God Is Good

If you believe in Love, you believe in God.

Asking God for mercy and forgiveness is like asking the sun for light and heat, since these belong to the incorruptible nature of divinity itself; they are self-evident attributes of it; they proclaim and describe it; they speak on it's behalf, and even prove it's existence by their own.

Religious feeling is only a higher octave of natural feeling. Collectively or singlehandedly, the mere ideas of goodness, kindness, mercy, charity, compassion, forgiveness, and love are enough to make a true believer out of one who is highly sensible of them, -- provided only that one has not been too heavily contaminated by malformed notions of God, which may either inhibit or prohibit the transmission of an original revelation; regardless of how pure and simple that revelation may be.

In the abstract, the virtues are full of potential, they are perfect. Yet, when considered under the mantle of a divine-human being who personifies (because he exemplifies) them, how much more likely are they to lift up mortal minds, which almost require some manner of form upon which to perch; like fledgling angels incapable of prolonged flight? It may be that, as we progress in spiritual understanding, the forms we attach our minds to will become, not only nobler, but finer in another sense; more delicately articulated; more richly detailed; and, yet, somehow more vague; nuanced, like a thousand whispered suggestions conveying one ineffable, thundering insight. We must regard those sublime forms which most compel us, in order that we might ultimately be compelled to regard the sublimity in all forms, and, finally, in formlessness.

If something is intensely beautiful, it beautifies all that surrounds it. Nothing is so prosaic that it may not appear in a stranger, more poetical light, when placed beside an article of overwhelming sublimity. The insects are ennobled by the flowers. The rags which cover a beautiful peasant girl partake somehow of her charms, and we may even come to imagine that they suit her, in an odd way which no finery ever could. Might it not be that evil, too, somehow does justice to the benevolence of God? We may try to imagine Christ seated upon an immaculate throne, attended by the most gorgeous angels, yet, it seems that he is never so much "at home" as when he is on earth, condescending before some dangerous or leprous wretch. Not by coincidence do carpenters make both crosses and frames. Good is the portrait, and evil what frames it.

In reality, God is always present, always condescending to appear beneath the peculiar-yet-fitting mantle of some new form. Mostly, we don't see Him. Our prayers float up, but the Lord has already come down, and granted us an intimate audience with Himself. Our part, then, is not to speak, but to place ourselves in this divine presence; at the foot of the beloved one. 

We must be humble and we must listen. (Now, these two really are one, for we must be humble enough to listen, and listening itself is what humbles us, so, the more humble we become, the more deeply we listen, and the more deeply we listen, the more humble we become.)

Lovers are silent in the presence of what they love.

What can we demand which our beloved has not already granted us; the very qualities she exudes, -- being herself no more nor less than the essence of their substance, -- which alone have endeared her to us? Though beggars in the eyes of the world, we should enjoy the most immeasurable riches before our beloved.

To pray is to count one's blessings, not to ask for them.

Such solicitude is mere ingratitude. Not love, but avarice. Tell me, what further blessing can we ask of God which God, in His foreknowing wisdom, has not already chosen, once and for all, to decree?

Grace is co-eternal with God, beyond compromise,
for grace is only from God, and God is always gracious.

How can you ask the Lord for ought?
It only proves you know Him not.

Merely receive Him, and you shall have it,
for no grace is greater than His presence,
and He would give you no less than Himself.

God has made blessedness an attribute of His nature, as light is of the sun.

Though clouds of ignorance may cast shadows of guilt over the souls of men,
the sun does not go black, nor does the Lord condemn.

God In Love

Love, once struck upon my thought,
has never wondered with the ape,
nor tended with the breaking smoke
to drift, as to escape.

More than a corpse, she may keep still,
more than a breath, she may make sound,
she may conceal or show her midst,
yet never lost was love I found.

And though I oft' embrace another,
loving daughters just as well as sons,
I keep them each this close beside me;
I hold a million hands at once.

Hence, think not lightly of my love,
nor of your throne upon my breast,
for here are castles, courts, and kingdoms,
worlds and galaxies, no less.

Whatsmore, my golden suckling,
we need not curse, nor cause a fuss,
when both our souls might thus be loved;
as bold, as broad, as blessed!

On The Passion of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ

Question:

"I realize I am betraying my ignorance by asking this question, but I should like to ask: in what way did our Lord bear our sicknesses and afflictions? I ask this, for I don't remember our Lord ever being sick in the Gospels. Certainly He bore the punishment for our sins in His Passion, is this what His Excellency is referring to? Please forgive my ignorance in this matter."

