 "Magnificat" by Ben Wildflower
I am hopeful that the above, wonderfully-wicked, portrayal of Mother Mary thoroughly violates your sensibilities! Living in an era in which the Unholy Trinity (privilege, profit, and power) holds sway over our culture, indeed, over every aspect of our culture, we are factually in dire need of our Rowdy Mother: kicking ass (at least metaphorically)... If you haven't the faintest idea as to what I am writing about, perhaps you might look up Luke's Gospel: right there, near the beginning, is this Rowdy Mother (to be, of course)... It's likely that Luke, very much later, interviewed Mary and heard, directly from her luscious lips, the words we know as the Magnificat... (I am feeling rowdy myself, so I'm also hoping that describing her lips as luscious also throws you for a big loop!) Inevitably, the honest reader of the Magnificat, comes away from it with a certain "stunning" to her soul... Mother Mary makes an unmistakable values judgment which should also bear unmistakable weight in our spirituality, economics, and our politics: cast down the mighty, send the rich away... Everyone twists the teachings of her son, Yeshua bar Alaha, to suit their agenda and donation apparatus: but do they also have the gall to twist the Mother's words? Of course not! But they do forget them! They do excise them through a rapid-page-movement: "Okay! Jesus was born! Now, let's move on to the really good part: he dies! And is resurrected so that we can gain entrance into heaven!" Mainstream theology manifests, in plain view, its adoration of the Unholy Trinity: by preaching the necessity of privilege, profit, and power as the cornerstone and entry-plan of heaven and eternal life... But for the radical: for the contemplative: for the honest man: Mother Mary is still adopting her revolutionary stance... and it is towards her burning hand that the mystic reaches... Now, how do we nudge ourselves closer to the living image of the Divine Beloved: who is the root of the root of our being? How do we untether ourselves from the theological, economic, and political cords that bind us -- mind, heart, and soul -- to the Unholy Trinity? This is the alchemy of the heart... with Mother Mary's words emblazened on our hearts, at least in this Advent Season, we might summon the courage to ask what is the path to transformation? It is always here that we begin... Perhaps this thought from Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel indicates this place of beginning: "One must live and act as if the fate of all time would depend on a single moment." Right here and now, one could very well be tempted to throw out the book, the blog, and the effort... if everything could come down to me is too great of a burden... On the other hand, why not relax and have a good laugh? Just a momentary change of perspective is a potentially dynamic moment: it doesn't have to be big... it just has to be honest! Like a plate of food you could give to someone hungry... In other words, every act of love and justice fulfills the hunger of the Universe for the Adoration that is the example of Mother Mary... and it could be your example as well... because that is exactly how the Universe works: It is wired, as it were, for the Revelation of Every Teeny-Tiny Evidence of the Possibilties of Love... Now that we have taken a deep breath, and perhaps also chuckled, we might just as well seriously (ha-ha) begin... and what better place than another holy man, Rabbi Akiba: "All of time is not as worthy as the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel, for all the songs are holy, but the Song of Songs is the holiest of holies." So, look at the Song of Songs: melt into the evidently treasured song and dance of lovers' foreplay... Certainly, the Song of Songs is a mystical treatise... but it is also evidence of an ancient marriage rite, pre-dating the Hebrew peoples... For us, though, it is the story of our melting into love, into the intimacy of a lover's adoration... Sorry, but that's all for today... The Alchemy of the Heart, Part Three will be coming soon...
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 Why do you stay in prison / When the door is so wide open?
