Who Tossed the Rock Through the Window? Time to Fess Up.

“Morality, like art, means drawing a line someplace.”         --G.K. Chesterton, British author

“Who broke this window?!”

 A group of us neighborhood boys stood in a sidewalk line-up, something like 55 years ago, on a warm summer afternoon. One of us had thrown a rock through the glass front door of a home on our street, resulting in a pile of glass and some very scared and angry homeowners within. That rock was meant to get the attention of a boy who had taunted us, and then run home to hide. My mom or dad, or maybe another parent, played interrogator to our collection of miscreant minors. I remember vividly how I answered the question about who was guilty. Or not.

“Who did it?!”

“Not me!” I said, too immediately, with false confidence, my head held down, not even looking my accuser in the eyes. Of course, it was me who’d tossed that stone in anger. The first time in my young moral life that I remember crossing a line, so to speak.

First there was the rock. Then I had the chance to tell the truth and take responsibility for my actions, but nope. I didn’t stay on the correct side of a moral line that I’d been taught since birth. Failed to respect an ethical boundary between right and wrong, lessons taught to me by my family and by my faith.  

Don’t throw rocks through windows. You could hurt someone.

Always be honest too. Don’t lie. Especially to an adult, or worse, your parents. If you do the wrong thing fess up. Face the consequences. On that day long ago, I failed to do the right thing. I crossed a line, as I have many more times in this life. Not usually with rocks but with thoughts and with words and with things undone. All humans do this. Cross lines of healthy and loving behavior into not so healthy, less than loving behavior. 

We sin, stumble, screw up, become our worst selves. We pick up that rock.

A gift of trying to live an intentional spiritual life is that we can try, with God’s grace and forgiveness, to see the line, and then hold the line. One of the most important tasks of religion has always been to give its followers codes of conduct. Ways of life. Think of the Ten Commandments. Or Jesus’ teaching to love God, love neighbor, love self. Lines and laws that keep us in check when temptation gets too great.  

Yes, faith traditions have also fallen short in this work. We’ve vilified the wrong people or behaviors or worst, been hypocritical. Do as I say, not as I do. Yet when faith gets it right, it shows us how to live good lives. How to do the right thing. How to live so well, that the world is a better place for us having been here.

Because we also know what happens when line crossing becomes the norm in our world. When codes of conduct, when norms for behavior, are ignored or mocked as old fashioned or plain just run right over for expediency or moral relativity.

Then chaos results, hurt and fear in the wake of so much line crossing. Can we trust our neighbor or the stranger? Then there are the political and cultural influencers who are supposed to lead us with decency and honor but who instead lead as bullies and braggarts and blowhards. We pay a huge price for such communal line crossing. Individuals, families, communities, and nations, even democracy itself, threatens to fall apart.

Or we can try and try again to do that right thing. Not in braggy or self-righteous ways but in humility and hope. We can reject those who revel in their own wrongdoing and wears their indictments and transgressions like badges of honor.  We can remember that we are moral role models for our children, and kids on the teams we coach and in the classes we teach, in the friends we keep.

Yes, someone is always, has always, crossed the line. But for me, especially right now in our world and culture, it feels like there is so much more at stake when it comes to doing the right things or doing the wrong things.  I don’t think I’m being overly dramatic or going all chicken little-ish.  With an election looming and a planet reeling from wars and so much conflict, we need line respecters, now more than ever.    

What do you think?  

We all throw rocks and cross lines sometimes. But to live spiritually gives us the chance to confess, to make amends, to clean up our mess, and then to start all over again. 

Thanks for that second chance God.  And sorry about the rock.

The Reverend John F. Hudson is Senior Pastor of the Pilgrim Church, United Church of Christ, in Sherborn, Massachusetts (pilgrimsherborn.org). He blogs at sherbornpastor.blogspot.com and is a resident scholar at the Collegeville Institute at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota. For twenty-five years he was a columnist whose essays appeared in newspapers throughout Massachusetts and Rhode Island. He has served churches in New England since 1989. For comments, please be in touch: pastorjohn@pilgrimsherborn.org.

