Hello on the final holiday weekend of the summer,
As I attended worship this morning, I was blessed to sit with two people who’ve become dear friends to me. While one is my former landlord after I sold the Acre, what I have learned is how incredibly astute he is as a land person, and while quite successful, he never acts arrogant, entitled, or pompous. The other half of the duo is capable in a number of ways, but in her soul, she is a mother through and through. However, while they are extraordinary, I believe they are also simply faithful people, much in the fways that many individuals try to be, living their faith not necessarily on their sleeves, but rather in their simple goodness and through their actions. I have also learned that for one of them, it seems our piety is quite similar. Long-story-short, they have become unparalleled blessings in my life.
While I sat with them listening to the sermon this morning, and thinking about the text in Matthew, that was the morning gospel, Pastor Mohan noted the two Greek words the writer of Matthew uses in this particular text, the first (at least in this text) being σκάνδαλοs (which means sort of trapped) and the second, being the more typical, αμαρτία (which means to fall short of the mark – imagine an arrow falling short of the target). So I was writing both words in my bulletin to remind me. I think about how they overlap with each other. Being trapped is something we can do to ourselves, or it can be done to us, but either way we are not allowed to accomplish what we are able to do. And yet, the idea of being trapped (either self-induced or inflicted) as a sort of sin is interesting and something I need to think more about (perhaps another post). The idea of falling short of the mark is something I understand intimately. And then as I drove home, listening to NPR (and a travel show), I heard the word, circumambulate, which I could figure out from its root words, but I do not ever remember hearing it before. Circumambulation is actually a religious term that is multi-connected to faiths from Christianity to Buddhism or Judaism to Hinduism. It means to walk in a circular way around something. And yet that was not how it was used in the piece I was listening to, it was about how we might return to something again and again, but we never see it the same way. An interesting, but accurate twist on both the word and its imagery. For those unacquainted, if you ever witnessed when the clergy walks around a casket (for instance) and they are incensing the body, they are circumambulating. But what if our entire life is a series of such action or motion?
When I ponder the moments I believe most significant in life consumed by education, certainly the amount of time spent both as a student as well as a professor takes up the majority of my life. And yet is it where I learned the most or what was most important? In terms of cumulative learning, I am sure that period of life on both sides of the blank stare is where I learned the most. In terms of what or when the most profound learning moments occurred, that is a much more difficult thing to ascertain. Certainly in terms of knowledge or expertise, between classes and application, the things learned in the classroom and in the academy were consequential, both in terms of the person I’ve become, both established an incredible core that does a lot when it comes to my understanding the world, others, or myself. And to be sure, it’s provided a good life as well as it allowed me to travel the world in ways that went far beyond what either the service or my initial European experience did. And the many trips to Europe, and particularly Poland have circumabulatory nature, especially when I think about Kraków. Traveling provides an incredible education. I often say after schooling, the best money spent is on travel because it is a cultural enlightening. It teaches us simultaneously about ourselves and how we perceive the world, while allowing us to interact and learn about and from the other. Perhaps one of my former students stated it most appropriately as three of sat at dinner in Kraków one January. When I asked the two of them what the most important thing they learned as we were finishing the month in Central and Eastern Europe, he responded, “I learned that while America is important, we are not as important as we think we are. There is so much that has happened and happens here that matters.” What an amazingly astute observation and realization. He was, and still is, correct.
The ultimate university, if I can refer to it as such is the ability to integrate our experiences, our travels, and our education, our knowledge, our emotions, and our relationships. Perhaps the ultimate university is simply life. It is understanding the circumambulatory nature of our existence, realizing that we are a different person each time we return to something previously experienced, be that a person, a place, or specific event, even though we’ve done it before. The other sort of mistake often made is a belief that everything is manageable. Some things just aren’t. And perhaps some of those things we are incapable of mastering, of passing (if I want to use the university analogy a bit more) are things we believe we fundamentally should be able to accomplish. In a recent conversation with someone, they told be they believed that I was incapable of something many might believe basic to our humanity. I am not sure they are correct, but I am unsure that they aren’t. I will need to search deeply to determine that. I would add that while their assertion was difficult, it was not done in a mean-spirited manner, which makes my consideration all that more important. The conversation, which has been ongoing for a bit, has been both (and with appreciation for that) insightful and cathartic (again hopefully for both). The circling back is significant because it pushes me to come to terms with some of a history that I had not dealt with up to that time. And while the traversing of that has been life long, it’s almost half my life ago I had not managed it. The things done since to do so are not always apparent for those now because they did not know me 30 years ago, and for those on the other side, they have not been around to see who I am now.
What I’ve been doing, in many ways is gathering the notebooks of my life-long classroom and peering into them. The return to those previous recitations, where perhaps I did less than well are necessary. It’s always helpful to know that not everything from the past falls into the “do-over” realm, but there are some rather large failures, to be sure. Perhaps the gift of my ultimate university reality is there is still time to learn, to return and perhaps, to a degree, remedy my failures. That does not erase them, nor completely compensate for them, but hopefully it can ease the pain and hurt of the other. Just possibly, it offers an opportunity to provide a place of peace and comfort where there has been pain and hurt.
Perhaps it might allow my favorite prayer to be heard and felt for those who still have ears and the desire to listen. This prayer was sung at my ordination, which I have noted before. Ironically, today would be the singer’s birthday.
Thank you as always for reading.
Michael
thewritingprofessor55 