Answer:

I cannot speak for another, but can share my own interpretation. Christ referred to himself as a physician, and to sin as sickness: "I came not to bring the righteous but the sinners to repentance; for the well need not a physician, but them that are sick,". So, in bearing our sin, he has born our sickness; for sins are nothing if not ailments of the soul. However, in bearing our sickness, he did not himself become sinful, or sick in soul. Not everyone who inhales a germ is contaminated by it. For there are some possessed of constitutions sufficiently bold in resisting infection; who can laugh, as it were, in the face of disease, and, while preserving themselves in perfect health, may spend hours upon a sickbed, giving comfort to the afflicted. Such was our Lord's power, who remained unpolluted in his soul, while taking upon himself all manner of wickedness and misery.

Of course, it must be stressed that the above instruction is solely to be understood according to the spirit, and not the letter; that is, by analogy, and not by mere appearance. We are speaking strictly of the soul of Christ, which is immune to the vicissitudes of our phenomenal world, with all of its attendant corruptions. Yet, for our sakes, the pure and incorruptible soul of God's true Son did clothe itself in a body of tender flesh; and it was this flesh which bore the wounds and stripes of the willful crowd, unmindful and unanswerable to the Holy Spirit of the Father, who, from unimaginable compassion, permitted their free misdeeds. Yes, the body split, and bled, and festered, as any mortal body would. And Jesus, who dared not spare himself the gravest sufferings of humankind, writhed and wrung with agonizing purpose, even crying out as one whose faith is lost, who believes himself abandoned; for among his last words we hear, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me." Still, it was the body, not the soul, that cried out thus. For Christ, as spirit and Son of God, spoke always to the Lord as "Father". It is the special intimacy of this relation which distinguishes the Christian soul in relation to God the Father. Therefore, Christ could not address the Lord as spirit unless he spoke in the attitude of a Son to his Father. Only the briefest, reflexive spasm of the body could induce the breath to speak in unfamiliar terms of that One whom the soul has known -- and, having known, must always know -- so intimately, as Father. As if to leave no doubt concerning the orthodoxy of this interpretation, we hear Lord Jesus deliver his final words but a fraction of a moment later: "Father," he calls Him, effectively acknowledging that mysterious bond (which identifies and unites, far more than it distinguishes and divides), -- that bond which exists between the soul of Christ and the spirit of the Father Most High, "into Thy hands I commend my spirit." And, as if these words were not proof enough for even the most heedless listeners, he declared the last three words which, like a golden seal, would certify his victory over the world: "It is accomplished."

So, why did Christ incarnate; why was he born, to live and teach and die and resurrect before a dim and disbelieving crowd?

He came for us, because of our great need of his love and witness. He suffered for our sins just as we all suffer for the sins of others, because one cannot live in this world without suffering from the sins which fill the world. But, being entirely free from sin himself, his suffering was entirely voluntary, and he alone suffered the full price for sin; since his perfect goodness provoked so much friction between itself and the imperfect world. Had there been less sin in the world, he would have suffered less, but he suffered in direct proportion to the accumulated sins of the world; no more, no less. A dry cloth, if it is capable, absorbs the amount of liquid it is placed in; likewise, a virtuous man, who is capable (as only Jesus is), will draw upon himself the amount of sin that is present in the world. Merely by choosing to enter the world, he is choosing to gather up the sins of the world. Likewise, it is as if a great and powerful magnet were to be let down into a pit of nails. However many the nails may be, the magnet is able to collect them and carry them away. This is one way to understand the sacrifice of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Now, it may be objected that, while Christ took upon himself the guilt and the debt for sin, he did not literally remove all sin from the world; for we have only to look around to see the world so full of sin. The answer is that Christ, who dwells in eternity beyond the world, has acted once and for all, erradicating sin at its source, but the world, which dwells in time, has yet to perceive the significance and finality of his intercession. Each individual soul, "in fear and trembling" must come to terms with the reality of Christ's life and death. It is our freewill which determines the time of our encounter with eternal grace. When a dam is erected at the spring of a river, high on the mountain's peak, the water naturally ceases to flow from that point. Nonetheless, there is a remnant emanation of water which has yet to wind its way downward to the sea, and, to those situated at vaious heights upon the mountainside, the river will appear unbroken; lest, with the eyes of faith, we behold the source, and not the appearance. Christ has shown the way to sanctity, once and for all time. His accomplishment cannot be repeated, only emulated. What is added to it, or what appears to be added to it, are only those saintly performances which his revelation has inspired, and will continue to ignite until the world is judged by love and full of light.

Frags

Silence is not practiced at the expense of speech. On the contrary, we will value our words to the extent that we value our silences; the fewer our words, the weightier they must be.

There is one path. It is that which you are on. It is the only path -- from which there is no deviation. Now it leads upward into wider light. Now down into a narrow dark. Like a river, it traverses hill and vale, field and wood, disdaining nowhere, welcome in all places and times. Without concern, it nourishes all things.

