Dear old and new friends,

      In our last reflection we proposed jettisoning our fears of yesterday that we carry in our backpacks into this new year 2016, even the really old ones, relics of our cave dwelling years. It is important as we begin to consider how in the process of getting rid of fears we acknowledge some of them are valid, healthy and should be respected, say like our ancient fear of lightning.

     If you have fears preventing your full enjoyment of life, naturally you ask how to liberate yourself of them? The eminent psychiatrist Karl Menninger said once, “Fears are educated into us and can, if we wish, be educated out.” Each of us is different and we’ve had different fear educations, but our commonly educated fears are snakes (yet only a few species are poisonous), people who have different color skin than ours and strangers. Politicians aware of these embedded learned fears use them to encourage fear laden prejudice against aliens and those with black or brown skins. The Church also is a teacher that instills fearful intolerance of those of different sexual orientations.

     Among the fears we lug along with us in our human backpack are relics, prehistoric ones. No one educated us to be afraid of the dark. That is tattooed in us from the time when wild animals lurked outside the circle of fire of our ancestors. A dark bedroom when we were small and defenseless was terrifying since it hid all kinds of imaginary monsters. And after we can sleep peacefully in darkness without a small light, that old fear is resurrected as natural and healthy when at night we walk alone down a darkened street. A fear of one age should be educated out of us, while later in life it needs to be preserved in another life situation. Gun merchants make a very good living off fears of dark skinned African Americans and Hispanics, and fears of strangers.

     As Dr. Menninger wisely said, with our fears educated into us by parents, politicians and merchants selling all kinds of security devises, we can “if we wish” become our own teacher and educate ourselves out of them. Astute, wise Menninger knew we can unconsciously be afraid not to be afraid…which is to be liberated! The wise teacher of Nazareth Jesus is called a savior, which is a liberator, who taught freedom from fears by challenging us not to fear but to love what we fear.

     Actually, you and I have been self-teachers since we were children. At an early age we self-learned that fire can burn and be painful, and in our later teens to wisely take only calculated risks since some risks were stupid and could be lethal. And now regardless our age we must teach ourselves to discard negative, opposed to the fullness of life, fears. But how? A good student listens to the teacher and wishes to learn.

     So listen and respond to the voices of fears admonishing and scolding you. Teach yourself to talk back when an anxious voice urges you not to do something; disobey it, contradict it and “do whatever it is.” Education needs to be repetitious, so your corrective voice must be repeated, repeated and repeated until it is no longer necessary. This emptying of the mind is an inner resource of peace to deal with fears.

     The oldest way of teaching was telling stories, and this one is from ancient Japan:

     In the end of the 17th century Lord Yama-ro-tuchi went on an official trip and took with him his tea master, a renowned instructor in the art of tea. They stayed at a royal villa, and one day Lord Yama-ro-tuchi urged him to go for some sightseeing, and the tea master departed attired as a samurai with two swords. While on his way he came upon seated on a large stone a muscular Ronin (a samurai who has lost his attachment to a lord and often lived by robbery) who said, “Seeing you are a samurai, I would consider it an honor if we engaged together in sword play.”

     The tea master was fearful and didn’t know what to do, saying, “I am a tea master only dressed as a samurai, and am completely unfamiliar with swordsmanship.” The Ronin grinned, as his real motive was to rob this traveler. The heart of the tea master was flooded with the fear of finding it impossible to escape and not wishing to die an ignominious death that would shame his Lord. Suddenly, he remembered that shortly before he had come upon this large Ronin he had passed a swordsman training school near Uyeno. Instantly he decided to return there to learn how to honorably die, and said, “If you insist, we will engage in swordsmanship, but first I must attend to an errand for my master. I will come back here, but please allow me the time for this duty.”

      The Zen master at the training school listened to the story of the tea master and was impressed he wanted to die an honorable death, and said, “I will teach you, but first may I have a cup of your tea?” The tea master was pleased, and entered into the elaborate ceremony of the tea ritual forgetting all about his approaching tragedy. The Zen sword master suddenly cried out, “You have no need to learn the art of death! Your state of mind you presently have is sufficient for you to cope with that despicable Ronin. All you must do is what you’ve done here in the tea ceremony.”

