OPENING DOORS

A New Year’s Sermon by James Ishmael Ford

30 December 2001

The Text

For the sake of a single verse, one must see many cities, men and things, one must know the animals, one must feel how the birds fly and know the gesture with which the little flowers open in the morning. One must be able to think back to roads in unknown regions, to unexpected meetings and to partings one had long seen coming; to days of childhood that are still unexplained, to parents whom one had to hurt when they brought one some joy and one did not grasp it (it was a joy for someone else); to childhood illnesses that so strangely begin with such a number of profound and grave transformations, to days in rooms withdrawn and quiet and to mornings by the sea, to the sea itself, to seas, to nights of travel that rushed along on high and flew with all the stars—and it is not yet enough if one may think of all this. One must have memories of many nights of love, none of which was like the others, of the screams of women in labor, and of light, white, sleeping women in childbed, closing again. But one must also have been beside the dying, must have sat beside the dead in the room with the open window and the fitful noises. And still it is not yet enough to have memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again. For it is not yet the memories themselves. Not till they have turned to blood within us, to glance and gesture, nameless and no longer to be distinguished from ourselves—not till then can it happen that in a most rare hour the first word of a verse arises in their midst and goes forth from them.
Rainer Maria Rilke


In my conversations with people over the last month, I’ve heard over and over how glad many of us are that this year is nearly over, and even wish it would be gone more quickly. Certainly, much of these past twelve months have been hard: Illness, loss of jobs, the difficulties of the economy, and that nightmare at the heart of the financial district in Manhattan. No wonder people, if they don’t actually wish this time away, certainly wish it had played out differently.

I hear all this and think of Jelaluddin Rumi, who sings to us. "Sit down and be quiet./You are drunk/and this is the edge of the roof" Today, I want to spend our few minutes together reflecting on that drunkenness, and that roof (although I’ll be shifting from that image quickly), and ultimately what sobriety might look like.

This seems a right time for such reflections. After all New Year’s is often a time to stop and reflect and to make resolutions. Usually, admittedly, it is about smaller things, our habits of ordinary life. So, our resolutions frequently are about less chocolate or more exercise: small things. Honestly, I don’t want to take us far from our ordinary lives. But, I do want to discuss the inherent possibilities of this stopping and reflecting at its deepest level. So, this New Year, let’s reflect on the nature of things, and of our selves, and what resolutions may flow out of that reflection.

It seems to me the biggest single event that has marked this past year was the horror at the World Trade Center. What, if anything can be made of such madness? Beyond the geo-political, beyond the claims and counter-claims of righteousness, what can this possibly mean in our lives, your life, my life?

Now, I have some very strong feelings about how we engage terrible events. On the one hand I think to assert these events happen for a purpose; to teach us, you or me, something in particular has the stench of evil about it. Of course the universe and everything in it happens in causal relationship, everything is caused by something; or more accurately by many things. But the very size of it all, the very complexity of it all gives the lie to any assertion of meaning meant especially for you or for me in these events. For human purposes things like this just happen. I walk out the door and get hit by a truck. You get cancer. Things happen.

The question, the spiritual question, is how do we respond to these events that are beyond our control? How do I engage what has happened? Now at the moment this question is asked, the possibility of purpose, of meaning, begins to flicker. Perhaps at first just a slight flame, just a few wisps of smoke. But, it can be fanned, it can be banked, and it can become a roaring beacon. It all has to do with how we engage.

At every moment of our lives we are faced with choices. At every moment of our lives we are faced with doors. And here is the primary image with which I would like to work today. Doors. An interesting image, don’t you think? The word door is Northern European, although I found at least one source that attempts to find a version of the word in our mythical "Indo-European" source language.

Essentially a door is an opening in a wall through which one may go in or come out. A door is a passage, an entrance or an exit. So, small wonder the door becomes one of the primary metaphors of our human existence. It is so fundamental to our human lives, and it points so naturally to those other most fundamental aspects of our lives, our choices and their consequences.

As we reflect on this past year, and how it might shape our lives going into the next year, particularly as we think of all this within the context of those terrible hours on the 11th of September, we certainly face doors. Each of the many many doors in front of us open in different directions, toward different possibilities. So, let’s spend a moment considering the nature of doors, and how we chose one or another.

By the bye, I found numerous references in the Hebrew scriptures of going to the "door of the tabernacle of the congregation." The door of the tabernacle of the congregation: It’s a standard line in the Scriptures, rich in suggestion. Also, I’m sure nearly everyone in this room is familiar with that line in the Gospel of John where Jesus spoke of himself as a door. And expanding from that one door to the tabernacle or to the manifestation of love, the seventeenth century poet Sir John Denham gave us the lines "To the same end, men several paths may tread,/As many doors into one temple lead."

Now this is part of the difficulty. Yes, we in fact face many doors. And while many of them do indeed lead to the one temple, they don’t all do so. Some doors lead to madness, others to despair, others to dark paths leading forever away from wisdom. And, as Rumi reminded us, we’re facing these doors rather impaired.

Drunk, he sings, and at the edge of the roof. Another image, another metaphor. One still useful for us on this New Year’s reflection, I think. But, perhaps to help convey the urgency and the difficulty, in fact the danger of where we are and what we must do, there is another story about doors. My colleague Ron Sala writes how "Many of us are probably familiar with the story of The Lady, or the Tiger? by (the) nineteenth century writer Frank R. Stockton. I still remember a movie version our teacher showed us in junior high.

