Man, remember how to "be";
GOD will remember your works.
Prayer is the soul turned to God. It is impossible to be rightly disposed without being in an attitude of prayer. To be present is to be in the presence of God; to be present in God. Every experience of the true is an experience of the holy.
Holiness is meaning in the world.
Cast your heart upon the waters! Give your head to providence! Enter swiftly on that path which leads away from world events!
Be of good cheer; for the Lord is with you, always. Remembrance of this alone is needful. Every soul is well supplied until it doubts.
Jesus of my Heart, Lover of God, Sweet Flame, consume my life!
Overwhelm me, Father, with your thousand favors. Teach me to love. All good things are in your Son, to whom I owe amazement.
Have you exhausted the treasures of righteousness, that you should look elsewhere for an inheritance? God forbid! Only summon up the courage of your faith. There is gold enough among the good.
Love is golden splendor, giggling cherubs, soft honey in your tummy, light tumbling up your eyelids, the sky warm and giant, loose breezes in September.
The judgement of the Lord is mercy: A reprimand sufficiently tender to impress upon us the importance of tenderness could hardly be called a reprimand.
As a boy holds the hand of his father, hold the name of God.
It is sweet to remember the Lord; to stumble, at once, on the source, substance, and subject of all that is good.
Church is a spiritual gymnasium;
faith is a muscle exercised in prayer.
Virtue leaves its perfume in the mind.
We have light enough to find him, if we are serious about looking.
Prayer is the journey as well as the destination;
you cannot turn to God without turning to God.
Decorate the walls of your mind with icons of the saints.
We sing that we sing! We glory that we glory!
Praise the Lord who makes us to declare his praises!
Every prayer answers another prayer;
if I pray for you, someone prays for me.
Gratitude is the measure of gifts.
He is king who sits in his rightful place.
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Saturday, September 8, 2012
Religious Symbols Discussed
We should like to devote some space here to a discussion of semantics; of the rigidity of definitions, and the corresponding inflexibility of doctrines, which has given rise to so many bitter theological disputes, and even so-called holy wars. While the mystics, the true experts, of all religions have agreed that "God" is a transcendent reality which eludes classification, and which it is pointless, even ironic, to dispute, -- nevertheless, the uninspired interpreters and executives of religions continue to raise violent objections over the most insubstantial differences of doctrine.
Of course, if a Church is not somewhat clear on what it believes, it cannot get on with the business of being a Church. The same is true for individuals. Hence, it is necessary, or, at any rate, desireable, to arrive at a concensus. Even an individual must confer with himself, making the appropriate compromises among the divergent elements within himself, before he can set out in earnest upon a path. And, while it matters comparatively little which path we choose, it matters greatly that we choose; for, as wisdom states, "who attempts to follow all paths, follows none," and "a man who stands for nothing, falls for anything."
If we were lost in the wilderness, we would look for shelter. We are lost in a spiritual wilderness, and should therefore seek a spiritual shelter, -- or erect one, from existing materials, if no fitting structure can be found. There are many suitable domiciles which welcome new tenants, and many blueprints we can follow and use to create a secure structure of our own. Churches consecrated to ancient gods will serve ours just as well, but one may also wish to start from scratch.
We are not expecting to have absolute truth nailed down to a science; we merely wish to construct a mental temple, answerable to our individual needs. Walls will be blown out, additions built-on, as our needs and our means change or become apparent. It is essential, therefore, that even the firmest and most time-honored conclusions are taken to be no more than frameworks. We want the Spirit to breathe and freely move.
Terms (like "free will") should have their limits and their place. Now, there are many schemes we could lay out for consideration, and lessons we might draw, using free will as a model. I myself apply the term in a Christian context which is largely idiosyncratic; highly personal, subjective, and specific to my needs and purposes. Others are perfectly welcome to take certain aspects of my thought and weave these into their own philosophies and traditions. Unlike the magpie, they will be taking nothing from me.
Free will, like a few other big ideas, is a room with many doors, from which we can branch out into endless speculations. The point is not to pin anything down, nor to wander aimlessly, entertaining possibilities distinct and remote, but, rather, to make use of all things for the glory of God. If a perspective is helpful in elucidating a certain moral lesson, then it has served its function. It is not necessary to reapply the same perspective in an exhaustive variety of contexts, in order to make sure that it "fits" every time. We are making a meal, not feeding the world. Not yet, anyway.
So, for instance, today we might look at free will as a necessary stage of juvenile rebellion on the part of the soul, -- a need to assert independence, uniqueness, personhood. But let's say this would ultimately be going against a more central need, and a more central will, which is to merge in one spirit and be led by something transcendent of oneself. The word "freedom" is then curious, because whether we follow God or go our own way, in either case, we can say that we are free in one respect and not in another. Like Saint Paul, we find two spirits, two wills, within us; freedom for one means bondage for the other.
((In some sense, freedom is not freedom. However many choices we may appear to have, we may only choose one thing. If I am free to go my own way, I am not free to follow God; and if I am free to follow God I am not free to go my own way. "You cannot serve both God and Mammon."))
