I have a painted board in my kitchen above the cupboards that reads: "Love is patient, love is kind, love never fails." This is one part of the most oft quoted line in the Bible, a line that seems almost universally known. It shows up in wedding ceremonies from the most religious to the most secular. It comes from a passage in I Corinthians. I spent my high school years staring at a hand carved version of this famous passage--an enormous wooden plaque at the front of the chapel at the boarding school I attended. The chapel did not have any religious images. This passage, apparently, was not deemed religious.
It is interesting that it strikes such an interfaith note, that people from all backgrounds are drawn to it. There is no reference to God or Spirit or Jesus in the passage, simply Love, but this Love that is written about is quite different than your garden variety. You may love gummy bears and warm summer days and bubble baths and chocolate, but this Love distinguishes itself through some incredible qualities. The one I am thinking of tonight is contained in the words: "love never fails."
How amazing! Something that never fails. Something that never fails is something that always succeeds, no matter what. In my own life, there are a number of areas in which I strive and labor and work to succeed. In trying to succeed I often get tired or irritable or irritated or grow helpless. But Love does not fail, nor does it grow weary or bitter or angry.
Sometimes, with my children, I can try every kind of method to calm them down, to repair a crises or squelch a tantrum, without any success. Then, one word of love, genuinely spoken from my heart, changes everything. While we cannot, in our own strength and wisdom, succeed every time we do something, Love can, Love does, and Love will. Try for yourself, the next time you have a challenge or a conflict. Instead of using your head knowledge, your will or your wit, tap into the Love of the Universe. (Imagine the love of every person on the planet put together and combined. Imagine the power of all of that love and we might get a glimpse of this greater Love.) How do you do that? I don't always know. Pausing, breathing and remembering that Love never fails can help. Love can accomplish what needs to be done. Even a moment's meditation on such a powerful thought might be enough to open us up to allow the Love that knows no failure to move through us and work in us.
--Reverend Sam Wilde
Monday, June 27, 2011
Monday, June 13, 2011
Relationships Bring us Toward God
Love never dies and no relationship is a mistake.
Love changes form and all relationships serve us on our journey to learn to love. Before we mature in love, and learn to love without expectations, conditions, and demands on another human being we can come into severe conflicts in relationship. When we learn to have our own needs met in ways that go with the flow instead of against it, we can let other people be who they are and appreciate them for who they are. We take responsibility for our own emotions and perceptions and give others room to be themselves. If we need to remove
ourselves from a situation, we do that calmly without blaming the other person for our discomfort. Relationships help us get closer to God.
We encounter over and over again that nobody can meet all of our needs. No one can be exactly who we want them to be. God helps us to come into our wholeness. God helps us feel loved and not alone when we are needing to be held in unconditional love. Over time relationships teach us, through rubbing us and scrubbing us clean of our childish demands. We become peaceful and appreciative of all of our relationships once we can see how each relationship has helped us grow, feel and experience what it like to be truly human.
We love the people in our lives for all of who they are...their quirks and their wondrous qualities. We accept ourselves with our quirks and our wondrous qualities. We are comfortable inside our own skin and our love never dies and we are grateful for each of our unique relationships and how they have made us who we are.
--Reverend Supriya Hermenze
Sunday, June 5, 2011
Seeing the Good (Weather)
This past week our area suffered from the effects of several tornadoes. While my town was not touched by the strong winds, many towns close by had immense damage. During the storm, I certainly knew what I wanted to pray for--my own safety, the safety of my children, the safety of all those around me, for, actually, good weather, the sort of beautiful, early summer day we enjoyed today.
Who makes the weather? In the aftermath of a storm, there is so much talk. Some talk about the "wrath of God." Some talk about global warming. Some talk about our crazy weather patterns, how we have changed the world, how we are now victims of a cruel Mother Nature.
I don't know. But in the past few days, I have been wanting to stay close to my original prayer, for the safety of myself, my children, all children and people everywhere that we may collectively SEE the good weather.
A few weeks ago, the world, at least according to one man, was meant to end. I do not find this sort of prophecy laughable, I find it historically intersting. People have thought, for the history of all human time, that the world would end on such a day--a Saturday, a day next week, in ten years, surely in their lifetime. I have also heard people say, on many occasions, that things in the world were getting "worse." And we hear that, of course, about the weather. The weather is getting worse.