Our home will not shelter us unless the world becomes our home, our kin will not comfort us unless all creatures become our kin, and our god will not bless us unless all being becomes our god; for our home takes shelter in the world, our kin take comfort in all creatures, and our god is blessed by all that is.

A baby bird breaks through the egg and disregards it, not because it served no purpose, but because it's purpose has been served. So it is with the soul's relation to the material world. Like an egg, or a womb, it is that which shelters and nurtures the soul, until the soul has become sufficiently developed to break through.

 The spiritual world is not altogether hidden behind the material. Truly, the Kingdom of Heaven shines through nature, as a light beneath the door. Thus, in preaching the doctrine of world-transcendence, we do no disservice to the creation as instituted by the Lord, Our God. One does not deny, nor disregard, a doorway by passing through it, -- but, rather, makes proper use thereof; for Heaven cannot be entered, lest the door be apprehended, and the threshold traversed.

Freedom is that commodity which labor cannot secure.

You are here to decide for yourself why you are here;
not to discover a meaning, but to declare one.

I have a mind like a sieve;
it retains only stones, shells, and bones,
and occasional nuggets of gold insight.

Fools give credence to authority and whatever is commonly held.
To their way of seeing, that an idea is original only proves that it is false.

We are in no position to judge a vice which we have not discovered in ourselves. Nor have we any right to judge a vice which we have discovered in ourselves. The former would expose our ignorance -- the latter our hypocrisy.

 It takes courage to be sincere; to be serious, vulnerable, insightful, and to allow others to be serious, vulnerable, insightful; without immediately cracking some careless, stupid joke. Not everything is ironic. Not every reflective moment needs to be shattered with instant levity. Where did we ever acquire this notion that being cool means caring for nothing? Enough with that! It is not cool to be flippant. It is cool to care, to question, to teach, to share what you really think and feel. All of my heart to the sincere, serious people. The ones who make you think. And, yes, I love the ones who make me laugh, but it would be nice if they knew when to stop; when not to make a joke out of everything; when to allow something to stand, a little awkward on the page, if need be, declaring something of substance. Jokes are easy. Apathy is effortless. Cowardice.

How could any momentary pleasure, however exalted, not leave a residue of disenchantment behind; when man is that being who harbors a longing (insatiable by definition) for the Absolute? Even mystical wine has dregs.

Love of hard work must have developed for sound reasons, dictated by necessity, but now we see it encouraged for absurd ones, far beyond the bounds of reason, and dictated by excess. Without a doubt, it is one of the virtues most treasured by materialists (whether or not they practice it themselves), since their luxuries can only be afforded at the cost of tremendous labor. Whereas, idealists naturally esteem love of ease far more than love of labor, and labor only as much as it will afford them ease. Their pleasures are not culled from the earth, nor very long in procuring. They do not require heat, nor cold, nor any treatment at the hand of man. The world as it stands distributes more goods than they could ever make use of or hope to surmise. An idealist is wealthy beyond measure because he does not search for objects of beauty, but, rather, his search ignites the beauty within all objects. He is no less content with the idea of an object than with the object itself. This is why he praises leisure over labor; being over doing; as a man for whom God has performed all things, and is all things.

Mankind harbors a sneaking suspicion that the deepest emotions, insights, and perceptions to which he is sensitive have already occurred to him, and are present in his earliest memories. The aim of all culture is to make infancy articulate. In spite of the reality of evil, if all things are tending towards good, we may say that only good is ever really happening. Indeed, we may have good reason to.

Guerilla Radio

Who hath ears to hear, let him hear." -- Matthew 13:9


Love is in the air,
riding the airwaves,
making beautiful music --

playing new songs
all day and night long
in the heart of a mystic
attuned to this delicate frequency...

God is ON THE AIR, broadcasting LIVE.
All the prophets have advertised.
Everybody knows the time:
now and forever.

So, when are we going to tune in?
When will we raise our antenna;
lift our hearts skyward and listen?

Christ Jesus is taking requests.
And angels are singing their best
love songs.

Loud and clear...

For ALL to hear...

But who has ears?

