- Feb 5, 2002
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COMMENTARY: We try to live the family’s life, which reflects their teaching, and we eventually understand, or maybe not. But we live it, because it’s our family’s life.
“As our blessed founder said,” the priest at the retreats would begin, and then relay some complete banality, on the level of “Look both ways before crossing the street” or “Brush between meals.” He offered some better quotations, too, and I benefitted from the talks, but I felt like I was being fed a lot of tasteless rice cakes along with some treats.
The friend who invited me explained this one night when the priest had offered more rice cakes than usual. He wasn’t trying to be profound, my friend said, but was giving us messages from Dad. He felt a real, personal connection with his movement’s long-dead founder, and the members like my friend did too.
Even the banalities meant something to them, because they didn’t look to their founder just as an authority, a dispenser of wisdom and instructions they could get from his books. They felt him to be their father, someone at whose feet they sat. They heard what to me were banalities as loving instruction for their good. They may have found more in the banalities than I did (though I doubt it), but they did feel them more keenly, in a way that helped them live the sayings with more attention and more care.
The story illustrates a lesson I learned only belatedly about reading Scripture, which with another insight changed how I saw it and helped me to read it.
Continued below.
www.ncregister.com
“As our blessed founder said,” the priest at the retreats would begin, and then relay some complete banality, on the level of “Look both ways before crossing the street” or “Brush between meals.” He offered some better quotations, too, and I benefitted from the talks, but I felt like I was being fed a lot of tasteless rice cakes along with some treats.
The friend who invited me explained this one night when the priest had offered more rice cakes than usual. He wasn’t trying to be profound, my friend said, but was giving us messages from Dad. He felt a real, personal connection with his movement’s long-dead founder, and the members like my friend did too.
Even the banalities meant something to them, because they didn’t look to their founder just as an authority, a dispenser of wisdom and instructions they could get from his books. They felt him to be their father, someone at whose feet they sat. They heard what to me were banalities as loving instruction for their good. They may have found more in the banalities than I did (though I doubt it), but they did feel them more keenly, in a way that helped them live the sayings with more attention and more care.
The story illustrates a lesson I learned only belatedly about reading Scripture, which with another insight changed how I saw it and helped me to read it.
Continued below.
Read the Bible Like It’s Your Family’s Story
COMMENTARY: We try to live the family’s life, which reflects their teaching, and we eventually understand, or maybe not. But we live it, because it’s our family’s life.
