Editor’s note: This text was originally published within the 8/30/1997 issue of America.
Two years ago America published a set of 25 temporary essays by quite a few notable personalities (9/30/95). The editor, James Martin. S.J., put to his respondents the next query: “‘If someone were to ask you: How can I find God? what would you say?” The contributors were to assume the questioner as a detailed friend, with no specific religious background. This month those answers shall be published, together with some 50 more responses, in How Can I Find God? (Triumph/Liguori Publications,1-800-325-9521). The brand new collection greatly expands the scope of the unique article; Mr. Martin has included not only a few of the “famous” but in addition some “not-so-famous” people from across the country, in addition to contributors from six different religious traditions: Catholic. Protestant, Jewish, Muslim, Native American and Buddhist. We present here a number of of the brand new essays.
The Rev. Daniel J. Harrington, S.J., is professor of Latest Testament on the Weston Jesuit School of Theology in Cambridge. Mass. Father Harrington, an internationally recognized Scripture scholar, is the final editor of the journal Latest Testament Abstracts and the Sacra Pagina series of hooks. He can be the writer of many scholarly articles and books, including The way to Read the Gospels and Interpreting the Latest Testament.
I find God largely in and thru the Bible. Most of my academic, spiritual, and pastoral life revolves across the Bible. It’s for me crucial approach to come to know, love, and serve God.
My love for the Bible goes back a great distance. I stutter. I all the time have, and I suppose I all the time will. As a young boy I read in a newspaper that Moses stuttered. I looked it up within the Bible, and sure enough in Exodus 4:10 Moses says to God: “I’m slow of speech and slow of tongue.” But I discovered far more in Exodus 3-4. It’s the story of God’s self-revelation to Moses at Mount Horeb. It tells concerning the burning bush, the suffering of God’s people Israel in Egypt, the revelation of the special divine name (”I’m who I’m”), God’s promise of liberation from slavery, Moses’ miraculous powers, and God’s call to Moses to talk on God’s behalf. I read that story again and again, and it progressively worked upon me in order that it has shaped my religious consciousness to this present day. As a boy of ten or eleven years of age I discovered God within the Bible, and I actually have continued to achieve this ever since.
As a Jesuit priest and professor of biblical studies I actually have been in a position to mix my occupation and my love for the Bible. Lots of my happiest personal experiences have taken place in the educational study of the Bible: reading the primary chapter of John’s Gospel in Greek, starting the study of Hebrew, earning a doctorate in biblical languages and cultures from Harvard University, teaching Scripture to theology students, and preaching on the Scriptures every Sunday for over twenty-five years. As general editor of Latest Testament Abstracts since 1972 I see every thing in the educational study of the Latest Testament. The Bible never grows wearisome or stale for me. I’m deeply in love with the Bible as God’s word.
“We bring to the biblical text ourselves, our experiences, our personal strengths and limits, our communal and individual identities.”
Those that find God within the Bible often surround their experience with theological terms corresponding to inspiration, revelation, inerrancy, canon, authority, and normativity. These terms have long histories and name significant theological realities. But more fundamental is the hermeneutical process that I illustrated above with regards to Exodus 3-4.
We bring to the biblical text ourselves, our experiences, our personal strengths and limits, our communal and individual identities. The Bible itself is a set of books, written at different times and in other places. The Old Testament comprises narratives about ancient Israel’s patriarchs and kings, law codes, prophetic oracles, songs of praise and laments, proverbs, wisdom instructions, love poems, and apocalyptic visions. The Latest Testament consists of 4 accounts of Jesus’ life and teachings, stories concerning the apostles,letters from Paul and other early Christian writers, and an apocalyptic prophecy.
