FOR GOOD MEASURE: Volume 8, March, 1989 by Paul F. Bosch Ten Radio Meditations (71-80) originally composed by ELCIC pastor Paul F. Bosch for CFCA-FM, Kitchener, Ontario. These meditation appear in speech-line form. With a little bit of editing, they may be rendered in paragraph form for use in newsletters and guides to worship. Be sure to credit the author for his work. 71) Hebrews: 100 Berakoth... 72) "The poor are not our problem..." 73) Religion turns society into a community... 74) Creed= credo = cor + do= to give your heart... 75) The rational in faith... 76) Two themes in Bible: idolatry, and the poor... 77) Tradition: gives grandpa a vote.. 78) The primary symbol in worship: people... 79) "...what we take from the poor..." 80) The cellular nature of the church... 71) Orthodox Jews have a marvellous way of looking at the world. It's an attitude I'd like to copy in my own life. They have a type of prayer they call a BERACHAH; it's a way of praising God that usually begins, "Blessed are you, O Lord our God, Ruler of the universe..." and it goes on to offer praise to God for whatever strikes your fancy. I love that because it's pure praise, pure adoration. There's no agenda there, there's nothing you want God to fix. It's simply praise for a marvellous world: Blessed are you, O Lord our God for the fingers of frost on the window pain. Blessed are you O Lord our God for the song of a robin in March. Blessed are you O Lord our God for the first dandelion of Spring. They say that every person should pray one hundred BARAKOTH every day. Good idea. 72) Jim Wallis is the editor of Sojourners Magazine, and he has a neat way of explaining the difference between the third world and the first world, between, that is, the rich and the poor. He says, "The poor are not our problem; we are the problem of the poor." That's probably somewhere near the truth of the matter. It's not so much that we rich nations have a problem on our hands, and the problem is all these poor nations. It's the other way around: The reason these poor nations are poor, you could even say, is because the rich nations are rich. So too with the poor in our own communities: Maybe they're poor because I'm rich. Jesus doesn't have a lot to say about homosexuality or abortion or communism. He has a lot to say about the abuse of the poor by the rich. 73) I heard a wise man say recently that it's religion that turns a society into a community. I had to think about that. Can faith be that important, important enough to civilize us, to turn us into a community? I like to think that's true; true to the point of tragedy in places like Northern Ireland and the Middle East, where religion, at its worst, seems to cause people to kill each other. But true too in a more wholesome sense here at home. Perhaps we're a community here, and not just a society, because we've been civilized by religion at its best. That's a hope that keeps me going. 74) The other day I learned the meaning of the word Creed. It comes from the Latin credo, which in turn is made up of two other Latin words, cor, meaning heart, and do, meaning to give. There it is, cor-do, or credo, meaning creed, what I believe, and it means, to give my heart. That's a terrific way of looking at faith, isn't it? My faith, my creed, my belief, means my giving of my heart. And I suppose you could say that kind of thing, that kind of giving of your heart, of a lot besides religion. When I believe in you, for example, I'm giving you my heart. 75) I heard a wise man say recently that although there are limits to the rational, he, for his part, was not willing to believe in anything that does not seem to be at least reasonable. Faith and reason have had a long and stormy relationship, as you might guess. And there have been Christian thinkers who have been downright suspicious of reason. There are limits, after all, to what we can reason out. And you don't have to be religious to admit that the world is full of miracles and the unexplainably numinous. Nevertheless, I like the reminder that faith ought to be rational, at least rationally discussable. It's no credit to faith if I have to leave my brains at the door when I enter the house of religion. 76) Here's a piece of Bible trivia for you: What sin, do you suppose, is most often talked of in the Bible? What's the one sin that gets the greatest attention in the proverbs and in the prophets and in Jesus? Homosexuality? Adultery? Sexual faithlessness? Abortion? Give up? It's idolatry: worshipping any other God than God. And can you guess what's next? The abuse of the poor by the rich. Idolatry, and the oppression of the poor: The Bible gives more space to condemning these, than to condemning any other sin. Come to think of it, that's not so trivial. 77) I heard a good description of tradition the other day. Tradition, someone said, is one way of giving my grandfather and grandmother a vote in the decisions I must make today. I like that, because it suggests a kind of transgenerational democracy. If I have a tradition -- a family tradition or religious tradition or whatever -- then I'm giving my forbears a voice and vote in the choices I must make today. Not the only vote, not the deciding vote, but a voice and vote nevertheless that gives honour to all those who've gone before me. I don't have to be an Oedipus to be thoroughly modern or mature. I don't have to turn my back on history. In fact, by honouring my tradition, I may even learn something. 78) Someone has said that the primary symbol in Christian worship is -- are you ready for this? -- the people present. That came as a surprise to me. The most important symbol in our churches is not -- get this -- the cross, nor the crucifix, nor the altar table, nor the pulpit, nor bread and cup, nor the baptismal pool -- but the people here. That's not the way I might have arranged it, but I think it's true, and a good reminder for us today. People are what's important. The people are the sign of God, and God's presence. The presence of the spirit of God is here: in you, in me, in us. That's a heavy thought. 79) Jim Wallis, the editor of Sojourners magazine, says, "The question is not What do we give to the poor, but rather, What do we take from the poor." That's not the way I usually look at things. I'm used to thinking that the world belongs to me. Now here's this fellow claiming that the world belongs to the poor. I think he's got me though. I think he's right. That's certainly the viewpoint of the Bible: The poor, not the rich, are God's favourites. And there's a long tradition in the Christian church that says God has a preferential option for the poor. And I expect that our community -- and our nation -- will one day be judged by that standard: How did we treat our poor? 80) One of the most exciting developments in the recent history of religion has been the re-discovery of the cellular nature of the church. That is, we've just re-discovered, in our own day, the image of the church as an organism, with cells and tissues and organs and systems like a human body. One implication of this view is that the congregation down by the gas station is not the only form the church takes. There are larger forms of this organism, like the diocese or region, and there are smaller forms, like the house-church or the base community. And I see each cell and tissue and organ contributing to the whole, and I see different functions at different levels of organization. That's an image worth a closer look in our church bureaucracies.