Asking Questions

I learned a bit about asking questions some years ago. My mom was dying. While her son with whom she lived was a Unitarian Universalist and a Zen Buddhist priest, religion was rarely a topic of conversation. Her mother had been a fundamentalist Baptist, and while she professed being a Protestant, she attended church maybe a dozen times in a half dozen years. I don’t know, it felt important. And while driving together alone on some errand or other, I asked, what she believed. Turned out her faith could be summarized in two points. Evolution was a crock. And homosexuals were going to hell. We never ventured into the topic again…

Now, auntie is looking wan. Various issues are popping up. In fact I’m writing this in a hospital waiting room following some exploratory surgery. When checking in she was asked if she’d like a chaplain to swing by. She said sure. Before this I noticed she’d tucked a bible in together with her Vampire romance novels. Since her sister died nearly fifteen years ago she has walked into churches maybe three times. These were the ones I served and were for big occasions like my installation as the minister.

But, I’m not going to ask her what her religious opinions are.

I’ve learned a bit of a lesson.

Recently on Facebook someone asked me my opinion about a Zen teacher and his organization. I waltzed around the issues. I think he’s real enough, but there’s puffery and he uses what I consider misleading terminology about what he offers.

Apparently it wasn’t what the person actually wanted when asking my opinion. I was sternly chastised for my sectarian views and given a bibliography to catch me up…

Asking questions can be a dangerous thing, no doubt.

(Yes, and answering them presents new wrinkles on the issue…)

And, so what?

Mostly it doesn’t mean much at all. I mean if you ask someone how they are and they really tell you, the cost is the revelation of some hurt or maybe a little extra time.

But, there are bigger fish we sometimes hope to fry.

And this blog is more than anything dedicated to the interior life, to the great quest.

And, if we’re thinking of launching ourselves on some spiritual quest, seeking to know who we really are, what we’re really up to in this world of sorrows and joys, we probably should think a little about it before we accidentally stumble on an answer or two.

May regret it.

Particularly if we’re invested in things being one way.

And not another.

Fair warning…