Empty-Handed Charity

all you gathered under
working for an answer
holding what is out of hand

meekly struggling to awaken
bravely failing what's at stake and
drowning in a glass of stars

my heart is in the place of mourning
weeping blood upon your tombs
growing chill and wafting
sighs of love's perfume

pray, do see my verse is gentle
dear friendship is the banner hung
and heed with force this sober rhyme
before your lives are said and sung

for there is lighting in the cloud
and more than ready to be blunt
some thing most woeful will not hold
some thing more ancient will affront

behold The Devil now complacent
all his fiercest demons placed
insisting with their patient roots
upon the neutral soil

angels on their bellies
sparrows sunk in mud
here lies the wild we fathered
in purest impossible love

grinding our teeth to the beast
bones we all suckled by nature
like cannibal offspring nursing
when milk has ceased to run

is this the dawn of action
is this the fight or flight
has free-will made a motion
which faith cannot abide

for it would seem all things are blessed
and nothing simple could be wanting
that greed alone demands a test
and complicates exalting

people get lost just finding their place
words want to leave when unspoken
mind weaves a web to watch its own thoughts
silently creeps up and eats them

this is the fire we said we would tend
back when our souls were dark ovens
back in the night of interior life
when daylight was but an illusion

there we discovered a secret height
faint and yet present in blackest sight
tender to the breath's own breath
like the candle of a ghost

how it held us in suspension
saw us through the emptiness
left no doubt, no door, no question
blessed us with a full abyss

'till the cock disturbed our dream
by signaling the sunlight forth
and all was lost that was not seen
all subtleties quite blotted out

grunt forth self-dismembering angel

this is the lime

glowing out, become

the life spread for a time

splayed legs and minds

dissected, dismembered

unforgotten but clinging 

like a slime

like roots spreading unencumbered

freely reaching to become

ghosts transfixed

floating over notes

slinging a thousand songs 

shouldered like the throngs

of disbelieving chorus

where we have spun

struggled embittered

like the sun not betraying

endless feelings

but singing, singing,

bleeding like full women

cunts remembering what it was

to love like this

and south of here

strange emblems declare

something you would own

if you could own

all the myriad rhythms

that coarse like gifted madness

through the tomb of you

words crash like bubbles 

into airy discovery

we won't let them fall 

not now, not when 

we could ride them

like fast cocks

into nothingness

because that's the place

where dreams break

like tired waves

and curse us

who love them

chamber maids discover us

naked babbling memories

we would do our best

to feign enchantment

if all would leave 

us alone

blankly tumbling

over forests embedded 

in planet earth

souls stumbling 'round stumps

and forcing our way through

into black triumphant wonder

where we don't know

what we won't

understand

anyway

angelic hosts

choke on however many

angry fast motes

garbled in light

struggling to emerge

into signs, into words

wanting to stand

for more than beauty

and how many of you here

wander staggering star-struck

awe-struck in sympathy

with this transfixed crowd

of constellations?

will you ever draw back

into the moment without remembering

another time like this one

or girls squirming

like this rare woman

who has been a girl

and has shed girlhood

in so many tears

will you draw back

into her chest

while she holds you

and you remember

a similar fierce warmth

because of her

in spite of her

will you fall headlong

into remembering

while she stands strong

anxious to withstand

the heartbreaks

you're preparing

your soul ghost

ambivalent, passionate

not at all forthcoming

but blazing some truth

all around, but not inside

buried deep like water

locked in ice

will you transcend

the tears that jump

and gather, crumbling

in seas that suspend your ghost

how can you hope to

fire rises like any element

burning what sustains it

burning you and your treasured

anxious imaginings

all that you're worth

burning, burning

because isn't this how you want it

how you imagined heartfelt grace

rendering itself somehow

immaculate in sin

ghosts running

gallant flesh trying

wanting what it already is

wanting what it can never

be more than

its own wanting

oh my ones

slurp the hoar

you frosted goats

unemplore the missing

wonder forth

impress the host

with undisclosed

forgiving

range a million

isles of sundered

smoke-lit thunder

cliffs

give forth

endless

ageless

naive

hope

oh my sundered

surrendered ones

my poor angels

digruntled

wondering

what goes

you unbelievable ones

you powerful ones

disbelieving ones

how can I speak to you?

all my wonders 

gasp

before you

dependent

on your strange attention

Strange

a bottle of wine
a sonorous rhyme
an hour of what it can be

Sunchild, mild, soft-trodden girlfriend, wild angel, my animal. You come ready into me, and I withstand all I can. Your power transcends my spectacle. How can I impress your most imaginative heart? All my ageless dreaming ends in emerald shallows before you. How can I implore your passion, I who would sustain you? I am milk under the mountain.

Gentle, I would lay all my ignorance down. Be rid of all embarrassment at once. Fires humiliate me, my skin shrinks. I am post, declaring laundry.

Worm wriggling under this enchantment, smile delivered from unknowing, ghost testing passage, -- you are all my strange inspirers. Lights that shock and show no reason, -- you are my provocation. The question that I feel is the reason for my loving.

But I am struck with grave misgivings.

Some gross consideration thus disturbs my liberal attitude.

Can everyone enjoy this moment, as subtle and as odd? I want to know.

And is it snobbery, if I alone, or of a few, delight in this?

