Tag: spiritmindbody

YMCA and Gerard Manley Hopkins

YMCA and Gerard Manley Hopkins ::: an unlikely and unique connection between the genius of George Williams and the British poet Hopkins – a rare exploration of the convulsive context in which the Y was founded and the poetry created – both a testament to their personal and transformative experiences of God’s salvation and calling upon their life.

The Y and Hopkins were born the same year, in 1844; both British in birth and embodiment of the diverse Christianity that grounded their culture.

June 6, 1844 is the founding of the Y; Hopkins is born July 28, 1844 and would die still a young man at age 44 on June 8, 1889.

  • George Williams
  • Gerard Manley Hopkins

This past Sunday I wrote about Williams founding the Y, today on Hopkins death-day I want to remember him and the cultural context he shared with the Y, and what it could contribute to an ecumenical Christian emphasis today.

There are very few articles on the internet that make this kind of unique connection; this one published by JSRT of Gonzaga University titled Romantic Critiques of Industrial Technology is illuminating.

A bit more about the context in which the Y was founded:

The Young Men’s Christian Association was founded on June 6, 1844 by 23 year old George Williams and eleven Christian friends.

Williams was involved in the drapery or clothing industry, and would become very successful and prosperous in it.

His conscience was pricked by the complex societal difficulties and suffering of urban families, especially the young men leaving the family farms for factory work.

This cultural upheaval was experienced as one caught in the roiling surf, almost caught by a riptide but almost to tired to take the extended hand of the lifeguard in the boat.

The YMCA was started for multiple intertwined reasons: to save the souls of young men in the city who had left their parish behind; to save the minds of these young men from the grinding and filthy monotony of the factories; to save their bodies from the base temptations afflicting their neighborhoods.

The wider cultural changes included resentment and resistance to the calculated rationale of the Enlightenment and its mechanistic interpretation of the world which fed the appetites of industrialists but destroyed families.

Movements emerged which sought to re-humanize the world, to lift up the heart and value personal experiences; this was reflected in part by the birth of evangelical revivals which stressed individual conversion marked by emotional and dynamic evidences.

Poets, artists, novelists, philosophers and theologians all added their talent and energy to this movement.

The YMCA was not the only Christian organization to emerge in this time to rescue young men from the de-humanizing industrialization of the community and create space for them to have a transformational inward spiritual awakening and calling.

It seems so simplistic now, but it was a radical act of hospitality to open up housing for these young men that was safe, sanitary, secure, but also spiritually alive.

Bible studies, prayer sessions, worship gatherings were all forms of protest against state-supported or traditional churches that rigidly clung to form of transformation, logic over emotion, correctness over inspiration, hierarchy over brotherhood.

Inspired by the dark and grueling context in which Williams founded the YMCA, what are the depressing and gross circumstances that young people need rescued from today?

What kind of housing and hospitality, safety and spiritual vitality can the Y offer in these dangerous days?

A bit about Hopkins and his context in 1844:

Gerard Manley Hopkins converted from Anglicanism to Roman Catholicism, inspired by the writings of Cardinal John Henry Newman, much to the sorrow and grief of his devoutly religious family.

As a young man he was caught up in continual conflict, complicated loyalties, frustrated talents, and isolated friendships.

His deep love for nature and people put him at odds with the rational industrialized culture which prioritized technology and production over people.

As a poet he had a roiled soul, drawn to love and serve God, inspired by the stunning Creation, but personally struggling with depression, loneliness, and meaninglessness.

Like the YMCA, he spent his life with young men, seeking to build them up in spirit, mind and body.

Though the YMCA was a evangelical Protestant Christian organization, and Hopkins a Jesuit Roman Catholic, they both valued the inner heart of an individual, striving to bring discipline and freedom to their soul, instructing and guiding others to be one with God and be His faithful servant in a fallen, corrupted, industrialized world.

The YMCA and Hopkins are both unique in their Christian contribution to God’s work in the world; both are still a force for good and an inspiration to Christians these many years later.

They both inspired many other people to experience renewal and attempt their own creative projects.

