How I feel

[This is part of an email I sent to a professor tonight...]


I am not sure how to make heads-or-tails of what all is going on in life for me right now, but I am at a point where I feel rather powerless in the face of increasing schoolwork and other stressors. My emotions seem to have been on the fritz as of late and I have not dealt with them well. Spiritually, I feel shot. I have few other words to use. I am beat. My heart and my body and my emotions and my desires and my everything are in deep need of God's touch and restoration. I am not sure how reliable my emotions are right now, especially because I realize that the flu took a lot out of me and I am probably still physically recovering. But I am quite convinced that there is significant stock to be placed in what I've said.

As far as the assignments go, I don't want to let you or my classmates down. It bugs me that I feel like I'm giving up - I don't want to be defeated. But I think I am defeated right now. I need to get adequate sleep tonight and I think I need to take a moment and look at where I am - to look at what is truly important and to allow that to inform my priorities. I think - perhaps I am wrong - that at this moment, these matters of the heart are very important. I am tired.

I am truly not seeking leniency grading-wise. This email is sent partly to ensure that you understand that I mean no disrespect by these incomplete assignments. This email is also admittedly self-serving in that I wish to "save face." But I'm tired of saving face, too... so really, finally, I desire your thoughts and prayer as (I hope) God works with me through this time.

And that's what it comes down to, in a lot of ways. I'm tired and frustrated. With a whole lot of things, in a whole lot of ways. I desperately need to encounter God and for him to give rest to my restless soul, and for his love to overcome my irrational "desire" ("fear" is probably a more accurate term) to run to everyone and everything but him.

[Have you ever heard the song "Jealous Kind" by Jars of Clay? Here's two lines: "I'd rather feel the pain all too familiar / Than be broken by a lover I don't understand"]

Read it.

"Without truth, without trust and love for what is true, there is no social conscience and responsibility, and social action ends up serving private interests and the logic of power, resulting in social fragmentation, especially in a globalized society at difficult times like the present" (5).

"Fidelity to man requires fidelity to the truth, which alone is the guarantee of freedom (cf. John 8:32) and of the possibility of integral human development" (9).

... these are words found in a recent encylical, "Charity in Truth" (Caritas in Veritae) issued by Pope Benedict XVI. They are quoted in an article, authored by Francis J Beckwith. Beckwith reviews the recent Pope Benedict XVI's encyclical, commenting on its content and meaning.

It is a very worthwhile read, I think: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/julyweb-only/127-53.0.html. It's a short article, too.

Additional links:

The full text of the encyclical in English: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20090629_caritas-in-veritate_en.html

An op-ed piece talking about the difficulty that many have in understanding the full depth and breadth of this encyclical (or of much Christian thought in general): http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0710/1224250386825.html

Return?

I hope that I am on the threshold of a decisive step back towards God.

I too have gone astray, I wish to return to my Shepherd. Yet my desires are impotent and fleeting.

I pray my Shepherd comes and finds me and brings me home.

I am highly skeptical of my authenticity in stating what I have written above.

I need you, God - this is a call.

I don't believe in the power of prayer

I believe in God, attentive to his creation, present in history.

I do not subscribe to the belief that belief itself is credible. It is not. Faith is only as reliable as its object.

"Credulity is no virtue."

Prayer itself has no power.

If there is no hearer...
If there is a hearer who is not interested in responding...
If there is a hearer who has no capacity to respond...
then prayer is a pep talk at best, willful self-deceit at worst.

I think we should not pray for the sake of praying.

I think we should pray as the consequence of the belief (no matter how tenuous) that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - the God of Jesus - is attentive to His Creation and present in our human affairs.

And so I do not agree whatsoever with the statement, "I believe in the power of prayer." For I do not believe in prayer; I believe in God.

Chasing Happiness

When I surveyed all that my hands had done
___and what I had toiled to achieve,
everything was meaningless,
___a chasing after the wind
(Ecclesiastes 2:11, NIV)

The American dream of happiness is rooted in a belief in the right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," which is written into the Declaration of Independence. Yet we all know coworkers, friends, or loved ones who use their liberty to pursue happiness and end up... saying, "This isn't what it's cracked up to be." Their pursuit of happiness becomes "chasing after the wind."

That American dream is broken. It always has been.


--The above is copied (sans emphasis) from a letter I received today from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. (Note: all discussion about the merits of this and similar organizations will have to wait for another day.. that's not the point of this post - if you missed the point, read again). I am interested to find out how their TV special, "America's Dream: Chasing Happiness," touches on this topic. Airing times can be found here.

Later, all.

"That American dream is broken. It always has been."

Unity?!

Unity - what is it?

Is it possible? How?

Oh, the thoughts that have run their course through my mind as of late... modernity, postmodernity, truth, God, Christ, Christianity, priorities, surrender, society, politics, word-deed disconnect, God as a social construct vs. God as Himself, the Church, pain and brokenness, orientation, misplaced focus, existence, HIV/AIDS and a properly Christian approach, love, justice, interpretation of Scripture, do we trying to follow ourselves even though we pretend to be following God?

Maybe I'll unpack some of these here. Maybe.

Peace. Soli Deo Gloria.