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by
Richard Rohr
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July 2 - July 10, 2021
“Resurrection” is another word for change, but particularly positive change—which we tend to see only in the long run. In the short run, it often just looks like death.
The Preface to the Catholic funeral liturgy says, “Life is not ended, it is merely changed.”
My personal belief is that Jesus’s own human mind knew his full divine identity only after his resurrection.
?
St. Maximus the Confessor (580–662) put it, “God made all beings to this end, to [enjoy the same union] of humanity and divinity that was united in Christ.”
Michael Dowd, Thank God for Evolution (New York: Viking, 2007),
Jon Sweeney, Inventing Hell: Dante, the Bible, and Eternal Torment
By the way, prostitution is never mentioned as one of her demons in any account. I suspect sex is our demon and we projected it onto her.
the foundation of Jesus’s social program is what I will call non-idolatry, or the withdrawing of your enthrallment from all kingdoms except the Kingdom of God.
God is quite obviously very humble and patient, and will get the job done without us as cheerleaders.
Love and suffering lead us toward the beginnings of a contemplative mind if we submit to them at all,
We also try to ride all three wheels in a “rational” way, knowing that if we give reason its own wheel, it will end up driving the whole tricycle.
American Peace Pilgrim,
Jonathon Stalls and Andrew Forsthoefel,
Until Richard recognizes and somehow compensates for his prejudicial way of seeing the moment, all Richard will tend to see is his own emotional life and agenda in every new situation. This is the essential lesson of Contemplation 101,
The mystics and great saints were those who had learned to trust and allow this pattern, and often said, in effect, “What did I ever lose by dying?”
Barbara Holmes, Joy Unspeakable: Contemplative Practices of the Black Church
Foundationally, we must find a prayer form that actually invades our unconscious, or nothing changes at any depth. Usually this will be some form of centering prayer, walking meditation, inner practices of letting go, shadow work, or deliberately undergoing a longer period of silence
“take God at face value, as God is. Accept God’s good graciousness, as you would a plain, simple, soft compress when sick. Take hold of God and press God against your unhealthy self, just as you are.”
“Stop analyzing yourself or God. You can do without wasting so much of your energy deciding if something is good or bad, grace given or temperament driven, divine or human.”
“Offer up your simple, naked being to the joyful being of God, for you two are one in grace, although separate by nature.”
“Don’t focus on what you are, but simply that you are! How hopelessly stupid would a person have to be if he or she could not...
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If your Divine Mirror cannot fully receive you in this way, Then it is certainly not God. Remember that regret profits nobody. Shame is useless. Blame is surely a waste of time. All hatred is a diversionary tactic, a dead end.
For some reason, all religions find it very hard to have a positive, healthy, and honest theology of both money and sex.
The philosopher Jacob Needleman, in his book Money and the Meaning of Life, makes quite a dramatic statement that only people of his caliber would be allowed to make: “Whatever stands in the way of a conscious contact between the spiritual and the material in human life, only that is truly evil.”
Lash, Nicholas. Believing Three Ways in One God: A Reading of the Apostles’ Creed. London: SCM, 1992.
