Welcome to PINS OF LIGHT!

Today's Readings

In his bestselling book, The Road Less Traveled, M. Scott Peck drops a line that makes you feel like dropping his book.  In the very first sentence, he declares quite simply and bluntly:  "Life is hard."

Now, tell me:  Who wants to be reminded about that?  I don't know about you, but that's one truth I'd rather not deal with.  Of course that doesn't change the fact that life is, in fact, hard--and we know it.  That's probably why Peck's book became a No. 1 bestseller over twenty five years ago and continues to be read today--its dire and ominous opening notwithstanding!

The Lord knows that life is hard.  We know from his life and death that he's no stranger to a difficult life. He's "been there, done that."  His words in today's gospel ring so true, and they are among his loveliest and most consoling.  He tells us:  “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest." 

Like many who have lived long enough, I've gone through a number of crises in my own life--some of them quite earthshaking.  In the darkest, most painful moments of my life, I have found myself again and again turning to these words of our Lord, and each time I have drawn strength and comfort from them just when I need them most.

But the next line is just as consoling.   He says: "Take my yoke upon your shoulder, and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart."  It intrigues me that this time our Lord does not compare us to the more customary and, to me, more acceptable sheep.  Instead this time by using the metaphor of the yoke, the Lord compares us to oxen, which, as we know, are "beasts of burden." 

Biblical scholars are guessing that it's probably because Jesus is referring to the specific type of yoke used on oxen, usually, a U-shaped wooden crosspiece bound to the necks of not one, but always a pair of oxen.  Come to think of it, that's probably why a yoke of oxen means a pair of oxen!

So in promising to help us in our burden, the Lord places himself not behind us, where the master of the ox is found, but right there beside us as a fellow "beast of burden."  As we bear our burden, Jesus bears it with us and shares in carrying its weight!  It is a most radical, but also most consoling, portrait of who the Lord is and how he joins us and walks with us when we are at our most burdened moments.

I've been thinking about the burdens we bear.  We bear different kinds of burdens.  First of all, there are burdens that "just happen" to us:  They simply befall us, and we have not much choice or control over them.  Examples of this include the effects of accidents and natural disasters such as damage to property and especially the loss of someone we love.  Just the other day I saw a Probe documentary on the MV Princess of the Stars tragedy, and couldn't help but shed tears over the pain of the relatives, many of whom still had no idea about the fate of their loved ones.  Days after the tragedy, the relatives continue to bear a burden they did not choose, over which they have no control.

We also bear burdens caused by other people, over whom we also have no control, but who affect us and who, in spite of themselves, hurt us and wound us:  A self-destructive son, a colleague who creates problems for us, or a person we love who is undergoing a long and painful depression.  We also exercise no control over these burdens, but they are caused not by natural disasters or accidents but by other people's mistakes or sins.

Then there are the burdens that we cause ourselves, those that we, wittingly or unwittingly, inflict on ourselves:  These burdens are the result of our own doing, like getting lung cancer as a result of years of heavy smoking, having sleepless nights due to a guilt-stricken conscience, or suffering in an unhealthy relationship because we can't bring ourselves to walk away from it.  In these cases, we suffer because of ourselves, and at least to some extent, we can do something about these burdens.

Finally, there is another type of burden that we cause ourselves, but unlike the previous ones, we choose them for a good reason.  I'm referring to unpleasant tasks that we choose to take up or painful sacrifices that we freely make out of love.  There is the mother who leaves the country to support her husband and children, the child who foregoes his own needs in order to care for his aging and infirm parents, and the volunteer doctor who chooses a difficult assignment in a far-flung barrio over a lucrative practice because he wants to serve the poor.

We understandably tend to complain about the burdens we bear, but it might do us some good to examine them carefully since some burdens we can actually do something about, while others we have no control over. As the well-known "Prayer for Serenity" tells us, it is important to distinguish between the things we can change and the things we cannot. 

Moreover, some burdens leave us bewildered because they don't seem to mean anything, but others can be offered with love and can, for those they are offered, make a world of a difference. These burdens are worth bearing--sufferings that we choose to take up out of love for others.  Lest we forget, we Christians have a word for this type of burden:  Cross.

