Hi, this is Compass Finding Spirituality in the Everyday. My name is
Ryan Dunn. Today we're talking about hope,
but not the fluffy, unrealistic kind.
We're talking about a hope that has mud on its boots.
It's the kind of hope that shows up even when the sky is falling.
We're gonna cultivate or rekindle some personal hope in this
episode, and we're gonna do that while admitting that everything
is not okay right now. More on that in a little
bit. I'm a reverend, but I don't spend much
time in a pulpit. In fact, I deliver like one or two sermons a
year. And one reason for that is out of a sense of
personal calling. I just don't feel a real strong pull to
deliver sermons every week. But also, I have to admit that in
my religious tradition, my voice, and that's the voice of a middle aged,
straight, cisgendered white guy, is pretty well represented.
I appreciate hearing the voices of those who offer a
different perspective. Now, I say this to acknowledge that, yes,
maybe. Well, this podcast becomes my pulpit
from time to time because, you know, I'm not in that church pulpit much.
And this episode represents one of those instances when
I might get a little bit preachy. For example, we're starting
here with a scripture reading. This is Romans,
chapter five, verses three through five. And this is the Apostle
Paul talking to the church in Rome. It's way back in the first century. It's
a time when the church is being persecuted. That's the audience that Paul is
addressing when he says this. We also boast in our
afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance,
and endurance produces character, and character produces
hope. And hope does not put us to shame because God's
love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given
to us. That's the end of the scripture there. Right
now, it's hard not to feel
overwhelmed. As I'm recording this, there are devastating
floods in Texas. Friends and neighbors on the east coast and
upper Midwest are facing more severe weather. And
let's be real, many of us are weary from watching political
priorities unfold in ways that feel really
cruel or disconnected from our values of compassion
and justice. Hearing about people celebrating detention camps
and deportations is repulsive. Certain budgetary
decisions that we see being made by the US Government have us
worried about the safety of all people. And then there are always the
wars that are hovering in the back of our minds. I
just completed a road trip across a good part of the Midwest, and
in traveling around and Talking with people that I just don't get to talk with
every day. I noticed that a lot of people are feeling wearied.
It's almost a form of, like, analysis paralysis.
There's so much to feel upset about, saddened or
outraged about that people don't know where to go
with all of it and are just left feeling numb. And
sometimes that appears as apathy, although I think more often it's a form
of self protection or self care. Now, if you're
feeling disheartened or anxious, angry,
it's clear you're not alone. And if you're
spiritually curious or trying to piece together your connection to the divine,
this kind of moment can really make you wonder. It
inspires some deep questions of theology and faith, like, where
is God in all of this? Or even what good
can I possibly do when everything feels like it's burning down?
If we're supposed to be on this course towards a more heavenly world,
or as Martin Luther King Jr. Put it, if the moral arc of
the universe is always bending towards justice, then
why does it feel like we're going backwards on so many issues
of justice? What do we have to be hopeful
about? And this is the question I've wrestled with
lately. What am I to do with when the load of outrage
and care feels so heavy that I just want to set it down for an
undetermined amount of time? How do I keep from giving up
or giving in? I hate answering my own
questions, but the thing I have to say about this today is this.
Hope is not optional. Nor
is hope escapism. And it's not toxic
positivity. You know, toxic positivity says everything
happens for a reason. Or it says something like, we just need to think
happy thoughts, or, well, there's always someone who has
it worse. In faith, we may wrap this kind of toxic
positivity into statements like, well, God won't give you more than
you can handle, or a blanket statement like, you know, just
pray more and you'll worry less. Toxic positivity is
the kind of optimism that just skips over the pain and
then leads towards feelings of shame for not feeling
pain. Okay, and here's the thing. This stuff might
sound spiritual, right? It might even come packaged in a Bible
verse or a prayer. I believe, though, that if it's silencing
your grief or invalidating your anger,
then it's not leading towards healing. It's just pushing
discomfort deeper down. I think I heard a particular
sentiment expressed in some early episodes of this podcast.
You can't heal what you refuse to feel.
That really sounds like something our old friend Steve Austin would say.
One thing Steve definitely did tell us was that shame cannot
survive being named. And in the same way, we have to name the
hurts in order to deal with them. Brian Tillman made a
point of that in talking about racism and why we need to
continually bring up points about racism.
You are allowed to name what hurts.
In fact, you're encouraged to name what hurts.
You are allowed to feel anxious.
You are allowed to be angry at the injustice in the world, and
you're allowed to feel overwhelmed by it all.
