Francis Berger's Blog, page 126
April 25, 2020
Chancellor - Gord Downie
My favorite song from Gord Downie's first solo album, Coke Machine Glow. Gord was one of those singers who really couldn't sing, but somehow made it work all the same. The low-key video was shot on Toronto's Centre Island.
Like most Gord Downie songs, the true magic happens in the lyrics. One excerpt I particularly like (especially the last line) comes from the beginning of the tune:
Seconds from pajamas I must
First open all the doors and the windows
And invite the vampire in to be one of us.
Then, in the guise of cool air,
In the softer hours, he's there,
Sitting, talking, in the voice of your mother
About leaving one good party for another,
And the night of a thousand missteps
And the loss that made him dogged
Or it could have been the doggedness that caused the loss in the first place, I guess.
Like most Gord Downie songs, the true magic happens in the lyrics. One excerpt I particularly like (especially the last line) comes from the beginning of the tune:
Seconds from pajamas I must
First open all the doors and the windows
And invite the vampire in to be one of us.
Then, in the guise of cool air,
In the softer hours, he's there,
Sitting, talking, in the voice of your mother
About leaving one good party for another,
And the night of a thousand missteps
And the loss that made him dogged
Or it could have been the doggedness that caused the loss in the first place, I guess.
April 24, 2020
An Idea Concerning God's Unresponsiveness
Over the past month or so I have encountered many comments on various blogs in which the commenters explicitly cited God's apparent unresponsiveness in light of everything that has occurred in connection with the birdemic. Some commenters lamented feeling abandoned by God; others expressed disappointment at the perceived and seemingly conspicuous lack of signs or communication from God. For many, the church closures did little more than rub salt into these despondent wounds.
Though I don't agree with these perspectives at all, I can understand where many of these commenters are coming from. I suspect most of these commenters are good, solid Christians who pray daily, read the Gospels regularly, and had attended churches before they closed. In other words, they were probably doing everything good, solid Christians are supposed to do. In light of this, I can certainly understand their frustration and discontent. After all, the evil in the world has magnified immensely in the past five or six weeks. Seen from the fixed perspective of most good, solid Christians, God does appear to have been rather unresponsive thus far.
Yet, perhaps there is a reason for God's seeming unresponsiveness - a reason that has everything to do with co-respondence. By co-respondence, I am not referring to an exchange of letters, but rather to the notion that perhaps God's seeming unresponsiveness to us has a great deal to do with our unresponsiveness to Him.
I cannot believe God has ceased communicating with us. What I can believe is the notion that perhaps our communications with God - those tried and true, good, solid Christian methods of communication that served so well in earlier times - have become inadequate and insufficient in the here and now. By the same token, our adherence to these tried and true methods of communication might very well be making us deaf and blind to God's communication. Simply put, perhaps God does not appear to be responding to us because we are not properly responding to Him.
I believe God is our loving father, and that he desires what is best for his children. Like all loving fathers, God wants his children to grow up and mature. This entails different approaches to and different levels of communication. God has taken this step forward; we in turn, have not. Put another way, God is trying to talk to us like adults, but we continue to talk and listen to him like adolescents (and fairly apathetic adolescents at that).
God will respond to us once we understand how we should begin responding to him. Part of responding to him as adults must contain an element of understanding our role as Co-Creators. According to Berdyaev, the next step in Christianity involves not only Man discovering himself in God, but also God discovering Himself in Man. This type of discovery necessitates a new, unprecedented form of co-respondence. It includes viewing God from an entirely new perspective - not as some distant, autocratic ruler one must obsequiously and blindly tremble before and obey, but a relatable friend and partner one can love and work cooperatively with, in the same manner an adult son or daughter can love and work cooperatively with a loving parent.
The co-creation Berdyaev speaks of involves a recognition of our latent spiritual creativity. This creativity is not the same as or equal to God's, but serves to complement it. By the same token, God's creativity is not the same as Man's, but God's creativity alone no longer appears sufficient. God is not responding to us because our communications with him are not creative. God will respond to us fully the moment we begin creatively communicating with Him. Once we learn to do that, we become Co-Creators. Our creative spirituality will become enhanced through God, and God's creative spirituality will become enhanced through us. The new co-respondence involves a fortifying and enhancement of both God and Man, a fortification and enhancement that can occur only when we understand our creative role.
Spiritual creativity requires initiative from us. This initiative must derive from freedom. According to William Arkle, once Man shows this initiative, he escapes all determinism and becomes actively creative - to the point that God can no longer accurately predict what Man will do. This is the essence of Co-Creation. This is the essence of the latent spiritual power within us - a latent spiritual power demonstrated fully by Christ.
To sum up, God may appear unresponsive to us because we are essentially unresponsive to Him. The good, solid, traditional methods of communication are no longer sufficient or adequate. The way forward requires spiritual growing-up by embracing freedom and becoming Co-Creators, and it will likely involve a process akin to Romantic Christianity and Berdyaev's third epoch of Christianity.
Though I don't agree with these perspectives at all, I can understand where many of these commenters are coming from. I suspect most of these commenters are good, solid Christians who pray daily, read the Gospels regularly, and had attended churches before they closed. In other words, they were probably doing everything good, solid Christians are supposed to do. In light of this, I can certainly understand their frustration and discontent. After all, the evil in the world has magnified immensely in the past five or six weeks. Seen from the fixed perspective of most good, solid Christians, God does appear to have been rather unresponsive thus far.
Yet, perhaps there is a reason for God's seeming unresponsiveness - a reason that has everything to do with co-respondence. By co-respondence, I am not referring to an exchange of letters, but rather to the notion that perhaps God's seeming unresponsiveness to us has a great deal to do with our unresponsiveness to Him.
I cannot believe God has ceased communicating with us. What I can believe is the notion that perhaps our communications with God - those tried and true, good, solid Christian methods of communication that served so well in earlier times - have become inadequate and insufficient in the here and now. By the same token, our adherence to these tried and true methods of communication might very well be making us deaf and blind to God's communication. Simply put, perhaps God does not appear to be responding to us because we are not properly responding to Him.
I believe God is our loving father, and that he desires what is best for his children. Like all loving fathers, God wants his children to grow up and mature. This entails different approaches to and different levels of communication. God has taken this step forward; we in turn, have not. Put another way, God is trying to talk to us like adults, but we continue to talk and listen to him like adolescents (and fairly apathetic adolescents at that).
