Saturday, May 24, 2003

What does it mean to be offspring of original universal energy, substantiated and concretized in particular generative experience as creating expression of unbroken oneness?

Christ!
Father!
Mother!
Spirit!

Words are of a twofold kind. ...They are deloma pragmatos (onoma), revelation of things, and deloma praxeos (rhema), revelation of an action. (Martin Heidegger, p.48, in Introduction to Metaphysics)

What revelation of things and action are we capable and willing to contemplate?

In prison yesterday Zach, Dick, Josh, Gail, Joe, Ryan, and I wondered aloud what these revelations seemed like in our midst. We read Albert Camus, Theodore Roethke, Taoist tale of two enemies and karma, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the Buddha, and Galway Kinnell.

In the flash of a single thought,
The agitated mind is put to rest.
All the inner and outer sensations
Become lucid and transparent.
Breaking the great void
By a turning of the body,
The ten thousand phenomena
Of the majestic world
Rise and disappear.

- Han-Shan Te-Ch’ing

Ryan said 'the Christ' noun/verb (Greek, onoma/rhema) was easiest for him to enter the revelation. The historical repetition of biographical facts of Jesus and Paul were wearing and numbing. He preferred to consider the a-historical relevance of the Christ in present reality.

Zach quoted the final line of Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises as rain fell all about prison grounds.

Gail said it was the solidarity, the simple conversing together interconnecting inside/outside the walls that gave her (and all of us) much joy.

What is the revelation-taking place?

This, surely.

Thursday, May 22, 2003

“Ask,” Jesus said, “and you will receive.”

The moon’s the same old moon,
The flowers exactly as they were,
Yet I’ve become the thingness
Of all the things I see!

- Bunan (1602-1676)

Ronald told us at the shop something his mother taught. Translated from Dutch – “No, you have. Yes, you may get.”

His point, ask – what’s to lose?

No?

Yes!

Sunday, May 18, 2003

Meetingbrook's vision is for a Schola Contemplationis et Gratia -- i.e. A Place of Contemplation and Gratefulness.

The eye sees it,
But no hands can take hold of it.
The moon in the stream:
This is the secret of this school.

(- Shinkage-ryu school)(dailyzen)

Residing at the intersection of four traditional expressions of learning, prayer, contemplation, and creative expression, Meetingbrook Schola Retreat Hermitage is a middle place. Between university, monastery, library, and meditation retreat center.

Meetingbrook Schola Retreat Hermitage will serve as a new form for the dwelling of intelligent inquiry, prayerful service, artistic expression, and silent sanctuary.

A dream? Yes, an active one. It will be a place of eco-spirituality and hospitality dwelling profoundly in nature's embrace, welcoming openly each arriving face.

Will there emerge a contemplative center that is interfaith, interreligious, multicultural, and open to the Spirit in our world?

What would any of us be willing to support if it were dedicated to peace and understanding, service and hospitality in the midst of a troubled and dangerous world crying out for new life and healing for all?

If you would, today, take a minute. In your heart say a prayer. In your mind hold a thought. In your imagination wish this prospect well.

God is longing from within our experience to fully enter this earth, this world, this moment now.

It is a simple request.

See it.