[Excerpted from "Holy Obedience" by Thomas R. Kelly]
Out in front of us is the drama of men and of nations, seething, struggling, laboring, dying. Upon this tragic drama in these days our eyes are all set in anxious watchfulness and prayer. But within the silences of the souls of men an eternal drama is ever being enacted, in these days as well as in others. And on the outcome of this inner drama rests, ultimately, the outer pageant of history...
Meister Eckhart wrote: 'There are plenty to follow our Lord half-way, but not the other half. They will give up possessions, friends, and honors, but it touches them too closely to disown themselves,'...
Our churches, our meeting houses are full of such respectable and amiable people. We have plenty of Quakers to follow God the first half of the way. Many of us have become as mildly and as conventionally religious as were the church folk of three centuries ago, against whose mildness and mediocrity and passionlessness George Fox and his followers flung themselves with all the passion of a glorious and a new discovery and with all the energy of dedicated lives. In some, says William James, religion exists as a dull habit, in others as an acute fever. Religion as a dull habit is not that for which Christ lived and died.
There is a degree of holy and complete obedience and of joyful self-renunciation and of sensitive listening that is breathtaking. Difference of degree passes over into utter difference of kind...
George Fox as a youth was religious enough to meet all earthly standards and was even proposed as a student for the ministry. But the insatiable God-hunger in him drove him from such mediocrity into a passionate quest for the real whole-wheat Bread of Life. Sensible relatives told him to settle down and get married. Thinking him crazy, they took him to a doctor to have his blood let—the equivalent of being taken to a psychiatrist in these days, as are modern conscientious objectors to war in Belgium and France. Parents, if some of your children are seized with this imperative God-hunger, don't tell them to snap out of it and get a job, but carry them patiently in your love, or at least keep hands off and let the holy work of God proceed in their souls. Young people, you who have in you the stirrings of perfection, the sweet, sweet rapture of God Himself within you, be faithful to Him until the last lingering bit of self is surrendered and you are wholly God-possessed.
The life that intends to be wholly obedient, wholly submissive, wholly listening, is astonishing in its completeness. Its joys are ravishing, its peace profound, its humility the deepest, its power world-shaking, its love enveloping, its simplicity that of a trusting child. It is the life and power in which the prophets and apostles lived... It is the life and power of myriads of unknown saints through the ages...
God inflames the soul with a craving for absolute purity... No average goodness will do, no measuring of our lives by our fellows, but only a relentless, inexorable divine standard. No relatives suffice; only absolutes satisfy the soul committed to holy obedience. Absolute honesty, absolute gentleness, absolute self-control, unwearied patience and thoughtfulness in the midst of the raveling friction of home and office and school and shop... Boldly must we risk the dangers which lie along the margins of excess... For the life of obedience is a holy life, a separated life, a renounced life, cut off from worldly compromises, distinct, heaven-dedicated in the midst of men, stainless as the snows upon the mountain tops.
http://www.quaker.org/pamphlets/wpl1939a.html
----
"All we can say is, Prayer is taking place and I am given to be in its orbit. In holy hush we bow in Eternity, and know the Divine Concern tenderly enwrapping us and all things within His persuading love. Here all human initiative has passed in acquiescence, and He works and prays and seeks His own through us, in exquisite, energizing life."
~ Thomas R. Kelly
"As the experience of this inward life matured, Thomas Kelly found himself using language that would have repelled him during his years of rebellion against evangelical religion. 'Have I discovered God as a sweet Presence and a stirring life-renovating Power within me? Do I walk by His Guidance feeding every day, like the knights of the Grail on the body and the blood of Christ?' An Earlham colleague wrote of his visit there in the autumn of 1940, 'He almost startled me, and he shocked some of us who were still walking in the ways of logic and science and the flesh, by the high areas of being he had penetrated. He had returned to old symbols like the blood of Christ, that were shocking to a few of his old colleagues who had not grown and lived as he had. But he brought new meaning to all symbols, and he was to me, and to some others a prophet whose tongue had been touched by coals of fire.'"
~ from: 'A Biographical Memoir' by Douglas V. Steere
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Dependence On God
An inner light warms and pricks to life the cold, tired, congealed soul who waits attentively upon it. But what does it mean to "wait", in a spiritual sense?
To wait is, in fact, to do nothing, perchance to be obliterated.
What every soul entering the inward chambers of the spirit discovers for itself is the simple reality of God's grace; the reality that it is not the creature who prays to God, but God who prays for us in our own depths, and that our proper orientation is not to speak to him, but by him; to listen quietly for those divine stirrings which are already being offered up for us by God in the depths of our souls.