We may consider the matter from the perspective of focus. The will responds to where we set our focus. "We covet what we see." Illusion or not, we cannot easily break the enchantment with ourselves; we continue to identify with ourselves, and to join our affections to many things, making use of many things to bolster our self-image. We are the prodigal teenagers. We can go anywhere, but we cannot go back to God; for that would be paramount to growing up; and whosoever grows up must put away childish things (in this case, all things, since one's fundamental relationship to all things is what changes). Because the enchantment with oneself is persistent, and cannot be shattered in an instant, -- at least, not by any act of will, but only by the grace of God, -- it is necessary to gradually condition the focus away from content and in the direction of essence. When we have seen essence, we have seen is-ness, and the will does not come into play; it has no application.
We use simple yet profound religious symbols, umbrella concepts, to gather together our focus from the many toward the one. We must evoke a sense of the sacred; paradoxical feelings of the heaviest darkness and the nimblest light. We must become aware of the significance of life, and of the supreme significance of the present moment. Religion is more compatible and congenial to this sense of significance than anything I know.
I believe repentance has a place, but that we ought to repent, or regret, the pollution of our focus, more than the behaviors which are only the last and least preventable consequences of losing sight of God. Shame and genuine repentance are frightening, but they are, seemingly, a necessary and inevitable part of the recovery of depth, and the realignment of focus with God. We must become disgusted with whatever takes our focus away from God.
In the early stages, only obvious crimes like rape and murder disgust us. A scoundrel does well if he merely avoids other scoundrels. But in the later stages, the merest deviation of attention from Holy Presence becomes a roadblock to spiritual progress. The sages have said that we must, in some capacity, despise our world, our families, our lives, and ourselves in order to love God. In order to acquire the compassion necessary to bring us into closer intimacy with these things, it is imperative that we first acquire detachment from them, and intimacy with God. The mystical experience of God's Love is what empowers authentic relationships on all levels. But, in order to seek God, we must become disillusioned with the world, and with our own powers to acquire goodness, wisdom, and happiness. Without our consent and willingness to receive (rather than rule), he will not, -- perhaps he cannot, -- condescend to us more than he has already done through the person of Christ and through the lives of the saints. We must turn away from the will of the flesh, which we call "free", and into the will of the spirit, which is freedom itself; in harmony with all.
And all this is accomplished by the secret ministrations and maneuverings of the grace of God within us. Our greater life, our spiritual life, is what goes on beneath the distractions of the senses and of the self. It is a life of which most men remain almost entirely ignorant. In great souls, who turn inward, away from the mad carnivals of sense and self, not only is this spiritual life perceptible, but it is the outer life which has faded into obscurity.
The question becomes, "which is the true will, the true self" and that would be the higher will and the higher Self, which we understand by the form of Jesus Christ, whose personality is primarily, if not completely, definable in terms of his having descended from God and his being dependent on God. To the extent that he is not the receptacle of graces, but the fountain of graces, not the willing servant, but the willing master, we may identify him more directly with God the Father; and this should provide insight on the Trinity, -- for, even as Christ sheds the role of Son, ever so slightly, in order to more closely characterize his intimacy with God (as actual identity with God), this is yet another way in which he retains the role of servant, of Son, because he continues to serve as an Image of God, and that is what it means to be the Son, since an image is always once-removed; the thing itself, God the Father, cannot be represented in form.
Rounding out the Trinity, or pointing it out, rather, is the symbol of the Holy Ghost, which mysteriously unites the formless with the form while maintaining an equally mysterious respect for their separateness. There is no giving without receiving; the two are part of a single process, which nonetheless depends upon the independence of its parts. The entire process is the Trinity; the giver is God the Father, the receiver is God the Son, and the relationship between them is the Holy Spirit. All three are distinctly present, but also present in one another; since the giver receives something in giving and the receiver gives something in receiving; therefore, both Father and Son contain each other, and each contains the third, -- while the third, the Holy Spirit, contains the first two, since each is ultimately defined only by its relation to the other, and this mutuality is what we interpret to be the work and substance of the Holy Spirit.
The Trinity, as a symbol, is another attempt to gather together the seemingly disparate parts of a larger idea or circumstance under a single heading, with the purpose of concentrating attention on greater unities. Whether the symbol is effective, each of us may judge independently. What we ultimately want, though, is an image utterly dense with significance. We should be able to pick it apart, for the purposes of analytical contemplation, and each part should be strikingly evocative of the most deeply significant revelations and emotions. Then, when we gather these together under a single name, or when we learn to recognize all of them, together, under each of their separate names, the intensity of the experience generated should be manifold.
The image of Christ crucified should evoke a sense of the profound significance of our ever-present choice; either to draw closer to God, or to pursue our individual aims. If we choose the former, we are among the faithful who stood by the foot of the cross, their eyes downcast into their souls, or fixed in weeping upon the Son.
