Temples

I've lost about 60 pounds over the last couple of years, and I'm hopefully a few days away from achieving my ideal weight as determined by my doctor, myself, and the internet.  Part of the reason I was carrying those extra pounds in the first place, however, is my powerful enjoyment of eating.  I just like to eat.  And after 40 years of liking to eat, I now know it's simply part of my life, and so I mostly concentrate on how to integrate it, as opposed to trying to "fix" it (think unlimited celery, pickles, and sparkling water!)

It's in this context that I received the Eucharist at Mass today.  Sometimes I half-jokingly tell the students I work with, "you are what you eat," when explaining my limited understanding of the Eucharist.  Today during Communion that concept was bridged within me to Paul's notion that we are temples of the Lord (where "my body is a temple" comes from).  As I consumed the Host, something inside me said, "remember: this system - your mouth, tongue, throat, stomach - the whole thing - this is the system by which All that Is, aka GOD, enters and becomes you.  It's the same - the one and only - system by which you eat everything else."  That's part of what makes the system a "temple."

If this mouth, stomach, etc., is the system by which God joins with me more closely than I can imagine (in the Eucharist), then what does that imply about what else I use this system for?  When I'm sitting around considering eating when I'm not hungry, or eating more than I need, or eating something destructive, what am I really considering doing?  Is it an accident that the destruction of the Temple is regarded as one of the darkest moments in Judeo-Christian history?  In those moments, I pray God to remind me that temples are places where holy things happen, and that the temple of my body is the church wherein Jesus enters to become one with me.  May God grant me delight in maintaining this holy place.

The Carpenter

Last week I finished a birthday present for my friend's 50th: I built an extension onto his backyard deck.  To those who know me well enough, this will come as a bit of a surprise, because I don't do construction.  In fact, I don't really do anything the project involved: being outside in the heat of summer, or mosquitoes, or manual labor of any kind, really.  My upbringing, education and career have all been in music - a somewhat more "genteel" enterprise.  I was raised by a generation of parents who hoped we would avoid a life of manual labor by going to school ("You don't want to dig ditches for a living, do you?").  I'll save the economic/political/social conversation about the value of labor for another time.... 

But one of the great things I learned through the experience - and perhaps the most valuable - is what the work felt like.  As I got up each morning, put on my jeans (to protect from bugs, even though it was way too hot), sprayed mosquito repellant all over myself, and headed out to the yard, I was reminded that this was the work done by Joseph and Jesus.  What's more, this is the kind of work done by most people in the world.  Most people don't play the piano and think about Mass - or write blogs - throughout their days.  Most people in the world work hard and pour sweat every day. 

One of my desires in prayer lately has been to live in greater solidarity with the poor, which is to live in greater solidarity with Jesus.  It can be a romantic notion, but once it's experienced it quickly becomes evident that being poor is difficult.  (Now the "poor" I'm referring to aren't the professional laborers who actually make more than I do!  The truly "poor" are the ones who have no choice in the matter.)  I've never actually been poor - I've always had everything I've needed, and just about everything I've wanted.  And I don't presume that a 5-day project for a friend in any way qualifies me to say I've experienced poverty.  If anything, it brings into greater relief the vast gulf between my frankly leisurely life and the exhausting, uncomfortable hardship of most of the world's population.

I guess the most conscious takeaway for me is a deeper respect for those who work hard every day in the grueling heat or other uncomfortable situations to support themselves or their families.  I have been issued a serious challenge to my childhood attitude that "those poor bastards should have gone to college."  It turns out those poor beloved children of God are bonded with Christ in a way that I will never be.