Nothing causes prayer to dry up, -- or, rather, nothing shuts our ears to the everflowing streams of prayer within, -- so quickly as the thought that one is praying and is the source of prayer.
Humility is perhaps the first condition for true receptivity, but the self-conscious conviction that the spiritual life depends upon ourselves and our own decision to respond to the inward call is born of pride. Yet, how many self-professed Christians, for all their talk of Christ, see salvation as dependent upon man; that is, upon themselves, their own choice, and on the choices of others? Far from a heroic act of free will, by which we take the kingdom by storm, and force our own will into alignment with the will of God, the authentic prayer, like the authentic conversion, is one of inaction.
There is one thing in us capable of willing what God wills for us, and that is the will of God in us. Ours is merely to submit. But can one will oneself not to will? Of course not, since that would also be an act of will. The abdication of self-will in submission to the will of God is purely the work of God. When grace does appear to be withheld, it is only the lawful result of the soul's attempt to take credit for grace. Grace is anathema to man's will, and the more one seeks to generate spiritual force by one's own volition the more spiritual force is dissipated.
How then shall we proceed? The only way we can. Stumblingly. For our will is a stumbling block, over which we continually stumble until, utterly in spite of ourselves, we fall upon our knees and into the arms of the Father.
The prerequisite for receptivity to grace is the confession of our own insufficiency. We cannot open to receive the infinite while taking pride in what is finite. All creatures are, in some sense, rebellious to the One who creates. In order to be reborn, it is first necessary to die. We must be consumed, as it were, in the flames of our own personal hell (the flames of pride), before we may rise from the ashes of humility into a new life in Jesus Christ.
To wait is, in fact, to do nothing, perchance to be obliterated.
What every soul entering the inward chambers of the spirit discovers for itself is the simple reality of God's grace; the reality that it is not the creature who prays to God, but God who prays for us in our own depths, and that our proper orientation is not to speak to him, but by him; to listen quietly for those divine stirrings which are already being offered up for us by God in the depths of our souls.
Nothing causes prayer to dry up, -- or, rather, nothing shuts our ears to the everflowing streams of prayer within, -- so quickly as the thought that one is praying and is the source of prayer.
Humility is perhaps the first condition for true receptivity, but the self-conscious conviction that the spiritual life depends upon ourselves and our own decision to respond to the inward call is born of pride. Yet, how many self-professed Christians, for all their talk of Christ, see salvation as dependent upon man; that is, upon themselves, their own choice, and on the choices of others? Far from a heroic act of free will, by which we take the kingdom by storm, and force our own will into alignment with the will of God, the authentic prayer, like the authentic conversion, is one of inaction.
There is one thing in us capable of willing what God wills for us, and that is the will of God in us. Ours is merely to submit. But can one will oneself not to will? Of course not, since that would also be an act of will. The abdication of self-will in submission to the will of God is purely the work of God. When grace does appear to be withheld, it is only the lawful result of the soul's attempt to take credit for grace. Grace is anathema to man's will, and the more one seeks to generate spiritual force by one's own volition the more spiritual force is dissipated.
How then shall we proceed? The only way we can. Stumblingly. For our will is a stumbling block, over which we continually stumble until, utterly in spite of ourselves, we fall upon our knees and into the arms of the Father.
The prerequisite for receptivity to grace is the confession of our own insufficiency. We cannot open to receive the infinite while taking pride in what is finite. All creatures are, in some sense, rebellious to the One who creates. In order to be reborn, it is first necessary to die. We must be consumed, as it were, in the flames of our own personal hell (the flames of pride), before we may rise from the ashes of humility into a new life in Jesus Christ.
Submission To The Present Moment
Whether or not all that happens is according to the will of God, it is clear that God wills for us a patient, unruffled, and selfless submission to all that happens.
It is rightly said that his will consists in neither this nor that, but in a state of self-abandonment to whatever befalls us at any given moment, provided it is the present moment; for what has gone before, however sanctifying it may have been, is no longer useful for us, and what is to come, however sanctifying it may be, is not yet of any use to us. All things which befall us, whether they be good or evil in themselves, provide the raw material for the production of more abundant good within us, if only we receive them equally, as means of practicing submission to God.
Every obstacle, every delay, every inconvenience is in fact an invitation to rejoin the present moment; for what can block our way when we ourselves are the way; what can detain us when we ourselves are the destination; and what can inconvenience us when everything we encounter may be put to higher use?
So it is that we ought not to prefer one thing to another, -- riches to poverty, health to sickness, life to death, and even good to evil, -- for holiness consists in this: complete acceptance of whatever comes as being that which is most efficacious for the development of our soul; if only because it is that alone which occupies the present moment and is, therefore, the only means of which we may make use.