Biblical scholars try to know the books of Scripture with the methods of literary, historical, and theological evaluation. They make available tools that enable readers today to know and appreciate the text higher than they might do on their very own. And yet the Bible is just not simply an object of antiquarian research or words on a page (irrespective of how sacred). Within the encounter between the reader and the text the “word of God” comes alive. Something can and does occur. In that encounter— whether it takes the shape of silent or oral reading, literary evaluation, or preaching—the word of God comes alive for me. I see analogies, points of contact, between what the biblical text describes and my life. As I discover and articulate those analogies I develop a language for considering and talking concerning the experience of God and about human existence. This in turn shapes my way of life and the way I interact with others. And the entire circle of experience, biblical texts, assimilation of the text, and praxis—the hermeneutical circle—begins again.
The “word of God” is just not similar with the text of the Bible. For me, it refers back to the whole technique of encountering God in and thru the Scriptures. From the Bible we come to know the God of our religious tradition and what it means to be God’s people. With the assistance of the Psalms we learn to precise each our thanks and praise to God in addition to our sadness and anger. We discover what hope means through the prophets and seers. We meet Jesus of Nazareth whom we confess to be the “Word of God.” In and thru the Word/word, God tells us who God is and what God wants us to be and do. The Epistles show what it means to live out Christian faith amidst the realities of a sometimes dangerous and hostile world—one nevertheless under the sovereignty of God and his Messiah.
The encounter with God through the Bible can’t be programmed or forced. In keeping with the Bible (and particularly Exodus 3-4). God takes the initiative on this relationship and leads us where God wants us to go. There may be. nevertheless, an ancient, easy, and effective framework for facilitating encounter with God through the Bible. It is commonly called by its Latin name, lectio divina (divine, or spiritual, reading).
There are 4 steps in lectio divina: reading (What does the text say?), meditation (What’s God saying to me through this text?), prayer (What do I would like to say to God on the premise of this text?), and motion (What difference can this text make in how I act? What possibilities does it open up? What challenges does it pose?).
The God of the Bible is the God of Jesus Christ. I experience this God in and thru the Bible and my life. It’s my privilege as a Jesuit priest to check and teach Scripture, to proclaim and preach God’s word, and to rejoice the church’s liturgies (that are largely forged within the language of the Bible). Within the midst of those wonderful activities (that are my best joy) I occasionally stutter. And this brings me back to where my spiritual journey with the Bible began. Though I’m slow of speech and tongue like Moses, I still hear the words of Exodus 4:11-12: “Who gives speech to mortals? Who makes them mute or deaf, seeing or blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go, and I shall be together with your mouth and teach you what you’re to talk.”
“It’s my privilege as a Jesuit priest to check and teach Scripture, to proclaim and preach God’s word, and to rejoice the church’s liturgies.”
The Honorable Jean Kennedy Smith is the U.S. ambassador to Ireland, appointed to this post by President Bill Clinton in 1993. In 1974 Mrs. Smith founded Very Special Arts, an academic organization affiliated with the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, which provides artistic opportunities for people with mental and physical disabilities. Ambassador Smith currently lives in Dublin, Ireland.
If someone were to ask me about finding God, I might start my answer by reflecting on the values which were taught to me by my parents. My parents were generous and loving, and their faith helped to shape all of their children as individuals and as a family. In our home, faith and prayer were vital values, and, because the years went on, Mother established the tradition of all of the family saying the rosary together on special occasions or, sometimes, just sitting on the porch after dinner. Through her example, Mother showed us that prayer was a part of our on a regular basis lives—that it was vital to attend church on Sunday, but that it was equally vital to stop in for a visit after we were shopping on the town. In that way, we got here to consider religion as a conscious search, fairly than an authoritative demand, as something that enriches our life, fairly than restricts it.
Over time, I actually have turn into increasingly more aware of the many alternative ways by which one can seek for God. There isn’t a single path. In my work with artists, some who’ve overcome significant physical and mental challenges, I actually have often been impressed by the way in which by which they’ve found grace through their artistic expression. Through the humanities, possibly unlike any experience, an individual is in a position to transcend limitations, explore the imagination and discover the unknown. This technique of discovery can awaken for all of us tlie profound wonders and the deep meaning in our lives.
