LABELS AND RIDICULE

Some online friends yesterday turned up a website which apparently offers human cloning services. And a second site, petitioning for the removal of the first site. As it turns out, the first site is actually tied in to the upcoming feature film Godsend. I don’t know if the second site is also tied to the film or if it was started by someone who thought the first one was “for real.” It doesn’t really matter for what I want to consider.

What I do want to consider is the fact that these friends - who are mostly non-Christian and non-religious - were making snarking remarks about the gullibility of fundamentalist Christians (based on posted comments at the anti-Godsend site). That term to them (“fundamentalist Christian”) means those of uber-conservative, Republican allegiance, accompanied by a general unquestioning outlook and a lower degree of intellectual sophistication. Not that they’ve sat down and drawn up such a definition, but rather that is the gist of their comments.

So. There I am, a Christian in the midst of this. Among folks whom I consider friends. What am I supposed to do or say?

Do I point out to them that their sweeping condescension and dismissal of “fundamentalist Christians” hurts me?

I call myself a middle-of-the-road person on political and social issues. I have found that those who declare for one side of the road or the other tend to develop blind spots, and an ingrained resistence to all suggestions from the “other side.” Me, I prefer to try and not let general preferences get in the way of the specific matter in front of me. The result is, ironically, that among my liberal friends I seem more conservative, while among my conservative friends I seem more liberal.

And just to be clear and fair: elsewhere online, I’ve observed conservative (and Christian, at that) friends being equally sniping about certain “liberal” figures and stances. The reality is that I don’t find either sets of sniping appealing - at least not on the issues.

So, again, what am I to do and/or say about these instances of ridicule? Admittedly, it is very rarely directed at me personally. But, just the same, it stings when folks don’t consider that someone in their number might be injured by their comments.

Reality check: we all have a tendency to make sweeping general statements. And when someone protests the comment, we get defensive. It happens. And it is rough when people on the one hand say of their general comments “Oh, well of course there are exceptions,” but of your general comments “But that just displays your unsociable hatred of those people.” It is hard when you are not allowed to concede exceptions and are constantly labeled as biased against particular sets of people (whether you in fact are or not).

One of the Beatitudes says “Blessed are you when you are persecuted for righteousness’ sake.” Sometimes I want to respond, “Thanks, Lord, but that doesn’t tell me how to deal with it!”

What it comes down to is: how important is this moment, this discussion? Arguing and getting antagonistic only generates alienation. And these are people I care about, that I enjoy having contact with. If I cannot behave charitably toward these folks that I like (whether they are Christians or not), I will never be able to touch those I don’t know or don’t like.

It goes back to the issue of forgiveness. I have to let go of the sting and act as if I never felt it. It wasn’t meant as a slam or attack upon me personally, and I shouldn’t treat it as such.

And I shouldn’t get into a jag about how ridicule of particular groups isn’t funny. Because it sometimes is funny. (Like folks mistaking a very convincing website touting a currently illegal process as being “for real.”) It’s also pointless to wish that ridicule would never happen (particularly me wishing that: my sense of humor runs to the sardonic and sarcastic).

Ridicule can hurt. I just can’t make it an issue for battle.

HOW MUCH DO YOU WANT THE JOB?

Recently, there was an opportunity for me to move up the ladder at work. A couple of writers positions opened up. Now, this happened at a time when I’ve been working toward moving on with my own writing pursuits. But one of these positions would be very advantageous for me, even if it was just a temporary position (as was a possibility).

So, I set aside my outside pursuits to go after one of the positions. And prayed about it all. It really felt like the right thing, to go after the position.

Well, when the decision came down, I did not get the job.

Now, on the one hand, I wasn’t really upset by that outcome, because, as I said, I was already pursuing other possibilities. But on the other hand, it would have been so fitting for my pursuits if I had gotten the job. And also, why would God have me go through the exercise of applying for it, doing the work involved in the application (there was a writing sample required), and then not put me into the position? It was a puzzle.

