A Second Simplicity With Carmen Acevedo Butcher

Everything Belongs: Living the Teachings of Richard Rohr Forward

Center for Action and Contemplation

Religion & Spirituality, Christianity

4.8 • 723 Ratings

🗓️ 1 May 2024

⏱️ 94 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

How can we transform our understanding of life and self to cultivate a deeper sense of acceptance, letting go, and a "Second Simplicity" in the face of life's inevitable challenges? In this episode, we're joined by Carmen Acevedo Butcher as we continue our chapter-by-chapter exploration of Falling Upward with Chapter 9: "A Second Simplicity." In this conversation, Carmen offers thoughts on her shifting practice of contemplative stillness—depending on her stage of life. It’s something she calls “resting in wordless, imageless, Love.” Before we dive in to the interview with Carmen, CAC staff catch up with Richard at his hermitage to hear his reflections on the ninth chapter a decade after he originally wrote it. Carmen Acevedo Butcher, PhD, is an author, teacher, poet, and award-winning translator of spiritual texts. Her dynamic work around the evolution of language and the necessity of just and inclusive language has garnered interest from various media, including the BBC and NPR's Morning Edition. A Carnegie Foundation Professor of the Year and Fulbright Senior Lecturer, Acevedo Butcher teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, in the College Writing Programs. Resources: A PDF of the transcript for this episode is available here. Grab a copy of the newly revised version of Falling Upward, with a new foreword by Brené Brown here. To learn more about Carmen's work, visit her website here. Connect with us: Have a question or thought about this season that you'd like to share with us? Email us: podcasts@cac.org Send us a voicemail here: http://www.cac.org/voicemail

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	You're listening to a podcast by the Center for Action and Contemplation.
0:04.0	To learn more, visit cac.org.
0:07.6	Simplicity gets a bad rap in a complex world.
0:11.9	Simplicity can be viewed as a dumbing down, or even as a dismissal,
0:16.1	of the necessary intricacies of an interconnected life in a thorny reality. This can be true, but there is a
0:24.6	deeper truth, a radiant simplicity that warmly embraces complexity with a contemplative gaze.
0:32.5	Father Richard calls this a second simplicity. It is the freedom of a beginner's mind that patiently engages
0:40.4	paradox with a childlike wonder and intellectual inquiry while resting in the mercy of the
0:46.6	mystery of God. In today's conversation, we meet back in Richard Termitage with Richard
0:53.3	and his faithful dog, Opie, and dive into a conversation on Chapter 9, a second simplicity.
1:00.3	In our time together, we talk about the entangled journey with complexity and simplicity, meaning-making,
1:07.5	and the endlessly evocative ripples of the simplicity of the Gospels.
1:19.5	From the Center for Action and Contemplation, I'm Mike Petro.
1:23.2	I'm Paul Swanson.
1:24.4	And this is Everything Belongs.
1:32.7	Thank you. I'm Paul Swanson, and this is Everything Belongs. Richard, I'm so excited that we get to talk to you about Chapter 9, which is the second simplicity.
1:40.4	So I love this passage. You write, it's on page 106 for most people. You say as time passed,
1:47.4	I became simultaneously very traditional and very progressive. And I've probably continued to be so
1:54.9	to this day. I found a much larger and even happier garden. And you're referring back to the garden in Revelation 21.
2:03.5	I totally believe in Adam and Eve now, but on about 10 more levels. And you say literalism is
2:08.8	usually the lowest level of meaning. Well, I'm glad I said that with that book. I didn't know.
2:13.7	Oh, yeah. I already believe that way. Good. Good. Listen to this part. It's great. I've lived much of my
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Center for Action and Contemplation, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Center for Action and Contemplation and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.