful as third grade and Mrs. Hanson had been, I was ready to take what I had learned from that experience and build on it.  I was ready to expand my horizons.  I was hungry for more.  And I was going to get it...and I had the bookbag to hold it all in.

That was the fall of 1963.  Later that November I would be so grateful for my teacher, Mr. Gaydosh.  He was strong and funny, wise and cool.  We all loved him.  He treated us like "scholars" and taught us how to play chess.  He let us make decisions about things like consequences and expectations.  We learned to set goals and work in teams. 

When our Principal came in one day and told us that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, Texas, Mr. Gaydosh was the perfect teacher for me.  He brought in his black and white television the next day, let us watch "history in the making," he encouraged us to write about our feelings and how the events were effecting our families, our neighborhoods, our sense of who we were in the world.

I don't think I would be writing this post if it weren't for Mr. Gaydosh.  He expected us to know ourselves, to probe our feelings, to sort through our experiences, and to see how world events were having an impact on how we behaved, thought about our roles, and began to help us determine what we wanted to become.  

I started to see that I had needed exactly what Mrs. Hanson brought to my life as a third grader, but that if I wanted to grow and expand as a learner and as a person, I would need lots of different kinds of teachers, friends, and other adults to help me discover all that the world had to offer.   I somehow knew that I needed diversity.  Even when I was content with where I was.  Mr. Gaydosh, and fourth grade made me want to learn from people who didn't necessarily think like I thought, or agree with my opinions.  Mr. Gaydosh taught us to love debating issues and ideas.  He taught me that people could disagree without being disagreeable.

In fourth grade I would meet someone who would be my first "best friend" besides my sister.  She was the first person outside of my family I ever loved.  That experience alone was critical to my understanding of how expansive the heart is.  What if I had never gone to fourth grade. 

Tonight as I thought about my daughters entering Middle School, I remembered a statement from Mary Baker Eddy's Miscellaneous Writings:

"We should remember that the world is wide; that there are a thousand million different human wills, opinions, ambitions, tastes, and loves; that each person has a different history, constitution, culture, character, from all the rest; that human life is the work, the play, the ceaseless action and reaction upon each other of these different atoms. Then, we should go forth into life with the smallest expectations, but with the largest patience; with a keen relish for and appreciation of everything beautiful, great, and good, but with a temper so genial that the friction of the world shall not wear upon our sensibilities; with an equanimity so settled that no passing breath nor accidental disturbance shall agitate or ruffle it; with a charity broad enough to cover the whole world's evil, and sweet enough to neutralize what is bitter in it, - determined not to be offended when no wrong is meant, nor even when it is, unless the offense be against God. "

I hope and pray that with new teachers, classmates, opportunities, and experiences, our daughters will grow in their ability to have compassion for the lives and circumstances of their new acquaintances, patience with the strong opinions of others, and a willingness to surrender their own opinions for open-minded discourse.  I pray they develop a keen relish for, and an appreciation of, everything that is beautiful, great, and good. And I hope that they discover...within themselves...a charity so broad, and a temper so genial, that the world becomes a playground...and not a battlefield.

Today I wrote the girls' names in black Sharpie on all their new school supplies, tomorrow I will sit outside their classrooms as they take math placement tests, I will help them find new lockers, and sew an embroidered "W" (in honor of their soccer coach) on new soccer jerseys.  I'm as excited about this "first day of school" for them, as I was for each new school year (or at least once I got over my fear of fourth grade). I can't wait to see what "new views of divine goodness and love" this "successive stage of experience" (Eddy) will bring to all of us...

Welcome September...I have always loved your promise....

always,
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

[photo from Wyeth's first day of Kindergarten 2009]

"Another day..."

