velveteen rabbi – Aspirational Adventures

Saturday my friend and I went to see Six: The Musical. If you get the chance go and see it. It is high energy, high emotions and totally amazing songs and dances for 90 minutes. We came out with tears down our faces and emotionally trembling.

But as I tried to sleep it got me thinking how this musical fitted in with so much of what I have been pondering around seeing and being seen which is why I’ve put it as third and didn’t post it on Sunday. [though am writing it Sunday whilst it is still fresh in my head]

Here were these six young women. And yes we do forget that they were all young. Yes Catherine of Aragon hung around until she was 50 but the other five were young enough to give Henry VIII an heir. And by the time he got to wife number three he was gout ridden, had a vicious temper, had syphilis of sleeping around and wasn’t a nice person.

In the musical the six women have decided to have a contest to see which is the “best” of the queens. The themes they use to explore this covered physical appearance, emotional trauma, abuse, infidelity, the patriarchal system, which still is in evidence today, especially with how we regard the physical appearances of women. All the time bitching to each other of which one had the hardest time with Henry and all the while selling themselves short. All of them crying out “see me” I felt.

Then Katherine Parr slows things down and to my mind says basically “we can’t see each other properly because we are in competition rather than in solidarity with each other.” She goes on to remind them that even though Henry VIII did many things he is mainly famous for having six wife and that it is these six women that made him such a figure in history.

In following on from the last two posts I think too often we are busy trying to compete with each other – whether openly or within our own heads. We want to be seen but we don’t want to see. We are afraid if we see others then we will lose something of ourselves – which I felt did come over in most of the songs.

So we need to come together in solidarity to truly see each other and let go of the things that could divide us. As Velveteen Rabbi says we can only build community if we do it together acknowledging our differences.

Acknowledging our differences is truly seeing each other.

Seeing part II

Renly deciding he should be navigating. Because I know his limitations I had to move him to the back seat.

Seeing someone for who they truly are doesn’t mean that we let them do what they want. But also it doesn’t mean we penalise them for things they don’t yet know.

As always when God wants to highlight something for me it comes at me from all sides. I’ve been reading Henri Nouwen’s daily meditations and there has been a recurring theme of letting go of one’s own fear to really see and accept others as they are. Here is today’s piece:

Hospitality means primarily the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy. Hospitality is not to change people but to offer them space where change can take place. It is not to bring men and women over to our side, but to offer freedom not disturbed by dividing lines. . . . The paradox of hospitality is that it wants to create emptiness, not a fearful emptiness, but a friendly emptiness where strangers can enter and discover themselves as created free; free to sing their own songs, speak their own languages, dance their own dances; free also to leave and follow their own vocations. Hospitality is not a subtle invitation to adore the lifestyle of the host, but the gift of a chance for the guest to find his own.
https://henrinouwen.org/meditation/

It is about truly seeing each other and truly allowing each other that space to explore. In the story in Acts 3 John and Peter gave the man what he wished for – being able to walk. They did not try and covert him. In fact when there is a bit within the early church of trying to get people to conform that is when issues occur. Jesus didn’t want his church to be homogeneous but did want them to be loving and accepting.

In this week’s Velveteen Rabbi Rachel talks about Exodus 25:1-8 where all the Israelites bring different things to build the temple and of how this creates community. And she goes on to say that even when a community disagrees about major issues each still needs to come together as they are in God.

When we hold space for our differences, we make community holy.
Community Means .. .. Velveteen Rabbi

So hold space for our differences, give hospitality to explore and to fully be within those difference but do it all with the love and respect of God and of our love for each other as a whole.

Truly see each other and truly accept each other and then, like the lame man, we can be truly healed and then go on to heal our world