The definition I will be using for this meditation on alchemy is: the understanding of the relationship between consciousness and matter... and what matters most are the matters of the heart... For the Christian, in a broad sweep of mysticism, Yeshua bar Alaha came to reveal the opened door to the Beatitude life: an alchemical design... All matter is, through and through, a doorway into the Christ Consciousness... but, like a traditional Japanese Tea House, one must first disarm, then get down on one's knees, to enter... Beatitude is life re-imagined from suffering first, to gratitude with every breath... While suffering in one form or another, time and time again, is part and parcel of this being alive, it is not the story that matters. That Jesus lived and died is a certain glorification of every life, but it is only the introduction to the story as it is being written... Alchemy is an "old word" that indicates the quantum nature of matter: consciousness is the root: the Divine Beloved, Universal or Cosmic Consciousness, is the root of the root: there is not the least bit of something / anything that is somehow separate from this Unity... Rumi's Question why do you stay in prison, when the door is so wide open is the wonderment of every alchemist... return to the Beatitudes now, and ponder them as a doorway into a transformation of the matter of our lives into the living awareness of the Sublime Unity that is the purpose of our being alive... If there is a doorway, what then is the door? One could say that the door is Yeshua himself: much of both Christian faith and mysticism is focused on that as a matter of belief. That belief is not wrong, but is instead, a starting point: Jesus never proposed that our faith stop with touching the "doorknob" of this belief: again, instead, he proposed a whole life door: the Beatitudes as the door to transformation: the living of the Beatitudes steadily nudges us across and through the threshold... and to further clarify the links of each of the Beatitudes, one with each other, he gave us the great parable of the "Last Judgement": when it is both as nations and as responsible individuals that our transformation is either advanced or limited by our daily practice of "I was hungry and you fed me" and so on. There can be no mistaking: this radical Yeshua bar Alaha: teaches every relationship is pregnant with Cosmic Consciousness (there is no escape from this fundamental reality!) Universe, Earth, Life, Matter: it is all One! The Beatitudes re-direct the heart from self, to other (every other) in the deliberate cultivation of compassion: from self-interest, to other (every other) in the deliberate cultivation of justice: from self-isolation, to other (every other) in the deliberate cultivation of community... and ultimately, into the Community of the Divine Beloved... (Remember: there is no separation...) More on the door in Part Two...  Tasha Tudor
Tasha Tudor, the beloved children's book illustrator, determined to live an 1830's lifestyle, complete with all that it meant: whew! Is that something that you would be up for? Still, for many of us, the idea of simplifying our lives is an appealing thought -- even as we grab for our cellphones and scroll the bargains on Amazon Prime... Isn't this, though, a simply beautiful photograph? Now, as to Sophia Perennis, who is she? Do you suspect that she is a young and fast-rising pop star? You would be both right (and wrong)! But, she is likely also the late Tasha Tudor! For those of you who already possess a mystic bent, you know that I'm just being silly (which I do enjoy!)... Sophia is Greek for wisdom: but not just any sort of ordinary wisdom: but something very special and super-duper unique: Sophia is the Feminine Face of God! Perennis is a reference to the Perennial Philosophy, articulated by philosophers Spinoza and Aldous Huxley among others, it goes like this: 1) There is an infinite, changeless reality beneath the world of change; 2) This same reality lies at the core of every human personality; 3) The purpose of life is to discover this reality experientially: that is, to realize the Divine Beloved (Unity) while "here" on earth... Wisdom teaching is (or should be) core to the Christian experience: Origen, Clement of Alexandria, Pelagius, Eriugena, Hildegard, Francis, Dante, Meister Eckhart, Julian of Norwich, are but a few from among many (and yet, they are so few when considering the broad sweep of Christian history)... Differently, but also similarly, each experienced and taught Christianity as, first of all, a way of love that was indicated by lifestyle and experiential transformation... The Orthodox, perhaps more so than the Catholic / Protestant versions of Christianity, preserved the mystery impulse to grace, beauty, icons, prayer of the heart, and a lifestyle directed to the sublime, the simple, and the humble... Rumi, Hafiz, and Ibn 'Arabi, from within Islam and the radical wisdom idea of Sufism practiced and