"...Oh, wake up Susie
Put your shoes on
Walk with me into this light..."
-     James Taylor

The minute I heard this video, of James Taylor singing "Another Day,"  which my friend Amy posted on Facebook, I thought of my love for the hours between dusk and dawn.  In the Bible's first chapter of Genesis, it says, "And the evening and the morning were the first day"...and the second day, and the third day, and on and on until creation was complete and given the benediction that, "God saw all that He had made, and behold it was very good, thus the heavens and the earth were finished..."   I love this.  I love thinking that my day begins with a proper sense of "evening" and naturally evolves into the "morning," and not the other way around.   In part, Mary Baker Eddy, spiritually defines these terms as:

"Evening: ...peace and rest"

"Morning:  Light, symbol of Truth; revelation and progress."

Of course, there is always the demand, in beginning one's day with the evening, to arrest any mistiness of thought...and weariness of mind...that would obscure our views of Divinity, present as humanity.  But once that is done, I love establishing the foundation of my day by beginning with a clear sense of peace and rest in the evening.  Then I can watch, in the hours between the evening and the morning, for those "first faint morning beams" of inspiration and promise wakening me to new view of divine goodness and love...in my life and in the lives of others.  When the morning dawns, I am filled with a confident expectation of revelation and progress throughout the day. In this "space" the night (or evening) is not the opposite of day, but is folded into the delight, wonder, and promise of its beauty.

But back to my love for the night...and one instance of why.

The other night someone dear to me called at about two in the morning...heart aching, peace shattered, confidence quaking.  She thought she was calling too late.  I assured her that I was very much awake, had been, and was certain, that I was awake for no other reason than to be completely ready for her call.  This was the absolute truth. 

I'd had a full day, a fuller evening, and a very, very full night of calls and emails...but as I finished up the last reply, folded the final load of laundry, started the dishwasher, and walked the dog...it was so clear to me that the physical and mental weariness that had been screaming at me all night as reasonable, was suddenly like an annoying, little gnat buzzing around my head.  I could easily swat it away in light of the joy I knew I'd feel in speaking with my friend.

As I've explained above, night is my favorite time of day.  It is so rich with silence, fathomless space, and inspiration.   I wish I could stay awake all night and only take cat naps occasionally through the day.  I've never been a big sleeper.  It seems like such a waste of all that silence.  The need for sleep is not something I have prayed about, overcome, or "demonstrated over".  It's just the way I arrived. I believe that this must be what God intended for me to "be" from the beginning...and I have been faithful. 

As a child I was, in fact...and much to my parents exasperation...very, very faithful to my appointment as someone who "refused to go to sleep."  I was often caught reading hours and hours after "lights out."  After I'd almost burned down the bunkbeds my sister and I shared by taking the wall-mounted lamp off the wall and putting it under my covers, my parents let me leave the lamp on, for as long as I wanted to read, on the condition that I was up, dressed, and off to school on time each morning.  I was.

I really do trust that if God wanted me to get my rest by sleeping, he would begin by putting the desire for sleep in my heart.  It hasn't happened yet! But this is also why I believe that this is not the way it is, or should be, for everyone...or anyone else. This is why there is such beautiful "diversity of spirits" in the universe of fellowship. God puts our desires in our hearts in individual ways so that there are both night owls and early birds...that way all the moments of the day are loved!!! Anyway, back to my story...

So when my friend called I was happier than a child sitting on the front steps holding a new ball, hoping someone would come by to play catch.  I'd been reading, thinking, praying, listening for exciting new ways to look at thing spiritually, and so the joy of having someone to listen together with...for ideas, inspiration, unfolding direction...was a slice of pure happiness for me.  

It wasn't a case of me walking her into the light, but the two of us walking together in the radiating light of love that our united hearts created when we came together in the dance of "Our Father...give us this day...".  It was like having two batteries, instead of just one, in a flashlight.  The connection of our two hearts coming together in a united hunger for a divine sense of  purpose, brought a light which illumined a rich field of inspiration and direction, white for our harvesting harvest.  The resulting bounty fed us both to overflowing.

