Clinging to Such Things

The task of a Zen master has been described as “stealing the farmer’s cow” or “snatching the beggar’s bowl,” that is, taking away a person’s most important possession. The thought of Zen, the Dharma, the Way of Buddha, your zazen practice, and the idea of yourself – it means taking away all these things. If the farmer’s cow or the beggar’s bowl is taken away, there is nothing left for them to do. As long as someone is desperately clinging to such things, it is impossible to die, that is, to truly give up your ego-self. ~Sekkei Harada, via Andrew

As I think of the way life takes away our most important possessions, my first thought is not to give thanks but more likely to want to lash out at something. That’s okay. Lash out at spirit, as did the Psalmist. ~jpc

O, to be detached. Namaste.

Sharing Approaches that Work

How to deal with global warming? Screaming meemees turn off more than they convert. “Action removes the doubt that theory cannot solve.”

Here are some actions that have caught my attention lately: a wind turbine company in Texas making money and providing jobs as they supply power to a million homes; hybrid car trend; refitting urban buses (GM); Portland’s integrated strategy; adapting to the future (e.g., prohibitive insurance and no government subsidies for coastal development); cancel catalogs, magazines, and newspapers to save trees (flip side: Kenya’s Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai has catalyzed the planting of 30 million trees in Africa).

A “Sharing Approaches that Work” campaign would be timely and worthy of Nobel/Pulitzer-type prizes. Suggest it to your local groups, media, companies, foundations, and governments. ~jpc

Argue the blue and red scene / but actively pray for green. Namaste.

Milk Shake Wake

After the service, we invited people to a reception in the church fellowship hall for milk shakes. . . . Our mother [Obera Bergdall] was a lifetime teetotaler and always served milk shakes instead. With that context, we invited people to share stories and memories about her. There were about hundred people there who shared stories for about a half an hour before heading to the cemetery. A mid-afternoon wake with milk shakes is just the kind of “different” approach my mother would have really enjoyed! ~Terry Bergdall, son

Let us celebrate life and death. Namaste.

Note: There were three eulogies, two by former Governors of Oklahoma. Also messages were read from a third Governor, a Senator, and a Presidential candidate.

Truth and Love Are the Answer

He [Bill Coffin] never lost his conviction that a better world is possible if we fight hard enough. At a dinner in his honor in Washington he had reminded us that “the world is too dangerous for anything but truth and too small for anything but love.” But as we left he winked at me and said, “Give’em hell.” ~Bill Moyers, “Remembering Bill Coffin,” via Harry Wainwright

Another has engraved his saintliness on the American soul and left us to figure out where and how we engrave ours. ~jpc

"The world is too dangerous for anything but truth and too small for anything but love." Namaste.

Instrument of Notension

knowing > attention
doing > intention
being > notension

Of course there is tension, as with Jesus in Gethsemane, but there is a radical communion with spirit at the heart of the situation, that transparentizes knowing and doing, as though one sees through and walks through walls. It is the “notension” of being at one with spirit, in a state of 100 percent intensity and 100 percent detachment. ~jpc

O to be an instrument of notension. Namaste.

Image: "Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane," John S. C. Abbott and Jacob Abbott, Illustrated New Testament (1878)

Note: Our Dad, Peyton, would have been 100 today. He was one who lost it all during the Great Depression, but lived to make sure his children had a great chance. On his shoulders we stand and give thanks for his great journey.

An Ordinary Life

On the forty-fifth anniversary of the [4/19/1943 Warsaw Ghetto] uprising, a survivor named Irena Klepfisz said, “What we grieve for is not the loss of a grand vision, but rather the loss of common things, events and gestures. . . . Ordinariness is the most precious thing we struggle for, what the Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto fought for. Not noble causes or abstract theories. But the right to go on living with a sense of purpose and a sense of self-worth – an ordinary life.”

~www.writersalmanac.publicradio.org

How many in creation are "grieving for" an ordinary life? Namaste.

Whose Am I?

Whose am I if none of these:
Neither Christian, Jew, nor Moslem.
Not of East, West, North, or South;
Not of Nature nor Universe stars.
Not of Europe nor the U.S. of A.;
Not of this world nor the next.
Neither body nor soul, I belong to spirit:
The One I seek, call, see, and know.

