I am so thankful for your words and each day they give me much to consider. It is difficult to rid oneself of a dualistic way of thinking but so necessary during this interim time.
As usual, your commentary today hits home with me. I know I am a part of Nature, but sometimes I forget I am a part of all humanity -- and that all the parts of humanity are a part of me. Grief is hard, especially if I have to acknowledge my participation in the wrongdoing. I like to think of myself as a savior -- I so appreciate your kind reminder to just be present with love.
"May this moment not harden us, but humble us. May it break us open, not apart." Exactly humility is so desperately needed within us and within our interactions with others. We all don't know wholly, for we all only see partially, if only we are willing to admit this truth.
Beautiful. The question you pose at the beginning isn’t the kind of question that has an answer. It’s one that is meant to be carried in our heart and reflected upon every moment.
This reflection highlighted for me the importance of acknowledging personal and collective shadow work necessary to move toward the next stage of human/cosmic/spiritual wholeness....hoping that we can do this personal and collective homework.
As our stories of ourselves as “the good ones” collapse, this makes way for the stories of ourselves as the ones deeply formed, armored and bound by a system that thrives only by killing the biosphere. This in turn makes room for us to remove the armor and be to shaped by the path of the wild world of Creation.
We did not so much leave the Garden of Eden as we commodified and killed it. We were not ever cast out of the Garden of Eden as punishment. We were told how our relationship with the whole Creation was changing as we sought tyranny over tenderness.
Our myth of separation promised security but has brought us to self-termination. The reality of our one-ness with the whole body of Creation has always been our one and only Kin-dom of Heaven. But vast quantities of swords and guns and bombs will litter the wasteland planet we leave behind.
What we call history is largely a story of organized crime masquerading as governance.
Generativity is to be found now only in absolute vulnerability.
We are vulnerable like the wild plants that we often think of as mere weeds - and so have largely eradicated. We are like the animals and insects so long exterminated by us as useless or as pests.
In our vulnerability we can only dance our prayers upon the earth, crying out for Mother Earth and Father Sky to make us anew.
As we choose to love and nurture life as best as we can, we re-enter the Kin-dom of Heaven in each moment. This has always been the Way.
We must cast off the chains of dead wealth and dead power that keep us in a trance of broken ways. We must embrace our mortality and so invest ourselves in the living wealth of loving relationship. This is the narrow path that leads to life.
We are indeed a mess. We are restored to health and life even as we perish. I trust that life makes a way for life, and love makes a way for love.
We are invited into the Beloved Community of Creation just as we are. We are beloved and we belong.
The Garden has always been here, and it will be here - taking new forms - forever.
My response arises out of gratitude for your invitation into becoming real and humble again. Thank you!
Open Relational Theology was good and even the questions and answers. There is a Church of the Nazarene nearby but they don't call themselves by their name and certainly way right of the middle not even purple and their attendees haven't a clue of the church's theology. That recent speaker and all you offer ring a bell with me. Thank you for all you do. KatieD+
Return to your day—not as savior, not as judge, but as a presence in process.
Return to your day—not as savior, not as judge, but as a presence of love in process.
My mind scrambled to understand this article until finally the last line above. That’s what pulled it together for me, reading it a second time - adding ‘of love’ to it.
I am not a separate being. We belong to each other as equals in God’s family. The world may be falling apart around us, but we, from within our hearts can continue with love by purposely living out all the components of love: compassion, kindness, forgiveness, understanding, patience, etc., and all that can bring peace, joy and love into the small world around us in which we live and have our being.
To acknowledge the truth of what is, accept it, because it is what it is, and try to live love accordingly, in ways that are calling us to love. Be alert and awake, and willing to love with a God-love to the best of our unique abilities.
Thank you, Cameron. Your words give clarity to our days, encouragement and hope.
It has been several years since I read or taught the late Walter Brueggemann's "Prophetic Imagination." I seem to recall, however, that he too claimed that the task of the prophetic voice what not simply to describe and denounce that which was broken, but to lament it as well. Your meditation this day fits the bill: we cannot look away or cease to describe the brokenness, and we must lament the harm of our present reality. Brueggemann also declared that the final task of the prophetic imagination was just that--to imagine and dream of the new reality that God is about. I often read of you doing that as well. For today's offering and for so many others, I thank you.
I’m sharing my reflection on Sister Cameron’s opening question that I sent to my dear brother:
Cameron’s question this morning is so spot on!
(My answer: I don’t know. But knowing that she’s there and my Anum Cara is there……. Others too…. at least gives me the Holy Honesty to seek the path to an answer. ❤️🙏❤️)
I am so thankful for your words and each day they give me much to consider. It is difficult to rid oneself of a dualistic way of thinking but so necessary during this interim time.