Is it, perhaps, some deliberate pretentiousness?

Or are we of a kind, however misaligned,
do we find a separate joy in equal oddities?

Are we fools to one another,
while masters in our minds?

Do we translate the same dream
into vague, disparate signs?

Within

Before we can discover His name,

He is present deep within us.

As long as we live, the Lord has not ceased to offer

a light into mystery and a hand out of trouble.

It is not God who limits Himself, but we who limit God;

for His will is not to impose, but to wait upon our invitation.

His teachings are as inexhaustible as our patience in attending them.

His generosity supplies no more nor less than we desire to hold.

The more closely we listen, the more compellingly He speaks;

the more deeply we examine, the more astonishing are His signs.

It is not a matter of deciding which signs are worthy to be called divine;

but of allowing the divine to enter, by custom or by stealth, into every sign.

When we are full of God, then every sign, no matter how obscure,

will discover itself effortlessly related back to Him.

Even in a foreign realm, every new spectacle more clearly recalls,

whether by similarity or difference, the spirit of our homeland.

Thus the boundaries of God's kingdom extend as far as our steps,

and as we proceed, so does His sovereignty increase.

For He is in us, as we are in Him.

The Merit of Frail and Fruitless Labors

in times of dryness
just keep going

show up
and play your part
as if courage was enough

even if you're not on fire
like Christ and his holy martyrs

even if it doesn't come
like lightning
from a ready cloud

and your mind is doubting
and your heart is underneath the dirt

keep looking
keep trying

because that's what faith is
anyway

that's where ressurection comes from
after all

though all the world
in awe of graces
will never know

the merit of frail
and fruitless labors

Distracted By Daylight

distracted by daylight
i have wandered in the green
forgetting my beloved
until now...

the golden tablet dissolves
submerged in a bath of trees
and spreads like fine powder
magenta in the sky

silvered night rises
a trembling steeple within me
to pierce with hopeful longing
the flesh of my poor heart

and all the world is flesh
cooling underneath the sky
quiet and deep and full
of more than human feeling

but you my love are spirit
never gathered nor dispersed
everpresent, undiscovered
and observant

Fragments

What first strikes us about God is not his love, nor any other attribute, but his incomprehensibility. First and foremost, God is mysterious; subtler than silence, deeper than space, more impenetrable than eternity. "His ways are not our ways." In a flash, he strides over mortal understanding and is lost in the mystery. Therefore, we ought to desire a respectful ignorance of God; not to overstep the boundaries of experience by laying claim to knowledge we do not possess. Even in the interpretation of experience, we must not hasten beyond what is there plainly given. Faith reaches into the unknown, and what it posits are merely footholds; clumps of cloud, temporarily solid-enough to serve as stepping-stones into a deeper experience of the ineffable. All supposed knowledge of God is kept in perspective, and the pride of man is held in check, by the constant recollection of one's ignorance of him; which infinitely transcends what one thinks one knows. We come closest to God when we have left all knowing behind, and entered firmly upon the way of the unknown; a realm of unspoken riddles, ghostly shades, fleeting glimpses, and forgotten dreams, charged everywhere with the unmanifested potentials of being. When we have shed a thousand ideas, a thousand skins, and become naked as the light, -- then, we may have some inkling of what "God" means.

The world is a deep pit, and who can fault a man for falling? But try to stand in the presence of the Lord. Recollect your soul into the presence, when you can. Do not wrestle with yourself, but give way to conflict, and discover that you have overcome. Seek peace. Seek it enough, and you will come to love it. Peace will attract you of its own accord, drawing you into the very heart and core of your being, that you might dwell in ever-widening oceans of bliss. For there is within you a still point, a calm in the eye of the storm. Here, one does not become drowsy with relaxation, but increasingly lucid. Keeping silent, one's soul vibrates to the most subtle, yet the most titanic, movements in the earth, sky, and spirit. There is a whole world to discover beyond oneself, within oneself; self-surrender IS self-realization.

Contrary to popular opinion, having an ideal and falling short of it does not make you a hypocrite. Too often, we see idealists discouraged from speaking their truth, on the grounds that they have yet to bring their lives into accordance with their visions. Is this criticism, this attempt at censure, specifically designed to prevent those in need of virtue from contemplating virtue? But how are they to become virtuous? And even if all they ever do is speak of it -- what then? At least, fine words are spoken. Would you rather they conform all their perceptions to what they can lay hold of, like blind men? Ah, but this is what the crowd likes to do. How many would rather compromise their ideals, and pervert their reason, in order to conform all things to their own level; so as not to be haunted by the recollection of what is greater?

