Moving Parts

+Lowell E. Thomas+

July 10, 1919 - October 14, 2011

“You must be someone special,” said my uncle. “He doesn’t let the rest of us touch this stuff.” So went the last time I saw my grandfather, “Papa.” I got to drive the electric train set he had so lovingly assembled on multiple tracks in the rear bedroom. 

The moving parts of anything motorized or electric were child’s play to him, both in the sense of being easy, and a source of joy. Ham radios were his specialty, and his knowledge of the inner guts of a car was encyclopedic. He could fix anything, thinking in a spatial-technical way that the rest of us could only marvel at.

Though they are many, they are one body. (I Corinthians 12:12) Our bodies have many moving parts; yet we don’t view them as so many items in an assembly line, but rather as a unity, as one whole. Late in his life, Papa connected more deeply to the Christian church. He became a moving part of the mystical body of Jesus. Whole in another sense.

Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes. (Matthew 20:34) When Jesus moves, he moves us with him. He opens our eyes to see all the moving parts. Can I see myself as part of a larger, spiritual whole?

Move me, open my eyes to the living body that Papa joined. Amen. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We are packing our bags for a place none of us has been.

A place that has to be believed to be seen.

-U2, "Walk On"

Christianity is not a theory or speculation, but a life; not a philosophy of life, but a life and a living process.

-Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The Resurrection Fern - to Papa.

Thousand Faces

Love sometimes comes in disguise. A very successful and recently retired business-owner friend of mine, convinced of the “just business” way of doing things, explained why he chose to sell the company’s shares to his long-standing employees, rather than to an outsider: “Sell the company to a stranger? How could I do that to them?”

He calls that business, I would call it love. His action betrays his deep sense of humanity. That’s love in one of its many faces. Any decision that takes into account the general welfare of others, no matter how coldly logical or financially savvy it might be, comes from a moral imperative we all have built inside of us: the imperative to love.

Because she loved much, she will be forgiven much. (Luke 7:47) A prostitute showed Jesus her very erotic expression of love and was forgiven precisely for it! The disciples could not accept this form of love, because they feared it. It came with a face they did not recognize. 

We call love by other names, like “ethics” or “morals”; we marginalize it in favor of being “practical”; we limit its range by inventing rules and taboos; we stamp it out by ignoring its diversity. Why do we fear love?

Help me see that Your Love has a thousand faces. Amen.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Go to YouTube or Itunes and listen to a further thought by Randy Montana on Love's Thousand Faces. We recognize diversity of love but we also need to know that we are seen, individually. The song could be heard as talking to God, or even as God talking to you: "Love has a thousand faces, but I see you." 

I owe the expressions, "love has a thousand faces" and last week's idea, "many shores, one ocean" to  Tariq Ramadan. In Quest For Meaning he argues that religious diversity signals a unity, and that unity implies a shared diversity. He wrestles very eloquently with the problem of the multiplicity of religious ways and beliefs, and how they might be seen as illuminating a universal meaning. Much more to come from this rich resource, as I continue to learn much from it!  

Sailing Paths

Head up and into the wind, I enjoy the sunlight on my face as I see the skyline of Boston recede. The ferry makes its way out of the harbor. From it, the city seems to rise straight out of the Atlantic. It must have seemed so even to those who sailed here in pre-revolution days.

In Sailing to Philadelphia, songwriter Mark Knopfler captures the feeling of journeying: “Now hold your head up, Mason, see America lies there. The morning tides have raised the capes of Delaware. Come up and feel the sun, a new morning is begun. Another day will make it clear why your stars should guide us here.” 

The song is a poignant expression of the courage and steadfastness of two men, surveyor Jeremiah Dixon and astronomer Charles Mason, called upon to go to a new land and draw what would become the Mason-Dixon line. 

Why did the stars guide me here? And now why are they taking me elsewhere? Certainly because I choose this way and not that. And yet, we cannot escape the sense that we are also chosen, guided, called. 

We saw His star. (Matthew 2:2) When we sail to a foreign shore, we learn that all paths indicate a Path, that all shores touch one Ocean.

Out on the water, away from shore, I hold my head up and see Your star. Amen. 

~~~~~~~~~~

I am Jeremiah Dixon
I am a Geordie boy
A glass of wine with you, sir
And the ladies I'll enjoy
All Durham and Northumberland
Is measured up by my own hand
It was my fate from birth
To make my mark upon the earth...

He calls me Charlie Mason
A stargazer am I
It seems that I was born
To chart the evening sky
They'd cut me out for baking bread
But I had other dreams instead
This baker's boy from the west country
Would join the Royal Society...

We are sailing to Philadelphia
A world away from the coaly Tyne
Sailing to Philadelphia
To draw the line
The Mason-Dixon line

Now you're a good surveyor, Dixon
But I swear you'll make me mad
The West will kill us both
You gullible Geordie lad
You talk of liberty
How can America be free
A Geordie and a baker's boy
In the forest of the Iroquois...

Now hold your head up, Mason
See America lies there
The morning tide has raised
The capes of Delaware
Come up and feel the sun
A new morning is begun
Another day will make it clear
Why your stars should guide us here...

We are sailing to Philadelphia
A world away from the coaly Tyne
Sailing to Philadelphia
To draw the line
The Mason-Dixon line

Sailing to Philadelphia on Itunes

See Live Performance by Mark Knopfler