Jim Cogley: Reflections Tues 6th Feb – Mon 12th Feb

Tue 6^th February – The Great Divide

For longer than we care to think there has been in society a huge dichotomy between faith and practice that has amounted to serious hypocrisy. This has now come back to haunt the traditional churches as a younger generation have seen through it and are voting with their feet, away from the direction of age-old practices. While many have thrown out the baby with the bathwater, and abandoned all spiritual values, lots are pursuing a path that is deeply spiritual. A most common heard statement is: ‘I’m spiritual but not religious.’ This is reflected in the fact that most bookstores today have entire areas devoted to spiritual literature, so great is the interest. Up to a few years ago a few shelves were sufficient. It seems as if the death of an old order and the birthing of something new and pure is taking place at the same time. Meanwhile, we live in a transitional space that demands flexibility and openness to change. To hold on too tightly to what was, is to invite unnecessary suffering, while to be open to change, before it is forced upon us, seems to be the best way forward.

Wed 7^th Feb – Hypocrisy in Practice

The following statements reflect the all too common hypocrisy that often lurked beneath the thin veneer of religious observance.

‘My sister is the most religious woman you might meet and yet she could cut you dead.’

‘My father and mother were deeply religious and yet were not on speaking terms with neighbours, and often not with one another.’

‘The most religious people in our community where we grew up were also the most intolerant and judgemental.’

‘How is it that when you scratch the surface on so many so called religious people a very nasty person often lurks beneath the surface?’

‘Our pastor was well liked and hard-working, he appeared so devout and sincere. We could not believe when he was convicted of child abuse.’

‘I grew up in a home where religion was enforced and cruelty was inflicted in equal measure.’

‘Christ was the friend of outcasts and sinners. My life is far from what it should be, so why should I feel so ill at ease in many churches and in the company of religious people?’

Thurs 8^th Feb

The above quotes, taken at random, carry an echo of universality that makes them sound all too familiar. While they point to blatant hypocrisy and double standards it would be purely judgemental not to examine such behaviour at a deeper level and see why it is so, and what we can learn from it.

Could it be that a particular brand of religious teaching has contributed to the division that is often so evident in families and communities that extends from generation to generation?

Is it possible that the individuals responsible for the aforementioned hypocrisy were themselves let down by the religious system to which they aspired?

Has the Institutional Church lost its way by becoming more focused on morality than spirituality?

Fri 9^th Feb – The Schism of Today

In most Churches of our time there appears to be an undeclared and ever widening schism. On one side are those who want to restore things to the way they were, even if they didn’t work! Then on the other there are those who are prepared to explore new ways of presenting the age-old truths based on biblical principles, tradition and modern day psychological insights. In between are the hungry masses, many of whom are searching, and others who are not even aware of their hunger. Then there is also a large percentage who have tried religion but found it didn’t meet where they were at, and simply gave up practicing. A common criticism from such folk is that teachings and sermons used ‘outmoded language’, were too much ‘up in the air’ and ‘not grounded in the human reality.’

Sat 10^th Feb – Our Homing Demons

Christianity has had a long and very uncomfortable relationship with the shadow side of human nature. Down through history Jews, Muslims, women and countless other groups have all been targeted as scapegoats and forced into the wilderness of oblivion. The tribalism that characterised the internal division between the Christian churches is another example of shadow projection.

At a much deeper level much of what constituted our humanity was also treated as unacceptable shadow material and effectively cut off. So, it is entirely true that, ‘a very nasty person often lurks beneath the surface of someone who appears to be quite religious.’ Aspects of our humanity that have been rejected will always appear with an ugly face, sometimes to the point of seeming demonic. Hence, the psychiatrist Carl Jung could say, ‘Most of the demons that Christians want exorcised are in fact aspects of their own shadow that are crying out to come home and be integrated.’

