Keene’s Kwikies

El Rio de Dios
A Baptismal Meditation
1/9/11

West of the Texas town of Del Rio a great river cuts through the massive barren and beautiful wilderness.  The land is a desert of rocks and cactus and scrub brush which can endure the glaring heat and searing dryness.  Lizards and rattlesnakes—and an occasional jackrabbit—are most abundant here.  Some say that small deer live in the area but, like phantoms, they are rarely seen.  It is a quiet place, speaking only the wind—the breath of God—and scratchings of something skittering across the sand.  Against a blue sky the predominant color is brown, except when the sparse rain adorns the land with orange, yellow, and purple jewels of prickly pear.

A valley winds quietly through this wilderness.  Hidden to the uninitiated eye, it can be reached only by those who know the way, who can navigate the wilderness.  The Great River runs, and by choices other than its own separates North from South, Smith from Vasquez, those who have from those who do not have.  Yet to the river, this is but a temporary arrangement.  It ran in the days before this division; it will run when the current boundary exists no longer.

To ride the river is to enter a different realm of time.  Wristwatches have no place here, for time is marked in other ways.  High above the river, on the cliffs that overlook it, are the marks where water once stood and carved out caves, lapping against the shores of another time.  Where the valley bottom broadens to a thousand yards or more, that dry land marks a different time, when the waters receded to expose a sandy base.  A sliding-board rock juts up in the middle of the river to mark yet another time when the water flowed over it and slowly scoured it smooth.  The Great River marks times past by thousands of years of slow, infitesimal change.

And of the time which is to come there are signs, too.  Scrub brush growing in the cracks of massive stone cliffs bear warning that some day, when the erosion of the sporadic rain and the gently persistent pressure of the roots have done their job, the cliff shall collapse, pouring its tons of rocks into the river.  Gravel bars built one pebble at a time point to the day when a new dry place will be exposed, and the river’s course shall change.  Dirt shorelines are undercut, eventually falling and forming a new corner to be navigated by the water.  Time is numbered in years and thousands of years.  The Great River is unhurried and incessant.  Life and death are simply different moments of a changing beauty.

This is God’s creation:  a river in the wilderness; hidden to the uninitiated eye.  Unseen water nourishing and nurturing life without end; flowing through time in years and thousands of years.

This is God’s River—El Rio de Dios; hidden to the uninitiated eye.  Hidden, but not secret.  Hidden only to those who cannot find their way through the wilderness; who cannot believe that there is, indeed, a river there, and so settle for life in the wilderness.  They live dry, parched days in the desert.  Oh, yes, they, too, receive the river’s water and are nourished; but so far from the source are they that they will never know its green and flowery abundance.

El Rio de Dios—hidden to the uninitiated eye.  Hidden, but not secret.  For the ancient legends talk about the water; they point the way to the river:  “When God began to create the heavens and the earth. . .the breath of God was moving over the face of the waters.”

“And God made the firmament and separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters above the firmament.  And God called the firmament heaven (that is, Sky).”

“And God said, ‘Let the waters under the skies be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.’  God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together He called Seas.”

“And God said, ‘Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures.’  And God saw that it was good.”  And still today the life of the child is brought forth from the waters of the mother.

From the waters come creation and life; and in the waters is the presence of God; and over the waters is the Word of God:  “It is very good.” And this creation takes place over years and thousands of years; this river flows through time and history, even into our day:  creation, and presence, and the Word of God:  “It is very good.”

I have been to the Great River—the Rio Grande—and have been terrified by it, as well.  Usually the river is peaceful and serene.  But I have seen the waters suddenly rise and rage from an unknown storm.  I have struggled frantically in mighty currents threatening to carry me away.  I have been thrown against rocks in furious and frenzied rapids.  In shot, I have been tested by the waters; I have been tested by the river.

And it has seemed to me that the river claims its own freedom, its supremacy over me.  It has seemed to me that the river has judged me for the humility to accept its lordship when I enter its waters; that it has searched me for the wisdom to respect its power; and that it has tested me for the courage to continue in the face of my fear—that is, for my ability to trust.  It has seemed to me that the river has actually been my adversary at times, bent on destroying me.