God will respond to us once we understand how we should begin responding to him. Part of responding to him as adults must contain an element of understanding our role as Co-Creators. According to Berdyaev, the next step in Christianity involves not only Man discovering himself in God, but also God discovering Himself in Man. This type of discovery necessitates a new, unprecedented form of co-respondence. It includes viewing God from an entirely new perspective - not as some distant, autocratic ruler one must obsequiously and blindly tremble before and obey, but a relatable friend and partner one can love and work cooperatively with, in the same manner an adult son or daughter can love and work cooperatively with a loving parent.
The co-creation Berdyaev speaks of involves a recognition of our latent spiritual creativity. This creativity is not the same as or equal to God's, but serves to complement it. By the same token, God's creativity is not the same as Man's, but God's creativity alone no longer appears sufficient. God is not responding to us because our communications with him are not creative. God will respond to us fully the moment we begin creatively communicating with Him. Once we learn to do that, we become Co-Creators. Our creative spirituality will become enhanced through God, and God's creative spirituality will become enhanced through us. The new co-respondence involves a fortifying and enhancement of both God and Man, a fortification and enhancement that can occur only when we understand our creative role.
Spiritual creativity requires initiative from us. This initiative must derive from freedom. According to William Arkle, once Man shows this initiative, he escapes all determinism and becomes actively creative - to the point that God can no longer accurately predict what Man will do. This is the essence of Co-Creation. This is the essence of the latent spiritual power within us - a latent spiritual power demonstrated fully by Christ.
To sum up, God may appear unresponsive to us because we are essentially unresponsive to Him. The good, solid, traditional methods of communication are no longer sufficient or adequate. The way forward requires spiritual growing-up by embracing freedom and becoming Co-Creators, and it will likely involve a process akin to Romantic Christianity and Berdyaev's third epoch of Christianity.
April 23, 2020
The Immolation of False Selves in the Birdemic-Pandemic
One of the most helpful insights I have gained from reading A Geography of Consciousness is William Arkle's revelation of the True Self and the role false selves play in obscuring and obstructing this True Self. According to Arkle, the True Self is of divine origin, and it houses our own potential to be become or, at the very least, to move closer to the divine.
A good way to conceptualize the True Self (at least for me) is to think about it as a latent seed buried deep within our being. Provided the proper conditions and nutrients, the latent spiritual seed grows and develops. Denied the proper conditions and nutrients, the latent seed remains muted and hindered. I use the word latent to describe the True Self here, but if my understanding is correct, latent does not imply the True Self is completely dormant or passive. On the contrary, the True Self is always active to some degree, but it is the degree of this activity and, more importantly, the degree of our own perception and understanding of this activity that determines the effectiveness of the True Self's activity.
Consciousness is the medium through which the True Self communicates; hence, the effectiveness of its communication depends entirely on the effectiveness of our perception of this communication. If our consciousnesses align (partially at least) with our True Selves, we begin to perceive and have the opportunity to respond to this communication. If our consciousnesses are misaligned with our True Selves, we either do not pick up the communications or misinterpret them when we do.
A good way to think about it might be through the idea of higher and lower frequencies, which is one of the ways Arkle illustrates the relationship between the consciousness and the True Self. If our consciousnesses our attuned to lower frequencies, they will miss much of the higher communication the True Self is transmitting. Nevertheless, if we set our consciousnesses to higher frequencies, we will begin to pick up what the True Self is broadcasting. Of course, this does not imply that we will immediately understand everything the True Self communicates to us, but we will, at the very least, become aware of this stream of communication. From the perspective of spiritual development, awareness itself is major step forward.
Since the True Self is of divine origin, it is essentially the seat of our divine meaning and purpose in this world. The closer we come to understanding the True Self, the closer we come to understanding why we are here and what we should be doing. And this is where false selves come into play. False selves are basically what the name implies - untrue or only partially-true conceptions of our meaning and purpose in this world.
False selves are false in the sense that they either provide little or nothing in the way of spiritual development or, much worse, act as hindrances or obstacles to spiritual development. Unconscious or automatic responses and skills - including but not limited to things like driving or the thousands of other routines comprising our daily lives - make up the former, while the latter comprises selves that are grounded in activities, thinking, and behaviors that are likely antithetical to the True Self and spiritual development. I tend to think of these false selves as being driven and fed by lower instincts and emotions such as greed, lust, hatred, fear, despair, and the like.
From my perspective, the false selves stemming from lower instincts are far more pernicious and harmful than the purely robotic false selves (though these can prove harmful as well if not properly considered). For example, very few people identify themselves with or attach any meaning or deeper purpose to simple, automatic tasks like the daily making of a cup of coffee or tea. Brewing a cup of coffee or tea in the morning is simply something one does - it is not what a person is.
By the same token, the truly obstructive false selves are those to which we identify purpose and meaning. For example, people might not identify with or derive any deeper purpose and meaning from brushing their teeth, but many do derive deeper purpose and meaning from their vocations or, more specifically, from the lower instincts fueling most vocations. There is meaning and purpose to be found in almost any job, and many jobs can provide the ingredients needed for learning and spiritual growth; however, if we identify only with the lower frequencies of our livelihoods, we run the risk of establishing the kinds of ego-based false selves that lead us away from or obstruct our True Selves.
I could spend pages detailing the various aspects and degrees of false selves, but the definitions supplied thus far are sufficient for the purposes of this post. And what is the purpose of this post? To draw attention to Arkle's concept of the True Self and how the process of aligning the consciousness with the True Self underscores spiritual development. It should go without saying that this is something we should be both aware of and, ideally, willingly and actively pursuing throughout our lives in the interest of spiritual development, even in the best of times.
Having said the above, the circumstances of the birdemic pandemic present a unique and unprecedented situation concerning false selves. Rather than willingly and actively confronting false selves, we have been placed into a situation in which we are practically forced into confronting false selves. Put another way, the birdemic has manifested and is manifesting conditions in which the existence of false selves, both in others and in ourselves, becomes glaringly evident.
On one hand, the lockdown has suspended or curtailed most of our routine and mundane tasks of the automatic/robotic kind - commuting to work, work-related tasks on job sites, passive enjoyment of certain pleasures, etc. On the other hand, the lockdown has also at least partially severed us from jobs and past times that fuel lower instincts like ego and status. Needless to say, this has created varying degrees of discomfort and inconvenience for all of us. Much of this inconvenience and discomfort stems from a severe curtailment of personal liberties and freedoms, but I suspect a great deal of it might also originate from the forced position of having to confront false selves.
Ideally, the confronting and stripping away of false selves should be a freely chosen and freely willed individual decision, but lacking such motivation, we sometimes find ourselves in circumstances in which we are more or less forced to confront false selves through no conscious choice of our own. This is an essential part of learning. I believe the birdemic panic has placed all us in this kind of position. For the first time in my living memory, the greater bulk of humanity has been given the opportunity to take a step away from the world and engage in the process of becoming aware of false selves - their own false selves and the false selves of others.
