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Birth is a miracle but not magic.

Worship is a ‘receipt’ given to God in return for the divine gifts of life which we receive…. It is an artful response to our awe and wonderment at the miracle of creation which surrounds us…..

Do not let the Christian doctrine of the Trinity alienate you from the oneness of God; for God is both the many and the one.

Until we discern the riches of the other tradition, any union will simply be a matter of absorption.
Uniting two traditions can create a space where a third and more life- giving form of spirituality can emerge.

Wholeness is a process rather than a static state: it is not an end to the journey but the journey itself.

“I GREET THAT OF THE COSMOS WITHIN YOU”

Homecoming after a splendid summer respite. Readings Proverbs 1:20-23; Ephesians 4:11-13 and John 8:30-32. I am indebted to Peter Rollins for his excellent insights into the need for church to be a place where we consult our suffering.

New images arise out of the death of old images so do not be afraid of the wilderness or of the dying.

This is an excerpt from a book Jim Burklo is writing this summer: MINDFUL CHRISTIANITY. The research he’s doing for this project has taken him deep into the history of Christian spirituality. According to Jim: “The more I learn, the more I have to learn!”

Liberty and Freedom: People – especially politicians, it seems – frequently use the two terms interchangeably, as if they were the same thing. But while civil liberties can be legislated and personal freedoms can be infringed upon, there is something autonomous about personal choices and actions that can never ultimately be denied or encumbered. “Freedom is not something that anybody can be given,” the late author and civil rights activist, James Baldwin, once said. “Freedom is something people take, and people are as free as they want to be.”

An earlier commentary considered the two ideas of conscience and consciousness as a spiritual component and practice of human experience. These comments are written as we approach our nation’s annual observance of the Independence Day holiday; exploring what might constitute a progressive Christian perspective of a kind of liberating “freedom” that is comprised of loosing the bonds of all the little deaths we die, and binding oneself to that which can irrepressibly spring once more to life.

THEME Two Faces of the One God –the One Life Force
THOUGHTS FOR REFLECTION
1. Darkness is the womb of the light, nothingness the womb of all things.

THEME The path to destruction and the path to new life.

Civilization defines justice as retribution – payback; an eye for an eye. But the deeper meaning of justice is distributive: the rain falls on the good, the bad, and the ugly without partiality. Civilization does not use that definition except in cases where there is clearly injustice if partiality enters the picture.

People accuse each other of cherry picking sacred texts, as if the term was an insult. But for those seeking to honor the quest of the Bible writers or to raise healthy children within a Christian tradition, that is precisely the right approach.

Our senses and our use of them are part of God’s creation.

  A famous poet, William Wordsworth defined poetry as “emotion recollected in tranquility.” I wonder if it might be productive to apply that notion to our interpretation of the New Testament. This approach, this perhaps at-first-alarming approach, …

When love and hatred engage in mortal conflict it is love which suffers most; but love has the final victory.

The mystery of the Eucharist (Holy Communion, Mass) is only fully perceived when all flesh is seen as embodying both the suffering and the delight of God.