Yet, the river is not malevolent.  In spite of it all, it has always yielded its blessing.  It has always given up its gift, and I take with me fish offered and caught; sights seen and cherished; friendships renewed and deepened; adventures lived and relived.  But greater than these all is the gift of time with the river itself;  of nurture and testing and growth.  But the river is not mine to control; it gives from its own freedom.

And the ancient legends, these histories, tell of this, as well—of El Rio de Dios.  They tell of Noah and his family riding out the flood of the river’s judgment for humility and wisdom:  how those who could not acknowledge its authority or respect its power were doomed.  They tell of the river testing the people of Israel for courage and trust, as death and slavery pursue them in the form of an Egyptian army, when the only possible escape is to plunge into the beckoning, demanding, and terrifying waters of the Red Sea.  The legends tell of how the river has seemed to be our adversary at times.

Yet, they promise that El Rio de Dios is not, finally, malevolent; that the blessing will be yielded; the gift will be given:  “The people of Israel walked on dry ground through the sea, the waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.” And the people of the legends dance their song to the river:  “I will sing to God, for he has triumphed gloriously.  Yahweh is my strength and my song; and he has become my salvation.” For the river is always a victory; the river always gives its blessing.  But its blessing comes in its own time and out of its own freedom.  That’s the lesson of testing and judgment.

And, again, I have seen the death and destruction of the Great River, El Rio Grande.  I have seen whole river banks—this solid ground—torn away as the river cuts for itself a new course.  I have seen trees uprooted and carried like matchsticks by the river, and have witnessed ugly pictures of utter desolation left behind.  I have seen the bloated carcasses of sheep and cattle and once living things swept along by the current, and have shuddered.

But after the apocalypse, when this nightmare vision of the river has faded, I have felt a fresh and vibrant day; a dawn being born in brilliant sunshine, with warm and gentle breezes against a deep blue sky.  I have awakened to the peace and serenity of the river once again.  And so I have learned to look for this hidden birth by the river.  I have learned to say, “This is not the end.  This is yet another day, fair and beautiful.”  I have learned to hope; to trust the river.

And to sing the songs of the legends:  “Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes in the morning.”  “His anger is but for a moment, his favor is for a lifetime.”

And the legends speak morel  “Do not be afraid; for I know you seek Jesus who was crucified.  He is not here; for he has risen as he said.” For the river flows on—El Rio de Dios—and nothing shall stop it:  “Neither life, nor death, nor angels, nor principalities, not things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation.” The river flows on, creating life; nourishing life; bringing forth new life.

And I have stood before the font like the thousands before me and the thousands who will come after me, and have splashed the river’s water on a child’s head with the ancient words, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” And I have seen their lives touched by the river; I have seen them caught up by the water; I have seen them washed in the river’s redemptive waters to be claimed as the children of God.

So come, my friends, yet again to the river.  Welcome, again, to this story which is so much bigger than you and I, but in which both you and I nonetheless have our places and our parts.  Take the place given you on the river.  Treat the river with humility and respect; trust it, and you will know its blessings and gifts.  For life on the river is of God, and God does not fail us.  On the river the Word is spoken:  “Behold, it is very good.” And it shall be very good.

By the grace, and to the glory of God.

 

The Christmas Truce
Is. 9.2-7; Luke 2.1-14
12/24/10

“It’ll all be over by Christmas,” they said.  “I’ll be home for Christmas,” they sang.  And so they donned their uniforms, these courageous and confident young men, and marched off to defend their lands, their peoples, their ideals.

And their lands, their peoples, their ideals cheered them on.  They had been told what a brute the enemy was.  They had seen drawings of the deformed monster destroying beloved homelands, bayoneting babies, assaulting women.  They knew the enemy was not human, and so learned to refer to him in non-human terms, like I was taught for war in Vietnam during basic training:  we were not fighting people, but “gooks.”  And they, too, were fighting some hideous and obscene mockery of a human being.