taught the to the root of the root implications of prayer: into a transformation of both lifestyle and consciousness. The Divine Unity (Alaha) is the Allness of every within and without: pursued, yearned for, and hungered after by the Sufi (the Jew, the Christian, the Hindu, etc.) The Sufi uses (and lives) as a springboard the Divine Unity and the Invocation of the Divine Name to focus experiential intention... Such a life becomes a practice of the theophanies of Divine Presence: nature (the first and greatest teacher), art, poetry, music, and the passions of loving... We can thank the Krishna Consciousness Movement for advancing further (at least in the West) the spiritual necessity of a cultivated practice of bhakti: loving devotion to, and passion for, the Divine Beloved: music, dance, art, and the chanting of the Divine Name, again, are core to the experience of the Hindu heart and mind... Paramahansa Yogananda, one of the earliest Hindu teachers from India who came to the United States, similarly taught devotion to the Cosmic Beloved as the sure way into a steady transformation of consciousness... And further uniting these various strands of mystic / sophia perennis is the devotion to the Feminine Face of God. Of note in regards to St. Francis and a core Franciscan contribution to Christian life / mysticism, is devotion to Mary: archetype of the complete identification with the Beloved: "do as he says" implies more than filling jugs with water, but with a lifestyle of identification with the Beatitude Way of Yeshua bar Alaha (Jesus)... Few Christians know of Islam's love for Mary. And fewer still understand the inseparable link between Krishna and Radha... Indeed, they are only correctly referenced as Radha Krishna (the unity of the Sacred Masculine and the Divine Feminine)... Radical Grace is the implication that it is through the Divine Feminine (Mary) that our consciousness is opened to the sophia perennis, the Wisdom of the Divine... Finally, Sophia Perennis is the communal practice of the Beatitudes: if Yeshua said that he was the way, the truth, and the life, it was only in the context of the Beatitudes. The Beatitudes present us with a quantum leap beyond that of "commandment", rules, codes, or laws: they are an invitation to an evolutionary leap into the New Human, the expansion of "normal" consciousness into and across the very threshold of the Christ Consciousness! Sophia Perennis is the love-letter written by the First Thought to every following part and particle of Consciousness: we are supposed to embody the blessedness of Mary's baby, born every moment within every breath, in the beatitude life...  R. Buckminster Fuller, American Philosopher If it wasn't for gravity and, likely, comedy, none of us would be here: "here" being the condition of fakery aliveness... yes, we all bleed, breathe, eat, and excrete so there is that certain definite semblance to aliveness... but we all know, if push came to shove, that we are simply waiting our turn to die... Why? you might wonder? Why indeed!  Seriously: if all of us were to wear only cover-alls and dedicate a few hours everyday to kissing our lover, or a willing stranger, our happiness quotient would rise to the tippy-top of the wellness chart: and world peace would be in our collective grasp! "Tell no lie" is probably the first Big Fish every human must learn to fry: without a commitment to honesty, we live as a waste of space... even for an Occupant of a White House or a Cathedral...
Seriously: if all of us were to wake to our essential nature as mystics, we'd be shooting flames of love in every possible direction: how very eezy-peezy to feed all of the world's children! And! isn't a child dying of malnutition and starvation also an abortion? And! we are all the doctors servicing these abortions through our political limp-dick moral shit-fuck cowardice to change... Seriously: if all of us were to lie down under a tree and look up at the waving leaves everyday for at least an hour, and everyday for at least a summer, we'd be able to stride, with that unique blend of confidence and humility, into the upper eschelons of Stupifying Insight! What good are our "religious" practices if we have lost all sense of the value of our time? If we don't have time to be utterly useless, we will never be capable of any really good use! Seriously: if all of us were to fall in love with a dog, tortoise, or goat, we'd be awakening to our desparate need for life companionship and the splendor of basic kindness: such an awakening is similar to the story of a hermit-monk being given a basket of grapes by a passing caravan in exchange for the new basket he had woven. Knowing, though, that a certain Elder in a nearby cave was lonely and missing the comforts of his long-ago family home, he took the grapes and gave them to the Elder. The Elder, knowing that a certain young monk was deeply troubled by doubt, took the grapes to him.. Not surprisingly by now, but the young