note - this and 2. Nothing/Everything, 3. A Friend Forever, 4. God Where Are You?, 5. New Vision, 6. In Due Season, 7. The Only Thing Necessary, 8. Transformed and 9. From Earth to Glory are added, in this version to the end of 'Joshua'.
the first friend I ever had lived next door. I was 2 years old. not long after we first became friends, he moved. I lost my first friend and felt the first pain of loss. he was just a playmate; we merely shared each other's sandboxes, so it did not hurt much. being very affectionate, however, I fell in love easily as a child. when I was 4 years old I fell madly in love with a beautiful girl named Thelma Stewart. I dreamed about her all day long and could not wait until three-thirty when school was out so I could stand at the street corner and watch her walk past with her friends. I don't think she even knew I existed. one day after school she was standing on the corner talking with her friends. then she got on a bus, as her friends all said good-bye. I somehow knew i would never see her again. she never once looked at me or even acknowledged that she noticed me. my heart ached as the bus pulled away. my world crumbled, but I don't think I told anyone. I kept the suffering to myself, just as I would always keep it to myself. pain seemed endless after that. other friends came into my life and just as casually left. it took me a long time to forget thelma. my life as a child was terribly lonely. I was shy and could not talk to people I felt love for, so I wandered in a world of fantasy and
4 dreams. I learned very young that I was alone in a world where everyone seemed a stranger and that you could not hold on to even those you loved. they only too easily slipped away from you. and even more painful, there was no assurance that those I loved, loved me in return. people impressed me as being without feeling. they just laughed and talked and said funny things that made others laugh, but had no real feeling for one another.
I used to think I was odd. as I grew older, though, and saw so much of others' pain, I began to realize that the whole world is fulled with pain. I was not unique in feeling alone on a planet way out in the middle of space. everyone eventually has the same experience in life. friends come and go, passing in and out of your live. strangers establish a friendship when they need you, then when their need is resolved, they drift. if you are sincere in your friendship this is hard to understand. people you love remain for a time, then they too leave when they outgrow their need for you. if at the twilight of your life you have one dear friend who has endured the fickleness of existence and remained in your life you are blessed. but, for the most part, you walk alone, very much alone.
I do not feel this experience of isolation was harmful in any way or had a negative effect on my life. I mention it only as a premise to where it led me psychologically and spiritually. I think it is more or less the lot of being human. all of us, no matter how extroverted we might be, are very much alone, not necessarily lonely, but
5 alone, unable to share with anyone the deepest secrets of our hearts. I did not realize it then, but emotional and psychological pain was to become, perhaps, the most powerful force in molding the course of my life. for some people, pain and hurt breeds bitterness and cynicism. for others it cause them to look deeply into themselves and into life itself in an attempt to understand the meaning beneath seemingly capricious or arbitrary happenings.
I was fortunate as a child to have been introduced to God. my mother said my prayers with me each night, and developed in me a sense of Jesus as a person who cared for me. this took hold. I don't know what path my life would have taken if I had had different experiences during that sensitive time in my life. but having found that God could be a real friend, I could share my secrets with Him. when I made my first Communion, I was filled with the comforting realization that Jesus was now an intimate prat of my life. on my own I went to Mass every morning so I could receive Communion and spend time in church by myself just sitting and thinking of god. He was real to me, not make-believe, but a living presence. I sensed His presence in a way that made me feel as if my soul was floating inside me. it was more than emotion. it was more than just a need for a friend to fill the emptiness of a child's loneliness. His presence touched my being and i knew He was with me. and it affected my life profoundly. when I was hurting, I would talk to Jesus about it, or tell His mother. I sensed Jesus heard me and even though He might not
6 do anything tangible in response, I knew He heard me and I knew He was nearby to give me strength. Jesus did say after all that for those who accept Him, He and His Father would come and live within them.