The knowledge that spirituality reveals itself in lots of diverse places and forms has made me more aware of the intrinsic value of the several religions throughout our world. In my life, I actually have been privileged to witness a wide range of religious traditions, each with its own richness and wonder, each marked by prayer and fidelity as pathmarks which point toward God.
I feel that all of us need to appreciate that God and the seek for faith are truly universal, and that there are numerous ways to precise belief and to go looking for that which lies beyond. Our seek for God is, I feel, a seek for a greater humanity, one by which there may be love and compassion for all people. It have to be rooted in these values and marked by an openness and understanding of the range of human expression.
“The knowledge that spirituality reveals itself in lots of diverse places and forms has made me more aware of the intrinsic value of the several religions throughout our world.”
Chris Erickson works on the farm that has been in his family for over 100 years. His ancestors emigrated from Sweden,.settling in Nebraska in 1884. On his farm Chris grows 2,000 acres of corn, 100 of alfalfa, and 50 of wheat. Chris’s education, a level in agricultural economics from the University of Nebraska, and his family’s experience have helped him to take care of a profitable livelihood, and one which he enjoys. ‘’As a farmer, you’re your individual boss and may make your individual decisions, “ he says. “Plus. I like working outside. “ Chris, 33, was raised as a Lutheran and continues to attend church frequently in his hometown of Holdrege, Nebraska.
If someone were to ask the right way to find God, I might smile and tell them that I see God day-after-day. Being a farmer requires one to work with the earth and nature, and I cannot consider one occupation outside the clergy that will expose an individual to God and His Creation greater than farming. From the planting of the seeds through the harvesting of the grain. I see God’s plan at work on a regular basis. The complexity and sumptuous aura of nature in addition to the constant order under which it functions lead me to consider that only a Supreme Being could have provide you with the concept for its existence.
I also see God in people: These could also be people I work with, do business with, worship with, or friends whom I share spare time with. What higher source for locating God than people? For we’re created after His likeness. God is obvious throughout us and is straightforward to search out, but with the intention to do that, one must first place confidence in God. Without faith it could be difficult to search out God.
To be a Christian requires an act of religion. My very own faith has grown through my life and God’s presence has turn into much clearer. I see Him within the every day work I do as a farmer.
Farming generally is a very labor-intensive occupation. Many long, hard hours are spent planting the seeds, tilling the fields, watering the crops, and harvesting the grain. But I actually have nothing to do with the seeds sprouting, the plant growing, or the production of grain that happens inside the plant. When God created the Earth, He had a master plan for the way nature would work. Humans can’t make seeds sprout or plants grow: it’s God’s plan through nature that does the work. All of it is a continuation of my personal relationship with God. In that relationship, faith is the important thing factor. Once I plant the seeds, I actually have faith they are going to sprout. If I irrigate the plants, I actually have faith they are going to grow. Being a farmer allows me to experience God’s Creation and my relationship with Him on each a physical and spiritual basis.
My assumptions of God’s presence in nature are based on the proven fact that God created the Heavens and the Earth. Though I’m no expert on the scientific origins of the Earth, I find it difficult to consider that Creation was just something that “happened.” The complexity that happens in nature leads me to consider that the next being had responsibility. The intricate way by which matter is formed, via quite a few bonding processes of atoms and molecules and the complexity of genes and chromosomes in animals and humans, demonstrates to me that only a extremely smart being might have been the architect of our universe. There may be also an order to Creation. The law of gravity, the sunrise and sunset, and the seasonal changes are only a number of examples of the orderly way by which the Earth functions. All of this, combined wilh the magnificent glory of God’s Creation, corresponding to the natural fantastic thing about the land and sky, and the vastness of the oceans, makes me consider that God is our Creator, as is described in Genesis.
