Category: Personal

It’s True…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

I do talk, and sing, and think, about Jesus. A lot. And I worry sometimes that people around me may not understand.

It’s definitely not about being smug or perfect. I’m not entitled to the first and anyone who’s known me for more than a day or two knows I’m not capable of the latter. Yet it’s not a scheme, either. It’s pretty tough to try to live an authentic Christian life as a get rich quick program or a sure winner for a popularity contest.  More than likely, especially in these days, trying to follow Christ is not going to get you a seat at the best restaurant in town or an invitation to the right party, or even for that matter the Democrat or Republican party,

Although some may think it so, it’s not an obsession. An obsession has pathology about it and if anything my attachment to Christ has made me less pathological, or at least better able to cope with my pathologies. I don’t need Jesus like a junkie needs a fix. Are there needs in my life that Jesus meets? Yes. Yet my walk with Christ is a communion not an addiction, two friends, as it were, walking together down the road.

And frankly I just find Jesus plain old smart. I look at his teachings, his way of life, and his call on humanity and it seems so wise and good. I imagine what the world would be like if everyone lived as Jesus did and when on those occasions I actually succeed in doing so myself I find a deep rest and sense of being a whole person.  If all people are thinking about when they consider Jesus is a way to get “saved” for some future I think they’re missing the great possibilities of life in the present with Jesus. Love God with your whole being. Love your neighbor as yourself. Live at peace, as best you can, with every human being. Don’t be overcome with the desire for wealth but rather share what you have with those who have less. Be captivated by the things that are eternal and be free of the things that never last. Live a moral life, avoiding human excesses like an athlete avoids carrying extra weights during a race. What better life could there be? Even if there were no heaven it would still be a good thing and because there is it’s a taste of that existence here.

Frankly when I see Jesus I want to be like him. It’s not because I hate myself it’s because I see in him the possibility for my best self, my truest humanity. To be a human in this world we need to have teachers and every one of us has them whether we acknowledge them or not. We need a guide to help us in every day of our life and I’m not sure I could find a better teacher than Jesus, or a better example of how to live in this world than him. Of course I don’t always live up to his ideals but that doesn’t mean they aren’t worth the effort or that they aren’t good, or right, or true.

We human beings have this amazing power of choice. We’ve been given life and we can choose what we do with it. I like lots of things, gardens, music, sunny days, a good baseball game, the list could go on.  And the choices we make will naturally flow out of our life and into the world. I expect Vikings fans (our local football team) to talk about the Vikings. I expect artists to share their art. Grandmas have pictures of their grandchildren. What’s inside comes out. So it is with Jesus and me.

Again it’s not about being smug or perfect. It’s just my thing. It’s one of my joys. It’s a river of happiness that sometimes overflows its banks. You don’t have to listen or even approve. I hope you’re blessed by it, of course, but people are different and you can do what you want. As for me, I’m just going to keep on walking, and seeking, and pushing on through and stay as close to Jesus as I can.

An Old Friend Visits…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

Had a return visit from my old friend, atrial fibrillation, last night. I say “old friend” with a bit of sarcasm yet it also is an old friend in the sense that, while it’s not fatal, feeling your heart go bump in the night does help you sort out the things that matter from those that don’t. Even illness can be a source of blessing for those who let the weakness and struggle draw them away from the things that mean little and towards the things, and the One, that endure.

Of course I wish it was different and I wish it would go away. It’s hard to feel your heart struggle to get back into a normal rhythm. Yet I was born in God’s care, I live my life in God’s care, and I will pass into eternity in God’s care. One day, if the Lord tarries, my body will be a thin line in the ground, earth to earth awaiting the resurrection. So it should be no surprise when, even now, it manifests some of its struggles that will eventually, but temporarily as Christians know, cease its earthly journey.

Until then I plan on living a life as close to the coming eternity as possible and my prayer is that things that, like my heart, sometimes go bump in the night will not draw my away from the narrow but beautiful path. Your prayers would be appreciated as well.

On Father’s Day…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

My father has been with the Lord for almost twenty years. His own father passed away when he was a young boy and times were tough for my father growing up. Everything about being a dad he had to learn while we were arriving because there had been no one to teach him. I remember my dad sacrificing for us, riding the bike to work instead of the car to save money, wearing shoes for years, fishing trips with each of us, all kinds of little things so that we would have some of the things that eluded him in his childhood. My dad worked hard, maybe too hard, but we were never hungry, always had a roof over our heads, clothes on our backs, all the things that were not so certain when he was growing up. My prayer is that on this day, like all the others, he has found his rest in the arms of the God he loved, because when he prayed and spoke of heaven with tears in his eyes we saw the man he really was.

I Hate Writing…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

about politics these days because so much of the news is dismal and my soul is darkened when I wallow in the controversies of the world. Yet when I do speak, because sometimes it is a necessity, I try to speak for freedom, for that which would be good, for solutions, and hopefully not for the degradation of any person. Of course I fail at this sometimes and when this happens I need to step back, calm my passions, and focus on the things and the One that really matters.

That’s what really counts. I will speak for human dignity and freedom. I will seek justice as best as I can understand it. I will do my best to not harm or belittle anyone along the way.  Yet above all I hope to keep myself on the Beautiful Path that is the Christian life and help any others who might like to come along. Beyond specific issues I believe this is the best way to make any society better, to help the transformation of people from within by the grace of God in Christ.

Princes, rulers, governments, they come and go and are never a place to store ultimate trust. God and the life that God offers are what lasts and remains. I will speak and write of many things but cling only to that.