As mentioned above, becoming aware of false selves - both in ourselves and in others - rarely breeds comfort or pleasure. In other words, recognizing and eliminating false selves can be an arduous activity, one wrought with startling revelations, errors in judgement, and genuine moments of being (for lack of a better phrase), which helps to explain why so many of us are perfectly content to reside purely in the realm of false selves.
Another problem with the recognition and elimination of a false self is that it rarely leads toward the True Self but, more often, to the falling back upon or creation of another false self. Nevertheless, in terms of spiritual development, the mere awareness of false selves is a step forward.
Oddly enough, the System, which breeds, nurtures, and maintains false selves, has now distanced a great portion of the populations of most countries. This gives us all an opportunity to reflect upon the false nature of the System and of our own false selves and their relations to the System. Through no choice of our own, many of us have been placed into positions where the conscious choice of that step forward can be made, or if it has already been made, can continue in a fairly intense and robust way.
As people read this, I fear I may be accused of desperately trying to find a silver lining in an otherwise dark cloud. Before I conclude this post, allow me to stress that the conditions of the birdemic panic have been motivated and fueled by evil. As such, they are not Good. All the same, this does not imply Good cannot arise from these conditions. One possible good that may arise is an increased awareness of false selves and increased movement toward the True Self - that divine spark within us all. And if it doesn't occur at the collective level, it can still certainly occur at the individual level. And if it is to occur at the individual level, then it must occur now.
No excuses.
A good way to conceptualize the True Self (at least for me) is to think about it as a latent seed buried deep within our being. Provided the proper conditions and nutrients, the latent spiritual seed grows and develops. Denied the proper conditions and nutrients, the latent seed remains muted and hindered. I use the word latent to describe the True Self here, but if my understanding is correct, latent does not imply the True Self is completely dormant or passive. On the contrary, the True Self is always active to some degree, but it is the degree of this activity and, more importantly, the degree of our own perception and understanding of this activity that determines the effectiveness of the True Self's activity.
Consciousness is the medium through which the True Self communicates; hence, the effectiveness of its communication depends entirely on the effectiveness of our perception of this communication. If our consciousnesses align (partially at least) with our True Selves, we begin to perceive and have the opportunity to respond to this communication. If our consciousnesses are misaligned with our True Selves, we either do not pick up the communications or misinterpret them when we do.
A good way to think about it might be through the idea of higher and lower frequencies, which is one of the ways Arkle illustrates the relationship between the consciousness and the True Self. If our consciousnesses our attuned to lower frequencies, they will miss much of the higher communication the True Self is transmitting. Nevertheless, if we set our consciousnesses to higher frequencies, we will begin to pick up what the True Self is broadcasting. Of course, this does not imply that we will immediately understand everything the True Self communicates to us, but we will, at the very least, become aware of this stream of communication. From the perspective of spiritual development, awareness itself is major step forward.
Since the True Self is of divine origin, it is essentially the seat of our divine meaning and purpose in this world. The closer we come to understanding the True Self, the closer we come to understanding why we are here and what we should be doing. And this is where false selves come into play. False selves are basically what the name implies - untrue or only partially-true conceptions of our meaning and purpose in this world.
False selves are false in the sense that they either provide little or nothing in the way of spiritual development or, much worse, act as hindrances or obstacles to spiritual development. Unconscious or automatic responses and skills - including but not limited to things like driving or the thousands of other routines comprising our daily lives - make up the former, while the latter comprises selves that are grounded in activities, thinking, and behaviors that are likely antithetical to the True Self and spiritual development. I tend to think of these false selves as being driven and fed by lower instincts and emotions such as greed, lust, hatred, fear, despair, and the like.
From my perspective, the false selves stemming from lower instincts are far more pernicious and harmful than the purely robotic false selves (though these can prove harmful as well if not properly considered). For example, very few people identify themselves with or attach any meaning or deeper purpose to simple, automatic tasks like the daily making of a cup of coffee or tea. Brewing a cup of coffee or tea in the morning is simply something one does - it is not what a person is.
By the same token, the truly obstructive false selves are those to which we identify purpose and meaning. For example, people might not identify with or derive any deeper purpose and meaning from brushing their teeth, but many do derive deeper purpose and meaning from their vocations or, more specifically, from the lower instincts fueling most vocations. There is meaning and purpose to be found in almost any job, and many jobs can provide the ingredients needed for learning and spiritual growth; however, if we identify only with the lower frequencies of our livelihoods, we run the risk of establishing the kinds of ego-based false selves that lead us away from or obstruct our True Selves.
I could spend pages detailing the various aspects and degrees of false selves, but the definitions supplied thus far are sufficient for the purposes of this post. And what is the purpose of this post? To draw attention to Arkle's concept of the True Self and how the process of aligning the consciousness with the True Self underscores spiritual development. It should go without saying that this is something we should be both aware of and, ideally, willingly and actively pursuing throughout our lives in the interest of spiritual development, even in the best of times.
Having said the above, the circumstances of the birdemic pandemic present a unique and unprecedented situation concerning false selves. Rather than willingly and actively confronting false selves, we have been placed into a situation in which we are practically forced into confronting false selves. Put another way, the birdemic has manifested and is manifesting conditions in which the existence of false selves, both in others and in ourselves, becomes glaringly evident.
On one hand, the lockdown has suspended or curtailed most of our routine and mundane tasks of the automatic/robotic kind - commuting to work, work-related tasks on job sites, passive enjoyment of certain pleasures, etc. On the other hand, the lockdown has also at least partially severed us from jobs and past times that fuel lower instincts like ego and status. Needless to say, this has created varying degrees of discomfort and inconvenience for all of us. Much of this inconvenience and discomfort stems from a severe curtailment of personal liberties and freedoms, but I suspect a great deal of it might also originate from the forced position of having to confront false selves.
Ideally, the confronting and stripping away of false selves should be a freely chosen and freely willed individual decision, but lacking such motivation, we sometimes find ourselves in circumstances in which we are more or less forced to confront false selves through no conscious choice of our own. This is an essential part of learning. I believe the birdemic panic has placed all us in this kind of position. For the first time in my living memory, the greater bulk of humanity has been given the opportunity to take a step away from the world and engage in the process of becoming aware of false selves - their own false selves and the false selves of others.
As mentioned above, becoming aware of false selves - both in ourselves and in others - rarely breeds comfort or pleasure. In other words, recognizing and eliminating false selves can be an arduous activity, one wrought with startling revelations, errors in judgement, and genuine moments of being (for lack of a better phrase), which helps to explain why so many of us are perfectly content to reside purely in the realm of false selves.
