Sharing a Resource - Richard Rohr's Daily Mediations

I wanted to take a minute today to share a resource some of you might find useful in your spiritual path: Richard Rohr's Mediations from Center for Action and Contemplation. Signing up is free, and you have a choice in receiving meditations on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. You can sign up here. Two sample mediations (one from today and a weekly summary from the week of January 4 through 10) follow:

Blessed be,

Joel

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God Creates Things that Create Themselves 

Monday, January 26, 2015 

In Romans 8:22, Paul says, "From the beginning until now, the entire creation as we know it has been groaning in one great act of giving birth." That is a very feminine notion of creation, giving birth slowly through labor pains. It complements Genesis' masculine statement: "Let there be light!" (1:3). Just this one line from Paul should be enough to justify a Christian belief in evolution. Yet to this day, the issue of evolution still divides some Christians, questioning what is rather obvious: that God creates things that create themselves. Wouldn't this be the greatest way that God could create--to give autonomy, freedom, and grace to things to keep self-creating even further? (Non-creative minds tend to not see or allow creativity anywhere else. In fact, that is what makes them so uncreative!)

Healthy parents love their children so much that they want them to keep growing, producing, and performing to their highest potential. Good parents are even excited when their children surpass them, as my uneducated farmer parents were when I went off to higher studies. Mature parents are generative about their children and say, in my paraphrase of Jesus' words: "Don't get too excited about the things that we did. You're going to do even greater things!" (John14:12). Immature parents only see their children as images and extensions of themselves. True love empowers and delights in the even larger and independent successes of those they love. (It is often would-be successful sons who are most resented and abused by jealous and weak fathers.)

For a long time most people were satisfied with a very static universe. Yet Jesus understands reality as dynamic and evolutionary. Clearly there is an unfolding to the universe (we are literally still expanding!). Reality is going somewhere. It's moving, until "In the end there will only be Christ. He is everything and he is in everything" (Colossians 3:11). The One > Multiplicity > Conscious Unity seems to be the underlying pattern. Paul sees history as an ongoing process of ever greater inclusion of every lesser force until in the end, "God will be all in all" (1 Corinthians15:28). The notion of the Cosmic Christ is precisely "the One" reality that includes everything and excludes nothing. As St. Bonaventure put it, "God is the One whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere."

Adapted from Christ, Cosmology, and Consciousness (MP3 download); 

and A New Cosmology: Nature as the First Bible, disc 2 (CD, MP3 download)

 Copyright © 2015 Center for Action and Contemplation

cac.org

Center for Action and Contemplation | 1823 Five Points Rd. SW (phys) | PO Box 12464 (mailing) |Albuquerque | NM | 87195

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The Wisdom Tradition

Summary 

Sunday, January 4 - Saturday, January 10, 2015

What I teach is true not because "Richard Rohr says so." This wisdom is grounded in the unchanging yet ever fresh and relevant themes of a mature spirituality. (Sunday)

Unity is the reconciliation of differences, and those differences must be maintained--and yet overcome! You must actually distinguish things and separate them before you can spiritually unite them. (Monday)

"The real Source of Wisdom lies in a higher or more vivid realm of divine consciousness that is neither behind us nor ahead of us but always surrounding us." -Cynthia Bourgeault (Tuesday)

All that a true spiritual teacher really does is "second the motions" of the primal and ever present Holy Spirit. (Wednesday)

An alternative orthodoxy is never stingy with grace or inclusion because it has surrendered to a God who is infinitely magnanimous and creative in the ways of love and mercy. (Thursday)

"Through the practice of deep looking and deep listening, we become free, able to see the beauty and values in our own and others' traditions." -Thich Nhat Hanh (Friday)

Practice 
Audio and Lectio Divina

Audio Divina
Listen to this passage read from The Book of Wisdom, accompanied by flute, marimba, and keyboard. You might follow the same steps as described below for lectio divina. Click here to listen. ("Meditations on Wisdom," Transformations, by Matthew Pennington and  John Pennington; used with permission.)

Lectio Divina

With the first reading, listen with your heart's ear for a phrase or word that stands out for you. During the second reading, reflect on what touches you, perhaps speaking that response aloud or writing in a journal. Third, respond with a prayer or expression of what you have experienced and what it calls you to. Fourth, rest in silence after the reading.  

And now I understand everything, hidden or visible,
for Wisdom, the designer of all things, has instructed me.
For within her is a spirit intelligent, holy,
unique, manifold, subtle,
mobile, incisive, unsullied,
lucid, invulnerable, benevolent, shrewd,
irresistible, beneficent, friendly to human beings,
steadfast, dependable, unperturbed,
almighty, all-surveying,
penetrating all intelligent, pure and most subtle spirits.
For Wisdom is quicker to move than any motion;
she is so pure, she pervades and permeates all things.
She is a breath of the power of God,
pure emanation of the glory of the Almighty;
so nothing impure can find its way into her.
For she is a reflection of the eternal light,
untarnished mirror of God's active power,
and image of his goodness.
Although she is alone, she can do everything;
herself unchanging, she renews the world,
and, generation after generation, passing into holy souls,
she makes them into God's friends and prophets;
for God loves only those who dwell with Wisdom.
She is indeed more splendid than the sun,
she outshines all the constellations;
compared with light, she takes first place,
for light must yield to night,
but against Wisdom evil cannot prevail.
- The Book of Wisdom 7:21-30 (The New Jerusalem Bible)

Gateway to Silence

Wisdom pervades and penetrates all things.

