The Shrewd Manager

Luke 16: 1-13

He's a man in crisis. He's about to be fired and the job prospects don't look good. Not butch enough to dig for a living, and too proud to beg, he's endearingly vulnerable. I imagine Woody Allen playing the lead in the movie version.

The guy is also smart. Very smart. True, he panics when he first gets the call from the boss, but then he makes a plan. The plan works: He gets both his job back and his boss’s praise for being shrewd.

The story is a metaphor for your life and mine. It’s about how not to lose your soul. If you want to hold on to your soul, be like this endearing and shrewd manager.

What’s it like to lose your soul? One of Rachel Remen’s patients, a gifted cancer surgeon, told her, “I can barely make myself get out of bed most mornings. I hear the same complaints day after day; I see the same diseases over and over again. I just don’t care anymore. I need a new life.” He’s in an advanced stage of ennui, plodding along to be sure, sitting upright and taking nourishment, but zest for his work has disappeared. He’s lost touch with his soul.

Years ago, a friend described his own feelings when he was in this state: “I feel like I’m lying face down in a half inch of life and drowning.”

It sneaks up on you. Somewhere along the way—in your routines of getting up, making the coffee, going to work, paying the bills, checking in with friends and families, renting the latest video—you fall asleep, lose your passion and purpose, lose sight of the pleasures of moving about this vast and glorious planet. Your spirit slips away. Everything becomes gray, empty, and tedious. Suddenly you find yourself living, but not really living.

And there you are: up to your ears in what we religious types call a spiritual crisis. You’re like the man in today’s gospel when he is brought to account. But in this case, it’s not your boss’s property you’ve squandered, but the life that God has so graciously given you.

Perhaps a day of accounting arrives— maybe in old age or maybe sooner—when you look back at your life with regret:
• So many things you wanted to say or do, but were just too afraid, or just couldn’t overcome the inertia.
• So many wonderful moments you wanted to savor, but were too busy with the details of making a living and paying the bills.
• So many people you wanted to let into your life, and who would have let you into theirs, had you taken the time and made the effort.

And what will you do then, oh man, oh woman in crisis? What will you do?

It’s tempting to simply change your life’s outer circumstances: move to a new place, start a new career, find a new lover. And it’s true that sometimes changing the outer world can help. But often the old maxim holds true: Wherever you go, there you are. We carry our own mental conditioning with us, and if we’ve managed to screen out spirit from our lives where we are, chances are we won’t find it in any new circumstances either.

Today’s gospel hints at how we can respond to such a crisis. In the story, Jesus suggests that, to reconnect with our souls, we need to be like shrewd business people, like the manager in the story.

Faced with financial calamity, most people hustle to make ends meet: cut back on the lattes and videos, and maybe figure how to bring in a few extra bucks. We may be shrewd at money matters, but we are not so shrewd at keeping spirit alive. When chained to a life that no longer gives pleasure or passion or purpose, that ability to spring into action doesn’t seem to kick in. As Jesus puts it, “The children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light.”

So what does this Woody Allen-like manager do? First he makes a decision—“I have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed…, people may welcome me…”—then he gets into high gear, takes the concrete steps to do what he has to do.

When we lose our souls, the simple decision to really live, and not just go through the motions, is the first step to finding our way back. This decision can itself arise from simply recognizing where our present path is heading, picturing what a life without spirit is like. Recognizing the monotony and boredom of such a life can put us in high gear to find another way. The simple decision to live spiritually is the first step.

And concrete actions must follow that decision. These can vary depending on your unique situation: Start reading books that challenge and inspire, or listen to music that opens your heart, or hang out with spiritually serious people who can support your own effort to live with more spirit.

One action step is suggested by the early fathers and mothers of Christianity. It involves simply moving through all the small and big moments of your day and giving thanks for each one.

Here’s how this works for me: I opened my eyes this morning and I could see. There’s no law that Richard Smith has to be able to see, but I could. This is not something I can take for granted. It’s a gift. Acknowledge it for what it is, and give thanks for it. And I could get out of bed on my own and make my way down the hall to the bathroom and the kitchen, fix coffee, read the paper. Again, no law says I have to be able to do these simple things. There are many people in the world who can’t do them. The fact that I can do them is a gift, one to acknowledge and give thanks for.

The early fathers and mothers suggest we offer this simple kind of thanksgiving consciously and frequently all throughout the day: the light turns green just as you approach the intersection, or a stranger in the checkout line lets you move in front of them, or that ice cream cone is especially tasty, or your partner gives you a quick peck on the cheek on the way out the door. Each of these moments is a gift, God’s special gift to you.

Maybe when they occur, you’re too busy to notice them. Fair enough. But later, when you have a moment, look back on them, savor them, and give thanks.

Try this for a few days, and see if you feel any different: a little more alive, a little lighter, more joyful, more aware of God’s constant presence and care for you. Think of it as a suggestion, perhaps a part of your own action plan, from our early forebears in the faith. Try it and see what happens.

