Journey Reflection

The Great Tao

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

The great Tao covers everything like a flood.
It flows to the left and to the right.
The ten thousand things depend upon it
and it denies none of them.
It accomplishes its task yet claims no reward.
It clothes and feeds the ten thousand things
yet it does not attempt to control them….

The ten thousand things return to it,
even though it does not control them.

~Tao Te Ching, verse 24 http://www.thebigview.com/tao-te-ching/chapter34.html, via The Ecozoic, no. 1, 2008, p. 41

Spirit by another name. Namaste.

image http://tinyurl.com/nbfy7q

A Tribute to Thomas Berry

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:15:00 +0000

A TRIBUTE TO THOMAS BERRY:

151 Tributes, plus ...

His Memorial Services and
His Intellectual Biography
343 Page Book
$20.00 (includes US shipping)

Contact ...
Center for Ecozoic Studies
http://www.ecozoicstudies.org/
ecozoic@mindspring.com
(919) 942-4358

Thomas Berry writes of winter solstice celebration in the Cathedral. The gothic arch “takes on the shape of the uplifted throat of a wolf” who laments our present destiny and beseeches us to bring back the sun ... to let the flowers bloom, the rivers run and the living creatures live their wild, fierce, serene and abundant lives.

Out Over Nothing

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

[Using] Kierkegaard’s metaphor of being “suspended over 70,000 fathoms” … [we can be given to] see blessedness in suffering, revelation in mystery, certainty in uncertainty, and truth in absurdity. ~Josiah Thompson, The Lonely Labyrinth, p. 205

Kierkegaard talks about the religious sphere of depth faith as compared with the ethical or esthetic spheres. ~jpc

Out over 70,000 fathoms is where we live, in faith or mortal fear. Namaste.

image: "Against the Storm" by Phil Morin dailypaintingblog.com/

Apprehended in All*

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

Apprehend God in all things,
for God is in all things.
Every single creature is full of God
and is a book about God.
Every creature is a word of God.
If I spent enough time with the tiniest creature –
even a caterpillar –
I would never have to prepare a sermon.

So full of God is every creature.

~trans. Matthew Fox, Meditations with Meister Eckhart, p. 14, via Herman Greene

“God” is in all things yet not contained in anything. Namaste.

* Note: poem of panentheism (God at the heart of all), not pantheism (God is all)

image http://tinyurl.com/n35an3

Sunday Dialog CLXXIX

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

Nez: My student* said, “our minds fixate on partial visions … we forget the whole, the Earth … we become addicted.”

Journer: So what have we become addicted to?

Nez: Addicted to personal, family, national, and human needs.

Journer: But our destiny is bound up with the Earth. As the Earth goes, so do we.

______
* Brian Swimme, The Universe Is a Green Dragon, p. 78
image www.firstplymouthchurch.org/wholeearth.html

Saturday Delight

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

And oh! The towering feeling

Just to know somehow you are near.

The overpowering feeling

That any second you may suddenly appear!

People stop and stare. They don’t bother me.

For there’s no where else on earth that I would rather be.

Let the time go by, I won’t care if I

Can be here on the street where you live.

~from “On the Street Where You Live” (lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner), My Fair Lady

Quite a song, especially when “you” goes transparent to the all as profound awareness happens, suddenly. ~jpc

“The overpowering feeling” when the other really appears. Namaste.

Image http://tinyurl.com/n5ml5n

Note: photos and a report of the northwest Profound Journey Dialog (PJD) http://www.transcribebooks.com/NWPJDreport.html we helped guide last weekend near Seattle, Washington, USA

That Reality, Our Reality

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

[The artist] always wants to press deeper and deeper to let the span of his [sic] perception spread wider and wider; till he unites with the whole of that Reality which he feels all about him and of which his own life is a part. ~Evelyn Underhill, Practical Mysticism, pp. 20-21, via John Forbis

An agent of transparency, the artist helps us see the whole through its parts. ~jpc

Here’s to that reality of which we are a part. Namaste.

image: Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, photo by Jana Bergdall

JUMP

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

If we listened to our intellect, we’d never have a love affair…. Well, that’s nonsense.You’ve got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down.~attributed to Annie Dillard

Ranking at the top of the lists, this quote focuses on what deeply scares and fascinates us: risk. ~jpc

Observe, judge, weigh up, decide, and JUMP. Namaste.