     Returning to the brawny Ronin he apologized for the delay, and then began to repeat his tea ritual. He calmly took off his outer coat, tranquilly tied his sleeves with a string and gathered up his skirt. Then with serenity drew his sword and raised it high over his head. At this incompressible peaceful behavior of a once timid tea master, the Ronin robber dropped to the ground and begged his pardon before jumping up and fleeing away.

Dear old and new friends,
 
     If a cosmic stranger from another solar system visited Planet Earth this coming weekend of October 31st, he/she or it might surmise Earth folk were celebrating some kind of a Festival of Fear. Stores and homes are decked out with a variety of scary images of death, flying witches and bats. Children and adults parade around dressed up in frightening masks and costumes. But far from being afraid, all seem to be having fun.
 
     Halloween is a fun holiday, but those fears haunting many aren’t funny! Halloween—the Eve of All Hallows, all holy ones—challenges us to live the words the angel Gabriel spoke to Mary, “Do not be afraid”; the same words often used by Jesus of Nazareth. The admonition to “fear not” appears over and over in Christian scriptures! If you repeat those affirming words aloud to yourself daily as your morning prayer, imagine the consequences!
 
     Being afraid (something adults are ashamed to admit) can be attached to a particular threat…some authoritarian person, snakes, flying, growing old, the dark, being a failure, or that most common fear of having to stand up alone and speak to a large audience. Fears can come and go as we move from one age to another, or grow into toxic worry.
 
     As a Catholic looking back at my youth, I believe I suffered from the disease of Toxic Worry. The psychiatrist Edward Hallowell (and no, that’s not a play on Halloween) describes it as a disease of the imagination that is insidious and invisible like a virus that worms its way into your consciousness where it actually dominates your life. Toxic worry shrinks your enjoyment of life, cripples your creativity and your ability to love. I picked up the virus of this disease from the Baltimore Catechism and its moral teachings. Back in those days I feared the occasions of sin, and that could include motion pictures, magazine photos, your thoughts, meat on Friday, even your friends, it seemed. Really, just about anything.
 
     The toxic (meaning poisonous) worry like all infections spreads to life itself, and while it continues to involve religion, it moves beyond it to anxiety about yourself and how you appeared to others, your popularity, your failures or successes. Marvelously miraculous is the human body in its self-healing abilities to mend wounds, and so too the mind which, with maturity, causes some fears to disappear. However, there can be those deeply embedded fears that remain. I was fortunate to find a mentor who helped me resolve my toxic worry by simply having me meditate on these liberating words: “Perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment, and so one who fears is not yet perfect in love.” (1 John 4:18)
 
     So if you are burdened with some fear, I suggest you slowly love and accept whatever worries you, along with all of life’s problems and threats. Strive to truly love yourself; all your body, your mind, talents and inabilities, blunders and attainments, as you daily pray with zeal, “Do not be afraid!”

Dear old and new friends,

     Less than a week ago at your front door monsters appeared; actually small children in scary disguises. This reflection is about the real monsters hidden away in your closet. Everyone has at least one or two closeted fearful monsters. In 1891 electric lights were first installed in the White House and by 1921 President Harding and his wife were still afraid to use the wall light switches lest they be seriously electrically shocked—or worse. Many of their servants felt the same, so one White House domestic servant was chosen to perform that hazardous task. There’s a story that one evening this appointed light switch servant happened to be away, resulting in the White House’s electric lights being left blazing all night.

     A paradoxical fear is the reason that in countless children’s bedrooms a light is left on all night because of a fear of the darkness. That dread of the dark and the unknown dangers lurking in it continues into adulthood. Of what are you afraid? Don’t rush to answer…rather stop here and pause to seriously seek the answer to that question. While snakes, public speaking, insects, homegrown Islamic terrorists, flying, brain cancer and even change are possible answers, what do you fear the most?

