Thanksgiving for Friends

 

I recently wrote that I know many saints alive today, people who act in saintly ways, with saintly resolve.  I call many of them friends, and am privileged to have a few who call me friend.  I read recently again of the four kinds of love (C.S. Lewis’ book, outstanding!).  Some say one of the four, agape, is a love only perfect in God, and that the highest man can attain is philia, a love exchanged with that special friend that, for some, only comes once in a lifetime. 

In my readings this night, I read words which spoke of love, and as my thoughts are turning to Thanksgiving Day, the words from The Better Part (Meditation 207) meshed and struck me deeply:

            There is nothing in this world that can satisfy us as much as the love of Christ.

            The Pharisees … were self-centered.  Jesus, on the other hand, was completely self-      forgetful.

He patiently waits in every Tabernacle across the globe, glad to be able to adore the Father in our name, and willing to put up with hours and hours of loneliness in order to still be there when one of his followers needs to talk.

If we let Christ be the friend He wants to be, maybe we will learn to be that kind of friend for others.

Help me to want what You want, Lord.  Help me to do what You want.  I don’t care what other people say about me --- only You have the words of eternal life.

You are more interested in how I treat my colleague down the hall than in the biggest headlines of the biggest newspaper in the world.  You are more interested in my heart than in wars and disasters.  Everything here is passing away, but every human soul will live forever, either in a light or darkness.  Lord, make me a lantern and a flame to spread Your light.

I give You thanks, Lord, for the friends you have put into my life.

- - - - - - - - -

A bunch of young women just entered the adoration chapel where I am meditating, likely from some class which was held in the church tonight.  I took no notice of them, or that a guitarist had also entered, until she began playing and softly singing:

“Open the eyes of my heart, Lord … I want to see You.”

 

Hmmm.  In these thoughts about friends did I mention that You, Lord, are my best friend?  And I give You thanks.

Perhaps I Should Explain About Obama ...

I recently sent a note to a fellow blogger to explain a comment I made on her blog.  I feared it might be misunderstood and perhaps even be offensive, so I clarified and apologized if she took offense.  She assured me she didn’t, but the exchange reminded me that often we assume things, understandings and dispositions of others, which are not true.  In my last post, an excerpt from C.S. Lewis’ Tales of Narnia series of books, I assumed any reader of that post would have also read the Lewis books.  I thought the excerpts I posted were profound and would lead to further thinking on the reader’s part, but I saw no comments from anyone, and now I wonder.  So I will be clearer, in what I perceived from Lewis’ words.

First, let me say that I don’t think Lewis was a prophet, and his words written as some Divinely-inspired foreshadowing.  I think Lewis would agree he was not.  However, I was struck with the timing of my reading of those words and how they would fit so clearly to our country’s present situation.

The Tales of Narnia books lay on my bookshelf unread for many years.  I purchased them long ago, thinking I should read them some day, but the day never seemed to come.  I don’t know why, in the summer of 2008, I decided to read them.  Perhaps it was a coincidence, but I don’t much believe in coincidences anymore.  Many coincidences I now see as opportunities to open my mind to the ways of God.  But, going on, to explain what I read (or understood) relative to Narnia:

In the beginning of Lewis’ story, the animal kingdom of Narnia was in a non-stop winter, under the control of the evil queen.  (This is like the world before Christ.)  Aslan, a lion, comes, saves the animals and ends the winter.  (Aslan represents Jesus Christ.)  Narnia continues on, led by kings appointed by Aslan (the Church), while Aslan only appears infrequently to help Narnia in its times of need, when they call on him.  In the final book, The Last Battle, a black ape comes to Narnia and says he was sent by Aslan, to tell Narnia what to do.  He points to Aslan in the far distance, and the people see what looks like a lion, and follow the ape’s commands, which he says come from Aslan.  He says “Aslan says to do these things for your own good.”  But it is not really Aslan in the distance, it is only a confused donkey.

The excerpt I printed here on my last post shows the animals of Narnia questioning the black ape, and themselves.  Can this really be as Aslan wanted?  Are we following someone else?  Will everyone follow this stranger, forgetting Aslan?  As I read the book and those words, the 2008 election campaign was nearing its end, and I saw the images of the campaign, and the promises of one of the candidates, and I saw a parallel to Lewis’ story.  And the parallel troubled me.  Not that I was thinking in terms of some last battle or the end of the world, but I felt like we were being led astray and some good things being said were in fact not really intended for our good by the speaker.  And the black ape’s name, Shift, bothered me too:  Shift --- Change?  An election for Hope and Change, whereas: my religion and Jesus Christ were telling me to have Faith, Hope, and Love.   Have we lost Faith?  Have we replaced our Love with expectations of the government, Shift, doing these things?  Have we forgotten Aslan, Jesus?

I saw these things in 2008, and after the election results I thought that perhaps we needed a time of trial like Narnia was going through, to awaken us, to show us that we were being misled, and like the animals in the excerpt I published, to ask:  Is this continuing the kingdom of God which Jesus brought to earth?  Like the animals, I wondered, would we be able to awaken and say:  “This is not Aslan.”  Those were my thoughts, as I published my last post.  I guess no one saw the words as I did.

Today I began reading the Wall Street Journal editorial page, and I read these words:

“More and more clearly, the Obama administration has put its faith in the view that the governed, who must be told what is best for their lives, whether they want it or not, can also be told that they have not seen what they’ve seen, have not heard what their ears clearly told them.”

Those words were written by a member of the WSJ editorial board.  I think they could have just as easily been written by Tirian, referring to Shift.

Thoughts From: The Last Battle

“He was the cleverest, ugliest, most wrinkled Ape you can imagine
      … And his name was Shift.”

“I’m so old that I’m so wise.  And it’s because I’m so wise that I’m the only one Aslan is ever going to speak to. … And now here’s another thing, the Ape went on, I hear some of the horses are saying let’s hurry up and get this job of carting timber over as quickly as we can, and we’ll be free again.  Well you can get that idea out of your heads at once.  Everybody who can work is going to be made to work in the future.  Aslan has it all settled.”

“No, no, no, howled the beasts, it can’t be true.  Aslan would never sell us into slavery.”

“Hold your noise, said the Ape with a snarl.  Who said anything about slavery?  You won’t be slaves.  You’ll be paid – very good wages too.  That is to say, your pay will be paid into Aslan’s treasury and he will use it all for everyone’s good. … It’s all arranged, and all for your own good.  We’ll be able, with the money you earn, to make Narnia a country worth living in – and roads and big cities and schools and offices and whips and muzzles and saddles and cages and kennels and prisons – oh, everything.”

“But we don’t want those things, said an old bear.  We want to be free.”

“Now don’t you start arguing, said the Ape.  What do you know about freedom?  You think freedom means doing what you like?  Well, you’re wrong.  That isn’t true freedom.  True freedom means doing what I tell you.”

“Look! Said Tirian, it has all been a lie.  Aslan has not come to Narnia at all.  You have been cheated by the Ape.”

“You must think we’re bloomin’ soft in the head, said Griffle.  We’ve been taken in once and now you expect us to be taken in again the next minute.  We’ve no more use for stories about Aslan.”

“Tirian had never dreamed that one of the results of an Ape’s setting up a false Aslan would be to stop people from believing in the real one. … How many other Narnians might turn the same way?”

                        Excerpts from: The Last Battle   -- by C. S. Lewis.    (c1956)