~Rumi, adapted by jpc

Call it “one,” “father,” “buddha,” “allah,” “christ,” or “spirit,” we know the One, for we have heard, seen, felt, and communed that power. ~jpc

I belong to spirit. Namaste.

Story Releases Life

We watched “Anne Frank Remembered” (1995 Oscar-winning documentary) recently and again became aware that without the presentation of the story much of the meaning of life in the past, present, and future is not. Story makes significant our common journey. Anne’s diary, its myriad publications, all the witnesses, the documentary team, and the DVD – they tell a powerful story that did not end in death in a concentration camp but ends up in our imagination.

We are all beckoned to help tell the story that releases life – both for the ones who hear it and the ones who tell it. ~jpc

All stories, including yours and mine, are crucial to the utterly significant journey. Namaste.

Note: In this regard, look forward to Bishop Mathew’s story of Brother Joe: A 20th Century Apostle. Also, read the comment under yesterday's quote by Diana Eck, which has web sites and photos of play about diversity by Donna Zigenhorn , member of this list.

Communion or Consequences

Pluralism is not just another word for diversity. It goes beyond mere plurality or diversity to active engagement with that plurality. Pluralism goes beyond mere tolerance to the active attempt to understand the other. Pluralism is not simply relativism. It does not displace or eliminate deep religious commitments, or secular commitments for that matter. It is rather the encounter of commitments. ~Diana Eck, A New Religious America: How a "Christian Country" Has Become the World's Most Religiously Diverse Nation, via Randy Williams

Each being has its priority of commitments. The only way we can be an authentic community locally, globally, and universally is to bow to the other, repeating this mantra adapted from Buber: “Willed for a life of communion.” ~jpc

Communion or consequences. Namaste.

Happy Earth Day: go to http://www.vanityfair.com/features/general/articles/060417fege07 for the best article I’ve read on global warming; finally the rest of the world and the rest of the USA is not waiting on the U.S. Government to deal forcefully with global warming (via Harry Wainwright)

Transparency

All of us see life go transparent. All of us experience our ordinary images of living being transformed and deep stuff oozing and sometimes rushing in. Think of a movie clip as an example of when you have experienced that wonder.

For me, the Gandhi movie had many such clips. I can’t forget what I saw and experienced there: a peek at the mystery, depth, and greatness of being human. I was in touch with a high-water mark of what a human is. I felt ennobled just being a part of the same species, swelling with pride, knowing that I had capacity for compassion and courage and sacrificial service. Little wonder I also experienced fear as well as fascination as I imagined myself enacting such clips. ~jpc

Spirit can do its thing in us even when we're sitting there eating popcorn. Nowhere to hide. Namaste.

"I'm O.K., You're Biased"

A Princeton University research team asked people to estimate how susceptible they and “the average person” were to a long list of judgmental biases; the majority of people claimed to be less biased than the majority of people. . . .

And yet, if decision-makers are more biased than they realize, they are less biased than the rest of us suspect. Research shows that while people underestimate the influence of self-interest on their own judgments and decisions, they overestimate its influence on others. ~Daniel Gilbert, “I’m O.K., You’re Biased,” nytimes.com, 4/16/2006

Welcome to the human race:
we overestimate ourselves
and underestimate the rest.
Though everyone’s judgments are wrong,
life miraculously goes on.

~jpc

Thankfully we biased are accepted. Namaste.

image: One cannot look at this image without a bias.

Easter Fulfillment

On Easter we hiked for three hours in the National Forest behind our house – quite a strenuous hike up the mountains. At the top we sat on a huge rock and meditated in the sereneness of Nature. Awesome. ~Roseanne Sands, via Lynda (image: NC Appalachian Mountains -- 1,000,000,000 yrs. old)

Why is Easter so fulfilling? We united with our children and five grandchildren in Virginia, at the farm (Rosedale, 1790) of Lynda's sister, Diane, and her family and grandchildren. Everyone was wondrously rejuvenated just sitting, talking, and eating under the trees; and by walking, running, and playing in the fields. ~jpc

Easter is an earthy, spirit-filled celebration. Namaste.

