My weblog description claims that this site is about, among other things, faith, but I have not yet spoken about faith here. This is probably as good a time as any, and better than most, to start.
I have just come from an evening of discussion about who Jesus is to us, led by Melanie Morrison, one of the directors of the Leaven Center and the author of a book, The Grace of Coming Home: Spirituality, Sexuality, and the Struggle for Justice, which, come to think of it, belongs in my Lifetime 200.
You never know when an opening will occur, and as proof I offer one I had about five minutes into Melanie's introductory comments. Although I was very engaged in the rest of our conversation, I could have left then, to go find some quiet place and just sit with what had entered me, and that would have been a good way to spend the evening.
Melanie started by telling us a little bit about what she believes, and does not believe, about God and Jesus. I am going to pull just a short fragment of those comments out of context and mash it through my memory. I'm sure it won't nearly do justice to her eloquence, but I will do my best.
Actually, I guess I should start by saying a few things about my own faith, just in case anyone ever happens to read this who is not one of my six closest friends. Although I am not a Christian, I am a member of a religion which has its origins in Christianity: the Religious Society of Friends, or Quakers. More importantly, I am an experiential and mystical God-lover. I have a personal and intimate relationship with God which manifests itself both in extraordinary mystical experiences and in, at the best of times, a daily sense of God's presence with me, God's compassionate, loving, friendly, and companionable presence.
After my son was born, I spent months basking in God's approval and gratitude. I could feel God's extraordinary perfect love of Eric, and I could feel God's gratitude to me for opening a little space in the world for this new person to enter into. I knew that in having a baby, in becoming a mother, I had united with God's will for me, for my son, for humanity, and for the world.
In recent months, my partner and I have been trying to discern whether having a second child would be right for each of us as individuals, for our son, and for our family. As part of this decision-making process, I consulted with my doctor, who sent to me to a blood specialist to follow up on a minor bleeding disorder that was diagnosed during my pregnancy. In the course of doing some tests, the blood specialist discovered that I also have an antibody in my blood that can make carrying a baby to term very difficult.
I took that information to my obstetrician, who specializes in high-risk cases. He told me that there is a treatment for the antibody, but the treatment is highly invasive and complicated, and carries its own set of risks for both the baby and the mother. I knew before I left his office that David and I would not choose to proceed with a pregnancy under those conditions.
This was a week ago, and since then I have felt very sad. Although David and I had not decided to have a second baby, I hoped we would, and soon.
When Melanie was describing the God in whom she believes, she said that she does not believe in a father-figure God who dispenses justice, but in a God who is the loving heart of the universe, and that that love is vulnerable, breakable, and hurtable.
And I had an opening. I know from my own experience that God feels with us our joys and pains, and that God feels as well a particularly God-like joy when our choices lead us closer to God's will, by which I mean closer to that integrity which unifies us with ourself, with God, and with creation, and in which we are able to manifest our gifts in right measure, neither squandering them nor out-running them. I also know that God grieves when we are prevented, through our choices, or by external circumstance, from acting in unity with God's will.
The opening I felt, which brought me to a physical, emotional, and spiritual stillness, was that when Melanie said that the love God feels for us is breakable and vulnerable, I felt God with me, and the God I felt was unharmed by my inability to have a second baby. I am sad, and David is sad, but God is not grieving this loss.
This may sound suspiciously close to a kind of pious false comfort I despise, that leads people to tell someone who has suffered a terrible loss that it is God's will, or part of a plan, or that "everything happens for a reason." I do not mean that; I do not believe God has a particular plan for me, a life mapped out in such detail that every choice I make is either "right" or "wrong." Nor do I believe that God ever wills our suffering.
What I do mean is that I understood that not undergoing a second pregnancy is no impediment to me living a life of unity with God's will, in which my gifts are used fully. This comforts me, long before I had expected to feel any real respite from my sorrow.
I think there may yet be another baby in the world for me to mother; a beloved friend had an image of me while we were in worship together a few weeks ago which led her to suspect this, too. But the failure of my (very detailed) plan to make that baby is not a failure at all, in God's eyes. God is content with this situation, which helps me to be content with it, too. Much will be known in the fullness of time which is not apparent to us now.
Posted by Su Penn at March 27, 2003 08:13 AM | TrackBack