The Y has been a source of original contributions to the world: ESL, camping, basketball and volleyball, group exercise and swim lessons, etc.

Hopkins invented a fresh and engaging form of poetry, putting together new words and rhythms that compel attention and spur fresh insights into Creation.

At their heart, the Y and Hopkins strive to see the world as it really is, to see men and women as they really are, to see humanity in truth and grace.

They know darkness and the light, joy and suffering, friendship and abandonment, success and failure.

For Y leaders wanting a fresh perspective on seeing the world, try taking up some of Hopkins eclectic and intriguing poems.

For Christians wanting to remember the real context for the founding of the Y in all its complexity and genius, getting to know the real George Williams and Gerard Manley Hopkins can ground you as well as inspire you.

Here are a few of my favorite poems by Hopkins that attempt to help us see the complex spirit of humanity, the faithful Spirit of God, and how we can participate in the reconciliation and restoration of all things as ones loved and transformed inwardly by Christ Jesus.

Gerard Manley Hopkins – 1844-1889

God’s Grandeur

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs–
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Sunrise over Jerusalem

Pied Beauty

Glory be to God for dappled things—
   For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
       For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
   Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
       And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise Him.

Silver Bay YMCA on Lake George, NY

As kingfishers catch fire

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies dráw fláme;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves — goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying Whát I dó is me: for that I came.

Í say móre: the just man justices;
Kéeps grace: thát keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is —
Chríst — for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.

Kingfisher

The YMCA & Forgiveness For All

The YMCA & Forgiveness For All :: June 6 is YMCA Founders Day, when we remember Sir George Williams and his 11 Christian friends who prayerfully and courageously started the Y in 1844. We celebrate all who have inspired the Y to be for all, empowered by the life and love of Christ Jesus. In these difficult times, we need the Y more than ever to support and train our members on how to do forgiveness for all. This will deepen our inclusive equity work in our communities. Read for more on this proposal.

The emphasis on inclusion in the YMCA is admirable and crucial.

For Christians in the Y we see inclusion as central to our original purpose, which is why we highlighted the prayer of Jesus “that we all may be one” in our early logo (John 17:21).

The adapting logos of the YMCA since 1881

The religious and social motivations for initiating the Young Men’s Association are an example of what radical inclusion looked like in 1844 industrial London.

On Founders Day, June 6, YMCA’s pause to remember Sir George Williams and his 11 Christian friends who prayerfully launched the Y in order to save young men in spirit, mind and body.

Sir George Williams, London

Here we are, almost 180 years later, benefiting from their religiously and socially inclusive work, still striving to keep living out our mission; remarkable really.

Inclusion in the YMCA and our world has gotten more difficult and complicated, for many reasons which include globalization, technological and proliferation of social media, and cross-cultural human migration.

More diverse people are more uprooted from their traditions and tribes, are more scattered across the globe, and thus more kinds of different people must interact with each other.

It doesn’t always go well.

Which is why the Y is so wise to emphasize inclusion the way it does.

However, one element I have rarely ever seen taught in the YMCA regarding inclusion is the practice of forgiveness.

What happens when people are bigoted and exclusionary? Is this just a misunderstanding? Is it just lack of understanding? Is it at least a character flaw? An area for improvement? Is prejudice wrong or just unpreferred?

Can we call bigotry “sin” in the Young Men’s Christian Association?

If we can, then we open up opportunities to really nurture a transformation in the spirit, mind and body of our fellow members that hold on to ugly stereotypes and bigoted habits.

To be honest, every single Y member has some kind of prejudice that they have to work on. If bigotry and prejudice foment hate and violence, we need a strong word and concept to describe it: sin.

Within the Christian tradition of the Y there are beautiful examples and practices for people to be transformed from sin-full exclusive bigots to grace-full inclusive neighbors.

One example is the life and teachings of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. His Christian faith was undeniably central and crucial to his accomplishments for civil rights and a just peace.

When MLK taught about inclusion, it required teaching about and modeling forgiveness.

The Y is at a place in our inclusion work where we need to recover the teaching and practice of forgiveness. Without it we will have slogans with no spirit, policies to embody but no way to recover from hurt hearts and broken promises.