Another problem with the recognition and elimination of a false self is that it rarely leads toward the True Self but, more often, to the falling back upon or creation of another false self. Nevertheless, in terms of spiritual development, the mere awareness of false selves is a step forward.
Oddly enough, the System, which breeds, nurtures, and maintains false selves, has now distanced a great portion of the populations of most countries. This gives us all an opportunity to reflect upon the false nature of the System and of our own false selves and their relations to the System. Through no choice of our own, many of us have been placed into positions where the conscious choice of that step forward can be made, or if it has already been made, can continue in a fairly intense and robust way.
As people read this, I fear I may be accused of desperately trying to find a silver lining in an otherwise dark cloud. Before I conclude this post, allow me to stress that the conditions of the birdemic panic have been motivated and fueled by evil. As such, they are not Good. All the same, this does not imply Good cannot arise from these conditions. One possible good that may arise is an increased awareness of false selves and increased movement toward the True Self - that divine spark within us all. And if it doesn't occur at the collective level, it can still certainly occur at the individual level. And if it is to occur at the individual level, then it must occur now.
No excuses.
Senza un perché - Strange Little Tune
I first heard this little ditty when I watched The Young Pope (an odd, sexually-charged television series focusing on an ultra-conservative, authoritarian 'young' American cardinal who tries to return Catholicism to its conservative roots after he is elected pope and takes on the name Pius XIII).
The song is called Senza un perché (Without a reason) and it is sung by the Italian singer Nada (whom I had never heard of before). Anyway, in the Young Pope series, the prime minister of Greenland gifts the song to Pius XIII when they meet in the Vatican (don't ask me why).
It's definitely not the world's greatest song or anything, but it has a way of staying in your head - for better or for worse.
The song is called Senza un perché (Without a reason) and it is sung by the Italian singer Nada (whom I had never heard of before). Anyway, in the Young Pope series, the prime minister of Greenland gifts the song to Pius XIII when they meet in the Vatican (don't ask me why).
It's definitely not the world's greatest song or anything, but it has a way of staying in your head - for better or for worse.
Starting The Home Renovations Early This Year
For me, summer means home renovations.
I purchased an old house in a small village in western Hungary four years ago, and I have spent every summer since then working on it bit-by-bit in an effort to make it more beautiful and livable.
I had big plans for this summer. I had wanted to have the roof replaced create a loft from the space upstairs, but I put these plans on hold indefinitely after the birdemic broke out. The truth is I don't really need a new roof (yet) and the loft can wait. In light of the uncertainty out there, I considered it best to keep the money I would have spent on this major renovation safely in my pocket.
Even though the summer is still a way off, the past six weeks have felt like summer to me. Firstly, the weather has been glorious. Secondly, I have spent the last month-and-a-half at home. Though I'm still working, I have plenty of free time most days, which has resulted in the itching need to do some kind of renovation project, birdemic be damned!
Though I have spent a considerable amount of time creating a nice vegetable patch and completing other gardening tasks since mid-March, I feel the urge to partake in a little home renovation. Thus, I spent a few days thinking about what I could do and came up with four possible projects.
One - repair the cold cellar. Two - renovate the small, free-standing outbuilding into what Hungarians refer to as a "summer kitchen." Three - restore and replaster the old chicken coop in the backyard. Four - strip and repaint the doors and doorframes inside the house.
I think I'll tackle the chicken coop first. It's a solid brick building that needs a little replastering, a new door, and a couple of new windows. I doubt it will cost much to renovate and chances are it won't take too much time either.
After that? Who knows? Maybe I'll get some chickens. Of course, I don't know the first thing about keeping chickens, but it looks like I'll have plenty of time this summer to learn everything there is to know about it.
I purchased an old house in a small village in western Hungary four years ago, and I have spent every summer since then working on it bit-by-bit in an effort to make it more beautiful and livable.
I had big plans for this summer. I had wanted to have the roof replaced create a loft from the space upstairs, but I put these plans on hold indefinitely after the birdemic broke out. The truth is I don't really need a new roof (yet) and the loft can wait. In light of the uncertainty out there, I considered it best to keep the money I would have spent on this major renovation safely in my pocket.
Even though the summer is still a way off, the past six weeks have felt like summer to me. Firstly, the weather has been glorious. Secondly, I have spent the last month-and-a-half at home. Though I'm still working, I have plenty of free time most days, which has resulted in the itching need to do some kind of renovation project, birdemic be damned!
Though I have spent a considerable amount of time creating a nice vegetable patch and completing other gardening tasks since mid-March, I feel the urge to partake in a little home renovation. Thus, I spent a few days thinking about what I could do and came up with four possible projects.
One - repair the cold cellar. Two - renovate the small, free-standing outbuilding into what Hungarians refer to as a "summer kitchen." Three - restore and replaster the old chicken coop in the backyard. Four - strip and repaint the doors and doorframes inside the house.
I think I'll tackle the chicken coop first. It's a solid brick building that needs a little replastering, a new door, and a couple of new windows. I doubt it will cost much to renovate and chances are it won't take too much time either.
After that? Who knows? Maybe I'll get some chickens. Of course, I don't know the first thing about keeping chickens, but it looks like I'll have plenty of time this summer to learn everything there is to know about it.
April 21, 2020
The Most Poignant Pieta Painting?
Full disclosure, nearly every representation of the Virgin Mary holding the body of Christ in her arms or lap I have ever encountered has moved me in some way. The Pieta just has a heartrending affect on me. I'm not ashamed to admit the image usually chokes me up - sometimes it even moves me to tears (which is exactly what pietas are meant to do).
The Pieta is most often a subject for sculpture - the most famous example being Michelangelo's Pieta in St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City. Nonetheless, countless painters have tackled the theme as well. Which one of these pieta paintings is the most poignant?
In my humble and uneducated opinion, this would have to be William Adolphe Bouguereau's Pieta painted in 1876.
The word pieta means pity or compassion; hence, a pieta image is meant to evoke pity or compassion (or both) in the viewer. Bouguereau accomplishes these objectives in a most effective and touching manner. The color contrast between Mary and Christ is superb. Note the motherly manner in which Mary holds Jesus, her hands clasped together around his body indicating not only her deep love but her seeming refusal to let him go.
Bouguereau places Mary and Jesus directly in the middle of the canvas and frames them in an arch of grieving angels. The mourning angels amplify the pity and sadness of the scene. Bouguereau eschews any background. Only blackness exists behind the figures. The items placed in the foreground - the crown of thorns, a bowl, jug, and sponge - remind the viewer of the crucifixion and the agony Mary must have suffered on that day as she watched her son die before her and the heartbreaking tasks that awaited her once he was taken from the cross.
