I need help getting to Haiti

On February 24th, I will be accompanying a fellow St. Paul’s parishioner, Ted Cassidy, along with a group from Huntsville, Alabama on a trip to Haiti.  We will be continuing an effort to bring clean water, and fresh food to a country that has not only been desecrated by an earthquake in 2010 but also has suffered from tremendous poverty, deforestation and the occupation and enslavement by the first world (in other words us). 

Here’s a great article on why Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2010/01/15/haiti-a-historical-perspective.html

That's Ted planting a tree

Ted has been going to Haiti fairly regularly (a few times a year) over the last few years but do to personal reasons in his family (good things, don’t worry) he will be unable to go for a while.  So he called me (literally) and asked if I would be interested in taking over some of his roles as a trip leader.  This trip will be an educational one, where I will learn the ropes and discern if making more regular trips to Haiti is something I’m called to do.  

I think there’s something in me that is very uncomfortable with the idea of romanticizing  this trip into something theological or spiritual.  Maybe it’s white guilt or maybe it just feels exploitative.  To be perfectly honest with you, I have no idea what I’m getting myself into.  I don’t know what level of austerity and seriousness I need to have going in or even if I’m the right person for the job.  But I am willing and I never have thought it to be a bad thing to try.  

Often times we spend a lot of time theologizing, talking about serving the poor, justice, etc.  Often times we don’t take action, usually not because we are unwilling but because we have oriented our lives in a way (whether it be because we live in a neighborhood far away from actual poverty or we just don’t have time) that the opportunity simply doesn’t reveal itself.  We could probably sit around and feel guilty about it but that would be probably be unhelpful.  My point is this, here is a wonderful opportunity to do something, and I am going to accept it.  And we’ll see how it goes.  There’s this wonderful thing in our Christian ethos called grace, Jesus offers it most freely to those who are humble (1 Peter 5)... so here’s my best shot at humility and I pray this trip humbles me further.

If you would like to support St. Paul’s “Heart for Haiti” campaign (building nutritional facilities, planting gardens and trees, digging wells for clean water), you can send a check to 116 N. Academy St.  Murfreesboro, TN 37130.  All money sent to that fund from now until March 2nd, will go directly to supporting our trip in February.  To be honest I could use some financial help getting down there, so any amount of financial help to pay for my plain ticket, vaccinations, and lodging would be a tremendous gift.  

Peace to you and may grace be our guide

P.S. I'm fasting from social networking this week (for solidarity with a couple students I've challenged to unplug this week) so please leave your comments on this site...

Lost in the Woods

Here’s a parable an orthodox priest told me today (the origin is unknown to me):

A man found himself lost in the woods and he became lost for many years.  As the days turned into weeks, the weeks into months and the months into years, the man became more aware of his lostness but at the same time more at one with the woods.  One day he stumbled upon a group of hikers who were also lost but just for a few hours.  They asked him, ‘we’re lost, can you help us find our way out of here?’  He replied, ‘I cannot, but I can help you be less lost.’

I’m beginning to consider how foreign the way of Jesus might actually be to our world.  As I have only just begun my journey of solitude and contemplation, my awareness of the difference between this world and the one I seek is still blurred.  But what I can see frightens me.  

My thought is that the more self aware I became, the more consistent my prayer life, the more time I spend alone in contemplation and prayer, the less lost I would become.  However, I believe the opposite is true.

You see, the values of our culture are so terribly ingrained in our DNA that we can’t see the forest for the trees.  Following Jesus’ way of self-sacrificial, communal, neighbor oriented love isn’t the same values as our Americana.

We live in a very individualized world.  Our values for the most part are concerned with MY (or even MY family’s) safety and security, MY dreams, MY salvation.

As I watch the circus of this current political season I see politicians promising safety, security and prosperity in exchange for your loyalty.  If all things belong to God, I'm not sure those things are theirs to give.  As I watch commercials on television, their products promise an identity.  Buying one product against another defines you as a consumer.  But isn’t my identity in Jesus?  All of this to say, I wonder if any of my innermost desires, those things I think to myself, ‘if I just had ____, I would be happy/centered/satisfied,‘ are actually for God and what God has promised to give?

Think about it...this is what God has actually promised to God’s people: Eternal life, oneness, healing, joy, peace, and rest.  

This is exactly what I’m afraid of.  I realize, in total honesty with myself, I never really wanted any of those things.  I want people to like me.  God promises people probably won’t.  I want financial stability.  Jesus tells us, ‘blessed are the poor.’  I want a family of my own.  Most of the heroes of our faith, the ones who are venerated as the truest followers (mystics and saints) lived a life of celibacy.

My point in writing this is to encourage you.  If you feel disoriented, if you feel discouraged, if you are afraid of what God might ask of you, you might actually be going in the right direction.  To follow the way of Jesus is like getting lost in the woods.  When we suddenly deny all of those things that we used to rely on for our sense of identity, security and happiness, we will feel alone, naked, and lost.  We become like infants all alone in the wilderness.  The feeling is extremely vulnerable  

To be honest with you, I can’t tell you why I continue to go through with it.  It can be quite miserable, frustrating and lonely, staring at your darkness and allowing God into your broken soul.  I see people who seem that are probably full of dysfunction and bad values, that seem to go on just fine without working ont them.  I'm sure their are plenty of happy people who go their whole life without ever walking down this so-called narrow road.  But I believe at my very core the way of Jesus leads to something utterly whole.    

I can’t promise you that this way is thrilling, fun or even that your going to find what you’re looking for.  But I can promise you that if you choose to get lost in the woods, I won’t be much for helping you find your way out but I can help you get less lost.  

Shalom