Why are we all such doom-sayers? What is the appeal in that? For one thing, we could well be wrong. Yes, it is unusual to have a tornado in Massachusetts, but I learned we had one most recently in 1995--not so incredibly long ago. Is the world really in a worse place than it was ten years ago? Thirty years ago? Three hundred? I happen to think we have more peace now than ever before, more consciousness of kindness, more humanitarians, more hope, more spiritual thoughts and greater spiritual work. But ultimately, what I SEE is only a reflection of myself, my opinions, and my feelings about my own life.
I have had friends reflect to me a sense of doom about the world--while depressed. Those same friends, in a different state of mind, have such a sense of optimism about the globe.
I wonder if this can translate to our sense of the weather. Shall we just talk about the "terrible" state of Mother Nature? Or can we consciously, purposefully, actively and often SEE the good weather, anticipate a greater peace within nature, a harmonious relationship between humans and the earth we walk on? Let's not forget how powerful our thoughts are, how strongly they effect our lives, and let's not exclude even our thinking about weather, any more than we do our thinking about God, and the other great mysteries around us.
My husband said to me: "You could be picked up by a tornado and set down somewhere else without being hurt. It's the stuff--debris, pieces of car, futniture, house--inside the tornado that does the most damage."
What an interesing thought, that even a tornado could hold a sort of gentleness in the absence of our endless life accesories. Perhaps it's a useful metaphor as we go forward, to keep seeing the kindess in Mother Nature, and to keep clearing our own landscape of unnecessary and damaging thoughts so that we may accurately see the Good around us.
Who makes the weather? In the aftermath of a storm, there is so much talk. Some talk about the "wrath of God." Some talk about global warming. Some talk about our crazy weather patterns, how we have changed the world, how we are now victims of a cruel Mother Nature.
I don't know. But in the past few days, I have been wanting to stay close to my original prayer, for the safety of myself, my children, all children and people everywhere that we may collectively SEE the good weather.
A few weeks ago, the world, at least according to one man, was meant to end. I do not find this sort of prophecy laughable, I find it historically intersting. People have thought, for the history of all human time, that the world would end on such a day--a Saturday, a day next week, in ten years, surely in their lifetime. I have also heard people say, on many occasions, that things in the world were getting "worse." And we hear that, of course, about the weather. The weather is getting worse.
Why are we all such doom-sayers? What is the appeal in that? For one thing, we could well be wrong. Yes, it is unusual to have a tornado in Massachusetts, but I learned we had one most recently in 1995--not so incredibly long ago. Is the world really in a worse place than it was ten years ago? Thirty years ago? Three hundred? I happen to think we have more peace now than ever before, more consciousness of kindness, more humanitarians, more hope, more spiritual thoughts and greater spiritual work. But ultimately, what I SEE is only a reflection of myself, my opinions, and my feelings about my own life.
I have had friends reflect to me a sense of doom about the world--while depressed. Those same friends, in a different state of mind, have such a sense of optimism about the globe.
I wonder if this can translate to our sense of the weather. Shall we just talk about the "terrible" state of Mother Nature? Or can we consciously, purposefully, actively and often SEE the good weather, anticipate a greater peace within nature, a harmonious relationship between humans and the earth we walk on? Let's not forget how powerful our thoughts are, how strongly they effect our lives, and let's not exclude even our thinking about weather, any more than we do our thinking about God, and the other great mysteries around us.
My husband said to me: "You could be picked up by a tornado and set down somewhere else without being hurt. It's the stuff--debris, pieces of car, futniture, house--inside the tornado that does the most damage."
What an interesing thought, that even a tornado could hold a sort of gentleness in the absence of our endless life accesories. Perhaps it's a useful metaphor as we go forward, to keep seeing the kindess in Mother Nature, and to keep clearing our own landscape of unnecessary and damaging thoughts so that we may accurately see the Good around us.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
The Labor of Love
A few weeks ago, I was on my way to my weekly yoga class after dropping my 3 year old son off at school. It had been a particularly challenging morning: whining, demanding, testing. And I thought to myself: “Thank God I have yoga to retreat to and replenish myself with – without it, what would I do?”