For Further Study

Things Hidden: Scripture As Spirituality

"The Perennial Tradition," Oneing, Vol. 1 No. 1

 Copyright © 2014 Center for Action and Contemplation

cac.org

Center for Action and Contemplation | 1823 Five Points Rd. SW (phys) | PO Box 12464 (mailing) |Albuquerque | NM | 87195

Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 2015

With wondering about where and what causes King would have undertaken and fought for, I present this video that came my way. Do you remember that King was working toward economic justice when he died? Listen to how the Industrial Revolution both helped the pilots and then hurt them. Listen to Powell's concern about the "pride in workmanship."

How much father do we need to go to fully enter the Kin-dom of God, the Blessed Community?

Blessed be (and enjoy),
Joel

Remembering Our Baptisms

I find it refreshing (timely?) that in their wisdom the editors of the Revised (and even just) Common Lectionary put the celebration of the Baptism of the Lord toward the beginning of the calendar year. For those of you who weren't aware, this was the text for yesterday.

At the beginning of the calendar year, with new year's resolutions fresh in our minds, we are reminded of the way that through our baptisms God calls us and names us Beloved. What a way to start the year.

In pondering this I am reminded of a story a photo journalist tells about his first day working for National Geographic Magazine. He was called into his directors office and told, "We only hire the best." A pause. "That includes you. So there is no need to prove yourself." A pause. "Each day I expect you to improve. ... and if I ever catch you proving yourself, you're fired."

Did that make you smile a little? If through our baptism we are already God's beloved, then we have no need to try and strive to find that our prove it. Instead we can grow into that love, we can improve our abilities to share that love, to return that love.

What would happen if each time we showered/bathed we remembered or baptism and gave thanks? Imagine the difference in our own lives by this reminder. Imagine the difference in the lives of others.

Blessed be,
Joel

Epiphany Boat (or House) Blessing

Last night, one of our middle school daughters asked us if we were going to do the blessing with chalk again for Epiphany. Unbeknownst to us parents, we have started a tradition. In case you have, too, I thought I'd better update a previous post regarding the ritual of blessing your house (or boat, for some of us). I forgot to take a picture after the blessing last year. However,  here is a photo of what it looks like a year later.  As you can see, no worries about this becoming permanent (and this is on oiled wood, rather than varnish or paint).

Blessed Be,

Joel

Updated From a few years ago:

Epiphany was [is] celebrated in the West yesterday [today] (January 6th), and I thought I'd give a prayer and point to some boat (house) blessings today.

Epiphany is the celebration of the end of the Christmas season (the 12 days following Christmas), and celebrates the Wise men/women (too, ?) coming from the East as they followed the star (see Matthew 2:1-12). As Christianity spread out of the Jewish community to include the Gentile community, Epiphany became important as a reminder that Christ came to all.

It has been a very long tradition to bless human dwellings by marking the door posts/lintels (take for instance the Exodus stories). Epiphany has become a time of blessing dwellings, too. This is often done with chalk with the following notations:

20 + C + M + B + 15

Casper, Melchoir and Balthasar (the C, M and B) have become the names of what tradition has now identified as the three magi (there have also been 24 and 12 over the years). So a reading of this blessing could be as follows:

The three wise men,
Casper, Melchoir and Balthasar
followed the star of God's Son,
who became human for
20 thousand
15 years ago.
++ May Christ bless our home,
++ And remain with us through out the year. Amen.

I should also mention that C M B can also be (might originally be?) shorthand for the Latin: Christus Mansionem Benedicat ("May Christ Bless this House").

There are a number of prayers that can go with this blessing process - including having a pastor/priest bless the chalk during a worship service, and the congregation taking home the chalk to bless the house. Gertrude Nelson Mueller has a delightful book To Dance With God: Family Ritual and Commuity Celebration. (Paulist Press, 1986) that includes this ritual and others. When I find my copy again (I've misplaced it) I'll write a book review for you. Rev. Basco Peters has an excellent web page about rituals and liturgy (Liturgy: worship that works - spirituality that connects) which I used for some of this information, check it out. He has lots of prayers and ritual suggestions for Epiphany.

Boat's don't really have lintels, but we do have hatches, which is what we used last night following a similar ritual. Adding a prayer out of the United Methodist Hymnal (#255)

          Epiphany
O God,
you made of one blood all nations,
     and, by a star in the East,
     revealed to all peoples him whose name is Emmanuel.
Enable us to know your presence with us
     so to proclaim his unsearchable riches
          that all may come to his light
          and bow before the brightness of his rising,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
     now and for ever. Amen.
(Laurence Hull Stookey - based on Matt 2:1-12)

Hoping your Epiphany was [is] blessed and wishing you a blessed New Year,

Joel

Now the Work of Christmas Begins

With Epiphany making the end of the Season of Christmas just a few days away (January 6th), I thought the following poem by Rev. Dr. Howard Thurman appropriate (“Now the Work of Christmas Begins”):

When the song of the angels is stilled,
when the star in the sky is gone,
when the kings and princes are home,
when the shepherds are back with their flocks,
the work of Christmas begins:
to find the lost,
to heal the broken,
to feed the hungry,
to release the prisoner,
to rebuild the nations,
to bring peace among the people,
to make music in the heart.

I hope you have had a wonderful Christmas. I hope it has been filled with some relaxation, for there is work to be done. Are you ready to begin the work of Christmas?

Blessed be,
Joel