Hope does not deny those feelings. In fact,
I'd say that real hope begins when we get honest about
the hurt. It's not a silver lining that we just
slap on top of sadness or anger. Hope actually
is proactive. Hope is resistance. Hope says, this
is not okay. And still I believe in
something better. As I'm recording this, we've just gone through a strange July
4th season in the United States. And I say it's strange because
I heard a number of people express discomfort in celebrating
patriotism when it feels like that ideology has
been hijacked to represent a skewed sense of
nationalism or exceptionalism. Hope suggests that
we can celebrate the goodness of what may still be.
Hope says, the flood waters may rise, but I will
keep building. Hope says, I will not let cruelty
or despair write the final word. And that's why I believe
that hope is not optional. It's a form of spiritual
defiance that helps push the world towards what many of us believe
God intends for it. Hope is a kind of sacred
rebellion against giving up. And in that way,
in a world like ours, hope is one of the most radical things
that you can actually practice. Theologian Cornel west
once said, I cannot be an optimist, but I am a prisoner
of hope. In Scripture, we read things like Romans
5, which, again, to note what that was earlier,
it says, suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character,
and. And character produces hope. I have a
teenager at home, and I feel like I'm preaching this all the time. But
the best sermons, we preach to ourselves. So I think, really, as
I nag my teen about persevering through adversity, I'm
really reminding myself of this reality. Hope shows
up through the struggle, not around the struggle, not to the
side of the struggle. It shows up through the struggle. It is
spiritual defiance in the face of despair.
And it's a practice, something we do
and we cultivate even when we don't feel it yet.
In our last episode of compass I talked about Ignatian Examine,
and I noted that it's a wonderful practice because it's really
adaptable. The point isn't to do it right through the step by
step instructions. The point is to have an encounter with your
soulful spiritual side. It's to offer yourself a
moment to connect with God's presence and God's work in
your own midst. Here's something that I've started doing when I feel
swallowed by the bad news of the world. Well, at first,
actually, I just started with a simple reflection on gratitude. I had
a simple challenge for myself to name five things that I was grateful for in
the moment. But that wasn't aspirational enough to deal with
the big systemic hope stealers. So the following
has become an adapted practice which was in part based
off some Ignatian Examine Start with just
sitting down, maybe with a journal. More often just with my coffee. And
I do what I'm calling a Hope Inventory. Like Ignatian
Examine, it's consisting of five simple
prompts. You can try them right now in your mind, or jot them down
and return to them later. Whatever. I'll put them on the episode
page on umc.org too. Anyways, here's the
Hope Inventory. What's something small
that made you smile today? A bird? A
meme? A bite of something good? Or your teenager
telling you about why Star wars is so cool? Secondly,
who showed you kindness recently? Or who did
you show kindness to? Thirdly,
where did you feel connected to yourself? Someone else,
or even God? Was it a walk? A
hug? A breath? A prayer?
What beauty have you noticed around you? That's number four. What
beauty have you noticed around you? Is the sky
inspiring you today? Did a small child laughing bring
laughter to you as well? Was there beauty in a song
that you heard? Did you see an awesome album coming? And
fifthly, what are you still hoping for? Even if it feels
far off, naming it gives it shape. So name
those things for which you hope. It's amazing
what shows up when you start looking for that light.
Not because the darkness around it disappears, but more
because the light was actually there all along. And maybe we just forgot
to look for it in our national discourse. We We've lost
sight of the value of good stories. This is what I've noticed at least.
There are a lot of negative stories, stories of harm or
of breaking relationships for us to hark on. We're missing
the stories that share what it looks like when the world
is as we believe it should be. The stories of people really
stepping up in support of one another, or where
radical inclusion and hospitality created something beautiful
people because it always does. A practice of hope
might help us see those stories again. If you're
listening to this and you're feeling like you don't know how to hope anymore,
it's okay. You don't have to force it. But maybe just try the
inventory. Just name what it is. Or start more
simply name those three or five things that you can be grateful for
today. And maybe, just maybe, hope will sneak in
through the cracks. Here's what I hope May your
soul be stronger than the headlines. May your spirit stay soft
even when the world feels hard, and may you find,
even now, small reasons to keep on showing up with love.
If you'd like to try the Hope Inventory again again, I'll post
those five questions in the show notes@umc.org
Compass thank you for walking by with me today. If
this episode meant something to you, would you take a second to
rate or review Compass? It really helps others find the
show. We'll be back again with more conversations,
reflections and practices for finding spirituality in the
everyday. Next episode comes out in two weeks. Time and
again, I'm really invested in finding these hopeful stories, so send
them my way if you can. Until then, take care
and keep exploring peace.