Then a thought emerged as if on cue: Attachment is the root of all suffering. As I drove I contemplated the Buddhist teaching on suffering. I guess I am attached to yoga, to all kinds of things...my life, my husband, my son, all the people I love, my health, my job, my home, pretty much everything I own – and even the things I don’t like our beautiful cherry tree, and the perennials I’ve planted. And I'm certainly attached to my yoga, and especially my teacher Janice. She is the best, really the only one who does it right. Yes, I admitted, I see the attachment.
I arrived at class, ready to exhale my morning onto my mat and place my life and body trustingly in my teacher's hands to learn that she was announcing her retirement, and closing up shop, no one would be taking her classes. I laid my mat in the back corner and went to the bathroom heaving up a heavy sob.
I felt my attachment with full force, the ache in my heart, the love for my teacher, the trees I viewed from the windows, even the dull paint of the room where we practiced would be missed. How would I cope with parenting and life and stress without this weekly dose of quietude?
I felt raw for a week…or more, honestly - so deep was my attachment. It was useful for me to drag it out, feel self-pity, complain to friends, indulgent as it was. For, I could see that my spiritual maturity has much to do, still with outside circumstances. I can see how well I do with life when my attachments are intact and life flows as I predict.
This week my dear friend Rhei C. went through terribly long and agonizing labor. Hopeful for a home birth she was equipped with: birthing tub, meditation tapes, candles, coconut water, midwives, husband and me, all focused on this single goal. At the 48 hour mark, my astonishingly courageous and powerful friend made the call, time to let go of our expectations and attachments, I need the hospital, now. With the help of an epidural, she gave birth naturally to a perfect expression of love a few hours later, Chayton Theodore Bura.
When I think of how long she bared the pain, how hard it was to let go - truly let go, not the “look at me I’m letting go”-letting go, but the authentic release of your grip on life – I am filled with awe. The admission that the life span of this dream (relationship, car, job, tree, you fill in the blank) is complete. It is done. That most painful place of simultaneous arrival and departure is a rare space where God and life and love are born in us anew.
Thoreau wisely said it, “The soul grows by subtraction.”
And the subtraction is painful, especially when it means letting go of someone/something we really love. And I suppose, that is the spiritual labor of love - when its life span is complete and we must let go.
I give thanks to the spirit of all life, the formed and formless, that is constantly evoking the labor pains of growth, maturity, awareness. Through the endless series of attachments we are able to release, we get to experience the freedom that lies beyond them and a love that is unlike what we have ever known.
Rev. Katherine Silvan
Then a thought emerged as if on cue: Attachment is the root of all suffering. As I drove I contemplated the Buddhist teaching on suffering. I guess I am attached to yoga, to all kinds of things...my life, my husband, my son, all the people I love, my health, my job, my home, pretty much everything I own – and even the things I don’t like our beautiful cherry tree, and the perennials I’ve planted. And I'm certainly attached to my yoga, and especially my teacher Janice. She is the best, really the only one who does it right. Yes, I admitted, I see the attachment.
I arrived at class, ready to exhale my morning onto my mat and place my life and body trustingly in my teacher's hands to learn that she was announcing her retirement, and closing up shop, no one would be taking her classes. I laid my mat in the back corner and went to the bathroom heaving up a heavy sob.
I felt my attachment with full force, the ache in my heart, the love for my teacher, the trees I viewed from the windows, even the dull paint of the room where we practiced would be missed. How would I cope with parenting and life and stress without this weekly dose of quietude?
I felt raw for a week…or more, honestly - so deep was my attachment. It was useful for me to drag it out, feel self-pity, complain to friends, indulgent as it was. For, I could see that my spiritual maturity has much to do, still with outside circumstances. I can see how well I do with life when my attachments are intact and life flows as I predict.
This week my dear friend Rhei C. went through terribly long and agonizing labor. Hopeful for a home birth she was equipped with: birthing tub, meditation tapes, candles, coconut water, midwives, husband and me, all focused on this single goal. At the 48 hour mark, my astonishingly courageous and powerful friend made the call, time to let go of our expectations and attachments, I need the hospital, now. With the help of an epidural, she gave birth naturally to a perfect expression of love a few hours later, Chayton Theodore Bura.