If we choose the latter, we are among the persecutors of Christ. From a Christian perspective, we all belong to one body and share a responsibility to every other member of that body. Hence, all complacency is complicity. "Those who are not with me are against me." By our inattention to the spiritual dimension of life, we contribute to the condition, to the overall atmosphere, of the community, which encourages and makes possible either the acceptance or the rejection God; whether by a society, collectively, or by its members, respectively. Christ is crucified, not only by our sins, but by the lukewarmth of our virtues, as well; -- just as he is received, not only by our virtues, but by the timidity of our vices.
We ought to look upon the crucified Christ and feel a great many things -- not only admiration, gratitude, worship, love; but, also, anxiety, shame, restlessness, etc. We are still men, and are not so far beyond such things that we cannot make use of them still.
Indeed, we should be shaken to our depths. We should be existentially dislodged; dislocated with respect to our values and identities. We should tremble to think how lightly we permit ourselves to take this sacrifice, this unsurpassed exhibition of divine love, which one inspired soul has made, and which many inspired souls have since imitated in honor of him, and in honor of what he made known to the world.
At least, this is my feeling, and why I believe as I do.
Of course, if a Church is not somewhat clear on what it believes, it cannot get on with the business of being a Church. The same is true for individuals. Hence, it is necessary, or, at any rate, desireable, to arrive at a concensus. Even an individual must confer with himself, making the appropriate compromises among the divergent elements within himself, before he can set out in earnest upon a path. And, while it matters comparatively little which path we choose, it matters greatly that we choose; for, as wisdom states, "who attempts to follow all paths, follows none," and "a man who stands for nothing, falls for anything."
If we were lost in the wilderness, we would look for shelter. We are lost in a spiritual wilderness, and should therefore seek a spiritual shelter, -- or erect one, from existing materials, if no fitting structure can be found. There are many suitable domiciles which welcome new tenants, and many blueprints we can follow and use to create a secure structure of our own. Churches consecrated to ancient gods will serve ours just as well, but one may also wish to start from scratch.
We are not expecting to have absolute truth nailed down to a science; we merely wish to construct a mental temple, answerable to our individual needs. Walls will be blown out, additions built-on, as our needs and our means change or become apparent. It is essential, therefore, that even the firmest and most time-honored conclusions are taken to be no more than frameworks. We want the Spirit to breathe and freely move.
Terms (like "free will") should have their limits and their place. Now, there are many schemes we could lay out for consideration, and lessons we might draw, using free will as a model. I myself apply the term in a Christian context which is largely idiosyncratic; highly personal, subjective, and specific to my needs and purposes. Others are perfectly welcome to take certain aspects of my thought and weave these into their own philosophies and traditions. Unlike the magpie, they will be taking nothing from me.
Free will, like a few other big ideas, is a room with many doors, from which we can branch out into endless speculations. The point is not to pin anything down, nor to wander aimlessly, entertaining possibilities distinct and remote, but, rather, to make use of all things for the glory of God. If a perspective is helpful in elucidating a certain moral lesson, then it has served its function. It is not necessary to reapply the same perspective in an exhaustive variety of contexts, in order to make sure that it "fits" every time. We are making a meal, not feeding the world. Not yet, anyway.
So, for instance, today we might look at free will as a necessary stage of juvenile rebellion on the part of the soul, -- a need to assert independence, uniqueness, personhood. But let's say this would ultimately be going against a more central need, and a more central will, which is to merge in one spirit and be led by something transcendent of oneself. The word "freedom" is then curious, because whether we follow God or go our own way, in either case, we can say that we are free in one respect and not in another. Like Saint Paul, we find two spirits, two wills, within us; freedom for one means bondage for the other.
((In some sense, freedom is not freedom. However many choices we may appear to have, we may only choose one thing. If I am free to go my own way, I am not free to follow God; and if I am free to follow God I am not free to go my own way. "You cannot serve both God and Mammon."))
We may consider the matter from the perspective of focus. The will responds to where we set our focus. "We covet what we see." Illusion or not, we cannot easily break the enchantment with ourselves; we continue to identify with ourselves, and to join our affections to many things, making use of many things to bolster our self-image. We are the prodigal teenagers. We can go anywhere, but we cannot go back to God; for that would be paramount to growing up; and whosoever grows up must put away childish things (in this case, all things, since one's fundamental relationship to all things is what changes). Because the enchantment with oneself is persistent, and cannot be shattered in an instant, -- at least, not by any act of will, but only by the grace of God, -- it is necessary to gradually condition the focus away from content and in the direction of essence. When we have seen essence, we have seen is-ness, and the will does not come into play; it has no application.
We use simple yet profound religious symbols, umbrella concepts, to gather together our focus from the many toward the one. We must evoke a sense of the sacred; paradoxical feelings of the heaviest darkness and the nimblest light. We must become aware of the significance of life, and of the supreme significance of the present moment. Religion is more compatible and congenial to this sense of significance than anything I know.
I believe repentance has a place, but that we ought to repent, or regret, the pollution of our focus, more than the behaviors which are only the last and least preventable consequences of losing sight of God. Shame and genuine repentance are frightening, but they are, seemingly, a necessary and inevitable part of the recovery of depth, and the realignment of focus with God. We must become disgusted with whatever takes our focus away from God.
