Joanie loves Chachi?

Did Joanie Cunningham really love Chachi Arcola and if so did they find their thrill on Blueberry Hill? That is the question that has plagued the civilized world since 1980 when Chachi first revealed his true intensions to his love, the beautiful Joanie with a late night dinner preplanned on the advice from his conversation with Lori Beth. Last night once more this question arose as I lay in bed watching the newest VH1 reality show featuring our one time hero and the former Charles in Charge star Scott Baio. The show is titled “Scott Baio is 45 and Single.” It is about his journey to escape his past and to figure out why at the age of 45 he has run away from all his relationships. The show is obviously a result as a feeble attempt to resurrect a career of an actor that has long since drifted into pop-culture history but surprisingly as I watched I could relate in some way as his questions and the patterns of his behavior is not all that different then mine.

Baio has spent the majority of his life fearing true intimacy with women and seems to have a great deal of anger about never being able to escape his past childhood fame, the fame which pays for his lavish lifestyle. I have to take my hat off if I had one for those individuals who are so willing to allow the world around them the opportunity to dissect there lives and the poor choices they have made along the way. However that being said we have to also acknowledge there is a certain level of narcissism going on here but that’s another topic now isn’t it. Perhaps we should talk later on regarding the Paula Abdul show! Any way, as I viewed this show I could not help but start to review my own life and many of the choices I made along my own personal journey. As part of his therapy his “Life Coach” made Baio start to revisit his past and ask the women why they left him and what was it that made them leave. That would not be a question I’d want to ask men of my past but then again most of them wouldn’t say anything I already didn’t know…which is probably why I wouldn’t want to ask it!

He began with the first women he ever loved and then went on to visit “Joanie Cunningham” who was the women he lost his virginity too. “Joanie” talked about his short fuse and his inability to relate well to people around him…more or less she talked about his selfish outlook and his inability to work with people without becoming irritable. The first girlfriend pointed out that he actually went out of his way to try to keep a measure of distance between there relationship so as not to get to close. Baio repeatedly acted out destructively out of fear of opening up and trusting someone with his heart. On six different occasions he had intimate indiscretions with other women before she finally ended their relationship. I couldn’t help but feel as if the cameras at this time had turned on to me. While I never have cheated on a person I allowed myself to care for I have on many occasions prevented myself from getting close to men and usually allowed myself to sexually act impulsively with little or no thought to what I was doing until afterwards. I know this had more to do with fear of getting to close because the moment anyone ever suggested getting closer to me or said the forbidden word of boyfriend I usually ran for the door very quickly.

She went on to say that Baio was always “looking for the next best thing…there is no next best thing there is just the next thing.” Was this something I did? Without much thought I knew the answer already and sadly I know in my heart that true intimacy can never be based on physical attributes but instead on the emotional compatibility shared between the two lovers. There must be a common agreement between each partner that desires not for their own personhood but to become more like a humble servant who realizes their only desire is to encourage their partner to be the best version they already were. Love is all about what we know in our heart to be right and the conscious choice that we make with each other in regards to being a true gift of self-donation…it is that gift of choice that separates us from the rest of creation, it is that gift of choice that helps to realize only mankind has the ability to authentically love another because they are also the only one in creation that has the ability to hate. Life is all a choice my friends!

I laid in bed that night thinking about what she said and I assure you these thoughts are not new to me as I have done a great deal of reflecting with my past but still I couldn’t help but wonder what would my life have been like if I would had realized this sooner. If I had not spent so many years seeking out pleasures that only offer some solace for brief moments and or a couple years. What if I had not compromised my inner desire that I had at one time before I became so self-seeking inside? Would I have been in a real loving relationship with someone who was emotionally supportive towards my needs? Do I even understand what is love…have I ever felt it? We all say we have been in love but what is love really. It’s such an easy word to say but with what actions have I lived out those words. What was it really that keeps people such as Baio and myself in this position that keeps our hearts so captive that we don’t allow ourselves the chance to let someone in finding instead the simple fact we have dated the same person over and over and the only thing that has changed is the names.