When I think of how long she bared the pain, how hard it was to let go - truly let go, not the “look at me I’m letting go”-letting go, but the authentic release of your grip on life – I am filled with awe. The admission that the life span of this dream (relationship, car, job, tree, you fill in the blank) is complete. It is done. That most painful place of simultaneous arrival and departure is a rare space where God and life and love are born in us anew.
Thoreau wisely said it, “The soul grows by subtraction.”
And the subtraction is painful, especially when it means letting go of someone/something we really love. And I suppose, that is the spiritual labor of love - when its life span is complete and we must let go.
I give thanks to the spirit of all life, the formed and formless, that is constantly evoking the labor pains of growth, maturity, awareness. Through the endless series of attachments we are able to release, we get to experience the freedom that lies beyond them and a love that is unlike what we have ever known.
Rev. Katherine Silvan
Monday, May 16, 2011
Blinded by the Light
The other day while driving, I headed down a hill and directly into the light of the sun. It was so bright and so direct that for a few seconds I could not see anything else except the light. It glowed yellow and swallowed up everything else in my vision so that I could only view the brightness.
This is no good for driving, of course, but it is the truth as I understand it of Divine Love. This Love, Agape, is a light. When we truly look at it, receive it, and our connected to it, there is nothing else. These momets of total awareness of the Divine Love Light may be few, but they are powerful, and they teach us that God, or Divine Love, is not an extra component to our life or in this world, not a small piece of things, but the total view, the complete experience. In truth, there is nothing but God's Light and Love. What a joy that occasionally we may become blinded by it, so that all the petty concerns, the silly details, the doubts and the fears, are blocked out entirely.
May the bright light of Love shine for you today. In all kinds of weather, rain and cloud and thunder, may you find you can turn your face to the Sun of God and be encompassed by the healing power of goodness. I see that for you today, and for me, we will be bathed in the radiant warmth of Agape.
--Rev. Sam Wilde
This is no good for driving, of course, but it is the truth as I understand it of Divine Love. This Love, Agape, is a light. When we truly look at it, receive it, and our connected to it, there is nothing else. These momets of total awareness of the Divine Love Light may be few, but they are powerful, and they teach us that God, or Divine Love, is not an extra component to our life or in this world, not a small piece of things, but the total view, the complete experience. In truth, there is nothing but God's Light and Love. What a joy that occasionally we may become blinded by it, so that all the petty concerns, the silly details, the doubts and the fears, are blocked out entirely.
May the bright light of Love shine for you today. In all kinds of weather, rain and cloud and thunder, may you find you can turn your face to the Sun of God and be encompassed by the healing power of goodness. I see that for you today, and for me, we will be bathed in the radiant warmth of Agape.
--Rev. Sam Wilde
Sunday, May 8, 2011
I Will Always Love You
I had an awesome experience this weekend dancing with those I love who have died. This was a workshop at Kripalu called I Will All Ways Love You. I was moved by the uplifting energy coming from remembering the love and the particular energies of people who inspired me and are part of me as they touched my life deeply. Their spirits never die. They are waiting to be communicated with. I felt their love and their wisdom reminding me to love as deeply as I can while I am living and enjoy my precious life. I would love to inspire you, Agape readers, to take some time and communicate with those you love who may not be here in their physical form.
You can create an altar with their photo on it and write to the person, ask for insight. You could dance, sing, play music, meditate, pray or simply sit and listen as you focus on the person. Souls gone by want to be of support and are waiting patiently to share their love, protection and wisdom with us.
May this season of rebirth open us to love deeply and to learn to open our perception...
Love,
Rev. Supriya Swerdlick Hermenze
You can create an altar with their photo on it and write to the person, ask for insight. You could dance, sing, play music, meditate, pray or simply sit and listen as you focus on the person. Souls gone by want to be of support and are waiting patiently to share their love, protection and wisdom with us.
May this season of rebirth open us to love deeply and to learn to open our perception...
