Center for Action and Contemplation - Father Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation "Resistance to Change" for Friday, 21 March 2014

Center for Action and Contemplation - Father Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation "Resistance to Change" for Friday, 21 March 2014
Whole people see and create wholeness wherever they go. By the second half of our lives, we are meant to see in wholes and no longer just in parts. 
Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation
"Dualistic Thinking" 
"Resistance to Change"
Friday, March 21, 2014
Sadly, the mind trapped inside of polarity thinking is not open to change. How else can we explain the obvious avoidance of so many of Jesus’ major teachings within the Christian churches? Jesus’ direct and clear teachings on issues such as nonviolence; a simple lifestyle; love of the poor and our enemies; forgiveness, inclusivity, and mercy; and not seeking status, power, perks, or possessions have all been overwhelmingly ignored throughout history by mainline Christian churches, even those who so proudly call themselves orthodox or biblical.
This avoidance defies explanation until we understand how dualistic thinking protects and pads the ego and its fear of change. Notice that the things we Christians have largely ignored require actual change to ourselves. The things we emphasized instead were usually intellectual beliefs or moral superiority stances that asked almost nothing of us—but compliance from others: the divinity of Christ, the virgin birth, the atonement theory, and beliefs about reproduction and sex. After a while, you start to recognize the underlying bias that is at work. The ego diverts your attention from anything that would ask you to change, to righteous causes that invariably ask others to change. 1 Such issues give you a sense of moral high ground without costing you anything (e.g., celibate priests who make abortion the only sin). Sounds like an ego game to me.
Whole people see and create wholeness wherever they go. Split people split up everything and everybody else. By the second half of our lives, we are meant to see in wholes and no longer just in parts. 2
1. Adapted from The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See, page 94 
2. Adapted from Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life, page 151
Gateway to Silence: Be not afraid 
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