So the weekend after the decision about the positions was announced, I was praying about this. It was a song that I’m sure God has heard many, many times. “How come, God? Why did you nudge me to do this, if it wasn’t going to pan out? I could have been working on the other stuff! So, how come?”

Now, when you’re praying like this, and actually desiring an answer to it, you shouldn’t be surprised if an answer does come along. There I was, in the “how come?” mode, and a very different question slides quietly into my thoughts. It brought the whine (for that’s really what it was) to a halt.

In the jumble of all my thoughts about the possibilities lost, complaints about time lost on projects, and general discontent with the stalled feeling I had in my life, the question “How much did you really want the job, for itself?” crept in.

I sat in silence for a bit, both actually and mentally. Because the reality was that I didn’t want the job all that much for itself. Oh, I could have done it well, and I would have enjoyed it. But I didn’t want the job in and of itself. I wanted it for the things I could reach more quickly because of having that particular job. It seemed like an ideal short-cut to some things I want to reach professionally. And that was why I had gone after it.

Now, I don’t think God really objects to us doing some jobs because they bring us closer to some other goal. Sometimes it is the only way we can get to the desired destination. But I do think he is not pleased when we enter a job in an attitude that could cause us to do less than our best in that job.

If my eyes were always set on the Next Thing I was heading to, how would that affect the quality of my work? I don’t think it’s a good thing to be looking at any job as a means toward some outside end. Because the reality is that the ends do not justify the means.

Most of the time, we can disguise the fact that we’re not giving the job at hand our full attention and our best work. If it is done “just enough” to get by, we and those we work with and for usually let it go. But one of my activities and interests is doing artwork. And there is no disguising in a picture those times when the artist has taken short-cuts. You just can not hide a “sketchy” section of a drawing that is otherwise well-finished and polished. And yet, I still slide into that “getting by” mode when I’m working on things other than drawings.

Now, of course, I’m talking about job options that are in a field I happen to love. So, it’s easy enough for me to talk about the importance of wanting the job, and doing it well. But I also vividly recall a conversation with my father years ago. I was still in college at the time, and had made some impassioned statement about loving one’s job. My father responded in very pragmatic tones, observing that most people don’t have that choice, that most people have to do dull jobs, perhaps even drudge-work. Jobs they are not likely to love even in the best of circumstances.

At the time, I couldn’t imagine that. Optimist that I am, I was all for pursuing the occupations that spring from the things one loves doing. Since then, I’ve done my share of brain-numbing drudge-work. And I’ve tried to do those jobs well. Even so, I don’t always consider two crucial questions, questions that are even more important when the prospective job is in a field I really do love. They are questions that need answering one way or another before going into a new job, just so you know where you stand. In some ways, they are aspects of the same issue, sounding like the same thing. The answers are between you, God and the job, but that doesn’t mean you can ignore them. I’ve certainly been reminded to ask them of myself. That Still Small Voice has a way of sneaking them in, if I try to avoid them.

Why do you want this job?

How much do you want the job, in and of itself?

“VERY FUNNY, GOD”

I think God has a strong sense of humor.

It’s been said that the key to humor is incongruity, the mashing together of two things we don’t expect to find together. The color pink and an elephant. Bumblebees and flying (come on, you know they shouldn’t be able to fly). Dignified figures slipping on banana peels.

We are amused by these sudden unexpected juxtapositions. I think God is also amused by such things. But on a bigger scale. On a scale that is also at the same time very personal.

I was born in Michigan and spent my early years there. I distinctly recall one day when I was in either fifth or sixth grade. Some school friends were over at my house and we were outside talking and playing a ball game. It was the end of the school year and we were talking about the future, and places we might want to live. The conversation wound down, and I concluded with the adamant statement “I’ll never live in California! And especially not in Los Angeles!”

Fast-forward to the present. Guess what? Not only do I live in California, in Los Angeles, I live in that area known as Hollywood. (Hollywood-the-locale does not always mean Hollywood-the-state-of-mind-and/or-profession. I happen to belong to both.)