Monday, May 28, 2012
Grains of Salt (excerpt)
Women have flowers. Men have women.
Milk for babes, and tears for strong men.
We cringe before the moment, and crow before eternity.
Humility works hard to satisfy its pride.
Pride covets Virtue; vanity covets her appearance.
Good men find their greatest pleasure in being virtuous,
while the rest of us find great pleasure a virtue.
We tend to lose sympathy for a man to the extent that his suffering,
having quite overwhelmed him, begins to affect ourselves.
We generally reproach a man for the immodesty of his suffering
when it is ourselves who cannot bear so much as the suggestion of it.
Though you may not always bring your imagination to life,
you may always bring life to your imagination, --
and that is the finer thing.
I give my Lord this moment, all else I leave to Him.
The earth is a part of you,
no less than the foot that walks upon it.
In fact, you would last longer without the foot.
Cynicism is the denial of hope by the fear of disappointment.
Substance is the height of style;
good form takes the form of the good.
Patience isn’t waiting for something.
Courage is ripeness of will.
A warm humor satisfies all paradoxes.
Children always think they're playing.
Wise men carve the loneliest paths;
fools are always finding each other.
Some won't drink, but want a drunk.
It is superfluous to judge a man if he is guilty in his own eyes,
and ridiculous if he is not.
The moral sense is strong in some, weak in others,
yet, even in this, the strong still persecute the weak.
Hatred of evil is the craftiest and least well-known of vices,
so easily is it mistaken for love of good.
Asking God for mercy and forgiveness is like asking the sun for light and heat; these belong to the incorruptible nature of divinity itself; and, 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.
In silence there is sweetness.
Words fall, and often rise, into this;
and fall back through, to rise again.
Nothing teaches, and nothing prejudices, like experience.
We walk clumsily in another man's shoes,
when we've yet to remove our own.
Dreams are the rebellion of sleep,
and stars are swords raised against a dethroned sun.
The soul is a fallen woman,
and the Lord, her unlikely suitor.
She eyes Him always with suspicion,
unable to believe that her longing
is answered by His love.
She is coy, elusive, silly.
He is sincere and devoted in pursuit.
By and by, He will win her heart,
and, with it, the dowry of the world.
In the same direction, forgiveness walks,
understanding runs, and love takes flight.
The first requirement for greatness is the audacity to be great;
one must begin upon the heights to ascend beyond the clouds.
The heart is a treasurehouse,
where the sweetest things are preserved.
Inventions are higher discoveries. --
God is our most ingenious invention,
and our highest discovery.
The bell of the world is struck
by the birth of the man, or is silent.
Every head is a headstone;
every body, a grave for restless spirits.
I am a ferment of other minds.
The view that is not represented is never assented to.
My passion is tame. It's my reason that's wild.
Every man's philosophy is his own;
it will never fit anyone so well as himself,
and, even then, it will begin to pinch.
Have you been blinded in the darkest depths?
You will be blinded in the light, as well.
Look around you now.
The nut may not fall far from the tree,
but the roots spread into eternity.
The horizon recedes on the crest of an eternal dusk.
The wisdom of the earth is lofty in the underworld.
The sins of a humble man are always before him,
therefore he judges no one; but a proud man overlooks
his own sins to look upon the sins of another.
A genius is a man who has his madness,
but whose madness does not have him.
We resent the ones
who have given us the most,
for not having given us more;
it is with them that our appetites
and expectations have been spoiled.
The world is a longing for God.
God is a furnace of mystery,
and all creation is burning with questions.
All things speak of God, but the Voice of God is Silence.
Grace is a gust of wind, prayer is a beating of wings.
Speaking well is the art of treating with equal respect
the claims of both honesty and tact.
What is good cannot be true. Only what is great can be true. Truth belongs to the heights. She is free and without purpose, because she is great, and not good; purposefulness is good, but pure being is great. A good teacher teaches with purpose, so that others may learn. But a great teacher teaches for no reason at all, and only because she is a true teacher. What is true has no purpose; this is what it means to truly "be".
Liars are always the last to hear the truths they speak.
To know an aphorism is human;
to know when to apply it, divine.
Who is more unreasonable:
the man who possesses no respect for human life,
or the man who expects it of him?
If a man is unfit to judge himself, who is fit to judge him?
A man who judges thinks he can enforce the laws of righteousness
by sacrificing the first among them.
Ask yourself if you are dreaming and, at once, you begin to awaken.
We are frequently engaged in many places at once, and present nowhere.
