"Perhaps one of the things that most undermine the development of our intimate relationship with God is our inability to realize and accept the fact that God does really want an intimate relationship with us, that we are really important to him. He made us for no other reason than to enjoy us and to have us enjoy him. He had an absolute fullness of happiness and he wanted to share it, so he made us. Such absolute gratuity is difficult for us to comprehend. Our whole training and the attitudes that prevail in today's world reinforces the conviction that one has to merit love, that everything we get has to be paid for. Not so with God. Nothingness cannot merit until it is gratuitously given something to serve as a basis of activity and possible merit."
"Centering Prayer" by Basil Pennington
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Monday, September 21, 2009
In Celebration of International Peace Day
In celebration of International Peace Day, I offer the following quote from George Fox, founder and visionary of the Quaker movement.
"We utterly deny all outward wars and strife and fighting with outward weapons, for any end or under any pretense whatsoever. And this is our testimony to the whole world. The spirit of Christ, by which we are guided, is not changeable, so as once to command us from a thing as evil and again to move unto it; and we do certainly know, and so testify to the world, that the spirit of Christ, which leads us into all Truth, will never move us to fight any war against any person with outward weapons, neither for the commonwealth of Christ, nor for the commonwealth's of this world."
"We utterly deny all outward wars and strife and fighting with outward weapons, for any end or under any pretense whatsoever. And this is our testimony to the whole world. The spirit of Christ, by which we are guided, is not changeable, so as once to command us from a thing as evil and again to move unto it; and we do certainly know, and so testify to the world, that the spirit of Christ, which leads us into all Truth, will never move us to fight any war against any person with outward weapons, neither for the commonwealth of Christ, nor for the commonwealth's of this world."
Saturday, September 5, 2009
"Answering the Great Deception" by Howard Thurman
Howard Thurman is one of my absolute favorite writers. This piece by him is a great encouragement to keep the hope and faith even in times of despair and disillusionment. The great deception is that there is no hope. Let us keep the faith!
During these turbulent times we must
remind ourselves repeatedly
that life goes on.
This we are apt to forget.
The wisdom of life transcends our wisdoms;
the purpose of life outlasts our purposes;
the process of life cushions our processes.
The mass attack of disillusion and despair,
distilled out of the collapse of hope,
has so invaded our thoughts that what we know
to be true and valid
seems unreal and ephemeral.
There seems to be little energy left for aught but futility.
This is the great deception.By it whole peoples have gone down to oblivion
without the will to affirm the great and permanent strength
of the clean and the commonplace. Let us not be deceived.
It is just as important as ever to attend to the little graces
by which the dignity of our lives is maintained and sustained.
Birds still sing;
the stars continue to cast their gentle gleamover the desolation of the battlefields,
and the heart is still inspired by the kind word
and the gracious deed….
To drink in the beauty that is within reach,
to clothe one’s life with simple deeds of kindness,
to keep alive a sensitiveness to the movement
of the spirit of God in the quietness of the human heart
and in the workings of the human mind—this is as always the ultimate answer to the great deception.
During these turbulent times we must
remind ourselves repeatedly
that life goes on.
This we are apt to forget.
The wisdom of life transcends our wisdoms;
the purpose of life outlasts our purposes;
the process of life cushions our processes.
The mass attack of disillusion and despair,
distilled out of the collapse of hope,
has so invaded our thoughts that what we know
to be true and valid
seems unreal and ephemeral.
There seems to be little energy left for aught but futility.
This is the great deception.By it whole peoples have gone down to oblivion
without the will to affirm the great and permanent strength
of the clean and the commonplace. Let us not be deceived.
It is just as important as ever to attend to the little graces
by which the dignity of our lives is maintained and sustained.
Birds still sing;
the stars continue to cast their gentle gleamover the desolation of the battlefields,
and the heart is still inspired by the kind word
and the gracious deed….
To drink in the beauty that is within reach,
to clothe one’s life with simple deeds of kindness,
to keep alive a sensitiveness to the movement
of the spirit of God in the quietness of the human heart
and in the workings of the human mind—this is as always the ultimate answer to the great deception.
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