cunninglily

You're right. lily

So you're having trouble finding a church, you say. Seriously though, I agree 100%. Churches seem to be either so irrelevant that there's no point in going at all, or so much like the rest of our lives that there's no point in going at all. I've pretty much given up the hope of finding a church community that's going to provide much in the way of real spiritual transformation, and concluded that I'm basically going to have to seek out those avenues on my own -- which actually makes the search for a church community a lot simpler, since we can focus more on factors like worship style, social outreach opportunities, making friends who share our values, a positive religious education experience for kids, etc. Land, Community, Family type stuff. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Very reasonable compromise; very sane and mature and responsible. It also occurs to me almost daily that this is the right way to go...to get involved with a church, and God help her and me, persevere there as authentically as possible. But all the things you list Fred, like 'worship style', 'social outreach', 'making friends' and 'religious education' already send up a red flag in me. These things are parts of institutions and therefore subject in quality to the core values which comprise them. I wouldn't want my kids, for instance, being taught some of what is considered "a positive religious education" out there. Even "making friends who share our values" seems like something one could do anywhere in which common interests are shared, and not something one would go specifically to church for. I dunno, maybe I'm just a miscreant misfit. If the truth be known? I would much rather a small group of five or six, outside, under the sky, with sained food and drink, a few guitars, a few bodhrans, who are sick of the ###### and are ready to get on with it... ...on the other hand, maybe i just want to remain a marginal christian and sit on christian web sites ranting so as to convince myself that I still have a pulse... lily

I should read Bauer's book. Joining the horizontal attributes to the vertical and finding that "third way" that Fred introduced is really all I was trying to say in my last post. My apologies for my crankiness. I do sympathize with James though and I do hope that the "progressive" push in the church will amount to more than just making Christianity more comfortable for more people. The mysteries ARE scary. In ancient times they placed fierce Gorgons at the entrance to the temples so that those who were not ready or prepared would cower away. There is wisdom in that, I think. I remember visiting a church in North Carolina around Thanksgiving where an ardent young Christian woman went around to all the visitors offering salvation in the name of Jesus in exchange for a free turkey. I'm not making this up. This fixation on salvation for the masses, requiring nothing more than assent, negates the response required of us who are called to be sons of God. It is not we who issue the Call, it is God. Our responsiblity is to speak the truth and those who have ears to hear will come. I've said this before, and I'll say it again. Our biggest stumbling block to church building and reconstruction is our insistence that those who are outside the fold are damned; that only Christianity holds the keys to Truth, and that it is our responsibility (and not Gods) to knock them over the heads and drag them in if need be....or bequile them with "pap" and assurances. And what gets sacrificed here but the Truth, which is not confined to any one tradition, but is as Free as God. Or so I believe. lily

Well, many would describe the "new wave" of liturgical music as "progressive," and I suppose there are plenty of progressives who think it's the greatest thing since peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwiches. I, however, would describe its most salient feature as market-friendliness: easy to swallow theologically and socially, nice and light on the soul and mind. Nothing that might suggest God's radical otherness, or that the condition of our souls is anything but A-OK. Nothing about the God who radically claims us, and radically relativizes all other claims on us. These ideas don't sell. The problem is that so many people associate them with the kind of guilt-, shame-, and control-based religion that has become synonymous with the pre-Vatican II Catholic Church, and the "new liturgical consciousness" wants to steer clear of that at all costs. I can't say I blame them. Unfortunately, right now I see it all degenerating into a war of "old" vs. "new," when what is really needed is a third way. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Amen to that! I've been thinking of this very thing in a broad way; thinking in terms of the "mystical" message of Christianity versus the "orthodox". From the beginning, it seems, the mystical lineage and the orthodox split at this very point, between what sells, what "fits" into the workaday world, and what requires radical sacrifice and transformation. My hope is that with the advances of science (yes, science), in particular the science of psychology, and more specifically depth psychology, that the split can now be breached. We now know that the subjugation of the ego, for example, is not a work of the ego, and that it is IN the daily trials and tribulations of our workaday lives that the ego may be transformed. It is not necessary to leave the workaday world behind in any literal way. One can go on as before while seeking and submitting to a radical change of heart. Transformational religion is not meant to be comfortable; but neither is it meant to be radically divorced from the affairs of Men, and so an "earthiness", a down-to-earth quality, a sense of anchoring to our Land, our Communities, our Families, belongs in our tradition. But, too often, any attempt at this translates into a casualness that results in superficialites that lose meaning. Maybe we've forgotten how to be in our bodies, connected to the Land and to one another; maybe we're still too much in our heads; too warped by a sin consciousness which renders us amorphous and ashamed and distrustful of our own humanity. The dignity of the Sons of God has not yet dawned in us. The truth that it is as human beings, here and now, that we inherit the Kingdom of God, has not seeped in...and so, we "play" church as best we can. And because we do not recognize our divine potential, or the sacrifices that are discerned within it, and instead focus on a mandatory salvation that requires and expects nothing more than our assent, we continue to lower the bar, and offer less and less of substance to the world and one another. This sounds harsh and I know that all of you can give examples of where this is not so, but in my opinion, all in all, it is so. lily