     Whatever is your greatest fear, don’t evade it but face it directly. Picture it clearly with its painful consequences, and how you would deal with them until you are able to manage that fear as something you can live with without being frightened. Jesus, encouraging a life of trusting, frequently admonished, “Do not be afraid.” As a faithful disciple you might say you’re not afraid of anything. That is a pious response but not a good answer since your survival necessitates being afraid of such things as poisonous snakes.

     An essential part of a Zen Samurai warrior training is overcoming the fear of death, and connected to that training comes one of my very favorite stories:

Once there was an infamous Japanese warlord and his army who were terrorizing a mountain region of small villages that included a Zen monastery. Upon hearing this notorious warlord and his rampaging soldiers were approaching the monastery all the monks fled into the mountains…except the Abbot. When the warlord arrived at the Zen monastery’s gates they stood wide open, so he boldly stalked alone into the deserted courtyard.

At the far end was the temple and at the top of its steps stood the old abbot with his arms folded as the warlord in full armor and with his hand gripping the handle of his large Samurai sword stomped across the courtyard to him. At the foot of the steps, he stopped, and snarled, “Do you know you are looking at a man who without batting an eye could run you through with his sword?”

The old Zen Abbot bowed slightly and replied smiling, “Do you know that you are looking at a man who could be run through with your sword without batting an eye?” The warlord bowed deeply, and then slowly backed out of the courtyard since he had come face to face with a man who wasn't afraid to die.

Dear old and new friends,

    The Chinese holy man Chuang Tzu tells a parable about an Emperor who sent a fighting rooster to be trained by a famous old fighting master. After two months, a court envoy arrived asking, “Is the Emperor’s bird ready?” “No,” replied the white-haired trainer. “He is fiery, wants to fight every bird he sees, but he’s not ready…come back later.” Three months pass, again an envoy came asking, “The Emperor enquires: Is not his bird finally ready? The old master replied, “Not yet! If he hears another cock crow, he flares up and ruffles his feathers threatening, but he’s not ready. Come back later.”

    Four months pass and the envoy comes again saying, “The Emperor is growing impatient, isn’t his fighting cock ready?” “Almost ready,” answers the old trainer, “yet he still gets furiously angry around other roosters. No, he isn’t ready, come back in ten days.” Ten days later, the Emperor himself comes. The old cock trainer makes a profound bow before him as he demands, “Is my bird finally ready?” Arising from his deep bow, the old cock master smiles, “Yes, now he is ready. When another bird crows loudly he doesn’t blink and stands still as if made of stone. Now when he walks into the yard the other birds take one look at him and run.”

    Chuang Tzu’s parable reminds me of the words of President Roosevelt’s wife about the silent strength and courage the Emperor’s fighting cock obtained.  Eleanor Roosevelt said, “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face…You (then) must do the thing you cannot do!” Whenever afraid, resist shying away from what is so frightening, and muster the courage to look what is feared directly in the face. Living in a country of reoccurring senseless gun violence asks the question: If you are unfortunately involved in the next massacre are you ready?

    Each week we hear of another horrendous shooting at a school or shopping mall. When as a nation we do nothing to stop or prevent this gun carnage, don’t we logically live in a country where anyone of us could be among the next victims? We must train ourselves to look that fear directly in the face again and again until we are ready. The United States doesn’t have more mentally disturbed citizens than other countries but it does permit the easy purchase of unlimited guns and ammunition. Countrywide gun violence and public killings creates dark anxiety about our personal and domestic security resulting in stores, aided by the gun industry’s propaganda, being busy selling guns to defend oneself and one’s home.

    When face to face with danger, instead of resorting to weapons or physical strength, Chuang Tzu teaches us to learn how to become inwardly strong and confident. Eleanor Roosevelt adds we should look whatever is frightening directly in the face again and again until we are ready to do the thing we think we cannot do.