I think, perhaps, that finding God at such a young age may not have been a common experience, but I am grateful that it happened to me. my awareness and understanding of Jesus had a much longer period of time to expand and mature. I had a chance to evaluate and relate event and life's experiences to my relationship with Him during my childhood, my adolescence and my whole adult life. during my years of theological studies I could filter what i learned in theology through my experiences with Jesus. this made it possible for me to take the cold, finely chiseled theological concepts and transform them into a living expression of the way Jesus thought and envisioned life. though theology was cold and sterile in its intellectual expression, it was for me a vehicle for understanding the mind of God and for developing a precise sense of God and a healthy realization that God could not be defined or limited by human concepts. I also saw from our extensive study of Scriptures that God had a sense of morality that was much more open than the narrow, rigid morality of moral theologians or even the Church itself. that was to affect radically my understanding of people later on when they came to me with very disturbing moral problems. I could always see abundant goodness alongside the very severe moral weaknesses in people and learned to treat them as whole persons and not as sinners, the way Jesus
7 for example, treated the Samaritan woman who was married 5 times and did not even bother to marry the last person. Jesus still saw goodness in her and decided one day to meet with her and choose her to announce the Good News to that Samaritan village. churches do not treat people that way. sinners are very carefully avoided in our churches and are not allowed to take part in the real life of the church. we do not feel comfortable with sinners and we make them feel uncomfortable by not allowing them to perform services and ministries that are open to others whose lives superficially are more in keeping with Church standards.Jesus, on the other hand, was open to people who had glaring defects and saw them in the wholeness of their lives and saw in their lives the goodness that far outshone their weaknesses. he could pick a publican, Levi, with the bad reputation publicans had, to be not just a disciple but an apostle. He Himself got a reputation for going to the homes of excommunicated people for parties, because as the God Shepherd He continually reached out to the bruised and hurting sheep. we, on the contrary, tell the bruised and hurting sheep they cannot approach Jesus because they are not worthy.
that is why a precise understanding of Jesus is so important for us, so we can share His vision of God and His understanding of human nature and frame for ourselves our own relationship with God within the context of the rest of His creation. if Christianity is merely a theological system it will at most produce a highly educated elite devoid of anything resembling the living
8 Christ in their personal lives. we saw this recently in the presidential campaign, when one of the candidates, well educated theologically, was spewing forth the most shockingly un-Christ-like invectives and ridicule against homosexuals and homeless people, showing a lack of sensitivity and compassion that betrayed a poverty of spirituality that shocked most decent people.
unfortunately, so much energy in ecclesiastical institutions is used in validating theological and social positions in relation to other denominations and the secular world that the fundamental purpose of religion, to foster and most spirituality among its members, fades out of focus. thus, we are faced with the masses of Christians wandering the glove trying to find their own way to God, while religious professionals and religious news publishers engage in the much more ego-rewarding task of fighting global issues. the consciences of religious leaders and religious media people can be sensitive to the physical starvation of people around the world, of which they are to be commended, but they seem so often to be totally insensitive to the much more devastating spiritual starvation of people in their neighborhood, for whom they are immediately responsible. rarely do you hear clergy talk about spirituality, or teach their people the ways of prayer and how to develop a deeper intimacy with god. perhaps, they don't know how. perhaps that has never been a priority with many clergy. we teach theology, we explain Scriptures, we enact nice liturgies, we debate public issues, we parade the streets in protest marches. that is good form
9 and intellectual challenging. the world of the spirit, however, is the substance of religion and the pilgrim's path through that world is devoid of expert guides. for this frightfully labyrinthian journey, fraught with so many pitfalls and mine fields, we as clergy rarely provide people with the tools they need to find their way to God.
this struck me very clearly when I was in a country where Buddhism was popular. relaxing in my hotel room one day, I picked up a copy of a book on Buddha. after giving a synopsis of Buddha's life, the book went on to describe his way of life and principles for healthy spiritual living the rest of the book contained a detailed description of how Buddha arrived at his vision of life and how his followers, in imitating him, could find their way to inner peace. we don't to that with Jesus. we have endless books about whether He existed, or whether the Jesus we have learned about is really accurate and historical or mythical. we have endless complicated tracts on fine technical issues, but we don't explore Jesus' way to happiness and peace, or try to understand His feelings about god and creation or how He vies our relationship with God, or His attitude toward human weakness. understanding these thins could help us immensely in our own search for inner peace and a meaning to life. indeed, it is a rare seminary today that teaches anything about Jesus other than in Christology courses, which in several prestigious seminaries I know of are merely offered as electives.