I think that there are Natural Laws and Principles, which if not understood or outright ignored, do result in consequences. I have always seen these Laws as standing outside of the Love of God...by this I mean that Gods Love is steadfast and never-ending and without variance. There is no punishment therefore, no vindication, only consequences or "karma" or Justice according to Laws established before the foundation of the world. This, to my mind, accords us full responsibility without condemnation. One of our biggest responsibilities, I think, is to rightly discern the Principles by which we arrive at our judgement of sin. What Principles undergird our sense of morality and ethics? Why is this or that "wrong"? Which Principle or Natural Law is at play? "The World" mocks the much parodied and bastardized version of Christian sexual morality, for example; and it is admittedly repressive in some instances to an unhealthy degree. But the Principle undergirding sexual morality is that Sex is Sacred; that Sex, as a Principle, is THE Creative Force that manifests ALL of creation, and that full Awareness of this affects and effects our basic attitude and behaviors toward this most beautiful and precious aspect of Life. It has nothing whatsoever to do with "sex" is shameful and dirty, quite the contrary. So, no, people do not "deserve" what they get, as if they are being rewarded or punished according to merit. People reap what they sow, however, and this is nothing but Justice, unerring and fair, and what is more to the point of this discussion, we reap what the Body as a Whole sows because we are One.

What does the dead man lose? Place yourself on the deathbed and think about what in a moment will no longer be "yours". Everything you hold dear will be wrenched from you. Everything. Nothing remains. Lie there for a moment in this emptiness: no likes or dislikes, no preferences, no wife, no child, no husband, no car, no boat, no houses, no rights and no rights to be trampled upon... What is left now, dead man? An unobstructed flow of Life through you. That is all and ALL. "...The human machine functions according to the determined program "maximum pleasure at minimum cost", in a way to lend itself to precise prediction in its reactions to given circumstances. In the intellectual domain, it rejects every notion and every idea which does not harmonize with the intellectual system established in it; in the psychic domain it rejects all that does not harmonize with the complex of "happiness" established in it; and in the physical domain, it automatically follows the orders transmitted by the complex of "instinct" established in it. It is only the functioning of the human machine when a rich man declares himself anti-communist and a poor man declares himself pro-communist. But it is a miracle- that is to say an act of freedom- when a rich man abandons his possessions and embraces poverty..." "There is no freedom outside of the miraculous, and man is man only in so far as he lives from the miracle, through the miracle, and for the miracle." -Author Unknown The only genuine act of freedom available to us is to sacrifice the self to the Self; to die before we die. This is the miracle of true freedom and Everlasting Life. Every seeming choice we make apart from this; every theodicy we contrive, every position we maintain is a knee-jerk response to something hammering on the machine. Only the Justified Men, only the Sons of God, only those who have been Crucified with Christ allow Life to flow unobstructed through them and thereby mediate the Mandate of Heaven upon the Land. Any other position becomes just another part of the problem. One begins to see this. It becomes harder and harder to self-identify as either conservative or liberal, progressive or fundamentalist, humanitarian or rank materialist, rich or poor, saved or not saved...One begins to see that they are all flip sides of the same coin, with one defining the other; that they are not different or separate at all, but literally dependent on the other for existence. One wakes up one morn in fear of believing in nothing anymore. And yet a great and undying force courses through. And what could this force be but Love, undying, undaunted, indeed a miracle in and of Itself; the Light that alone shines in the Darkness. lily

