VIII. The Way of Activism and Renewal

 ·        Martin Luther – 1483 - 1546

"Night and day I pondered until… I grasped the truth that  the righteousness of God is that righteousness whereby, through grace and sheer mercy, he justifies us by faith. Therefore I felt myself to be reborn and to have gone through open doors into paradise. The whole of scripture took on a new meaning, and whereas before ‘the righteousness of God’ had filled me with hate, now it became to me inexpressibly sweet in greater love. This passage of Paul became to me a gateway to heaven.”  From Eerdman’s Handbook to the History of Christianity, Tim Dowley, editor. Grand Rapids: Eerdman’s Publishing, 1987, p 236.

Martin Luther lived in Germany and started his higher education studying law at the University of Erfurt. In 1505 he joined the Augustinian hermits and gave his life to God and the  study of theology.  He traveled a long spiritual journey that led him to reject theology that was based solely on tradition. Reading Romans, he came to understand that salvation is based on faith alone, not faith and works (as then taught by the Catholic Church. At that time, the Catholic Church was the only church). He publicized his new discoveries by posting his theological objections on the door of the church in Wittenberg in 1519.  

Luther did not intend to split the church as it had been known for centuries. But his protest became a revolution—a reformation of the Catholic Church. The new form of the church was called 'Protestant,' due to the theological protests of Luther and others. From Luther’s actions was born the Lutheran Church.

Luther’s three main concerns were:

• Scripture as the highest authority of the church, thus a rejection of the central authority of the Pope and the church hierarchy
• The need for everyone to know that salvation came by grace, not works
• The priesthood of all believers--all Christians, in any occupations, could be considered God's equal children 

You may want to find a copy of "Luther," a recent movie (2004) that tells his life story.     

Ignatius of Loyola – 1491-1556

“I call it consolation when the soul is aroused by an interior movement which causes it to be inflamed with love of its Creator and Lord and  consequently can love no created thing in this world for its own sake, but only in the Creator of all things…I call desolation all that [is] darkness of the soul, turmoil of the mind, inclination to low and earthly things, restlessness resulting from many disturbances and temptations which leads to loss of faith, loss of hope, loss of love.”   p. 225

Quoted in Devotional Classics, edited by Richard Foster and James Bryan Smith. Harper SanFrancisco, 1990.

Ignatius was a Spaniard who began adult life as a mercenary soldier.  While recovering from a serious leg wound, he found God. He paid special attention to life's subtle influences which either led him toward and further from God.  He was so changed by his conversion that his friends began to notice the differences in him and asked him to teach them his spiritual exercises.  Thus his spiritual practices became called The Spiritual Exercises and remain in print and are used by Christians all around the world.

The Spiritual Exercises (sometimes called the Ignatian Exercises) are primarily concerned with:

• Discernment
• Daily examination of our life and conscience
• Praying the Scriptures

The Ignatius quotation above refers to his way of noticing what things led him toward God (consolation) and those practices that led him away from God (desolation). He extended this method into a guide to decision-making that involves meditating on Scripture and noticing our responses to the invitations from God and his Word.

Ignatius also taught a daily time of reflection during which he remembered the small moments and choices which drew him closer to God.  This daily practice he called 'the Examen' (Latin for 'examine'). He valued this means of noticing God’s actions in life's circumstances.  

Ignatius’s influence spread rapidly and those following him ultimately became the Jesuit order (or the Society of Jesus) . He established many monasteries where meditation on scripture and an emphasis on education were primary. Many fine Jesuit educational institutions follow this tradition around the U.S. and abroad today.  

 EXAMEN OF CONSCIENCE  

Ignatius of Loyola developed a method for reviewing his day to look for the presence of God in the midst of his activities.

By asking some or all of these questions, we can detect the “God-moments” of our lives. This process also helps us discern areas in ourselves where God may be present but unnoticed.

Adapted from Sleeping with Bread by Dennis and Matthew Linn.  

For what moment today am I most grateful?
For what moment today am I least grateful?  

Other ways to ask these questions:

When did I give and receive the most love today?
When did I feel most alive today?
When did I feel life draining out of me?
When did I have the greatest sense of belonging to myself. Others, God and the universe?
When did I have the least sense of belonging?
When was I happiest today?
When was I saddest?
When was today’s high point? Low point?

·        Teresa of Avila – 1515 – 1582

“Who are you?” her Beloved asked her.  
“I am Teresa of Jesus,” she replied. “And who are you?”
“I am Jesus of Teresa.”  Or so the story goes.

“Teresa felt God’s call to reform the convents of her day, and she began the work of reform with herself by vowing to live a more perfect life. Feeling that her own convent had departed form the Carmelites’ original intentions, she urged her fellow nuns to live a simple, humble life uncluttered by worldly distractions." p. 15-16

quoted in Under Her Wings, Kathy Bence, Nashville: Upper Room Books, 2001.  

