Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States - Center for Action and Contemplation - Father Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation "Exposing the Ego" for Wednesday, 2 April 2014

Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States - Center for Action and Contemplation - Father Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation "Exposing the Ego" for Wednesday, 2 April 2014
We don’t come to God by doing it right; we come to God by doing it wrong! 
Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation
"The Path of Descent" 
"Exposing the Ego"
Wednesday, 2 April 2014
The Cross teaches us to win by losing. But the ego doesn’t like that. The ego wants to win by winning! That’s the nature of the human psyche. And when the ego is not exposed for what it is, which Jesus’ teaching does very clearly, it simply gets out of control.
In a masterful game of smoke and mirrors, the Christian church has focused for centuries on judging the shadow self, which Jesus never wasted time on. He put all of his energy into revealing the ego self. But we have spent most of our time making people feel guilty about their shadow self, that part of us for which Jesus has great pity and sympathy and compassion. Jesus is never upset at sinners; he is only upset with people who do not think they are sinners (i.e., those who have not faced their shadow and often project their evil elsewhere). 
Look at Jesus’ story of the Pharisee and the tax collector. The Pharisee’s ego had him trying to engineer his own righteousness. He could not see the shadow of his arrogance and judgment. The tax collector saw his sin, and realized his complete reliance on God’s mercy. It was the tax collector who went home “justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 18: 14).
The commonly accepted version of Christianity has largely developed in response to individual ego needs for worthiness and significance. But in the biblical tradition you do not see this self-made, autonomous “getting it right” agenda that you see in later images of Christian holiness. Biblical rightness is primarily right relationship! There are no Promethean figures in the Bible. With the possible exception of Jesus’ mother, Mary, and Jesus himself, almost every other biblical character, whether in Hebrew or Christian scriptures, is shown as a transformed sinner, as someone who first does it wrong before he or she ever does it right. The Bible is full of flawed, wounded individuals.
Surprise of surprises, we don’t come to God by doing it right; we come to God by doing it wrong!
Adapted from The Path of Descent (CD, MP3 download); Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality, p. 136; and Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life, page 59
Gateway to Silence: When I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:10)
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