Our broken songs are half-composed,
and we ourselves, half-composed;
we sing ourselves,
and sing ourselves completely.
Great truths are dropped from great heights,
so they are sure to crush a few egos.
He has courage to attack who lacks courage to defend.
It is easy to disregard a man's objection, and to rise above his offense, if we consider him a simple lunatic or brute. It is only to the extent that we respect him or his opinion, that we may even be provoked by them at all. We must have some humility for our pride to be stung.
There is divinity in idealism; to have an ideal is not to be godless, --
and it is a kind of blessedness to remain faithful to one's ideal.
To admit when you are wrong,
suggests that it is not your pride
which insists on being right.
Every school should have a garden.
Every word is an Arcanum.
Reason is to revelation
what the mind is to the soul.
Reason mediates revelation:
mind mediates soul.
Form is modest, beautiful and deep, like silence.
For men of action, simplicity is character;
for men of thought, it is suicide.
The essential difference between a philosopher
and someone who is not a philosopher is this:
Both have a head full of contradictory and irreconcilable points of view,
but the philosopher knows it, -- and, beyond knowing it,
embraces this conflict as the fountainhead of creative thinking.
There is no such thing as "the last word", in wisdom, or in anything else. Even conversations continue when those who conversed have gone their separate ways. And there may be systems of philosophy, and men who claim to belong to them, but this is also a fib. No man has ever agreed on the essential points with any other man who has ever lived. Not entirely. We may have to dig for him, but we always find the individual. Though he surrender his reason to the common faith, he cannot silence the mind which whispers even out of the deep unconscious; and every mind is uniquely formed.
I’ve not chosen a religion, but I’ve tasted the many cups.
To drunkards who protest that I drink not, but merely swish and spit,
I say, “Perhaps I am a connoisseur.”
They wear crosses like anchors around their necks,
and fall on their knees like ships run aground;
their hands, joined in prayer, fork the sand:
"Lord, deliver us from oceans, though we be ships!"
There are those who see shipwrecked men,
and say, "The sea is off-limits to sensible men."
Perhaps it is so, and I would rather be senseless.
The truth of love, spoken clearly, is like a great flood, purging the land of all that is merely superficial and unrooted in the natural order. Nothing false can stand in its wake. The mouths of the foolish and the wicked are stopped, and the tides of ignorance and animosity ebb like phantoms in the morning light. Only the truth of love has this magnificent cleansing power. But it must be spoken. It must never be silent.
Silence is the wisdom of the foolish and the folly of the wise.
If fools could be silent, wisdom could speak.
That which is mortal in us is undisturbed by loud noises and harsh words. Being of the same nature as these, it will only grow louder and more harsh itself, in order to accommodate them. But that which is divine is truly delicate. The slightest noise, the merest hint of discord, is enough to dispel it. A mound of stones is not upset by a strong wind, but a mound of powder is lost in the weakest breeze. Though we may not disturb what is coarse by behaving in our usual way, we must take greater care not to disturb what is fine. So it is that we must be gentle with one another, not for the sake of what is mortal, but for the sake of what is divine.
Like a vagrant,
I fall asleep on the steps of my prayer,
and never ascend to the door of His love.
A thousand unlocked doors between us,
but I still search for a key.
To be precise, Lord, I do not believe
in the peacefulness of your kingdom,
but in the kingdom of your peace.
Fools will say that you are most yourself
when you are least in control of yourself.
The very sunlight which pours through our hands is pure gold,
and the very idea of love is love freely given.
Milk for babes, and tears for strong men.
We cringe before the moment, and crow before eternity.
Humility works hard to satisfy its pride.
Pride covets Virtue; vanity covets her appearance.
Good men find their greatest pleasure in being virtuous,
while the rest of us find great pleasure a virtue.
We tend to lose sympathy for a man to the extent that his suffering,
having quite overwhelmed him, begins to affect ourselves.
We generally reproach a man for the immodesty of his suffering
when it is ourselves who cannot bear so much as the suggestion of it.
Though you may not always bring your imagination to life,
you may always bring life to your imagination, --
and that is the finer thing.
I give my Lord this moment, all else I leave to Him.
The earth is a part of you,
no less than the foot that walks upon it.
In fact, you would last longer without the foot.
Cynicism is the denial of hope by the fear of disappointment.
Substance is the height of style;
good form takes the form of the good.
Patience isn’t waiting for something.
Courage is ripeness of will.
A warm humor satisfies all paradoxes.
Children always think they're playing.
Wise men carve the loneliest paths;
fools are always finding each other.
Some won't drink, but want a drunk.
