I was wondering about divinity this week, as can happen when eating homemade pizza in a quiet room (thanks, Mom!). It took two slices, but somewhere along the line divinity presented itself as completely other than our usual ideas about it.
We tend to think of divinity as better than wherever or whoever we are at the moment. We’ll get there—or at least get closer—when we stop falling short of perfection, when we’re more peaceful, more loving, more whole.
But this cannot be true because then we will never be good enough, and God sees us with the eyes of love, which do not see the beloved as flawed but as an absolute wonder. Not to mention that repeated proclamation that all creation is good.
I buy eggs from someone in a different office at work. Her coworkers have gotten used to me coming in and walking out with several dozen eggs. I don’t know their names, but we recognize each other and exchange greetings and smiles.
As I left this week, I felt a strong surge of gratitude for these friendly greetings. Divinity is no farther away nor more complicated than these exchanges, no farther away nor more complicated than pizza, than joy, than heartbreak.
We don’t attain divinity; we live in and into it. We come to recognize its presence within and around us at every moment.
When God calls to Moses from the burning bush, Moses answers exactly as Abraham did, “Here I am.” What an astonishing thing to say to a voice coming from a bush that happens to be on fire in the middle of nowhere.
We come to know the divinity that is always present to us not by becoming perfect but by becoming present to what already is, by saying “Here I am” no matter the circumstances.
Here I am, waiting to be found. Here I am, willing to love and be loved. Here I am, already part of the Divinity in which we live and move and have our being.
Being Finite 
Lol got pizza! Goosebumps for Moses and Abraham and Rachel’s “Here I am.”
I meant “for” pizza.
Gloria’s Pizzeria in Flushing on Main St. has the best pizza in NYC, and therefore in the known universe. Just had to get that out.
I’m thinking of a theme that came up in our last LS Video gathering: how to acknowledge both the very real beauty and the very real suffering of the human condition in this world. Somehow these both need to be held in awareness simultaneously, without an excess of either cynicism or naivete. This seems analogous to the manner in which we come to understand and know ourselves more deeply and authentically. That process involves seeing blindspots (difficult), acknowledging problematic aspects of our personalities, as well as appreciating the good stuff. All facilitated by a safety net of grace. The cultivation of these perspective, upon the world and into our selves, seem so central to spiritual practice.
“saying “Here I am” no matter the circumstances”, is perhaps the best approach to doing this.