Our clan: Kelley, Clara, Jeremiah, Kaitlyn, Veronica, Nolan, John, Lynda, Preston, Lyndon, and John II (there were four generations present, counting Lynda and Diane's father)

Language is Language is Language

Of everything one may ultimately say that, whether one uses man-language or God-language, it comes to the same thing in the end. . . . This means that we must be able to translate the traditional language of the cosmic Christ, existing supernaturally as a metaphysical Being, into the worldly language of a Christic cosmos. ~JAT Robinson

What is the language trying to describe? That the divine happens in the temporal. Quite enough to know. ~jpc

The Spirit enforces the stars in their courses,
The sun in its orbit obediently shine;
The hills and the mountains, the rivers and fountains,
The deeps of the ocean proclaim the divine.

~Katherine K. Davis, adapted by jpc

"Let all things now living a song of thanksgiving." Namaste.

image: "Gratitude" by John Vega http://www.dancingimage.com/gallery32.htm

An Easter Message

To say that “life is good” is not a personal, social, or ecological reality, but an ontological reality, which means that life, as it is, doesn’t get any better than this, however “this” shows up. The power at the heart of life is full of grace: always accepting, forgiving, and loving; always enlivening, transforming, and resurrecting. Death is not the last frontier. Possibility, born of grace, is.

There is no time, place, or relationship that is not grounded in the reality of grace; therefore, life hates the phrase “but for the grace of God there go I.” It loves the phrase “t’weren’t for grace none would go.” In the world of grace, which is the only world there is, there is no such thing as the wrong time, the wrong place, or the wrong relationship. This time, this place, and this relationship are absolutely good because grace is (the ontic factor).

Evolutionarily, grace is always birthing a new ecological, social, and personal reality. If our knowing and doing are not grounded in grace (and most knowing and doing that I observe are not), guess what: a graceless ecology, sociality, and personality abort the good life for all concerned. ~jpc

Grace is the heart of all, and we deny it at our peril. Namaste.

image: the Illinois GRACE Project (Global Resource Adaptation through CoopEration) rsim.cs.uiuc.edu/grace/

"Enough! the Resurrection"

… Enough! the Resurrection,
A héart's-clarion! Awáy grief's gásping,
joyless days, dejection.
Across my foundering deck shone
A beacon, an eternal beam.
Flesh fade, and mortal trash
Fáll to the resíduary worm;
world's wildfire, leave but ash:

In a flash, at a trumpet crash,
I am all at once what Christ is,
since he was what I am, and
Thís Jack, jóke, poor pótsherd,
patch, matchwood, immortal diamond,
Is immortal diamond.

~Gerald Manley Hopkins, from “That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire”*

... Enough! the Resurrection ....

In a flash, at a trumpet blast,
I am all at once what Christ is,
since he was what I am, and
Me, Jack, joke, piece of clay,
patch, sliver, broken piece of s___,
Am really a diamond ...
by "God."

~jpc, Hopkins modified ... and you too have poetic license….

Easter Day. Namaste.

*http://eir.library.utoronto.ca/rpo/display/poem1045.html

Life is Resurrectional

"When it becomes dry, the resurrection fern seems to die!
But not to fret, it comes back when it gets wet." ~Floridata.com

[D]eath brings an end to the life I have known. And at the same time it is the promise of something new. It is a call to Courage – to grasp the new and begin inventing another life. I’m thinking this is equivalent to a resurrection, one that happens Now! ~David Zahrt

At the center of death is resurrection, in this life, manifest over and over. Scripture proclaims this, for example, in these words from Mark and I Corinthians:

“His death and resurrection are ours. Before, we were No-People, enslaved. . . ; now, we are a People, free to the possibilities of life. We are a People who have come through the sea of Death, and have risen to life – genuine, authentic life – to find that we have made a Covenant with the One who brought us here. . . . As this New-People, we celebrate this New Exodus.”

Life is resurrectional. Namaste.

The Word and the Deed

[E]very religion struggles to have the Word become Deed. Whereas there is only one “Word” expressed in many words, there is also only one “Deed” acted out in many deeds, what we Christians would call the “cruciform deed.” The diverse religions will and should forever maintain their own poetry to describe their encounter with the Word, but it strikes me they all already agree on the Deed, which . . . plays out in some kind of life lived to serve. To illustrate [consider these contemporary] exemplars from the great religions: Mother Teresa (Christian), Elie Wiesel (Jew), Gandhi (Hindu), Dalai Lama (Buddhist) and Anwar Sadat (Muslim). ~Randy Williams

We are one in Word and Deed. Namaste.