Social responsibility and being for all includes the practice of forgiveness – this is what enables there to be any kind of diverse social cohesion and survive the chronic misunderstandings and human foibles.

If the Y is as serious as we say we are about our inclusive mission, we must utilize our Christian heritage, in particular its tradition on forgiveness.

The brokenness and violence in our communities is more than just poverty of jobs and resources, it’s the sinful spirit of us all without recourse for letting go of grudges and making amends.

If nothing else, for the majority of Y members that identify with a Christian tradition, the Y ought to resurrect specifically Christian teachings on forgiveness so that Christian Y members who are racist or bigoted or holding on to grudges have proximity in the Y to the Jesus of John 17:21.

When it comes to forgiveness for all, where to start for resources and models?

For the many Christians in the Y, we start with Jesus Christ and what he taught and modeled on forgiveness. The Y ought to explicitly endorse and encourage Christian Y members to be more like Christ Jesus. It’s needed, no?

It’d be worth remembering and reflecting on the Christian sermons of Rev. Martin Luther King, especially the collected in the edition Strength To Love in particular his writings on forgiveness for all.

For a fresh and startling Christian perspective on forgiveness for all, I strongly recommend these provocative reflections by Soren Kierkegaard, a Danish Christian who wrote extensively around the time that George Williams was forming the YMCA. Kierkegaard was also a deeply formative influence on MLK. And me, for what it matters.

Take these Christian comments on forgiveness for all by Kierkegaard and reflect on them with a humble, inclusive spirit and mind.

I think they could be a powerful catalyst for Christians in the YMCA to reawaken as a powerful force for radical inclusion and reconciliation, healing and just mercy, inspired by the truth and grace of Christ Jesus.

That Jesus Christ died for my sins certainly shows how great his grace is, but it also shows how great my sins are.

Christ abandoned ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,’ and turned the relationship around. He introduced a different like-for-like: as you relate yourself to others, so God relates himself to you. Forgiveness is to forgive.

To forgive sins is divine not only in the sense that no one is able to do it except God, but also because no one can do it without God.

It is God’s joy to forgive sins. Just as God is almighty in creating out of nothing, so he is almighty in uncreating something; for to forget is to uncreate something.

When I hate someone or deny that God is their Father, it is not they who lose, it is I. It is I who then have no Father. With unforgiveness there is always the reversed echo.

The anguished conscience alone understands Christ.

Is this the test: to love Christ more dearly than mother and father, than gold and goods, than honor and reputation? No, the test is this: to love the Savior more than your sin.

God created out of nothing – marvelous you say. Yes of course but he does something more marvelous- he creates saints out of sinners.

You will get a deep insight into the state of Christianity in each age by seeing how it treats Judas.

Father in heaven! Hold not our sins up against us but hold us up against our sins, so that the thought of you when it wakens in our soul, and each times it wakens, should not remind us of what we have committed but of what you forgave, not of how we went astray, but of how you saved us!

The need for forgiveness is a sign that one loves God. But both parts correspond to one another – when a person does not comprehend what a great sinner he is, he cannot love God; and when he does not love God, he cannot comprehend how great a sinner he is. The consciousness of sin is the very passion of love. Truly the law makes one a sinner, but love makes one a far greater sinner! It is true that the person who fears God and trembles feels himself to be a sinner, but the person who in truth loves feels himself to be an even greater sinner.

You may think that the sin remains just as great whether it is forgiven or not, since forgiveness neither adds nor subtracts. But this is not so. Rather, when you refuse to forgive you increase the sin. Does not your hardness of heart become yet one more sin? Ought not this be brought into the reckoning as well?

All Kierkegaard quotes in this article taken from Provocations, pgs 283-287
For more YMCA resources on forgiveness for all, try out this devotion series called Living Stones developed by Y leaders.

John 17:21 & Our Flourishing

John 17:21 & Our Flourishing ::: what are ways the mission and Christian origins of the YMCA enliven our work these days to strengthen the foundations of our community for all? Especially for diverse Christians in the Y striving to live out their faith in an inclusive, equitable and global way…

Unity.