As usual, your commentary today hits home with me. I know I am a part of Nature, but sometimes I forget I am a part of all humanity -- and that all the parts of humanity are a part of me. Grief is hard, especially if I have to acknowledge my participation in the wrongdoing. I like to think of myself as a savior -- I so appreciate your kind reminder to just be present with love.
"May this moment not harden us, but humble us. May it break us open, not apart." Exactly humility is so desperately needed within us and within our interactions with others. We all don't know wholly, for we all only see partially, if only we are willing to admit this truth.
Beautiful. The question you pose at the beginning isn’t the kind of question that has an answer. It’s one that is meant to be carried in our heart and reflected upon every moment.
This reflection highlighted for me the importance of acknowledging personal and collective shadow work necessary to move toward the next stage of human/cosmic/spiritual wholeness....hoping that we can do this personal and collective homework.
As our stories of ourselves as “the good ones” collapse, this makes way for the stories of ourselves as the ones deeply formed, armored and bound by a system that thrives only by killing the biosphere. This in turn makes room for us to remove the armor and be to shaped by the path of the wild world of Creation.
We did not so much leave the Garden of Eden as we commodified and killed it. We were not ever cast out of the Garden of Eden as punishment. We were told how our relationship with the whole Creation was changing as we sought tyranny over tenderness.
Our myth of separation promised security but has brought us to self-termination. The reality of our one-ness with the whole body of Creation has always been our one and only Kin-dom of Heaven. But vast quantities of swords and guns and bombs will litter the wasteland planet we leave behind.
What we call history is largely a story of organized crime masquerading as governance.
Generativity is to be found now only in absolute vulnerability.
We are vulnerable like the wild plants that we often think of as mere weeds - and so have largely eradicated. We are like the animals and insects so long exterminated by us as useless or as pests.
In our vulnerability we can only dance our prayers upon the earth, crying out for Mother Earth and Father Sky to make us anew.
As we choose to love and nurture life as best as we can, we re-enter the Kin-dom of Heaven in each moment. This has always been the Way.
We must cast off the chains of dead wealth and dead power that keep us in a trance of broken ways. We must embrace our mortality and so invest ourselves in the living wealth of loving relationship. This is the narrow path that leads to life.
We are indeed a mess. We are restored to health and life even as we perish. I trust that life makes a way for life, and love makes a way for love.
We are invited into the Beloved Community of Creation just as we are. We are beloved and we belong.
The Garden has always been here, and it will be here - taking new forms - forever.
My response arises out of gratitude for your invitation into becoming real and humble again. Thank you!
Open Relational Theology was good and even the questions and answers. There is a Church of the Nazarene nearby but they don't call themselves by their name and certainly way right of the middle not even purple and their attendees haven't a clue of the church's theology. That recent speaker and all you offer ring a bell with me. Thank you for all you do. KatieD+
Return to your day—not as savior, not as judge, but as a presence in process.
Return to your day—not as savior, not as judge, but as a presence of love in process.
My mind scrambled to understand this article until finally the last line above. That’s what pulled it together for me, reading it a second time - adding ‘of love’ to it.
I am not a separate being. We belong to each other as equals in God’s family. The world may be falling apart around us, but we, from within our hearts can continue with love by purposely living out all the components of love: compassion, kindness, forgiveness, understanding, patience, etc., and all that can bring peace, joy and love into the small world around us in which we live and have our being.
To acknowledge the truth of what is, accept it, because it is what it is, and try to live love accordingly, in ways that are calling us to love. Be alert and awake, and willing to love with a God-love to the best of our unique abilities.
Thank you, Cameron. Your words give clarity to our days, encouragement and hope.
It has been several years since I read or taught the late Walter Brueggemann's "Prophetic Imagination." I seem to recall, however, that he too claimed that the task of the prophetic voice what not simply to describe and denounce that which was broken, but to lament it as well. Your meditation this day fits the bill: we cannot look away or cease to describe the brokenness, and we must lament the harm of our present reality. Brueggemann also declared that the final task of the prophetic imagination was just that--to imagine and dream of the new reality that God is about. I often read of you doing that as well. For today's offering and for so many others, I thank you.
Whew!
I’m sharing my reflection on Sister Cameron’s opening question that I sent to my dear brother:
Cameron’s question this morning is so spot on!
(My answer: I don’t know. But knowing that she’s there and my Anum Cara is there……. Others too…. at least gives me the Holy Honesty to seek the path to an answer. ❤️🙏❤️)