Depth Symbols

A friend wrote me: “Since I loped into the Catholic fold, Lent and Easter have become most important times of the year for me. Singing in the church choir for the Easter Triduum has become a meaningful time in the midst of those high, holy rituals. We actually wash feet on Holy Thursday, shroud the symbols and turn out the lights on Good Friday, and baptize and confirm the newbies at the Easter Vigil.”

Yet a symbol does not have to be religious to be profound. What about Gandhi's salt march, the Twin Towers, the Earthrise, and the wedding ring – all secular symbols? ~jpc

Depth symbols direct our attention toward the power at the center of creation. Namaste.

Healed by Wordless Speech (Psalm 19:1-4)

In this world ablaze with sectarian violence, and divided by narrow self-interest, and filled with non-stop noise and clutter, there is a way out of our splintered, empty ways.

It is through the daily sermon of nature that begins at dawn with a beauty that can move us and a power that can shake us. This silent proclamation is open to all without regard to nation, creed, race, or religion. And if we will stop, and pay attention, and recognize the universal truths contained in this wordless speech, we can be healed, and we can be whole, and we can be one. ~Jack McKinney, Pullen Memorial Baptist Church, Chapel Hill, NC, via Herman Greene

Let this spring begin to heal us. Namaste.

What is Spirituality?

[W]e are getting very close to what might in fact be an integral spirituality, a spirituality for the modern and postmodern world that includes the best of the premodern traditions as well. ~Ken Wilber

So what is spirituality? Spirituality is about oneness and wholeness, together the very ground of life lived on behalf of all that is. And let us never forget that spirituality is not an achievement but a gift. ~jpc

The gift evokes thankfulness, first of all. Namaste.

What is your SQ?

“SQ” (for SasQuatch) is the name of Nike’s new driver, the one that Tiger plays – and not too great lately. That reminds me of Danah Zohar’s 2000 book called SQ (for spiritual quotient). She writes, “Our spiritual intelligence grounds us in … purpose and meaning within the larger context of cosmic evolutionary processes.” How large is your context? How well do you relate to it all? What is your SQ? What would a 150 SQ look like? ~jpc

Think SQ is more important than IQ? Namaste.

"Voice in My Head"

You then no longer derive your identity, your sense of who you are, from the incessant stream of thinking that in the old consciousness you take to be yourself. What a liberation to realize that the “voice in my head” is not who I am. ~Eckhart Tolle

That “voice,” coached by self-centered TV commercials and tyrannizing prejudices, is hardly the truth. Who am I? The truth is I am a child of spirit, a creature of the earth community, a part of the human species, a part of many groups and communities, an I and a thou of countless relationships, and who I yearn and decide to be. ~jpc

The “voice in my head” and “the still, small voice” are not the same. Namaste.

Our Authentic Power

To all who received the Word … power was given to become children of God. ~John 1: 12 (NT and Psalms: An Inclusive Version)

Not only kings and popes can trace their lineage directly to God. The Word (spoken through one of the great theologians of the Christian New Testament) says we are all children of God, all of divine lineage. The source of that power is the Word that comes into the world of everyone and everything. That Word is the source of authentic power for all. Does one have to become a Christian? No, but, sure, we can bow the knee in that direction if it makes ultimate sense. ~jpc

Of whatever faith, I say yes to that Word at the heart of creation and spread my wings. Namaste.

Stop Chasing Outside Yourself

Once, the great Ma-tzu said to me, “Your own treasure house already contains everything you need. Why don’t you use it freely, instead of chasing after something outside yourself?” From that day on I stopped looking elsewhere. ~Hui Hai, in a speech to the assembly of monks (8th Century) via yakrider.com

You are unique and unrepeatable. You’re the pearl of great price, the salt of the earth, a child of spirit. As perfectly acceptable as you are, stop looking for anything more outside yourself. ~jpc

We give thanks for our great being, just as it is. Namaste.

Granddaughter Lyndon waking up: she knows all this stuff.