How can we discover God? He’s throughout us. The essence of our very existence. After we take a look at God’s Creation, we see the wonderful work of the Almighty Hand. I find God within the soil I till, the crops I grow, and the water I take advantage of—all working together to offer food lor many all over the world and myself with a living. I see God in other people through their acts of kindness and caring. And I feel yow will discover God in the way in which our universe functions, within the intricate and sumptuous way it operates and the consistent order with which it functions—all of which point to God as its Creator. If you have got faith, all you have got to do is open your eyes, and God is straightforward to search out.
“Though I’m no expert on the scientific origins of the Earth, I find it difficult to consider that Creation was just something that ‘happened.'”
Frederick Buechner is the writer of twenty-seven works of fiction and non-fiction including the autobiographical books Telling Secrets, Now and Then, The Sacred Journey in addition to Godric, the story of a medieval monk, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Mr. Buechner studied on the Union Theological Seminary in Latest York City and served as a teacher and chaplain at Phillips Exeter Academy in Latest Hampshire throughout the Nineteen Sixties. Today he lives in Hobe Sound, Florida.
Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit are the words C. G. Jung had chiseled into his stone lintel in Switzerland, which mean, freely translated, that you’re going to eventually find God whether you must or not. If you must (even for those who don’t occur to consider he exists), all you have got to do is locate some quiet place, be quiet inside yourself, and ask Him to let you discover Him (or Him you). So far as I do know, it’s a prayer that’s all the time answered.
Deotha Armstrong, on the age of six, was sent to a Catholic grammar school in her Harlem neighborhood. The next 12 months Dee decided she desired to make her First Communion along along with her classmates. One among the nuns told her this might prove difficult since her parents won’t approve. So Dee decided to ask her parents to turn into Catholic. “But you’re only eight years old!” said the nun. “But what’s the issue?” replied Dee, “God is God throughout!” Thus began a process which led to Dee (and eventually her parents} joining the Catholic Church.
Today Dee works as a receptionist at St. Aloysius Church in Harlem, Latest York City. Together along with her late husband, Dee raised one child Laverne, now forty, and is the proud grandmother of two girls. Dee decided to reply the query orally, in what turned out to be a vigorous monologue.
To begin with, everybody has some sort of problem of their life. And also you often find God when things aren’t all good. Often, when there’s an issue in your life you’re on the lookout for some form of help, some sort of connection, since it’s a heavy burden. And I all the time feel you must give you the chance to go on to God. Because, to start with, he made you, so he knows you higher than anybody. He loves you. And all he’s doing is waiting so that you can ask him.
Now. he’s not a quick person, he’s a sure person. Swiftness is not his smartest thing. So you have got to appreciate that whenever you ask him to enable you it can not be done in the following breath. Sometimes it’s, but nine times out often it can be done in his time, not your time. But you have got to have that faith to know that he’ll come to your rescue. No matter what it’s. It could possibly be something so simple as on the lookout for a shoestring. You’re in your own home on the lookout for that shoestring and saying, “God, where is that shoestring?” And also you look up and down and say, “Look, Lord, you realize where it’s. Help me out. I would like this!” And sure enough, you discover it. You’ll be able to say. “Oh, it was here on a regular basis,” but hey, did he come through?
In terms of on the lookout for God, for those who even don’t know what to search for, I might say that you simply’re on the lookout for peace of mind. Here’s a situation: After working for an insurance company for 31 years I used to be fired. I used to be devastated. . 31 years of your life, after which someone calls you in a single afternoon and says, “You not work here!” What?
“You’ll eventually find God whether you must or not.”
At that time you’re really in a dilemma. that that is your livelihood. What are you going to do? Who are you able to turn to?