Love,
Rev. Supriya Swerdlick Hermenze
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Being Adult
That's what we're all about, right?? Maturation, accepting adult responsibility,taking care of business...how many of us are in the business, in some form of helping ourselves,our children,our spouses and others we meet to step up to the plate, to make the most of ourselves...sounds good, right?? Well, there are times when I really don't want to do any of that, where I resent having to be an adult, I resent the unending burdens, obligations and responsibilities that life brings...I complain "when can I go to the beach?" I do have to admit that I gave up complaining for Lent, which was an amazing experience of clearing out jammed up stuff. But just to be clear, it will be a long time before I am nominated for sainthood.
It is in this spirit of juggling,which most of us are mastering as the art of getting through the day, that I feel moved to share the following story which appeared one day on my Day-at-a-Time Little Zen Calendar. It is not attributed to any one in particular, and is simply called Zen Story. If I were a truly responsible adult, I would know exactly which day it was, but all I know is that it appeared some time in April 2011.I'm sharing it because I laughed right out loud when I read it, appreciating the deep humanity in it for all of us.I thought it was particularly poignant because of the Lenten season, Easter and Passover, which are almost completely behind us, and which require both a LOT of deep (physical,emotionaland spiritual) housecleaning, and which call us to rise up out of our deadening old ruts, to be freed from the small, tight places that cramp and enslave us.
"A man seeking help went to see the Buddha. He told him he was a farmer. "I like farming," the man said, "but sometimes it doesn't rain enough, and sometimes it rains too much. One year we nearly starved." The Buddha listened.
"I like my wife," the man said, "but sometimes she nags too much, then I get tired of her...We have kids too. Good kids, but sometimes they don't show enough respect, and..." the man went on like this.
After the man finished, the Buddha sat, thought, then said, "I'm sorry, I can't help you."
"What? Why not?" said the man, astonished. The Buddha went on to explain that everyone has problems. In fact, he said, we all have eighty-three problems, and he enumerated them, from birth to death, but as he talked the man grew more and more furious until he questioned the very premise of the Buddha's teaching.
"Well," the Buddha finally said, "I may be able to help you with the eighty-fourth problem."
"The eighty-fourth problem? What's that?"
"The problem of wanting to not have any problems."
Personally, I am beginning to think that certain kinds of problems are around to plague us just for the entertainment value,to prevent boredom and allow intellectual stimulation. The responsible ones say our problems are growing edges, so we can rise above our limitations and be more fully ourselves...but we know about those responsible ones, don't we...and where's the beach? Rev.Susan
It is in this spirit of juggling,which most of us are mastering as the art of getting through the day, that I feel moved to share the following story which appeared one day on my Day-at-a-Time Little Zen Calendar. It is not attributed to any one in particular, and is simply called Zen Story. If I were a truly responsible adult, I would know exactly which day it was, but all I know is that it appeared some time in April 2011.I'm sharing it because I laughed right out loud when I read it, appreciating the deep humanity in it for all of us.I thought it was particularly poignant because of the Lenten season, Easter and Passover, which are almost completely behind us, and which require both a LOT of deep (physical,emotionaland spiritual) housecleaning, and which call us to rise up out of our deadening old ruts, to be freed from the small, tight places that cramp and enslave us.
"A man seeking help went to see the Buddha. He told him he was a farmer. "I like farming," the man said, "but sometimes it doesn't rain enough, and sometimes it rains too much. One year we nearly starved." The Buddha listened.
"I like my wife," the man said, "but sometimes she nags too much, then I get tired of her...We have kids too. Good kids, but sometimes they don't show enough respect, and..." the man went on like this.
After the man finished, the Buddha sat, thought, then said, "I'm sorry, I can't help you."
"What? Why not?" said the man, astonished. The Buddha went on to explain that everyone has problems. In fact, he said, we all have eighty-three problems, and he enumerated them, from birth to death, but as he talked the man grew more and more furious until he questioned the very premise of the Buddha's teaching.
"Well," the Buddha finally said, "I may be able to help you with the eighty-fourth problem."
"The eighty-fourth problem? What's that?"
"The problem of wanting to not have any problems."
Personally, I am beginning to think that certain kinds of problems are around to plague us just for the entertainment value,to prevent boredom and allow intellectual stimulation. The responsible ones say our problems are growing edges, so we can rise above our limitations and be more fully ourselves...but we know about those responsible ones, don't we...and where's the beach? Rev.Susan
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