The ornate, almost Byzantine-style halo draw the viewer's eye Mary's face, and this is where Bouguereau's genius in evoking pity and compassion become evident. Mary's expression is what makes Bouguereau's Pieta the most poignant. While other pietas usually feature Mary looking upon Christ or looking forlorn towards the sky, Bouguereau chooses to have Mary stare straight ahead from the canvas directly at the viewer.
As Mary fixes her mournful gaze on the viewer, the viewer is left no escape. A mere look at Mary's face is all it takes for the compassion to materialize - the viewer is practically forced into a position where he or she cannot help but feel Mary's pain and suffering. Truly affecting.
The Pieta is most often a subject for sculpture - the most famous example being Michelangelo's Pieta in St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City. Nonetheless, countless painters have tackled the theme as well. Which one of these pieta paintings is the most poignant?
In my humble and uneducated opinion, this would have to be William Adolphe Bouguereau's Pieta painted in 1876.
The word pieta means pity or compassion; hence, a pieta image is meant to evoke pity or compassion (or both) in the viewer. Bouguereau accomplishes these objectives in a most effective and touching manner. The color contrast between Mary and Christ is superb. Note the motherly manner in which Mary holds Jesus, her hands clasped together around his body indicating not only her deep love but her seeming refusal to let him go. Bouguereau places Mary and Jesus directly in the middle of the canvas and frames them in an arch of grieving angels. The mourning angels amplify the pity and sadness of the scene. Bouguereau eschews any background. Only blackness exists behind the figures. The items placed in the foreground - the crown of thorns, a bowl, jug, and sponge - remind the viewer of the crucifixion and the agony Mary must have suffered on that day as she watched her son die before her and the heartbreaking tasks that awaited her once he was taken from the cross.
The ornate, almost Byzantine-style halo draw the viewer's eye Mary's face, and this is where Bouguereau's genius in evoking pity and compassion become evident. Mary's expression is what makes Bouguereau's Pieta the most poignant. While other pietas usually feature Mary looking upon Christ or looking forlorn towards the sky, Bouguereau chooses to have Mary stare straight ahead from the canvas directly at the viewer.
As Mary fixes her mournful gaze on the viewer, the viewer is left no escape. A mere look at Mary's face is all it takes for the compassion to materialize - the viewer is practically forced into a position where he or she cannot help but feel Mary's pain and suffering. Truly affecting.
To Those In Despair - William James Tychonievich
Pen friend and fellow blogger William James Tychonievich has a message for those who are tempted to succumb to despair - toughen up, cupcake.
Others are posting messages of comfort, but I get the distinct feeling that what some people really need is a message of discomfort -- a swift kick in the seat of the pants. So, never being one to dismiss distinct feelings, here goes.
Ahem.
Listen. You were always going to suffer and die. Everyone in your family was always going to suffer and die. Everyone you know was always going to suffer and die. All your earthly efforts were going to come to nought, your country and culture -- and, least we forget, "the economy" -- were going to degenerate and disappear, and the sun was going to expand into a red giant and consume the earth as though it had never existed. All that was always going to happen, and you knew it all along, or would have if you had been paying attention.
If you are in despair now but weren't before, you're an idiot. You do realize this game you signed up for is called mortal life, right? Did someone not explain that to you? Were you expecting something different? I don't know anything about your situation, but I know it hasn't fundamentally changed. You were born on death row. Don't you think that should have made you a little tougher than this?
As for the all the dupes and caitiffs and hypocrites and quislings you suddenly find yourself surrounded by -- I hate to break it to you, but they were already like that. All you're seeing now is what their true colors were all along. That's what the word apocalypse actually means, you know: Revelation. Revealing. Uncovering. The green field coming off like a lid. For just a second, you get a glimpse of all the men behind all the curtains in the world. The whited sepulchers may have looked nicer before they were opened, but they were full of dead men's bones all along.
Read the rest of Wm's swift kick to the seat of the pants here.
Others are posting messages of comfort, but I get the distinct feeling that what some people really need is a message of discomfort -- a swift kick in the seat of the pants. So, never being one to dismiss distinct feelings, here goes.
Ahem.
Listen. You were always going to suffer and die. Everyone in your family was always going to suffer and die. Everyone you know was always going to suffer and die. All your earthly efforts were going to come to nought, your country and culture -- and, least we forget, "the economy" -- were going to degenerate and disappear, and the sun was going to expand into a red giant and consume the earth as though it had never existed. All that was always going to happen, and you knew it all along, or would have if you had been paying attention.
If you are in despair now but weren't before, you're an idiot. You do realize this game you signed up for is called mortal life, right? Did someone not explain that to you? Were you expecting something different? I don't know anything about your situation, but I know it hasn't fundamentally changed. You were born on death row. Don't you think that should have made you a little tougher than this?
As for the all the dupes and caitiffs and hypocrites and quislings you suddenly find yourself surrounded by -- I hate to break it to you, but they were already like that. All you're seeing now is what their true colors were all along. That's what the word apocalypse actually means, you know: Revelation. Revealing. Uncovering. The green field coming off like a lid. For just a second, you get a glimpse of all the men behind all the curtains in the world. The whited sepulchers may have looked nicer before they were opened, but they were full of dead men's bones all along.
Read the rest of Wm's swift kick to the seat of the pants here.
April 20, 2020
The Double Sin of Despair Over the System
The first sin is simply the sin of despair. For any serious Christian, the mere notion of despair should be anathema. After all, how could any serious Christian ever lose hope in the example of Christ? Above all else, the Resurrection is a testament against hopelessness. When Jesus defeated death, he proved, beyond all doubt, that we have nothing to fear or feel hopeless about, neither in this world nor in life everlasting. The trials and tribulations of this world cannot destroy the next world if we follow His example and believe on Him.
The second sin is the nurturing of hope for a System that is inherently antithetical to God - that is, diametrically opposed to Truth, Beauty, and Virtue. The System is not only anti-Good, it has been meticulously engineered to actively wage war against the Good. Any experienced beneficial side effects of the System are either remnants from an earlier time (when the System itself may have been less inherently evil) or purely material by-products that offer nothing above the level of physical comfort, convenience, or pleasure.
To lose hope over a System that was designed to generate perpetual hopelessness, a System whose sole purpose in the past century (at least) has been to deny and destroy the Truth at every possible turn is akin to a Gulag prisoner losing hope in the proper, effective functioning of the Gulag that tortures him and keeps him captive.
The manner in which the System is faltering or collapsing (take your pick) is not something we should be celebrating or embracing. By the same token, it is also not something we should be resisting or despairing over. The System should have faltered or collapsed decades, nay centuries ago, but this development should have been achieved through our own willed decision to turn away from the System and establish a new mode of Being.
