Am I Ok?
Last Wednesday Fthr Beverley from the Cape Town Diocese reminded me why I ranked him up there along with Russ Blassoples as influential spiritual leaders in the Anglican Church. While this mild-mannered but strong-willed old mans body is beginning to slow his sound mind never fails to enlighten.
I expect it is his realism that I relate to. He emphasised the uselessness of fasting if the withdrawal left you miserable and terrible to be around, along with other faith-related topics. But what quite stuck out for me was his stories of saints like Paul and Augustine who did not start out as saints- quite the opposite actually. Augustine had quite the taste for women and led a hedonistic lifestyle. When his mother prayed for his salvation, Augustine prayed "create in me a pure heart O Lord- just not now", and indeed he went on to become a great saint. I suppose what I take from this is that it is never too late to redeem oneself. Remembering that we are human and not without fault this is rather comforting.
I too find myself battling with human habits, such as vanity. As an example a problem I face is that I take pleasure in it whether I like to admit it or not. So when I pray "please Lord don't let me care about how my hair looks or how the world sees me", essentially I'm lying. I'm asking for something I don't really want which seeems to be defeating the purpose. The human state can be amended then, but where do we start without being hypocritical?
Tonight Fthr Moodely took the floor and also touched on humanity and its tendencies; by posing the question: Am I Ok?
Am I ok in the sense of spiritual well- being, is my heart ok? We all maintain our composure he noted, but God knows us intimately, he knows what's going on inside. Like swans; he used the metaphor. Gracefully floating on the water yet beneath the surface paddling frantically to stay afloat. A reflection of of what our lives are like. Perfect composure for the world to see while we quietly but frantically deal with internal battles. Fthr Moodeleys' solution to this is to let into your heart the one being that already knows what is going on inside it. A powerful prayer, a 'one-liner' he labelled it. Favoured by a colleague of his at St John's in Belleville: "Come into my heart O Lord, there is room for you in here". So then going back to the issue of vanity, perhaps we don't always pray for the right things.
Instead of negative prayers (take away my vanity) we should perhaps try positive prayers (give me the wisdom to appreciate what's really important).
Am I ok?
Answered with an Indian urban legend, Fthr Moodeley concluded:
In the old Indian villages there were always wise old men around to give advice and to answer questions. One day a little boy decided to try and trick an old wise man. He caught a little bird and, holding it behind his back, asked the old wise man if the bird was dead or alive. Very smart of this young boy knowing that if the old man said the bird is dead, he could present a living bird, but if the old man said alive, he could twist the birds neck with a simple movement and present a dead animal.
The wise old man answered simply: "The answer is in your hands"