We are rich with the spoils of spiritual warfare; for we are heirs to the saints, the prophets, and the Son of God. What priceless revelations of the Holy Spirit have come down to us! Behold, the inheritance which the Lord has delivered into our hands for safe-keeping. Unsearchable treasures of his wisdom.

"God is and is not." (~ Upanishads) My sense is that disputes between atheists and theists have largely revolved around semantic misunderstandings. The decision to adopt a religious viewpoint, and to make use of religious language, is inherently a value judgement; it is as if to say "this is worthy of being called holy", and "this is worthy of the name of God", for it seems no more exalted terms c

an be found to represent objects, ideas, and experiences which are themselves truly exalted. If we wish to understand religious matters, we must consult experts in religious matters -- i.e. MYSTICS; and not, by any means, fundamentalists. The mystics have always taught that religious terms are ultimately symbolic, and that the spiritual reality utterly transcends those names and forms we merely employ for the sake of convenience. Admittedly, we are dealing with the figurative, not the literal; "the spirit", not "the letter". Yet, according to this way of seeing, there is indeed such a thing as figurative reality. Christ, whether or not he exists in a more literal sense, or "merely" (one might rather say "purely") in a figurative sense, is no less real. As flesh and blood or as an idea in the hearts and minds of humanity, he is possessed of tremendous potency, and has undoubtedly influenced our history more than any other character we can dig up. Go figure.

Shall I tell you how I, as a Christian, reconcile with ease those contradictions arising from a comparison of the Old Testament with the New? It is simply this: The law is not a dead, but a living thing. That which is carved in stone (or printed in bibles) will fade in time, but what is written on our hearts must change and grow as we do. Revelation is ongoing; the law is not destroyed, but, rathe

r, it is fulfilled, by undergoing periodic evolutionary changes. As George Fox tells it: "You will say, 'Christ saith this', and 'the apostles say this', but what canst thou say? Art thou a Child of the Light, and hast thou walked in the Light, and what thou speakest, is it inwardly from the Lord?" The largest Christian hearts well know that Paganism provides (and has always provided) the foundations upon which their faith rests. Still, they are tolerant and inclusive with respect to those who have yet to embrace this fact. (("Receive him that is weak in the faith, but not to doubtful disputations... Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.")) One of my favorite pieces in the tradition of wisdom writing comes from radical Christian Leo Tolstoy; his essay 'The First Step', wherein he argues that a great error was committed at the advent of the Christian religion, when the Pagan virtues were disregarded in favor of the Christian ones. Basically, he says, one cannot even begin to practice Christianity in earnest until one has entirely mastered the Pagan virtues. We must be just before we can be merciful; champions before we can be martyrs. We must honor many gods before we can learn to honor the One in whom they live, move, and have their being. Christ might easily have recourse to the words of Isaac Newton, "If I have seen further it is by standing on ye sholders of Giants." 

It takes courage to be sincere; to be serious, vulnerable, insightful, and to allow others to be serious, vulnerable, insightful; without immediately cracking some careless, stupid joke. Not everything is ironic. Not every reflective moment needs to be shattered with instant levity. Where did we ever acquire this notion that being cool means not giving a fuck? Fuck that! It's not cool to be flippa

nt. It's cool to care, to question, to teach, to share what you REALLY think and feel. All of my heart to the sincere, serious people. The ones who make you think. And, yes, I love the ones who make me laugh, but it would be nice if they knew when to stop; when not to make a joke out of everything; when to allow something to stand, a little awkward on the page, if need be, declaring something of substance. Jokes are easy. Apathy is effortless. Cowardice.

More Fragments

I am a moth encircling a flame;
deterred by the heat from merging with the fire,
but incapable of parting from the light.

I'm learning to claim victory when my ego is defeated;
to relish a sweet aftertaste when my pride is bitterly stung.

What we call "preaching", the wise call "speaking".
If we aren't being accused of preaching,
we probably aren't saying anything.

It is easy to forgive a sin when it is overshadowed by a graver sin;
we would damn Peter and his denial without Judas and his betrayal.

The answers we give are never so revealing, enlightening, nor damning,

than the reasons we possess for answering as we do.

God is a great mystery because of the world,
and the world is a great mystery because of God.

That love exists -- 
that even the notion of love exists,
is proof that God exists, and that he loves us.

Look with the heart. Listen with the heart.
Think with the heart. Speak with the heart. Act with the heart.
All our faculties should be loyal subjects of the heart, who is their queen.

We are wiser than we know, but we dismiss our intuitions,
and let our passions carry us where they will.

While honoring truth as a noble ideal, it is equally important to remember that it is not static, like a destination, but dynamic, like a journey. Truth is not less subjective than objective. What this means is that each of us must progress at our own pace, not attempting to run ahead of ourselves; -- for that is to run ahead of the truth.

