” ‘Wondering is a word connoting at least three things: Standing in disbelief. Standing in the question itself. Standing in awe before something.”
~Richard Rohr, The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See

I have found myself doing a fair share of wondering these days. I have been in several situations where I have found it unclear what was really happening. This has mostly been in meetings where decisions were being made, where people were engaged in debate and dialogue about a particular issue and have become entrenched in standing their ground in a way that made me wonder what the ‘conversation behind the conversation’ really was. Ever have experiences like this? It is an experience of the furrowed-brow.

So it was with a certain amount of relief that, while reading a book by author and speaker Richard Rohr that I came across the words that gave some context to my own wonderings. In it he describes a time when certain arms of the Catholic church were actually debating societies, hardly ever holding the same opinions on anything while still being welcome in the tradition. “Unfortunately, in later centuries this practice degenerated to just needing answers. And preferably certain answers. And preferably about everything. We moved from wondering to answering, which hasn’t served us well at all.”

Can I hear an “Amen”? My deep amen comes from reading how my own United Methodist church is behaving as they gather for our General Conference. This coming together happens every four years and allows us to once again reaffirm who we believe ourselves to be as one arm of a diverse band who seek to follow Jesus. At this gathering there is opportunity to listen to the lives of those present, how the Holy is moving in them and to agree to change, amend, remove the language in our Discipline, the book that guides us. In short, it is meant to be a time of wondering. But the reports I read of what is actually happening seems very far from this ancient gift of standing in the questions posed by a universe birthed by Mystery. Instead, it is more about answers and certainty and creating camps of those who are in and those who are out, those who are right and those who are wrong. It breaks my heart.

Of course, in our political life together we see the same drama being played out. The rhetoric is exhausting and filled with exaggerations and half-truths. In the muddled noise that flies over the airwaves, there is very little room for wondering, little room for standing in the questions in a way that might lead us to some greater understanding of not only ourselves but of the working ways of the world. What happened to that time of listening and learning from the experience of another? That time of hoping to evolve the wisdom planted within that is an ever-opening blossom?

What are you wondering about these days? What questions do you find yourself standing smack in the middle of? Who is standing there with you? Are you listening to one another with gentleness? What recent sight or sound or experience has filled you with an awe that took your breath away?

This gift of wonder is, I believe, planted at the heart of all Creation, at the heart of each of us. On this day, may we all be caught up in wondering. May it startle us and humble us. May it draw us closer in the Spirit’s tether. For our own good and the good of the world.