Attaching blame could be seen as a degenerate impulse toward meaning, so too the taking of political responsiblity, and the search for human safeguards and technological cures against destruction reveal a core search for meaning. Destruction = Death, and death is meaningless to us; Our search for meaning has as its ultimate impetus the natural disaster we experience as Death, and meaning is essential for us. I observe my own mind darting about; my own mouth speaking nonsense; my efforts to orient myself around a core of belief that provides meaning in the face of change, chaos, and destruction. In all this I am making effort to maintain a "horizontal awareness" as well as a "vertical awareness" and to locate my consciousness where they meet. In some ways this requires a suspension of judgement, and, paradoxically, a relinquishment of meaning as formed by belief. It requires an effort to simply be aware of things as they are, and to resist the very strong impulse to turn my face away by attaching blame, affixing responsibility, or finding a cure. To yield to this is awkward; to have nothing to say and to maintain no certainty of position. Psychospiritually it is the archetypal situation of suspension; a crucifixion upon the poles of human accountability and power, and Heavens own mandate. If we are a part of the Whole, then the two are in Reality one occurence. We are both responsible and powerless at once; Death and Destruction are imminent, and inevitably we who are here today witnessing will become the witnessed. Where is meaning then but in embracing Death and Destruction? In our flight from Death we remain deadmen, scrambling for meaning and cures and solutions in a dead world. There is no escaping death and destruction. Our only real choice is to die now or to die later, with all the assurance of faith that in dying we Live. Trace one ill that does not have at its core the fear of death, and one "human" solution that is not a scramble to deny it. Are we not grasping at straws? "squeezing out gnats and swallowing camels"? At the very heart of religion, and, perhaps, most especially our own, is the Truth that all that is corruptible shall pass away, and that it is ONLY from the position of Eternity that the incorruptible reveals Itself to us. lily

They are all enrolled at ULL (University of Louisiana at Lafayette) and settled snuggly in dormitories (actually right now they are in the living room preparing to dye each others hair strange colors ). Thank you Flow for understanding the spirit of my rant. In the last week or so I've witnessed genuine compassion and generosity from many many people, and on my best days I do have faith that the majority of people are wrestling with these issues just as we are. I know that these are complex problems and Aletheia brings up some of them in our discussion of "privilege" in another thread. What is true sacrifice anyway? One definition I like comes from my study of the Tarot and the so-called Western Mysteries: "True sacrifice is giving up what one no longer wants for that which one does want." If one thinks deeply enough on that definition, it just about covers it. lily

Right, hence my confusion when I originally answered the post back in May - I think the phrase "renunciation of privilege" is ambiguous and perhaps could be worded a bit differently. But how? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> The word "privilege" refers to "an exceptional law for or against any individual or group". Also, any "advantage, favor, or immunity given to some and not to others." An example of this would be to claim religious freedom for yourself and your own religious tradition etc. while denying this freedom to those who believe differently. I agree with Flow. I don't think the 8th Point is referring to economics per se in its use of the word "privilege" either. I think it speaks more to the right of non-Christians or non-mainstream Christians to their own beliefs and religious practices...or, as the case may be, to the right of conservative Christians to theirs. In other words, it discourages the superiority of "progressive Christians" over "conservative Christians" and vice versus, or the favor of "heterosexual Christians" to "homosexual Christians" and so on... lily

Dang! What ARE you guys feeding that kid? At this rate he'll be posting in 6 months! lily

