Daily Reading for September 11
The spiritual or moral history of our species could be written as a struggle not to kill or run away from what is different—how we learn to treat those with whom we cannot identify. “Remember that you were strangers once,” Moses reminded Israel. Writing to the Christians of Ephesus, St. Paul begs that we lead a life worthy of our calling, “with all lowliness and meekness, with patience, forbearing one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” The apostle is up against nature, and he knows it. He asks us not to assume that anybody else has motives worse than our own. It is especially important to be “lowly and meek” when we are sure that we are right. This is true in part because there are other people in the room who know they are right, too.
Forbearing one another in love is a religious way of saying that because we value one another we don’t crush one another. . . . Paul wants us “eager” to maintain the bond of peace. . . and in Paul’s mind it is the gift of the Holy Spirit. That is one of the reasons Jesus told his disciples to share his body and blood: you can’t easily eat with people you reject. . . . An even bigger gift of the Spirit is to come to difficult discussions eager to help people work things out, to find a way. Such eagerness, for me, is religion at its best.
From “Beating the Inner Reptile” in Messages in the Mall: Looking at Life in 600 Words or Less by Paul V. Marshall. Copyright © 2008. Seabury Books, an imprint of Church Publishing. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org