{"id":851,"date":"2012-02-28T21:02:36","date_gmt":"2012-02-29T03:02:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/michellevanloon.com\/?p=851"},"modified":"2012-02-28T21:02:36","modified_gmt":"2012-02-29T03:02:36","slug":"falling-upward-chapter-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/","title":{"rendered":"Falling Upward, Chapter 5"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life<\/a><\/strong>. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around and join the conversation here if you\u2019re facing a mid-life transition. Father Rohr offers us all some meaty food for thought. <\/em><\/p>\n

Here are links to my previous posts in the series:\u00a0<\/em> Intro<\/a> \u2014 Chapter 1<\/a> \u2014 Chapter 2<\/a> \u2014 Chapter 3<\/a> \u2014Chapter 4<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

* * * * * * *<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>We now`round the bend into Chapter 5, entitled \u2018Stumbling Over The Stumbling Stone\u2019. \u201cSooner or later,\u201d Father Rohr writes, \u201d if you are any classic \u2018spiritual schedule\u2019, some event, person, death, idea, or relationship will enter your life that you simply cannot deal with, using your present skill set, your acquired knowledge, or your strong willpower.\u201d We have to come to this painful point in order to be open to change. Otherwise, we would have no reason to leave the proverbial comfort zone.<\/span><\/p>\n

The paradox is that we can\u2019t simply generate this as an item on our own spiritual agenda. \u201cAny attempt to engineer or plan your own enlightenment is doomed to failure because it will be ego driven,\u201d Rohr notes. The best we should expect from someone else\u2019s prepackaged growth plan is a greater attentiveness to what\u2019s happening in our own lives. If anything more than that is promised by a spiritual leader, it\u2019s a case of overselling on their part.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe must stumble and fall, I am sorry to say. And that does not mean reading about falling, as you doing here.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

If we are honest, there are some things in our lives that can not be fixed. Rohr calls the cross a dramatic symbol of \u201cthat necessary and absurd stumbling stone\u201d. I would disagree here. The cross is not metaphor. It is cure. \u201cMany Christians even made the cross into a mechanical \u2018substitutionary atonement theory\u2019 to fit into their quid pro quo<\/em> worldview, instead of suffering its inherent tragedy, as Jesus did himself.\u201d In this, Rohr is correct. It is impossible to know the comfort of One who suffers with us<\/span><\/a> if our experience of God is limited to cognitive affirmation of a set of theological words about him.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe cross solved our problem by first revealing our real problem \u2013 our universal pattern of scapegoating and sacrificing others. The cross exposes forever the \u2018scene of our crime\u2019\u2026 Jesus must be crucified, or there can be no resurrection. It is written in our hardwiring, but can only be heard at the soul level. It will usually be resisted and opposed at the ego level.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Rohr points at the testimonies of recovering addicts who end up thanking God for their former lives because it took every bit of it to \u201cbreak down their false self and open them to love\u201d. In contrast, he notes that many of the poorly-parented inmates he served during his years as a jail chaplain had no sense of boundaries, identity or inherent awareness of their own dignity, and destroyed themselves and others as a result. Though some are broken by jail and find new life, most others are so wounded that they can do nothing more than hold onto their broken false self like a life preserver. <\/span><\/p>\n

If we don\u2019t do the container-forming task of first half of our lives well, when the stumble comes (and it will), we will not be able to rise and move forward. Those who have never experienced this fall are often the ones who have benefited from soft circumstances and their ability to stand on the necks of others to arrive at their position of power. He notes that many of the slaveholders of the South were these \u201cself-made men\u201d. A refusal to fall, or perhaps a fear of falling has rendered them spiritually impotent, keeping them \u201cfrom awareness, empathy, and even basic human compassion\u201d, gaining the world but losing their souls in the process.<\/span><\/p>\n

A couple of years ago before the gears got stripped from my right shoulder, I was a part-time caregiver and worked for months in the homes of two different, extremely wealthy older clients. One was generous, gentle and treated me with respect. The other was imperious and demanding, and treated me as though as I was a dumb grunt. I learned a lot from serving each of them. Each needed some assistance with the tasks of daily living. The generous woman had come to terms with her diminished physical capabilities, and was grateful for my assistance and companionship. I was grateful to get to know her as well.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

The other had lived a privileged North Shore life \u2013 country club memberships, household \u201chelp\u201d in the form of maids, gardeners and the like. I learned that she was confident that treating her help as though they had the value of\u00a0 3\/5ths of a person<\/span><\/a> was morally acceptable. Her life of comfortable entitlement had buffered her from the pain of a flat-on-the-face stumble for 9 decades of life, though she was stumbling a bit with issues related to her aging when I came onto the scene. Perhaps her epic bossiness had something to do with her loss of some control in her life, but I think in her case it was more of a lifelong habit, unchecked by the kind of stumble that redirects us away from our fabulous selves and toward our cure.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stumbling really is a necessary step, isn\u2019t it?<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around and join the conversation here if you\u2019re facing a mid-life transition. Father Rohr offers us all some meaty food for thought. Here are links to my previous posts in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1449,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-falling-upward"],"yoast_head":"\nFalling Upward, Chapter 5 - Pilgrim's Road Trip<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Falling Upward, Chapter 5 - Pilgrim's Road Trip\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Pilgrim's Road Trip\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-02-29T03:02:36+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/files\/2012\/02\/vonKreutzbruck_Stolperstein-300x225.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Michelle Van Loon\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Michelle Van Loon\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/\",\"name\":\"Falling Upward, Chapter 5 - Pilgrim's Road Trip\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2012-02-29T03:02:36+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2012-02-29T03:02:36+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#\/schema\/person\/d2eb5ce9dc11a89e961d3077629446cc\"},\"description\":\"I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Falling Upward, Chapter 5\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/\",\"name\":\"Pilgrim's Road Trip\",\"description\":\"Schlepping Toward Glory\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#\/schema\/person\/d2eb5ce9dc11a89e961d3077629446cc\",\"name\":\"Michelle Van Loon\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/author\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Falling Upward, Chapter 5 - Pilgrim's Road Trip","description":"I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Falling Upward, Chapter 5 - Pilgrim's Road Trip","og_description":"I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/","og_site_name":"Pilgrim's Road Trip","article_published_time":"2012-02-29T03:02:36+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/files\/2012\/02\/vonKreutzbruck_Stolperstein-300x225.jpg"}],"author":"Michelle Van Loon","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Michelle Van Loon","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/","name":"Falling Upward, Chapter 5 - Pilgrim's Road Trip","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#website"},"datePublished":"2012-02-29T03:02:36+00:00","dateModified":"2012-02-29T03:02:36+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#\/schema\/person\/d2eb5ce9dc11a89e961d3077629446cc"},"description":"I\u2019m blogging through Richard Rohr\u2019s Falling Upward: A Spirituality Through The Two Halves Of Life. Even if you haven\u2019t read the book, please stick around","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/2012\/02\/falling-upward-chapter-5\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Falling Upward, Chapter 5"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/","name":"Pilgrim's Road Trip","description":"Schlepping Toward Glory","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/#\/schema\/person\/d2eb5ce9dc11a89e961d3077629446cc","name":"Michelle Van Loon","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/author\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1449"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/pilgrimsroadtrip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}