Sun 11^th Feb – Leprosy

Perhaps our closest experience of what leprosy was like goes back just a few years to the Covid crisis. During that time, we were expected to be like magnets with reversed polarities so that when passing each other we were to keep as far apart as possible. We were being advised to treat ourselves and everyone we met as a carrier of the disease. Life felt as if it had been put on pause and became very narrow. We couldn’t go anywhere, and our basic need for human connection and touch was denied. In effect, Covid had turned much of our world into a giant leper colony.

The leper in the gospel did exactly what he was forbidden to do, he came up to Jesus saying ‘If you want to you can cure me’. Jesus moved with compassion then did what he was expressly forbidden to do, he touched him and with a voice that has echoed down through the ages, he said, ‘Of course I want to, be cured’.

In the Gospels leprosy can be seen as a symbol of that word sin that we don’t hear used as much now as we used to. But it is still that reality that alienates us from ourselves, from others and from God. Jesus came as the Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world, in other words all that separates us. That’s what we say in the Mass, ‘Lamb of God you take away the sin of the world’. In the Jewish tradition whenever a person sinned or messed up they took a lamb to the temple for sacrifice. The priest then examined the lamb to see if it were pure, without spot or blemish and if it passed the test then it was sacrificed as a sin offering. It wasn’t the sinner that was examined it was the lamb and that’s really important to understand, the acceptable sacrifice in the sight of God is never us, it is Jesus the spotless Lamb.

In one Eucharistic prayer we say – ‘We offer you in thanksgiving this holy and living sacrifice. Look with favour on your churches offering and see the victim whose death has reconciled us to yourself.’ It’s also why we say in Mass – ‘This is the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world’ – of ourselves we are not worthy, we never were and we never will be, but it is Christ’s offering of himself on the cross that makes us worthy. That is why it is so important to accept Christ as Lord and Saviour into our lives because it is only in him that we can be as acceptable as him. If Christ is truly our Lord then there can be absolutely no room for any trace of guilt or unworthiness in our lives.

Why is the Mass the central celebration of our Christian faith for 2000 years? It is precisely because it is the making present once again of Christ’s death on Calvary where we are cleansed of the leprosy of sin and are able to come pure and spotless into the presence of God.

For us who were brought up in the Catholic faith, where there was so much focus on hell fire and damnation, it’s quite difficult for us to let go of feelings of guilt and unworthiness. We hold onto these negatives as if they were a badge of our Catholic identity. There’s even a condition known as Catholic Alzheimer’s where we forget everything except the guilt.

Yet to see ourselves in any negative light whatsoever is to fly in the face of God who looks on us and only sees the reflection of his son in each of us. To not love ourselves as God’s creation is to pay the ultimate insult to the God who loves everything that he has made and who takes delight in his creation. We can only honour the God of mercy if we are prepared to forgive ourselves.

Just days before his death I had a chat about all this to an elderly priest in a nearby parish. We talked about how important it is to see ourselves as God sees us. By virtue of our baptism, we are already the children of God and how necessary it is to see ourselves in that light. The focus in the past was much more on the fear of God than knowing His love; far too much on sin and guilt and far too little on the story of redemption and how Christ had destroyed them both on the cross. His last words were, ‘It’s hard to let go of all the old stuff, but we sure need to, because it just weighs us down.’ They were to be almost his last words because he died a few days later. Somehow, I was glad we had that last conversation. I have a feeling that some burden of being unworthy, of not feeling good enough all his life, had lifted from him and he was free to go his final journey unencumbered by baggage

Mon 12^th Feb – The Curse of Perfectionism

The curse of perfectionism has pervaded centuries of Christian teaching and preaching. This meant that all that was deemed unacceptable about the human condition was effectively given the scissors treatment. The focus was on the elimination of the bad and not on the cultivation of what was good. Nothing buried remains hidden for too long. The rejected shadow soon projects itself unto others who then become the victims of our intolerance, harsh judgments and even cruelty. We then see and judge in others the faults we are blind to in ourselves

The teaching contained in the Parable of the Wheat and the Darnel stands in marked contrast. The disciples wanted to pull up the weeds but Jesus forbade them to do so. The potential for good can so easily be lost when we focus on our faults and failings, our weaknesses rather than our strengths.