It is superfluous to judge a man if he is guilty in his own eyes,
and ridiculous if he is not.
The moral sense is strong in some, weak in others,
yet, even in this, the strong still persecute the weak.
Hatred of evil is the craftiest and least well-known of vices,
so easily is it mistaken for love of good.
Asking God for mercy and forgiveness is like asking the sun for light and heat; these belong to the incorruptible nature of divinity itself; and, 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.
In silence there is sweetness.
Words fall, and often rise, into this;
and fall back through, to rise again.
Nothing teaches, and nothing prejudices, like experience.
We walk clumsily in another man's shoes,
when we've yet to remove our own.
Dreams are the rebellion of sleep,
and stars are swords raised against a dethroned sun.
The soul is a fallen woman,
and the Lord, her unlikely suitor.
She eyes Him always with suspicion,
unable to believe that her longing
is answered by His love.
She is coy, elusive, silly.
He is sincere and devoted in pursuit.
By and by, He will win her heart,
and, with it, the dowry of the world.
In the same direction, forgiveness walks,
understanding runs, and love takes flight.
The first requirement for greatness is the audacity to be great;
one must begin upon the heights to ascend beyond the clouds.
The heart is a treasurehouse,
where the sweetest things are preserved.
Inventions are higher discoveries. --
God is our most ingenious invention,
and our highest discovery.
The bell of the world is struck
by the birth of the man, or is silent.
Every head is a headstone;
every body, a grave for restless spirits.
I am a ferment of other minds.
The view that is not represented is never assented to.
My passion is tame. It's my reason that's wild.
Every man's philosophy is his own;
it will never fit anyone so well as himself,
and, even then, it will begin to pinch.
Have you been blinded in the darkest depths?
You will be blinded in the light, as well.
Look around you now.
The nut may not fall far from the tree,
but the roots spread into eternity.
The horizon recedes on the crest of an eternal dusk.
The wisdom of the earth is lofty in the underworld.
The sins of a humble man are always before him,
therefore he judges no one; but a proud man overlooks
his own sins to look upon the sins of another.
A genius is a man who has his madness,
but whose madness does not have him.
We resent the ones
who have given us the most,
for not having given us more;
it is with them that our appetites
and expectations have been spoiled.
The world is a longing for God.
God is a furnace of mystery,
and all creation is burning with questions.
All things speak of God, but the Voice of God is Silence.
Grace is a gust of wind, prayer is a beating of wings.
Speaking well is the art of treating with equal respect
the claims of both honesty and tact.
What is good cannot be true. Only what is great can be true. Truth belongs to the heights. She is free and without purpose, because she is great, and not good; purposefulness is good, but pure being is great. A good teacher teaches with purpose, so that others may learn. But a great teacher teaches for no reason at all, and only because she is a true teacher. What is true has no purpose; this is what it means to truly "be".
Liars are always the last to hear the truths they speak.
To know an aphorism is human;
to know when to apply it, divine.
Who is more unreasonable:
the man who possesses no respect for human life,
or the man who expects it of him?
If a man is unfit to judge himself, who is fit to judge him?
A man who judges thinks he can enforce the laws of righteousness
by sacrificing the first among them.
Ask yourself if you are dreaming and, at once, you begin to awaken.
We are frequently engaged in many places at once, and present nowhere.
Our broken songs are half-composed,
and we ourselves, half-composed;
we sing ourselves,
and sing ourselves completely.
Great truths are dropped from great heights,
so they are sure to crush a few egos.
He has courage to attack who lacks courage to defend.
It is easy to disregard a man's objection, and to rise above his offense, if we consider him a simple lunatic or brute. It is only to the extent that we respect him or his opinion, that we may even be provoked by them at all. We must have some humility for our pride to be stung.
There is divinity in idealism; to have an ideal is not to be godless, --
and it is a kind of blessedness to remain faithful to one's ideal.
To admit when you are wrong,
suggests that it is not your pride
which insists on being right.
Every school should have a garden.
Every word is an Arcanum.
Reason is to revelation
what the mind is to the soul.
Reason mediates revelation:
mind mediates soul.
Form is modest, beautiful and deep, like silence.
For men of action, simplicity is character;
for men of thought, it is suicide.
The essential difference between a philosopher
and someone who is not a philosopher is this:
Both have a head full of contradictory and irreconcilable points of view,
but the philosopher knows it, -- and, beyond knowing it,
embraces this conflict as the fountainhead of creative thinking.