“It’ll all be over by Christmas,” they said, and marched off in late August of 1914 to gather at the “western front” between France and Germany and Belgium.  They all gathered there, these courageous and confident young men, and began to kill each other in defense of their lands, their peoples, their ideals.

It wasn’t war like we think of war—with surgical air strikes and remotely launched missiles and immediate helicopter evacuation of the occasionally wounded; war in which the enemy’s face is rarely seen.  No, this was “The Great War,” where men faced off against each other out of trenches bordered with barbed wire and only a few hundred yards of no man’s land separated the combatants.  In order to kill you had to see your enemy, like it is when you go deer hunting.

The whistle blew, you went over the top and charged headlong into no man’s land, screaming and cursing and firing, while to the right of you and to the left of you and ahead of you men fell and wailed in agony and blood flowed even from the still, the quiet, the dead.  And perhaps you made it to their trenches.  Then bullets would be of no more use, and instead it would be clubbing and bayoneting, kicking and punching and gouging there in the mud, fighting for your life however you could.

Or perhaps you didn’t make it that far.  Perhaps the defense was too strong, and you were repelled; forced to return to the safety of your own trenches, leaving behind in the fury and the filth the dead and some wounded.  Regrouping there in the trenches.  Catching your breath, bandaging the wounded who manage to make it back.  No time to cry, to mourn for your lost friends, for a minute might bring the sound of a whistle from a few hundred yards away, and the screams of a thousand killers coming toward you. So you do what is human, what is necessary:  you turn that grief into hatred for the enemy.

“It’ll all be over by Christmas,” you assure one another.

But August gives way to September, and nothing is gained.  September to October, and still nothing is gained.  October to November and it’s the same.  No man’s land is littered with decaying, rotting bodies; some, you knew; a few were your friends— but it’s too dangerous to try to retrieve them for burial.  And the trenches have become a cesspit of foulness; nearly as many men die from trench foot—a disease caused by living in the same wet boots and socks for weeks at a time; it rots living flesh and gives way to gangrene.

Thanksgiving comes and goes, and with it the hope and fiction of being home for Christmas.  And Christmas Eve arrives, there in the trenches of these once courageous and confident young men.  It is quiet as darkness falls—another night in the cold and the mud.

Until, do you hear it?  There’s. . .singing over there!  On the other side of no man’s land.  Listen:

Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht!
Alles schläft; einsam wacht

I don’t know those words.  But I know that tune.  They keep singing:

Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht!

And then somebody here starts humming the tune.  Softly.  To himself.  Slowly, others join in.  And somebody starts singing the words.  And is joined by others, until they all are singing:

Silent night!  Holy night!
All is calm.  All is bright!

Those men, hunkered down in the mud, wounded and infected, cradling their rifles like some obscene parody of the carol’s Madonna and child; still, singing the same song together, in different languages.  Sung in unison, it washes over no man’s land—the land of the dead—this song about a mother and her divine infant:

Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht!
Silent night!  Holy night!

The next day—Christmas morning—the dawn reveals the same old squalor; the same cesspit of the trenches, the ribbons of barbed wire, the land of the dead before them.  In the darkness it has been possible to escape into the magic of the song.  Now, as with all daybreaks, the magic seems a dream.

Until the morning fog rises and there stands one step in front of his trenches—those trenches from which “Stille Nacht” was heard—one step closer and fully exposed to the enemy, a terrified soldier holding a spindly little Christmas tree.  He grimaces a frightened smile, holds the tree up with one hand, and extends his other as if asking a friend to come forward.  Every man among this gathering of enemies is rigid with anticipation, hardly daring to breathe, waiting to see what will become of this terrified, courageous, foolish youngster in a uniform.

The minutes tick on.  Until from across no man’s land another terrified, courageous, foolish young man in a different uniform steps forth.  The two cautiously walk toward each other and finally meet.  There, in the middle of the land of the dead, they greet:  they shake hands;  they wish each other good Christmas and exchange candy and cigarettes.  A thousand rifles point at them, and they smile.