Yet we resisted and rejected that much needed shift of consciousness every time the opportunity to take it up arose. Instead of committing to this much-needed and, at times, sorely overdue consciousness shift we chose instead to double-down on our hope in the System. What we are experiencing now is an epic case of reaping what we have sown. Rather than despair, we should be feeling sorrow and shame - sorrow and shame that we collectively ever allowed ourselves to become materially-enslaved to such evil.
The faltering or total collapse of the System will undoubtedly generate much discomfort, hardship, and pain . . . perhaps even death. It is difficult and unsettling to consider what may await us all - our family, friends, loved ones, and the countless people we don't know - as the System continues to crumble, but we must never forget that all hope in the System is fundamentally sinful and misguided. The System was designed to abandon us. The System was designed to work against us. Hope in the System is, at best, hope invested in totalitarian, bureaucratic tyranny; at worse, it is hope invested in something even more sinister.
Any feeling of despair over the System is a declaration of the victory of evil. Hope, faith, and love are crucial in the here and now, but we should remain vigilant about where we place our hope, faith, and love.
God is a loving Creator. He will never abandon you. He will never work against you. He will arrange the material world in such a way that it becomes what each of us needs to nurture our continued spiritual growth and development. Our continued spiritual growth and development may not necessarily entail our continued material growth and development . This is a difficult pill to swallow for some Christians, but swallowed it must be.
God will never abandon us. God will never work against us. We must remember not to abandon or work against Him. In fact, the time has come to take up the cause our ancestors neglected to take up and begin working with Him creatively. That requires a total shift in consciousness, but that is what is needed, now more than ever.
Note added: Any feeling of despair, especially despair for the System, must be repented. We are all bound to taste despair in the weeks and months ahead. Having said that, it is one thing to taste despair and repent it; it is quite another thing to taste despair and then voluntarily feast on it.
The second sin is the nurturing of hope for a System that is inherently antithetical to God - that is, diametrically opposed to Truth, Beauty, and Virtue. The System is not only anti-Good, it has been meticulously engineered to actively wage war against the Good. Any experienced beneficial side effects of the System are either remnants from an earlier time (when the System itself may have been less inherently evil) or purely material by-products that offer nothing above the level of physical comfort, convenience, or pleasure.
To lose hope over a System that was designed to generate perpetual hopelessness, a System whose sole purpose in the past century (at least) has been to deny and destroy the Truth at every possible turn is akin to a Gulag prisoner losing hope in the proper, effective functioning of the Gulag that tortures him and keeps him captive.
The manner in which the System is faltering or collapsing (take your pick) is not something we should be celebrating or embracing. By the same token, it is also not something we should be resisting or despairing over. The System should have faltered or collapsed decades, nay centuries ago, but this development should have been achieved through our own willed decision to turn away from the System and establish a new mode of Being.
Yet we resisted and rejected that much needed shift of consciousness every time the opportunity to take it up arose. Instead of committing to this much-needed and, at times, sorely overdue consciousness shift we chose instead to double-down on our hope in the System. What we are experiencing now is an epic case of reaping what we have sown. Rather than despair, we should be feeling sorrow and shame - sorrow and shame that we collectively ever allowed ourselves to become materially-enslaved to such evil.
The faltering or total collapse of the System will undoubtedly generate much discomfort, hardship, and pain . . . perhaps even death. It is difficult and unsettling to consider what may await us all - our family, friends, loved ones, and the countless people we don't know - as the System continues to crumble, but we must never forget that all hope in the System is fundamentally sinful and misguided. The System was designed to abandon us. The System was designed to work against us. Hope in the System is, at best, hope invested in totalitarian, bureaucratic tyranny; at worse, it is hope invested in something even more sinister.
Any feeling of despair over the System is a declaration of the victory of evil. Hope, faith, and love are crucial in the here and now, but we should remain vigilant about where we place our hope, faith, and love.
God is a loving Creator. He will never abandon you. He will never work against you. He will arrange the material world in such a way that it becomes what each of us needs to nurture our continued spiritual growth and development. Our continued spiritual growth and development may not necessarily entail our continued material growth and development . This is a difficult pill to swallow for some Christians, but swallowed it must be.
God will never abandon us. God will never work against us. We must remember not to abandon or work against Him. In fact, the time has come to take up the cause our ancestors neglected to take up and begin working with Him creatively. That requires a total shift in consciousness, but that is what is needed, now more than ever.
Note added: Any feeling of despair, especially despair for the System, must be repented. We are all bound to taste despair in the weeks and months ahead. Having said that, it is one thing to taste despair and repent it; it is quite another thing to taste despair and then voluntarily feast on it.
April 19, 2020
Some Spiritual Implications of Project Despair
When the birdemic 'crisis' broke, Bruce Charlton published a post in which he implored people not to succumb to fear and despair. Since then, we have witnessed and experienced the unbelievable success of the Fear Regime, which evil has utilized to pull of the greatest totalitarian coup the world has ever seen. Though the Fear Regime is still going strong, it has begun making room on the global stage for the next phase in the demonic strategy of mass soul damnation. Dr. Charlton has referred to this next phase as Project Despair.
Despair is a state of hopelessness. It can be triggered by a variety of factors and exists at the individual or small group level even during the best of times. But these are anything but the best of times. For the first time in my living memory, the stage has been set for potential mass despair at the global level; and by mass despair I mean millions or billions of people all across the world becoming simultaneously infected by hopelessness.
At its core, despair is a spiritual problem, but the vast majority of people in our despiritualized world refuse to recognize it as such and tend to attribute despair solely to various biological, psychological, social, or economic factors. For the sake of consideration, let's follow this line of thinking and focus almost exclusively on material factors.
As alluded to above, the vast majority of modern people are materialists; that is, they wholeheartedly adhere to the theory that fundamental reality is restricted to physical matter and the various interactions and movements of physical matter. As a result, modern people generally reject spiritual values and stress the value of physical comfort and material possessions.
Materialism is essentially a theory of meaninglessness for it can provide no answer to the question of the underlying purpose for the existence of the material world. For the materialist, everything - including consciousness and emotions like love - is just the result of stuff interacting with other stuff. Therefore, the only meaning a materialist can hope to find in world made of nothing but stuff is to divide the world into good stuff and bad stuff. As a result, materialists strive to accumulate or enjoy the good stuff - possessions, property, pleasure, status, and so forth - while simultaneously avoiding as much of the bad staff - poverty, illness, depression, disempowerment, etc. - as possible.