God must have been laughing at me back on that late spring day as I bounced a volleyball on the sidewalk.

Since that time, I’ve learned to at least try and avoid saying anything that begins with “I will never.” Because God is listening and seems to delight in pricking the bubbles of our self-important, self-determining proclamations.

When I look back on my life, now, and consider the shape of it, I can see that my path may have eventually led to this place, no matter what I did. By the time I made that declaration of never living in California, I had already acquired a love of theater. I had already begun writing and storytelling (although at that time it was not my primary interest). I had already begun a fascination with the behind-the-scenes mechanics of film-making. God had already surveyed and laid out the route for me in my interests and abilities. I just didn’t know it. My eyes were on a different route altogether.

My first serious ambition in life was to be a fashion designer. But I discovered in ninth grade that I didn’t have the temperament to do that day in and day out. It took me some time to realize that I did have the temperament to be a writer. I love writing, of almost all sorts. And I wanted to be good at it. As good as I possibly could be.

So I went off to college to train myself as a writer. Everything I studied applied to that, one way or another. I studied literature in order to know and understand “the good stuff.” Because I didn’t want my own work to be “the bad stuff.”

Eventually the writing pursuits led me to Los Angeles. Most of my writing interests could be done everywhere. But the reality of pursuing screenwriting is that you need to be in the entertainment community. It’s hard enough to break in when you’re on the spot. It’s very difficult to do it from Points Elsewhere.

But back to God’s sense of humor.

Even during that time when all my thoughts and plans were focused on fashion design, I was writing. God could see what was developing in me. While my conscious mind was set on New York as my future, the rest of me was being tuned for a different destination.

The first time I stepped off a plane in Southern California (and I’d completed my Masters degree in English by that point), I had a surprising reaction. It was in Ontario, the day was very humid for Southern California, the smog was such that it obscured the nearby mountain, the traffic was amazing – even to this urban child. And yet, that first moment was the shock of recognition: “This is my place.”

I’d encountered God’s sense of humor before, so I had already acquired a sense that he bends our expectations and plans. But the sudden realization – that I’d found my home territory and it was the very place I had long before said I would never live in – that realization had the feel of cosmic amusement. God laughed.

How many things are there in my life that I consider to be unlikely in the extreme? Oh, so many. Of course, these days I cloak them in the “reasonable evaluation” that I would not do such-and-such. Because I avoid the words “I will never.”

And I’m sure God has more surprise revelations waiting for me. Incongruities that turn out to be amazingly appropriate. Even if I hadn’t experienced these unexpected turns of life, I think I’d understand how much God delights in playing with our conscious intentions. He does know us better than we know ourselves. And, in a way, it’s part of storytelling: pulling the audience along a path that they think leads toward one particular destination, you draw them around a corner to something unexpected but very fitting. The delight of the incongruity. I think God likes to lay out our lives like that, and that he hopes we’ll stick to the path he’s designed.

So take it from me: be careful what you say after “I will never.” God may be laughing at you and your plans.

FORGIVENESS

Last week, Anderson Cooper did a number of segments about forgiveness on his CNN show. Topical for the week, I suppose, since it was Holy Week. But it was interesting to see a national news show tackle the subject.

One of the segments dealt with how unforgiveness can be detrimental to one’s health. The stress of carrying a load of anger and bitterness can undermine the resistance to illnesses. And that choosing to forgive can spark a vast improvement in health.

It seems to me that we all do intuit that much about forgiveness. What we find hard is the forgiving.

I think part of the problem comes from how we think the mechanism of forgiveness works. We know it has to do with the interaction and/or relationship between two people. And because of that, we tend to look at the matter as being outside ourselves.

Bobby Perpetrator hurts Johnny Injured. This creates anger, hostility and bitterness in Johnny. And Johnny finds it hard to let go of those feelings unless and until Bobby admits to what he did and apologizes, and possibly even makes amends for what he did.

