Welcome to Target Practice!

What (or who) is your aim today? That's if, in fact, you're aiming at all.

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WELCOME TO TARGET PRACTICE!

An Ugly Word

When I was a girl the word “sin” was, frankly, kind of a sin in our home. My grandmother rolled her eyes and sort of “fiddle-dee-dee’d” it away. That was just another Catholic piece of junk to keep us all in line. Sin was a bore, outdated, overrated. Ancient nonsense.

Sin: Ewwww.

I mean, it’s soooo archaic. Puh-leeeez! Can’t we do aaanything anymore?

On the Los Angeles leg of my spiritual journey, I often attended a self-monikered “trans-denominational” church. This was before the word “trans” became what it is today. I muse about that day this pastor named his church; this preacher perhaps called a meeting to share all the ideas he had for names to reflect how he would include anyone and everyone. And then I think isn’t that what catholic means? But in that meeting the word “trans” was claimed for his church name. And I took it at face value. Now I screw up my face thinking, what does that really mean? Changing denominations…all the time? As in “trans”-itioning? (Excuse me while I shake my brain out.)

Actually “trans” according to (one of) the definitions in Webster’s dictionary, is a prefix for “on the other side of… or across”. Which I’m hoping is what he was thinking. That makes a little more sense. But I wonder now if this preacher feels a little thwarted (or assisted - depending on his outlook) by the new love for everything “trans”.

The point I bring up is that, aside from the rather long informational moniker of said church, this was the very place that took “sin” (that horrid word!) from the above mentioned “snore’ to no more than “missing the mark”.

“Heeeey!” the preacher preached, “It ain’t no thing, Baby!” As if to say, “You just made a widdle mistake. You misaimed; you missed the target. Try again! You’ll hit it eventually.” Topped with the inferred habanero: You didn’t do anything wrong.

All this trash, ahem, gobbledygook, aheemm, verbiage - as if all of our life choices are relegated to motivational goal setting, which, if in doubt, spending thirty seconds on any social media platform will affirm.

As it is with all stealthy half-truths, it was with this trans-denominational half-truth church. They weren’t actually wrong about the “missing of the mark” example.

Now class – eyes to the board for a short lesson: The word “sin,” (oh, that WORD that WORD …awwwwful! Stop! It’s the 21^st Century. Use something, anything else, you cavewoman!), comes from the Greek word Hamartia which means to miss, to fail, to go wrong, to miss the goal. So yes, when you put it that way “sin” isn’t so bad after all! We’re all going to miss, fail, go wrong, or miss a goal at some point, right? We’re only human after all. Go easy on yourself, Chuck.

Hmmm. (Picture me squinting my eyes at you.)

Albeit, processing it that way, I’d made a small leap forward in understanding. I wasn’t afraid to use the word “sin” anymore (tiny “ew”) because, well, now I was sure I understood it the way it was intended. I’d just missed my goal. It’s just a word and now I have cracked the code!

Sin! I could say the word! SIN! It had no power over me! Hamartia! Let freedom ring!

Until the bell cracked.

Upon further thought…so…does that mean that if I planned to reach 100 followers on Substack within six months and “miss that goal”…I’ve sinned? That’s “missing a goal”…. (If that’s the case, I have a problem.) It doesn’t really translate in our time when “sin” is likened to an amateur hit of the ping pong paddle.

Then upon deeper contemplation of this little word, the echo of “It ain’t no thing, Baby” wildly and quite suddenly became quite “a thing,” Baby.

SOMETHING TO CONTEMPLATE

Imagine you’re at a Target Practice. For this purpose let’s keep it in line with a pre-gun era. Let’s use bows and arrows.

You’re forty-five feet from the Target Stand. It’s large and perfectly round and you can clearly see the yellow bullseye at the center of the outer concentric red and blue circles that make the whole. Get that firmly in your mind. Now, you take up your large bow and arrow and squint one eye as you fixate your other for clearer vision on that center ring (…assuming you’re aiming at all).

But wait. Let’s name your aim. What is your bullseye? Marriage? The rearing of children? Fame? Fortune? Are you aiming for a plentiful savings? Are you aiming for heaven…hell?

Are you even aware of your choice? Because if you aren’t making a choice for yourself, someone or something else will.

Are your eyes, or at least one of them, even open?

Okay. Assuming your eyes are open, and you know your target…. Now. Pull back the bowstring. Aim. Let loose your arrow and THUMP!

Perhaps you hit the outer blue or red ring but not the center yellow. Perhaps you are so far out and off the path of the Target Stand that no one can find the arrow.

Perhaps you wildly missed the mark.

So what’s the issue here? Sin? Meh. Come on, ye Ancients! What’s so egregious?

