Last night I attended an awards ceremony organized by InterFaith Works. InterFaith is a great group that serves a lot of needy populations around Syracuse, from the poor and hungry to recent immigrants. They help organize food pantries, run classes for citizenship, and engage various groups in dialogue where communication has proved difficult. I’m the representative from my diocese on the roundtable of faith leaders, which means that I get to work with some pretty cool people from Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, and other faiths. And, of course, a nice smattering of Christians.

I really like InterFaith. I’m proud (and humbled at the same time) to be on the roundtable. Both InterFaith as a whole and the roundtable in particular make me want to do more for my community. Just being around the people who work there or are associated with the organization gives me an energy to serve others. But lately, InterFaith has helped me out of a bit of a slump.

The world had gotten me down, and it still gets me down. I try to stay away from the news, but I feel that, as a priest, it’s somewhat my responsibility to pay at least some attention to what’s going on because my parishioners are aware of what’s going on. The news can drag people down, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. I can help a bit with the emotional and mental troubles that people have, but it’s the spiritual depression that I see happening more and more to people. Our culture, however, doesn’t really talk about spiritual depression, and so part of my job is to help people first identify, then pray about, their own spiritual difficulties.

I’m not immune from spiritual troubles, however, and often I feel the spiritual lethargy of merely paying attention. Spiritual depression is often thought to lead to doubt, and it certain can, but there are other problems that come with spiritual turmoil. There’s lethargy in prayer, there’s an exhaustion or even callousness towards other people’s problems, there’s a feeling of a need to just run away from it all and care only for our creature comforts. When I am spiritually down, I find it hard even to pray intercessions – not that I don’t think that God will do anything, just that I don’t have the spiritual strength to turn towards God (or so I feel). I also turn to gluttony and eat a lot of those Little Debbie swiss rolls. Or I sneak some ice cream sandwiches that are intended for the kids. Or I just look at the world and have a general “meh” attitude.

There are a number of ways out of spiritual depression. One of them is simply to keep on showing up for prayer each day, whether we feel like it or not. This morning I spent twenty minutes in “silent” prayer, but all I really did was think about what I need to do today and grumble to God about how frustrated I am with my own prayer. Not great prayer time, but I showed up. And luckily, the quality of prayer is not completely reliant on us humans; the Holy Spirit is the one praying inside of us, not the other way around.

Another way to help spiritual depression is to stop eating Little Debbie swiss rolls. Yeah. There’s that, too…

Going to the InterFaith award dinner also rose my spirits, but not in the way I had thought. I’m not generally a fan of three hour gala events. I get antsy and distracted, and I start wondering about things like how we’re supposed to pronounce the name “Syracuse” correctly (there are actually two pronunciations, which is fascinating). But I love InterFaith. I love the people who work there and who lead it. And I really respect those who won awards last night. And it was that love that stayed with me, more than my inability to sit in a chair for a few hours. That love sustained me last night, and it sustained me this morning as I flailed around in my prayers trying to find my spiritual footing.

You see, the whole point of a spiritual life isn’t to walk around in complete serenity. Some days we might think it would be nice to be unmoved by the chances and changes in this world, but not only is that generally impossible, I don’t think it’s even desirable. We live inside bodies, and sometimes those bodies will have eaten something that doesn’t agree with us, or (like me) we may simply be too tall for the chair we’re sitting in. We may have something on our minds, be it good or bad, and while we can train our minds and our hearts to be calmer, sometimes things really get to us. As Christians, we’re not asked to just ignore that stuff; we’re asked to bring it to God. When someone cuts us off on the highway, we shouldn’t start with “I wish that didn’t make me mad” but “God, that made me mad.” Then the Holy Spirit will help us work things out and make us people who get less frustrated with bad drivers. But it all starts with turning to God.

I often hear people talking as if God will just kinda “work,” like a fire alarm that goes off as soon as it senses smoke, or a microwave that pops popcorn just by pushing the appropriate button. And yes, God certainly does act in the world without our calling upon him to act, but we are to take part in the cleansing and healing of our own soul. I think of it like asking my kids to clean their room. I just as well can do it for them, and I’ll probably help them out, but if they are the ones deciding on where things are and how they want their room to be, then it will be a much more satisfying space.

Some Christians may wonder if this means that we can achieve our own salvation, but we’re not talking about salvation here. We’re talking about the health of your soul. Some might call this “sanctification,” but I think that makes it all seem too official and even judicial. This is a spiritual heal choice; just like you go to the gym for your physical health or nurture a close network of friends for your emotional health, “cleaning your spirit’s room” is something we do for our spiritual health.

The InterFaith Works award dinner cleaned my spirit. It reminded me of the good work that people are doing and that I’m actually actively involved in. When I came home late last night, I saw my daughter’s face looking out the window, waiting for me to come home. I told her, with a laugh, that it was past her bedtime, but seeing her really warmed my spirit. Paying attention to things like this, and noting when our spiritual health is in decline, are important parts of living a good life.