Whatever type of burden we bear, there is one thing we can be absolutely sure of:  As we carry our loads, the Lord walks with us.  Just as Simon of Cyrene bore his cross with him on the road to Calvary, he bears our burdens with us. 

Ours is a God who shares our yoke and bears our burdens.

Here is a Quick Question for you:  "Think of a heavy burden that you might be bearing here and now.  Has it been 'inflicted' upon you--or have you chosen or caused it yourself?  If it has been self-imposed, have you chosen it for the sake of love?"  Think about it, and if you feel up to it, share a thought, a feeling, or a question.  Who knows?  It might actually help another reader.

Here is a recording of India Arie's "Loving (Intro), her version of the well-known "Prayer for Serenity," set to an animated Vista Windows wallpaper--very suitable for meditation. Below are the lyrics too.

LOVING (INTRO)

Oh God grant me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change
The courage to change the things that I can
The wisdom to know the difference
Oh ooh and God give me the courage to love with an open heart,
An open heart, an open heart I wanna love with an open heart
Oh ooh oh with an open heart

Today's Readings

Once in a while we see something on TV that stops us on our tracks.  On two separate occasions, while channel-surfing with the remote, I caught two interviews with Ingrid Betancourt--one by CNN's Larry King and the other by Stephen Suckor at BBC's "HARDtalk."  Both interviews were incredibly and surprisingly powerful.

As many people know, Ingrid Betancourt is the recently released hostage kidnapped by left-wing FARC guerillas in 2002 and held prisoner in the jungle for over six years ago.  Last July 2, in a stunning and bloodless undercover military operation, she and fourteen other captives were rescued by the Colombian National Military.  Her miraculous liberation and her dramatic reunion with her mother and two chidren--now both young adults--have captured the imagination not only of Colombia and France, of which Ingrid is a national, but of the whole world.

In the operation codenamed Jaque (Spanish for "checkmate"), military agents posing as FARC guerrilas had informed Betancourt's captors of an "international mission" that was coming to check on the hostages. As scheduled, a white helicopter appeared in the sky and landed in a predetermined place.  Colombian security forces posing as FARC rebels jumped out.  To Ingrid Betancourt's humiliation, she and the other hostages were handcuffed and placed aboard the helicopter, along with two of their FARC guards.  Ingrid felt only dismay because she thought that this was yet another media ploy of the FARC.  But soon after the helicopter lifted off, before she knew it, the two FARC officials with them were quickly disarmed and subdued.  According to Betancourt, the leader of the group then turned and announced, "We are the national military."  Then he said the words that, for her, were pure gift:  "You are free!"

In the interview with Larry King, Ingrid Betancourt describes her experIences in the jungle. "It was hell," she tells Larry King. "It was hell for the body.  It was hell for the mind.  It was hell for the soul." 

Asked about what she has learned most during those years in the jungle, Ingrid says it is man's inhumanity to man, the wickedness that people are capable of committing against other people. At one point, she pauses, her eyes lost in those years, and then says:  "Many things happened in the jungle that we have to leave in the jungle."

Towards the end of the "HARDtalk" interview, Steven Sackur asks Ingrid Betancourt a final question: "I just wonder, when you think about yourself, Ingrid Betancourt: How have you changed over the last six and a half years?  How are you different now from the woman you were running for president in 2002?"   

This time Ingrid doesn't pause before she answers.  It seems that she has thought about this question many times.  Her answer is like a breath drawn from deep inside her soul: "I am a woman.  I am a fragile woman."  And then she adds, "The difference is that now I know."

Many times while watching this incredible woman in both interviews, I found her image suddenly swimming in my tears.  Afterwards I asked myself what it was that had moved me so much.  I guess it was the person of Ingrid Betancourt, so serene and so wise--and so good--despite her imprisonment and torture in the hands of the FARC guerillas.  Here was a woman who had suffered unimaginable horrors for over six years, who had every reason to be bitter and to hate her captors, yet no matter how I searched her eyes and voice, I found no bitterness and no hatred in her.  Instead I found a woman of deep faith and love.

