Episode 130: HARMONY, Stages of Faith Part 4

Welcome to HARMONY the fourth and final stage of Faith. If you have been following along in this series you know that I have been summarizing the four stages of faith by Brian McLaren from his successful book FAD. If you aren’t familiar with the first 3 stages of faith SIMPLICITY, COMPLEXITY and PERPLEXITY, listen to episodes 124, 126, and 129 to bring you up to speed. In chapter 7 Brian sets the stage for stage 4 faith HARMONY for us: “In Stage ONE we ascended to the heights, became masters of Simplicity, stars of certainty heroes of dualistic thinking, legends in our own minds. “In Stage TWO we trekked up rugged trails of independence, up steep slopes of performance, higher toward the summit of spiritual success. We mastered the skills our faith community taught us from interpreting the Bible (our way), to sharing our faith with others, from grasping the complex concepts of our systematic theology to replacing some of our bad habits and so on…[People watched us develop as Stage TWO believers…..]and altho we experienced occasional failures and set backs we learned to recover and rebound, successfully.” “But then Stage THREE even tho it brings new gains feels like the loss of all that we worked so hard to attain, descent from the heights we worked to hard to surmount. >He likens it to a ‘plunge or fall like Dante’s protagonist dropping through various levels of hellish loss toward an inferno of abject despair.’ We find ourselves thinking all is lost. But I love what he points out, this is on pg 75 of FAD: “Over time we will see that our grim “all is lost” assessment isn’t the whole story. Eg. Stage THREE we still retain powerful and valuable treasures that we gained in Stage ONE. We learned, through dualism to care about whether we’re doing right or wrong. We learned to tell the truth. We learned to stand for something. NOW, in stage THREE our courageous commitment to honesty in the face of great cost and loss shows how well we learned the moral lessons of SIMPLICITY. “Similarly in Stage THREE we retain powerful treasures that we gained in Stage TWO. We learned to be curious and flexible. We learned that different spheres of life are like games that operate by different sets of rules, and we became fluent in the complex rules of multiple games. We learned independence, too, and became self-motivated learners and self-managers, adults who began to take responsibility for their own successes and their own failures. What we gained in SIMPLICITY and COMPLEXITY are what sustain us in stage 3, PERPLEXITY. And Stage 3 or perplexity will do the same for Stage FOUR. In his interview on the Bible for Normal People podcast Brian says, “I think what happens in stage three is you either become a mystic or a cynic, or you become a cynical mystic or a mystical cynic. But the cynicism is critical thinking, and the mysticism is an ability to live with unknowing.” That is such a fascinating take on stage 3; I loved it so much that I had to share it with you. In that same interview he continues, “when you are ready to take that step, I think that’s when you move to stage four, and that I call harmony. It’s where you begin to integrate.” Awesome. Although I feel a definite fluctuation, I can tell the times when my mindset, heart and soul are in a stage 4 faith frame of mind. It is expansive, tolerant, patient, able to hold and feel the tension of two opposing things – one in each hand. Additionally it gives me the opportunity to increase in love and compassion to those around me in whatever stage of faith they may find themselves. It opens up space without judgement! That is one of the beauties of HARMONY. In Harmony there is room for ALL OF IT! ALL THE THINGS— the THOUGHTS, ideas, the questions the doubts, the opinions, experiences, differentiation (remember the cynicism-it allows for, no applauds critical thinking and that only comes with differentiation), it embraces the diverse groups of PEOPLE and individuals alike. In HARMONY, the point isn’t to determine who is right or wrong in their ways or doing it good, better, best or who is the fastest vs who is behind or who is the biggest most successful. That misses the point of HARMONY completely. If you’re focused on any of those things, then most likely you are not in HARMONY. Not yet anyway. Of course, we don’t stay in A single stage; that is not the point. A faith journey is not linear and since we are human beings, there will be times when we’re operating from pragmatism of COMPLEXITY or longing for dualism of SIMPLICITY or perhaps trying to skip over some of the hard parts of PERPLEXITY so we can get to a place of HARMONY. If there is one thing I’ve learned, none of this can be rushed or forced. Just like when you plant seeds, some will germinate and sprout sooner than others. Humans are the same. This is Mother Nature at Her finest both with seedlings and with us, earthlings. Sorry I couldn’t help it. It is a very personal process. I want to conclude with some wisdom Brian shared at the Faith Matters Restore conference 2023: “If you stay in Stage 3 long enough, one of two things happens. You either get very comfortable in being the only person who sees through everybody else’s hypocrisy, or you say, I’m becoming cynical about my own cynicism and suspicious of my own suspicion and critical of my own critical thinking. I’m making myself sick. Where do I go from here? This is miserable. I don’t like where I am. I can’t go back, but I don’t like where I am. And many people, they spend enough time there and they start wondering, is there something beyond?” If this is you, just know that I SEE YOU. If I were texting this to you, it would be in all CAPS. I want you to know you are not the only one out there who may feel like they are stuck in the space of I can’t unsee what I have unmistakably seen. You can’t deny the existence of something after you have personally seen or experienced it. However,… there is hope. He says, >“you learn to be interdependent rather than dependent or independent or counterdependent. And now >you’re looking for a sage or a prophet or a mystic or somebody who has a set of skills of holding reality and all of its mystery and complexity together. >And you look for a way to be engaged [but to be engaged] thoughtfully rather than just in a superficial way. >And the deep insight at this stage is you start to feel and see in ways you couldn’t see before how everything is connected and that things are knowable and simultaneously unknowable. >And as one friend of mine (Brian’s, not mine) said it, a mega church pastor who went through this deep process, he said, where I am now is all I know is that life is a gift and love is the point.” Well let me echo those words. Life is indeed a gift and love is absolutely the POINT. I have learned it is by far the most important thing we can learn to do, be, experience, give, show, fill in the blank…in this meat suit (My coach Kim Job calls it that, laugh out loud) in this earthly realm. Thank you for joining me for this FOUR STAGES OF FAITH series; this is the final episode of this series. I mentioned in Episode 129 and I’ll say it again now, as you’ve listened and now feel moved to share your faith journey and join this movement to normalize the beauty and uniqueness of faith journeys, please reach out. Shoot me an email hello@meaganskidmorecoaching.com or DM, IG is best. FB tends to hide them esp if we are not already friends! See show notes for sources cited and also a link to a chart summary of the four stages that I retrieved from Brian’s website I believe. Finally, help me make friends with the algorithm! Subscribe so you’re notified first when future episodes publish. And while you’re at it, I wouldn’t hate it if you would take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Alright that’s it. Thanks for joining, until next time!