10 I have learned so many things about people's spiritual needs since the Joshua books became popular. having heard so frequently that people's interest in religion had fallen off dramatically, I was shocked at the almost universal response of the public to Joshua. it was not just Catholics and Episcopalians, and Lutherans and Presbyterians, but Baptists, Pentecostals, Evangelicals, Jews, Moslems, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and not just adults, but children down to 9..Catholic priests wrote letters of thanks, saying Joshua saved their priesthood. Baptist ministers told me after talks, with tears in their eyes, that Joshua healed them of burdens they had carried all their lives and brought them to a new and beautiful understanding of Jesus. Jews wrote and told me they read Joshua and have developed a beautiful relationship with Jesus and wan to follow His way of life privately. the same with people of other religions and even those with no religion. what all this said to me in a powerful way was people may be tired of religion, but they are desperately hungering for a relationship with God that can empower them with a new vision of life and heal wounds t6hat have been festering for a lifetime and renew their zest for living.
people's searching for spirituality is almost epidemic. for the past 20 years or more, Westerners have traveled to the Far East searching for happiness in Eastern religions. conversely, Hindus and Buddhists from the East are searching for a meaning to life here in the West. a group of Hindus contacted me after reading
11 Joshua,asking me if I would be their guru. they told me they found such peace in Joshua they wanted to learn more about Jesus' way of life. they asked if I would guide them in their search for peace and happiness and a deeper relationship with God. this search for a meaning to life and an intimacy with God is not limited to Westerners, it is universal. and that is precisely the reason Jesus came to earth, to teach us the way. 'I am the way, the truth and the life, He said. that is what we have lost sight of, Christianity as the way. what is so troubling about our religion today is that the clergy either don't recognize the people's hunger for spirituality or are unfamiliar themselves with Jesus' way of life and Christianity 's rich tradition of mysticism and asceticism, all well tested through the centuries. this is Christianity and application of Jesus' teachings at its best and we don't teach it to our people at the height of the Protestant Reformation, St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross, St. Ignatius Loyola and others were delineating the path of interior holiness through mystical union with god in such practical detail that even today their approach to holiness is still taught in theology courses and spiritual retreats. sadly, the masses of the people are not taught this in their churches, so not even knowing that such guidance exists, they look outside Christianity.
parents may teach religion to children. Churches may do the same. but that is not spirituality. that, too, should begin in childhood. children should be taught about god in a simple, loving way so they can learn to
12 trust Him and begin to know Him as a kind and loving Father who made them, not perfectly but with all they need to grow in His love. they could be taught about Jesus and about His life and how He lived and how He loved people. they could be taught about Jesus as the Good Shepherd who cared for the hurting and the troubled sheep, so they can learn to run to Him when they have problems, and when they fall and make mistakes.
Ordinarily, spirituality is not a child's venture. Spiritual growth like growth in any other facet of our lives is a process. it works through phases. the spiritual life is most frequently activated after some personal crisis or tragedy. to force a strong spirituality on children before they are ready is unnatural and can kill a child's interest in religion and even in God. we can introduce a child to God and plant the seed that will in god's good time germinate and grow, but moving in a world of spiritual things is not really what interests young people. in fact it can be harmful to demand too much from them when they are too young to even understand the meaning of the word 'spirituality'. so many of my friends in their excessive zeal to arouse their children's spiritual lives saturated them with religious activities. when the children became adolescents, they couldn't stand religion and went to church only after horrendous fights. the older children stopped going to church altogether.