Dear old and new friends,

    A friend gave me the book Staring at the Sun by Dr. Irvin Yalom, a psychiatrist who wrote about our lustful craving to revere a great man or woman or to become the disciple of some master or mentor. He relates the extraordinary reverence paid to the Dalai Lama when he spoke in 2005 at Stanford University. Yalom wrote of watching as eminent professors, deans, even Nobel-level scientists, all rushed forward like schoolchildren to bow before the Tibetan Lama and call him “Your Holiness.” He then quotes Erich Fromm’s Escape from Freedom who wrote about “the lust for submission,” which is the stuff, says Yalom, from which religion emerges.

    Erich Fromm’s words inspired me to recall when I first tasted the lust for submission which was in college with my deference to those who possessed a superior intellect, be they classmates or brilliant professors. My lust to be deferential was heightened in the presence of bishops and archbishops of the Church’s hierarchy. While I never personally met a pope, I fanaticized kneeling to kiss his ring and addressing him “Your Holiness”—and being able to boast this rarest of events to others. The adoration of a fan’s (short for fanatic) fascination of stars from television, movies and sports, and even in politics, is another form of that lust.

    Irvin Yalom’s accusation that the yearning to be subservient was “the stuff of religion,” drove me to explore honestly my own religion. The personal rituals in my Catholic religion of hushed silence in church and genuflecting and kneeling for prayer and worship, I had considered signs of reverence, not subjugation. But scrutiny of prayers like “O Lord, I am not worthy” and “Lord have mercy on me for I have sinned against you” I came to see as verbal confirmations of submissiveness of those rituals.

    Fear is the evil root of any acquiescence, fit for slaves but not lovers of a compassionate and beloved God. The Galilean Teacher radically somersaulted society’s values both then and today by calling his followers to be lovingly submissive to other’s needs. By his words and the servile washing of his companion’s feet he taught his community was not to lust for any kind of hierarchical structure. When it came to disciples, the unspoken desire of Jesus was expressed well by Gandhi: “I don’t want disciples or followers, just fellow seekers of the truth.”

    An ancient Hindu proverb says, “A person consists of his faith. Whatever is one’s faith, even so is he or she.” Be a seeker of the truth! Examine honestly your religion, church or faith to see if it has infected you with a lust to be submissive to the powerful. If so, then cleanse every bit of it out of yourself. As for any urge to cleanse it from your religion—don’t! That’s God’s business, not yours!

A good New Year’s resolution (in case you’ve procrastinated) that can also be your morning prayer are these words of Mohandas Gandhi:

        Let the first act of every morning be to make
        the following resolve for the day:

        I shall not fear anyone on earth.
        I shall fear only God.
        I shall not bear ill will toward anyone.
        I shall not submit to injustice from anyone.
        I shall conquer untruth by truth. And in resisting untruth,
        I shall put up with all suffering.

Those words about not fearing anyone are jarring since they imply the question, “Do I fear anyone?” Beginning in childhood we feared authority figures such as our parents, teachers or coaches. As small children we longed for their approval, feared their punishment or displeasing them. As adolescents, we entered into a compulsory civil war with our parents for our independence, while struggling to be loving and obedient yet simultaneously somehow our own masters.

At each escalation to a new stage in life that old deeply ingrained childhood fear resurfaced. It needled us when we had to relate to bosses who behave as our masters expecting we kowtow, grovel and cringe before them. That ordinary title “boss,” however unknowingly, hides our deepest fears of domination. Early and democratic Americans detested the title of “master” because of its aristocratic and slave owner’s implications. So in the late 18th century they began using the Dutch word “Baas,” which meant master but lacked the offensive implications, and pronounced it, “Boss.”

Interestingly, authoritarian persons in the Catholic Church adopted parental titles like Holy Father, Reverend Father and Reverend Mother. While these imply caring parental relationships, they had deep roots associated unconsciously to childhood parental submission and early fears of displeasing.

Gandhi’s third resolution, “I shall not bear ill will toward anyone,” follows logically upon the first. Adults, even adolescence adults, easily resent those who exercise power and mastery over them. Resentment festers quickly into anger and repugnance either suppressed or expressed.

What is a mature positive attitude towards anyone in authority? Because of the hidden heavy burden of responsibilities they carry, deliberately substitute instead of fear a genuine sense of respect, even esteem, for them. Respect them but never kowtow to them.