Generosity (2015.08.16 Sermon Audio)
August 18th, 2015 | John Chandler
Gideon Tsang of Vox Veniae trekked over from East Austin to share some of the things he’s been learning about generosity.
Links and quotes mentioned:
- “Sacrifice” usually leads to a well-hidden sense of entitlement and perpetuates the vicious circle of merit, a mind-set that leads most of us to assume that we are more deserving than others because of what we have given or done. As the old saying goes, all expectations and self-sacrifice are just resentments waiting to happen. Jesus came to end all false sacrificial notions, I believe, and he did it once and for all. But the ego and egoic culture led us right back into it, probably because the False Self rightly feels so unworthy that it must earn a sense of worthiness through some notion of heroism or hard work. Even rich white men who are born into their money will somehow let you know how much they “sacrificed” to get what they have. When you sacrifice, you always “deserve.” Sacrifice, much more than we care to admit, creates entitlement, a “you-owe-me” attitude, and a well-hidden sense of superiority. Jesus brilliantly said, “Go, learn the meaning of the words, ‘What I want is mercy and not sacrifice.’” It seems to have been one of his favorite lines from Hosea (Matthew 9:13, 12:7), although it was a risky and dangerous idea in a religion still based in temple tithes and the sacrifice of animals and grains. Jesus knew that most notions of sacrifice largely appeal to our False Self, are not needed by the True Self, and are almost always manipulated and misused by people, most institutions, and warring nations. — Richard Rohr
- It is just not the Gospel, but only its most common substitute.You see, there is a love that sincerely seeks the spiritual good of others, and there is a love that is seeking superiority, admiration, and control for itself, even and most especially by doing “good” and heroic things. — Richard Rohr
- “If I had a message to my contemporaries it is surely this: Be anything you like, be madmen, drunks, and bastards of every shape and form, but at all costs avoid one thing: success . . . If you are too obsessed with success, you will forget to live. If you have learned only how to be a success, your life has probably been wasted.” — Thomas Merton
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