image: photo by Paul Souders www.art.com

The Edge

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

The edge is the meeting point between the known and the unknown, between something being too well known, which makes it boring to us, and too unknown, which makes it confusing. The edge is a zone, beyond comfort, of high intensity, instability, creativity and innovation. ~May East, “Ecovillages: Design at the Edge,” Kosmos journal, Spring/Summer 2008: Vol. VII/No. 2, via Jeanette Stanfield

Everyone is experiencing the edge zone these days, by necessity of our global and planetary situation. ~jpc

Pray, let’s not fall off the edge. Namaste.

image http://tinyurl.com/nk5pn3

Three-hour Caretaker

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

Early on in our life with ALS, I mentioned being a caretaker, which put Fred in the role of being the receiver. A wise colleague suggested … she was in a partnership with her husband up until 3 hours before he died; only then did she become the caretaker. We now see our relationship as just that – a true partnership – each one giving the other what they have to offer at each moment. ~Nancy Lanphear, e-mail, 8/21/09

The best definition of true partnership I’ve ever heard. ~jpc

“Each one giving the other what they have to offer at each moment.” Namaste.

image: photo of Fred’s Folks who walked for ALS http://tinyurl.com/nwlal8 (we visited with Fred and Nancy and a couple dozen other colleagues yesterday near Seattle)

Practical Spirituality

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 05:01:00 +0000

Practical spirituality happens where we are, at work, with the family, in church, at the movies, at the beach, in a meeting, at school, in the shower, in bed; practical spirituality happens in what we’re doing, whether seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling, dialoging, dreaming, writing, calculating, walking, swimming, making love; practical spirituality happens in what we’re reflecting on, praying, cogitating, mulling, and brooding over, weighing up, deciding, contemplating, meditating; practical spirituality happens in what we’re being, confused, joyful, sorrowful, despairing, provoked, called, resistant, surrendering. ~jpc, Our Universal Spirit Journey, pp. 204-05

We surely are spiritual. Namaste.

image: LLC's 94-year-old father, at the time, late spring 2008, watering his big garden at day's end

Sunday Dialog CLXXVIII

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 04:01:00 +0000

Nez: My student* said, “Today, the planet is the only proper ‘in group.’”

Journer: What about our universe?

Nez: We don’t relate to it as our home in the same way.

Journer: Either way, I’m glad I’m here.

______
* A Joseph Campbell Companion, selected and edited by Diane Osbon, p. 25

image: "Planet Earth" on Discovery channel http://tinyurl.com/ob7yuq

Buddhism's Gift

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

Many of the people [in America] who became involved in the meditative and contemplative traditions of Asia in the 1960’s have gone back into Judaism and to Christianity and really worked to rekindle the more contemplative and mystical aspects of those traditions. If in three hundred years we look back and see that’s what Buddhism did for this society, I think it would be fantastic. ~Helen Tworkov in The Life of Meaning, p. 320

West meets East and is deeply enriched. Namaste.

image http://tinyurl.com/ldozzs

Communion between Realms

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

[I]t’s to the Quakers that I really owe deeply my earliest experience of Christianity as a place of silence and compassion and communion between realms. ~Cynthia Bourgeault interviewed by David Riordan http://integrallife.com/node/49052

Let intercommunion of Earth’s realms start in mindful silence and end in demonstrative compassion. Namaste.

image: "Meeting for Worship," Adrian Martinez http://www.adrianmartinez.com/hpaintings/meeting_for_worship.htm

Reunion Time

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

Seemingly freed from our dependence on community and environment, we must choose and forge new relationships with both. ~Randolph T. Hester, Design for Ecological Democracy (2006), via JPC II

Through our technology and hubris we humans have felt that we haven’t needed community with other humans nor the natural world, but the decision to reunite is the new imperative. ~jpc

Not just a good idea but that without which we perish. Namaste.

image: www.cpawsmb.org/conservation/fisherbay6.php

Which Am I?

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

Siddharta to Govinda ... Seeking means: to have a goal; but finding means: to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal. You, O worthy one, are perhaps indeed a seeker, for in striving towards your goal, you do not see many things that are under your nose. ~Herman Hesse, Siddhartha, p. 140 (to be read several times over)

Which am I, a seeker or a finder ... striver or seer? Namaste.

image mrhopkins.edublogs.org/

Pessimistic or Optimistic?

