Tag: contemplation

Unity Consciousness in Spiritual Experience

If you are spiritual you cannot ignore the flesh

you cannot pretend we don’t need the body

to live/breathe/move/see/hear/think/contemplate God

without the body and its senses there would be no spirituality

contemplation allows us to connect scriptures to life

to see how the God who liberated the Israelites

from slavery

wants to liberate us 

from slavery

to addictions/codependency/consumerism/victimhood

however, “Shame and aggression are central

in the human psyche, particularly men –

and these are the universal ‘original wounds’

not ‘original sins’ – and they are hard to shake”

– Otto Rank

but prayer heals

and translates religion/doctrines/dogma

into vital spirituality

and we pray in the first person

subject-to-subject

our soul to God’s soul

we say, “Lord, I am sad/joyful” 

not “Lord, he/she/it is sad/joyful”

Carl Jung’s personal myth of meaning

which he also found expressed in the Western Mystics

was the myth that God needs us 

to become more and more conscious

so that God can become conscious of the whole

which is what the Spirit is leading us to

the core of spiritual experience 

is the same in all religions:

unity consciousness

which is not a phantasmagoric mystical experience

but rather a life-changing sense 

of the unity of all things –

no more separation

we are all one

with God/others/ourselves

the whole Creation.

COSMIC SHIFTS IN CONSCIOUSNESS

The only direction of evolution is “convergence” –

which is both positive and creative –

the creation of evermore complex life forms

the “Axial Period” within that positive direction

happened between 800 and 200 years before Christ 

in China (Confucius and Lao Tzu)/India (Buddha)/

Persia (Zoroaster)/Israel (Prophets)

all arose and transformed everything

that human beings could be

Hugh and Richard Saint Victor

Christian philosophers/mystics 

wrote in the 12th century that there are three eyes:

the first eye of flesh gives us sight

the second eye of reason gives us meditation/reflection

and the third eye of contemplation gives us true understanding –

the ability to see with the eyes of the heart –

the brothers Saint Victor continued the God-given

unfolding of human consciousness

but in Buddhism and Christianity there has also always been

a “contemptus mundi” – a contempt for the world

however, churches in the postmodern world 

can no longer pretend they are the only sources of grace 

and that the Holy Spirit is not active in all civilizations

or churches will continue to become irrelevant/fringe groups  

the tradition of churches condemning their best thinkers 

like Meister Eckhart (who in 1329 was labelled a heretic)

means that the real victim was not Eckhart himself 

but Christianity since Eckhart’s “Creation Spirituality “

which is Jewish/biblical/prophetic

was replaced by an anti-intellectual asceticism

which is apolitical/dualistic/introverted not world-shaking

still, conscious evolution goes on – 

Christianity finally shifted from the fall/redemption 

Era of Peter from Constantine’s Holy Roman Empire 

in 310 AD to the 1960s – the beginning of the Era of John

a mystic of the Cosmic Christ

who promoted Cosmic Consciousness

and noted that even Peter was a mystic –

for he repeated three times

“Lord, you know that I love you” (John 21:15-17).

CURING INDIVIDUALISM

Scripture says Satan, the Father of Lies

loves to deceive mortals

and so all private revelations/claims of visions/voices

are subjected to rigorous discernment

by Vatican authorities

Teresa of Avila had a private revelation

a vision of an Interior Mansion inside everyone

and we progress from one inner mansion to another

and riches/treasures/joys are in the fifth mansion

and the majority of people gain admittance there

and the devil is kept out

and the Vatican approved this vision 

as far as visions go, believers cannot trust society

to tell us the ways of God and Satan 

because society is confused/blown about 

by constant winds of change/

only concerned with pragmatism/and immediate consequences

and so, believers must somehow learn

to trust God again 

and there is objective good/objective truth

society cannot save us for 

“It has become normal to feel ill-at-ease

as we watch the fraying rope

of our culture unravel strand by strand

and slowly break” – Bruce Cockburn

families tie society together but individualism unravels them

curing individualism comes from recognizing

we are essentially social beings

we are all subjects before God

we are interdependent

and called to unity/accountability for others/the world/ourselves

the best way to be accountable is thru contemplation

for the essence of contemplation 

is to experience God’s “I AM” which:

illumines your own “i am”

ties us all together as one family of daughters/sons of God

being loved by one Eternal Mother/Father

being mindful of the Holy Spirit/the Present Moment/

healing of all our mental/physical wounds/

awareness of Jesus the Great Healer/the healing of the Trinity.

WAKE UP!

