life – Intelligent Christian Spirituality

THE ENERGY THAT UNITES ALL

Though humans are made of both body and soul

they are one

and through them the material world

reaches its crown

and raises its voice

to praise its Creator.

Therefore, the only gift God requires of us

is our being – with all its imperfections.

When we realize we are lovable

because God loves us

despite our weakness/sin/imperfection

it quickens our self-love.

For the great Anglican theologian John Macquarrie

even our limitations and death point to transcendence –

death gives structure and perspective to life

and raises the hope of immortal life.

Therefore, we should approach our earthly life

not as a problem to be solved

but as an adventure to be lived

with our mind and heart open to whatever arises

until Sister Death welcomes us into life forever

in the glorious presence of our Creator.

Spirituality is giving life one’s all.

Therefore, anyone who gives their all

to their family/work/country/justice/art

is a spiritual person – whether they acknowledge God or not.

For many men, all-out devotion to their work or their family

is their way of being good/spiritual/a saint –

maybe they are not workaholics

maybe they are addicted to love.

After all, deep erotic energy exists at the heart of the cosmos

and becomes manifest in human ministry/family life/marriage/sexuality –

the desire to love and be loved – the One Source of spirituality and sexuality –

this desire is the cosmic energy

that unites God/humans/the universe.

GETTING BEYOND FLATLAND

We must get beyond Flatland –

the loss of transcendence –

and build a civilization that integrates

consciousness/culture/nature

morals/art/science

personal values/collective wisdom/tech knowhow.

Science and technology on their own

are not accountable to anything

except their own ethic: expediency and efficiency.

If technology allows us to do something

we feel we must do it

even if we destroy whole civilizations

with chemical/biological/nuclear war.

Normal ethics do not apply

to these autonomous powers.

“Life is always a battleground between opposites:

birth/death, joy/pain, good/evil, science/religion.

If the opposites ceased, life would cease.”

– Carl Jung

If science alone rules, we are in deep trouble:

“Humanity should not be afraid of God,

we should be afraid of losing God.”

– Meister Eckhart

Every civilization is built on mythology

and the most common myth is the hero.

The mythic structure is always the same

whether ancient/medieval/modern

whether Far East/African/Incan:

miraculous birth/early displays

of superhuman strength/then rise to power/

triumphant struggle with evil/

eventual fall due to pride or death.

Pope John Paul II noted also:

common mythic structures/elements/roots

in the many varieties of religion.

This pope was more on the side of

Vivekananda than Francis Xavier –

John Paul was a pope

who ironically transcended Christianity.

3 Big Ideas for May 15, 2019

Teilhard de Chardin was a Christian mystic who believed that love and energy are the foundation of the cosmos. This “love-energy” is the source of the universe’s intelligibility and therefore the basis of knowledge. This leads philosophy out of the impasse of making matter the basis of all empirical knowledge. Philosophers have traditionally made love secondary to knowledge – you have to first know something before you can love it. But for lovers of God like Teilhard, love is the source and goal of all knowledge.
Christian martyrs were willing to die for their faith because they believed “all is one” – everything, including life and death, is under the care of God. Now we have arrived at a similar state by the reverse process: we no longer believe there is a God, all is passing away, and therefore all is meaningless. Without God, all is not one, it is zero. The martyr was willing to die for God, but would the secular non-believer be willing to die for zero? This is important when you are speaking truth to power and fighting injustice.
Almost everything wrong with the world has to do with the way the “It” of institutions can be misaligned, out of control, and disconnect with the “I” and the “We.” The personal is destroyed by the impersonal when corporations, governments, and religious institutions become out of touch with the people they are meant to serve, and only serve themselves. The result is exploitation of others for money or sex, and rape of the planet’s resources on which we all depend. Unitive thinking, the idea that all is one, keeps the “It” of hierarchies connected to the common good, the “We.”