It makes sense to us to look at it that way, because we all want to have our injuries acknowledged. But sometimes Bobby Perpetrator doesn’t realize that what he did created an injury. How can he know that Johnny was injured? Johnny’s bitterness becomes a negative energy between them, fending Bobby off. So the acknowledgment and apology never comes. Sometimes Bobby doesn’t care one way or another, and again the apology never comes. How can Johnny forgive Bobby, without the acknowledgment?

I don’t claim to know a lot about Judaism. But what I have picked up indicates that in the Jewish mind, forgiveness can happen only between Perpetrator and Injured. And if one or the other is dead, nothing can happen. A third party cannot apologize for a dead Perpetrator, nor grant forgiveness on behalf of a dead Injured person. One would think that the deaths of one or the other would end the matter, but alas, it doesn’t happen. Particularly because the loved ones of the Injured actually do suffer, because of their love, for what happens to the Injured one. But since they aren’t really the Injured Party, under the direct tit-for-tat mechanism of forgiveness, they’re stuck with their negative feelings.

I grew up in a family of Christians, so this outlook was not the entire aspect of forgiveness for me. For which I thank God. Certainly, I’ve had my bouts of it, though. Like with my Mom. Now, mind you, I do love my Mother. But she and I are very different personalities, and she can press my buttons, and frequently did. I suppose it’s the case for all parents and children that the parents have blind spots about the personalities of their offspring. That injuries are done by the parents, which the children resent for the rest of their lives. I’ve certainly been there.

But when I was in college, I thought about this matter. My Mom really did not know how she had affected me. I remember once trying to explain to her how she had injured me. Her blank look of puzzlement jarred me greatly. She did not understand what I was getting at, or why it was so important to me. The moment I realized that, it was like yet another stiletto jabbing into my heart. She could (and did) say the words “I’m sorry”, but she didn’t understand. How was I supposed to give her the forgiveness I wanted to give her, when I wasn’t ever going to get an understanding apology, never mind any sort of “making amends”?

This is where the Christian understanding of forgiveness kicked in. Because forgiveness is not really dependent on the actions, or understanding, of the Perpetrator. It depends on the Injured one. It was my choice about what to do. I could wait around forever for that understanding apology, or I could let go of the bitterness, and start behaving as if the injury had not happened.

So often we hear the phrase “forgive and forget”. And we know that a lot of the time, forgetting an injury is actually impossible. People do try, of course. And the psychological impossibility of it gets pointed out in the cliche “Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt.” But, it is possible to chose to act toward a person as if they never had injured us. And mean it.

Learning to do that also started me thinking about the matter of the forgiveness of God. Because, of course, it’s a matter central to Christianity. We say that Jesus died for the forgiveness of our sins, making the payment - making the amends – for how we injure God (because, I think we can look at our wrong-doings as injuries to God). We are basically saying that Jesus is apologizing to God for all the things humans do wrong, and that God has accepted this as a sufficient apology for everyone. All we have to do is believe that.

If we believe it, then God’s forgiveness is available immediately to us.

On the one hand, it seems such a simple (though profound) thing. On the other, it seems impossible. How can someone else make amends on our behalf?

Jesus was once teaching a crowd of people at someone’s home. The place was packed. There were even some scribes present. Maybe they were there to check him out, find out what he was really like. By this time, his reputation for healing had gotten around. There was a man who was paralyzed. He had some friends who cared about him so much that they brought him to the house. But because of the crowd, they couldn’t get in. So they went up on the flat roof of the place, and broke through the ceiling. They were very determined to get their friend to Jesus. They lowered the man into the room below, right down to Jesus.

Jesus was impressed by the friends. And I’m betting that everyone in the room knew why they were doing it, that everyone present had heard that Jesus could heal people. Maybe those skeptical scribes wanted to find out for sure.

But Jesus, instead of healing the man, says to him, “Your sins are forgiven.”

We aren’t told what type of sins the man may have committed. I imagine that he wasn’t aware of many of them, things he didn’t even know he needed to repent of. In any case, the scribes were upset by what Jesus said, because in their minds, only God could forgive sins. Jesus could tell what their reaction was, so he asked them, “Which is easier, to say ‘Your sins are forgiven’, or to tell this man to get up and walk?” Well, the second one is easy to say, but difficult to make happen. But to prove the point about the first possibility, Jesus turned to the man and told him to get up and walk. And the man did.