In the early stages, only obvious crimes like rape and murder disgust us. A scoundrel does well if he merely avoids other scoundrels. But in the later stages, the merest deviation of attention from Holy Presence becomes a roadblock to spiritual progress. The sages have said that we must, in some capacity, despise our world, our families, our lives, and ourselves in order to love God. In order to acquire the compassion necessary to bring us into closer intimacy with these things, it is imperative that we first acquire detachment from them, and intimacy with God. The mystical experience of God's Love is what empowers authentic relationships on all levels. But, in order to seek God, we must become disillusioned with the world, and with our own powers to acquire goodness, wisdom, and happiness. Without our consent and willingness to receive (rather than rule), he will not, -- perhaps he cannot, -- condescend to us more than he has already done through the person of Christ and through the lives of the saints. We must turn away from the will of the flesh, which we call "free", and into the will of the spirit, which is freedom itself; in harmony with all.
And all this is accomplished by the secret ministrations and maneuverings of the grace of God within us. Our greater life, our spiritual life, is what goes on beneath the distractions of the senses and of the self. It is a life of which most men remain almost entirely ignorant. In great souls, who turn inward, away from the mad carnivals of sense and self, not only is this spiritual life perceptible, but it is the outer life which has faded into obscurity.
The question becomes, "which is the true will, the true self" and that would be the higher will and the higher Self, which we understand by the form of Jesus Christ, whose personality is primarily, if not completely, definable in terms of his having descended from God and his being dependent on God. To the extent that he is not the receptacle of graces, but the fountain of graces, not the willing servant, but the willing master, we may identify him more directly with God the Father; and this should provide insight on the Trinity, -- for, even as Christ sheds the role of Son, ever so slightly, in order to more closely characterize his intimacy with God (as actual identity with God), this is yet another way in which he retains the role of servant, of Son, because he continues to serve as an Image of God, and that is what it means to be the Son, since an image is always once-removed; the thing itself, God the Father, cannot be represented in form.
Rounding out the Trinity, or pointing it out, rather, is the symbol of the Holy Ghost, which mysteriously unites the formless with the form while maintaining an equally mysterious respect for their separateness. There is no giving without receiving; the two are part of a single process, which nonetheless depends upon the independence of its parts. The entire process is the Trinity; the giver is God the Father, the receiver is God the Son, and the relationship between them is the Holy Spirit. All three are distinctly present, but also present in one another; since the giver receives something in giving and the receiver gives something in receiving; therefore, both Father and Son contain each other, and each contains the third, -- while the third, the Holy Spirit, contains the first two, since each is ultimately defined only by its relation to the other, and this mutuality is what we interpret to be the work and substance of the Holy Spirit.
The Trinity, as a symbol, is another attempt to gather together the seemingly disparate parts of a larger idea or circumstance under a single heading, with the purpose of concentrating attention on greater unities. Whether the symbol is effective, each of us may judge independently. What we ultimately want, though, is an image utterly dense with significance. We should be able to pick it apart, for the purposes of analytical contemplation, and each part should be strikingly evocative of the most deeply significant revelations and emotions. Then, when we gather these together under a single name, or when we learn to recognize all of them, together, under each of their separate names, the intensity of the experience generated should be manifold.
The image of Christ crucified should evoke a sense of the profound significance of our ever-present choice; either to draw closer to God, or to pursue our individual aims. If we choose the former, we are among the faithful who stood by the foot of the cross, their eyes downcast into their souls, or fixed in weeping upon the Son.
If we choose the latter, we are among the persecutors of Christ. From a Christian perspective, we all belong to one body and share a responsibility to every other member of that body. Hence, all complacency is complicity. "Those who are not with me are against me." By our inattention to the spiritual dimension of life, we contribute to the condition, to the overall atmosphere, of the community, which encourages and makes possible either the acceptance or the rejection God; whether by a society, collectively, or by its members, respectively. Christ is crucified, not only by our sins, but by the lukewarmth of our virtues, as well; -- just as he is received, not only by our virtues, but by the timidity of our vices.
We ought to look upon the crucified Christ and feel a great many things -- not only admiration, gratitude, worship, love; but, also, anxiety, shame, restlessness, etc. We are still men, and are not so far beyond such things that we cannot make use of them still.
Indeed, we should be shaken to our depths. We should be existentially dislodged; dislocated with respect to our values and identities. We should tremble to think how lightly we permit ourselves to take this sacrifice, this unsurpassed exhibition of divine love, which one inspired soul has made, and which many inspired souls have since imitated in honor of him, and in honor of what he made known to the world.
At least, this is my feeling, and why I believe as I do.
Friday, September 7, 2012
The Sacrificial Ideal
What if God somehow burst into history in a singular way; what if he became like us, came to earth, proved himself with eloquence and miracles, proclaimed his unconditional love and forgiveness, -- and we killed him?
Shall we mention that he rose from the dead?
OF COURSE, he rose from the dead. He was God.
But we killed him.
Wrath, sloth, greed, shallowness, indifference, impatience, etc. -- the collective sins of his contemporaries determined that Christ's gospel be rejected and that he suffer death without mercy on the cross.
