Many years ago, Eric A. Clayton's spiritual director introduced him to the idea that he is beloved by God. Eric calls this belief "revolutionary" to his own spirituality because he often focused more on his shortcomings than his gifts and inherent dignity. During a Christopher Closeup interview about his book Finding Peace Here and Now, Eric explained, "That sense of being beloved for simply 'being' is countercultural and foreign to us, who feel like we have to produce, earn, and succeed. . . . It's a lot easier to count our mistakes . . . than it is to say . . . 'I'm the beloved of God, and I can live out of that joy and that delight.'"
Living out of that joy and delight can serve as the cornerstone of inner peace, which we can then spread outward. The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius can help because they lead us to ask and answer the question, "What are we made to do? We're made to praise, reverence, and serve God, and in so doing, help ourselves and help others."
Eric notes that how we praise, reverence, and serve God varies because we are each unique individuals: "The more we discover ourselves, the more we discover God at work in our stories. . . . And the more we can do that, the more we have to give to the world. . . . Real success, in the eyes of God, isn't an acquisition of more money and honors and pride, but an engagement with the world around us."
Joy also paves the way to peace, but it demands "specificity" and "gratitude" to be effective, said Eric. He recalled a conversation with Jesuit author Father Mark Thibodeaux, who has written several books about the Examen prayer and why it needs to begin in a spirit of gratitude. That didn't make sense to Eric because some people are trying to pray with the hardships and injustices in their lives. Why would they be thankful? "We begin with gratitude because it lifts our horizon," Father Mark responded. "Instead of spiraling and focusing just on the problem, we say, 'God is still at work. There's still good here, and we want to see it all.'"
Eric saw the wisdom in that approach, explaining, "From that position of beginning with gratitude . . . we can better address the problem. . . . Somebody shares a smile, the flowers are beautiful today, this bird is doing something crazy and it's making me smile. . . . Those little things is where God meets us, in the specificity, in the seemingly mundane. . . . We have these big, sweeping concepts of peace, but peace happens interpersonally. It happens when we share something of ourselves."
All of these approaches work better if we adopt what Eric calls "a spirituality of curiosity." That involves looking at the world and the people around us not in judgment, but in "wonder and awe." Eric observed, "We're supposed to be curious about God's creation. And we are God's creation, so we're not just curious about what the butterflies are up to, but we're curious about what we are up to. What is my neighbor doing? Why are they sad? Why are they joyful? Be curious. . . . It's so much easier to count our sins, mistakes, and shortcomings, for myself and for others. It's much harder, but much more enlivening to turn with curiosity - asking 'I wonder what this person is up to' - and be in awe of them and all that God is up to in the world. I think that's the foundation for peace."
This essay is a recent "Light One Candle"
column by Tony Rossi, Director of Communications, The Christophers; it is one of a series of
weekly columns that deal with a variety of topics and current
events.
Background information:
The Christophers
Eric A. Clayton
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