The point being that God’s forgiveness is easily and readily available to us.

However ... Confession time: sometimes, there are people I do not want to forgive. It was, when I got down to it, easy to forgive my mother, even if she never understood the injuries she did to me. Because I love her. But frankly, there is the occasional person that I just can’t quite like. People I don’t really want to be reconciled with. I’m only human, and therefore flawed.

I’ll admit, I’d rather ignore that matter. But it’s not part of the package of being a Christian. But I can’t escape it. Because the reality of forgiveness is not outside myself, like an object between me and that other person. It’s inside myself. My choice. And if God has made the choice to forgive me and everyone else, regardless of whether or not we acknowledge the things we do wrong, do I really have an option when I’m dealing with others?

God waits, ready, willing and able to treat us as if none of our injuries to him ever happened. Surely, I can at least behave in a similar fashion. I don’t think it’s hypocritical to at least try that. Because if I’m at least making an honest attempt at it, the action eventually affects the emotions, and I find that I no longer feel the resentment and hostility.

Yeah, I know. It sounds simple and easy. But even in the course of writing this, it’s occurred to me that there are some things in my past that I need to review. Places where I’ve skipped over acknowledging that I was even injured. I guess that realization could be a gift of Easter.

SQUANDERED TALENTS

With the success of Mel Gibson’s movie The Passion of the Christ, I’ve heard and read a number of criticisms of Mel for making money with the film.

Do they criticize him for putting his own money into a project that no one else wanted to touch? No. For getting the film in front of audiences when no studio really wanted to deal with it? No. For being very careful and savvy about presenting it to his primary audience, fellow Christians? Well, yeah, there seems to be a bit of feeling in the Entertainment Industry that he was really devious and sneaky in giving church groups previews of it, in order to generate word of mouth. Because it worked.

But mostly, the criticisms seem to be about what the critics call the “commercialization” of the Gospel. Except that, from what I can tell, the people saying that the most are the people who are least invested in that same Gospel. It puzzles me.

I guess it puzzles me because it strikes me as only fair and reasonable in the Big Picture that Gibson be rewarded for his commitment to his project. Because it seems very much in line with the Parable of the Talents.

The Parable of the Talents has always weighed heavily with me. Although Sunday School classes pointed out that the talent mentioned in Scripture was a unit of money, I was conscious from a young age that our use of the word for the special abilities people have was somehow connected to the older word. I thought about it a lot, because I knew I was talented (in our modern sense).

I don’t mean to imply that I had a huge ego about it. I have three siblings, and we are all musically inclined. Good singing voices and the ability to learn to play instruments and actually make music with them. That much seemed par for the course in our family. But beyond that I also had considerable artistic ability. I was always drawing, or making things. And I did well in school, absorbing information rather easily, doing assignments without painful endeavor.

I knew I was talented. And the Parable of the Talents worried me. Because it indicated that much was expected of those who receive much. And that burying one's talents was not a good idea in God’s eyes. He gives out those gifts in expectation of them being expended, put out into the world. I worried about how to address that for myself. How was I supposed to use all the talents God gave me?

Eleven year olds worry about strange things.

Even though I was aware of how important God considered the talents and abilities he gives us, it wasn’t until I was an adult that the point was made even more strongly. Because it was when I was in college, and starting to really pay attention to the details of my faith, that I learned that historically, a talent was 75 pounds of precious metal (it could be either gold or silver). 75 pounds! So even one talent - that single talent that the third servant in the parable buried in the ground - is a lot of money. Apparently, in God’s eyes, a little talent can go a long way, if it’s put out into the marketplace.

Modern American society has a very ambivalent response to talent. On one hand, we glorify those who are exceptionally talented. On the other, we treat “ordinary people” who are talented as if those people have “interesting hobbies.” It’s almost as if we expect people to be burying their talents in the backyard. As if we think that is actually the proper thing to do with talents. “Keep it at home. Don’t bother the rest of us with them.”