The hours sped by quickly as we talked and listened and laughed and talked.  But by dawn we were both so deeply rested that our voices were light with joy as we said our "love you, talk to you later"s.

The only place the word "exhaustion" has in my vocabulary is as a waste product the come from a combustible engine.  I am not combustible.  I do not depend upon a stimulus/reaction model to nerve my endeavors, to drive my actions, to kindle my desires, to encourage me to work, or to motivate my behavior.  I have no space in my life for any waste...and exhaustion is a waste of my time...day or night.

The Biblical precedent for my confidence came from a Sunday School student, who, when we looked together at the story of Moses and the burning bush that was not consumed, found promise for the environmental challenges we face in an expanding carbon dependent global community.  As he said, "The bush burned, so it put off energy...heat, light...but it was not consumed, so there was no waste."  Brilliant, and out of the mouth of a babe.  It figures!!

No exhaustion with the expending of useful energy. 

Mary Baker Eddy says two things that I love about active, purpose-filled sleepless, but restful, hours:

"The highest and sweetest rest,
even from a human standpoint, is in holy work."
and
"The consciousness of Truth rests us more
than hours of repose in unconsciousness."

I am resting the case of my wakeful heart on these Law-based promises, and on Biblical precedence.  And so far, these divine promises from my Father-Mother God,  have been kept throughout my life. Thanks Amy for posting "Another Day". I loved it.

with Love,
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

"Goodnight you moonlight ladies..."

"Goodnight you moonlight ladies
Rock-a-bye, sweet baby James
Deep greens and blues are the colors I choose
Won't you let me go down in my dreams
And rock-a-bye my sweet baby James..."
-James Taylor
"Sweet Baby James"

It occurred to me as I was driving home from Tulsa, well before dawn on Tuesday, that although lullabies are most generally associated with mommies, it is the voice of a father...a man, that I hear when I listen to the inner songsmith singing me to sleep in the dark. 

This surprised me greatly.  Every single night of my childhood, my own mommy sang us to sleep with a series of lullabies and hymns.  The same songs in the same order...night after night.  I repeat this tradition every night with my own daughters. And yet, when I thought about listening to the comforter within, his voice was, to me, clearly...well..."his."

Because of an earlier commitment I had made to myself, I was listening to no radio/CDs while alone in the car so that I could enjoy more silence each day.  I knew this would give me over 7 hours of quiet listening to examine the character and nature of the voice that speaks to me as consciousness...its tone and timbre, its strength and intonation.  And as I listened, I discovered that it was actually quite genderless.  It was strong, yet gentle.  It was musical, but not sing-songy.  It was soothing, but not hypnotic...in fact, it was rather invigorating while still bringing great comfort.  It was a glorious 7 hours that stretched into 13, as I stopped in rest areas over and over again to climb into the back seat and just close my eyes and listen with more focused attention.

I love the "voice" of God.  It is why, from the time I was a small child even till today, I have often thought that I could be perfectly happy living in a small darkened, silent space (like the cell lived in by Audrey Hepburn in "A Nun's Story") alone with my thoughts.  My family well knows that the opportunity to lie perfectly still for a moment (or hour) of non-sentience is a mini-retreat for me.  The perfect kind of spa. 

It is in these moments of total self-surrender to "the Voice" that the most remarkable insights and ideas occur.  And they don't just come and go,  leaving me with a return to silence.   They come and unite in community,  building on one another...angel upon angel...bringing new gifts to build on the one that has already been shared...morphing into even fresher, every evolving viewpoints, perspective, answers...and even more wonderfully...they result in more questions.   It is almost as if I am watching a team of angel gardeners planting, tending and harvesting a mental time-lapse garden in the space of a divine moment...or two.

My drive home was filled with "the Voice" waking me to "new and glorified views" of Her place in my heart, His presence in the desires of those I love, Their Father-Mother parenting in the lives of children of all ages...everywhere.  