It’s like a shattered dream.

German concentration camp, Flossenberg

Yet, it still compels a certain kind of yearning:

“If only we were more authentically united, we would have more peace.”

That’s my summary of what I hear people say.

We are not wrong to want unity, nor in the wrong to make attempts to forge unity in a hope for peace.

It’s just that calls for peace in general, abstract speeches for unity ring hollow after awhile.

How many of us want the results of peace without the work of unity?

In my church world the prayer for unity by Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane is getting a lot of traction (again).

It’s a beautiful prayer, very personal, raw, emotional and grand in its vision for humanity and God.

For Christians in any given community, there is usually some kind of chronic conflict disturbing the peace.

The garden prayer reminds us that the unity God wants for us most is oneness with Christ Jesus and the other “little Christ’s” in our world.

Maybe because of our public role in the community we can have a hand in preventing further disunity or defend it from worse conflict.

But as a Christian, in both our public and private world, the unity that matters most and that has the greatest power for unity in the world is to be found in the garden prayer of Jesus.

Here is a key part of that prayer:

“Father, my prayer is not that you take (my disciples) out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.

They are not of the world, even as I am not of it.

Sanctify them by the truth; your Word is truth.

As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.

For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be sanctified in truth.

My prayer is not for them alone.

I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.

May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one – so that they may be brought to complete unity.

Then the world will know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

[Jesus, in John’s Gospel, 17:15-23]

In the news media these days there is deep yearning for unity and peace to prevail between the people of Israel and Palestine.

Here in the USA there is a passionate desire for unity and peace to heal the racial divide.

How many families, how many friends have become painfully are separated in spirit, mind and body due to divisions over vaccines, election integrity, political ideology, and just plain drifting apart due to irreconcilable differences?

From whence comes any kind or real unity and peace in our world of suffering, chaos and disillusionment?

We as a global humanity have more scientific and technical answers for what disrupts unity and peace for a national society, tribe and culture than ever.

Same for tested theories of reconciliation and healing.

But, however abstract and principled these observations and theories may be, it is often not a matter of knowledge or information that keeps us from doing peacemaking and unification.

It is likely much more a matter of the will, of our desires, of what we want to choose.

We humans live through the heart, and too often merely use our head to justify what our heart feels, believes, sees, hears and experiences.

Jesus prays from the heart for unity within humanity: in particular those who will see him, hear him, believe him, and follow in his truth.

These humans in the first century were derisively called “little Christ’s” for their imitation of Jesus.

Despite the mocking and persecution they became a community, an embodiment of this prayer by Jesus for unity, truth, peace and love.

The current disunity in the world is mostly driven by incentivized envy and greed, insatiable lust and gluttony, lazy apathy towards others who suffer but bitter anger over ones own; mostly though it is wounded pride that drives ourselves, our tribes and modern societies to vengeful and “defensive” violence and madness.

This is generally true throughout recorded human history around the world.

For the past two millennia Christians have entered into almost these tribes and societies in the world, establishing the presence of Christ there through little communities.

What happens though is that these “little Christ’s” over identify with the culture and then too little with the presence of Christ Jesus.

Christ inclusively connects and unites his diverse followers around the globe, even when they come from warring tribes and societies pitted against each other.

For example, too many USA Christians over identify with the government of Israel and are mostly ignorant of the Palestinian Christians suffering in the Holy Land.

  • People inspect the rubble of a destroyed residential building which was hit by Israeli airstrikes, in Gaza City, Wednesday, May 12, 2021. (AP Photo/Adel Hana)

Or, here in the USA, too many White Christians are in denial of the racism that has wounded Black Christians in spirit, mind and body.

There is also the ecological crisis, of how wealthy Christians in the world despoil and degrade the land and cultures of poor Christians.

Of course there is rationalization and justification of intent and motives, of actions and consequences that blunts the conviction to repent, confess, lament, be sorrowful for the sinful brokenness and pride which is adversarial to Jesus’ prayer of unity.

