Amy Sander Montanez is a writer, teacher, therapist, retreat leader, and spiritual director who attends Trinity Cathedral, Columbia. She is the winner of two 2008 Polly Bond Awards for Devotional / Inspirational Writing from Episcopal Communicators You can access an archive with her award-winning reflections on the diocesan Web site at www.edusc.org/ArchiveElectronic/.
In the Moment—One Pilgrim's Attempt to Be Present
By Amy Sander Montanez, D. Min.
Who do you hang with?
So much of what’s true in life seems to have a paradoxical
nature, doesn’t it? Like a hologram, you can look at it one way and
see a very clear image, and then shift it just slightly and see a
completely different picture. Over and over I am struck with the
multifacetedness of most things, especially the political,
philosophical, theoretical, psychological, and theological.
My daughter and I have been discussing a statement that has come
into both of our lives in the last year. It has several
modifications, but basically it goes something like this. “You are
only as good as the people you surround yourself with.” It’s been
said to us by business associates, anxious boyfriends, mentors, and
yoga teachers, not to mention every aspect of popular culture. I am
sure I said it to her at some point in her adolescence, and I
suspect it was probably said to me at the same point in my
development.
So I hold the hologram up and I see it from that perspective. When
we surround ourselves with good people, people who have the same
moral and ethical standards we have, people who are striving for the
same things in life, we are helping ourselves in so many ways. We
lessen the temptations that could come our way. The positive energy
of others can impact us in positive ways. The network of people like
this is beneficial. We have others we can call on to support and
help us. We spend less time and energy having to define and hold on
to ourselves. There is less drama. In family and marital matters, it
really helps. A friend of mine told me her mentor said to “Surround
yourself with stars.” It just makes life a lot easier. It makes a
lot of sense. I’ve experienced it. It works.
And then there’s Jesus. And then the hologram looks different. At
first glance, Jesus doesn’t seem to be paying much attention to the
positive qualities of those he chose to hang around with. He
certainly wasn’t surrounding himself with “stars.” The apostle Peter
was impulsive and impetuous, not to mention the fact that in the end
he was a lousy friend. Thomas couldn’t really decide how he felt
about Jesus. Matthew was a tax collector and seemed to have a rather
rigid personality. Jesus also spent a good deal of time with women
and children who weren’t exactly considered status friends. He hung
out with lepers and a Samaritan women who was living with a man out
of wedlock, and he ate dinner wherever they would feed him. He
didn’t seem at all interested in protecting his moral and ethical
standards, nor did he seem interested in what others could do for
him. If Jesus was “only as good as the people he surrounded himself
with,” he wouldn’t be our model and teacher. He wouldn’t be Jesus
the Christ.
So what makes Jesus different? I am thinking it has a lot to do with
how much time he spent in prayer, in communion with God. And by
spending this kind of time, he must have been centered and grounded
in a way most of us don’t experience. It didn’t matter who he was
with, he knew who he was. He knew that the values of the popular
culture wouldn’t make him happy, would not bring him peace, nor
would they bring about God’s reality (the kingdom of God) which he
so zealously wanted to bring to us. He knew in his innermost being
what was really important, what mattered and was going to matter,
and he carried this wisdom with him to those he hung around with. At
the very end of his earthly life, he knew that death was not the
worst thing that could happen. Selling his soul would be worse.
Being someone he was not, would be worse.
And so, holding the hologram up one way, we probably get some very
important needed support from hanging around the kind of people we
are and want to be. Looking at it that way, we are who we hang out
with. Maybe Jesus got all he needed from hanging around God. And
just as Jesus did, we need to hang around God a lot, too. When we
are centered and grounded in God, we can branch out and stand sure
in what we believe and who we are. When we spend time in prayer and
contemplation, when we retreat from the popular culture and let
ourselves be reminded of what is really important, then we can turn
and look at the hologram another way. When we know who we are, we
can hang out with all kinds of people, holding steady and fast to
the truth as we know it. Then we are a light to those not like us.
Then we aren’t afraid of those who are different from us, who
society tells us are unclean or unimportant or less than us. Then we
can be like Jesus the Christ, sure of who we are and able to carry
that assuredness with us.
© 2008 Amy Sander Montanez