my faith | reverse threading

we sometimes forget.

as close as we are, as much of a presence it is for us, we sometimes forget that this giant lake is right there.

we walk along it, we drive past, we linger – staring at it. but we still forget the magnitude of lake michigan, its oft-seemingly-own weather pattern, the big-water force it has on us.

i’ve never not lived near water, big water. my growing-up town on long island is between the atlantic ocean and the long island sound. i lived in florida a hop, skip and a jump to the gulf of mexico. on island we were right on water’s edge on the lake michigan side. and here – a block or so off the lake. i don’t know what it is like to live in an area that doesn’t have big water, that’s land-locked. i suspect i could find it difficult. so, near or on a lake will have to be the future minimum standard. somehow, big water all makes me feel closer to the far horizon, closer to the universe, closer to a two-way with god.

valerie bertinelli in her book enough already wrote, “i [] had long since lapsed in terms of structured religion. but i [] had develop[ed] a recipe for my own spiritual soup. it still included a belief in god, a higher power who accepted collect calls in emergencies.”

i, too, have lapsed in terms of structured religion and i, too, have my own spiritual soup. after thirty-five years of working for churches plus all the rest of being at churches, i have had enough of it all. i realize now that my last church job did me a favor when they fired me. they broke the continuity, making it possible to NOT do that which seems obvious TO do. i am grateful. it was a long time and i endured much at churches that you would likely rather not know. it was time to stop.

but my faith has not stopped. and as i stood at the edge of the sound a couple times in last months, as i stand at the edge of our lake michigan, i can feel the tidal strength of the universe. i can feel the days sink into nights into days into nights. i can start to understand the stars and the vast-ness. i can feel the connection to that which is so much bigger than me.

maybe that is what big water does for me: a place that brings the divine closer, just across the waves, just beyond the shore, just brushing the sand and leaving shells and rocks in its wake, just right here for me. a place to gaze and stare, a place to ponder and pray.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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he wrote, “that building is not God.”* (john pavlovitz)

the light lit up the sky, a golden glow in a fog toward the heavens. it is one of the chicago botanic garden’s iconic displays, this tunnel of light, begging you to look up, be wrapped in its light, acknowledge the goose bumps. the luminous winter cathedral drawing people toward it. they stood, marveling, they strolled slowly, they posed for photographs, the millions of starry twinkling lights enveloping all.

i’m not much for cathedrals, really. i never have been; it’s nothing new. while i can appreciate their stunning beauty and the incredible feat it often took to build or install, they have never brought me closer to faith than any other place…outside, in the presence of others, at the piano, alone in wonder.

in my life – and in three and a half decades of my work life – i have found churches to not only house beauty. i have found churches to also house ugly. and so, i was relieved to read the words of john pavlovitz. it is important to distinguish the difference – the building is not God. and, sometimes, the best place to find the supreme deity you are seeking – no matter the name, no matter the denomination or affiliation, no matter the book of written word – is not in a place, not in a building.

the people – so many gathered there – under the arch of the winter cathedral seemed softer. the glow of light on their faces, they moved slower, offered to photograph others, gazed up. just as a community of people in a church often do, they seemed to come together, one of the benefits of “the building”. but, as i have found time and again – and, if we are to speak truth – those benefits sometimes run out. and people within become consumed by that which would never be considered a basic tenet of faith – the hypocrisies of power and control and discrimination and subjugation and competition, toxic things that “[don’t] feel like Love anymore”*.

as i walked under the night sky i knew that the cathedral would be close to the last installation on the guided path. i steeled myself for its overtones, even with its undeniable beauty.

we stood back and watched people enter it. in awe. it is truly glorious.

we approached and there was this tiny voice inside my head naysaying “church” to the other tiny voice exclaiming “wow”. both.

yet ethereal was there and it shone down on us as we walked through to the other side. and then we were once again under a night sky, full of stars we could see and stars we couldn’t see. just like faith.

“you are fully freed to run into the wide open spaces of this world, and to experience life and faith and beauty in ways you never thought possible…”*

*****