 

 

 

 

 

When I Am Old: Acceptance and Panic As Time Goes By.

“The glory of the young is their strength; the gray hair of experience is the splendor of the old.”--Proverbs 20:29

When I am old….

I’m not quite sure who wrote the supposedly inspiring line, “When I am old, I will wear purple!” but if I were them, I’d definitely add a few caveats.  Like, when I am old, I will wake up and feel pain in places previously pain free and then think, “What the hell is that?”

Or when I am old, I will read stuff about how folks much younger than me are thinking or living or doing in the world, and I will admit, “The world is not really mine anymore—and that’s ok.” Or, when I am old, I will finally and begrudgingly sign up for membership in the American Association of Retired People but then delete all their annoyingly daily emails without reading, because, hey, I’m not that old! Or, when I am old, I will meet for a yearly New Year’s reunion breakfast with the guys I hung out with in high school and then I will thank my God for blessing me with such good friends at that tender time in my young life. 

When I am old….when you are old.

It escapes no one, this aging thing, the clock of existence and time just ticking away, no way to turn back the hands. The truth is that the amazing and miraculous body and mind given to us by our Creator has an expiration date, a “use by” date. At some point, in the days ahead we will just not wake up one morning or we will take one final breath in our favorite chair while reading or at the end there might be hospice and cancer or maybe an accident and then that will be it. You get the picture. Accepting this fact of our mortality is, perhaps, the biggest part of getting old, the most challenging spiritual and emotional hurdle we leap over—or maybe just go around.  

Because aging either makes us panic or accept. Or more likely both.

Panic and do kind of stupid things like Botox injections or dating well below your age (that’s just creepy) or dressing ‘young’ and still looking old, or resenting the young because they don’t believe what we believe so let’s just make sure they won’t get their chance to run the world. Won’t get power until they pry it out of our wrinkled, knobby, blue-veined hands. Talking about you Election 2024! And you too, Rolling Stones….are you still rolling!?!?

Aging gives us the grace to accept just where we are at, to make peace with age, actually thank God for the gift of our maturation, our ripeness! “My name’s John and I’m 63 years old!”  “HI JOHN! Welcome to AA, Aging Anonymous.”

Recently I was with a group of old friends and colleagues, all of us thinking about and trying to figure out this whole aging thing, what it means for us spiritually, our relationship with each other and God. This gang of clergy—who have served churches, and colleges and hospitals and at home; we have met two to three times a year for almost 30 years now. There’s a gift of aging with old and dear friends. They love us in spite of ourselves and because of ourselves.  They’ve stuck around to be witnesses to our lives.

My friend Sarah said that aging is about both knowing more and knowing less. Knowing more because of life and professional experience but also knowing less and facing into the complexity of life not with hubris but instead humility.  Aging can teach us that there is often more wisdom in saying “I just don’t know” rather than insisting “I absolutely do know!”  

When I am old…when you are old.

Beyond wearing purple, what might God be telling you to do, with the precious God-given time that you have left on this beautiful and broken blue marble spinning in space? For no matter what our age, God is always inviting us to ask ourselves, who will I be in my time, and for this time, with God’s gift of finite time?   

The adventure of aging is finding the answers to those question.         

The Reverend John F. Hudson is Senior Pastor of the Pilgrim Church, United Church of Christ, in Sherborn, Massachusetts (pilgrimsherborn.org). He blogs at sherbornpastor.blogspot.com and is a resident scholar at the Collegeville Institute at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota. For twenty-five years he was a columnist whose essays appeared in newspapers throughout Massachusetts and Rhode Island. He has served churches in New England since 1989. For comments, please be in touch: pastorjohn@pilgrimsherborn.org.

 

My Opinion? We Need Less Opinion in 2024.

"Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions.” --Proverbs 18:2

Here’s my idea of hell on earth.

Being surrounded by people who insist on telling me exactly what their opinion is about this political issue or that current event. Folks sure that what I believe about politics or culture, or religion is completely wrong. And that what they believe is absolutely, positively right. If I do not agree with them, well, I must be unenlightened or not progressive enough or not conservative enough or I am the enemy or just clueless or even evil.   

Oh wait. That’s the world we live in now!

“No comment.” Does anyone in our culture, in particular politicians, influencers, sports stars, celebrities, pundits, journalists, “religious” types know of this wise phrase, one so rarely spoken in 2024? “No comment.”

Or how about, “I’m not sure what I believe.” Or “I don’t know.” Or “I really don’t have an opinion on that.” Or “I don’t think what I have to say is all that important.” Or “I’m still thinking about it, praying about it.” Or “I’ve actually changed my mind. I was wrong.”

The irony is not lost on me that I have been an opinion writer for almost thirty years, and I’ve been a preacher of opinions, and paid to have an opinion, for more than thirty-five years. But I am not so sure anymore just how helpful that is. To have an opinion and to feel compelled to share it with anyone, with everyone.

LISTEN TO ME!

Does the world really need one more opinionated person and opinion?  Does this world really need another blowhard candidate, with an overinflated ego, basking in the creepy adulation of his or her minions, at some stage-crafted telegenic rally, preening like some latter-day Mussolini? Is that what we need in a leader right now? How does that help anything or anyone in this mess of a planet on fire with so much conflict, violence, and self-righteousness? Do we really need to care about what a university or a toilet paper company or a sports team or a celebrity or a self-important billionaire thinks about the current hot issue of the moment?  

I’m not so sure. 

Opinions, millions of opinions are ours’ for the consuming every single day, heck every single second on all of our screens. Whatever opinion we seek to affirm, our opinion is just a click or a tap away. But is the creation of so much broadcast opinion improving what ails us? Stopping wars. Making peace between faiths.  Running a country well and with competence. Seeking the common good. Saving the planet.

When it comes to sharing just what I believe I need to be a little wiser and a little humbler and a little quieter. My faith tells me I need to go to a silent place on a regular basis. To listen to God and not just presume to speak about God. My faith teaches me that if the strength of my religious belief depends upon on my need to tear down another’s belief, that’s no faith at all. My faith reminds me that I have one mouth but two ears, I need to listen much more, and talk much less. My faith convicts me that just because I have an opinion does not mean I actually have to say it out loud. Foist it upon others. A wise spiritual mentor of mine once taught me a strategy for figuring out when to speak and when to go mute.

“Ask yourself three questions. Does it need to be said? Does it need to be said now? Does it need to be said by me?”

Of course, this is all just my opinion about opinion. I could be wrong.  But what heaven on earth it might be, if for just one day in our world, no one, not a soul, expressed any opinion about anything or anyone.   

Shhhhh. Quiet please. Listen. Learn. Hush. Pray. Amen.     

The Reverend John F. Hudson is Senior Pastor of the Pilgrim Church, United Church of Christ, in Sherborn, Massachusetts (pilgrimsherborn.org). He blogs at sherbornpastor.blogspot.com and is a resident scholar at the Collegeville Institute at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota. For twenty-five years he was a columnist whose essays appeared in newspapers throughout Massachusetts and Rhode Island. He has served churches in New England since 1989. For comments, please be in touch: pastorjohn@pilgrimsherborn.org.

 

      

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

Need Help With January Resolutions? Don't Go It Alone.

“In the beginning….” --Genesis 1:1 and John 1:1

I finally went back to the gym last week.  It’s about time. I’ve been paying $19 a month to the Planet Fitness Gym in the next town over for so long that I’ve singlehandedly paid for the college tuition of the gym owner’s three children. Their braces too.

Ok. I exaggerate.

