The Pomegranates - Everybody Come Outside

my good friends, the pomegranates, have just released their second full length album, everybody come outside. go and check it out. they lived in the brown house for a little while, they even have a song named after one of our dogs, who recently passed. check out their new album and try and make it out to see them in a city near you. great music and even better guys.

A Transformation That Continues

About four years ago I worked for a fairly wealthy aspiring mega church. At the time, I was also living in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Cincinnati. I would wake up every morning and see my next door neighbor on her way to the bus stop for work to support her three kids and her daughters two kids. I would then drive to the church I worked for and see extremely expensive cars and our youth room with 6 video game systems. It was at this time that I was learning more about Jesus and his concern for the poor. I eventually came to a decision to leave the church.

When I left the church, I was extremely cynical of the church, its members, and all other churches and members similar. It was not a great place to be, but I feel with the clash of cultures and teachings, something that is bound to happen. After a while of constant cynicism and negativity, I was shown a documentary called Another World is Possible. Part of the documentary was the clip above, with Aaron Weiss from mewithoutYou. The video struck me. Where he was before moving into The Simple Way and his attitude and outlook afterward was the beginning of a change for me.

Instead of blaming others, I should just "work on the plank in my own eye" and attempt to live the Kingdom of God the best I can and hope others will see that and follow. That video along with a great community, Vineyard Central, and the grace of God has helped me come a long way. There are times where I still struggle with cynicism and negativity, but as times I feel its ok to be what Rob Bell calls "beautifully angry." What the real challenge it my response to what makes me beautifully angry. I will end with what Thomas Merton says in his prayer, "The fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that my desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope that I have that desire in all that I am doing."

Lent: 40 Days of Water

From the beginning, this has been the hallmark of the Christian community, in which special collections were taken up, the faithful being invited to give to the poor what had been set aside from their fast. This practice needs to be rediscovered and encouraged again in our day, especially during the liturgical season of Lent.
-Pope Benedict XVI

Lent is a season in which Christians participate in three practices: prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, to prepare for the celebration of Easter. A lot of the time, there is a focus on what each one of us is giving up. Whether it be chocolate or fast food or television, the question has always been asked, "What are you giving up for Lent?" Fasting is an extremely important part of the journey toward Easter, the Pope gave his Lenten Message on the topic of fasting. As he mentions in his message, I feel that what you do with the extra money or time is the part that is key and often forgotten about when it comes to fasting. It is tradition that if you give up chocolate for Lent, the money you would have spent on that chocolate is to be giving to the poor. Last year for Lent I gave up fast food. Instead, I spent my money ordering pizza, which I considered not fast food because the pizza places did not have a drive-thru. I don't think that is the intention of fasting.

An organization called Blood Water Mission has challenged and encouraged people to participate in the oft forgotten Lenten practice of almsgiving. They have started 40 Days of Water. They are encouraging people to giving up drinking everything but water and to donate the money they save to help build wells to provide clean water for African communities. Many communities that are freed from disease and inequality caused by unsafe water are taking ownership of their own health and working together to battle poverty, inequality and AIDS.

I have been encouraged and challenged this Lenten season to take the three practices more seriously. I hoping that my attempt this year will have better end results for all. peace and all good.

God is...

What a relief it was for me, now to discover not only that no idea of ours, let alone any image, could adequately represent God, but also that we should not allow ourselves to be satisfied with any such knowledge of Him.
-Thomas Merton

God is a very fascinating, but at the same time, a very frustrating being. I am the type of person who needs an explanation. I like to ask why. God is the one topic that has questions with no answers, or at least answers we can't understand or explain or even comprehend. It is a relief, but also exciting and intriguing to know that nothing we can imagine or think up can fully encompass God. Yes, God is the Father, the creator, love, etc. He is all those things and...

In his book, The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American Pilgrimage, Paul Elie says of Merton, "He got a sense of God as living reality, existing beyond all human approximations..."

We can't fully grasp God. As soon as you have a full understand of who or what God is, he is no longer God.

*Thomas Merton photo courtesy of Alan Creech.

Easy Essay

The world would be better off
if people tried to become better.
And people would become better
if they stopped trying to become
better off.
For when everyone tries to
become better off,
nobody is better off.
But when everybody tries to
become better, everybody is better off.
Everybody would be rich
if nobody tried to become richer.
And nobody would be poor
if everybody tried to be poorest.
And everybody would be
what he ought to be
if everybody tried to be
what he wants the other fellow to be.
-Peter Maurin

Peter Maurin was the co-founder of the Catholic Worker movement. Maurin had a goal to create "a society where it was easier for people to be good" with 3 aspects: clarification of thought via open meetings with encouraged sharing their views, houses of hospitality for the poor, and farming communes which would enable people to get back to the land.

Maurin's idea/dream is one that I share. Although, being one who is not overly excited about manual labor, I wonder if I share this dream in theory only. The idea of offering hospitality to the stranger on a self sufficient farm is very exciting. I long for the simplicity that I associate with living on a farm and I need the community that would be present and necessary in offering hospitality and conversation sharing.

Being Lent, I have given up things that make my life more complicated, busy and that distract me from the simplicity of every day life, that distract me from the stranger in need of hospitality, the conversations to be had, and from God. I hope Lent is a time of growth for me spiritually and a time to become more disciplined in my every day life.

The Monastery

Below is a video about five guys who spent six weeks at a monastery in England. Its a pretty cool documentary.

On a similar topic, check out, A monk's life... but just until Monday. This a fascinating article about the current state of monasteries all around the world. Enjoy.