Let’s not deny the truth of the experience of suffering, both of Jesus and those who through the past 21 centuries have also suffered at the hands of those with political, economic and religious power.

Jesus is the incarnation of God’s Spirit in the human spirit, mind and body.

Whatever Jesus prays and does, it’s an embodiment of God’s desire for the world he created and the people he loves.

When Jesus prays for unity, love and truth, it’s not an overspiritualization at the expense of material cynical reality.

It’s the wisdom of God for how he is at work in the world that he fashioned and still holds in his hands, so to speak.

The flourishing of Christians is an overflow from being united with Christ and each other.

It does not mean there is no more suffering.

But it does mean no more suffering alone, no more suffering without faith, hope and love.

In this world we will suffer. But will there also be any flourishing in its midst?

What sets apart “little Christ’s” in communities across the globe is there solidarity with those who suffer across the globe.

It is the way of the world to hate their enemy, to take an eye for an eye, and give help to only their own.

But Jesus embodies a different kind of way, truth and life in the world; those that follow it are set apart, are sanctified, and strive to love their enemies, heal the unthankful, turn the other cheek, and seek just mercy for all.

What’s the vision that empowers Christians to strive for this kind of unity and flourishing?

Jesus prays that we who are his followers would have union with each other like he has with the Father, and that we would have union with both Father and Son, through the life-giving, spirit, mind, body -saving power of the Holy Spirit.

Theosis is the theological word for this dynamic transformation, of our oneness with each other as we are made one with God in Jesus through the Spirit.

Somehow this begins in this life on Earth,

There is no movie-soundtrack that accompanies theosis, no awards ceremony to recognize the achievements, no social media promotions to highlight theosis.

Theosis is gritty, it can be grueling, it is forged amidst suffering, as we strive for just mercy for the neighbors we love and hate, for the fellow Christians whom we enjoy and those we don’t understand.

Theosis is fueled by imitation of Jesus, by submitting to the Same Spirit which energized his work, by a vision of God sustained through trust.

Theosis and flourishing go together, along with the suffering that comes from being fully human in this real world.

There is no utopia!

Theosis is not about perfection in this life, it’s not about convenience, efficiency or effectiveness.

Theosis is about the fruit of the Spirit bearing out in our lives as we follow in the way, truth and life of the Jew Jesus.

Theosis looks like God sending Jesus into the world, which we can read about in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures.

Theosis looks like the apostle and disciples of Jesus being sent into the real world to proclaim the gritty gospel, preaching repentance and forgiveness of divisive sin – to the ends of the Earth.

Theosis requires love; this kind of love from Jesus to us that flows through us to fellow humanity is patient, this love is kind, it does not envy or boast in pride, it does not greedily seek its own at another’s expense, and like God is not easily angered.

Theosis is experienced through love that rejoices in the truth, a love that keeps no record of wrong, a love that does not delight in evil.

Our flourishing in theosis is experienced in God’s love for us and our love for neighbors, strangers and enemies; a love that always protects, always trusts, always hopes, a uniting love that always perseveres amidst the suffering and evil in the world.

Flourishing, theosis, love – it is all in the details.

Every day.

Being present, in the chaos and injustice, the mundane and boring, the busyness and hecticness.

It’s the courage to be, the courage to believe you are loved by God, the courage to desire unity, theosis, and flourishing despite observable inequities and brokenness all around us.

Shattered dreams are a crucial and painful moment that test our resolve to keep the faith, to keep hoping and loving (ala Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.)

Jesus’ prayer for our unity and flourishing, our theosis, occurred while on his knees in the Garden of Gethsemane, the night of his betrayal where he begged God to take this cup of suffering from him.

With drops of blood on his brow he prayed to accept the will of God.

His shattered spirit, mind and body on the cross would seem to have rendered his prayers ineffective.

Yet…the union he had with God before and after that shattering were transformative, they were the opening up of a new kind of theosis and flourishing for all.

May your desire for unity and peace, may your yearning for theosis with God in Jesus through the Spirit, amidst the chaos and suffering of our world, bear the fruit of flourishing for all Creation.