But for something like 15 years I’ve been sending that nationwide chain of training facilities almost twenty bucks every thirty days. That’s $3500 to pay and then not use any of the treadmills or stationary bikes or weight machines there. I know why I keep up that membership. It’s on the rare chance I will go beyond a hope-filled but most often doomed effort to get back in shape post January 1^st . 

For so many years, it goes like this.

In a fit of new year’s optimism and earnestness I resolve to go to Plant Fitness at least four times a week. Then about mid-February, on a chilly windblown afternoon, as I prepare to drive over to the gym in my ice-cold car, in the dark, in sweats that barely keep me toasty, my resolution stumbles and then it’s back to the couch for me, and my gym bag sits in a corner of my bedroom collecting dust.

Perhaps you dear readers have faced such defeats. We humans make a beginning at something, a start, a resolve to take up this new hobby or that new pastime, this new lifestyle change or that professional pursuit and then we stumble. We aren’t able to keep at it. To follow through. To make the change. To give up a vice. To start a new routine. To get back into the dating scene or to save more money for a rainy day or eat less or exercise more. To quit drinking or smoking or using pot. To go back to church. To pray each morning.

Making changes in life is hard. Sometimes very hard.  Our well-loved habits, especially the ones that bring us the most pleasure and stimulate the pleasure centers of our brains—these impulses are often the most difficult to curb.  One study from a Yale University researcher estimates it takes a full ninety days to end an old habit and begin a new habit. In Alcoholics Anonymous, newcomers are often advised to do “90 in 90”.  That’s 90 meetings, one a day, for three full months. And don’t drink. The longer we stick to something new and eschew something old,  the greater our chance at success.  

But the most important spiritual lesson I’ve learned in the many January beginnings I’ve tried in my 63 years, is that I cannot do this work alone. I can’t quit solo. I can’t get in shape on my own. I can’t go this life alone, tough it out all by myself. For me to change I need help from others. People to keep me accountable. Call me out in love if I go back to a bad habit. Folks who love me so much that they don’t want me to return to my old unhealthy ways. I need help from folks who struggle just like I do with addictions.

If I ever decide to go back to cigarette smoking, a nasty and dangerous addiction I struggled with for almost four decades, my friends and family will kill me. Not actually take my life but they would be so angry, hurt, and worried for me and so let down. In the rare moments I want a cigarette (yes even two years after my last Marlboro Red) I remember all the people I need to stay alive for now. For my nieces and my God kids and the people I serve at church and folks in the choir I sing with my cycling team and my mom and siblings and friends and so many others. I let someone I trust that I had a craving. By being honest, the power of jonesing for a cancer stick loses some of its power.

Want to change your life? Ask another for help. Recovering addicts in 12 Step groups know the power of this truth. So do support group members, running buddies and hiking partners and anyone who enjoys living life in community. It can be as simple as you and your dog going on a walk together knowing you each need one another. Or training for a marathon with crazy folks who’ll run on a frozen January morning. Sitting in a church basement packed with people and  saying out loud for the very first time, “My name is Bill and I’m an alcoholic and an addict.”  

Because finally, to begin, to begin again, to begin for the first or thousandth time, we need others. We need our God, a Higher Power of our choosing, to come to us most powerfully through the help of fellow human beings and children of God.

In the beginning…what are you starting or ending or beginning these days? My advice is simple. Ask for help from another. Ask for help from God.  

And maybe I’ll see you at the gym.

The Reverend John F. Hudson is Senior Pastor of the Pilgrim Church, United Church of Christ, in Sherborn, Massachusetts (pilgrimsherborn.org). He blogs at sherbornpastor.blogspot.com and is a resident scholar at the Collegeville Institute at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota. For twenty-five years he was a columnist whose essays appeared in newspapers throughout Massachusetts and Rhode Island. He has served churches in New England since 1989. For comments, please be in touch: pastorjohn@pilgrimsherborn.org.