Enjoy JT's video of "Sweet Baby James" a lullaby he sings and tells the story of writing one night as he drove from New England to North Carolina to meet his namesake nephew.  I think he must have been surrounded by a host of angels that night, don't you?  And thankfully, we've all enjoyed the blessing of the garden-song he harvested for over 40 years now.  I'm not thinking he was just driving along, chilling, and listening to the radio that night...he gave space to "the Voice" and what he heard was divine.

with Love,
Kate

"Shower the people you love with love..."

"Just shower the people you love with love
Show them the way that you feel
Things are gonna work out fine if you only will
Shower the people you love with love
Show them the way you feel
Things are gonna be much better if you only will..."
- James Taylor

I heard this song LIVE last night...really!!!  But I am getting ahead of myself. 

Earlier this winter I received an email from a fellow blogger/reader.  Emily wrote, "If you will drive to Tulsa, I have a ticket to the James Taylor concert for you."  Now, I could imagine this from my mother, my husband, a few of my sisters, or even my best friend, but although Emily and I had been regular readers of eachother's blogs (hence her awareness that I am THE biggest JT fan), had emailed one another about bees, folk music, spirituality, had talked on the phone a few times, and had met once at Ted Drewes in St. Louis for awesome frozen custard (because having Ted Drewes with me was one of the things on Emily's bucket list of 100 things to do), I never would have imagined she would have offered such an amazing gift to me.

I was shocked...very pleasantly...but shocked nonetheless.  I had only that afternoon gone online to price tickets to James Taylor's upcoming performance in St. Louis this spring and they were WAY beyond my budget...even if I stopped eating for a month or two.

But Emily assured me that this was what she really wanted to do.  She said that she knew how much I loved JT and thought it would be fun to see him with someone who loved his music so much.

Now, you may be thinking, Oklahoma, Tulsa...oil, cattle barons...ahhh, Emily is an oil baron's wife and lives on a massive cattle ranch.  Nope.  Emily is one of the most modest young women I have ever met.  Modest, socially responsible, and funny.  She and her husband Ron live in a little (Ron assured me it was less than 1,000 squre feet of living space) house in the "working class neighborhood" (Emily's words and she says she wouldn't think of living anywhere else...a gated neighborhood wouldn't let you have chickens and bees) in west Tulsa. 

They have a small, lush backyard that hosts two coops of beautiful chickens, an impressive vegetable garden, and three beehives.  They share their home with three lovely rescue pups, a finch, and a hamster that was displaced when Emily (and her department) were laid off last year.  They drive small fuel efficient cars and care about the environment, their neighbors, social responsibility, music, and Route 66. 

On the surface, Ron and Emily live simply and modestly. But deep beneath the well-worn carpet, gently-used clothing, and humble furnishings dwell hearts that are flagrantly generous. 

I felt like a queen in their presence.  I was showered with kindness and puppy kisses.  I was treated to a princess' tour of the city.  I was escorted through puddles (wish I hadn't changed into my "concert dress" jeans and boots so early...so I could have enjoyed it more thoroughy) and freshly mown grass to the garden full of new plantings...tomatoes, squash, peppers, herbs.

In my life, I have been blessed by the generosity of family, friends, and strangers...last night as I sat just yards from my most favorite singer-songwriter as he crooned, "Shower the people you love, with love..." I was deeply touched and humbled by the over-arching quality of modesty that characterizes this kind of generosity.  From my own mom who has never based her giving on what she had in her bank account, but by the fullness of the love in her heart, to the dear friend who has always shared her "widow's mite" and never seems to reach the limits of her giving, Emily's gift was a graphic reminder of how blessed I have been by the kindness of those who share what they have without fear.  And please don't get me wrong, modesty has nothing to do with the size of your bank account, your house, or the kind of car you drive. Modesty is a quality of thinking and acting characterized by humility, grace, and restraint. It is practiced by those from every walk of life, every neighborhood, every economic bracket. Modesty is not defined by lower numbers, but by higher aims and expectations for one's self in the "how" of living.

