Week in Review for the Week Ending May 18, 2025

the pearl as a metaphor for transforming suffering into grace

Oyster making a pearl

Matthew 13: 44-46 :: The Parables of the Hidden Treasure and the Pearl

⁴⁴ “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.

⁴⁵ “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls. ⁴⁶ When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it.

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Note: There is no video of me talking because perhaps I don’t need to talk so much, perhaps reading and contemplating and trying to understand and accept, and then writing about all that, is enough. Until I have something meaningful to say, I will continue to resist the urge to fill up the airwaves with my self indulgent noise.

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Reader, I did a thing last week.

I decided I wanted to go to church. I asked my sister what faith congregation she attends and I did some Google researching. I wrote a local pastor and I received a response, inviting me to attend the Sunday service, and I decided to attend. I booked my Über ride in advance and set my alarm for Sunday morning. I picked my tunic and a matching tichel to go with it. I watched the previous week’s sermon to learn where in the Bible this church was for sermon and study, so I could read ahead. And I dusted off my mother’s old Bible and I read the passage and I brought it with me to church.

It felt like going home, reader. When I was there I felt like I was at home.

It’s no secret to anyone who’s followed me for long enough that I have tirelessly sought after g-d for a long long time. I have looked everywhere for the answer of the Divine, thinking that it had to be something shiny and new, something other than what I had and what I knew and what I was and am. Reader, it’s not necessarily so. G-d lives right here, I don’t need to be someone else, I can be who S/He made me to be. To know g-d means to dig further into my own heart and soul, to tap into my soul’s Divine core, נְשָׁמָה aka Neshamah.

I’ll be honest and say that I have not liked the way that Christianity has promoted hatred of Jewish people—I have always found that a massive turn off. The Jews killed g-d rhetoric turns my stomach. Jesus was a Jewish man from Roman-occupied Judea, he wasn’t European, He wasn’t a Christian, He was a Jew. Period. To erase that historical fact erases Jesus Himself. It’s a self indulgent egoistic exercise. To use g-d to masturbate one’s own ego really abuses the Divine. That’s a bee in my bonnet, reader. Always and forever.

For those who don’t know, I left Catholicism in my 20s largely because of the sexual abuse scandal and the failure of the institution of the Holy See to protect the vulnerable and punish the abusers.

Primarily, I couldn’t coexist with a faith-based culture that protects pedophiles.

Secondarily, I found the gatekeeping of g-d a turn off. The you can’t participate in faith with our community, if you are married to a non Catholic, you can have g-d, you are unworthy to belong, blah blah blah rhetoric also turns my stomach, reader. Keeping people who seek g-d from communing with g-d seems mean spirited and not Christ-like.

Finally, the coercive control of hellfire and the devil always turned me off. The Kafka trap of the devil leaves me a bit cold. Though I can’t deny that such an entity does exist and I’m not certain debating the etymology of the origin story really adds any value to the discourse or 5ha5 it gets us closer to g-d. For that matter, the Torah figure of Amalek represents an eternally evil enemy of Bnei Yisrael. Finally, it’s important to note that, in Hebrew, שָׂטָן Satan refers to accuser or adversary, much like a cross examiner in a court of law — someone who’s part of the Universal Design. The Christian Bible states clearly in several locations that believers and lovers of the Lord will face tests of their faith and resolve.¹ Anyway, I don’t want to belabour that thought and I want to avoid spending too much time overthinking evil. A faith life requires us to practise and exercise balance and discernment. Suffice to say, an adversary does exist and works to thwart us in our journey to g-d. We can call that evil and personify it give it a name, that’s fair and perhaps prudent to do so.

Ultimately what we focus on grows.

What would I like to focus my soul and spirit on? That’s what will take root there.

So, here we are, right now in the present. I’ll disclose that the new pope had something to do with rekindling my interest in Christianity as a path to g-d. Even if I didn’t choose to return to Catholicism, Pope Leo XIV gave Christianity a new image, maybe even injected some hope into humanity.

Anyway, moving on.

So, to review the past week, I wanted to do something different and base my reflection on the week gone by upon the pastor’s Sunday sermon. I decided I wanted to write about the pearl—both as a hidden treasure and more importantly as a symbol of transforming an irritation or a hurt into something precious and beautiful and purposeful and for g-d.