There is no such thing as "the last word", in wisdom, or in anything else. Even conversations continue when those who conversed have gone their separate ways. And there may be systems of philosophy, and men who claim to belong to them, but this is also a fib. No man has ever agreed on the essential points with any other man who has ever lived. Not entirely. We may have to dig for him, but we always find the individual. Though he surrender his reason to the common faith, he cannot silence the mind which whispers even out of the deep unconscious; and every mind is uniquely formed.
I’ve not chosen a religion, but I’ve tasted the many cups.
To drunkards who protest that I drink not, but merely swish and spit,
I say, “Perhaps I am a connoisseur.”
They wear crosses like anchors around their necks,
and fall on their knees like ships run aground;
their hands, joined in prayer, fork the sand:
"Lord, deliver us from oceans, though we be ships!"
There are those who see shipwrecked men,
and say, "The sea is off-limits to sensible men."
Perhaps it is so, and I would rather be senseless.
The truth of love, spoken clearly, is like a great flood, purging the land of all that is merely superficial and unrooted in the natural order. Nothing false can stand in its wake. The mouths of the foolish and the wicked are stopped, and the tides of ignorance and animosity ebb like phantoms in the morning light. Only the truth of love has this magnificent cleansing power. But it must be spoken. It must never be silent.
Silence is the wisdom of the foolish and the folly of the wise.
If fools could be silent, wisdom could speak.
That which is mortal in us is undisturbed by loud noises and harsh words. Being of the same nature as these, it will only grow louder and more harsh itself, in order to accommodate them. But that which is divine is truly delicate. The slightest noise, the merest hint of discord, is enough to dispel it. A mound of stones is not upset by a strong wind, but a mound of powder is lost in the weakest breeze. Though we may not disturb what is coarse by behaving in our usual way, we must take greater care not to disturb what is fine. So it is that we must be gentle with one another, not for the sake of what is mortal, but for the sake of what is divine.
Like a vagrant,
I fall asleep on the steps of my prayer,
and never ascend to the door of His love.
A thousand unlocked doors between us,
but I still search for a key.
To be precise, Lord, I do not believe
in the peacefulness of your kingdom,
but in the kingdom of your peace.
Fools will say that you are most yourself
when you are least in control of yourself.
The very sunlight which pours through our hands is pure gold,
and the very idea of love is love freely given.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Crisis of Faith
What an uttery mockery our worship has become! We turn away from God, who is within, in order to praise him outwardly. Truly, it is not God whom we praise thusly, but a false spectre, made in the image of man to flatter man.
Saturday, May 19, 2012
A Prayer For Prayer
My Dear Lord Christ, I knock as a prodigal and a stranger at the door of my own heart, where your Holy Family resides, remembering the sweet words which the Father, by His Spirit, has spoken to you, and you to me; that I also may speak them, and gain admittance therein.
'The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.'
Pardon my long absence, Lord, and have mercy on a sinner who has strayed so far from his own front door. I have learned strange, angry, unholy languages, and all but forgotten my native tongue. Help me, My Own Jesus, to remember where I come from; for I have taken on airs, and denied my humble origins. Let me put off these rings and accessories, and be ornamented in God's pure light. Show me how to rend my stately robes to make a cassock, strait and plain.
Sweet Christ, uphold my prayer! Gather all my strength into a single point, and let not my thoughts sink for a moment back into aimless disarray. Dear Angels, intervene! How swiftly might your wings carry me to the Heart of Jesus, the heart of my heart. Blessed Mother, guide me in spite of my reluctance. Holy Spirit, you are subtle; slip as a thief into my innermost chamber, and leave me not outside.
Feeble is my prayer, but boundless is the vigor of your grace, Dear Christ. By my own power, I cannot so much as lift my eyes from the dirt; how shall I see that all the world is funeral ash in the immolation of Love's emergence? You must grant me your eternal vision, O Lord; what is highest and best must be seen to eclipse all created things. I know that this is also your prayer for me.
Uphold this soul in worship; let me not forget my place. All glories flow from you, and ebb back to you, My God! All that can be praised is but an infinitesimal adjunct of your infinite goodness, Lord; yet, every little note of praise undoubtedly reaches and pleases you, for it comes from you.
Jesus, let not the devil deflect my prayer! I know the weariness and restlessness which hamper my best efforts are vestiges of evil. How shall I make use of more prosaic terms, when speaking of the war which a man's higher and lower natures wage against one another? It is a civil war, which does not draw a line of division through a nation, but right through the soul of every individual, wherever he is located. It is that upon which the very meaning and value of every life depends.
Hold me up, Lord, in the grace which levitates the elect, and offers a hand to all that is falling, fallen, broken, or out of body. Christ, you are my hope, my compass, my beacon, my savior, my refuge. When you are out of my thoughts it seems you do not exist, but when grace illumines my mind it seems you are all that exists. My Sweet Jesus, I will call you in ten-thousand ways, and ten-thousand times in every way, until your grace penetrates my stubborn will and finally conforms me to the will of God.