As I drove 7 hours back across eastern Oklahoma and the breadth of Missouri, I couldn't help but consider the spiritual connection between modesty and generosity.  There are countless incidences of Biblical precedence for this kind of giving.  From the remarkable loaning of a precious, much-valued axehead to one of the sons of the prophets, to the sharing of their modest victuals by the disciples with five thousand strangers...time after time the miracles that followed blessed a waiting world.  I can't help but wonder, however, whether the real miracles were the floating of an axehead and the multiplication of loaves/fishes, or the generosity of those whose own resources were modest...bold, courageous giving in the face of lack and hunger.

So, tonight as I harvest the spiritual lessons from my 800 mile in 24 hours trip to Tulsa, I am thinking about how I can more generously "shower the people I love (and as a global citizen, this is a BIG group) with love and show them the way that I care" while still honoring our family's commitment to modesty, simplicity, and moderation. 

My adventure to Tulsa, yesterday, felt like a Soul-carved out space (out of my very full family/professional/community life schedule) of fourteen hours for silence, reflection, prayer, and fasting along old Route 66.  It was only fitting that my journey would take me past once-vibrant neon signs and sparkling diners, in honor of Ron and Emily's devotion to a simple man's road where family road trips, honest work-ethics, and a sense of community united small towns and cities along a thread of modest lives and generous hearts.

Enjoy this video performance of JT's "Shower the People" and although it is much like his performance last night, it will never, ever even come close to the experience of sitting next to my friend Emily in a small theatre in the dark hearing him singing it just to us...and about 500 of Ron and Emily's Tulsa neighbors and friends.

I pray you are blessed with showers of love today...you certainly have mine... 
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

*Don't miss Emily's post about this same experience  for May 4, 2009 on her blog "Red Fork State of Mind"...priceless!!

"And I still love you..."

"Well the sun is surely sinking down
But the moon is slowly rising
So this old world must still be spinning round
And I still love you

So close your eyes
You can close your eyes, its all right
I dont know no love songs
And I cant sing the blues anymore
But I can sing this song
And you can sing this song
When Im gone

It wont be long before another day
We gonna have a good time
And no one's gonna take this time away
You can stay as long as you like..."

If you are thinking that these lyrics seem familiar, you are right. I wrote Tuesday's post with this song as the keynote, but felt compelled to revisit it today. Deep beneath the surface of my experience with this song as a James Taylor/Carly Simon fan and folk song/lullaby-singing mother, lies a time when this song became my own anthem of comfort and surrender.

It wasn't an easy time, but it was probably one of the most profoundly spiritual periods of my life...and one I rarely talk, or write, about.

It was a long season of confusion, hope, fear, prayer, and anguish. I lived each day in a space of ceaseless prayer, seeking wisdom and guidance for just one more step forward...without falling.  The angel messages from God were clear, but terrifying.  I was being asked to take steps I couldn't even imagine without breaking into a cold sweat.  Hope kept me on my knees praying for "another answer" until my knees were sore and bruised.  My only relief from the relentless "oh, please not this" moments came in the middle of the night when my family was asleep. In the dark hours between midnight and dawn, I could steal away for long self-numbing, exhausting runs, and work with a hospice organization in our city.  This agency coordinated volunteer relief for families with children and teens who were facing terminal illnesses and under palliative...or "end-of-life"...care and services.  Volunteers were assigned to patients who were in hospitals, hospice centers, or were receiving palliative care in their own homes.

Attending to the basic needs -- hand holding, placing a cool cloth on a fevered brow, reading, singing, talking, listening, cherishing -- of patients so that parents and family members could rest...or even just feel like they could leave the room for a moment...was a release for me.  For a few brief hours between midnight and dawn, I was free from the terror of my own journey through the valley, the wilderness, the desert of human hopes.  It was not that the work was physically demanding, but that it required complete and utter focus, and I welcomed it.  Focusing on the needs of others, was like a deeply needed rest from myself.  It was a divine gift allowing me to be free of retracing my past and agonizing over my future.