In the gospel passage today, the Lord tells the parable of the sower who scatters seed everywhere.  It is a farming strategy that makes no sense to me.  To scatter seed with such extravagance and with such abandon, with no consideration of where the seed may fall--tell me, what's the point?  Why doesn't the sower reserve the seed only for the rich fertile soil?  Why waste all that seed on what he knows is rocky, thorny, barren soil?

I think God has answered my question through Ingrid Betancourt's story:  The Lord scatters his word everywhere because he knows that you never know where his word will bear much fruit.  In the case of Ingrid Betancourt, who would have thought that God's word can yield so much good in the worst of  her experiences?  The worst of humanity--its rockiest, thorniest, most barren souls--has brought out the best of it in Ingrid Betancourt's own soul. 

God knows that even in the rockiest, thorniest, most barren places, we can sometimes stumble over rich and fertile soil. 

Here's a Quick Question for you:  "What are the rocky, thorny, and barren places in your life?  Could God be sowing some precious seed--even and especially in those places?"  Think about it, and if you feel up to it, share a thought, a feeling, or a question. Who knows? You might help another reader with your sharing.

(image:  Ingrid Betancourt in captivity, from BBC)

To watch an excerpt of Larry King's interview, click here.  For the HARDtalk interview, click here.

And here is the raw footage of the rescue operation codenamed "Jaque." No words can describe the disbelief, joy, and relief on the faces of Betancourt and her companions when they finally realized that they were--at last--free.

Today's Readings

It's not easy to find a commencement speech that's both wise and witty.  But I think that's exactly what J.K. Rowling, bestselling author of the "Harry Potter" series, delivered  at Harvard last June 5, 2008.  The title she gave the speech gives you a fairly good idea of the gems of wisdom that she offered the Harvard graduates: "The Fringe Benefits of Failure and the Importance of Imagination."  Even for non-Harry Potter fans, the speech is worth reading in full--and thanks to technology, we can even watch the delivery itself (see below).

What struck me in particular about her speech was what Rowling called some of her "greatest formative experiences" when she had worked in the research department at Amnesty International in London during the pre-Potter days.  This is how she described those days:  "There in my little office I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them. I saw photographs of those who had disappeared without trace, sent to Amnesty by their desperate families and friends. I read the testimony of torture victims and saw pictures of their injuries. I opened handwritten, eye-witness accounts of summary trials and executions, of kidnappings and rapes."

She spoke of one unforgettable African torture victim, who was no older than she:  "...as long as I live I shall remember walking along an empty corridor and suddenly hearing, from behind a closed door, a scream of pain and horror such as I have never heard since. The door opened, and the researcher poked out her head and told me to run and make a hot drink for the young man sitting with her. She had just given him the news that in retaliation for his own outspokenness against his country’s regime, his mother had been seized and executed."

She sums up her experiences in Amnesty International with the following observation:

"Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power. I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard and read.

"And yet I also learned more about human goodness at Amnesty International than I had ever known before.  Amnesty mobilises thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have. The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners. Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet. My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life."

In describing what she witnessed at Amnesty International--both the great evils and the great kindnesses humankind is capable of--J.K. Rowling might as well be talking about today's Parable of the Weeds and Wheat.   In the parable, the Lord talks about a master of the field finding weeds among the wheat, but refusing to pull out the weeds for fear that the wheat might also be uprooted.  So he decides simply to let the weeds grow--yet another strange strategy, if you ask me, not only in agriculture, but also in the universe. 

Applied to our world, we see evil existing alongside goodness, and we can't help but be bewildered, if not scandalized, about why the all-good, all-powerful God cannot--or will not--eliminate evil so that only goodness survives.  Surely, as the parable teaches, God sows only the good seeds, so the weeds really come from somewhere else, so why let them grow?  Why not grab a sickle and eliminate them immediately?

No adequate explanation is given for this divine strategy; instead the Lord offers an invitation to trust that this is the best way and the consolation that in the end, all shall be well, when at harvest time, the weeds will be collected, tied in bundles, and burned, while the wheat will be gathered in God's barn.

