Go kick its ash

"What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate...The willing is ready at hand, but doing the good is not. For I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil I do not want...Miserable one that I am! Who will deliver me from this mortal body? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord."
-Romans 7: 15, 18b-19, 24-25

Happy Ash Wednesday! The joyful day when we're reminded of our impending mortality, and its effect on us. But...let's set aside the "Jesus now enters the desert for 40 days and probably craves bacon" portion of today, and I'd like to share my musings on the bible verse above. It was mentioned in the mass today, and it caught my ear.

I'm not one to take the Bible out of context (see: Kathleen's Pet Peeves), but this pretty much speaks for itself. It's not even a particularly revolutionary message. It is basically;

WHY CAN'T I GET SOMETHING RIGHT FOR ONCE? A;LCNE;OIHAO4EHTAOHLAN;LN!!!

Sincerely,
Paul, #1 Reformed Bully and Telemarketer for God

I took some comfort in that knowledge; that a guy who had literally been struck with holy lightning couldn't get it through his skull to just do the right thing, yahwehdammit! Perfection has never been the aim of Christianity. If this passage doesn't say that loud and clear, the gospels definitely should. But modern Christianity holds its nose high and lofty, giving off the impression, "No thanks, I've got this one all held down...now fall in line."

Really? If perfection was the aim of Christianity, then why on Earth would Earth still be as broken as it is? Some of the most devout Christians I know hold their "imperfections" at bay, refusing to take responsibility for them or let others see them, so instead of moving on, they hold on to that horrible faker of progress; guilt.

Guilt (see; Kathleen's Pet Peeves), has to be one of the most useless things out there. It's the ego's way of tricking us into thinking we're making progress, all the while bogging us down in everything that is selfish. Paul got that. He was saying, again, "I accept that I suck."

Awesome.

Here's my dream for the post-modern Church (don't ask denomination, Church is Church);

A total and complete love of being imperfect. The permanent lowering of the nostrils of judgment, and the total turn outward. The official end to beating ourselves up on the inside while maintaining an air of "I'm so together I'm practically threegether" (that was bad, but I'm sticking with it) on the outside.

Paul admitted his struggle with doing the most basic right for all of posterity, and I hope that I can open my heart enough to admit this struggle to myself, and to give it up. Another phrase that I brush over...but that's it. I give up! Instead of giving something up this Lent, I'm going to try to give myself up; because I too easily agree with Paul that I never end up doing what I wanted to do. There's one reason for this; I'm irreversibly human. Maybe 40 days will be a good amount of time to process that imperfection and embrace it...

Maybe I should get a bolt of lighting, after all?