Tree of Life

Sunday morning, I read of Western science and Eastern spirituality agreeing that everything, every thing is interrelated, and dynamic, in ceaseless change, and that anything that seems unchanging is illusory.

Sitting on our deck, I look up from my book and experience this truth firsthand: leaves drop one by one from the tree in our backyard against the backdrop of a vibrant blue sky and an intensely green lawn on this crisply cool fall day that has followed the weekend rain. The azaleas are in lively red bloom as the dead brown leaves collect.

Last week I witnessed an old friend dying in a hospital bed. The next day around 3 a.m., I awoke in my own bed thinking of him, unconscious, mouth agape, yet breathing on his own, and I felt for him. And I also thought, this could be me or Wade or my sister or brother. Later I would learn he died within the hour I unknowingly sat vigil.

That had been a hard week, nation-wise. Probably world-wise too, if we Americans could look beyond our own troubles to see others’ suffering as well. It was a week that started with the federal government planning an attack on the rights of transgender and intersex people, continued with pipe bombs mailed to progressive leaders from a right wing fanatic, included another hate crime against blacks, the disenfranchisement of voters in advance of the midterm elections, troops being sent to intercept those on a pilgrimage for asylum, and a week that ended with a massacre of Jews worshiping in their Pittsburgh synagogue, Tree of Life.

As I read the news story of the Tree of Life, I could not stop crying. It may have been grief accumulated over that week, but I think also it is the grief that accumulates over generations of virulent anti-Semitism, unintelligible to me. Several of those who died there were survivors of the Holocaust.

My LGBT community and its allies have often gladly utilized the work of the late Yale medieval historian John Boswell, documenting the treatment of Queer people in Europe and the church through the Middle Ages. But many miss the overall theme of his short life’s work, which was the treatment of minorities at the hands of majority cultures. Maybe his work was inspired by horrific scenes he witnessed as a youth as an “army brat,” like the heads of a hated group stuck on spikes along a road in the Middle East. Undoubtedly it was also inspired by his own experience as a gay man.

On one of his several trips to give the Lazarus lectures in Los Angeles that I organized, we arranged a lecture at UCLA that I took him to. He began the talk by announcing he would be describing the treatment of a minority in medieval Europe. He wanted the audience to discern if he was talking about the mistreatment and prejudices of Jews or of gay people. His ironic conclusion was that his description covered both groups!

When asked about gay rights in another context, he said it would be better if the LGBT community fought for rights across the board rather than for just ourselves, because it was too easy for a dominant culture to pick off one group at a time, as is happening now in the U.S. with transgender and intersex people, as well as current immigrants.

Boswell’s most memorable story came during that same series in a lecture entitled, “Why Bicycle Riders?” Just before WW II, A British gentleman and a German Nazi were forced to share a room. The German went on and on about all the troubles the Jews were causing. As he listed each false “truth,” the British gentlemen egged him on as if he were agreeing with him. Finally, at the end of the German’s diatribe, the Britisher adamantly agreed, “Yes, all the troubles of the world are caused by Jews and bicycle riders!”

The German looked surprised and confused, and asked, “Why bicycle riders?” To which the British man simply said, “Why Jews?”

Yesterday I eulogized my friend, Thom Hayes, as “good, civil and kind.” I said that if all people were like him, the midterm elections wouldn’t be such a worry for us. I said that if our national leaders were like him, they would talk out their differences over coffee or drinks. I said that if world leaders were like him, they would go to lunch rather than to war.

Thom was unassuming, I said, but he did assume everyone just needs somebody to see them as a person with their own story and a desire for human connection. A mutual friend had told the story of him and Thom getting stuck somewhere, and decided to enter a biker bar, in which the gaily dapper Thom proceeded to meet everyone in the place before they left.

Everything is interrelated, and dynamic, in ceaseless change, and anything that seems unchanging is illusory. Those of us who are “good, civil and kind” must lean in to change history’s trajectory. God’s kingdom come!

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Copyright © 2018 by Chris R. Glaser. Permission granted for non-profit use with attribution of author and blogsite. Other rights reserved. 

Dead White Men

Some of my best friends are dead white guys!

This blog’s delivery problems had the silver lining of hearing from a lot of subscribers about your appreciation of its posts. Thank you!