The parable is usually applied to good people and evil people--such as those whom J.K. Rowling came to know in her work at Amnesty International.  But we can also apply the parable to the good and the evil within each one of us. Certainly we know all too well that in that field of our soul, we find not only wheat, but also weeds.  Those among us who desire conversion and holiness sometimes can't help feeling frustrated at our failure to weed out the evils within us. In fact, many end up giving up altogether because of our inability to be completely good. 

But our Lord's message to us today is as psychological as it is spiritual:  We simply can't remove our weeds without harming our wheat.  The reason is that as some of us may have noticed, our greatest strengths usually constitute our greatest weaknesses.  Our gifts are also our flaws.  Our compassion, a keen ability to feel for others and listen to them, has the same source as our not-always-healthy penchant to rescue people.  Our passion to make a difference in the world sometimes leads to an addiction for honor and power.  Each of our qualities has both lights and shadows.  Our Lord knows that to eliminate the shadows completely will mean extinguishing the lights too.

Today's parable teaches us to let our weeds grow along with our wheat.  We can't rid ourselves of them altogether, but we can at least manage them so that they do not overwhelm the wheat.  Letting the weeds grow is not an easy thing to do.  It takes a lot of humility, patience, and trust.  The parable invites us to leave the weeding out to the Master of the Harvest, who will do that in due time.

Here's a Quick Question for you:  "How do you feel about letting your weeds grow alongside your wheat?"

Note:  If you want to read the full text or to see the video, click here (courtesy of the Harvard Magazine online).

Or you may want to watch it here--in three parts.

Today's Readings

Reading today's parable made me recall a story I read somewhere about an emperor and a beggar.  It goes this way:

Once there was an emperor who met a beggar as he was coming out of his palace for his morning walk. He asked the beggar, "What do you want?" 

To the emperor’s surprise, the beggar laughed and said, "You are asking me as though you can fulfill my desire!" 

Of course the emperor was offended. He said, "Of course I can fulfill your desire. What is it? Just tell me, and I will give it to you." 

The beggar said, "Think twice before you promise anything."

Actually, the beggar was no ordinary beggar.  He was a powerful wizard who wanted to teach the emperor an important lesson.

The emperor insisted, "I will fulfill anything you ask. I am a very powerful emperor.  What can you possibly desire that I can not give to you?" 

The beggar said, "It is a very simple desire. You see this begging bowl? Can you fill it with something?" 

The emperor said, "Of course!" He called one of his officials and told him, "Fill this man’s begging bowl with gold coins!"

The official went and got a sack of gold coins and poured them into the bowl.  But to his great surprise, the coins immediately disappeared. He poured more and more coins, but in an instant, every single coin he poured into the bowl disappeared, and the begging bowl remained empty.

The story quickly spread throughout the land, and a huge crowd gathered. The emperor felt that his prestige was at stake. He said to his officials, "Even if the whole kingdom is lost, I am ready to lose it, but I refuse to be defeated by this beggar." 

And so they filled the beggar’s bowl with diamonds and pearls and emeralds, but the begging bowl seemed bottomless.  Just like the gold coins, every diamond and every pearl and every precious tone disappeared as soon as it fell into the bowl.

Finally it was evening, and the palace treasury was now totally empty.  The people stood there in utter silence as the emperor dropped to his knees before the beggar, admitting his defeat.  He told the beggar, "You win, but just tell me one thing before you leave: What is your mysterious bowl made of?  Why does it consume everything and remain empty?" 

The beggar laughed and tossed his bowl, "It is no secret.  The bowl is none other than the human heart--a heart filled with worldly desires. " 

The emperor didn't understand the beggar's words, but the lesson that the beggar was teaching him is quite valuable and universal.  We all of us have that same begging bowl in us because all of us have worldly desires. One minute we want one thing, and the next we want another.  Even if we make sure we get every single thing we fancy, unfortuntately we will still feel empty.  Just like that mysterious begging bowl, our desire can consume everything and yet leave us empty. 

Think about it:  What have you been craving for lately?  Isn’t it the case that if we give in to our desires either we get frustrated because for some reason we don’t get it, or if we do manage to acquire it, our excitement eventually fades away anyway.  Either way our desires leave our hearts empty like the beggar's bowl.