We do not live in a void. And the real-life target is never alone in a wide-open field for safety’s sake. So let’s do this again. But now, we are going to set up the Target Stand a little differently.

Got that aim in mind? You do know what you’re aiming for, yes? Good start.

YOUR FAVORITE PERSON

Now think of the person you love more than life itself. Who is that?

Put that person right in front of the Target Stand just left or right of the bullseye. He’s smiling at you. She just blew you a kiss and made a heart shape with her hands. They love you so. They trust you. They depend on you.

You smile and blow a kiss back – just as you pull back your arrow and aim directly at the center, the bullseye.

Before you let go - tell me that missing the mark “ain’t no thing, baby”.

Take a look at your arrow. Look closely now. There’s a word, a phrase, or a desire engraved upon it. What does it say? Only you know. Now line that arrow up with the target whilst your loved one roams around it, back and forth, in, out and around your aim. What will happen when that particularly assigned arrow, intention, goal, or desire hits the bullseye? How will your virtuous hit of the bullseye bless them?

What if you miss? What, or whom, otherwise did you hit? How did they suffer? What is their loss? How did your miss of the mark change their course forever?

This isn’t about perfection. It’s about choices, actions.

Put another of your loves to the other side of the Target. Now put someone else you care about behind the Stand; their head and shoulders just over the top. Let your bestie recline on her side on the ground just in front. (She just gave a little wave and a wink. How she trusts you.)

Now, the gravity of your good aim sets in.

Sin, (Oh! That …awful word?), becomes heavy with the weight of consequence and begins to vibrate with its intended meaning. What did the Ancients understand that we do not?

Call your bestie from the target over to you. (I bet she’s thankful for that.) Give her the bow and arrow.

Now you go take her place in front of the Target and watch her lift the arrow and aim in your general (general?) vicinity.

How do you feel about “missing the mark” now?

YOUR TURN NOW

What then, happens when someone is hit by your sin?  Your “missing the mark”? Your failed “goal” to love them? If indeed there was a goal of love at all.

They bleed. When they bleed do you look at them and simply state “Oh well, I was just doing ‘me’, Boo, and you do you… yikes, that blouse is gonna stain. See ya!” Hopefully not. Because, of course, that’s you on the receiving end, too, and you’ll never get the blood out of that ivory silk.

Unfortunately, that is the very nonsense that’s being touted in the “there’s no sin” era of today. And to our great fortune, the church guides us through the directives of God, amends, forgiveness, and atonement. Because you are going to miss the mark. Even in the moments when you were sure your aim was perfect. After all, people are in constant shift and movement as they take their own aim, and temptation, one of sin’s own besties (or should I say “beasties”) loves the moment just before you let loose your arrow into flight.

Everyone is aiming all the time (hopefully they’re aiming!) in a variety of directions; most not even knowing that there’s archery involved. People are outright flinging knives and hatchets at targets with holy innocents standing before them. People who don’t believe in sin.

What I do can affect your joy or pain and vice versa. First, I think about my choices, that could become my sins, the choices that target the people I love the most. But then what about the sins of omission¹ that affect the people with whom I may never cross paths; who may be the very people that you love the most; who may suffer more than my simple humanness could ever bear (if I knew), thereby causing your suffering as well…

…and the Breaking Wheel² continues to turn.

I don’t roll my eyes when I hear that awwwwful hideous word anymore. That hoooorrible word, “sin”.

No. I do my best, my imperfect attempt, to think of who surrounds the goal as I aim for love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, thankfulness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Wouldn’t you like someone to have some self-control when you’re in the path of their arrow?) I think of how I fail daily (hourly) but have been given the grace and the tools to atone and to pick up the bow again.

I LEAVE YOU WITH QUESTIONS

What or where is your aim today? What is engraved on your arrow? (And should you even be dallying with it?) Where is your mark? Can you even see the bullseye? If you can’t, could it be because you inwardly sense that it’s too crowded and you would have to sacrifice too many for your selfish gain? Ouch. I know because I’ve been there. Do you need a completely new Target Stand, outlook, paradigm with which to make these decisions?

Do you need a new guiding principle? Do you need the Church? Fellowship? A new understanding of what “catholic” - universal - really means?

How do you feel about that awful word “sin” now? Does it feel the same… do you need to see what has long been written on your arrow with new eyes?

Brothers and Sisters, where is your aim?

How is your release?

Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.

Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy.

1. Sins of commission are sins that you are conscious of, you know it’s wrong and you do it anyway. Sins of omission are sins that are the result of you failing to do something you know is right. For example, helping your neighbor, being silent under oath when you are in possession of the truth.

2. An ancient instrument of torture, also called the Catherine Wheel - used to execute St. Catherine of Alexandria - but it broke when she touched or when an angel touched it, depending on differing stories. Afterwards she prayed and layed her head down on the chopping block and was executed.