But I received one negative comment, and of course, like Jesus’ parable of the shepherd leaving the ninety-nine to pay attention to the one, I felt compelled to respond. It stuck in my craw, as a grating grain of sand an oyster defensively covers with pearl. Well, this post ain’t no pearl.

This live white guy wrote, “Your blog is a real low point for ‘progressive.’ How about sourcing it with someone other than dead white men?”

He did not sign his name, but I had his e-mail, and could figure out who it was. I waited a day to respond, considering whether I should. But I wrote back that actually I did “source” it with other than dead white men, offering multiple sample names he could find using the blog’s search engine in its upper left corner. Then I wrote: 

I also think dead white men have much to offer, especially as I am nearly one myself. And they include Jews, gays, and other marginalized groups that have perspective on the spiritual life. 

I could have added the many who died of AIDS, perhaps my single largest source of contemporary spiritual wisdom and inspiration.

Of course he had struck a nerve. Believe me, I’ve noticed how much a product I am of my European/British/American heritage. But I read outside that genre, and sometimes others’ words and actions stick and sometimes they don’t.

I also think it’s a mistake to think of dead white men monolithically. It reminds me of my church during college years thinking the Chinese family and the Korean family would want to sit together at social functions—after all, both families were Asian! Church members were blissfully ignorant of their (sometimes hostile) differences historically, culturally and ethnically.

Neither are dead white men of one piece. I’m not even of one piece. My Irish ancestors were treated harshly when they immigrated to the U.S., giving me empathy for immigrants today. “The luck of the Irish” was among the ethnic slurs used to describe them—after all, an Irish man or woman could only achieve success through luck because we didn’t have the skills or brains to do it on our own.

My German ancestor left Germany in the 1800s, because, he wrote in a letter, Germany was becoming too militaristic and he did not want to serve in its armies. Given my last name, I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that he was a Jew who felt compelled to assimilate when coming to the U.S.

My Swedish ancestor came to the U.S. because she fell in love and married someone of the “wrong” class, unacceptable to her family.

And I’m a gay man, meaning I have always viewed the dominant culture as an outsider and as one who doesn’t meet my gender “specs.”

Obviously the person I “source” most is Jesus. To some he’s just another dead white man. But for most of us, each of those designations is up for discussion.

P.S. The subscriber responded to my e-mail with a thoughtful and considerate one that included some thought-provoking questions about my beliefs, which I happily answered in kind. All’s well that ends well! (I know, quoting another dead white guy named Shakespeare!)

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Copyright © 2014 by Chris R. Glaser. Permission granted for non-profit use with attribution of author and blogsite. Other rights reserved. 

Spiritual Struggle

One spring day I was taking our dog Hobbes for a walk and noted what a beautiful morning it was. The air was crisp, cool, and clear, the trees and lawns brightly green and gardens in bloom with a riot of colors. It was one of those e. e. cummings “most amazing days,” and I thought, how blessed I was to be a part of this universe, a part that could enjoy its beauty through the mystery of consciousness and self-consciousness, that somehow matter has evolved to the place of being able to see itself, to reflect on its own existence, inspired by that sacred drive for life that we call by many names, given our religious or philosophic perspectives. It was an ah-hah moment that came without struggle, that came naturally, that was an absolute gift.

That, I believe, is how many people think about spirituality and how I often experience the spiritual life: serendipitous, joyful, uplifting, insightful, broadening of one’s horizons. The idea of spiritual struggle seems contradictory, a paradox, a product of effort and dare I say “discipline,” as in practice? Do we really have to work at spirituality?

The truth is that we don’t always have “most amazing days” such as the one I described. That they are occasional is the very thing that makes them eventful and extraordinary. We go to work or we get sick or we have a colleague who bullies us or we wonder if we are loved or we live with or near or are related to challenging people. Community has once been defined as the place where the person you would least like to be with always lives.

And, as we look at our broader human family, we see poverty, hunger, disease, injustice, and violence interfering with the possibility of “most amazing days.”

But not to despair! In the retreats and workshops I lead I often do a meditation exercise in which people are invited to recreate in their imagination a moment when they felt most fulfilled, most connected, most loved and loving, most at peace. When time comes to share the images conjured up by this exercise, there are the usual, expected bucolic scenes like the one I just described. But there are just as often the unusual places, people, and things which despite all odds proved an environment or an occasion in which individuals felt complete, fulfilled, loved, loving, and at peace. Hospital rooms. Doing chores. Suffering a loss. Rising to a challenge. Comforting someone.

