Seeking a Simple Heart of Gold

My therapist recently asked me where I get inspiration. I had to think for a minute about that. I don’t attend church anymore. I have this ongoing struggle with institutional religion. I know there are wonderful congregations out there, mostly small ones, that do good work, where worship is not an hour of entertainment and hype and shallow platitudes, but rather, quiet and reverent worship, where the people gather to learn and to grow and to find ways to be better human beings.

But, for me, the institution of religion is mostly fraudulent and trivial and self-centered. I’m speaking primarily of institutional Christianity.

Retired minister and prolific author, John Shelby Spong, has said that religion today “is a division between the shouters and the disinterested.” He has written, “Jesus becomes the captive of the hysterically religious, the chronically fearful, the insecure and even the neurotic among us, or he becomes little more than a fading memory, the symbol of an age that is no more and a nostalgic reminder of our believing past. To me neither option is worth pursuing.”

I agree. And, in spite of all of that, I am still captivated by this Jesus of history.

So, church is not my place of inspiration, although as I have mentioned here before, I do enjoy walking into the Cathedral de Guadalupe in downtown Dallas to dip my finger in the holy water and cross myself, to sit in a pew, to take in the quiet, to be in the presences of transcendence, and to light a candle for the living and the dead. There is insight and affirmation in that for me.

Another source is music. I have told you how much I love the songs of Leonard Cohen. What a poet and a mind he was. Not to mention his great expanding heart. Real. Authentic. A man of deep thoughts and beautiful lyrics, of intellect, of humanity. I love his music. It inspires me. There are others.

Books inspire me. Fiction or non-fiction, poetry or biography, it all mesmerizes me. Pat Conroy, Mary Oliver, Tana French, John Updike, Carl Rogers, Jung, John Shelby Spong, Anne Lamott, Elaine Pagels, Maslow, Erickson, From, Dostoyevsky, Mark Twain, Gabriel García Márquez, Margaret Atwood, and so many others. These writers have instructed me in the deeper issues of life. They have provoked feelings of grace, love, courage and joy. They have immersed me in my own humanity and in the humanity of all of us. They have shown me what love looks like. They have taught me that pain and suffering, though often useless, can still at times, incredibly, heal us. They have brought me to tears and have left me laughing out loud. Great writing truly inspires me.

Here are some other things.

Babies. I love holding a baby. They smell like God to me, like the freshness of love, like life in all of its purity.

Children. Their silliness. Their contagious laughter. Their little curious questions. Their peaceful sleep. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not forbid them. For such is the kingdom of God.” I don’t know what the kingdom of God is, whether it’s heaven, or what the church is supposed to be, or the best life we can know. But whatever it is, children represent it. And I want to be there.

Art. What a gift this is to our human journey. I told my therapist I want to visit more art galleries. I want to look into the mystery and the genius of great art and feel the inspiration of transcendence. Paintings, sculptures, murals, all have the power of transporting us to places beyond the mean, tawdry, arrogance of life and leave us enveloped in excellence, in romance, in beauty. Picasso said as children we are all artists and the challenge is to remain one once we grow up. I love that. How easy it is to lose our creativity when we enter adulthood. How wonderful, that stunning art can stir it within us again.

Neil Young sings, “I’m getting old / keep me searching for a heart of gold.” Yes, that, too, is my inspiration. I want one of those; a simple heart of gold.

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The Unclad Soul

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