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

The coming of Darwinism … [implied] there may be something like another million years to come for us. Ought we not to question this kind of progressive optimism, especially at a time when men [sic] are capable of altering nature here and there and of destroying much of the world, including many of themselves? ~John Lukacs, “Putting Man before Descartes,” Winter 2009 http://www.theamericanscholar.org/putting-man-before-descartes/

Whether pessimistic or optimistic about the future, together let us work our proverbial asses off to create it. Namaste.

image: Ilkka Halso, photo of "Restoration No. 5, 2000" (interesting short article) http://tinyurl.com/r6bm7k

350 Target at Copenhagen Meetings

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 06:57:00 +0000

…we’ve shown the world that a global climate movement is possible and set a bold new agenda for the upcoming United Nations Climate Meetings in Copenhagen this December. The 350 target [www.350.org/ see photos from around the planet] is the new bottom line for climate action and world leaders must now meet that target. ~Bill McKibben, for the 350.org Team, via John Gibson, 10/26/09

Why is 350 the most important number in the world? It’s the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, according to scientists.

Mystery In All

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

Every relationship, every encounter, every moment is significant. We encounter the Mystery in all, all the time, but we are asleep most of the time.… We lack the mindfulness to see, the language to communicate and the discipline to practice and absorb the truth. ~Jack Gilles, e-mail 7/24/09

Mindfulness, communication, practice, and service are mystery’s methods. Namaste.

image http://outdoorurbanite.com/tag/yoga/ (getting grounded)

Cradle of Humankind

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 04:00:00 +0000

KARONGA, Malawi (Reuters, 10/23/09) …”This latest discovery of prehistoric tools and remains of hominids provides additional proof to the theory that the Great Rift Valley of Africa and perhaps the excavation site near Karonga can be considered the cradle of humankind,” Professor Driedermann Schrenk said…. The site also contains some of the earliest dinosaurs which lived between 100 million and 140 million years ago and early hominids believed to have lived between a million and 6 million years ago.

Sunday Dialog CLXXVII

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 15:01:00 +0000

Nez: My student* said, “The world is going to be saved through unitive consciousness or not at all.”

Journer: Maybe so, but what is unitive consciousness?

Nez: A comprehensive consciousness that moves from deep sensitivity to practical consensus.

Journer: Where do I look?

______
* Cynthia Bourgeault, interviewed by David Riordan http://integrallife.com/node/49052

image: a story for children (and adults) about unitive consciousness and action (Who are the robbers today?) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_Musicians_of_Bremen

Saturday Delight

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

I’m happy to see a proud cultural group equivalent in discipline to a proud military unit, though here marching loose and jazzy until a mid-point flashy lock-step. A championship team usually thrills me more than an individual. You too will be delighted with “76 Trombones” – without instruments of course – sung and choreographed by the Ambassadors of Harmony: 2009 International Barbershop Chorus Champions. ~http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmDGntpZC3I&feature=player_embedded via Nancy Trask

Refreshed by witnessing a profound corporate act. Namaste.

OW in TW

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

Being introduced to the inner workings of “the Other World in the Midst of This World” – OW in TW – started me on a journey to explore such places as … my “Inner Spiritual Altar.” It opened up the possibility of associating every human experience as a metaphor. ~William Salmon, EarthRise reflection, 7/21/09

“Every human experience as a metaphor” of what: divinity, the sacred, reality, truth, profundity, meaning, fulfillment … the other world? ~jpc

O to see what’s really there. Namaste.

image: “Metaphor” painting by Virginia Fry http://www.smallfryenterprises.com/previous_paintings.htm

Divided No More

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

All of us arrive on earth with souls in perfect form. But from the moment of birth onward, the soul or true self is assailed by deforming forces…. Only when the pain of our dividedness becomes more than we can bear do most of us embark on an inner journey toward living “divided no more.” ~Parker Palmer, “Finding Your Soul,” Sept/Oct 2004 issue Spirituality and Health, via Jack Gilles

When has the pain of dividedness driven you toward living “divided no more”? Namaste.

image: "Chicago South Side / North Side" (1950s) painting by Walter Sanford & Jerry Pinsler of Chicago http://tinyurl.com/oy3t4w

Me, Subjugating?

transcribebooks@triad.rr.com (Journey Reflection) — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 04:01:00 +0000

The truth is that male religious leaders have had - and still have - an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women. They have … overwhelmingly chosen the latter. ~Jimmy Carter, "Losing My Religion for Equality," 7/15/09, theage.com.au

Will I live long enough to see a woman head of the Christian [Roman Catholic or Greek Orthodox or Russian Orthodox or Southern Baptist] or Muslim or Jewish religions? ~jpc

Who/what in creation am I subjugating? Namaste.

image: Jimmy Carter speaking to a church group http://ecumenicalwomen.org/2009/07/17/loosing-my-religion/