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Advent: Step 4 Act
The fourth and final step for our spiritual tuneup is to act. No, you don’t have to join a stage group (although that may be what your reading, praying, and reflecting move you to do). Rather you are at a new place where you can choose to be in the world in a way that is more in sync with yourself and with God.
I’ve just started reading The Beating of Great Wings by Marianist Father Bernard Lee, SM, and in the very first few pages he says that action is not identical with activity. “Action is the exercised responsibility for collaborating with God historically in the redemption of historical experience.” (page 3) While he doesn’t define “activity” at this point, the image that comes to mind is “doing stuff” or the big and little things that make up our daily roster of activities. I also get a sense that “activity” as a sort of frenetic experience, a bit random and perhaps lacking or verging on lacking control.
Had I read Lee’s definition of action (especially in contradistinction to activity) and not already pondered this 4-step process, I probably would have thought to myself, wow, that’s a tall order to be responsible for collaborating with God in the redemption of anything, even a pop bottle or can! But the care-full process of immersing oneself in reading, praying, and reflecting is what prepares the way for being a person of action, a person who collaborates with God in redemption. That “redemption of historical experience” means that it begins with us and our everyday lived experience — shopping for diapers, working, studying for finals, having a drink with friends at the bar, sitting in traffic, etc. It also means being mindful of and action-oriented toward the needs of the bigger world — our neighborhood, our country, our world. This is the stage, so to speak, for collaborating with God.
Thoughts, questions, ponderings, ideas, inspirations? What’s percolating?
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Funny you should mention being stuck in traffic. That’s the image I had about the difference between action and activity. Specifically, my goal is to get from point A to point B. If I’m stuck in traffic on the highway, I might think about taking an exit, driving through one or two downtown areas, and finally getting where I’m going, even though doing so might take longer and/or be a greater distance. At least I’d be DOING something (activity), whereas if I stay on the highway and work my way through the traffic jam (action), I might get there just as fast, and I can listen to an audiobook while I’m at it.
And on the subject of traffic, I saw a relevant bumper sticker the other day: “If nothing changes, nothing changes.” A bit simplistic, of course, but hey, there’s only so much room on a bumper sticker!
Does the “redemption” of anything mean finding meaning in anything, even the mundane details of our lives? And finding God there? I’m not sure I understand completely the difference between action and activity, but action sounds more deliberate, with deeper roots, and may or may not require activity.
I’ve just read through these four blogs and really enjoyed the thread, thanks!