 

The Rain…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

has been coming down off and on for nearly a month. Everything is damp and the sky has been a gray iron helmet. When the sun comes it’s a tease, a few moments, an hour or two, and then the sky begins to weep again.

On the trip down to LaCrosse, Wisconsin this Sunday past the constant drizzle and drip forced its way into my thoughts. Windshield wipers scuffed back and forth. The road was shiny, glazed with water. Clouds rolled by like a monochrome wall. Surely the drought conditions of the year gone by were over. Now what falls from the sky is simply adding insult to injury, damp to dark, and purposeless wetting to what should be a beautiful day in June.

Except, of course, for the larger scheme of things.

I’m a creature who lives in moments, moments past and moments present. All I see is the rain. All I remember is the rain. All I ponder is that the rain will never stop. That this rain may actually be for years from now, an aquifer for some future dryness means nothing to me. That rivers need replenishing all the way down to the sea for people I do not know has not crossed my mind. That creatures other than myself may find not dreariness but abundant life in the waters falling from the clouds is not in my frame of reference.

But all of that and more is always present to God who causes the rain to fall on the just and the unjust. God is mindful of things in ways that I cannot comprehend. So the rain falls. I wait. Soon the sun will shine again for the same reasons the rain falls now, order, meaning, and purpose from the One who sees everything in its proper and timeless perspective.

Woke Up This Morning…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

with My Mind on Jesus.

Well, woke up this mo’nin
With my mind, stayin’ on Jesus
Woke up this mo’nin
With my mind, stayin’ on Jesus
Halleluh, halleleluh

Well, singin’ an prayin’ with my
Stayin’ on, Jesus
Singin’ and playin’ with my mind
Stayin’ on

Well, stayin’ and playin’
Halleluh, halleluh

Well, walkin’ an talkin’ with my
Stayin’ on
Walkin’ an talkin’ with my mind
Stayin’ on, Jesus

Halleluh, halleluh

Well, singin’ and prayin’
Stayin’ on, Jesus
Singin’ an playin’ with my mind

Halleluh, halleluh.

As I Was on My Way…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

to the Orthodox Church more than a decade ago I had the privilege of spending time with Fr. Michael Harper and his wife at a local restaurant. Fr. Harper had been an Anglican Priest and a leader in the world charismatic movement and was now Orthodox. As the meal progressed we spoke of the transition to Orthodox Christianity and he said something that has stuck with me over time. He told me that as he was on his own journey to Orthodoxy  he struggled with the idea of praying for the departed, a common Orthodox practice. Yet, he said, there was a choice. He could form the “Fr. Michael Harper Orthodox Church without prayers for the departed” or trust that even though this issue was personally difficult there was a larger wisdom on this matter in the life of the Church, a wisdom in which he could rest.

The challenge in this understanding lies in being able to rest, to trust, and to believe and not be the center of your own theological universe. To be Orthodox is to belong to something larger than yourself, to be a thinker, for sure, but one who thinks in community and communion. A person does have to set aside a certain amount of ego to make this a reality in their lives. In a culture where the emphasis for some time has been on micro-religion, that is individual and atomized belief structures peculiar to a person’s own experiences, this may require a lifetime of adjustment and be a central struggle to adopting not just the Orthodox label but the Orthodox way of life.

The strength, though, of this understanding lies in the freedom that comes with not having to personally reinvent the wheel each time a wheel is needed. There is none of the loneliness that comes with believing you have to create and sustain a spiritual way of life with only what you might have on hand at any given moment. You can learn from others, share in wisdom that’s been worked out over time, and realize a whole universe of fellow travelers walking with you on the beautiful path.

The late Fr. Harper made his choice and stepped through the doors of Orthodoxy. I took his words to heart and stepped through myself some time after this encounter. A perfect world all of the time? No. Yet there is rest here and that’s made it worth it all.

I’m Aware…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

of the sins, the struggles, the general craziness that rears up, sometimes daily, in the Orthodox Church. I’m aware of our scandals, our tragedies, the games played behind the scenes, and many places where we fall short of our ideal. I am touched by them. At times I am, regrettably, part of them. I sin and struggle and so do the people of my Church.

I’d like it to be better. I wish everyone in my Church were perfect and myself the first. The process of becoming perfected is horrible sometimes.  There is so much to clear away, so much to remove, so much illness to be scoured out. The thought of it overwhelms me at times. Sometimes I despair. Sometimes I think of just letting it all fall away and leave for that elusive something, somewhere, where the grass across the fence seems greener.

But I won’t. I plan to stay.

I know that the day to day affairs of Orthodoxy can be touched by deep darkness and knicked by a thousand small sinful cuts. Yet I know that its also the way out of all of those things, the sins, the struggles, the dark moments, and the disease which sometimes effects everything from the largest structure of the Church to the smallest corner of my soul. It remains the beautiful path. Narrow for sure, often untrod, and surrounded by dangers, but yet the beautiful path.

My prayer is only that I stay on this path as best as I can and when I wander away I retain enough sense to find my way back. While I see the cares and struggles around me I pray that God gives me the vision to keep my eyes focused on Christ who walks with me on the way and is also the goal of my travels. If I do that I may not always be in the most comfortable spot but I will be safe, and that makes all the difference.

Five in the Morning…

~ Fr. John Chagnon ~ Leave a comment

and my open window catches the hymns of birds awaiting the sun. If this is their last day they know not. If there will be enough of the stuff of life they are unaware. They live. They trust, even if they don’t understand. They sing to usher in the morning from the night, living as their Creator gave them life. So help me to be now and always.