monk knew of a kind old basket-weaving hermit-monk who just might really enjoy the grapes... and indeed, they were the sweetest grapes he had ever tasted... Dying to the irrational need to glorify oneself -- and simply being kind to others -- is e v e r y thing... Seriously: if all of us were to change our religion and our politics to Gravity and Comedy we would lose some words from our dictionaries: like misery, greed, idiocy, violence, rape, and fear... Gravity is sort of like the door to the home we always dreamed of: the place where both voice and silence are free; where barefeet and comfort are like a gentle, giving, massage or cup of wine; where we meet others in Sacred Circle with our stories, songs, joy and grief, poems and dance... And Comedy is like a crowded bathtub or a midnight-flashlight-beachball-volleyball game; where reality is alternatively defined as "a gateway to the nonviolent life" and where the "different", the "stranger", the "lost and lonely" can finally find their place... Seriously: we have, right now, the option of exchanging eaten up by nothing with a new metaphysics of love... and everything could change in just one minute...  By now, most folks have heard something about yoga... and, likely most, when they think of yoga, it is "standing on one's head" or twisting like a pretzle... and perhaps some fewer think of meditation when thinking about yoga... To be sure, there is something at least somewhat true in each of these reactions... however... Yoga, at its heart, is all about Time... moment-by-moment Time... The word itself contains its Secret: yoga means Oneness: to yoke the soul with the Divine... but, yogi's know that the Divine never left the person (or any person, part, or particle of creation), so, yoga is really a path of Remembrance that consciously cultivates, moment-by-moment, a sacred life through sacred living in Time... Mystics tend to look out upon the world with an attitude of surprise: as in a mirror, the Divine is always looking back at us: and always with adoration... "What does the Divine do all day? She lies on a maternity bed giving birth..." (Meister Eckhart). We are all supposed to be mid-wives to the Birthing of Divinity! And for this, we need Time... we need a spirituality that creates space for Sacred Time... (you can call it yoga if you wish...) Instead, what are we doing? How are we living?  Rumi, in his life and in his poetry, cultivated space and sacred presence... If we are going to ponder the yoga of Time, then we need to consider our use of Time: and more to the point, how do we effectively use the very limited amount of Time that is our personal allotment? And digging deeper, how do we cultivate lifestyles of simple living, harmony, and "right tribe" so as to be able to increase our freedom?
Love might be looking back at us from our mirrors, but if we turn and rush away into the cultural madness of ump-teen, hours-upon-hours of work: not for one's daily bread, but for "moving up in a frantic world": we will, inevitably, have to put aside whatever mystical inclination that we might have had: and dole out the bucks for therapy... Oneness is given: but how often, and by whom, is it received? We need to "yoke" ourselves to Sacred Time... Weirdly, it has taken a brutal pandemic and corresponding economic struggles to get more folks into their kitchens and out into their gardens. For all of those taken by the covid virus, like every other means of death, more Time is the one thing they would have wished for themselves: Time to treasure family, friends, meals, relaxation, play, gardens, kissing, holding hands, walking and talking with a beloved, saying one is sorry for not having been better, and all of the other things that are of genuine value... One could say that the intentional cultivation of Simple Living and Sacred Time is the architecture of happiness... You, I, We are alive today! Yahoo! Will you, I, or We be alive tomorrow? That is the question, isn't it? The goal, I think, is to die young -- as late as possible! To see with eyes opened, everyday, by wonder. To walk with your hand held in another, everyday. To make something, everyday, that has spoken to you to be made: it could be a song, a poem, a cheese enchilada, a home-baked loaf of bread. To kiss, to praise, to surprise someone with a bit of your freely given Sacred Time. To do nothing of what the dominant culture considers to be of value! To loaf. To read a book. To draw a comic. To dance in your backyard: to dance in your frontyard! All of this, and more, is the Yoga of Time: and! there is still more Time for meditation, standing on your head, chanting, and saying your prayers: along with the layers of silly that is so adored by the Divine Beloved!  Baba Ram Dass
