In regards to sharing confidently, lovingly, and appropriately, I saw this lovely quote from a recent live Q&A online chat.  The speaker said, “Those who are most tolerant are those who are most secure in their faith.”  I love this, because I know that a big foundation in ecumenical and interfaith conversation is the desire to support us all in being more familiar with other faiths, and thus more tolerant.  But that tolerance can never bloom or blossom in my experience if I’m on a big rush to open up my wallet and show everyone else what I have, without listening to them.

Much good to keep exploring and sharing together :-)

Once when I was newly divorced, strapped for cash, and needed help around the house, God graciously sent a team of young Mormon men in neat white shirts and dark ties.  They humbly did all the stuff I needed.  I repaid them with some fine dinners, and we had a wonderful time sharing ideas.

Mother Teresa once said:  “I love all religions, but I am in love with my own.”  I don’t think there’s anything more satisfying than experiencing everyone, everywhere, as children of Truth.

I have really been enjoying considering this Radical Act and keeping it close to my heart recently.  It’s gotten me thinking about those qualities back of a wallet.  Although it certainly has great qualities, it also might symbolize a temptation to hedge your bets, or represent carrying around preconceived ways of accomplishing things.

A couple weeks ago, some missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints came to the door.  I really enjoy chatting with the missionaries and the Jehovah’s Witnesses who come as well – I have sort of this recipe for how I can listen to them, and then assure them how much I already love God and Jesus and heaven, and then try to slip in an offer of a Christian Science Sentinel (weekly magazine published by the Christian Science church that includes articles and testimonies of healing).  I do mean it all sincerely, but it’s also definitely not been flowing with the inspiration of the moment.  A few months ago, though, my wife called me on it and asked if I was engaging in conversation with them to make myself feel good about engaging in ecumenical activity, or if I truly cared about them.

So, back to the Mormon missionaries.  They start to share, I start to wind up my little recipe…and then I realized I wasn’t listening to what they were saying.  I was so wrapped up in pulling my mental wallet out to show them what I had that I wasn’t listening to what they were sharing – and I’d therefore be unable to offer anything, myself.  So I asked them to repeat what they’d just said, and threw away that heavy mental wallet which had all my conversation strategies in it.  My highlight was when I really wanted to start sharing about Christian Science, which I dearly love and study, and instead realized that these young men were truly on a mission and I knew that I wasn’t going to be a part of the conversion aspect of their mission.  I respectfully asked them if there might be another time we could get together, which wouldn’t interfere with their specific missionary time, and they said they really appreciated it and would love to.  We said goodbye after exchanging numbers and they headed out.

So, according to that wallet of expectations I used to carry, this was a failure: I didn’t share anything about Christian Science, I didn’t get to hear a ton of what they believed, and I wasn’t even sure we’d get to hang out again.  But I threw that wallet away, and I was so glad!  In it’s place, I was so filled with a sense of joy at having gotten to finally hear the spirit behind these folks’ actions – love for their neighbors.  I was grateful to be free from feeling rushed to get my story out and to simply let that unfold in a graceful way.  Every time I’m able to break a habit of feeling rushed, I’m grateful!

We actually did get to hang out in the following week, and had a wonderful conversation.  We each got a deeper sense of each other’s faiths and what we live and love about our faith.  Most importantly, we all left with a greater sense of understanding and love for our community, and an awareness of how we can effectively work together to see healing in our community.  Looking forward to getting together with them again soon!

It’s so neat how these Radical Acts are all about ideas and qualities, and not trying to shoehorn Jesus’ teachings into specific and pre-planned expressions.  The improvisation of divine Love is a beautiful thing and I’m glad to have one less wallet to distract me.

I wanted to share how this RA popped up in an unexpected–but extremely helpful–way last week.

I received a call from a friend who was frantic because her wallet had vanished. She’d just taken some cash out of the ATM to pay another friend back for something–cash she didn’t feel she could replace. On top of that, there were also several receipts in her wallet that she needed for bookkeeping purposes.

She was upset about the loss, but more than that, she was angry at herself for being irresponsible.

As I listened to her tale of woe, the thought that came to me had everything to do with this Radical Act. I thought, “But Jesus promised that we *could* travel without a wallet!” This isn’t to say that I was in any way writing off the loss of the wallet, or consenting to its disappearance. But I was rejoicing in the power inherent in Jesus’ example. In other words, if Jesus told us (and proved to us) that we could travel without a wallet, then that must mean that our substance, our supply, everything that a wallet stands for, must not be in matter. We can travel without a wallet because our supply rests in God–the source of everything, the abundance of good itself.

