Tag: sin

CAST YOUR NETS INTO THE DEEP

The growing gap between theology and science

for five centuries meant religion got relegated

to the backburner of fixed abstract concepts

which couldn’t cope with a universe of dynamic change –

Isaac Newton believed God’s living commands

would be replaced by mathematical laws

and Darwin’s theory of universal evolution

destroyed the immutable world of religion.

 

We either accept our fixed views/beliefs/assumptions

about reality, or we challenge them –

to remain open and curious, according to Buddha

is the best use of our lives.

 

 Evolution entails a continuous revolution

in consciousness that eventually expresses itself

in deeper religious understanding –

most Christians today are rethinking Augustine

who gave way too much weight to one verse:

“I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin

did my mother conceive me” Psalm 51:5.

The idea we all are sinners

right from the moment of conception

gave birth to the prevailing paradigm of Original Sin

and convenient communal amnesia about the verse

that God originally created everything

including us humans “very good” (Psalm 1:31).

Religious ideas in western Christianity

are now in flux/diverse/non-dogmatic

even in religious America only .05% believe

they or their neighbours will go to hell

and 70% believe many religions lead to eternal life –

contemporary atheists now seem to know more

about traditional Christian beliefs

than most Catholics and Protestants!

 

The request of Peter by Jesus

to cast his nets into the deep

was a symbolic invitation to us to go deep into our souls

and haul up a treasure of self-knowledge –

that, and communal remembering

and becoming mystics as Karl Rahner advocated

are the only ways we will make Christianity work again.

THE TRANS-PERSONAL MESSIAH

 

For the past 500 years, the scientific lens

in which everything is rational and testable

has been robbing us of the wonder

of the former magical/mythical era.

We should have integrated science and religion long ago

since they are both foundational to our makeup

of both body and spirit.

 

Immanuel Kant was on the right track –

he refused to let religion be reduced

to objective scientific explanation

because he demonstrated subjectivity

cannot be reduced to objectivity

and he was an enlightened Lutheran who believed

what contemporary theologians believe –

we are in a dynamic/trans-personal relationship with God.

 

Quantum theology today focuses on

‘sin’ as ‘missing the mark’

which implies a dynamic process of seeking

and flexible/multiple ways of arriving at the ‘mark’

rather than rigid/dualistic/mechanistic notions of right/wrong.

 

Scientific research shows three broad arcs

to human psychological growth:

pre-personal/pre-rational/pre-conscious

to personal/rational/conscious

to trans-personal/trans-rational/trans-conscious.

 

Scripture is tran-spersonal in Second Deutero-Isaiah

where we first hear that Yahweh is not just God of the Jews

but of all people, and we first hear of the Messiah

not just as the ideal king of the Jews

but as the Universal Ruler over all people.

 

The only way Buddhists and Christians

can keep Buddha and Christ alive today

is for their followers to live their teachings –

Jesus needs Christians to thoroughly practice

his central teaching, the Beatitudes

for, as Teresa of Avila said:

“The only feet/eyes/hands

God has are our feet/hands/eyes” –

The trans-personal Christ is mediated to the world through us.

 

 

 

CLEARING UP RELIGIOUS MISUNDERSTANDINGS

 

 Stories move people more than reason

because they transport us right into the living context.

The Jewish and Christian scriptures are full of stories

that bring God into the richness/messiness of life.

 

Meister Eckhart knew that stories promote understanding

more than logic, and he defined ‘understanding’

as ‘deiformity’ – conformity to the mind of God –

when we rightly understand how the world works

we are drawn into/formed in the mystery of God.

 

There have been many misunderstandings in Christian history –

Saint Paul has been grossly misunderstood 

as anti-marriage/pro-patriarchy/anti-Semitic/pro-slavery.

In all this he did not betray Jesus or invent Christianity.

What he did was: challenge Jews to new ways of thinking

and confront Roman patriarchal theology by proclaiming

Jesus not Caesar is Lord.

 

More misunderstandings: some theologians think

the doctrine of original sin is optimistic –

it does not teach humans are evil by nature

but that evil in humans is unnatural/a disorder/a sin.

If evil were natural to humans

we would be perfectly happy in evil

but evil people are not happy

or if they are, it is not natural.

 

Misunderstandings caused his fellow monks

to treat Saint John of the Cross harshly.

After eight long months in prison/a dark closet

and constant beatings by other monks

he escaped in 1585 and wrote his spiritual classic

Ascent of Mount Carmel.

 

Misunderstanding Bible verses such as

“Be perfect as God is perfect”

results in perfectionism/fear/legalism/hypocrisy

but the context is: God exhorting us to love everyone

just as “God makes the sun rise and the rain fall

on the good and the evil” (Matthew 5:45-48).

Perfection therefore consists in 

unconditional love not moral flawlessness.

 

THE KEYS TO THE UNIVERSE

 Nonbeing was used as a concept

by Plato to contrast suffering/existence with pure essence

by Plotinus to describe the loss of the self/soul

by Augustine as an ontological interpretation of sin.

 

It is inevitable that we fall into nonbeing/sin –

the tension between our freedom and our finitude

creates anxiety as we confront

our great responsibility to fulfill our potential

and our limited ability to do so.

 

Our thoughts carry us away like the wind

but if we let them dissipate like mist

we end up in the Present Moment

where there is primordial richness and wisdom.

We need to always return to the Present – the Gift.

 

We also need Community – no matter how flawed.

If the Sangha is having trouble

you first need to transform yourself

into a candle which lights the other candles.

But any Sangha, any Community

Is better than no Community –

Evil/Ego wants to separate and divide us.

 

In the Body/Ego stage I focus only on

my own physical body and its survival.

In the Mind/Us stage I can put myself in others’ shoes

so I focus on relationships.

In the Spirit/All of Us stage I become aware

not only of all our differences

but also our common values –

the common good of all sentient beings.

 

Love at all stages: self/others/all creatures

is the Universal Key – God has given humans

the Keys to the Universe

and “Each of you will be rewarded

according to the measure of your love

not according to the amount of work or time it took.”

– God speaking to Catherine of Siena

BIRTHING HEAVEN AND EARTH

“From time immemorial

people have had ideas about a Supreme Being

and the Land of the Hereafter.

Only today do they think

they can do without such ideas.” – Carl Jung

“Sin is to believe the lie

that you are self-created/self-dependent/

self-sustained.” – Augustine

People are bound not free because they sacrifice

their personal integrity/spiritual liberty

for security/money/ambition/pleasure.

Global warming is a global warning

that this self-centeredness is not working –

people dying from flood/drought/fire

is the canary in the coalmine of human extinction.

According to legend, the Buddha’s father

provided his son with 40,000 dancing girls

and all pleasures that material/secular life can offer

but the gods disguised themselves

as an old/then sick/then dead man/

and as a happy monk

and so the Buddha-to-be retired from the world.

Mindfulness is the womb that produces the Buddha

so we are all potential Buddha-mothers.

If we take care through mindfulness

of the baby Buddha latent inside us

eventually Enlightenment will be born.

We all need to see today

in a more holistic/paradoxical/wise way

going beyond mere rational thought

to giving birth to God inside us

not as an external agent

and to Nature as sacred

not as a means to personal gain.

We all need unitive thinking to give birth

to a New Heaven/New Earth

within and without.