[ChatAction] Fwd: Richard Rohr Meditation: A Hopeful Story
Karen Ball
bluebonnetkaren at gmail.com
Tue Jan 12 08:44:09 MST 2021
The quote at the beginning of this reflection is from Karen Armstrong, the
theologian who won a TEDx prize to create the Charter for Compassion.
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Center for Action and Contemplation <Meditations at cac.org>
Date: Tue, Jan 12, 2021 at 1:19 AM
Subject: Richard Rohr Meditation: A Hopeful Story
To: Karen Ball <bluebonnetkaren at gmail.com>
In these dangerous times, our whole planet now needs more than ever a good
story to live in and to live by.
No images? Click here <https://email.cac.org/t/d-e-cuykhe-tlkrdyjydy-q/>
Tuesday, January 12th, 2021
Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation
>From the Center for Action and Contemplation
[image: Image credit: Tree Trunks near Hermitage, Gethsemani (detail),
Photograph by Thomas Merton, copyright the Merton Legacy Trust and the
Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine University. Used with Permission.]
Week Two: A New Story
A Hopeful Story
*Human beings fall easily into despair, and from the very beginning we
invented stories that enabled us to place our lives in a larger setting,
that revealed an underlying pattern, and gave us a sense that . . . life
had meaning and value. . . . [Story] is not about opting out of this world,
but about enabling us to live more intensely within it. *—Karen Armstrong, *A
Short History of Myth*
*Nearly two decades ago, Brian McLaren began urging Christians to embrace a
more healing, compassionate story by which to live. His words are just as
relevant today: *
In these dangerous times, our whole planet now needs more than ever a good
story to live in and to live by. There are a number of stories competing
for the hearts and imaginations of humanity as we emerge together into this
new century and millennium: the regressive stories of fundamentalist Islam
and fundamentalist Christianity, or the progressive stories of secular
“scientism” or American consumerism, for example. Once taken to the heart
of human culture, each of these stories will produce its own kind of world.
. . . The story we believe and live in today has a lot to do with the world
we create for our children, our grandchildren, and our descendants one
hundred thousand years from now (if?). [1]
*I have to admit that twenty years ago most of us probably thought a
hundred thousand years of human thriving sounded likely, but I’m afraid
that it sounds almost fanciful to many of us today. Great and hopeful
thinkers like Brian, Joanna Macy, Brian Swimme, Mary Evelyn Tucker, Ilia
Delio and others give us the faith, scientific understanding, and courage
to continue to do our small part. In one of his more recent books, Brian
writes with his friend Gareth Higgins about a “Seventh Story.” It is a
cosmic and all-inclusive story which, if believed and lived out, leads to a
very different future, one of healing instead of conflict. *
Around the margins, another narrative has been taking shape during these
most recent moments of . . . history. In this narrative, humans envision
learning to live in harmony with one another and with the boundary
conditions (or laws) of nature. We imagine seeing all our fellow humans—and
all living things—as part of one family of relations, sharing in the same
unfolding story or song of creation. We imagine ourselves creating
conditions in which peace and well-being are not only possible but normal,
and in which inevitable conflicts can be resolved through justice,
kindness, wisdom, and love. . . .
As the amazing 13.8 billion-year story of the cosmos continues to unfold,
in this little corner of the universe, we hope to tell a story of justice
and joy, love and peace, for the benefit of future generations who will be
born into the story that there is no [us and] them at all. [2] This is a
cosmic and inclusive story that demands healing more than punishment.
[1] Brian D. McLaren, *The Story We Find Ourselves in: Further Adventures
of a New Kind of Christian* (Jossey-Bass: 2003), xiv.
[2] Brian D. McLaren and Gareth Higgins, *The Seventh Story: Us, Them, &
the End of Violence* (Porch: 2018), 163–164.
Image credit: *Tree Trunks near Hermitage, Gethsemani* (detail), Photograph
by Thomas Merton, copyright the Merton Legacy Trust and the Thomas Merton
Center at Bellarmine University. Used with Permission.
*We can't always see the ways trees are in relationship because their
complex world of roots lives underground. We, the human family, are also
inextricably interconnected.*
*Prayer For Our Community*
*Loving God, you fill all things with a fullness and hope that we can never
comprehend. Thank you for leading us into a time where more of reality is
being unveiled. . . *
Read the full prayer and listen to Father Richard pray it aloud.
<https://email.cac.org/t/d-l-cuykhe-tlkrdyjydy-r/>
*Story From Our Community*
*My brother connected me to the [Daily] meditations five years ago when my
world had fallen apart. By 50 I had experienced great loss, including the
deaths of two children. These meditations have helped me make God-sense
again in my broken life. Thank you to Fr. Richard and the team for your
generous, wise, encouraging and inclusive words. They bring me back again
and again to that quiet place in God’s lap, meditating in whatever form.*
—Liz C.
Share your own story with us.
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How do you reignite purpose and meaning in your contemplative
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*Study The Franciscan Way*
What happens when you start to question the dominant story of your faith
tradition? Explore the Franciscan Alternative Orthodoxy with Richard Rohr
and like-minded souls all over the world. Discover how the teachings of St.
Francis can reconnect you to your calling as a loving steward of creation.
Registration for our online course The Franciscan Way
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Explore Richard Rohr's Daily Meditations archive at cac.org
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