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A Transcendental Meditation

© Kathy Shaidle

I'm powerless over popular culture. I dog fresh fads and fashions like a bloodhound, scan the daily paper's "Entertainment" section and recycle the remainder unread with nary a blush. That's why I'm surprised by my knee-jerk distaste for so many current trends in matters theological. For instance, I happen to like referring to God as my Father, thank you very much-for precisely the same reason many people don't: I've endured two of the mortal variety, and can honestly say that God is the only father I've ever had who's never let me down.

Then there was that retreat I once attended. The facilitator asked the thirty of us if we preferred a transcendent notion of God to an immanent one. At the word "immanent," twenty-nine hands shot obediently up to the sky. ("UP to the sky," hmmm? Interesting.) Only my hand remained still. I'm usually half the age of the other participants at such events, so one might reasonably expect that I of all people would be receptive to the latest ideas. Nope. I suspect it's precisely due to my status as a "Vatican II baby" that I'm more embarrassed than inspired by lumbering liturgical dance and ersatz indigenous drumming. One is, after all, inclined to rebel against one's upbringing, whatever its trappings. I do so envy pre-concilliors, those lucky ducks who got to mutiny against Limbo and Latin; folk masses, felt-appliqué banners, those Casper-The-Friendly-Ghost illustrations in "Good News For Modern Man"-these hardly inspire the aspiring satirist. But I digress. That retreat proved to be a life-altering experience indeed, although surely not in the manner the facilitators intended. I was granted a revelatory vision of my essential at-two-ness with the progressive Catholic universe, caught a glimpse of my Inner Old Fart. Fortunately, I soon discovered concrete, if unlikely, proof that I wasn't quite alone-a "Deep Thoughts" greeting card of all things, which read: "If God is inside us like some people say, He'd better like burritos 'cause that's what he's getting."

Exactly! Immanence is so, well, unseemly. The notion of a perfect God residing within imperfect me is difficult to accept. Like a squeamish schoolgirl with a horror of cooties, I've never outgrown the ghastly misconception that God will smother under last night's hastily gobbled tub of Chocolate-Chocolate-Chip. And, poetically speaking, you must admit that transcendence is infinitely more majestic--unless you happen to be one of those poor deluded souls who actually prefers Robert Bly to William Blake. "God is inside us, all's right with the world" just doesn't have the same ring to it.

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