You are My Lover, My Master, My Teacher, My Brother, My Truth. You are male or female, light or dark, earth or sky, close or far, in glory or in chains -- depending on the subtle requirements of the moment. Letter becomes Spirit; words and images become metaphors, while metaphors become supple, liquid, unable to hold their shape in the higher realms of contemplation. All that can be said is water mingling with water. Meaning is ephemeral. Realization lasts but a moment. What is eternal cannot be turned over. My God, when I think you are this, you have already become that!
Hold me up, once more, My Lord! Sparkle like sunlight through a green mind. Tickle my thoughts like wind in the leaves. Bless my fine intentions; carry them safely to the holy shore. O My God, how I long to sing a new and wonderful song of praise to you! My limbs, despite their ignorance of the steps, carry me up, and already I am dancing to an unknown melody. My eyes are gazing upward to reflect a light they cannot see. My heart would leap through your embrace directly into your bosom, Lord!
Shall I cease my prayer, when I am given light? Have I accomplished what I intended? God forbid! When my heart's one true desire is to be eternally united with Love! I shall not stop, but be encouraged to renew my strength; to breathe and bear-up. Grace is a gust of wind, prayer is a beating of wings; therefore, let me not be like the gull who drifts on a lucky gust of wind, but like the eagle who beats her wings most vigorously precisely when the wind uplifts her, that she may reach still greater heights. My Holy Spirit, I come not only to bask, but to make use of your grace, for such is the quality of grace which you have given me. I thank you, Lord, and bless you (as quaint as this may sound), for you have not placed the pen in my hand without placing my hand in yours; you have not given me gifts without giving me the will -- your own will -- to use them.
Gentle Lord, come to me in whatever form I may recieve you, for your creative power is inexhaustible, while my mind is narrow and easily bored. Send to me the Blessed Virgin, with a train of many angels in toe. Let her soft gaze cool my brow, after I have stood beneath the cross and sweated from the heat of your sad and serious eye. Send me flowers when I forget them; a staff when I should stand; a sword when I should lay it down. Provide what is needful for the moment, and always open my eyes to the gifts which you continually set before me.
Take care to keep me humble, Lord, -- or make me so; for I am not. Lead me, lest I wander and not recover the way. Teach me to see that, if ever I grow puffed-up with all my praying, then it is no longer prayer, but an invocation of another kind which fills my pages and gathers force. Bring me to my senses, Lord; for, surely, arrogance is madness of a most deplorable kind. Resurrect me, Jesus, from the pit of pride; from a fate less dignified than death. If I make so poor a use of prayer, then let this gift be taken from me. My God, My God, I place my trust in you!
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, may your name be honored until the end of the world, for it is the treasure of the world. Amen
'The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.'
Pardon my long absence, Lord, and have mercy on a sinner who has strayed so far from his own front door. I have learned strange, angry, unholy languages, and all but forgotten my native tongue. Help me, My Own Jesus, to remember where I come from; for I have taken on airs, and denied my humble origins. Let me put off these rings and accessories, and be ornamented in God's pure light. Show me how to rend my stately robes to make a cassock, strait and plain.
Sweet Christ, uphold my prayer! Gather all my strength into a single point, and let not my thoughts sink for a moment back into aimless disarray. Dear Angels, intervene! How swiftly might your wings carry me to the Heart of Jesus, the heart of my heart. Blessed Mother, guide me in spite of my reluctance. Holy Spirit, you are subtle; slip as a thief into my innermost chamber, and leave me not outside.
Feeble is my prayer, but boundless is the vigor of your grace, Dear Christ. By my own power, I cannot so much as lift my eyes from the dirt; how shall I see that all the world is funeral ash in the immolation of Love's emergence? You must grant me your eternal vision, O Lord; what is highest and best must be seen to eclipse all created things. I know that this is also your prayer for me.
Uphold this soul in worship; let me not forget my place. All glories flow from you, and ebb back to you, My God! All that can be praised is but an infinitesimal adjunct of your infinite goodness, Lord; yet, every little note of praise undoubtedly reaches and pleases you, for it comes from you.
Jesus, let not the devil deflect my prayer! I know the weariness and restlessness which hamper my best efforts are vestiges of evil. How shall I make use of more prosaic terms, when speaking of the war which a man's higher and lower natures wage against one another? It is a civil war, which does not draw a line of division through a nation, but right through the soul of every individual, wherever he is located. It is that upon which the very meaning and value of every life depends.
