Removing the Blog From My Own Eye

HEGO - a word for one who aspires, consciously or unconsciously, to the heroic and strives, as the writer Henri Nouwen says, to be RELEVANT, SPECTACULAR, and POWERFUL. These three are the temptations for us all as they were for Christ in the desert, who modeled a "downward mobility" and called us home.

To be RELEVANT, SPECTACULAR, and POWERFUL, to try to enlarge one's font size, to be a person of ALL CAPS - an image of pride that I know all too well, not only in my own fallenness, brokenness, search for approval, but especially in the temptation lurking to forever judge the motives of others as not being altruistic, but really efforts to be RELEVANT, SPECTACULAR, and POWERFUL. There is a temptation, that I know and fall into so often, to see a selfish gene lurking in "my brother's eye", when it is my own judgment that speaks of the arrogance I want to condemn in someone else.

How is it learned to be on the downward path of the spirit, to applaud, to celebrate not only the countless acts others show when they give themselves away, but equally when these can be viewed as arising from the most humble, and loving of intentions? I have a lot to learn.

And for a blog such as this? Maybe Christ's words can best apply, particularly as a Lenten reflection, to ask myself: HOW am I a HYPOCRITE? I need to take out the BLOG of my own eye, ask myself if I really only write for some pursuit of being RELEVANT, SPECTACULAR, and POWERFUL. It may simply be the underlying motive for me. But I will try and keep asking such questions, and ever write with a smaller font and smaller caps.


"The small man builds cages for everyone he knows.
While the sage, who has to duck his head when the moon is low,
keeps dropping keys all night long
for all the beautiful, rowdy prisoners." - Hafiz