Sitting with the Sacred

Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.

Luke 12:51

Jesus follows this question and answer by giving various ways his message is going to divide the very units of society I’d like most to see unified — families. What verse 51 says is difficult enough to hear, but then, with the part about relatives, Jesus says to me, “There is no part of your life I won’t unsettle if you follow me.”

Because I’m someone prone to anxiety, and because I’m someone who depends on others to do for me what others do for themselves, the declarations of Luke 12:49-53 are the epitome of what I don’t want to hear. My first instinct is not to alienate anyone.

I hate controversy. I hate conflict. As someone whose “normal” has always looked and felt different than the “normal” of those around me, I just want to belong and be accepted. As someone whose brain sends garbled signals to my body, with the result being that all my muscles try to work at once, I want to be still and to relax. I want to sit on the outside of the of the events of life that range from the inconvenient to the tragic, infuriating, and horrific.

I know that my mental and physical conditions actually don’t make me different from other people in my desire not to make myself or others uncomfortable. My conditions just make this desire all the more intense — too often paralyzing. Still, I don’t think I’m alone when I acknowledge that there have been plenty of times when I wish I hadn’t been afraid to speak up. There have been plenty of situations I look back on and wish I hadn’t been afraid to stand out. There have been so many times when maintaining or earning approval felt more important than acting on what my spirit said was right. The fruits of these moments of silence and inaction haven’t been peace. Instead, my insides have churned. I may not have been divided from others, but I was divided within myself. That’s the opposite of peace.

Despite these experiences, there have been more and more times, especially as I’ve gotten further away from my teens and twenties that I have spoken out — even if I still don’t speak about my own convictions and act on my own words as often as I would like.

When I do engage in uncomfortable conversations, they usually happen with the people I’m closest to, and I don’t think I’m alone in this experience. I open up first to the people I feel are most likely to continue the relationship with me even after I tell them something they don’t want to hear.

What happens when I venture into these conversations? Yes, my heart races, I sweat, and I blush. But how do I feel once I’ve said what I needed to say? Calm. Why? Because I’ve been honest. I haven’t suppressed what matters to me. I’ve allowed myself to experience God’s peace, which is rooted in love, truth and justice. And as I heard in the homily this weekend, God’s peace means more than “getting along.”

Does this deeper understanding of peace mean I should act with violence, or that I should go through life starting arguments? No! God desires that everything I do be rooted in love, truth, and justice. And neither adopting a confrontational tone by default, nor resorting to violence is rooted in these building blocks of peace.

Work cited

The Bible. The New American Bible Revised Edition, Kindle edition, Fairbrother, 2011.