Alan Imberg

So much has happened this month. Multiple murders at the hands of The Proud Boys…er… ICE. Journalists arrested, civil liberties trampled, our “leader” behaving belligerently, children being victimized by government agents and used as bait. It all makes me feel spiritually dry, hopeless, ashamed, saddened, ANGRY!

I struggle to live the words that so many of my spiritual guides teach. Love my enemy (Jesus), have unconditional good-will to all (Buddha), be an instrument of peace (Francis of Assisi). It all feels incredibly unattainable. I want to follow the examples set by all the spiritual leaders and thinkers I have spent years learning and admiring. But it all becomes so unreachable when I see, as an example, Stephen Miller, The White House Deputy Chief of Staff, telling obvious lies with a smug bitterness that makes me want to act violently. I find it impossible to have any love towards the man who is largely responsible for unleashing of the present government-sanctioned racist violence. I genuinely despise this man and his boss.

I can feel that anger eating at me, taking away any peace. Despair and anger exhaust me.

BUT…..

I’m reminded that I alone will only have despair and anger in the face of such negativity, that I need help. This is the message Jesus said about loving the enemy when he predicated all he did with prayer, that it was prayer that provided the means to love the enemy. And the Buddha reached the understanding of METTA after much error and reflection. And St. Francis didn’t just become an instrument of peace. He prayed to become that instrument. And that is where, when I find myself so spiritually dry and brittle, I realize I can’t do anything good or noble on my own. I need to foster that spiritual connection. And when I do, I’m less angry at Stephen Miller, Donald Trump, and the rest of the people currently causing so much pain and fear. That is not to say I’m ready to love them yet. I’m not a saint. But I see the connection between a spiritual relationship in the form of prayer and meditation with a Higher Power and the hard work of agape. That, in fact, is what makes Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. so remarkable in my eyes.

SO…..

I’m reminded that, when I feel so spiritually dry, I need prayer and meditation for guidance, strength, courage, and love. In the words of St. Francis of Assisi:

“Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.
O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.”

AMEN!!!!!