There was something so liberating about being able to be present in the moment and just...well, be.  I was not there as a healthcare professional, I was not there as a Christian Science practitioner, pastoral counselor, or hospital chaplain .  I was serving as a non-denominational lay volunteer.  My only role was to support patients and their families.  It was as much about...as I would eventually learn... beginning the healing of my own grief.

This didn't mean that I wasn't praying, I was. I was always listening for God's life-affirming message concerning what was true about His child, listening for direction about how I could be of help, and listening for His constant reminders that He was present...right there in rooms where things often seemed terribly bleak and void of hope.   There were times when all I could do was silently bear witness to the evidence of His presence.  The face of God in the kindness of a nurse, the tenderness of a mother, the strength and courage of a child facing a journey that no one could provide a map for. But I was not there to give Christian Science treatment. I was not there to give advice or my opinion. I was there to simply give of my heart, my time, my silent certainty of God's presence. And I could give the gift of songs, songs I'd sing just because I loved them and I knew they brought comfort, joy, inspiration, and peace...to me, if nothing else.

"You Can Close Your Eyes" was just one of the songs that I sang to myself, and for those patients and their loved ones...devoted family members sleeping in hard plastic chairs, on floors, or in the bed next to a comatose child...night after night. 

I would start with the lullabies I had sung to my daughters earlier in the evening and then move on to hymns, folksongs, songs I had taught children in school,  love songs, gospels...and always to this song of comfort and love.

One night, it was a young man and his sleeping mother (click on this link to read a poem, "Hospice - You are Not Alone" I wrote at the time, and posted a few years ago on this blog) that I poured my songs out for. And this song was a gift...a promise of rest and peace.  I thought I was singing it for that mother and her son...as well as those who were asleep in hospital beds throughout the city...but after about the tenth time through I realized that I was singing it to myself as well. 

We could all close our eyes.  We could rest, not from the dripping of medication, the pain of loss, the sorrow of grief...but on the arm of our Father-Mother God.  We could rest in His presence, we could rest upon Her wise and generous preparation of our hearts and lives for the journey each one of us was facing.  And we could rest under Her wings of comfort and protection from the gathering storm of emotions that seemed to toss us to and fro, the glaring heat of self-doubt and regret that came in waves of "could I have done more?" and "what if I'd only..."

I have long loved this song as a child's lullaby, a prelude to sweet slumber.  But as I re-read Tuesday's post, I realized that I couldn't let Tuesday's message stand as the only testament to this song's spiritual impact on my life.  During those nights, this beautiful song was also a sweet, strong, tender companion to me, and a blessing offered to those I sang it for. I was singing for those who slept in darkened rooms where monitors beeped, nurses tiptoed in, mother's wept silent tears of heartache and surrender...and yes, I sang to myself, where in this sacred space and time I was learning the value of just being present, aware, gentle, and humane. I was learning that sometimes it is enough to simply sing a song and rest with another in, on, upon, and under a divine Parent's loving care. An ever-wakeful Parent who is always whispering, "and I still love you..."

"...So close your eyes
You can close your eyes, its all right
I dont know no love songs
And I cant sing the blues anymore
But I can sing this song
And you can sing this song
When I'm gone..."

I will never forget those families who taught me so much...i still love you...
Kate

"...Oh, hold them up, hold them..."