Despair is a tricky issue for materialists because the fundamental meaninglessness of their philosophy is inherently despair-inducing to begin. The only hope materialism can offer its worshippers are the physical possibilities of possessions, power, and pleasure. In theory, hope remains viable as long as the possibility for material gain remains viable.
The problem with materialism is that physical possessions, power, and pleasure rarely provide lasting fulfillment; the kind of fulfillment that can only stem from true meaning and purpose. The accumulation of possessions only breeds a desire to accumulate more possessions. The acquisition of power often leads to the motivation to expand power or, conversely, to the fear of losing power already obtained. Pleasures rooted purely in the physical tend to fade rather quickly, spurring the need for new pleasures more exciting or exotic pleasures. This is the only real hope materialism can offer.
Sounds good, right? Well it must because over the past two or three centuries it has become the dominant theory driving our civilization. Simply put - materialism has triumphed. Despite this, there is one thing over which materialism cannot triumph - death. For materialists, death is an outrage - the ultimate insult. It nullifies the shining beacon of hope materialism projects. In the end, the power, pleasures, and possessions a person has accumulated and experienced are rendered null and void. The person simply ends. Nevertheless, the beacon of materialist hope remains as long as the person remains - in theory at least.
Put another way, hope for materialists is delicately tied to the prospect of acquiring or enjoying stuff. But what happens to this hope when all prospects fade or disappear? Even worse, what happens when these diminishing prospects coincide with actual material losses? Well, if history is any guide, such conditions offer a severe challenge to the hope materialism extends to its followers. Of course, these challenges occur all the time at the individual level even during the best of times. A lost job or a bad investment or a divorce are all stress tests to a materialist's hope. If hope begins to fade, the materialist can always seek distraction through pleasure or intoxication, which is a go-to strategy for many a materialist. But if hope continues to fade, the materialist is ultimately left in a state of despair.
Because materialists reject the existence of the other-wordly (supernatural), any hope they can nurture is inevitably tied to this-world (natural). Consequently, their hope and faith in materialism is put to the test every time the world turns against them. Under these conditions, clinging to hope becomes a real challenge for materialists, and whatever hope they manage to sustain depends heavily on their ability to locate further material possibilities - comfort, pleasure, gain, etc.
I mention this all of this because the birdemic lockdown has turned the material world against us all in these past five or six weeks. People have just recently started waking up to the economic devastation the lockdown is causing. Over 20 million people have been thrust into unemployment in the United States alone. Goodness only knows what these numbers might be in other countries. Add a potential avalanche of destroyed small businesses, loan defaults, and other calamities to the list and you have all the ingredients needed for mass suffering at the material level - mass suffering that may very well precipitate mass despair.
As mentioned earlier, despair is fundamentally a spiritual problem. The fact that most modern people do not recognize it as such is a major victory for the forces of evil (of course, the fact that most people are materialists is also a major victory for evil). People who regard despair as a purely material phenomenon and seek to escape despair by purely material means have already potentially damned themselves because they refuse to accept two inescapable truths: despair is a sin; despair can only be avoided by belief in something beyond the worldy.
For people like this, despair becomes a pain threshold. Their ability to endure despair will depend heavily on purely biological, psychological, and physical survival instincts. Under these conditions, materialists will be perpetually alert to the existence of anything that might offer the slimmest glimmer of hope - anything that might be able to alleviate their material suffering and restore their faith in the material world.
The forces of evil are keenly aware of this and will work hard to formulate a purely material panacea that promises to remedy a great deal of the physical discomfort and material hardships people are experiencing or will experience. Of course, this panacea will come with a price. That price will be the total surrender of human freedom and, more significantly, the surrender of the soul.
Materialists damn themselves by refusing or rejecting all notions of a spiritual solution to their material suffering. By repudiating the existence of the other-worldy and making this repudiation the basis of their hope in this-world, materialists effectively fall into the despair deathtrap evil has set for them for they become eternally blinded by the borders of biological death.
Evil uses the trick of materialism to negate the Truth. Evil then uses materially-induced despair to veil the spiritual hope Reality offers through Christ and the Promise of Heaven. Nevertheless, not all materialists are not lost cases. There is a chance some may discover true hope within the depths of despair. If they do, they will take the first step out of the worldly deathtrap and begin their journey toward everlasting life.
Understanding the obvious limits, those of us who believe in the primacy of the spiritual must do all we can to inspire those caught in the deathtrap of despair, even this inspiration comes only through the form of prayer. At the same time, Serious Christians must remain vigilant about succumbing to despair themselves. After all, despair is a grievous sin - but I'll leave that for another post.
Note added: This post was partly inspired by my previous post on the subject, the comments Bruce Charlton left on that post, and the many posts Dr. Charlton has published on the subject over the past few months.
Despair is a state of hopelessness. It can be triggered by a variety of factors and exists at the individual or small group level even during the best of times. But these are anything but the best of times. For the first time in my living memory, the stage has been set for potential mass despair at the global level; and by mass despair I mean millions or billions of people all across the world becoming simultaneously infected by hopelessness.
At its core, despair is a spiritual problem, but the vast majority of people in our despiritualized world refuse to recognize it as such and tend to attribute despair solely to various biological, psychological, social, or economic factors. For the sake of consideration, let's follow this line of thinking and focus almost exclusively on material factors.
As alluded to above, the vast majority of modern people are materialists; that is, they wholeheartedly adhere to the theory that fundamental reality is restricted to physical matter and the various interactions and movements of physical matter. As a result, modern people generally reject spiritual values and stress the value of physical comfort and material possessions.
Materialism is essentially a theory of meaninglessness for it can provide no answer to the question of the underlying purpose for the existence of the material world. For the materialist, everything - including consciousness and emotions like love - is just the result of stuff interacting with other stuff. Therefore, the only meaning a materialist can hope to find in world made of nothing but stuff is to divide the world into good stuff and bad stuff. As a result, materialists strive to accumulate or enjoy the good stuff - possessions, property, pleasure, status, and so forth - while simultaneously avoiding as much of the bad staff - poverty, illness, depression, disempowerment, etc. - as possible.
Despair is a tricky issue for materialists because the fundamental meaninglessness of their philosophy is inherently despair-inducing to begin. The only hope materialism can offer its worshippers are the physical possibilities of possessions, power, and pleasure. In theory, hope remains viable as long as the possibility for material gain remains viable.
The problem with materialism is that physical possessions, power, and pleasure rarely provide lasting fulfillment; the kind of fulfillment that can only stem from true meaning and purpose. The accumulation of possessions only breeds a desire to accumulate more possessions. The acquisition of power often leads to the motivation to expand power or, conversely, to the fear of losing power already obtained. Pleasures rooted purely in the physical tend to fade rather quickly, spurring the need for new pleasures more exciting or exotic pleasures. This is the only real hope materialism can offer.
