One Wild and Precious Life: An ordination address by Emily Jane Lemole
The poet Mary Oliver asks,
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
The stand-out word for me here is do. What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? For our brief moment on beautiful planet earth—what will we do? This question is for everyone.
Actually we do what matters to us— or what we love. Swedenborg teaches that we are or become what we love. However, we can fool ourselves (masters of self-deception that we are) that we are living our beliefs—our deepest values—that our principles have become our process. But often we are asleep at the spiritual switch and sleepwalk through life. What will we do?
Only when we wake up can we take a good look at what we are doing and see if it matches how we want to live. What are our interests? How do we spend our precious hours? What do we think about when we are alone?
Swedenborg teaches that we are here to change—to reform, to transform, to regenerate, and be reborn. This ability springs from spiritual freedom and having choices. The key to change is to realize we have choices. William James had this advice:
To change one’s life 1) start immediately, 2) do it flamboyantly, 3) no exceptions.
What helps us in our choices toward living and doing a spiritual life (with God at the center, instead of us) is a gift of the greatest worth, given by God to help us experience heaven here and heaven later—remains: a funny name, but they do remain with us forever. These are affections for the good, the true, and the beautiful. They are laid down by angels in our infancy and are added to by loving, kind and thoughtful human influence for as long as we live on earth. Embedded in the deepest, inviolate, still place of our soul, they are a treasure trove given to us as an original blessing—a name and concept created by Matthew Fox, an ex-Dominican priest, to counterbalance the heavy emphasis on original sin.
Our theology does not believe in Original Sin, but has a different concept. We have natural hereditary tendencies that pull us toward self and the world and away from loving the Lord and others. These tendencies do not become sins unless embraced and incorporated as our own. Remains are ballast to help us stay in perfect equilibrium between good and evil—so that we really do have spiritual freedom for choice between the two.
Franciscan Priest Fr. Richard Rohr talks about an implanted promise—a gravitational pull toward God creating in us a longing for something deeper, for real meaning in our lives, and finally, a return to God. St. Augustine said,
“God, thou has made us for thyself and we are restless until we rest in thee!”
I think remains have a lot to do with my being here tonight.
My earliest years were deeply influenced by a loving family and a devout grandmother who read her Bible daily and sang and played Baptist and Methodist hymns on her little pump organ every day. Our housekeeper was Catholic and we watched Bishop Sheen together regularly. With a New Church education from pre-school through graduate school and a deep friendship throughout my childhood and adulthood with my Uncle George deCharms, who was Bishop of the General Church, I was drawn to loving the things of religion (and closet Catholic that I am, candles, incense and statues). I would ask my uncle why couldn’t I be a minister? I was never satisfied with the answer.
What began as a quiet push, or pull actually, became stronger. After our six children were grown, I earned a Master’s Degree in Religious Studies— and later was ordained as an interfaith minister. The master’s degree was of course theology, not ministry. The interfaith was ministry—wonderful to study about and be able to serve many faiths—but it still wasn’t the Swedenborgian context for which I longed.
Over the years I had become acquainted with and have developed a great affection for the General Convention. My dear friends in the Convention have helped me shape a new and broader understanding of the teachings of Swedenborg—and helped me to receive a bright and hopeful vision of my own role in the growing strength and influence of those teachings in this world. They are for the here and now, not just for the over there and later.
Rather than keep on kicking the door for ministry in the General Church (and my foot was getting sore) I realized it wasn’t the door I wanted to enter even if it did open.
In 1947 the Council of Ministers stated,
Convention thinks ultimate religious authority resides not in an ecclesiastical body or in a ministry, not in ways of stating things or in texts, but in the truth, and in Him who is the truth. The Lord’s mind, His spirit guiding into all truth, are to govern our thought and life. A supreme motto of the teachings of the New Church is that it is now the privilege of mankind to enter with the understanding into the mysteries of faith.
From the position paper in 1977 we read,
The heritage Convention as bequeathed to us is essentially one of spiritual freedom: the right to inquire freely and to make our way unfettered toward truth. A dogmatic attitude, or any other appeals to arbitrary authority, runs counter to this spirit of freedom.
And also this:
It is a firmly held point of view of Convention that it is essential to the protection of freedom of thought that presentation of different points of view continue to be encouraged rather than stifled. . . . All shades of opinion, interpretation, and understanding of the doctrines upon which the New Church is being and is to be established by the Lord are welcome.
I’d like my ministry to look like this: Rev. Frank Rose writes,
“I used to think that my job as a preacher was to tell people the truth. If I asserted the truth as I saw it from the pulpit, I would be satisfied that I had done my work. Now I think it is my job to lead people to the point where they see the truth for themselves, maybe without me even saying it.”
St. Francis said,
“Preach the Gospel all the time—if necessary, use words.”
So, “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” I’m sure it will be splendid! I plan to be a Swedenborgian minister. Amen
Originally published in The Messenger, Volume 234, Number 7, September 2012
Love this message. I feel the same way about the GC and hope to eventually be recognized as a Convention minister. Following in Janie’s footsteps: becoming an ordained interfaith minister in less than 6 weeks.
Thank you Emily! Yes yes yes. It’s all true, and it reminds me to keep living my one wild and precious life one day at a time.
Emily Jane, you have always lead people to the truth your whole life. Your movement to the ministry is just your next step. Enjoy the walk.