The writings of Ram Dass have been instrumental in my formation as a human being: Pat Mata and I perused Be Here Now while eating our bag lunches in High School... and a seemingly phenominal number of years later, I keep returning to that same book, and an even better one, also by Ram Dass, called Be Love Now... In pondering the insights of my dear brother Ram Dass, I suppose that I would boil his example and teachings down to relax and have a good laugh... This, of course, is not to say don't meditate, don't serve others, and don't work for justice. But rather, it is very much to say how you pray, how you serve, and how you work matters a whole deal... and further, are you, in your core, living your life as an accomplice to your own unhappiness and to the destruction of this precious blue Planet? Very sadly, that pretty much sums it up for most of us, and certainly for the systems under which we live, move, and have our being... we are a deeply unhappy people, divided and conquered by irrational desires, irrational politics, irrational economics, and irrational religions... Now don't get me wrong! Being "rational" is not the goal: perhaps, though, being freaky is! I mean: who in their right mind would like to hang out with us? Look at the anger on our faces and the judgments in our words: as often as not, hate is the look in our eyes: who wants to party with a hater? Another way of putting it is simply this: it seems to me that we are all planning on dying early! On the other hand, here is a little poem / prayer from the prayer book which helps me (Celtic Daily Prayer, Book Two, Farther Up and Farther In): Where is joy? As the hand is made for holding, and the eye for seeing, You have fashioned us for joy. Share with us the vision that shall find it everywhere. And, when our song of joy dies down to silence, come, hold our powerlessness with love! Then shall our fear be gone, and our feet set on a radiant path. Are you planning on dying early? The teachings of Ram Dass all suggest that we might consider dying young -- as late as possible! In other words, what we think, do, and say matters! Back in our old Soup Kitchen, I would sometimes ask our guest-volunteers who they would most like to see walking through our doors to eat with us? Mia would say her brother. Johnny would say a certain famous and gorgeous singer. Pam or Eleanor would say Jesus (no doubt hoping for a few extra brownie points). Ram Dass (through the Spirit realm) would say "treat everyone as if they are God in drag"... Which was, of course, the whole point of the exercise... Relax and have a good laugh is simply a way of suggesting that we, very intentionally, cultivate the attitudes and actions of a lifestyle geared to both happiness and a long-life... Why does that seem so weird and challenging? I love reading the Aims and Means of the Catholic Worker... but lately, I find the book The Blue Zone Solution way ahead of nearly everyone else. The author and National Geographic fellow, Dan Buettner, has identified five places around the world with the longest-lived people and the common denominators that basically united them all: 1) Move naturally; 2) Have a sense of purpose; 3) Have dedicated time for relaxing; 4) Follow the '80%' Rule (stop eating when 80% full); 5) Eat more plants; 6) Enjoy a glass of wine '@ 5' (I prefer an Oatmeal Stout); 7) Get your ass into the right tribe (my words, not his), develop close friendships; 8) Cultivate a spirituality that includes a sense of community; 9) Especially build and practice love in your family. Simple, right? This is where the Blue Zones Solution circles back to the Catholic Worker: Peter Maurin and Dorothy Day always used to say that the goal of the Catholic Worker was to create a society where it was easier for people to be good. Why should living be so fucking hard for so many people? Poverty sucks. Loneliness sucks. Fear sucks. Hopelessness sucks. And the feelings of being trapped in these endless battles with pain and grief sucks. We don't really need another Soup Kitchen: we need the intentional cultivation of those things which easily translate into possibilities of happiness. Why not reshape our cities and our rural communities both, into working zones of happy possibilities? It's obvious that everyone needs a home, safety, health, work, community, and a playful, relaxing, rest: so why not set about the business of taking care of this business? Oh I know, there in the back of the room, are the libertarian and the socialist already arguing and lifting their fists: but both are missing this essential point: we are all responsible for creating the cultures and environments in which we live. The libertarian is right in saying the individual has a responsibility to work his butt off: and the socialist is also right in saying the government has a responsibility to help remove the barriers to a free, responsible, and happy life for everyone... And Ram Dass is right in saying that we are all here to help each other in our walk home... and in our walk, we need the cultivated ability to stop... relax... and have a good laugh...  Thoughts on the Continuing Importance and Relevance of St. Francis of Assisi...