eventually people come to a realization of their need or God and their need to grow spiritually. real
13 spirituality and spiritual growth, however, has to be distinguished from religious activities and pious exercises. these exercises merely mimic spirituality. unfortunately, many people think that they grow close to God by performing religious practices and doing religious things. that is not spirituality. they may even get a reputation for being pious. Jesus lived for 30 years in Nazareth and you would think the townsfolk He grew up with would have been impressed with His holiness. oddly enough, they were surprised when He began his public mission and began to preach the Good News. 'Where did he get all this from? Isn't this the carpenter's son? obviously, His holiness didn't make a big impression. you might wonder how Jesus could have kept His exquisite spirituality hidden during all those years, so that even His playmates were shocked by His apparent new found interest in religion. what made it possible for Jesus to keep His spiritual life hidden from the eyes of those who lived so close to Him was that His holiness was genuine. it did not depend on showy external practices. 'When you pray, go to your room and lock your door, He advised the apostles, and pray to Your Father in secret and your Father who knows what is secret will hear you'. and on another occasion, He remarked to His disciples that they should not be like the scribes and Pharisees who love to recite long prayers and be seen praying in public. 'Do not do your good deeds to be seen by others. those who do such things already have their reward.
14 remarks like this give a good indication of where Jesus was coming from and the attitudes that guided His own life-style.
the mistake many people make when they start trying to be holy is they multiply religious practices and burden themselves with a host of activities, attending endless religious services, thinking that the more good things they do, the more spiritual they become. spirituality doesn't work that way. the spiritual life is something that grows slowly, imperceptibly, way beneath the surface of our lives. pressuring ourselves to do all kinds of nice things for people and performing a multitude of good works does not make us holy, it can, if we are not careful, make us extremely nervous and pressure us into commitments that can overload our already overburdened lives.
real spirituality begins by finding God, feebly, perhaps, in the beginning, but then more confidently as we travel along the way. at first, we may be driven to Him out of desperation. but that's all right. God uses all kinds of circumstances to lead us to Himself. or we may just feel a need to draw closer to god. whatever the reason, God is calling us to a deeper intimacy with Himself. Jesus teaches us the attitudes we should have when we establish contact with His Father. we must have a childlike trust. this isn't a command, but His attempt to teach us how to establish a healthy relationship with His Father whom He knows so well. 'Why are you all so worried? He said to the crowd one day. 'Look at the birds of the air. they don't sow and they don't reap
15 and they don't gather into barns. your heavenly Father takes car of them. you are worth more than all the flocks of birds and all you do is worry, as if you never had a heavenly Father,. Stop worrying. your heavenly Father knows what you need, even before you ask Him.
that is the beginning of spirituality, recognizing the need for God in our lives and placing ourselves in His hands with complete trust, confident of the tenderness of our Father
's love for us. we may have a difficulty with this, because all of us are only too conscious of our many failings and feel we do not have a right to God's kindness toward us. but that is precisely what makes God's love so beautiful. it does not spring from the goodness He sees in us, but from the overflowing goodness of His own love and the compassion He has for us in our weakness and sinfulness. the crowd Jesus addressed on that occasion when He spoke of the birds of the air were just ordinary people, sinners like ourselves, if you want to call them that, although Jesus didn't call them sinners. Jesus called people God's children and 'little flock'. it is touching the tender way Jesus spoke to the crowd that day assuring them of His father's concern, even though He was only too aware of the serious moral defects in their lives. so, when we begin our adventure with God, it is with the assurance that He is open to us and kindly disposed toward us. we do not approach Him as a nuisance. in spite of our past live and frightful weaknesses, he is glad we are turning to Him. like the prodigal father of the prodigal son, He
16 greets us with open arms and is only too ready to share with us His friendship and His boundless mercy. all is forgiven, all is renewed. though our sins be as scarlet, He will cleanse us and make us white as snow, through a baptism if necessary, or through a reawakening of the baptismal life we have already received and a healing reconciliation.
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