Hold me up, Lord, in the grace which levitates the elect, and offers a hand to all that is falling, fallen, broken, or out of body. Christ, you are my hope, my compass, my beacon, my savior, my refuge. When you are out of my thoughts it seems you do not exist, but when grace illumines my mind it seems you are all that exists. My Sweet Jesus, I will call you in ten-thousand ways, and ten-thousand times in every way, until your grace penetrates my stubborn will and finally conforms me to the will of God.
You are My Lover, My Master, My Teacher, My Brother, My Truth. You are male or female, light or dark, earth or sky, close or far, in glory or in chains -- depending on the subtle requirements of the moment. Letter becomes Spirit; words and images become metaphors, while metaphors become supple, liquid, unable to hold their shape in the higher realms of contemplation. All that can be said is water mingling with water. Meaning is ephemeral. Realization lasts but a moment. What is eternal cannot be turned over. My God, when I think you are this, you have already become that!
Hold me up, once more, My Lord! Sparkle like sunlight through a green mind. Tickle my thoughts like wind in the leaves. Bless my fine intentions; carry them safely to the holy shore. O My God, how I long to sing a new and wonderful song of praise to you! My limbs, despite their ignorance of the steps, carry me up, and already I am dancing to an unknown melody. My eyes are gazing upward to reflect a light they cannot see. My heart would leap through your embrace directly into your bosom, Lord!
Shall I cease my prayer, when I am given light? Have I accomplished what I intended? God forbid! When my heart's one true desire is to be eternally united with Love! I shall not stop, but be encouraged to renew my strength; to breathe and bear-up. Grace is a gust of wind, prayer is a beating of wings; therefore, let me not be like the gull who drifts on a lucky gust of wind, but like the eagle who beats her wings most vigorously precisely when the wind uplifts her, that she may reach still greater heights. My Holy Spirit, I come not only to bask, but to make use of your grace, for such is the quality of grace which you have given me. I thank you, Lord, and bless you (as quaint as this may sound), for you have not placed the pen in my hand without placing my hand in yours; you have not given me gifts without giving me the will -- your own will -- to use them.
Gentle Lord, come to me in whatever form I may recieve you, for your creative power is inexhaustible, while my mind is narrow and easily bored. Send to me the Blessed Virgin, with a train of many angels in toe. Let her soft gaze cool my brow, after I have stood beneath the cross and sweated from the heat of your sad and serious eye. Send me flowers when I forget them; a staff when I should stand; a sword when I should lay it down. Provide what is needful for the moment, and always open my eyes to the gifts which you continually set before me.
Take care to keep me humble, Lord, -- or make me so; for I am not. Lead me, lest I wander and not recover the way. Teach me to see that, if ever I grow puffed-up with all my praying, then it is no longer prayer, but an invocation of another kind which fills my pages and gathers force. Bring me to my senses, Lord; for, surely, arrogance is madness of a most deplorable kind. Resurrect me, Jesus, from the pit of pride; from a fate less dignified than death. If I make so poor a use of prayer, then let this gift be taken from me. My God, My God, I place my trust in you!
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, may your name be honored until the end of the world, for it is the treasure of the world. Amen
Friday, May 18, 2012
Addicted To Love (or Venus In Retrograde)
In the later stages of addiction, one no longer takes the drug to get high, but to feel "normal"; not to withdraw. Love being one of the more common drugs, we can often observe this principle fairly clearly in relationships.
The sweet words, affectionate carresses, kind gestures, and warm attentions -- these all become background noise for a time, until, spurned and neglected, they are withdrawn; and then it is we who begin to withdraw, as addicts do. Only then do we feel what they meant to us. And when we reclaim them, if ever we do, it is with a new appreciation, which even extends backwards to what has gone before, as if to settle the old debts.
This cycle is played out innumerable times in personal relationships before it is translated entirely into the spiritual realm, where, even then, it continues for some time before the soul can be carved into an easy channel for love; before one can learn to hold it and let it go, like water through a cleft, or sunlight between fingers.
God, too, gives more love than we can appreciate, or appraise, yet His love is never withdrawn; it only appears so to us, for we have neglected it so long, and forgotten how to weigh it; like men who trade gold and silver as though it were iron and tin, wondering all the time where the precious metals have gone.
If we saw, just once, the real value of love, we would see that it is all around; for it would never leave our thoughts, but would send roots into the deepest and hardest soil of our hearts, until it produced an abundance of leaves, flowers, and fruits inside and all around us.
We do not see that the very sunlight which pours through our hands is pure gold, and the very idea of love is love freely given.
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