It has been a slow acknowledgment, these twenty centuries, that whoever spoke this message of love was speaking truth. In many places today, truth still cannot be heard, and it is thought blasphemous to speak more than half-truth. The people are blinded by the fire of Christ's life and words, and can receive only partial reflections and distortions thereof. We want to prosecute crimes, swear oaths, wed, breed, own property, and kill -- all things which he expressly forbade as being unhealthy to the spiritual life of man.
And though the Master even makes endless allowances for our weakness, and though, no matter how often we turn back, and turn our backs on him, he still invites us to follow, -- nonetheless, we continue to distort his teaching, or else reject it altogether.
What we ought to do is humble ourselves to the awesome gravity of the Christian life; equally acknowledging the strictness of the law and the leniency of the lawgiver.
Whatsoever we do, we are assured of God's forgiveness and his love, but there is only one way which he blesses and calls us to; absolute abandonment to the Holy Spirit; desiring nothing before God, and nothing but God. Christ decrees that all men should be beggars, until all doors are thrown open, and bachelors, until everyone is embraced. He understands that ideals are meant to be lofty, and that Christian ideals should be the loftiest of all.
At the same time, he plumbs the depths of our depravity, and because he knows what we struggle with, he makes concessions to our frail humanity, such that we need never fear his judgement, though we have fallen so far short of what is good.
The ways of God are so perfect that we might say they are not intended to be fulfilled by any man; but, being infinite in scope, are meant, rather, to pose an equal and insurmountable challenge to all men. How else can we learn to depend entirely on the grace of God? It is essential that even the saints fall short of perfection.
We should know this. But two thousand years have passed and we are still crucifying the Word of God; corrupting the gospel for which Christ lived and died.
Placing limits on love, we place shackles on Jesus. Calling ourselves good, we forget the meaning of the Word. Our standards are low, but our punishments are severe, while the standards of the Lord are high, but he knows nothing of judgement; only mercy.
Let us embrace Christ on his own terms, not ours, or let us shun him altogether, as our ancestors have done. Either way, we would not inflict the further insult of a Judas Kiss; pretending to embrace his statutes, while secretly perverting them.
Is it so terrible to have an ideal, or to recognize an ideal?
Just because we come up short, ought we to lower all things to our height? Must we compromise our vision, when we compromise ourselves? Is it so difficult to bear any discrepancy between the two, that we must turn the moral world on its head, and put to death the one who came to give us life? For the law of Christ permits a man to fall, and to be exhonerated by grace, but it does not permit him to drag the law itself down with him, in order to exhonerate his crime as well as himself.
We killed God. We murdered our ideal. We covered it up. And now the ghost of Jesus, the Holy Ghost, haunts our churches, like a tell-tale heart. The ghost of the ideal... the buried heart of the world... will... not... rest.
Shall we mention that he rose from the dead?
OF COURSE, he rose from the dead. He was God.
But we killed him.
Wrath, sloth, greed, shallowness, indifference, impatience, etc. -- the collective sins of his contemporaries determined that Christ's gospel be rejected and that he suffer death without mercy on the cross.
It has been a slow acknowledgment, these twenty centuries, that whoever spoke this message of love was speaking truth. In many places today, truth still cannot be heard, and it is thought blasphemous to speak more than half-truth. The people are blinded by the fire of Christ's life and words, and can receive only partial reflections and distortions thereof. We want to prosecute crimes, swear oaths, wed, breed, own property, and kill -- all things which he expressly forbade as being unhealthy to the spiritual life of man.
And though the Master even makes endless allowances for our weakness, and though, no matter how often we turn back, and turn our backs on him, he still invites us to follow, -- nonetheless, we continue to distort his teaching, or else reject it altogether.
What we ought to do is humble ourselves to the awesome gravity of the Christian life; equally acknowledging the strictness of the law and the leniency of the lawgiver.
Whatsoever we do, we are assured of God's forgiveness and his love, but there is only one way which he blesses and calls us to; absolute abandonment to the Holy Spirit; desiring nothing before God, and nothing but God. Christ decrees that all men should be beggars, until all doors are thrown open, and bachelors, until everyone is embraced. He understands that ideals are meant to be lofty, and that Christian ideals should be the loftiest of all.
At the same time, he plumbs the depths of our depravity, and because he knows what we struggle with, he makes concessions to our frail humanity, such that we need never fear his judgement, though we have fallen so far short of what is good.
The ways of God are so perfect that we might say they are not intended to be fulfilled by any man; but, being infinite in scope, are meant, rather, to pose an equal and insurmountable challenge to all men. How else can we learn to depend entirely on the grace of God? It is essential that even the saints fall short of perfection.
We should know this. But two thousand years have passed and we are still crucifying the Word of God; corrupting the gospel for which Christ lived and died.
Placing limits on love, we place shackles on Jesus. Calling ourselves good, we forget the meaning of the Word. Our standards are low, but our punishments are severe, while the standards of the Lord are high, but he knows nothing of judgement; only mercy.