Sounds good, right? Well it must because over the past two or three centuries it has become the dominant theory driving our civilization. Simply put - materialism has triumphed. Despite this, there is one thing over which materialism cannot triumph - death. For materialists, death is an outrage - the ultimate insult. It nullifies the shining beacon of hope materialism projects. In the end, the power, pleasures, and possessions a person has accumulated and experienced are rendered null and void. The person simply ends. Nevertheless, the beacon of materialist hope remains as long as the person remains - in theory at least.
Put another way, hope for materialists is delicately tied to the prospect of acquiring or enjoying stuff. But what happens to this hope when all prospects fade or disappear? Even worse, what happens when these diminishing prospects coincide with actual material losses? Well, if history is any guide, such conditions offer a severe challenge to the hope materialism extends to its followers. Of course, these challenges occur all the time at the individual level even during the best of times. A lost job or a bad investment or a divorce are all stress tests to a materialist's hope. If hope begins to fade, the materialist can always seek distraction through pleasure or intoxication, which is a go-to strategy for many a materialist. But if hope continues to fade, the materialist is ultimately left in a state of despair.
Because materialists reject the existence of the other-wordly (supernatural), any hope they can nurture is inevitably tied to this-world (natural). Consequently, their hope and faith in materialism is put to the test every time the world turns against them. Under these conditions, clinging to hope becomes a real challenge for materialists, and whatever hope they manage to sustain depends heavily on their ability to locate further material possibilities - comfort, pleasure, gain, etc.
I mention this all of this because the birdemic lockdown has turned the material world against us all in these past five or six weeks. People have just recently started waking up to the economic devastation the lockdown is causing. Over 20 million people have been thrust into unemployment in the United States alone. Goodness only knows what these numbers might be in other countries. Add a potential avalanche of destroyed small businesses, loan defaults, and other calamities to the list and you have all the ingredients needed for mass suffering at the material level - mass suffering that may very well precipitate mass despair.
As mentioned earlier, despair is fundamentally a spiritual problem. The fact that most modern people do not recognize it as such is a major victory for the forces of evil (of course, the fact that most people are materialists is also a major victory for evil). People who regard despair as a purely material phenomenon and seek to escape despair by purely material means have already potentially damned themselves because they refuse to accept two inescapable truths: despair is a sin; despair can only be avoided by belief in something beyond the worldy.
For people like this, despair becomes a pain threshold. Their ability to endure despair will depend heavily on purely biological, psychological, and physical survival instincts. Under these conditions, materialists will be perpetually alert to the existence of anything that might offer the slimmest glimmer of hope - anything that might be able to alleviate their material suffering and restore their faith in the material world.
The forces of evil are keenly aware of this and will work hard to formulate a purely material panacea that promises to remedy a great deal of the physical discomfort and material hardships people are experiencing or will experience. Of course, this panacea will come with a price. That price will be the total surrender of human freedom and, more significantly, the surrender of the soul.
Materialists damn themselves by refusing or rejecting all notions of a spiritual solution to their material suffering. By repudiating the existence of the other-worldy and making this repudiation the basis of their hope in this-world, materialists effectively fall into the despair deathtrap evil has set for them for they become eternally blinded by the borders of biological death.
Evil uses the trick of materialism to negate the Truth. Evil then uses materially-induced despair to veil the spiritual hope Reality offers through Christ and the Promise of Heaven. Nevertheless, not all materialists are not lost cases. There is a chance some may discover true hope within the depths of despair. If they do, they will take the first step out of the worldly deathtrap and begin their journey toward everlasting life.
Understanding the obvious limits, those of us who believe in the primacy of the spiritual must do all we can to inspire those caught in the deathtrap of despair, even this inspiration comes only through the form of prayer. At the same time, Serious Christians must remain vigilant about succumbing to despair themselves. After all, despair is a grievous sin - but I'll leave that for another post.
Note added: This post was partly inspired by my previous post on the subject, the comments Bruce Charlton left on that post, and the many posts Dr. Charlton has published on the subject over the past few months.
April 18, 2020
Despair is a Deathtrap
We are experiencing how a materialist culture and civilization that has turned its back on God responds to calamity.Emboldened by a demonically-possessed elite, our civilization has rejected all meaning, religion, and tradition in the blind belief that materialism and the pursuit of pleasure alone would provide for and fulfill all of humanity's needs.
The problem is they don't.
And they never will.
Possessions and pleasure serve a purpose in life, but are not and cannot ever be the sole purpose of life. The irony of possessions is this: you start off possessing them, but they end up possessing you. And no matter how much you love them, they do not and cannot love you.
Pleasures, though quixotically addictive and fun, tend to fade rather quickly if they are not supported by the primacy of the spiritual. The void left behind immediately demands newer and newer pleasures until the idea of pleasure recoils back upon itself, becomes utterly perverted, and becomes saturated with sadism.
What remains after possessions turn cold and pleasures run black? More to the point, what remains after these possessions vanish and pleasures are withdrawn? What is left when the material is snatched from the materialists?
Not much. Nothing, in fact - as many of us are about to discover.
This point marks the border of nihilism, the vast poisonous belief desert of nothingness which inevitably leads to despair.
What is despair?
The complete loss of hope; the anguish of believing all has been lost; the torture of believing nothing can be done to save the present or the future. Poisonous whispers of crossing vast, hostile deserts without water; of being trapped in limitless oceans with no land in sight.
Despair is ultimate surrender; bitter capitulation; agonizing renunciation. The abandonment of hope. The rejection of faith. The refusal of love.
Against Good, a grievous sin. For evil, a most-coveted prize.
Past societies had built-in safety mechanisms to combat such torment, but our modern society has contemptuously cast these aside thinking, rather foolishly, that the fight against despair is one it would never have to fight. And in the unforeseen event that it would, it was assured that materialism and pleasure alone would provide it with all the weapons needed to win the battle.
Our modern society has been misled - and it has been misled in the most reprehensible and sinful manner it could possibly be misled.
People will be encouraged to despair as the wave of material catastrophe crashes over them - and many will find no other response than to despair. As their material worlds recede, they will allow the darkness of despair to corrode them until they crater like imploding stars and meekly surrender to evil the prize it seeks.
This why the rediscovery of faith, hope, and love are crucial - here; now. Faith, hope, and love are purpose and meaning and give us lives worth living and dying for.
Faith, hope, and love confirm that we can never be defeated even when it appears that we have been. All three are crucial and all three are needed; perhaps now more than ever.
Note added: This is a slightly modified re-post of an earlier post from this blog.