However incredible our pleasures, however fantastic our joys, however powerful our loves, however cherished our sentiments connected to hearth and home, -- nothing in our lives compares to the common experiences of sainthood; to the exquisite voluptuousness of being caught up, lifted out of oneself, and hurled into a whirlwind of divine effulgence; pierced, showered, and shattered by grace. Our gr

eatest natural successes cannot disfigure the reality as it appears in the supernatural light of heaven. We are failed saints; botched experiments at loftiness, salt without savour, fit only to be pitied and trodden upon by souls of keener quality than ourselves. If the realization of this fact does not pulverize and obliterate every idol erected by vanity, reducing our pretensions to nothing, to the fine ash of purest humility, then we are indeed lost; stricken; strangled in mediocrity; settled on something less than we were made for; dislocated utterly from the Absolute, which alone ought to inspire in us the most awful wonder, and the most wonderful awe. Our lives should be fodder. His to make, demolish, and remake. We should lust for our own destruction, and for the destruction of all that we have thought, amassed, and put into effect, if it is true (as it surely is) that such utter desolation is the only thing capable of heralding the rebirth of a Christian instinct.

Mankind harbors a sneaking suspicion that the deepest emotions, insights, and perceptions to which he is sensitive have already occurred to him, and are present in his earliest memories. The aim of all culture is to make infancy articulate.

Conversion: Giving Form To Liminal Space

Dear Reverend,
  
Thank you for your kind response, and for taking some moments to assist me with this. I don't know if you can help me, though. I've spoken with a number of clergy members in the past and "I always came out through the door that I went in". But I appreciate any time and effort gambled on me. My religious identity has become a question of great difficulty, partly because I am complicated, and partly because I am stubborn; I insist on over-thinking matters which transcend thought.

The baptism would be for me.  My family attended Protestant services sporadically when I was a child. I imagine I was probably baptized, but I'll have to check. In either case, I might be interested in the preparatory lessons, and possibly the baptismal ritual, and almost certainly Confirmation, if I choose to go forward in this path.

I've been exploring the Christian tradition independently for years, but in a largely haphazard and esoteric fashion. In some ways, I am already deeply initiated, while in other ways, I have yet to observe the most preliminary respects. The most "obvious" symbols and creeds of the Church are obscure to me; I never get beyond first principles, and they never lose their mystery.

While I desire, more than anything, to concretize my faith, and to honor the specific forms of Epsicopal doctrine, I find in myself an irrepressible tendency to lose sight of the forms. Categories and definitions blend and bleed into one another and appear to be profoundly interrelated. I have a sincere respect for the specific ritual forms used not only to symbolize but also to manifest our investment. I see that they are, and the Church is, a kind of Incarnation. But, too rapidly, I fly beyond the forms, in order to embrace something altogether interior and abstract. I want to embrace the forms, and the world.

I feel very drawn to the Liturgy, to the Divine Mother, and to other aspects of the faith, but I wish to embrace them without dissimulation, and, in all honesty, I fear there is something in me which undermines them and grasps too readily at the invisible. For a time, I thought I was a Quaker, and I enjoyed their services, and silences. I felt a kinship with the members of "the invisible church"; mystics who identified themselves only ostensibly as Christians, but whose approach was so "pure" as to largely do away with Christianity. Of course, one could argue that the purpose of the Church is to do away with itself; to make the loftiest mystical states accessible without recourse to itself. Even Christ did not come in his own name; he knew that, when we have received the sense and substance of a word, then the Word may be forgotten. Perhaps I am only confessing my spiritual immaturity, in clinging to the outer garments; to Mary, and to Jesus; as Sri Ramakrishna, when he clung to his own image of the Divine Mother:

"Mother, don't make me unconscious through the Knowledge of Brahman. Don't give me Brahmajnana, Mother. Am I not Your child, and naturally timid? I must have my Mother. A million salutations to the Knowledge of Brahman! Give it to those who want it. O Mother let me remain in contact with men! Don't make me a dried-up ascetic. I want to enjoy Your sport in the world."

I am naturally timid. I want to enjoy God's sport in the world, and in the Church. But I struggle with the deeper "Knowledge of Brahman", with the knowledge of the mystics, who have encountered the unknown God; the God without form and name. From this fog of unknowing, I look upon Jesus, and invent the strangest doctrines. I say things like:

"Even if he is a character of fiction, he is still the clearest incarnation of God. Just look how he has taken hold of men's minds and of human history! Does it matter if he was/is "merely" an idea? Perhaps an idea can be holy, and possess a more formidable substance than matter itself. Is this not what it means to read the spirit, not the letter? Somehow, this idea, this image, errupted into history, and from where could it have come, if not from God?"

