Living Embodied, Adventurously Expectant Lives

It was in the 17th century that some of the Western ideas related to dualism began to really get a foothold. It was writers like Renee Descartes – who was a French philosopher, scientist and mathematician best known for his quote, “I think, therefore, I am” – who really helped fuel this idea that the body and mind (or body and spirit) were separate. Furthermore, he would conclude that the mind was more important. These ideas set in motion a lot of things that we are still trying to recover and heal from.

We hear dualistic ideas in the first reading today from Romans 8.  Paul is talking about not living “according to the flesh” but encourages his listeners to “live by the spirit.” he goes on to say that “those who live by the Spirit…are the [children] of God.”

I think I know what Paul was trying to say. He was trying to warn his community in Rome about getting distracted by material concerns. He, likely, had heard the teachings of Jesus (from Matthew 6) that said:

If you decide for God, living a life of God-worship, it follows that you don’t fuss about what’s on the table at mealtimes or whether the clothes in your closet are in fashion…There is far more to your life than the food you put in your stomach, more to your outer appearance than the clothes you hang on your body. Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, careless in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds (translation, The Message)

While Paul was focused on “the Spirit” he knew that this led us to act in the world. In fact, if we use the same translation I referenced above for the reading from Romans 8 today, Paul tells us,

God’s Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go! This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike “What’s next?” God’s Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are (translation, The Message).

Unfortunately, though, most of us have heard his ideas expressed in a way that put the “body” against the “spirit.”

Of course we now know that these are not separate, and there’s no way to have one without the other. There is no way to engage God that does include our bodies and our sense experiences. And many mystics would say that these are THE way to engage God in this world.

Yet a lot of us grew up in this duality and need to recover from it. Engaging embodied practices as part of our prayer life – practices like yoga, being outdoors, touching the earth and somatic practices – are what some writers call “sensual mysticism.” So if you’re struggling in our prayer life as you engage practices like meditation and silence, please consider embodied practices as well (ones that do not require us to sit still!). These also lead us to God. 

Speaking of embodied, what I love about Jesus is that he was a fully embodied person.

In Luke 13 he encounters a woman who had been ‘bent over, completely incapable of standing erect’ due to a crippling disease for over 18 years. Her pain is not just “spiritual,” it is physical, and so Jesus responds correspondingly.

He lays his hands on her, and she immediately “stands up straight.”

We could probably stop there and get plenty from this gospel passage. God’s healing helps people “stand up straight.” No more bending over in this world. No more making ourselves small. No more shrinking. With Jesus, we come to stand in our full stature! As we heard from our reading earlier, “God’s Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are!” Amen!

But of course there is more.

The religious leaders of the day get all disturbed because Jesus did this healing on the sabbath ( I love how as the woman gets healed, THEY are now the ones who are bent out of shape!). What Jesus is doing is “illegal” according to Jewish law. Jesus points out their hypocrisy because he knows (and they know) that they do many things on the sabbath that are “against the law” as well.

When I think about Jesus “breaking the law” in order to privilege the healing of this woman, I can’t help but think about Martin Luther King, Jr. in his famous words from “Letter From a Birmingham Jail.” At this moment in history, I might encourage us all to go and read ( or re-read) this incredible text. 

King’s letter is responding to critiques – from Christian pastors – about his actions in Birmingham. It “feels” a lot like what happened to Jesus in the synagogue in our reading. And in his letter, King says

“You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations…”

The synagogue leaders oppose this woman’s healing, yet they do not oppose her living  a “bent over life”!

King goes on to say, “there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. 

We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was “legal” and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was “illegal.”

I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.”

There is so much in there for us to reflect upon. What stands out for you?

In our current context, many of us are finding ourselves faced with situations that may require us to act against unjust laws and decrees. We may be realizing that a commitment to “order” is conflicting with our desire for justice. We may be finding ourselves considering the need for direct action in  ways that we have not previously.

Taken together, today’s readings invite us to not “spiritualize” our scriptural tradition. What happens to people’s bodies in our world is God’s business, and our prayer lives must include embodied actions that seek to address the pain in this world. Like many throughout history, we, too, will need to consider what laws are unjust and what (and who) we must resist in order to align ourselves with the demands of the gospel.

As we see from King’s letter, this landed him in jail. And as we read from the gospel, this put Jesus in danger. Yet Paul reminded his readers, “This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant.”

This week, may we be fully embodied in our prayer lives. May we live adventurously expectant lives. And may we align ourselves with those whose bodies are being crushed by the empire and stand in solidarity with them – even if our solidarity is considered “illegal” by the world around us.

Note: This week is also the cultural celebration of Halloween and the religious celebrations of All Saints Day and All Souls Day. I would humbly offer some prior writing on Samhain (perhaps one of our last true connections to our own indigenous ancestry as europeans) and connection with our ancestors for your reflection on those days.