If we keep on yielding to our desires, we only end up feeling empty, and we will remain a beggar all our lives, always wanting something more and something else, never satisfied with what we have.

In today’s parable the Lord compares our heart not to a beggar's bowl, but to a field with a priceless treasure hidden within, a pearl of great price buried deep inside us.  In the parable, a man discovers the buried treasure and decides immediately to sell all that he has to buy the field so that he can own the treasure.  He is never the same again because his discovery has changed him and shaped his life!

I think the point of the parable is that our heart is like this field with the hidden treasure.  In the other story, the beggar's bowl stands for worldly desires that make us crave for everything, but always leave us empty.   And if the field stands for the human heart, then we already have that most precious and most priceless of treasures inside us!   But what is this treasure? 

Our faith tells us that we possess in our hearts a desire that is deeper than any other desire, a desire that will outlast all others.  Philosophers and theologians have called it an "existential desire."  This desire is none other than our desire for God. 

We don’t always feel this desire for God; that’s why it is hidden in our heart. It is buried beneath layers upon layers of other desires. We think we want so many other things aside from God, but actually it is God that we want the most.  Actually, it is our Creator whom we long for with the greatest, most aching need. The only problem is, too often we don’t know it.  You could almost say that most of us are in denial about this.  So we allow our other more superficial worldly desires to run and shape our lives.   Some people's lives end up becoming nothing more than an endless series pursuits of these worldly desires: things—or people—we want to possess, honor and accomplishments, or power over others.

Let's face it:  Our hearts are always looking for something. That's part of the human condition.  U2's 1987 hit song "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" captures this unceasing searching and existential restlessness of the human heart for God.  The song enumerates all the things that the singer has done to find his heart's desire--but despite and after all that, he's still looking.  If we look in the wrong places, our searching can be nothing more than a tragic vicious cycle.

St. Augustine puts it so well:  “Our hearts are restless until they rest in God.”  We run around like headless chickens, pulled--and running--in every possible direction.  But we need only one thing really--except unlike Augustine, we often aren't quite sure what it is we're looking for.

St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit Order whose feast we will celebrate in a few days, puts it another way:  “We have been created to praise, reverence, and serve God.”  In other words, God is "the first without a second."  Only when we discover and claim the treasure hidden inside us—our deepest desire, which is our desire for God—and allow this desire to shape our lives, influence our decisions and actions, will we receive lasting joy and fulfillment.

So here's a Quick Question for you:  "Is your heart more like a beggar’s bowl, always wanting something more and something else, never satisfied with what you have, and therefore somehow always empty?  Or is your heart more like the field with the hidden treasure, a treasure that makes you constantly seek ways to grow closer to the one most valuable thing in our lives--God?"

Think about it, and if you feel up to it, share a thought, a feeling, or a question. Who knows?  Your sharing might help some reader.

Note:  Here is a moving live performance of the song "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" by U2 with--believe it!--Bruce Springsteen.  This was shot during the "Rock and Roll" Hall of Fame Awards.  Or click here to watch the video.  Below the clip are the lyrics of the song.




I STILL HAVEN'T FOUND WHAT I'M LOOKING FOR

I have climbed highest mountain
I have run through the fields
Only to be with you
Only to be with you

I have run
I have crawled
I have scaled these city walls
These city walls
Only to be with you

But I still havent found what Im looking for
But I still havent found what Im looking for

I have kissed honey lips
Felt the healing in her fingertips
It burned like fire
This burning desire

I have spoke with the tongue of angels
I have held the hand of a devil
It was warm in the night
I was cold as a stone

But I still havent found what Im looking for
But I still havent found what Im looking for

I believe in the kingdom come
Then all the colors will bleed into one
Bleed into one
Well yes Im still running

You broke the bonds and you
Loosed the chains
Carried the cross
Of my shame
Of my shame
You know I believed it

But I still havent found what Im looking for
But I still havent found what Im looking for
But I still havent found what Im looking for
But I still havent found what Im looking for...