So men begin, slowly at first but then with increasing freedom, to go over the top.  To rush into no man’s land, though not with the screaming and cursing and killing of before, but with smiles and handshakes and blessings and gifts.  They gather there, and to the best of their ability talk about home and families and Christmas traditions.  They talk about life in the trenches and, looking around, soon join to go about the task of burying their dead.  When this hideous business is over, someone produces a soccer ball and they play, German against English.

Christmas Day, 1914 was spent this way, with enemies playing like children.  And the next two days, as well:  they gathered in no man’s land to visit, to play games, to share gifts.

The high commands on both sides were apoplectic.  They wrote memos—though not of course to each other, for they remembered who the enemy was—but for their own staffs.  They said in English and German, “If this fraternization continues, if these men start seeing each other as human, they will lose their will to fight.  The war will be lost.”  They sent orders to the line officers forbidding them to join in this, but the orders were greatly ignored.

For three days and then four this Christmas went on, and the high commands, the powers that be, became more and more concerned, more and more frantic that the war might be lost.  Until finally, as the men were once again gathered in no man’s land sharing stories and gifts, an officer in the trenches took aim and shot his enemy dead.

Stille Nacht!  Holy Night! was destroyed, and the killing resumed.  Orders went out by the high commands the next Christmas that any man caught fraternizing with the enemy would be executed on the spot.  Line officers were ordered to shoot their own people.  The war was gained for good.

The United States didn’t enter the Great War until 1917.  By the time the armistice was signed in November of 1918, 10 million young men who, given their hearts’ desires would have been playing soccer, exchanging gifts, and sharing stories of home, had been butchered by each other.  The high commands had taken control.

The powers that be in the world have their own plans.  And God has his.  The prophet Isaiah spoke of it 2500 years ago:

For all the boots of the tramping warriors
and all the garments rolled in blood
shall be burned as fuel for the fire.
For a child has been born for us,
a son given to us;
authority rests upon his shoulders;
and he is named Wonderful Counselor,
Mighty God,
Everlasting Father,
Prince of Peace.

And when the time was at hand, on that night, on this night that we remember, God took a leap of faith:  “She gave birth to her first born son, and laid him in a manger.” It cannot be seen by the high commands of this world, but only by the poor, the lowly, the outcasts—the shepherds and those like them.

Because he will be known only as the prince of Peace.  As he did in 1914, he will work peace among all peoples, for that is the will of this king of all kings.  Regardless of the claiming and blaming by all the high commands of the world, the peace of God will be achieved through peace.  Peace is his promise.  Peace is his power. Silent Night, Holy Night is his song.

The Holy Family

12/24/10

Luke’s Christmas Gospel

So, visions of Christmas:  the Holy Family.  A stable, insulated with straw like a down comforter.  A single candle illumines the scene with a golden peace.  Mary sits by the manger, mother holding a beautiful infant wrapped for warmth.  Joseph stands solicitously beside them, a father’s wisdom and concern showing in his eyes.  The child is innocence; the mother is love; the father is strength:  a Holy Family.

Just outside the shepherds have gathered to see, silent in their wonder, on their knees.  Above, angels hover, their mouths open in an eternal song of good will.  And over it all one star shines most brightly, its silver beam pointing for the wise men, who are on their way.  The Holy Family is there, and with them is love, security, and peace—the presence of God.  How agonizingly sweet is the vision, a promise, and inspiration for all families.

And then I remembered:  this year my sister was in jail, the drugs having led her there again.  The private tears of my mother were discovered as I roamed through the kitchen; the far-away gaze of my father was caught from time to time, as he sat on the couch present, but not fully there;  six places set at the table instead of the family’s seven—“at least we won’t be crowded this year,” was the gallows humor.  Every now and then the festivities rang hollow with the echo of that empty place.  All this bore the excruciating proclamation that there was no holiness about this family.