"…Oh, hold them up, hold them up
Never to let them fall
Prey to the dust and the rust and the ruin
That names us and claims us and shames us all…"
- James Taylor "Never Die Young"

I've asked people for many years what it is they love about their faith communities...faith communites from many different religious traditions.  I hear stories of hymns that have brought comfort, Sunday School classes where questions are listened to....and answered, families that pray together, church members who have shown kindness, healings experienced, and congregations that serve the poor. But I have also learned that when you ask someone about the things they love, they will often place it in the context of the things that they don't love. And the thing I hear most often that people, especially teens, don't "love" about their faith communities is "the way people treat one another".  Gossiping in the back of the fellowship hall,  people talking behind one another's back,  arguing about the color of the carpet in the entryway, discussing a fellow member's failures or indiscretions at the dinner table, a son-in-law's lack of ambition...these are the things that sadden and disillusion them.

So often we feel justified in looking at another's behavior, or choices, and responding in a way that "sends a message"....but once again I am getting ahead of myself...

In her primary work, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy wrote, "It is not the purpose of Christian Science to "educate the idea of God, or treat it for disease, "…and elsewhere avers, "Healing physical sickness is the smallest part of Christian Science. It is only the bugle-call to thought and action, in the higher range of infinite goodness. The emphatic purpose of Christian Science is the healing of sin…"   She doesn't say the correction or punishment of a sinner, but the healing of sin. 

Early in my study and practice of the science of Christianity, I searched for an  understanding of the word "sin" I could really get my arms around…if, in fact,  this was to be the most emphatic part of my work.  The big fat dictionary at the University library gave me a wonderful array of ways to look at this word.  But it was the etymological root of this word that I liked the most.  The word "sin" has at it's root the same base as the word "sunder" or "to separate".   In fact even my old worn Webster's includes this definition:  "a vitiated state of human nature in which the self is estranged from God".  

Ah, this resonated with me.  Sin wasn't a list of aberrant behaviors based on a variety of cultural norms and values.  Sin wasn't just about a human "missing of the mark" as if God were asleep and we had the free will to take aim in the wrong direction.  Sin was merely the belief that there could be any separation from an omnipotent and omnipresent Creator who never leaves His post in maintaining the integrity of His creation.   And because this could never be true and could only exist in the realm of belief, it didn't matter who was believing it to be true…the one reacting to the belief by "sinning" or the one who felt he/she was witnessing the sinning.  

I began to see that it was only a sense, a perception, an awareness of sin which needed to be given up or rebuked.    But this wasn't what I was observing, or even  experiencing, in faith communities.   In fact I was seeing quite the opposite approach to "sin".    Instead of dis-embodying sinful behavior from a person, the response seemed to be to hammer it home to the "sinners" that those behaviors or choices were clearly "theirs"…attached to them, springing from them, forever linked to their human history.  As faith communities we did everything we could to separate ourselves from this deformed perpetrator under the mantle of giving them space to "work it out" or come to their senses.  But what it felt like to the person being shunned or rejected was a further confirmation of the absence of good in their experience, in themselves…that they were indeed a sinner.

When someone does something we deem sinful we tend to want to send a message of disapproval.  We want them to remember that there is a God…and that He is not happy with them.   We think we are rebuking sin by withdrawing affection, kindness, compassion…by rejecting, or dismissing the person.  But if sin is only the belief that there is, or can be any separation from God, or good.  When we withdraw affection, love, goodness, we are only enflaming the belief in God's absence.  What rebukes sin is not the absence of love, but the presence of it in our lives.  As Christians, we are not in the business of rebuking sinners, but destroying the belief, ours or anyone else's,  in sin.  To see sin…to see someone as separated from God, is just as much a headlong capitulation into the belief in sin, as is behaving in a way that is deemed sinful.  To react to that belief  in the absense of God…by being dismissive, withdrawing, reproaching another… is to perpetuate that very belief and act contrary to the very thing we hope to identify ourselves with…our Christianity…our kindness, compassion, grace.

These "sinful" behaviors we tend to focus on and be impressed by, are nothing more than a reaction.  A reaction to the feeling that God is absent from our experience.  Stealing is just a reaction to the belief that God is absent as a caring Father who provides for our every need.  Lying is no more than a reaction to the belief that God is not present in our lives bestowing an experience that we are content with, proud of, or at peace about.  Cheating is merely a reaction to the false belief that God is not present as Mind, an infinite flow of intelligence and wisdom.  Judging others is just a reaction to the belief that God is not present as Principle upholding the integrity of His creation.