Let us embrace Christ on his own terms, not ours, or let us shun him altogether, as our ancestors have done. Either way, we would not inflict the further insult of a Judas Kiss; pretending to embrace his statutes, while secretly perverting them.
Is it so terrible to have an ideal, or to recognize an ideal?
Just because we come up short, ought we to lower all things to our height? Must we compromise our vision, when we compromise ourselves? Is it so difficult to bear any discrepancy between the two, that we must turn the moral world on its head, and put to death the one who came to give us life? For the law of Christ permits a man to fall, and to be exhonerated by grace, but it does not permit him to drag the law itself down with him, in order to exhonerate his crime as well as himself.
We killed God. We murdered our ideal. We covered it up. And now the ghost of Jesus, the Holy Ghost, haunts our churches, like a tell-tale heart. The ghost of the ideal... the buried heart of the world... will... not... rest.
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
God's Love
An artist is never so enamoured with the works he has created, masterpieces though they may be, as with the present work he has in hand. Not the perfected sculpture, but the stubborn, untamed block, intrigues, entices, and excites his creative inspiration. Likewise, the Lord is never so fond of his saints as of his sinners. God knows, the saints are full of graces, but the sinners are full of possibilities. And the saints, were they susceptible to envy, would no doubt envy us in a strange way, seeing that God is not yet done with us, and that it is our turn now; to discover his love for us, and to fall in love with him.
*
Love is sufficient for the longings of the spirit. Love comforts and reproves, heals, tests, and strengthens, pacifies, invigorates, encourages, and instructs. To contemplate love is to make a study of all good things -- all God's things.
*
Our love falters, sinks, recovers, and mounts up, but the love of God surrounds and infuses all that is. Our love is a trinket, little worth; a gift we are ashamed to give. His love is what upholds the world and makes it beautiful. We love him more or less, according to our moods. He loves us more each moment that we live.
*
Love is sufficient for the longings of the spirit. Love comforts and reproves, heals, tests, and strengthens, pacifies, invigorates, encourages, and instructs. To contemplate love is to make a study of all good things -- all God's things.
*
Our love falters, sinks, recovers, and mounts up, but the love of God surrounds and infuses all that is. Our love is a trinket, little worth; a gift we are ashamed to give. His love is what upholds the world and makes it beautiful. We love him more or less, according to our moods. He loves us more each moment that we live.
Monday, September 3, 2012
Turning
I am withdrawing from others in ways which might seem alarming, except that I am drawing closer to my contemplation, -- if not yet closer to my God. The world is no place for me. My pride, shame, and weakness all drive me underground. There is earth between myself and the light. The world has closed my accounts, and I have no alternative but to present myself as a beggar and a spirit at the window of the Lord.
How has sorrow pressed such exquisite ejaculations from the souls of men? Is all tribulation merely the painful recollection of former "glory in the flower... splendor in the grass"? Is it only in the night of agonizing self-criticism and spiritual assaults that we come to fully appreciate those sun-drenched joys which we only half-knew in the having?
Joy does not know herself until she suffers. And no man clings to the heavens so desperately as one who has lost his foothold in the world; to whom the sweetest fruit has become bitter, and the earth itself has become a torture; for it reminds him of what was, or half-was, and can never be.
One must come to see that, without God, we are in hell. There is no hope. No comfort. No light. No escape from this mad, grotesque pageant of incurables. Only in God, Christ, Mary, and the contemplation of the Saints, -- and only in friendships which vibrate in answer to these higher strings, -- can we safely trust to find nourishment for our souls.
If the Lord does not always cradle us, but sometimes chastens us as well, at least, he does not insult our intelligence, or our soul's dignity, with matters of light import. He speaks to us of nothing but destiny and questions of calling, because he calls us to fulfill a great destiny. He wants us to love what is good, and his judgment searches our souls, to see that we have not deceived ourselves as to the nature of the good, and sunk into the worship of idols.
For the world loves mediocrity, and burns offerings to it. But we who have loved beyond the world must suffer the light of scrutiny to rattle in the secret chambers of our hearts, scouring all impurities; exposing without compromise everything that is beautiful but not absolutely beautiful; good but not absolutely good; holy but not absolutely holy.
God is a jealous god because he is perfect. Who clings to him lets go of lesser attractions. At first, the lover of God wishes only to speak with those who have known the object of her affections, and who can give her some news of the Beloved. Later, she will settle for only the undisturbed presence of the Bridegroom himself.
The soul in love with God is greedy for the greatest, too spoiled to stomach the news of this world. Like a sick and stubborn child, he spits up what is served, and whines constantly for a Word from his Divine Mother.
It is true, his health depends on seeking new heights; rarified airs. Gradually, the Word of God becomes his daily bread (what else can sustain him?), and he gnaws a little hunk of it as he traverses the mighty cliffs, the valleys, gorges, riverbanks, and peaks of contemplation, his back against the world.
How has sorrow pressed such exquisite ejaculations from the souls of men? Is all tribulation merely the painful recollection of former "glory in the flower... splendor in the grass"? Is it only in the night of agonizing self-criticism and spiritual assaults that we come to fully appreciate those sun-drenched joys which we only half-knew in the having?
