Call To Worship The possibility that the zero gave birth to the universe, that all our somethings come from nothing, the fear of being alone like that, children of chance, orphans down to our atoms, is mother to the idea of god. God is a dress we slip over solitude, a mask for oblivion to wear, a rule-giver in a world where no flower or bear cares that we are here or what we do. I prefer a theology of silence, the eschatology of the shrug, a religion of holding my wife’s hand for now. But, if the industry of the church is what it took to give me bells ringing Sunday mornings, to which crows sometimes rise and deer turn, I’m grateful for a sound that pulls me out of myself, lifts my head toward sun and clouds, into the up and all, the blue, the on and on of it, when I bend the only knee I have to bend, feel happily small, contingent, and held, by what I can’t say, short of everything. Bob Hicok This poem reminds me of a day many years ago when I sat in a pew waiting for our son’s ...

  We do not attain anything by our own holiness but by ten thousand surrenders to mercy. A lifetime of received forgiveness allows us to  become  mercy. Mercy becomes our energy, our meaning. Perhaps we are finally enlightened and free when we can both receive mercy and give it away—without payment or punishment.  Richard Rohr I want mercy to become my energy, my meaning. I suppose I need to keep surrendering to mercy. It is difficult to lean into powerlessness, although perhaps it is like weightlessness. Perhaps there is a freedom in the surrendering. May mercy become who I am.