Promoting this false belief about God's absence in someone's life by withdrawing any good…kindness, forgiveness, charity, understanding…love, only further confirms in our own lives the belief in sin - God's absence. Punishing the "sinner" by retracting our humanity and benevolence does nothing to rebuke the basic false premise that our omnipresent God could ever possibly be absent, and therefore in this abyss of God's being there could crop up an aberration called a sinner.  The real rebuke to sin comes in pouring in more of our certainty in God's all-present love.

When Mrs. Eddy heard that President's Garfield's assassin was being held in prison she didn't reject or dismiss him.  She didn't withdraw her company, or kindness, from him.  She took her dear love into his prison cell.  She says that her "few words touched him…"  It was this dear affection that rebuked sin…not the sinner…and moral idiocy.   It is this Love that destroys hate, it is this Life that consumes death, and it is this kindness that refuses to see a sinner and therein deprives sin of an identity or life…in ourselves…or others.

But, we may ask, doesn't loving them send the message that what they have done or chosen is "okay"?  Jesus didn't send the message to the woman who washed his feet that her behavior was "okay" by loving, forgiving and exalting her actions…at that moment…above those of his esteemed host.  He didn't send the message to Zaccheus that his behavior had been "okay" even though he went and had dinner with him…as those around him worried it would.  What he did in each case was give them a reason to want to make better choices, to live more noble lives.  To continue to see themselves as he saw them…one with God, His child, their dignity, identity, and integrity forever held intact by an ever-conscious, ever-present Father who is Love and never leaves us on our own, alone and struggling, subject to errors or mistakes.   It is this false concept of our God as negligent that is the real offense.   But to see one another as a brother or sister in Christ with one omnipotent loving Father-Mother honors the entire family of God…held in the gospel of Love.

At a time when I had made choices that were being questioned by others, I experienced this kind of withdrawing of affection and "society".  I often found myself standing in a crowd within a bubble of distance and reproach.  If I tried to make contact eyes were averted and when they weren't, looks of disapproval and disdain were shot glaringly in my direction.  I had never felt more lonely or misunderstood in my life. 

One afternoon I was standing on the playground of our young daughters' school again wrapped in this bubble of reproach, when one parent, someone who I had once thought of as almost too attentive…in those years prior to my fall from grace when I enjoyed general kindness and approval…approached me. Her greeting was extended with the same generous love as always, but in the absence of any other friendship or affection I suddenly saw the rarity of her gift.  Her simple greeting and interest in my welfare made my knees buckle with gratitude.  She had penetrated that bubble of disdain and suddenly I was, even in my own eyes (because even though I knew my heart, I had begun to accept that if so many people could believe this about me, maybe it must be true) "No longer regarded as a miserable sinner, but as the blest child of God." (Eddy). 

This friend's consistent, genuine kindness thrown around me like a blanket of light, separated me (and her) from the darkness of sin - believing that anyone could be separated from God - and began the healing in my heart…and my life.  She didn't separate me from good by seeing me as a sinner, but separated both of us from sin by including me in the light of her love…her genuine Christianity.

Mary Baker Eddy goes on to describe this Christ-like viewpoint when she writes, "Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick. Thus Jesus taught that the kingdom of God is intact, universal, and that man is pure and holy."  She doesn't say that the kingdom of God will be restored, or that man will be holy, but that it is and he is…right now.  No process of healing, or restoration,  or recovery.    No sin.  No need for rejection, disdain, dismissal, or shunning.   No need to send a message of disapproval or disappointment.  It is the belief in sin that is banished…not a sinner.

There are no sinners...but each, and all, the blest children of God..let us then "hold them up, hold them up...never to let them fall..".
with Love,
Kate