I know Cynthia, and I apologize. I know that I sound shrill and skewered in my views. It just frustrates hell out of me that people will not understand that it is wealth that defines poverty in this and other countries. Many of the working poor in this country are quite content with their lives; we don't necessarily want more stuff, and have made decisions to put other things as more important than the pursuit of money. But the wealthy and the too comfortable middle class keep raising the standard of living in this country to such an extent, that the rest of us can't provide for ourselves the basics without constant struggle. If the rich are willing and able to pay $3.50 for a loaf of bread then the poor have to pay $3.50 too. The difference is that for the poor its a hardship. Do you see what I'm saying? If a doctor didn't have to pay $3000.00 dollars a month to heat and cool her luxury home, then perhaps it wouldn't be necessary to charge $300.000 for a gallbladder operation. No major franchise in this country employs full time below management level. The folks who ask you, "Do you want fries with that?" are not full time employees, which means no insurance, no benefits whatsoever, no unemployment, no workmans comp and etc. These people are working for minimum wage and living from paycheck to paycheck while the Burger King corporation (and Starbucks, and MacDonalds, and so on and so on) get richer by the minute. This is not a government problem. This is a lack of compassion and awareness of what your newest SUV or $600.00 dollar cell phone upgrade is actually costing the big picture. We all keep saying how horrible it is that there are so many poor among us. But we don't realize that our daily spending, our values, the place where our treasure is, where we put our attention, our goals, our entire orientation toward Life and its ultimate meaning creates Reality. If a major hurricane or a terrorist attack on New York City doesn't hammer in that Life is not about stuff, then what will? lily

Cynthia. The poor and disenfranchised in this country were not created by our current administration. I think we need to look deeper than that. The poor in New Orleans were left behind long before this hurricane hit. And this is true of the poor in every major city in our country. Don't come to the Gulf Coast. (I'm aware that you, Cynthia, live in the South) Take a good look in your own back yards. I'm only asking that we not turn our eyes away. Right now the American Red Cross is deluged with offers to help. Adrenalin is running high; everyone is stirred by what they are watching on tv. But, in a week or two, when adrenalin and excitement returns to normal levels and the rest of the country is sick to death of hearing about it all, the reality will still be here. There will be plenty of opportunity to do something for a long time to come...long after the "glamour" wears off. In truth, the opportunity has always been here. It's only reached crisis porportions now. We say this everytime tragedy strikes. Everytime. I am not attacking you Cynthia, but in truth, this is often nothing more than a sentimentalism stirred by emotion...it is not sustained. I work for a wealthy woman who is a devout Catholic and "helps" with charity organizations all the time. Very active. Good Catholic. She wouldn't know what poverty is if it hit her in the face. She's oblivious. And so she "helps" with no sacrifice. "Poverty" is an idealized, romanticised "cause" that "helps" people "over there". It's not her yardman, her handyman, her housekeeper. It's never nearby or allowed to get too close. Last week her 15 year old son was allowed to purchase rims at the tune of thousands of dollars to put on his new Escalade, while those of us who work for her are struggling to pay our bills. In the last couple of months he's spent (or she's spent) over a thousand dollars to get the vehicle detailed...which amounts to very expensive car washes. I'm sorry folks, but THIS is what causes poverty in this country, not the government. Too many people feel justified in their luxuries while millions among us struggle to survive. George W. has not suffered want a day in his life, and it shows. But, he's not alone. The average wealthy American is just as guilty as he is. The rich and the powerful opened shelters in N.O. for the poor who could not leave; provided no provision, no help, nothing. They drove or flew away grumbling at the inconvenience and didn't give a seconds thought to the thousands left behind. This happens everyday. EVERY DAY. The poor are not the only hit by this hurricane. Many of the rich along the Gulf Coast have suffered staggering blows as well. We are all suffering. This hurricane has leveled the playing field and it is my hope that we all see that there is no difference between the rich and the poor when the "trappings of wealth" are rent away. The poor are not "faulty humans" and the rich are not "superior humans". We are all just human. That's all. And the innate dignity of the individual human being is worth far more than all the 'things' money can buy. That's what this country, and indeed our entire world, hasn't figured out yet. lily