Baio had a hard time listening to what she had to say. He was embarrassed at how he had cheated on her with his actions and most importantly with his heart. It was hard to look up and see the pain you caused and often we do what he did…we get up when it’s uncomfortable and leave so we can put it out of our thoughts and later on letting ourselves instead of dealing with it we make cheep excuses for our choices. I should title this “Craig is 38 and Single.”

Tiny Tim in the land of Egypt

Do you sometimes feel like you are Tiny Tim and are confused as to what life is asking of you? We live in a world that pulls us in a thousand directions and often we end up feeling stretched, tired and in the end powerless because few prosper and those that do have no problem flaunting it in our faces leaving us feeling as if we are lazy failures. Life seems for most people a never-ending series of tribulations with few reprieves leaving us little time to tend our hearts or our needs let alone the needs of those around us. We can all understand this and have all felt it to one degree or another in our lives but you know in the solitude of our problems we find what is often called the twofold order of knowledge. The first is natural reason, which is the object and the other is Devine faith; the object is one of truth attainable by reason, Devine faith however is the mysteries hidden in God, mysteries in which we have to believe and which can only be known to us through Devine revelation.

There are not many words in our culture that seem to trip easily off the tongue and many such words leave a fowl sound to the ear. We can picture over weight preachers in $1000 suits telling us to have faith in God and give to there ministries. We envision women in fine furs with faces that are so worked over that after awhile you aren’t sure what’s real anymore because they seem to resemble a gazelle more then a human being proselytizing to us that God blessed them because of their faith and since I don’t have a shinny new BMW or have house in the nicer part of town it can only mean I’m a person with little or no knowledge and understanding of what faith is. There seem to be so many people with many ideas of what faith is and how it is a loop hole for God’s bountiful blessings but I am not sure if many people really do understand what faith means because the word has completely become misused. First what does the word mean? I’m a plethora of useless lingo so I shall tell you. (Pistis, fides) are Hebrew words in the Old Testament that are translated as faith in English and essentially these words mean steadfastness. But in classical Greek pisteuo was used to signify believe so basically it says trusting in God is faith, and faith is belief. But the question becomes now believe in what? Believe in a God that allows man to suffer? Believe in a God that seems week and powerless, often so quiet that we aren’t even sure he cares? It’s an easy word to say but I ask you…what are we to believe in, certainly not someone that doesn’t seem to love me because I’m alone, lost and confused…plus there are starving little children in Africa. God certainly can’t be trusted! Belief is an objective statement because it’s hard to say for a fact it is true because it is to most a revelation of the mystery of the Devine plan of God through creation. What I find amusing is how easy it seems to say we are a people of faith until that moment when God asks something from us. God in his infinite wisdom has given man free choice and allows us to co-participate with him. Christ is the eternal example of this gift in the analogy of the Bridegroom who gives up his entire self for his bride and we through our relationships, both intimate & professional, offer up ourselves as a groom would for his bride in a gift of self-donation. We are called to give what we have, the gifts God has allowed us to have, and share with others. If you have two coats, give one to the poor for example. But what’s interesting is how we are so trained to selectively hear what is easiest for us. We let this opportunity to be a gift of love, a gift to end suffering for another to be muted because we feel our greed is more important then their need telling ourselves we work hard and they are lazy, or it’s not my problem so I don’t need to worry about it…plus they wouldn’t learn to stand on there own two feet. It’s not so much God doesn’t hear our cry its more that we don’t listen to the opportunity of the Spirit. The decent of the Holy Spirit is the abandonment of our selves to the will of God. To take a risk on what he is calling us to do. God calls us to love everyone yet we usually seem to only love people that are easy to love. God is calling us to let our bodies mean something, to be a gift to another but we allow ourselves to be enslaved to our own desires and care little about what we are emotionally doing to those around us or the part we play in the destruction of there lives. God calls us not to hate yet we seem to have no problem holding judgmental thoughts towards others letting our hearts to be filled with death while we sit in the shadows filling the ears of others with gossip, malice and hatred…ideas that are nothing more then words of disdain based on our ignorance and fear, our lack of faith in God.