Joy does not know herself until she suffers. And no man clings to the heavens so desperately as one who has lost his foothold in the world; to whom the sweetest fruit has become bitter, and the earth itself has become a torture; for it reminds him of what was, or half-was, and can never be.
One must come to see that, without God, we are in hell. There is no hope. No comfort. No light. No escape from this mad, grotesque pageant of incurables. Only in God, Christ, Mary, and the contemplation of the Saints, -- and only in friendships which vibrate in answer to these higher strings, -- can we safely trust to find nourishment for our souls.
If the Lord does not always cradle us, but sometimes chastens us as well, at least, he does not insult our intelligence, or our soul's dignity, with matters of light import. He speaks to us of nothing but destiny and questions of calling, because he calls us to fulfill a great destiny. He wants us to love what is good, and his judgment searches our souls, to see that we have not deceived ourselves as to the nature of the good, and sunk into the worship of idols.
For the world loves mediocrity, and burns offerings to it. But we who have loved beyond the world must suffer the light of scrutiny to rattle in the secret chambers of our hearts, scouring all impurities; exposing without compromise everything that is beautiful but not absolutely beautiful; good but not absolutely good; holy but not absolutely holy.
God is a jealous god because he is perfect. Who clings to him lets go of lesser attractions. At first, the lover of God wishes only to speak with those who have known the object of her affections, and who can give her some news of the Beloved. Later, she will settle for only the undisturbed presence of the Bridegroom himself.
The soul in love with God is greedy for the greatest, too spoiled to stomach the news of this world. Like a sick and stubborn child, he spits up what is served, and whines constantly for a Word from his Divine Mother.
It is true, his health depends on seeking new heights; rarified airs. Gradually, the Word of God becomes his daily bread (what else can sustain him?), and he gnaws a little hunk of it as he traverses the mighty cliffs, the valleys, gorges, riverbanks, and peaks of contemplation, his back against the world.
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Wisdom
Wisdom is closer to instinct than insight. It is deeply engaged with the world, with life, with others, and with God. It is not something you know, but something you do, -- and something you are.
It would be foolish to speak of "making use" of wisdom, since wisdom itself is precisely the quality or condition of making use; wherein ability and will combine to produce those skillful utterances and actions we call wise. Even more foolish would be to speak of "not making use" of wisdom. Not making use is just unwise.
Being and acting are united in wisdom. A wise man acts by being. Because his actions are not separate from his being, they are rooted in God. It is God who is, and God who acts.
The works which are rooted in our depths are not performed by us, yet are the most natural and essential to us. In fact, all works are rooted in our depths, in God, and we only become identified with them to the extent that we are unconscious of their origin.
All actions ultimately proceed from the center of being, and everything is accomplished in the act of being.
Wisdom is being.
Behold what the Lord has made -- that it is enough; increase your knowledge of goodness -- and goodness is increased; magnify your understanding of God -- and God is magnified; perfect your appreciation of love -- and love is perfected.
If Wisdom were not beautiful, she would have no power to attract. If she were merely beautiful, she would have no power to hold. We learn to love Wisdom by finding her beautiful, but we stay in love because she is divine.
It would be foolish to speak of "making use" of wisdom, since wisdom itself is precisely the quality or condition of making use; wherein ability and will combine to produce those skillful utterances and actions we call wise. Even more foolish would be to speak of "not making use" of wisdom. Not making use is just unwise.
Being and acting are united in wisdom. A wise man acts by being. Because his actions are not separate from his being, they are rooted in God. It is God who is, and God who acts.
The works which are rooted in our depths are not performed by us, yet are the most natural and essential to us. In fact, all works are rooted in our depths, in God, and we only become identified with them to the extent that we are unconscious of their origin.
All actions ultimately proceed from the center of being, and everything is accomplished in the act of being.
Wisdom is being.
Behold what the Lord has made -- that it is enough; increase your knowledge of goodness -- and goodness is increased; magnify your understanding of God -- and God is magnified; perfect your appreciation of love -- and love is perfected.
If Wisdom were not beautiful, she would have no power to attract. If she were merely beautiful, she would have no power to hold. We learn to love Wisdom by finding her beautiful, but we stay in love because she is divine.
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Coins
What is man? A messenger who begs for a Word from God,
and groans under the weight of the One he's received.
One cannot look upon goodness or the sun;
the conscience burns from shame and turns away,
or is blinded by pride, if it stares too long.
The Sun would be God, if not for the Night.
Sinners are busy with many things,
but the work of the saints is rest.
Even the peace of a wicked man is labor;
even the labor of a righteous man is peace.
Loving God begins with loving what is good.
Consider the simple, wholesome life of the saints.
Dwell on holy influences, and become as they are.
We could not love God if he had not shown himself to us,
and he could not show himself to us but by loving us.
God is a great mystery because of the world,
and the world is a great mystery because of God.