Yup. "Sin City" has fallen. I wonder if the fundies are praising "God" for his "righteous judgement"? But forget the fundies. This catastrophe in the wake of hurricane Katrina exposes the nation, and indeed all of us. I hope that you guys are watching. lily

LOL no shite dude lily

...but don't you just love Snoops outfit?! Actually I see where canajan is going with this whole brain thingy. I too believe that our transformation is not only "spiritual" but physiological as well, just as I believe that our transformations effect the transformation of the Land and of all Creation. But I do not believe that the hardware is the "ruby slipper" and to suggest that all "conservatives" have less evolved minds than do all "liberals"...this is absurd and naive. Jesus said that "the Son of Man has no place to rest his head". There isn't a position in which any of us remain safe for long...and be glad of this, because change is the only stability there is. Awareness is the vehicle of transformation and maintaining "positions" hinder awareness. How can you grow if you've already found the perfect fit? You will either burst your seams or begin to smell... lily

I'm approximately three hours West of New Orleans, where we experienced only a grim and overcast day with slight gusts of wind. We've been refuge for several UNO students and my partners children since Friday evening and we are all exhausted here...but feeling extremely fortunate. The days following a major hurricane are often worse than the storm itself, and with a heat index of up to 110 projected for the week ahead and extensive power outages that will take weeks, if not months to fix, the victims of this storm are in for some real misery. We have no idea when they will let residents back in to N'Awlins and so the UNO students may be with us awhile (one is a family member who rescued a few out of state students who had no where to go). My partners children live just out of Baton Rouge and right now, gasoline shortages and the inevitable bumper-to-bumper traffic heading East on I-10 as the thousands of people make their way back home are our immediate concerns. We still don't really know how badly New Orleans was hit...we'll probably know better tomorrow. It just makes me heartsick... lily

No, no! You guys misunderstood. I mean "take out" Johnny Depp...you know, for a burger or something...lol... lily

Well, I don't know about Jesus wanting to take out people , but I sure wish he had a pair of human hands to help me take out my recycling bin. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> yeah...i think he wants me to take out Johnny Depp.

I was just thinking of this book the other day! This was the first "Jungian" book that I ever read and it made a tremendous impact on me and ushered in a whole new time in my life as a Christian. It was through the influence of this book that I studied the works of Fritz Kunkel, who was Sanford's therapist, and whose book, "In Search of Maturity" blew me away! Are any of you familiar with the works of Fritz Kunkel? anyway...I'm with Fred. Sanfords book is awesome. lily

hmm, well? I dunno. It seems to me that there were mystery religions already well established during the time of Jesus that offered access to the gods through such means as meditation, incubation, and initiations. The Essenes come to mind, as do the Eleusinians. Mysticism has always run parallel, if not counter, to orthodoxy. The problem between the so-called gnostic Christians and the orthodox Christians, which is I suppose what we are discussing, did indeed have roots in a battle between those who saw the wisdom in a tradition with well-defined and established doctrines that would be universal to all who called themselves "Christian", and those who believed in an on-going revelation of Truth open to all who "knocked". One of the criticisms directed against the gnostic Christians, was that they were always seeking and never coming to the knowledge of the ultimate truth, which the orthodoxs believed they already had in Christ crucified. The "gnostics" believed that this was only the beginning, and that there are "hidden" things in God that required going beyond where orthodoxy wished to stop. It really, according to my studies, had little to do with "empires that existed solely to control and plunder". This was a battle between Christians, not of Christians and empires. Both sides were (and are) guilty of considering the other illegitimate, and as fate had it, orthodoxy gained the upper hand. In my opinion, both orthodoxy and "the way of gnosis" are important. Have any of you seen the movie, "Searching for Bobby Fischer"? It's about this kid who is a natural born chess genuis who has two teachers; an orthodox, classical chess teacher who his father pays to teach him, and a street bum who plays speed chess in the park for cash. In the end, you realize how both teachers, through the mediation of the kids own gifts and passion, made the kid a chess master. It's kinda like that... lily