It isn’t easy to get one’s talent into the marketplace. It takes work and preparation and continual attention to the craft. Tiger Woods is a talented golfer, but he still has to keep in practice and work at it. Picasso was a talented artist, but he also exercised it every day in one fashion or another. Mel Gibson is a talented film-maker.

Matthew 25: 29 says: “For to everyone who has, more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall be taken away.”

That’s a very disquieting challenge. Much is expected of those who have been given talents (of any sort). But God is ready to reward our efforts at using the talents, if we’re ready to do the work to get them into the marketplace. But if we’re sitting on our hands, burying our talents, we run the risk of losing even what we do have. We aren’t promised that we’ll make a lot of money if we put our talents into the marketplace. We are promised that we’ll get a very good return, though.

So, I have no problem with Mel Gibson making money, even a lot of money, as a result of his film about Christ. He took his talents, his abilities, made an excellent film, got it into the marketplace, and is now getting a good return for his efforts. I don’t see how God would be displeased with that.

My only problem is that the success of the film has once again forcibly reminded me of the Parable of the Talents. And I’m again worrying about whether I’m doing all that I can to get mine out into the marketplace.

SILENT WITNESS

Actor Robert Pastorelli died on March 8th.

I’d enjoyed his work as Murphy Brown’s sardonic, and perpetually present, house painter. But like so many performers in Hollywood, it was not easy for him to stay in front of the eyes of the audience when the big job ended. What that did to him, I don’t know, but all reports on his death indicated that his life had been troubled in recent years.

I mention all this, not because I knew the man. No, I only knew his work.

But about a week before his death, I did see him at the grocery store I patronize. I’d actually seen him there before, about a year or so previously. The recent occasion was one of those “ordinary life” type encounters. I was getting out of my car, heading into the store. He’d just gotten out of his vehicle with his young daughter and was also walking toward the store. My brain did one of those momentary puzzling skips of “Why do I know that face?” It was immediately followed by, “Oh, it’s him!”

But I didn’t say anything to him. And now I wish I had. Because I’m pretty sure he saw the recognition wash over my face. I could at least have smiled and said “Hello.” My habit of letting celebrities have their private lives kept me from doing even that. And I’m beginning to think it was a mistake. I should have said “Hello.”

Everyone wants to be acknowledged as a person, yes, even celebrities. I don’t mean the greedy need for adulation, but rather the simple acknowledgment that behind the glamour there exists a human being, just like everyone else. And those little acknowledgments can actually be very powerful.

I was driving to work one day, and was stopped at a red light on a very wide street. An elderly man was crossing the street headed toward a medical clinic. He walked slowly, wearily, his shoulders a bit stooped. He happened to glance in at me as he crossed in front of me, and as our eyes met I happened to smile at him in response. Like magic, he straightened up, stepped a bit more briskly and continued on with a faint smile of his own. A little thing, done without real thought on my part, but I could see that for that moment, it made a difference to him.

The Friday after 9/11, my church held a special memorial service, and I was an usher, upstairs in the sanctuary’s balcony. An actress came in, one who had worked on a show I liked. I knew that at that time she’d been living in New York City, and guessed that she’d been on the West Coast for some business. I greeted her by name, and said I was a fan of the show. And that was all I said, at that time. She was alone, and very casually dressed. Definitely not out to attract attention.

After the service, she remained in her pew, praying. As an usher I needed to stay at my station, because it had been a candle light service, and I needed to make sure no lit or smoking candles were left behind. So I observed her. And thought about what she might be feeling. She’d worked in New York, her husband was still back there, and at that time, air travel was still grounded, so she was stuck in L.A. all alone.

So when she finally got up to leave, I spoke to her. I asked if she’d heard from everyone she knew in New York City. She seemed surprised at being asked that. I suppose she was expecting, even under those circumstances, to be asked some fannish question. I don’t think she expected to be considered as an ordinary distressed human being. And yet, for that brief moment, she seemed grateful that someone, someone immediately present, was concerned about her as a person. She said that yes she had, that her husband (they were newly married at the time) was in New York.