Teresa was born in Spain to a noble family. Her parents were not pleased when she announced that she wanted to become a Carmelite nun.  She entered the Carmelite convent of the Incarnation in Avila at age twenty. She was often ill, perhaps with malaria, but she loved convent life except that it seemed too lax to her. She set out to reform monastic life, particularly an emphasis on prayer—starting with her own prayer life. She founded a house (convent) where a life of prayer was practiced more devotedly and went on to found many such houses throughout her life.

Her influence extended ultimately to the pope when she wrote him regarding the need for reform throughout the entire Catholic Church.  She advocated a life of poverty, simple brown robes and the value of work and alms giving. Her work on behalf of the Catholic Church earned her the esteemed title: Doctor of the Church. She and Catherine of Siena are the only women to be honored with this title for their huge contributions to the church.

Teresa is best known for her book: The Interior Castle, which describes seven stories of a mansion which are metaphors for stages of prayer. She also wrote The Way of Perfection, a book on prayer and contemplation (written as instruction to Carmelite nuns) but excellent instruction for all of us interested in prayer).  

·        George Herbert – 1593 – 1633 – Poet

Love bade me welcome; yet my soul drew back,
Guiltie of dust and sine.
But quick-ey’d Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,  
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
If I lack’d any thing.  
‘A guest’, I answer’d, ‘unworthy to ne here’  
Love said: ‘You shall be he.’  
‘I, the unkind, ungrateful? Ah, my dear,
I cannot look on Thee.’  
Love took my hand, and smiling did reply  
‘Who mad the eyes but I?’
‘Truth, Lord, but I have marr’d them; let my shame
Go where it doth deserve.’  
‘And know you not, says Love, ‘who bore the blame?’
‘My dear, then I will serve.’  
‘You must it down, said Love, ‘and taste my meat.’
So I did sit and eat.

George Herbert was an Englishman, born in 1593, who studied at Cambridge, where he became distinguished for his scholarship. He became a Member of Parliament but left that honor to become an Anglican country parson in a small town near Salisbury.

He pastored this small church in obscurity for years, writing poems during his leisure. In his poetry, he used everyday ideas such as human love to convey the love relationship with God.  His many poems provide great devotional insights, perhaps gleaned from a hard life and constant illness. He died in 1633 at age forty, but his words live on.  

·        John Wesley – 1703-1791 – 18^th Century Awakening in England  

“Just love God who loves you. That is sufficient. The more deeply you love, the stronger you will feel.  And as soon as you have learned to love God with all your heart, ‘if you give fortitude full play you will go on to complete a balanced character that will fall short in nothing.” (James 1:4). p. 342. Quoted in Spiritual Classics. Richard Foster, editor: Harper SanFrancisco, 2000.

John Wesley grew up in a minister’s home as one of seventeen children. His mother, Susanna, discipled every one of them individually in the love of God. No wonder he ended up going into the ministry of the Anglican Church, as his father had. 

John went off to study in Oxford and was subsequently ordained. During this time, he and others at Oxford founded the Holy Club. Members of this group committed themselves to disciplined faith practices. For this they became known as 'Methodists.' But it was years later before Wesley's heart was ‘strangely warmed’ while reading Luther’s Preface to Romans. At that moment God’s love became real to him and transformed him from into one who became the father of a religious awakening that spread from England to the whole world.  

John preached to anyone who would listen but primarily the poor of England: coal mine’s in his home area, then on street corners to the working classes. Ultimately, he rode over 250,000 miles on horseback preaching and teaching all over England.

He is best known for his methodical way of organizing his societies of converts into discipleship groups, called classes and bands. Wesley became a significant contributor to, if not the founder of, the small group movement.  His methods spread and the Methodist Church was born. 

To read more of John Wesley's passion for discipleship and social justice check out the following websites. You might also want to check out his musical brother, Charles, who wrote thousands of hymns with wonderful lyrics and excellent theology.  

Ø      Choose a person listed above. Further investigatehis or her life and work for renewal of the church.

Ø      Research the need for the Reformation (from the reformers’ view) and what was changed. (Luther is the best choice for this question.)

Ø      Discover how protesters became Protestants and what this split in the (Catholic) Church involved.

Ø      Read some of George Herbert’s poems and look for their theological themes.

 RECENT ACTIVISTS FOR RENEWAL OF FAITH

 ·        Thomas Merton – 1915 – 1968

“The fact remains that [the gift of] contemplation will not be given to those who willfully remain at a distance from God, who confine their interior life to a few routine exercises of piety and a few external acts of worship and service performed as a matter of duty.  Such people are careful to avoid sin.  They respect God as a Master. But their heart does not belong to Him.  They are not really interested in Him, except in order to insure themselves against losing heaven and going to hell.”  Quoted in Spiritual Classics. Richard Foster, editor: Harper SanFrancisco, 2000, p. 19

Thomas Merton was born in Prades, France to an artist father. His mother died when he was six and Thomas traveled the world with his father while his father painted. His father died when Thomas was 15, leaving the lad on his own.  

