Edward Hays ~ Author, Artist & Storyteller
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Patting the Scapegoat

5/29/2013

 

Patting the Scapegoat

One day, a disciple came to the Teacher and asked, "Teacher, I seek perfection and strive daily to avoid all sins of sex, greed, gluttony and anger. Tell me, what is the most dangerous sin?"

The Teacher said, "Let me tell you the story of Adam's confession:

    One day after he had left home in Eden's garden, Adam knelt and looked heavenward and     confessed to God. "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned," he said, tears running down his         cheeks. "I realize now that after Eve and I ate the apple, I passed the buck. Not only did I     disobey you, but I made excuses for my sin and blamed Eve."

    For a long time the response from heaven was silence. Then, a solitary cloud drifted across     the blue sky, and from it came a voice, "You passed the buck? Don't you mean you patted     the goat?" asked God. "You put your sin on the nearest scapegoat you could find. The         sin that wearies me the most is when my children refuse to be responsible for their lives         and behavior. You will never grow up, Adam, you will never become mature, unless you         stop patting the goat. Stand up, my son, your sins are forgiven. Now, go in peace and do     not pat the scapegoat again."

Parable afterthought:

In American slang, to evade responsibility is “To pass the buck.” It may have originated from 18th century American business terminology for the trading of skins. Larger animal skins were called “bucks” and smaller ones “does.” It more likely comes from the 19th century card game of Poker for a silver dollar that was the marker—or “buck”—passed to the next player responsible to deal. President Harry Truman, an avid poker player, kept a sign on his desk: “The buck stops here.” The spiritual master would suggest each of us keep one on ours.

Kindergarten

5/22/2013

 

Kindergarten

Dear old and new friends,

    “Love makes the world go round,” from the popular song written in 1961 by Bob Merrill, should have included the line, “and makes gracious kindness abound.” Unfortunately, contemporary society is facing an increase of rudeness in traffic and checkout lines, along with impoliteness in interpersonal exchanges—all evidence of the erosion of kindness. Aware of this condition, a newscaster interviewing the Dalai Lama asked him, “Your Holiness, how does one cultivate loving kindness?” His Holiness paused thoughtfully and then smiled, “I feel that may be asking too much. What do you say if we just begin by working on getting the kindness part?”

    If you wish to follow this wise advice of His Holiness, begin by restoring old-fashioned thoughtfulness…and then you can upgrade it to “loving” kindness. Our parent-teachers taught us the first lessons in being considerate of others in the family, our neighbors and even strangers. However, early life parental lessons were easily eclipsed when we began to copy the discourteous behavior of peers, and then by the pressures of work and everyday life. If we are to cultivate kindness once again we must go back to kindergarten, pronounced kind-ergarten.

    Kind-ergarten, that mystic soul school teaches how to “correctly tell time” by the use of a clock without hands! Lacking hands and numbers we have to return to telling time by the sun. Sun time is for kids. Sun time is endless leisure. The sun tells “no-clock-crunch-time,” so it is always the “correct time” to be kind to others. Only a couple of sun seconds are required to perform an act of kindness, to allow others to go before you, or to turn and invite someone behind you in line to move up in front.

    Kind-ergarten’s gym soul class strengthens character, develops strong personality muscles and a wholesome love of self, all of which are required as “rudeness is a weak man’s imitation of strength,” said Eric Hoffer. Whenever you’re the victim of rudeness, respond by being kindly sympathetic of the offender’s crippling weakness.

    Kind-ergarten is for kids! Daily remember you are one of God’s kids, and so have inherited loving kindness in your Divine DNA. To be kindhearted is easy—simply allow it to flow out of you naturally.

Discover a New World

5/15/2013

 

Discover a New World

Picture
Dear old and new friends,

    The Alaskan Yupiit Indian people believe in a spirit they call a “Yua” that inhabits everything. And because they believe a Yua enlivens rocks, spruce trees, rivers and fish, as well as humans, they not only interact differently with creation but live in a bigger world than we. If a Yupiit woman comes upon a piece of driftwood on a river bank, she will pick it up and turn it over so its underside can get some fresh air and sun. By this deed she bestows a blessing on the Yua of wood and in return in gratitude she receives a blessing from the wood’s spirit.

    We industrialized people have no such relationship with creation, especially with anything inanimate. We treat our pets with concern and even affection, talking to them as if they understood us. Yet extremely rare if not impossible would be finding anyone who treats the various machines in their lives as they do their pets. The Yupiit interact with creation with respectful concern since they live in the midst of nature. We however live in a manufactured world that dominates the small green islands of living creation in our environment.

    To live a healthy and sane life in our metallic mechanized world it is a challenge to find ways to reconnect with creation, be it only a green plant in a flowerpot. Sadly, we inhabit a very small world shaped—or better deformed—by our human superiority complex and our Christian indoctrination. Feeling threatened by the old lively gods of creation and the powerful spirits of rivers and pools, early Christianity divorced itself from creation. It became an in-door religion of buildings with darkened windows of stained glass to keep out the natural world. It is time for reconciliation, so pray and worship out of door…and befriend creation as a companion that is alive with the Breath of God’s Spirit.