"The basic premise is that, in an ancient kingdom, a prisoner is brought into an arena and confronted with two doors. Behind one, is waiting a beautiful woman. Should he open this door, the woman is his. (This is obviously a pre-feminist tale.) Behind the other door waits ‘a hungry tiger, the fiercest and most cruel that could be procured,’ prepared to leap forth and devour him!"

So, here is the situation we find ourselves in. Here we are, at a moment where we must make choices. Our hopes for meaning and purpose hang in the balance. And the dilemma is this. We aren’t sure what lurks behind any of the doors, all those doors in front of us. And, worse for it all, we’re drunk. Our ability to choose is less than optimal. We’re drunk on our opinions. We’re drunk on our desires. We’re drunk on all the certainties we’ve pulled together over our lifetimes.

However, there is good news here. We can sober up. We can open our hearts and minds, and look a little more clearly. Here we find the hint and the promise sung to us by William Blake. "If the doors of perceptions were cleansed everything would appear to us as it is, infinite…" This is the good news of the New Year. We really can make our way through, should we be willing to clean up our act, to sober up a bit, and to look for hints and possibilities on the way.

So, another question: As we engage the mysteries of our lives, of the terror of the recent past, of the difficulties of the present, how do we sober up, and see clearly, and make the best possible choices? How do we cleanse the doors of our perception? How do we do this? Here I find myself returning to the wisdom of the desert, of those fourth century Christian monks and nuns who fled into the heart of the terrors of their day, and sought wisdom.

One of the stories tells us how some elders came to Abbot Anthony. As they sat together after prayers their conversation turned to the Holy Scriptures. The abbot began to examine them about their knowledge, starting from the youngest of the group and going on.

He asked about this passage and that, and each responded as best he could. After a time, the abbot said to them, "You have not yet achieved wisdom." Then he turned to abbot Joseph. "What about you, Abbot Joseph? What do you say the texts mean?" The old sage looked to the ground, and replied, "I don’t know." Abbot Anthony clapped his hands, laughed, and said, "Abbot Joseph alone has found the way, because he understands he doesn’t know."

"I don’t know." Precious words, magical words, the words of sobriety. Here is the gateway to wisdom. Here is the hesitation and possibility that allows us to sober up and to choose the right door. Only don’t know. It has many qualities, many hints of what may be. Here we can return to Rilke’s revelation, pretending to tell us how to write a poem, then opening his mouth and revealing his substance, his wisdom, and I think, showing us how we can find our own.

What does he describe? Rilke describes a life. He sings of each moment as it has presented itself to a single person. The particular counts, you and me. There is an image of a child resenting a kindness to another. There is an illness and a long time abed. There are images of the sea. And dreams described of nights of love. There is the pain of childbirth. There is the reality of dying, and death. And out of that, all of that, he tells us "One must be able to forget them when they are many and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again."

Remember the good news. We can look around this New Year, and see with new eyes and hear with new ears and act with new hands. Always the possibility of change, a turning of the heart. Here, no doubt, is the secret of all spiritual practice. Here is the substance of our coming to a genuine not knowing. We must, we must surrender our certainties, if we ever hope to pass through the gate, through the door.

That old line from the good rabbi, how it is harder for a rich man to get into heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle speaks to this mystery. I’m sure there is a simple aspect of this saying speaking directly to the acquisition of wealth, and its attendant problems. But, there is another equally simple point here, as well. We cannot take our knowledge with us through the door to wisdom. This wealth that we’ve accumulated over our lifetimes, gets us to the door. But, at that moment, it becomes a burden, a weight too heavy to carry through. It becomes the drunkenness that prevents us from making wise decisions.

So, here at this New Year let’s set down our burden. Let’s not wallow in regret over what has happened. Sadness is appropriate. Grief, anger, and desires to get back are all natural, and each emotion rises, and each emotion demands some kind of response at its time. But, then, after that, let go. Don’t cling to what has happened, tying ourselves to a corpse.

Rather, let us take it as it is, as they say in the twelve step programs, one day at a time. Let us take it all as it is, unbidden, unasked for; and wondrous and terrible as it is. And then let go. As we let go of our analysis, of our ideas of how it should mean, then we are given a new possibility.

I’m not saying there isn’t a time for analysis and responses, but those are momentary things of themselves. These things all rise and fall of their own accord, and we need to let them happen only in their context, and not to rule us, not to poison us, not to become our reality. As we lay down the wealth of those dream images, of our ideas of what should be, as we surrender our attempts to impose meaning upon these events, that God wanted it, that we needed it, whatever; then they can teach us just as they are.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson sings of this moment. "Moreover, something is or seems,/That touches me with mystic gleams,/Like glimpses of forgotten dreams--//Of something felt, like something here;/Of something done, I know not where;/Such as no language may declare." Here as we forget, as we don’t know, we in fact sober up.
Here at this moment we find the key that opens the right door. We have all the wisdom we need, if we can only find the depth of not knowing. So, don’t wish your life away. Don’t spend it all scheming on this or that. Let’s make this our New Year’s resolution: Don’t look for something meaningful beyond this moment and the child or lover sitting next to you. That’s it. If we choose this moment, we may well open a prosperous, a sober, and a beautiful New Year for all. And wouldn’t that be wonderful? May it be so.

Amen.