de Georges Moustaki...
A little bit of wisdom from the French singer. As I was rowing this morning, a song of his came up on the playlist (shuffle) — I didn't want to stop and see which one (though I should know) and one line caught my ear:
On s'enivre d'amertume.
One gets/We get drunk on bitterness.
I know I do. I suspect there are a lot who do. This whole fracaso over the Anglican Communion, border crossings, people lobbing labels at one another, people looking for any mite to criticise the presiding bishop or the General Convention or whomever, people on all sides picking up their marbles and leaving and on and on and on... there are a lot of us getting drunk on bitterness.
Naomi said, 'Do not call me Naomi, call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me,' but her bitterness is of a different sort. 'I went away full and the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the Lord has afflicted me and the Almighty has brought calamity on me? (Ruth 2.20-21).
I don't know how else to say it but the bitterness that is being sown these days is created and maintained by a bunch of power-hungry male clerics who want to maintain a non-inclusive status quo. It's about money, power and fear.
On s'enivre d'amertume.
One gets/We get drunk on bitterness.
On all sides. All people. Myself first most.
So how do we reach a sense of reconciliation such as that of my dear friend whose life was threatened by gang members, who could say that he didn't hate them; while they are not saints, poverty makes people do a lot of awful things. Instead of hating them, he prayed for them.
Señor, haznos instrumentos de tu paz...
Seigneur, fais de nous des instruments de ta paix...
Lord, make us instruments of your peace....
[photo: a non-drunken scene of tapas on the Plaza Mayor in Segovia, Spain, at the end of our pilgrimage, June 2007. If you look carefully, you can see a little bird perched on the back of the chair on the other side of the table. Note the newspaper, El Pais — finally after two plus weeks of not reading the paper, I splurged.]
3 comments:
Thank you for this post. I am fighting bitterness in my own life on several fronts at the present. We need reminders from time to time on the profound sadness and futility of becoming bitter about anything. It only adds to the problem, no matter what that problem might be.
Sorry. Posted the long comment on the wrong blog.
Bitterness tortures everyone. Personally, I try to get on with life. Forgiveness may be difficult but getting involved in life as it is now helps. At least for me.
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