That you have permitted me to share in the wonder of contemplating you, O Lord, -- this is the grace which I am given. To read your word, and rend my heart. Not to covet an abundance of gifts for myself, but to reflect, and reflect upon, the gifts which already abound in your elect. Not to speak, but to become a worthy audience for those whom you, in your wisdom, have caused to speak. That the prayers of the devout might serve as answers to my own.
Lord, I am desolate amid your treasures! How deep is my ingratitude? You have opened your vaults and still I beg of you. You have given so much! The utterances of just and noble souls fill the world with your bounty. A bookcase, a single book, or even the Word, "Jesus!", is enough to purchase more wisdom than the world can spend; if one but knew how to redeem that coin. For the name of Christ is the gold which meets my hand, like magic, each time I reach for it; so that I become richest when I think myself poor. Lord, teach me to make use of this treasure!
Libraries are monuments of charity, where anyone may go and find gold enough to fill his pockets; that the soul, at least, if not the body of man, may never need to beg.
Nothing we do for God is entirely evil. Including evil.
That love exists -- that even the notion of love exists, is proof that God exists, and that he loves us.
Love is more precious than all the souls and objects it dotes on or upholds. Nothing is more to be loved than love.
Karma is the Law of Moses and Grace is the Law of Christ. Karma is comforting to the just and fearful to the wicked. It is the mercy of justice. Grace is comforting to the wicked and fearful to the just. It is the justice of mercy. Grace really means this: That goodness is always God's. No act of virtue can make that more secure, nor can any act of vice take it away. God has triumphed, once and for all, because goodness is superior to evil by definition. Any supposed advance on the part of evil is only a lie. No matter how persistently it exists, it can never surpass good. The Law of Karma depends upon some reckoning, to make straight what is crooked. But the Law of Grace depends upon nothing, and declares that evil can never win, even when it goes unpunished. Appearances aside, evil is its own punishment, -- its own hell; and good is its own reward, -- its own heaven.
It is innocent to be suspicious among the angels,
and suspicious to be innocent among the ghouls.
The virtuous contemplate virtue, not themselves. They are partakers of the eternal, and magnifiers of the present, because they give themselves over to what is greater than themselves.
At first, I believed, or tried to believe, because it was romantic. A good story. More than anything else, the story of Christ enthralled me. Later, I believed because it was my own.
and groans under the weight of the One he's received.
One cannot look upon goodness or the sun;
the conscience burns from shame and turns away,
or is blinded by pride, if it stares too long.
The Sun would be God, if not for the Night.
Sinners are busy with many things,
but the work of the saints is rest.
Even the peace of a wicked man is labor;
even the labor of a righteous man is peace.
Loving God begins with loving what is good.
Consider the simple, wholesome life of the saints.
Dwell on holy influences, and become as they are.
We could not love God if he had not shown himself to us,
and he could not show himself to us but by loving us.
God is a great mystery because of the world,
and the world is a great mystery because of God.
That you have permitted me to share in the wonder of contemplating you, O Lord, -- this is the grace which I am given. To read your word, and rend my heart. Not to covet an abundance of gifts for myself, but to reflect, and reflect upon, the gifts which already abound in your elect. Not to speak, but to become a worthy audience for those whom you, in your wisdom, have caused to speak. That the prayers of the devout might serve as answers to my own.
Lord, I am desolate amid your treasures! How deep is my ingratitude? You have opened your vaults and still I beg of you. You have given so much! The utterances of just and noble souls fill the world with your bounty. A bookcase, a single book, or even the Word, "Jesus!", is enough to purchase more wisdom than the world can spend; if one but knew how to redeem that coin. For the name of Christ is the gold which meets my hand, like magic, each time I reach for it; so that I become richest when I think myself poor. Lord, teach me to make use of this treasure!
Libraries are monuments of charity, where anyone may go and find gold enough to fill his pockets; that the soul, at least, if not the body of man, may never need to beg.
Nothing we do for God is entirely evil. Including evil.
That love exists -- that even the notion of love exists, is proof that God exists, and that he loves us.
Love is more precious than all the souls and objects it dotes on or upholds. Nothing is more to be loved than love.
Karma is the Law of Moses and Grace is the Law of Christ. Karma is comforting to the just and fearful to the wicked. It is the mercy of justice. Grace is comforting to the wicked and fearful to the just. It is the justice of mercy. Grace really means this: That goodness is always God's. No act of virtue can make that more secure, nor can any act of vice take it away. God has triumphed, once and for all, because goodness is superior to evil by definition. Any supposed advance on the part of evil is only a lie. No matter how persistently it exists, it can never surpass good. The Law of Karma depends upon some reckoning, to make straight what is crooked. But the Law of Grace depends upon nothing, and declares that evil can never win, even when it goes unpunished. Appearances aside, evil is its own punishment, -- its own hell; and good is its own reward, -- its own heaven.
It is innocent to be suspicious among the angels,
and suspicious to be innocent among the ghouls.
The virtuous contemplate virtue, not themselves. They are partakers of the eternal, and magnifiers of the present, because they give themselves over to what is greater than themselves.
At first, I believed, or tried to believe, because it was romantic. A good story. More than anything else, the story of Christ enthralled me. Later, I believed because it was my own.
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