Speaking of giving thanks, in a few moments, we will gather at this table. It’s not by accident that the central mystery we celebrate here is called “eucharist,” the Greek word for “giving thanks”.

This morning, as you come to this table, for these few moments let your whole life be caught up in the mystery of Christ’s life, death and resurrection. Are there any corners of your life where you feel depleted, worn out, bored? Bring them, too. Let those parts of your life be caught up—and transformed—in this great prayer of thanksgiving and praise. Let this sacrament feed your spirit, filling you with more joy, more laughter, more passion, more life.

The Spittin' Image of Mom

"Actually, I was expecting someone with a full head of reddish-brown hair," I say to the gray-haired balding specimen squinting back at me from the bathroom mirror. It's not the first time I've been surprised and confused like this. In fact, it happens more these days, and sometimes it's annoying.
Like when I'm walking down the sidewalk innocently minding my own business and all is well, but then I'm suddenly ambushed from a storefront window by my own slouching reflection, which in turn awakens my inner scoutmaster: "Suck in that gut, shoulders back, atta boy, stand up straight; there now, that's more like it."
It's kind of obnoxious, actually. But not always.
For example, the other day one particularly sneaky mirror in a coffee shop gave me a candid glimpse of myself. I was the spittin' image of my mom when she's deciding whether to buy something at a hardware store, or figuring out her reply to some amazing thing I've just said. The gears in her head then turn as she wavers between desire and prudence, or maybe between admiration and utter stupefaction.
Whatever I was thinking at the time, there she was, looking back at me from behind my face in the mirror.
For some of my friends, discovering in themselves such traces of their moms would be the kiss of death. Me? I savor such fleeting moments.
Because the woman I call mom has class: a single parent with two kids, always there when we needed her, reliable as the dawn; a pioneering businesswoman from the days when banks refused to lend to women; a lover of quality--whether in a thread of yarn, an elegant old house, or an exquisite solo in the Seattle Opera.
And how many older women could receive the news that her son was gay as graciously as she did? She was front and center for Rob's and my wedding, loves him like a son, and adores her grandson, David. She's a blessing beyond words to my family.
Today, at 89, she takes long morning walks around her neighborhood, runs errands for the folks in her condominium complex, reads voraciously, hangs out with her good friend Joe and his lively dog, Abby, and even joins them for weekend camping trips.
And, oh yes. She, too, thinks George Bush is a cretan.
And just think: I sometimes look like her; I'm made from the same stuff! It makes me glad.

Was Our Son Stolen from His Birth Mother?

Was David's adoption process a fraud? The Guatemalan Procuraduria and the US Embassy are implying that it was. In the charged climate of a Guatemalan election year, they are painting American families like mine as unwitting contributors to child trafficking in Guatemala and, perhaps worse, as inflicting unspeakable pain on women like David's birth mother.

Are they correct? I doubt it. Most adopting families, including mine, have followed the existing legal procedures of those very same government agencies slavishly. And when my family went through the process, there were many precautions in place, including a DNA test establishing his birth mom's biological connection to David, her statement of relinquishment carrying her photo and signature, and a voluminous report of the social worker.

Still, even after all this, who can say for sure? The uncertainty now leaves me wondering what to think and how to feel.

Maybe I should just blow the whole thing off. Aren't we First Worlders already used to sipping rich creamy lattes knowing that the Guatemalans who picked the beans received barely enough to support their kids? We've gotten used to these moral ambiguities. Why not just add this adoption issue to the list?

But, hold on. Despite what Guatemalan politicians may say, this is not another story of exploitation by greedy Americans. It is, instead, a result of the sad legacy of Efrain Rios Mont, Guatemala's former brutal dictator, and his many sidekicks.

Thanks to that legacy, a high percentage of Guatemalan children--perhaps as many as one in four--die of intestinal infections because their families cannot afford filtered water. Education for these kids is almost non-existent, rarely going past the second grade. And there are many, many Guatemalan children in the streets and (as pictured above) around the dump in Guatemala City who survive by selling candy, shoe shines, and their bodies. It's for good reason that agencies like Camino Seguro (Safe Passage) ask for our help. And that many of us choose to adopt from Guatemala.

Rob and I once considered the surrogate route to creating our family. But with so many homeless kids in the world, we decided it would be better for us to adopt a child from a poor country. As it turned out, our discernment took us to Guatemala and Casa Quivira, an agency known for its integrity and the quality of its care.

Along with the rest of the world, I keep hoping that the authorities will clean up the abuses in the Guatemalan adoption system. But I don't regret my family's adoption path for a moment--despite the eyebrows now being raised by government bureaucrats and well-intentioned friends. Because David, the light of our lives and an aspiring race car driver, is safe, healthy, and, as I write this, tugging my pant leg and badgering me for a trip to the park. It could have been otherwise.