Almost without thinking, I found myself saying to my friend, “The only thing standing between you and that wallet is anger and self-recrimination.”

Her rant stopped. She agreed that she could calm down and turn to God, and that she could thank God for always being in control.

Mentally, I was trying to fill my own “wallet”–my spiritual sense of God’s supply, and His constant care for each of us–with an active trust in God’s power and ever-presence. And I realized that both my friend and I had what we needed to be calm and to hear God’s voice. Really, God was all we needed right then. And no storm of self-doubt and criticism could stand in the way of hearing God’s reassurance and direction.

20 minutes later, my friend called me back. Even though she’d been so sure that she’d had her wallet with her when she’d been out on her errands (which is when she discovered the wallet was missing), when she walked in the door to her house, there was her wallet. On the table–with everything in it.

I liked what Hayley was saying up near the top of the comment section about finding kindness in unexpected places.

It reminded me of a trip a few years ago to Mongolia.  A good friend is Mongolian and lives in the capital city, Ulaanbaatar. This is a relevant story because I had a wallet on this trip but I didn’t bring enough money on this several day side trip to the countryside so it was like traveling without a wallet.  I left most of my tugrik (Mongolian money) in Ulaanbaatar.  As it was my job to pay for the gas, meals, and the housing for my friend’s dad, her cousin, and me I was pretty worried as the funds started to dwindle.

I remember the first morning waking up in my ger, a rounded-movable tent-like structure, in the Mongolian desert.  I was in awe of the landscape, the warm welcome to a new culture, and the serenity but all I could think about was my wallet and the fact that there really weren’t any ATM’s in the countryside!  I was paralyzed by fear- I didn’t want to get out of bed and face the day.  I also felt bad about disappointing my very hospitable guides.

I could see that things weren’t going to be resolved through human means so I prayed.  Prior to leaving on this trip, I prayed about the purpose for going.  I filled my spiritual reservoirs as I knew this wasn’t going to be an easy trip- going by myself to four different countries in Asia where I didn’t speak any of the local languages.  There was this great quote that was on the first page of my journal, “Fear never stopped being and its action.”  Science and Health 151:18. There were lots of things at that moment that were trying to stop or alarm me and keep me from going forward.  Remembering my original motives for this trip, good-will and learning, helped me to feel less afraid.  I asked myself what is money?  Is it power?  Can paper with numbers make me afraid?  I thought instead that my currency is kindness.  I didn’t need an ATM for that- there wasn’t a shortage of my real love and affection as it was spiritually sourced.

I got up, dressed, and though I didn’t know how the money things were going to play out I knew that I could enjoy the trip- leaving the rest to the big “G.”  When we were settling up with the owner of the camp-site, where we had stayed in our gers, the owner said that he wanted to give me the “local” rate which made for a less expensive stay.  On many levels I was glad for the hospitality and feeling of belonging.  We had enough to pay for everything else and I appreciated the lesson not to worship my wallet but to draw on the unlimited resources that are always accessible.

I remember my first “paid” babysitting job about that time. Two shiny silver dollars. I couldn’t wait to put them in my wallet. I would look at them every day. They made me feel safe. They gave me a feeling of security. If everything else failed, I had two silver dollars.

I’d also learned that I could earn security. For a long time this drove my sense of peace. If I wanted to feel secure, all I needed to do was work long hours, work hard, and I could feel in control…I would feel peace.

Letting go of this version of security is a long story…one that I will not go into here. But it began with a day when a statement by Mary Baker Eddy seemed to float off of the page and settle in my heart:

“Security for the claims of harmonious and eternal being is found only in divine Science.”

Boiled down to its essentials…it read: “Security…is found only in divine Science.”

In that moment I glimpsed that all the security I seemed to feel whenever I had money in my wallet, was never going to be the real deal. It was never going to satisfy my hunger for the kind of security that is only found in something greater than my ability to work, save, invest wisely. Real security was found ONLY in divine Science….in, as Eddy state, “God’s government of the universe, inclusive of man.”

It was time to stop looking in my wallet for security, and start seeking it in an understanding of God.