Makes all things new

How is it that paradoxical contradictions sit one with in the other? They are every where, "out there" and within. For example policemen serve and protect; they also beat people and are often corrupt. Perhaps not the best example. I'll try another one. Religious organizations are a huge source of real charity, service, and spiritual comfort; they are also institutions of destructive divisiveness, subjugation, and cruel condemnation. A similar case could be made for governments. But all of that is too far removed.

This week I got to see a very personal example of paradox in my mother (my little southern lady voice is speaking in my head saying "bless her heart" which has many translations including "can you believe this shit"). So I had a good visit with my mother. It was redemptive, full of grace that shines a new light, and makes all things new. But what does that mean? That language is religious and trite. It means that I changed my mind and I like the new one better, but I needed help to do it. To break that down; I changed my mind. I exerted my will to think different thoughts. I decided to view this part of the paradox more than that part of the paradox. I like the new mind better. It is gentler to me, less sickening to me, and it still resides in truth. I just turn my head a some of the time to take in more of that part of the view and a little less of the other part. But I needed help to do it. That is more difficult to explain without the religious language. In making my decision to change my mind, I asked for help. And I got it from invisible, intangible source that can be called, in religious terminology, the Holy Spirit. When I got help from the invisible, intangible source how did I know that? It feels like falling in love really. Suddenly the other person looks better, more attractive, though not sexually in this context. I'm just making an analogy. Instead of passion you feel compassion. But that is what the holy spirit feels like, like falling in love. Only in this case you fall in love with yourself and with everything. And like falling in love it is not a permanent state, not without constant maintenance. But with constant maintenance it is not only permanent but ever growing.

So the paradox I witnessed this week can be illustrated in a couple of stories. My parents took me, my sister, and my niece (who is a grown up) to Disney world during my visit to Florida. It is a big scary place for me, but I really love the flowers. So it was fine. Mother loves Disney World but hates people as a group, especially foreigners and especially children. Guess what Disney is all about - large groups of people with lots of children and lots of foreigners. Well, mother rides one of those little power scooters around because of obesity and a very bad heart. I got to drive it a couple times; it's fun. But she needs a race track and pit team. She will go about 5 miles an hour through a thick crowd, pushing her horn little button, and yelling at small bewildered children to get out of the street. It is mortifying. I wander off at the sidelines somewhere and pretend I have no idea who that horrible person is. Restaurants are worse, I can't wander off easily. She growled at very small child who coughed as she walked near mother. We were sharing a table with their family. When I requested that she keep her peace, she said the child should be controlled and not cough on her food but mother didn't even have any food. So that is one side of the paradox. There is more to this story.

So we were at home and having a few friends in. A neighbor called and came to visit. the neighbor sat up erect on the sofa and told the group of friends and family effusive stories of how my mother had been an angel to her and her sick husband. How she would not have been able to cope without mothers loving help, bringing meals and coming to their house to cook, helping them find medical care and learn about options, listening and checking in on them. She literally felt that my mother was possessed of an angel spirit and acting as god's hand to her and her family. The woman was beaming. And I have known other friends of hers who had similar feelings toward my mother, similar stories.

How do these two persons reside in the same being? I don't know. Guess it is the same as the daylight and darkness we see in the outer world each day as our planet turns. This daylight and darkness also exists in our inner worlds. I know that I want to live the light as much as I can, and sit quietly with my darkness when it comes. I am trying to learn to sit quietly with the darkness of others. I don't know how we challenge the destructiveness of their darkness without participating in it and exacerbating it, like a storm that darkens the twilight. I do know that light dispels darkness, and that perfect love casts out all fear. That is all I can try for.