Fasting

 Lent is a time of fasting for many church believers.  Well, atheists and agnostics in Recovery Programs fast too.  From what? From being too busy to talk to the newcomer in the room.  When someone new comes into the meeting room, they are yoked to alcohol or some other substance.  They lack sustaining friendship and dignity.  They are marginalized and lack hope.  The newcomer is invited to share their name and anything else they would like to say.  But after the meeting, the regular members do not rust out to the next busy thing on their calendar.  A regular member in recovery walks up to the newcomer, introduces themself, offers a phone number and may even invite the newcomer for a cup of coffee somewhere.  This is fasting from self-preoccupation.  If the newcomer never is seen again, the member is helped to stay sober by reaching out.  Church going believers might keep all this in mind when the stranger shows up during Lent in their church service.  

Work For It

 Patience is good as someone said, but perseverance is better.  In any spiritual practice be it religion or recovery, you need to have patience that things are going to work out for the better in whatever practice you have.  Hope might be the connector between patience and perseverance.  You have to work at recovery or spiritual growth.  It does not happen just by sitting there and listening to a preacher or someone share their recovery process.  Such points in a direction, but direction is for a path and the path has to be worked.  This takes perseverance because the results are not so apparent early on.  Perseverance means discipline and following directions from those who have been or are on the path.  Growth comes “if you work for it.”

Bargaining Chip

 Prayer is not a bargaining chip.  We think if we give up valuable time in pursuit of our own interests we will get something through this “prayer.”  We afflict ourself with sitting there in quiet and stillness, trying not to pay attention to our restless, easily bored, self-focused mind.  I can change this spiritual power to my wants if I afflict myself with meditation or any prayer for that matter.  God will take note.  But prayer is not to change God or Higher Power.  It is meant to change us.  It begins with self-denial, the bitter taste of not getting our own way.  

Return On Investment

 I meet many a person who used to meditate.  They did it as a way to get a “return on investment.”  They wanted some payoff, pre-conceived from their time spent in silent stillness.  They got bored or mind-wandering instead, but mostly bored.  No payoff.  They were all about themself.  They could go to work and be bored, be married and be bored, do internet and be bored, but not meditate.  They at least got paid when they worked.  Or got to a destination after a long boring ride/travel.  We are so demanding of our prayer time, as if we have some control.  Patience and acceptance not required.  Thus we treat spiritual power as if it is a puppet at the end of our strings.  

Indifference

 I might be in a room with a group of people and I hear someone, maybe a stranger to me, talk about their present misery, their deflated life.  I think, “Boy I am glad that is not me anymore.”  Or, “This is a good reminder for me to keep doing whatever practice I have to avoid misery.”  OK.  I was helped by listening.  After the meeting, I have a choice:  go up to the person, or leave, or talk to buddies.  Indifference is a big loadstone in the way of growing up.  Pope Francis says it is the world’s biggest problem.  So I go up to that person and introduce myself and try to say something helpful.  Even if I feel helpless to that person, I have avoided my indifference.  

Your Gods

 Someone says, “I don’t believe in God!”  They might not believe in the religion God, but they may still have their gods.  Like what?  How about the god of fear, anxiety, money, self-esteem, and selfishness.  Anything that controls your life, or to which you pay daily attention, and is ruining your spiritual growth, becomes your god or gods.  I ask myself when I get up in the morning, “Who do I or will I worship today?”  My early morning actions and decisions then tell me who or what I worship.  If I get off kilter a little, getting together with fellow spiritual travelers during the day, gets me back on track.  

Strangers

 When you walk into a new group or new worship community, everyone is a stranger.  It is like a new job.  You might say, “I will never get to know all these people, their names and stories.”  A way that I look at it is to say to myself, “These are friends I simply have not yet met.”  People like home parishes, home groups, anything with home in it because it is the familiar.  We feel part of.  OK. So then what about the “stranger” who comes into your “home” whatever?  How do you respond?  This new person is not a stranger, but a friend you have never met.  Get out of your comfort zone.  Get out of yourself.  Oh, and Happy April Fool’s Day!