    The Pentecost Festival of the Spirit is approaching. Open yourself to be touched by the Spirit of God imaged as a dove and a mighty whirlwind akin to a Kansas tornado. Do not fear, however, that your world will be turned upside down as was that of believers two thousand years ago. We’ve domesticated the Spirit and keep it in a holy birdcage confident it won’t disturb the “sameness” of our worship and lives. Don’t be too sure! Just as nothing can cage or control a Kansas tornado, so too is the Spirit—the Energy of the Divine Mystery— uncontrollable. As sons and daughters of the Spirit, live with an abiding awareness of that mysterious presence in ourselves and in all of life.

    Become a Discoverer of a New World: Live these coming days like an Alaskan Yupiit and treat all things with reverence and compassion.

I Am...

5/8/2013

 

I Am....

Dear old and new friends,

    Uncertainty about religious belief today has caused an increase of those who identify themselves as nonbelievers, agnostics and atheists. Some Christians objecting to various dogmas of Christianity have created a new non-church identity, “I am follower of Jesus!” One wonders: “A follower of which Jesus…the romanticized stained glass savior or the real Jesus?”

    The scriptural commentator Patricia Sanchez, holder of theological and literature degrees, recently wrote, “Jesus chose to associate with people whom the rest of his contemporaries found reprehensible…Jesus’ manner was so off-putting that many people could not move beyond their repulsion to hear and accept his message. In a word he was a rule-breaker, an iconoclast, and those who follow him with integrity must be the same.”

    I found her last sentence, “…he was a rule-breaker, an iconoclast and those who follow him with integrity must also be the same,” so compelling I keep it before me on my desk. No Bible or sacred images of Jesus show him as a holy image-breaker, zealot, religious saboteur, rebel and a holy terror—all descriptions of an iconoclast. Nor is he ever depicted without a halo as a violator of religious rules and moral codes, a black sheep—a sinner! If you are a follower of Jesus, do either these two descriptions describe you?

    Jesus lived in a deeply religious culture where daily life was regulated by countless commandments and dietary and purification rules he distained to observe. This blatant disregard for religious rules and societal codes in the eyes of his law-biding culture made him a sinner! In fact, he was a notorious public sinner who audaciously enjoyed eating and drinking with religious outcasts and prostitutes. Outlaw Jesus didn’t rob banks—he just lived out-side-laws. He ignored as obsolete any that he judged incompatible with his great law of love. He didn’t break laws, he simply ignored those he believed no longer applied or whose observance was a burden.

    Which of the Bible’s God-given ancient laws today would the Black Sheep Jesus dismiss with a wave of his hand as obsolete, and so invalid? What regulations of Christian churches concerning whom one can or can’t marry, or attending church every Sunday as the law requires, or those about alcohol or dancing, do you think he would likewise dismiss today as being contrary to the freedom of the sons and daughters of God?

    If asked if you are a follower of Jesus, how many would reply, “Well, I’m definitely no follower of a reprobate breaker of rules, especially of laws in the Bible! I faithfully observe every Sunday the rule to attend church, keep all the Commandments and church rules, read the bible, and tithe as a faithful (choose one of following): Presbyterian / Methodist / Roman Catholic / Episcopalian / Baptist / Other Christian.

You-all

5/1/2013

 

You-all

Dear old and new friends,

    The old Irish marriage proposal, “How would you like to be buried with my people,” reflects pride in one’s family and its significance in life. Family gifts to each of us an identity, the security of belonging and the most ancient of insurance policies in needy times. Be proud that you are a branch on your family tree that is larger than a 330-foot California Sequoia! An anonymous poet used an old southern expression to tell of the enormous size of your family.

                “You-all means a race or section,
                 family, party, tribe or clan;
                 You-all means the whole connection
                 of the individual man.”

    The “whole connection” includes kissing cousins and Dutch uncles who aren’t blood relatives but being dear friends become family. Let’s say for an important event you desired to host all your living relatives at a grand dinner—how many would have to be invited and could you locate all of them? Being a nation of immigrants, few of us can name family members beyond Second or Third Cousins or maybe a couple First or Second Cousins once removed. Our original immigrants and their children moved several times, and often to distant places, so each of us surely has unknown living family relatives. But how many?

    At least one million! According to geneticist scholars we each have that many family members as close as a Tenth Cousin! Image a million relatives! Weekly news reports some horrible disaster, train wreck or massive fire in our country. To put flesh on that catastrophe glaring across the full color image of it on television, see this line: “A member of your family is among the dead or injured!” When a panhandler approaches, look into his eyes and think, “Are you my Third Cousin once removed?”

    Globally our hereditary realities are even more staggering as geneticists also say no person on this earth is any further removed from you than your Fiftieth Cousin!   

    Consider the double-edged sword impact of such seeming unimportant genetic facts. First, if you were lovingly respectful, patient and unconditionally accepting of everyone you-all encountered, how dramatically changed would be your world. Second, if you were lovingly respected and unconditionally accepted by all those who came into contact with you, how deeply changed you-all would be!


    Edward Hays


    Picture
    Haysian haphazard thoughts on the
    invisible and visible mysteries of life.

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