Me too. This seems like an honest and useful way to approach the parables to me. This was a very important realization for me too! and I'm still exploring its implications. Well, I'm not an expert on the subject, but gnostic Christians, as the author of the Gospel of Thomas certainly was, tended toward a radical and ascetic mysticism. This, in fact, was one of the chief complaints of the orthodoxy against them, who "affirmed the value of ordinary employment and family life", and felt that the practices of the gnostics were elitist, too difficult, and impractical for ordinary men. I'm glad that you are enjoying the discussion. I am too. lily

Actually, I'm quite well-versed with quantum mechanics, and I agree that it has enormous implications for how we think about pretty much everything. I'm just highly skeptical of attempts to read it back into ancient manuscripts. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I wouldn't claim to be well-versed, but I've done my share of reading. Frankly, I don't think more study is necessarily useful. Physics, in particular, has to be apprehended by the "minds eye" or intuited, in my opinion...one can't "get it" intellectually, and so by extension, if one can apprehend it intuitively, one doesn't need to study up. The Reality of unity is not something one needs quantum mechanics to grok. One can be brought to an immediate apprehension of it through such things as the parables of Jesus. lily

Gospel of Thomas - Saying 98 as translated by Meyer "Jesus said, "The father's kingdom is like a person who wanted to put someone powerful to death. While at home he drew his sword and thrust it into the wall to find out whether his hand would go in. Then he killed the powerful one." This translation is different from the one I originally posted. The first had the man thrust the sword into the wall to determine if his hand was strong enough...in this second translation he does so to determine whether his hand would go "through" the wall. It seems an important difference, especially if we are going to "talk" quantum realties and such, which I admit to having some resistance to, but am willing to work through. The commentators on The Gospel of Thomas that I have read understand the message of this gospel as ultimate union and lack of separation. There are no walls. In other words, there is no separation between the man who is like the kingdom of the father and the powerful man. They are one. This seems to be what you are saying, Flow, or am I misunderstanding? lily

Elaine Pagels doesn't deal directly with this "saying" in her, "The Gnostic Gospels", nor does Meyer or Barnstone offer any interpretation of their translations of the "Gnostic Bible" and Harold Bloom has next to nothing to say about saying 98, except to recommend a comparison with "Q" source 35 found in Matthew 11:12-13 and Luke 8: 19-21. (Bloom interprets Marvin Meyers translation of the Gospel of Thomas published by Harper Collins) Each of these books I have in my personal library and I have searched on-line as well. Perhaps to have a "meaningful" discussion we will have to rely on our intuitions rather than books. I assume from your post that you have searched these things out with some thoroughness already. How do you, Flowperson, interpret saying 98 based on your studies of the subject? lily

I did a small amount of research on this on-line and no one appears to have anything particularly enlightening to say about this parable. It's interesting and somewhat amusing to me that "scholarship" accords this as an actual saying of the authentic Jesus simply because they find it doubtful that anyone, namely the early church, would have put these violent and disturbing words into Jesus's mouth otherwise. I want to say that people put disturbing words through their own interpretation into Jesus's mouth all the time, but then I'm no scholar. 98 Jesus said: The kingdom of the Father is like a man who wanted to kill a powerful man. While he was in his own house, he drew the sword and drove it into the wall, that he might determine that his hand would be strong enough. Then he slew the powerful man. Most interpreters seem to give this an interpretation of "preparedness", but that doesn't satisfy, at least not me. "Jesus" says that this man is "like" the Kingdom of the Father who "while in his own house"...and so, to my mind, is reminiscient of the "mote and beam" parable and suggests that before the "powerful man" can be slain, we must deal with our own "will to power" within our "own house". It's also curious (and highly speculative I might add) to think that Jesus may have been "the sword that was driven into the wall" and by the strength of this "crucifixion", "the powerful man" was slain. any other thoughts? lily