Prayer is the place where much spiritual growth

and struggle can occur

caused by the true self and false self and sinful self

in conflict

 

your false self is not your sinful self

the intentionally self-centred self

that God does not like and you should not like –

the false self is good and necessary as far as it goes –

it is the outer things you think you are –

your name/gender/job/nationality

but it often poses as the true self/soul which it is not

thus it becomes false

 

the essence of spirituality is being aware/seeing/

becoming conscious – that is why Jesus and Buddha

constantly say “Be awake/wake up” –

“Therefore keep awake/be on the alert

for you do not know when your Lord is coming” (Matt 24:42) –

be awake particularly to your sinful self

the subtle self that likes the best spot in the synagogue

to be treated with respect and called “Rabbi”

or “Father”

 

the cure for the false self is what Brother Lawrence calls

“The Practice of the Presence of God” –

the holy habit

of getting used to God’s constant company

and constantly talking/constantly listening

to God in every circumstance –

even while making love

indeed, particularly while making love

that’s why sex feels so heavenly –

God is making love to you

thru your partner – wake up to that!

 

contemplative prayer can occur anytime/anywhere –

it is “a communion in which the Holy Trinity

conforms humans/the image of God/the Imago Dei

to God’s likeness” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 2713)

– thru grace we participate in Divinity! Wake up to that!

 

all souls thus owe God everything

and can repay God nothing.

 

WHAT CONTEMPLATIVES KNOW

God is real, unlike the mythical gods

who have no existence at all.

But God is no body and no soul

God is the life of the soul

which is the life of the body –

God is the Life of lives.

 

Until the 1960s, people were taught meditation

as an exercise of the rational mind

drawing upon the three powers of the soul:

memory/understanding (reason)/will.

There was no training in contemplation –

the experience of the living God in silence.

 

The contemplative person eventually realizes

s/he no longer knows what God is

because God is not a thing but a Thou

who constantly says “I AM”

which allows me to constantly say “I am, too!”

God makes me real.

 

All the contemplative knows is: God is Love –

the core energy of evolution and its goal.

Love-energy is the most universal/tremendous/

mysterious of all cosmic forces –

“The physical structure of the universe is love” –

Teilhard de Chardin

 

But what gets in the way of love is anxiety –

“Anxiety is the greatest evil that can befall a soul, except sin” –

Saint Francis de Sales

 

To combat anxiety we need to stay focused on God

particularly the Incarnate God, the Christ

who shows us “Perfect love casts out fear” (I John 4:18).

Indeed, the hymn in Colossians 1: 15-20 makes Christ’s divinity

as great or greater than the prologue of John’s Gospel

(John 1: 1-18) which declares that

Jesus is not only God

as the Cosmic Christ

He created the whole cosmos

and is its goal: The Beginning and the End –

the Alpha and the Omega.

 

 

SPIRITUALITY CONQUERS HARDNESS

The ascetic Desert Mothers and Fathers

passed their lives in silence/harsh penance/

solitude/prayer/manual labor.

The ascetics were called “Athletes for Christ”

because in Greek “askesis” means “athletics.”

 

Similarly, the Crusades were meant to be super-pilgrimages

and so the pilgrim Crusaders fasted/prayed

before battles/lived lives of austerity/poverty.

 

It is not that they were against sensual living

but like John of the Cross, they considered

the natural appetites to be like little children

always whining to their mother for this or that –

the ascetics/crusaders felt we must purify ourselves

of these restless urges so we can be empty

to be filled/fulfilled/in union with God.

 

Our culture’s rejection of the spiritual life of simplicity/poverty

for the relentless pursuit of material wealth

meant that when Vivekananda, a Hindu holy man

came to the West in 1893 to teach Asian mysticism

and give an address to the first Parliament of World Religions

he found westerners dissatisfied with orthodox/traditional religion

like sheep without a spiritual shepherd.

 

Two keys to mastering spiritual practices:

find yourself a good shepherd/teacher/spiritual director

find the time to practice as much as possible.

 

Whether it is western meditation with Father Thomas Keating

or eastern meditation with some holy woman or man

meditation can help us take ourselves wherever we are:

in confusion/conflict/peace/sanity –

as we rest in the Divine

contemplation allows us to be

in complete acceptance and unconditional friendliness

with ourselves – whether we are broken and lost

or whole and rejoicing in the Lord –

either way Psalm 36:8 says “They shall drink their fill

of the river of Thy delights.”

 

 

THE TEMPLE VS THE MARKET

Humans are integrally part of evolution

because they arise from it

but in reflecting on it they stand apart from it.

Teilhard would agree with Julian Huxley that

“We are nothing if not evolution becoming aware of itself.”

 

This is true, but the secular mythology of constant progress

is that the axial person moves

from the myth and magic of primitive humanity

to the rationalism of the great past civilizations

to the post-conventional stage of Jungian ‘individuation.’

 

However, Johann Baptist Metz, a German theologian

noted that the common theme in western culture is

not individuation but individualism

either by materialistic success for oneself

or by non-materialistic self-fulfillment/self-actualization –

the message is always that self-interest

is more important than the good of society.

 

If the world is a temple, everything is sacred

and has inherent value, which includes you and me.

If the world is a market, everything has market value only –

and spirituality is foolish and a dead end.