And, I know, this is very Gnostic of me, but I seem to recognize similar, if subtler, utterances among the saints. Still, my faith seeks the material, and I am inclined to believe the most conventional things. That he was a man, and was, at the same time, the one true Son of God, is something I can almost believe unreservedly. I used to think calling him "the one true God" was insensitive to other faiths, or only permissible in the sense that one might give one's father a "World's Best Dad" t-shirt, without seeing it as a (friendly or unfriendly) provocation to other fathers. On the contrary, it is endearing, and nobody would fault a loving son for idealizing his own father in this way. But, as diplomatic and reasonable as this explaination sounds, I am beginning to see it another way.

Nietzsche understood genius as a result of incredible social and historical forces. Whenever a civilization develops, it creates paradigms and blindspots; norms and more marginal areas of relative unconsciousness. Great pressure is built-up in maintaining these norms, and in repressing other matters into the cultural unconscious. At some point, these hidden matters errupt upon the stage of history, in the form of a person of unique genius. I believe Jesus of Nazareth is the greatest genius the world has known or may ever know; the erruption into history of universal love and wisdom; the first fruit of the Truth. I do not know if his identity came as a revelation to him or not, but I believe he accurately identified himself as the Christ, the Messiah, the Way, the Truth, the Son of God, and God. And while this claim is valid and justified in a hidden or subversive sense, I believe it is also unambiguously true, and may just as profitably be taken at face value. I believe he came to witness and to prove that the spirit has power over the flesh, and I believe he succeeded on both counts. Hence, the doctrine of the resurrection of the body is, for me, the easiest of all things to receive. I am unclear, though, as to how well my other ideas agree with the established doctrines of the Church.

I recognize a need for guidance and a more systematic approach, but my nature is introverted and independent to the point of eccentricity. I've never met a teacher nor an institution I could submit to, and perhaps that is my own fault, but I want to submit to Christ, and I try to find his intermediary in the Church. I'm just not sure what degree of involvement I am suited to have with the Church. Taking direction, as well as finding my place within a community, is not easy, and I'm not even sure it is possible for me. I stay on the outside because whenever I try to assert myself, I alienate people with my intensity and social naivette. Perhaps my place is on the outside.

In Christ,
Stephen

Openings

Cynics care what a man does, not who he is,
and can scarcely distinguish between the two.

Release your grip, relax and slip,
fall back and down, sink, sink, drop through,
trust Peace, and let Presence examine you.

Inside, the flame of Christ, and my poor heart dripping away. The subtle separating from the gross. Softly falling dregs of flesh, and perfumes of softly wafting soul; the incense of His Love. Cumbersome senses put to sleep, endless questions laid to rest, passions never fixed. Language crumbling into dust. The Virgin scattering into birds. Intimations breaking cloudbanks, and carried off by angels; for the Lord looks kindly on those who cannot fly.

My Soul, your great ambition was to be the artist. But, after a mere taste of humility, you wanted to be the brush. Another taste, and you swore you could become the paint. Yet another, and now you are even thinking like the canvas! So, for Christ's sake, be still. The LORD is painting his self-portrait.

My greatest insights are experienced at the limits of my understanding. It is only in the self-honest sense of my uncertainty and ignorance that I begin to touch my deepest truth. Only when the mystery remains intact, have I come to the ends of myself; if I am not confounded, it is because I have stopped short of the precipice. Every answer has in it something of a lie, and every question something of a truth.

Silence -- not listening to, but hearing from God -- is truth.

Because he spoke, because he loved, because he moved;
by his will, the Father draws us into communion with himself,
and what can we do, but wait upon his Word?

Man is either a slave of passion or a servant of love, --
but, for a single instant, when he chooses his destiny,
he is free; if only to decide who his master will be.

Your pain as well as your pleasure, your anger as well as your joy, your weakness as well as your strength, your fear as well as your faith, -- make you lovely in the eyes of the Lord.

He is mystery. He is awe. He is radiant design. Serendipity with a style. The abyss winking at you from behind the world. He is a chorus of light in the mind. Splendor beneath the surface of time. We should marvel at his depths. He is the reason for himself.

What a perfect expression it is, to say that we "reflect on" what we take into our minds, since we really do come to resemble, like a reflection, the matters we focus on. We cannot spend a day in the study of the saints without acquiring a conspicuous blush of goodness. And though we may become pale again a day later, all at once, the blood of Christ will run back into our cheeks, provided that we turn again to what is good. Saintliness is little more than an ingrained habit of fascination with goodness, and with God, who alone is good. Not all at once, nor once and for all, did the good become good. Rather, they became good by dwelling persistently on what is good. Even Jesus had to pray, and has to still. But, then, if he did not pray, he would not be himself. God is Prayer to God.