My plans to plant flower bulbs were rained on today. My hope is in tomorrow. However, having an inside kind of day I was able to get some more seeds planted inside and some seedlings transplanted into larger containers. Tomorrow maybe I can plant the flower bulbs, maybe.

It was a good day to catch up on some computer email stuff. A friend rewrote my parable on Monday’s posting. You can now find the new and improved version on the new Parable web page. My friend made it more dramatic and threw in a few old sayings to give it a more authentic look. It is still a draft and the name of parable is subject to change.

Parables are an old way of teaching a moral point with a word picture without preaching. Jesus, Gandhi and very ancient thinkers like Chuang Tzu of Taoist strain in Chinese thought used parables. I am not a wise teacher but have used them in the past. People can read what they want into a parable and often what they think they see makes them mad.

I remember once writing a modern parable using the “Good Samaritan” story in the bible as my model. Some friends read into the parable the priest passing by the injured persons as a priest whom we all knew. He was not the priest I was thinking of when I wrote the parable, but nevertheless they were angry at me.

Parables are also good ways of making paradoxes seem normal. The word picture story of a parable can make things seem upside down. That is okay since life is sometimes a paradox and the best way to describe contradictions is a parable.

This morning I read a quote by Thomas Merton that describes living life in the parable of paradoxes. He said in one of his poems: “Wake Up and dance in the clarity of perfect contradiction.” So if our parable makes sense to you that is good. If it seems like a contradiction that is also good.

Many parables in the Gospel are about growing, planting seeds and harvesting. Maybe we all need more parables in living a sustainable life of nonviolence.

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