Election day 2020 is not only a means of looking forward, but it can also be, an important time for a look over our shoulder into the past... If indeed, another world is possible, it likely won't come by way of the arrival of benevolent aliens. But rather, by means of our core values being "put to work" for all of us... Values has become a seriously mucked-up word: as often as not, it is now a word-knife used for the verbal stab, slander, or joke by folks seriously challenged by their small minds and brutally challenged hearts: so, can values be somehow resurrected into genuine meaning? This is where that "glance" over our shoulder into the past might be helpful, indeed, it this "glance" which motivates my own thought and life... You see, I (eye) see Francis of Assisi as an axial man (person) for all time... Sure, he was nuts in his own goofy-spectacular way: eye (I) am not going to regale you with stories of his life to prove my point: you can certainly order a "Life" of Francis through a local bookstore or Barnes & Noble (I recommend Reluctant Saint by Daniel Spoto) and discover this delightful goof for yourself... Rather, I am just going to dive right in with five essential points: 1) Francis revered creation: his attitude of reverence for every life, indeed, for everything that he came across is perhaps the foundational point of what it means to be franciscan... and nowadays, human... or at least, a human with an activated brain and conscience! We are responsible for our home! Climate change is real and a present danger: all life is @risk: this is not a subject for debate! Francis directs our attention to the necessity of reverence and regeneration for Planet Earth through lifestyle changes and public / economic policies and practices. 2) Francis respected women: his attitude towards St. Clare was his attitude towards every female: equality! Francis was perhaps one of the first incarnational feminists... for him, every woman was, in her own specific (and spectacular) person, a revelation of the Wisdom which is the Divine Being itself: yes, he was identified as another Christ (to his dismay) even while he lived... But that identification was of a mirror into which he called everyone to look and to see their own face looking back at them as the Face of Jesus himself (herself)... Francis directs our attention to the necessity of recognizing the equality of all men and all women: and further, into the equality of races and fluid-genders: we are all worthy of unlimited reverence... in policies and practices... 3) Francis venerated the poor: his attitude towards lepers, peasants, and workers was a revolutionary reminder to the wealthy class (the privileged and powerful) that the liberation of the poor was a primary requirement of the Gospel! As he embraced the lepers, he questioned every system of inequality, exploitation, oppression, and injustice: this questioning continues today! For any human being to be reduced by systems of oppression into objects is of fundamental opposition to the Gospel: we can't promote and live-by the "free market economy" and expect some sort of blessing from the Divine! (You are most welcomed to read Matthew 25... if you have forgotten this action-principle!) Francis directs our attention to the radical grace of a solidarity that steadily leans into genuine liberation (the full development of every person into her / his possibilities)... in policies and practices... 4) Francis directs our attention to nonviolence: his attitude towards the shocking Christian acceptance of the ends justifying the means broke his heart time and time again: hitching a ride with a Crusading army in order to preach peace on the battlefield between Christians and Muslims, nearly killed him with abject horror at the wanton destruction, greed, cruelties towards women, and utter repudiation of the Gospel of Jesus (which continues today)... Francis diects our attention to the gifted grace of lifestyles of peaceableness, direct action for an end to war, and the Gospel requirement of building communities and nations of peace and justice... in policies and practices... 5) Francis directs our attention to interfaith dialogue and reverence: then as now, many people of "faith" use their faith as an excuse to cause harm, continue exploitation, and deepen oppression. Hate towards differing religious views and practices is arrogantly stupid! Francis was reulsed by even the idea of hating anyone: he could never reconcile (as many Christians find easy) wealth in the midst of poverty, cruelty in the midst of human beauty, and power that condemns instead of lifting up into genuine human community... Francis directs our attention to organizations like the Parliament of the World's religions in the hope that soon (and very soon) we might learn to see differences of faith as like the different "fingers of God"... united in spirit, united in our common humanity, and united in a learned humility... in policies and practices... In conclusion, Francis would teach us that, in fact, a new world is possible! That possibility resides in a determined wisdom to practice reverence for creation, equality for women, solidarity with the poor, nonviolent lifestyles, and interfaith dialogue and reverence... Of course, in policies and practices... There is of course, another of course... and that is the importance of personal transformation: Francis completely identified with the Cosmic Christ (never as a sword, but always as a dove)... Francis completely identified with the Suffering Christ-in-his-brothers-and-sisters... and perhaps most of all, Francis identified with the Feminine Face of the Divine, whom he called Lady Poverty (perhaps you might consider beginning to address the Holy One as Lady Poverty... let me assure you, if we all do so, everything will change... soon and very soon...) Ah, now we're talking about living the good life! |
AuthorRobert Daniel Smith was privileged to serve the homeless and marginalized for 30 years in California. He is living now almost within shouting distance of the Twin Cities. He is a poet, artist, writer, and long-time Companion of the Way still dreaming... Archives
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