Perhaps that’s the wisdom behind the apostle Paul’s notion that “all things work together for good to those who love God, who are called according to God’s purpose.” It’s not that all things are good, but even the bad things might be transformed for the good in a person who “gets” the larger spiritual picture.

We just experienced the rare convergence of Passover and Holy Week, both observances  of spiritual struggles. Jews remembered their oppression in Egypt, and how they heard Yahweh call them out of slavery through a wilderness and to a Promised Land. Christians remembered the Passion and compassion of Jesus struggling with religious and political authorities on behalf of “the least of these,” his crucifixion at the hands of Rome, and his return to those who believed.

Spiritual struggle is called “jihad” in Islam, and Muslims in the United States are now reclaiming the word from terrorists through an advertising campaign. In a sense they are engaging in “jihad” against Al Qaeda’s and the Taliban’s violent interpretations of the term.

Similarly, much of our spiritual struggle as progressive people of faith is reclaiming spirituality and religion from those who would coerce rather than persuade, control rather than cooperate, take rather than give, enforce rather than inspire, condemn rather than bless. And we each struggle with similar temptations within ourselves. Hopefully our struggle will lead to more “most amazing days” for all.

Copyright © 2013 by Chris R. Glaser. Permission granted for non-profit use with attribution of author and blogsite. Other rights reserved. Check out past posts in the right rail on the blogsite.

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Posts you may have missed:

Spiritual Handcuffs

Mohammad’s Child

Interrupted Lives

Copyright © 2011 by Chris R. Glaser. All rights reserved.

My friend, fellow writer, AIDS volunteer and chaplain Pat Hoffman gave me a copy of Etty Hillesum’s An Interrupted Life during the early years of the AIDS crisis in southern California. She thought Etty’s diaries witnessing the Nazi takeover of her native Holland and the deportation of Jews to German death camps might speak to the experience of the prematurely interrupted lives we were beholding.

As I read, Etty also spoke to my sexuality, my writing, and my progressive faith. Unbound by religious trappings, subsequently claimed by both Jews and Christians, this young Jewish woman wrote, “When I pray, I hold a silly, naïve or deadly serious dialogue with what is deepest inside me, which for convenience sake I call God.”

As the editor of her letters, G. K. Garlaandt explains in the introduction, “Her mysticism led her not into solitary contemplation but squarely back into the world of action. Her vision had nothing to do with escape or self-deception, and everything to do with a hard-won, steady and whole perception of reality.”

Etty claimed a sense of equilibrium in the face of virulent madness as she wrote, “I am with the hungry, with the ill-treated and the dying, every day, but I am also with the jasmine and with that piece of sky beyond my window; there is room for everything in a single life. For belief in God and for a miserable end.”

And, as she anticipated being transported to Germany and its concentration camps, she boldly prayed:

Dear God, these are anxious times. Tonight for the first time I lay in the dark with burning eyes as scene after scene of human suffering passed before me. I shall promise You one thing God, just one very small thing: I shall never burden my today with cares about my tomorrow, although that takes some practice. Each day is sufficient unto itself. I shall try to help you, God, to stop my strength ebbing away, though I cannot vouch for it in advance. But one thing is becoming increasingly clear to me: that you cannot help us, that we must help You to help ourselves. And that is all we can manage these days and also all that really matters: that we safeguard that little piece of You, God, in ourselves. And perhaps in others as well.

Speaking about Etty Hillesum this past Sunday as an example of “Our Lives as Sacred Texts,” I was reminded that today, November 30, is the anniversary of her death at Auschwitz in 1943 at the age of 29. And this is the eve of World AIDS Day, December 1.

Spiritual writer Henri Nouwen advised against comparing the intensity of one’s suffering with that of others, explaining, “Your suffering is your own.” Yet Etty’s interrupted life shares a continuum with other interrupted lives, just as her words speak to my own vocation of writing:

Such longing to jot down a few words! Such a strong sense of: here on these pages I am spinning my thread. And a thread does run through my life, through my reality, like a continuous line. … It’s not so much the imperfect words on these faint blue lines, as the feeling, time and again, of returning to a place from which one can continue to spin one and the same thread, where one can gradually create a continuum, a continuum which is really one’s life.