Are we created? If so, how do we relate to a creator that big? I have an offering to help
We rotate 365.25 times per Earth year. We always do. We have for all the centuries recorded. Atomic clocks show the modern day is longer by about 1.7 milliseconds than a century ago as the tidal effects of the Moon slow us a little (2.3 milliseconds since the 8th Century BC when Rome was first founded and Eygpt was up to its 23rd out of 33 dynasties). That’s 767,025 years AD and 292,200 BC, or 1,059,225 years just since Rome.
No meteors have hit us. No black holes have gobbled us up. No change in this galaxy’s stratospheric environment has knocked us off our gentle twirl.
What amazes me most is that we wobble just enough to stop our massive oceans migrating with centrifugal force towards the poles and causing land in the equatorial region to emerge, resulting in a huge equatorial megacontinent and two large polar oceans. That’s what experts say would happen if we didn’t have exactly the right conditions to continue to spin and wobble at exactly the right amount for life to continue.
We do not want Evolution when it comes to spinning on our axis. Assuming you’re still with me and Genesis 1 (and yes, I know it isn’t necessarily literally true in the sense of our understanding of time, but our understanding is pretty small and that’s the point of this post), the world was created and that creator said we, personkind, are good.
Is this too great a thing to believe? That we are created? Have you ever looked at the James Webb Space Telescope? It is able to view objects that even the Hubble Space Telescope cannot. One look at the images shared on Facebook take my breath away.
Is it too great a thing to believe that to communicate with personkind, the creator speaks to us in unique ways, not necessarily in the way we do? Certainly Jesus, who said He was the Son of God, come to reveal His Father to us, spoke in ways that confounded the proud, the stuck-in-their-ways and the straight out haters of love. He didn’t do it to be mean. He respected their rejection of Him, all the way to the Cross.
Mystical, profound, gentle and hidden language is used to reveal deep mysteries. And it is up to us to learn how to speak that language.
PRAY. Pure relationship attention yielded.
Pray is not talking. It is a conversation, but not what we think of when we use that word. It is relationship and many of the best are not that way because of words. Many of us talk to God that way and there’s nothing wrong with it as long as we don’t become disillusioned when God doesn’t appear to answer us, when pain goes unhealed, life treats us unfairly and good things evade us. How much better to learn how to be alongside our creator and aware of Him/Her, of thoughts, ideas, insights and yes, cautions, corrections, inspirations and statements of love.
I find it immensely hard to sit still for all sorts of complex reasons. Sitting still and “doing nothing” is impossible. Breaking habits isn’t for the faint-hearted. Each time I set aside dedicated uninterrupted space to meditate or contemplate, I glimpse immense possibility for those things that seem out of my reach. St Ignatius encourages those making his* Spiritual Exercises to ask for the Grace they are seeking. In other words, we ask for what we don’t have, but know we need: the divine grace that regenerates and sanctifies our efforts, inspire virtuous impulses and imparts strength to endure trial or resist temptation. We don’t have to have these to start out with. We need to ask.
Because God is no control freak. He/She checks in. He/She uses ways of communicating that don’t manipulate, coerce or force us. He/She wants us to ask Him/Her. If we don’t we continue on our way as so many did in Jesus’ day.
We have so much more to be concerned about that the turning of the Earth or who made it, you might say. And I would say, look up. Not only at the incredible sky above us, but to who you truly are. Do you know? Do you even suspect that you were created not only with your height and hair colour, but with desires in your DNA that match the most extraordinary destiny you could imagine. Yes, you. Not the person next to you. You. The one you started covering up before you can even remember doing it.
This is a long way of inviting you to explore what God might say to you when you develop the capacity to truly listen, hear and speak with Him/Her. If you had a guidebook, some friends to journey with, binoculars for distant vision and glasses for close up work, a willingness to get up early and change some habits, to get out of your comfort zone...
Want to join me? I am starting a new initiative. Spiritual direction in groups. My first thinking is to offer groups to young people (20s and 30s) – way younger than me – because so many spiritual directors are not of this generation and their generation is what they need. Jesus travelled with a group. I imagine Peter and John learned as much from each other as they did from Jesus. (I am not Jesus. He is in the group though.)
If you would like to explore and see what emerges in this mysterious, mystical journey, drop me a line. Even if you’re not “young”, get in touch. Who knows? I’m listening, after all, for what God brings in response to my discerning of how I might live out my own gifts. Click the “email me” button and share your response. How would you like to share seeking spiritual direction with other disciples? Are you young? Or in Richard Rohr's second half of life (google it!)
Ignatius would say they are Jesus Christ's Spiritual Exercises, not his