In the end all faith calls us to do is to take the courage and make the first step in the direction of what you know in your heart God is calling you to do. Psalm 27 reminds us, be strong, let your heart be bold, put your hope in God and Psalm 130 reminds us that we are not alone, that God’s presence is there and all we need to do is wait, to watch for it like the coming of the dawn. But this isn’t easy is it, but then if it were would it be faith? Just because we approach something with the right intensions doesn’t mean people will value it. Just because we have enthusiasm and passion for something doesn’t mean others will share our thoughts. To begin a good thing isn’t enough. We must have the depth of commitment to carry it through to the end. It is here my friends in the obstacles of life that we have to begin our journey with Christ to the cross. We need to keep our eyes focused on the things that are above and not allow the limitations and blindness of those around you to cover your eyes from the truth and belief that God is God and the Devine creator does notice you and does desire what is best for you and that might mean that we have to be willing to remember what we feel is best for us might not be what would make us a clearer image of God.

It is good to remember that not many around you will join you or help you but still you move on. There will always be setbacks but you have to remember the oppressor never voluntarily gives freedom to the oppressed. If you want anything in life you have to be persistent. The oppressor means to dominate you and will never willingly give you up. Those around you will not necessarily want to listen to you because often those who are wrapped up in their own lusts and desires will have deaf ears and offer nothing but resistance. The lessons of Moses and the great exodus out of Egypt teach us that when you leave repression you will always find tension. When we get to the Promise Land we will find giants, those illusive adversaries that wait in the shadows to strike at us to take us down…to sidetrack us from what is being asked of us filling our heads with lies and deceptions…many distractions, but it is here in this overwhelming place that we find the gift of faith, the belief that God, the one who created you and me and laid out with perfection the creation of the universe balancing everything perfectly in total harmony is standing next to you and I loving us as a Bridegroom for his Bride willingly offering himself to us and all he is asking us is to trust him, to believe…to have faith. We must remain steadfast so God can be God and we learn our place in the grand scheme of creation. That we are made to be the image of God…God is NOT an image of us! Freedom my friend comes from humility. Do you find it interesting that society around us tells us we won’t be happy unless we live a certain way, dress a certain way, drive a certain car or live in a certain location. We live moment-by-moment for own lusts and ponder why we stand here craving more and always feeling like this wasn’t enough. We wonder why we look to porn or cheap sex and are left hungering later for something more, something real but always going back to what is familiar…can you not see the bondage you have allowed others to place you in. Can you not see how the few around us have exploited you and made you a slave to your flesh and in the end not trusting in God…instead we place our faith foolishly in ourselves, hording our money and possessions, living our lives to fill our lusty desires and this always leaves us wanting more? 1 Corinthians 13:13 says, “So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” These are three interrelated features of Christian life, more fundamental than any particular chrism. Love can only exist if we have faith and hope…without either of these you will never have or understand love. Love is trust, it is belief in the other person…it isn’t a prenuptial agreement and it isn’t based on self-seeking attitudes. Love is trust and belief and that is why it’s so scary. If you trust and believe in the other so much that you are willing to give yourself to them fully and completely you become vulnerable but it is here that you become a gift of self…and this revelation when you look through the eyes of faith is the blue print of all our relations with creation, not just limited to those we love. That is love…and this is what faith means.

To live with faith means we need to realize even if we have escaped Egypt and crossed over the Red Sea there will be moments where we will enter a wilderness and still we go on. What are you willing to lay our life down for? What are you willing to humiliate yourself for? Life is filled with people with passion, and people who will not let the oppressor hold us down, but these gifts of individuals instead find their voice in the humility of there actions by laying down there lives in faith so God can use them as his mouth peace. Faith must work with compassion and nonviolence. Violence will only create more violence and to find freedom means we have to be willing to be objects of love, we have to be willing to offer ourselves up as groom to the bride and that means we place ourselves in a position where we will be rejected. Even if a groom offers himself to the bride that does not mean she accepts but he does not force himself on her, just as God does not force himself on us.