So it was that the very sweetness of the Christmas vision condemned us:  the manger scene was the way it should be, the way God intended it to be—the holiness of the family.  And here’s the way it really was for us—anything but holy.

And the way it is for ex-husbands and wives bickering over who has the children this year; for children of blended families resenting these strangers they’re forced to live with; for newly divorced and recently widowed persons spending their season without a partner, wondering where they fit in; for gay partners forbidden from joining their lover’s families at the holiday meal; for brothers and sisters living out on the streets.  The Christmas vision of the Holy Family deepens the pain, or hardens the heart, with an acute reminder of our situation.

And of families who fit the norm, where husband and wife and children have managed to stay intact, what shall we say?  Shall we speak of the man desperately trying to forgive his wife’s unfaithfulness, or of the woman living in fear and loathing of her husband’s abusiveness?  Shall we think of the times we have screamed at one another, or been stunned by our children’s loss of innocence?  Shall we recall the hurt, as children, of  parents too busy with other things to much bother about what is happening in our lives, caring only that we behave well?  Shall we speak of the power plays, and feet of clay, and loveless days?

The Christmas vision of the Holy Family—how desperately we want it to be true in our lives.  And yet how painfully unholy we know our own families to be, lacking in innocence, love, and peace.

But look again!  Beyond the walls of the stable the Christmas vision grows, and there is Joseph struggling over what to do with a fiancée who has suddenly shown up pregnant.  There are the parents without enough money to tip the innkeeper for a room.  And there is Herod threatening to destroy this family—they have to run homeless into Egypt.

And later, there is Mary the single mother as her first-born becomes a teenager:  scholars surmise that Joseph had died, but the reason for his absence might be otherwise.  And there is the family trying to bring their religiously fanatical child home, who subsequently rejects them.  So there is the child, being pounded into a cross, to be hung like any criminal or revolutionary.

The Holy Family is not always innocence, love, and peace.  It is also strife, stress, and separation.  What we see in this Christmas night vision is one moment, one precious moment when the peace of God has broken into our fractured and frantic families; the kind of moment which, rare as it might be, undergirds all else in our lives and makes it possible to endure and hope; yes, even to change and improve—a light that has not yet been overcome by the darkness.

It’s the kind of moment our family received awhile back when, in the midst of dash-around schedules and frayed nerves, a quick dinner became a time of joking and laughter.  It’s the kind of moment when life partners sit quietly together, their hearts warmed with true gratitude for one another; when brother and sister genuinely and without prompting thank one another, or apologize, or stand up for the other, or work hard to find just the right gift for the other.  It’s the kind of moment when exes begin to see each other as human beings again; when the abuser vows to suffer whatever is necessary to change and follows through with it; when the child realizes his parents need to be loved, too; or when the widowed recognize that they belong and are loved.

These are the gifts of Christmas:  moments of God’s reality which make all else possible.  This is the mercy of Christmas:  that God chooses to come to us, to people who know strife, and stress, and separation.  This is the mercy of Christmas:  that the gift of love is given in the midst of all this.  This is the gospel of Christmas:  that it is okay to be human, for God finds delight in his people, even to the extent of coming to live among them.

The Holy Family was not holy because of some intrinsic virtue of innocence, love, and peace they had or somehow had accomplished, or because of some human notion of what “normal” families ought to be.  Look again at the Christmas vision.  The shepherds befriend them; the angels of God protect them; and the star—the eye of God—watches over them.  The Holy Family is holy because God is there, holding them in his holy hands.  And into the midst of their strife and stress and separation Christ is given, the gift of God’s love.  The Holy Family is holy because they are touched by a holy love.  And for just a moment it shines through the darkness of everything else announcing, “God is here.”

May you know, during these brief, sweet hours of Christmas, that your family—whatever it looks like—is holy and wholly acceptable to God.  May you know the rest and contentment of his love, and the words of his angels spoken to you:  “Glory to God in the highest, and peace to you, in whom he takes delight.”

And may you, then, become his angels, singing his song to other families who so desperately want to taste of this holiness in their lives.  Amen.