Thomas’s education came via tutors but he was brilliant and ended up attending Cambridge and then Columbia University in New York. Living as an atheist, one day while walking a city street, Merton felt called by God. Merton immediately believed and affiliated with the Catholic Church.  

Mertonwas drawn to the Cistercian (Trappist) monastic order and became a monk in this silent order in 1941. He vowed himself to the Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky at age 26. There he lived more and more in silence in a hermit’s hut. But he prayed and wrote prolifically. His writings regarding contemplative prayer are the treasures of our time. He also published his journals which contain spiritual riches.  

Silence and contemplation  

• Henri Nouwen – 1932 – 1996

“You can look at your life as a large cone that becomes narrower the deeper you go. There are many doors in that cone that give you chances to leave the journey.  But you have been closing the doors…making yourself go deeper into your center.  You know that Jesus is waiting for you at the end, just as you know that he is guiding you as you move in that direction.  Every time you close another door—be it the door of immediate satisfaction, the door of distracting entertainment, the door of busyness, the door of guilt and worry, or the door of self-rejection—you commit yourself to go deeper into your heart and thus deeper into the heart of God.”  Nouwen, The Inner Voice of Love. New  York : Doubleday Image Books, 1996, 51-52..

Henri Nouwen was born in Nijkerk, Holland. He came to the U.S. in 1964 at age 32. Henri gave his life to ministry as a Catholic priest; serving as a psychologist; teaching at Yale, Harvard and Notre Dame; and then as chaplain at L'Arch [a home for physically and intellectually challenged people] nearToronto.  

Nouwen wrote many books on the spiritual life and emphasized social justice as an outward sign of our intimacy with God. Practicing what he preached, he lived for a time in Central America with the poor and then in a home for disabled adults. His writings are characterized by his vulnerability and transparency  in his own relationship with God. His journals particularly are rich with insights from his own life. It seems likely that Henri Nouwen’s writings have been read by more Protestants than those of any other Catholic writer.

 WHO ELSE BUT YOU?

"O Lord who else or what else can I desire but you?  You are my Lord, Lord of my heart, mind, and soul. You know me through and through. In and through you everything that is finds its origin and goal. You embrace all that exists and care for it with divine love and compassion.  Why, then, do I keep expecting happiness and satisfaction outside of you? Why do I keep relating to you as one of my many relationships, instead of my only relationship, in which all other ones are grounded? Why do I keep looking for popularity, respect from others, success, acclaim and sensual pleasures? Why, Lord, is it so heard for me to make you the only one? Why do I keep hesitating to surrender myself totally to you?  

"Help me Lord to let my old self die, to let die the thousand big and small ways in which I am still building up my false self and trying to cling to my false desires. Let me be reborn in you and see through you the world in the right way, so that all my actions, words and thoughts can become a hymn of praise to you.

"I need your loving grace to travel this hard road that leads to the death of my old self and to a new life in and for you. I know and trust that this is the road to freedom. 

"Lord, dispel my mistrust and help me become a trusting friend. Amen."  From Henri Nouwen, A Cry for Mercy, p. 45-46.

Henri Nouwen popularized the need for solitude, silence and retreat for quality time with God.  Why do we need to retreat?

To retreat is to:

v     give yourself permission—to be and not to have to do

v     breathe and become spacious

v     make space for God

v     be open to wonder, to transcendence,

v     nest in God’s presence

v     allow God to pay attention to you

v     enjoy solitude

v     listen for the voice of God

To retreat is a gift we give ourselves when we make time and space to bask in God’s presence. Ephesians 1 says God ’lavishes’ love on us—but we can’t fully receive that love until we silence all the other ’noise’ inside us.

Exercise: Set  apart some time—ideally a morning or afternoon when you can be uninterrupted by family, work or phone. Spend the time in as much silence and solitude as you can arrange. Then do whatever you heart says it needs: pray, read the Word, journal or just ‘be’ with your Lord.  Invite the Lord to speak in whatever way and time you need. You will most likely find yourself refreshed in body and renewed in your spirit and love of your God.

[ Home ] [ KOINOS Seminars ] [ What's New? ] [ Seminar Schedule ] [ The Link ] [ Seminar notes ] [ Ministry Resources ] [ Bookstore ] [ The Nest ] [ Spiritual Formation ] [ Pastoral Retreats ] [ Consulting ] [ Daily prayers ] [ Links to Other Sites ] [ KOINOS Services ] [ Contact Us ] [ Travel Directions ] [ Doctrine Statement ]