We can only find the pearl after we have harvested the oyster and opened it up. Until that point, the pearl remains hidden to us. More profoundly though, there’s the notion of a grain of sand and a parasitic worm working inside the mollusk itself to form the pearl through a slow and methodical physical process. Rather than rejecting the irritant, the oyster secretes a substance called nacre, and it coats the irritant with layer upon layer of this strong smooth resilient iridescent substance from which mother-of-pearl forms. Eventually a pearl forms. Reader, isn’t that the way of life in this physical realm?

I definitely think this mirrors spiritual growth and transformation. I think suffering can bring us grace, if we work through them humbly and in earnest. That’s not to say there’s no pain and discomfort and even anguish. Of course there is all that, that’s the human condition, reader.

Romans 5:3-5 :: Peace and Hope

And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. ³ Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; ⁴ perseverance, character; and character, hope. ⁵ And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.

Reader, we have a choice in this life. If only in how to respond to our situation, including our unpleasant circumstances and uncomfortable feelings. We can respond to our hardship and suffering with perseverance, character, hope. And these traits will grow and flourish within us as we exercise them, like in any resistance training. Alternatively, we can retreat and freeze and abandon ourselves and abandon all hope. The first choice takes us closer to g-d and the second choice takes us away from g-d. We can follow the example of Jesus or we can follow the temptation of the adversary — g-d made us with free will to choose or not choose Him. He gave us this life and earthly realm to live our choice and to prove to Him our love and devotion.

lasciate ognesperanza, voi ch'intrate :: abandon all hope, ye who enter :: a warning that those who enter this realm must forsake any hope of salvation or redemption. It marks the entrance to a place of eternal punishment and suffering :: from Dante Alighieri, The Inferno

Readers may recognise the phrase, abandon all hope, ye who enter, as being the warning inscribed on the gates of Hell (Dante’s Inferno). It serves as a reminder of the point of no return, when consequences of our poor decisions, misdeeds, and bad actions lead to a place of unending misery and despair. Our today comes on the heels of our yesterday, our tomorrow becomes our today, and our today becomes our yesterday. We have a choice. We can vomit venomous anger, we can rage against the world, we can rage bait and spread misery in response to our hardships and anguish. We can sit in the darkness and gripe and complain. We can contract ourselves in selfishness and greed, like Jacob Marley in A Christmas Carol, and then spend an eternity in the afterlife carrying the heavy chains we linked together in life through our misdeeds. Or we can be the light we seek, we can coat that irritant with nacre until will find grace, and spend an eternity in the afterlife reaping the pearls we laboured to fashion through our good deeds.

We can choose. That’s hopeful.

Remember, though, that the hope doesn’t mean we will erase the sorrow or hardship or obstacles entirely. It simply means we will be better poised and positioned to carry what falls to us to carry. The Piaseczner Rebbe suffered tremendous hardship and tribulations in his life, during the Shoah. Nonetheless He drew close to g-d and ministered to his people right up to the end of his life, when the Nazis shot him to death. When I read the writings of Rav Kalonymus Kalman Shapira of Piaseczna, especially his sermons, his amazing humility in the face of the Divine strikes me. Reader, that’s hopeful. The Rebbe chose to reject rescue in order to stay with his people, when other Rabbis abandoned their people and chose to save themselves. Like I said, we each have a choice and only g-d can judge the choices we make with the life He has given us.

It is never my intention to preach, only to share. So take what I share here as you will, or choose not to take it and discard it. That’s your choice, reader. At any rate, here’s the audio clip of yesterday’s sermon, the Pastor is Jeremy Macdonald and the church is called Faith Fellowship, and below the audio clip I’ve provided a transcript of the sermon.

Transcript — I Found It! By Pastor Jeremy Macdonald. May 18, 2025.

92.8KB ∙ PDF file

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Question: So, reader, what’s the take away?

Answer: That we can choose how to respond to the current situation in our society and to the infestation of evil and misery in our cities. We can choose to gripe and rage farm and scapegoat. We can choose to amplify the misery and despair we see and feel. We can choose to count our blessings and make do with them and serve others by sharing our blessings and using our talents for positive values and outcomes. It’s up to each of us. Even when things feel and look overwhelmingly sh1tty, we still have a choice in how we respond to our lives and to and with those around us. May we be wiser, reader.

Below the line you’ll find links to the past week’s missives.

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1. For example:

1 Peter 4: 12 :: Suffering for Being a Christian

¹² Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you.