After she left, I was glad I’d spoken to her. At that moment, I was very conscious of how, as a Christian, part of my calling is to be that present and visible expression of God’s concern for my fellow humans. And how most of the time, that can be such a simple job. A small act, a smile, a greeting, an acknowledgment.

And yet, most of the time, like so many other people, I cruise through my daily life wrapped up in my own thoughts. I speak to the people that matter to me, but barely acknowledge the masses of folks I don’t know. Living life in a silent, limited bubble.

I have to ask myself, what kind of a witness is that? My own interaction with God is a personal, daily thing. And I see his hand in many small things that cross my path. But do I always remember to turn around and be that small thing in someone else’s path? No, I don’t.

And that’s why I regret that I didn’t say “Hello” to Robert Pastorelli. Or “She’s cute” about his daughter. I don’t know if it would have made a difference in his fate. But the possibility that it might have haunts me. That simple acknowledgment of him as a person, valued in the eyes of God.

I need to stop being such a silent witness.

BREAKING THE COCOON

I lost a ring on Wednesday.

It happens to a lot of people, all the time, I know. And it wasn’t like it was a wedding or engagement band. But it was significant to me. It was a $10 silver ring of a butterfly design that I bought on a visit to San Francisco, years and years ago. And I’ve worn it every day since that time.

The simple design had a small solder joint at the bottom of the ring, which had given way a couple of years ago. Hardly surprising, given how long I’ve had it, daily wear, and regularly catching it on things. And it had been catching more and more lately with the solder joint having let go. Silver is soft and malleable. So I’m sure the ring caught on something and just pulled away. I was in a rush about a number of things as I got going in the morning, and could easily have overlooked it pulling off.

Other than what the ring meant to me, both in the memory of the trip and the symbolism of the butterfly, it’s a small loss in the Big Picture of Life. But it is certainly jarring when such things happen. You get used to having certain objects in your life. You consider them part of “who you are”. But the fact is, it’s just a ring.

I wore it every day because I liked the constant reminder of the butterfly. Butterflies are a symbol of resurrection and renewal. Of change and becoming something new and beautiful. As such, it was for me a symbol of Jesus, of my risen Lord. I never talked about it to people, but it was always there. And I wore it so that when I held my hand out to others, the butterfly was always right side up for them to see. No one ever asked about it. I never used it as a “preaching point”, mentioning what it meant to me. It was just there. Always.

At this minute, I don’t know if I’ll find it again. It could be anywhere.

But losing it suddenly (a different thing from taking it off for a moment) has set off a train of thought.

First, the thought of how the objects in our lives can possess us. Because I had that sudden feeling, when I realized it wasn’t on my hand, that I was incomplete. Silly, but there it is. I’d invested some of my self-perception into this object. Losing it reminds me again that, pleasant though they are, the objects in my life are not part of my essence, they are not essential.

Second, it occurred to me that although for years I’ve been wearing this symbol of transformation, I still keep hindering myself from transforming myself, from making changes. Much as I want to be the butterfly and fly away, I keep clutching to caterpillar mode, or hibernating in the chrysalis. I do not break free – free of my comfort zone, where I know the parameters, rules and expectations. And also that for all the significance I gave the ring as an emblem of my faith, I never really told anyone that’s what it was.

Which leaves me with the third strange thought: that even if I find it now, it will no longer mean the same thing to me. For now, I would be always reminded of how much time I’ve wasted holding off the transformations.

If I don’t find it ... well, it will feel strange for a while. I’ve worn it for so long. But, this may be a good thing. The little jarring shock of its loss has caused me to reflect on how, at a time when I’ve been longing for changes in my life, I’ve still been hindering the transformation.

Time to let the cocoon break. Time to leave the chrysalis behind. Yes, life is a lot more dangerous as a butterfly. But butterflies fly.