Emergings: Cosmic Unfolding

“If we follow the path of evolutionary mysticism, we will discover that everything happens as part of a singular process of cosmic unfolding.”

 

 Jeff Carreira, author of The Soul of the New Self

When my former student called to tell me the difference I had made in her life…especially when she mentioned how I threw away typing papers submitted with corrections made over erased errors, I immediately thought of Elfreda Rusher, the Bowling Green State University professor who taught me how to teach typing. I Googled Dr. Rusher and learned that she is believed to be the oldest living former BGSU faculty member. She celebrated her 100th birthday on June 10. Last evening I wrote her a belated happy birthday letter and thanked her for her influence on me that made it possible for my former student to thank me for my influence on her. This gift of grace keeps on giving.

Those of you in the computer age cannot appreciate the challenge set before typing students in the 1960’s. There was no easy way to correct our errors without making a mess. Erasures tore the paper’s fibers and were easily detected. White out correction fluid, or liquid paper as it came to be called, was relatively new. It’s use was also easy to see.

Dr. Rusher insisted that our papers be typed perfectly or they would be thrown out. I must have learned well from her. I’m grateful that lesson made such a difference in my student’s life and career.

Remembering Dr. Rusher’s influence made me think of the current evolutionary spirituality book I am reading by Jeff Carreira. He makes the point that it is not the individual alone who is responsible for a victory. A complex set of circumstances and contingencies contribute to the outcome. This perspective is not a new one for me. In fact, I include this viewpoint throughout my memoir, A Long Awakening to Grace.

This way of looking at reality means that my ability to make a difference in my former student’s life has many factors associated with it:

• When I was in high school, our country was in the midst of a cold war with Russia. When the Russians launched Sputnik, students in the United States were encouraged to major in math and science to beat the Russians in the space race and save our country from communism. Since I had no aptitude for those subjects and our small school’s curriculum was limited, I took secretarial courses.
• I didn’t even consider going to college until the parish worker at our church encouraged me to.
• Women in large numbers were just beginning to seek college educations.
• My parents were willing to send me despite their reservations about the need for a wife and mother to have a college education.
• Dr. Rusher’s insistence on excellence and my own perfectionist tendencies influenced the way I taught my students.

Circumstances prevented me from following in the footsteps of our church’s parish worker as she encouraged me to do. However, her suggestion along with many other factors contributed to my entering seminary in 1975.  I speak to those influences in my memoir.

After I graduated seminary in 1979, I titled the retreat ministry I was developing Emergings. I was keenly aware of how my life had emerged and unfolded in ways I could never have imagined possible. I sensed the “hand” of the Divine working through the people and circumstances in my life to guide me in fulfilling my purpose for being here.

I knew the telephone call I received on Monday was a gift of grace from the Universe arriving at just the right moment to bring me back to myself and to my purpose for writing this blog and my memoir. Her telephone call is bigger than the two of us. The influence I had on her goes back to the beginning of the cosmos as complex circumstances and contingencies brought forth all those who influenced

• Dr. Rusher to seek a college education in the 1930s, something rare for women,
• To focus her 1950s doctoral dissertation on women in management positions, (I must add that I have a far greater appreciation for Dr. Rusher than I did in the 1960s after learning this about her in the above newspaper article.)
• Her influence on me,
• My influence on my former student.
• And my former student’s influence on all those touched by her life.
• And on and on…

We are a part of a long chain of relational connections. As Jeff Carreira languages it, “…everything happens as a part of a singular process of cosmic unfolding.”

The ways of cosmic unfolding are more magnificent than we have the capacity to imagine. But what a joy it is to recognize the gifts of grace when they come our way. Our Universe is alive and continues to generate life in all its fullness. Praise be!

“I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” John 10:10

That Jesus was way ahead of his time!