When the person was firing me I said. “I can’t consider that is true, but I don’t consider God will will let you close this door—which is my bread and butter— unless he had one other door to open. So, knowing that he should have one other door, and it needs to be higher than this after 31 years, I’ll leave and walk out of here knowing that he should have something else higher for me.” And, after all, he thought, “Oh yeah, that’s a stupendous outlook,” but I used to be serious. True, I’m blessed because I do know I can turn to God. But let’s say you don’t even know if he exists or not, OK? Now, if someone approaches me, and other people have after something drastic happens, and says. “What am I going to do?” I’d say, to start with, you have got to only sit yourself down and get yourself together. And the one one who knows you higher than anybody is God, whether you suspect it or not. Remember, you wouldn’t be on this world if he didn’t make you. So you’ll go to the Creator. It’s identical to for those who wanted a dress you’d go to the dressmaker, for those who wanted your hair done you’d go to the hairdresser. So let’s go to the start of this example: Let’s go to God.
Now, what do you say whenever you get there? You only speak on the situation. Not that he doesn’t know the situation! He’s well aware of the situation. But it’s essential voice it and let it come out of you. You might want to say, “God, I’m in trouble, I would like some help. Please help me.” Now, I used to be once told by a priest—and it’s good advice—that whenever you’re in big trouble sometimes you don’t know the right way to pray, but “Lord, have mercy” is greater than sufficient.
, you wouldn’t be here without God. If God didn’t breathe life into your mother’s womb, well, consider me. you wouldn’t be here. So let’s return to him. Just say, “Lord, I’m in trouble. I don’t know you, I don’t learn about you, but are you able to help me? And above all for those who just help me through. I’ll attempt to study you.” Consider me, he hears that. Now, like I said, sometimes it doesn’t work overnight, but greater than likely he’ll get to you. and you will notice a change of some sort, and that may encourage you on this road that you have got began down.
“I used to be once told by a priest that whenever you’re in big trouble sometimes you don’t know the right way to pray, but ‘Lord, have mercy’ is greater than sufficient.”
Ron Hansen is the writer of the novels Mariette in Ecstasy, concerning the religious experiences of a young nun, and the recent Atticus. His short stories are collected in a volume entitled Nebraska. Mr. Hansen, who recently married, is the Gerard Manley Hopkins Professor of Creative Writing at Santa Clara University in California.
The in the beginning way of finding God for me is within the Eucharist and in other sacraments and rites. Meditation on scripture, especially the psalms and the gospel accounts of the general public ministry of Jesus, has often afforded me overpowering experiences of God’s abiding presence, mercy, and love. Retreats, once I could be alone and silent for some time, have been wonderful occasions for eliminating the turbulence and chatter that interfere with God’s efforts at communication. I actually have profited from using as intermediaries in prayer holy individuals who have died—Thérèse of Lisieux, Thomas Merton, or Gerard Manley Hopkins—when I would like a human face and life to give attention to, and I also try to listen to and see God in family and friends, and to search for the fantastic signs of the Holy Being in nature and the ocean. And eventually once I write and I don’t know of the origin of a specific scene or image I wish to presume that the Creator is using me as an instrument, and I’m humbled, grateful, and thrilled.
“Meditation on scripture has often afforded me overpowering experiences of God’s abiding presence, mercy, and love.”
Sister Helen Prejean, C.S.J., is the bestselling writer of Dead Man Walking, a book about her experiences in prison ministry, which was made right into a movie of the identical name in 1996. Sister Helen, who has written and lectured extensively about prison ministry, the death penalty and other social justice issues, is a member of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Medaille, and lives in Métairie, Louisiana.
Probably the most direct road that I actually have found to God is within the faces of poor and struggling people. For me, it was just the reference to people within the St. Thomas housing projects, then with people on death row and in prison, after which with the murder victims’ families.
I used to be forty years old before I spotted the connection between the Jesus who had said, “I used to be in prison and also you got here to me. I used to be hungry and also you gave me to eat,” between that and the real-life experience of being in situations where I used to be actually with individuals who were hungry and other people who were in prison and other people who were fighting the racism that permeates this society. And it was like the sensation of coming home. Finding God was like coming home, because you only say, “Where have I been all my life?”
