Mike’s Rumblings 05-17-24

Faith Conversations

This is an audio version of Mike Murphy‘s Friday rumblings. This is a regular post on Facebook that I’ve turned into a podcast. I decided Mike’s words needed a wider audience. You may agree or disagree with what he says, but there is certainly much food for thought contained here. You can friend Mike on Facebook for the printed version or read it below

Rumblings.5.17.24

1. To remain silent when people are being treated unjustly, is problematic at best. At its worst it is flat out sinful.

Folks justify their silence, though, by saying “I don’t want to make waves.” Or, “It’s none of my business.” Or if “I say something my friends at work, school, and/or church will wonder if I’m still one of them.”

I understand these things. I’ve done my fair share of not doing anything and fear is something I’m acquainted with, perhaps even too acquainted.

However, I also claim to be a follower of Jesus. The Jesus I know made it his business to speak truth to power and in the process he made some waves. Religious leaders didn’t care much for His truth telling nor were they thrilled with the waves he created so they came after Him hard.

It seems to me that where there is injustice, good people need to find a way to speak up and make those Jesus style waves because someone has to remind the bad people that what they are doing is unconscionable.

2. Wisdom from Anne Lamott:

“Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.”

“Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul.”

“I’m here to be me, which is taking a great deal longer than I had hoped.”

3. Around

every corner

opposition

and

opportunity

show up

prepare

for both.

4. “Our whole business in this life is to restore to health the eye of the heart whereby God may be seen.” ~ St. Augustine

I really, really love this. I see it as an invitation to first restore to health the eye of my heart and to help others do the same.

5. Hunter S. Thompson was a writer and social critic in the latter part of the last century. It was said of him “that he feared the straight-laced and bland existence” and so he “often made himself ugly to expose the ugliness around him.” Sadly, he ended up taking his own life.

I confess I’m drawn to thoughtful rebels. That’s why so many Christian ‘saints’ appeal to my sensibilities and why I find ways to hear the echoes of the prophets in the writings of people like Hunter Thompson. As Mother Theresa said: “God often comes to us in a distressing disguise.”

Thompson wrote: “Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!”

It gets me thinking. How then shall I finish my life? Now, I’m just speaking for myself, but straight laced and bland doesn’t sound nearly as inviting as “Wow! What a Ride?””

How about you?

7. I’ve been rereading James Martin’s book “ Becoming Who You Are. Insights on the True Self.” The book is only 99 pages long but it sure does explain true self/false/self in a winsome way. Here’s a sample:

“Thomas Merton identified the false self as “the person that we wish to present to the world, and the person we want the whole world to revolve around…”

James Martin, a Jesuit priest, says of the false self. “I had created, over many years, this persona, this other self, which I thought would be pleasing to everyone: to my family, my friends, my professors. And this “false self,” separated from my true desires, was sure that a life in corporate America was the right path. This false self was sure about everything.”

Richard Rohr, the Franciscan priest, says “Our false self is who we think we are. It is our mental self-image and social agreement, which most people spend their whole lives living up to—or down to. Keeping this false self alive requires a good deal of work…”

8. There is a centuries-old aphorism, sometimes attributed to St. Teresa of Avila, that states, “God writes straight with crooked lines.”

The meaningful movements in our life very rarely follow a straight course. At least that’s true for me. Nothing is wasted in our walk and talk with God. It’s just that sometimes we get lost in the twists and turns of life and discouragement sets in. If we lay claim to the discouragement we’re sizzled. When we embrace the twists and turns and prayerfully try to make sense of them something good begins to happen.

9.. “An evil man will burn his own nation to the ground to rule over the ashes.” ~ Sun Tzu, The Art of War

“The winner is the last man standing” they’ll proclaim. So stinkin’ sad. For them. For us. There’s a lot of folks talking about and doing evil these days. They are almost impossible to ignore and if you can’t spot them – well, that says something doesn’t it?

10. This is from Heather Cox Richardson:

“…Josh Dawsey and Maxine Joselow in the Washington Post revealed that last month, at a private meeting with about two dozen top oil executives at Mar-a-Lago, Trump offered to reverse President Joe Biden’s environmental rules designed to combat climate change and to stop any new ones from being enacted in exchange for a $1 billion donation.

Trump has promised his supporters that he would be an outsider, using his knowledge of business to defend ordinary Americans against those elites who don’t care about them. Now he has been revealed as being willing to sell us out—to sell humanity out—for the bargain basement price of $1 billion (with about 8 billion people in the world, this would make us each worth about 12 and a half cents).

Chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration Richard Painter wrote: “This is called bribery. It’s a felony… even a candidate who loses can be prosecuted for bribery…”

Quid pro quo is one of his favorite games and finding players for it is never a problem for him but playing it at the expense of environmental protections is ‘mad man’ crazy.

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