"Trustees of Absolute Wonder"

… When I look at the complex, intricate immensities of the universe,
consider the enormous distances within the Milky Way galaxy,
and see earth as a spinning asteroid circling a minor star
at the edge of this one of many galaxies,
I am both humbled and amazed at the careful provision
that has allowed [us] … to emerge as witnesses … of all that is.

You have made us trustees of absolute wonder,
stewards of marvelous phenomena.

My mind boggles at the freedom and responsibility that comes
with being caretakers of all the billions of years
of evolving life on space-ship earth.
The myriad of flying, swimming, crawling, creeping, walking
life forms is no mean gift.

Life, here and now,
with all its magnificent possibilities
bespeaks a majestic wonder that I can only bow before
and vow to treat kindly, gently, respectfully on my watch,
ready to pass it on unharmed to those who come after me
to the seventh generation.

~Harold Slater, meditation on Psalm 8

Authentic wonder and thanksgiving evolve into authentic care. Namaste.

image: universe.nasa.gov

Unforced Meditation

Meditation . . . cannot be forced. . . . [Y]ou shouldn’t be concerned with how deep your experience is. Consciousness is infinite. You could have a more powerful, more profound experience of it, but it’s still the same infinite current. ~Andrew Cohen

Joe Slicker says he began self-conscious meditation in 1977, thirty years ago. It’s like the old monk who said he participated in canonical hours for forty years, several times daily, before he began to realize their power. Though meditation is unforced, one must be present. Then such old warriors say one begins to meditate without ceasing. ~jpc

Perpetual meditation. Namaste.

image: Patti Sapone, The Star-Ledger

Procreative with Spirit

With spirit at its heart, creation in totality is always procreating new creation. Cosmic “procreation” (to birth or bring forth) makes sense as we learn more about the last 13.7-billion-year journey in our universe. Stardust has procreated us. But isn’t it paradoxical that some in the pro-life movement are against procreation in this bigger sense? For example, some religious groups have praised the movie March of the Penguins for displaying penguins’ superlative values but maybe would not march against their extinction. The movie’s director, Luc Jacquet, said, “It’s obvious that global warming has an impact on the reproduction of the penguins.” What would it mean to be procreative with spirit in care of the penguins as another indispensable part of the earth community? For me procreation is about much more than making sure human babies make it into being. ~jpc

O, it seems only just to be inclusive agents of procreative strategies. Namaste.

image from www.joyinbirthing.com

Life Is Very Simple

Life is very simple: we are living in a world that is absolutely transparent to God and God is shining through it all the time. This is not a fable or a nice story. It is true. God manifests himself everywhere, in every thing, in people and in things and in nature and in events. You cannot be without God. It’s impossible. Simply impossible. ~Thomas Merton, talking with young monks, via Joe Slicker

Everything and every event is absolutely transparent to spirit. So where is spirit? Simple: at the heart of creation. And who are we? A part of creation. ~jpc

We cannot be without spirit. Simply impossible. Namaste.

http://www.geocities.com/ganesha_gate/merton.html

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We celebrate the life and death of Sra. Rosita, the mother of Raul Jorquera. For all the saints ...

I'm On My Way

One of my colleagues was concerned that another meeting of religious leaders seemed to be lacking “clarity.” He said, “They seem to be searching for who they are.” How ghastly! Not knowing who they are. At their age! Most everything on my journey has made things more unclear…. Maybe the clarity in all this is not where I am going but that I’m on my way…. I felt a yes pass by, a clarity that passes all understanding. ~Koshin (Bob Hanson)

Struggling, stumbling all of life through,
Future is waiting for you.

~from “Journey On,” The Singing of Those Who Care 1980-81

We can’t get off the way. Namaste.

image by Udah, “On the way to Mandalchan-la”

"Awake from the Rapt Sleep of Living"

And every poem and every picture
a sensation in the eye and heart
Something that jolts you awake
from the rapt sleep of living
in a flash of pure epiphany
where all stands still
in a diamond light
transfixed
revealed
for what it truly is
in all its mystery….

~from Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s poem “# 46,” A Coney Island of the Mind

Awakened, again and again. Namaste.

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We celebrate the life and death of Obera Bergdall, the mother of Terry, Tom, and Tim. For all the saints ...