I remember being in a homeless shelter—a food kitchen. My job was to serve the red Kool-Aid at first of the road when people got here for a meal. It was the primary conscious act that I did where I needed to be in contact with poor and struggling people. This young man got here up, a stupendous kid, he looked like Mr. Joe College. He was handsome, with blond hair and blue eyes, and his hand was shaking as he handed me the cup. And he whispered, “You’ve got to assist me, it’s my first time here.” The tears welled up in my eyes just from being touched. I used to be considering, “My God, what is that this young guy doing here?” It draws out of you this tremendous energy and gifts that you simply don’t even know that you have got.
My image of finding God is that our little boats are all the time on the river. We frequently are in a stall, and we wait and nothing moves, and every thing seems the identical in life. But after we get entangled in a situation like this—for me it was to be involved with poor people—it’s like our boat begins to maneuver on this current. The wind starts whistling through our hair and the energy and life is there. And that brought me straight into the execution chamber. You see, it was very quick from getting involved with poor people within the St. Thomas housing projects to writing to a person on death row, to visiting a person on death row, after which being there for him at the tip, because he had nobody to be there with him. And that have of being there with him, it’s really life up against it: it’s life or death, it’s compassion or vengeance. All life is just distilled to its essence.
In that situation, I experienced an incredible strength and presence of God, that God was on this man that society desired to throw away and kill. And the words of Jesus that “the last shall be first,” got here home to me. That’s what those words meant: that God dwells within the people locally that we most wish to throw away. It’s what builds the human family and human community. Because what makes things just like the death penalty possible, what makes things just like the racism that continues in our society, the oppression of the poor, is that there’s this disconnection with people.
To me, to search out God is to search out the entire human family. Nobody could be disconnected from us. Which is one other way of talking concerning the Body of Christ. That we’re all a part of this together.
I feel that everybody must keep up a correspondence with poor people. That in actual fact, as Jim Wallis of Sojourners Magazine has said, we’d like to just accept that one in all the spiritual disciplines—identical to reading the Scriptures and praying and liturgy—is physical contact with the poor. It’s a vital ingredient. If we’re never of their presence, if we never eat with them, if we never hear their stories, if we’re all the time separated from them, then I feel something really vital is missing.
The opposite thing I might wish to add to the entire query of finding God is the journey wherever it takes us—to me it has been to the poor and the struggling—have to be coupled with a mirrored image and a centeredness that comes from prayer and meditation. It’s very vital to assimilate what’s happening in our lives. I find that I can’t function if I don’t have that sense of being at the middle of myself and within the soul of my soul, in order that I’m truly operating from the within out. And it’s vital to be very self-directed, since it is so possible to be caught on other people’s eddies within the river and to get right into a stimulus/response form of thing. It’s so possible not even to appreciate that we’re really moved by other people’s vision of life, other people’s insights, other people’s agendas and simply to be caught on one current to a different, that now we have no rudder on our own boat.
Once you hit something big like this, and you realize that it’s greater than you—like working for justice on the planet, or attempting to connect faith with going against powerful and entrenched systems—you have got this sense of “Yes, I’m doing my part.” But then you definitely also have to give you the chance to place it down and let God run the universe, so you possibly can play a clarinet or be together with your friends or work in a garden.
To be whole could be very vital. Wholeness, I feel, is a component of godliness. I don’t think it’s cleanliness anymore that’s next to godliness, I feel it’s wholeness! To have a well rounded life. To have mental life, where you’re reading and considering and discussing. To have a robust emotional life where you possibly can give and receive intimacy with people. To develop friendships like a garden. Because there’s just no room for these Lone Rangers who go and check out to avoid wasting the world by themselves!
To see more answers, read this 1995 collection of responses to the query: Where can I find God?