 

The ego, like the market

 always has an opportunistic agenda

driven by ideology/fear/or anger

which feeds the False Self

whereas the True Self/the Soul has no agenda

except to help you see reality as it is.

 

The solution to the polarization of western culture

caused by individualism is contemplation.

True meditation is to be mindful –

to concentrate and look deeply

into the nature and roots of your inner life

and so to find your True Self/Soul

the Love which loves

God/Truth/and the Common Good.

CONTEMPLATION TRANSCENDS SCIENCE

The Pre-Axial Period was marked by mythology/fantasy.

The Axial Period was marked by reason/

the power of the individual/personality –

the “self” was born.

 

But the Present Age has conflicted feelings about reason

because: we now see its limits/

have felt its inhumane touch/

doubt its power to solve problems/

know its capacity to create problems.

 

What we need today is for scientific rationalists

with their focus on external knowing

to give assent to the internal knowing of mystics

as legitimate knowledge or at least information.

Instead of writing mystics off as their main opponent

deluded by superstition/myth/fantasy – scientists need to see:

people need meaning more than facts.

 

True nonviolence does not try to defeat its opponents

either physically/emotionally/intellectually/spiritually

rather it tries to find the good

already inherent in the opponent, which can be hard

if the opponent thinks the injustice they support is, in fact, just.

 

In western culture ‘meditation’ used to be equated with

‘rigorous thinking’ – which led to great achievements

in philosophy/theology and even science.

 

But in western culture Teresa of Avila was one of the few

who in medieval times taught the eastern way of no-thinking:

in contemplation you go beyond meditation –

you don’t think much, you love much.

 

In eastern thinking about no-thinking

the Tao: underlies the cosmos/

is the Absolute made manifest/

creates truth/nature/destiny/cosmic order

and Yin, the dark/passive/feminine principle

and Yang, the light/active/masculine principle

are inherent in all things – including each human being.

It is Yin and Yang – the Mother and Father aspects of God –

Wisdom (Sophia) and Yahweh – making endless Love

that creates the universe and all things.

LIVING IN BABYLON

Major structural injustices in which we

live/move/have our being

create haves/have-nots

and are hugely immoral – but most religions

while preaching personal and interpersonal ethics

ignore systemic evil and most believers accept

massive injustice as “the way things are” never asking

“How can individuals be moral in an immoral culture?”

 

The typical response of Christians living in

our Babylonian culture, in exile, is:

try to be faithful husbands and wives

raise virtuous children who are

compassionate/contemplative/seek justice

and who kick at the darkness till it bleeds daylight.

 

Catholics adopt Protestant practices:

daily Bible reading/speaking in tongues

and Protestants adopt Catholic practices:

praying the Divine Office and trying out

Benedictine/Franciscan/Ignatian prayer styles

and perhaps this is the Holy Spirit

weaving the entire Church together

so we all may be one

or maybe this is just rearranging

the deck chairs on the Titanic

as long as the structural injustices persist.

 

Hopefully, the Contemplative Way

will save and transform us:

because sometimes contemplatives

as they are liberated from all addictions/attachments

gain psychic powers/siddhis such as

telepathy and clairvoyance – genuine contemplatives

always hide these super-powers

but maybe they could use them to fight injustice?

 

In any case, the ultimate secret of the spiritual life:

“ever-present divine awareness” is not hard to attain

for anyone and is impossible to avoid

according to Lao Tzu/Shankara/Paul/Augustine/

Plotinus/and Teresa of Avila because it is always there

and awareness of the divine is the only thing

that makes living in Babylon bearable.

RETURNING TO RADICAL AMAZEMENT

The sexual/social/self-preservation drives

are the raw material of who we are as humans

and so cannot be killed off

although ascetics try their hardest.

 

According to Rohr/Rolheiser/Fox

these drives are all good and just need to be

harnessed/channeled/integrated not killed off

so they give energy to our spiritual endeavours

and serve us not destroy us – they are good

not evil monsters/dragons/demons.

 

According to Immanuel Kant as you move morally

from being biocentric (sex and survival) to egocentric

to ethnocentric to worldcentric (universal compassion)

you also discover your higher/truer/deeper self.

 

If you expand your heart and mind infinitely

you come to God’s Infinite Love, the “Ultimate Thou”

and to your self as the “Ultimate I”

culminating in the “Ultimate I-Thou Relationship.”

 

But as we take on jobs/get married/join religions

everyone pressures us to do

in order for us to live up to their ideals

and as we shove more and more stuff

into our shadow-bag

by midlife we are a mere slice

of the 360-degree-self we started with.

 

We become fraught with “sins of omission”

including: not living lives of justice/

not being transformed/being ‘born again’

only once instead of many times/

leaving creativity/divinization/original blessing/

the cosmos out of our theology.

 

Radical Amazement by Judy Cannato

invites us back into contemplative awe/awareness

of black holes/supernovas/the wonders of the universe

 which are the key to self-transformation

and transformation of the world.