scout meetings

"And David danced  before the Lord with all his might"  (2 Samuel 6:14)

Each of us sets up our own little structure of what is right, what is wrong, and what we think we can get by with. We worship religiously within that structure. Christ consciousness blows up the church. Buddha consciousness evaporates the temple. Rumi consciousness dissolves the mosque. And so on. When all our walls fall down, so do our rigid rules and our playing of sanctimony. You do not know what is best for me nor I for you. Keep going to your Scout meetings if you wish but come on out here and dance!

three christianities

First Gear: Hinayana Christianity (Small Path). I live in a split world, a subject-object world. Here is "me" and there is "everything else." God is out there. Jesus is out there. The church is out there. Other people are out there. I keep doing everything I can to make and keep the connections: me-God, me-Jesus, me-the church, me-people. I pray. I go to church. I try to do good. Sometimes the connections are here, sometimes not. Often I feel separate and alienated. I repent. I ask forgiveness. I struggle. I keep on. Jesus is out there. I worship him.

Second Gear: Mahayana Christianity (Great Path). I am the universe, the cosmos; the cosmos is me. God is in me and I am in God. I understand perichoresis and dependent origination. All is an interflow, a cosmic dance. I understand and experience that God is a circle with no circumference, a sphere with no surface whose center is everywhere. I sit in emptiness and stillness. All is interflow. All is love. Christ consciousness.

All Gears & No Gear: Zen Christianity (Path of No Path). Go straight ahead. Don't know. No mind. No theology. No philosophy. No concepts.This moment. Moment-um. No division and no no division. Inclusive of and beyond words. Compassion. Faith. Action.

r/evolution

...the ongoing battle since my childhood...the unwillingness to knuckle down (knuckles dragging on the ground) to the dogma of the social norm...the hatred of martin luther king...and now the hatred and fear of obama...the subtle and not so subtle racism...the stuffing of jesus into a theological coffin...the exclusion of all seen as different (not white, not christian, not of the born again)...dear lord, will i ever make peace with that? i think not...whatever is to be done?...let time go by...let the dead bury the dead...love and live from the heart...rise up! rise up! to where all angels dwell...merge with those beyond all human bound...

seeing through

We Christians have made an icon of Jesus. But an icon is to be seen THROUGH, not gazed AT. An icon is a window, opening to the boundless sublime.

When gazed AT, it becomes an idol, and the Christian becomes a rigid defender of a spiritual relic, guarding it against any infiltration of the different or any touch by anyone perceived as an outsider. 

Jesus is not to be gazed AT and worshiped. Such a stance turns into a spiritual club that no one but worshipers of Jesus may join. All others are relegated to the status of those to be prayed for, pitied, resisted, and saved.

Jesus is to be seen THROUGH. He is a window, a door, an opening to the boundless sublime. When one leaps through that opening, one opens into pure joy, a joy that is all inclusive, with no one or no thing left behind.

a story of our stories

In the 2012 elections, the blue counties seemed more likely to contain cities or university towns. The red counties tended to be more rural and without universities.

What this says to me is that the blue folk are in contact with a lot more stories of "reality" than are the red folk. Red folk mostly stay within the realm of stories of their own clan. Blue folk intermingle, live in a multistoried world.

As a result, blue folk are not threatened by stories other than their own; may even come to see them all as part of an even grander story unfolding.

"She kept asking if the stories were true. I kept asking her if that mattered. We finally gave up. She was looking for a place to stand & I wanted a place to fly." -- Brian Andreas

P. S. This is neither an attack on blue folk or on red folk. It is a simple sociological observation and hypothesis, another story if you will. Please be calm.

the great god

I did not make myself. The Great God did. I am not making myself. The Great God is.

If I try to make myself, a self-made man, I become a whirling drain-suck, taking all that is around "me" and turning it to my own ends. Look out! If I am a whirling drain-suck, you and all you love are fair game, raw materials for my self-making. Old America worshiped drain-sucks; its remnants still do.

I am called into being by Mystery: a loving, jovial, adventurous, and daring Mystery. He is friendly, forgiving, takes no prisoners -- I am either with him or left behind. He is always there though, laughing, smiling, dancing when I get off my butt and move again.

I love him. I love The Great God.

God's rosary

Each of the world's religions is a bead on a bracelet rosary worn around God's wrist.

the pulsing of the heart

There is only one Creative Impulse (rather, an impulsing, moving as It does in rhythmic pulse) producing abundant Life on earth, our solar system, the galaxies, the realms of the visible and the invisible. Without this Creative Impulsing, all would fall away, vanish, disappear.

Each society of humans across time and still today seeks to bag the Creative Impulsing in its own terms, for purposes of manipulation, adoration, and meaning. Little thought is given to the understanding that the Creative Impulsing deliberately looks to express Itself in the terms and form appropriate to and understandable by a given society.

Each grouping of people has its own religion, its own wine bag into which the wine of spirit is poured and flows, provided by the Creative Impulsing Itself. This is good. This is more than good; this is wondrous.

Perhaps the time has come for the humanimal to recognize this and stop standing in smug isolation from others. (This includes those standing in smug isolation from those they perceive standing in smug isolation.)

There is only one Creative Impulse and we, we all, are Its pulsing.

the supreme happiness

"It is he who has made us and not we ourselves" (Psalm 100:3) Whether you decide to call "he" she, thou, it, father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, maker, that, mystery, origin, source, genetic flow, tao, evolutionary unfolding, or I'd-rather-not-think-about-it, you did not make yourself. You are, we are, him embodying. We are our source sourcing. He is closer than our very breath. When we know that, truly know that, when we know him, this is the Supreme Happiness.

all things to all men

"I am made all things to all men" (I Corinthians 9:22) does not mean that one is a gutless chameleon, shifting with whatever arises, but that one has and is a strong heartfelt core, strong enough to move with the vicissitudes of all forms of human consciousness while remaining immovable. This is the essence of all relationship arts: martial, healing, spiritual.

the unborn borning

What we do not seem to get is that we are the Unborn borning. An interflow. A mutual co-arising. We differentiate ourselves, proclaim our selves as individuals. We do not seem to realize that this proclamation is all in our heads. We cluck and peck amongst other chickens caught in the same peculiarity and proclaim ourselves as wise. Wise cluckers.

Now that we have differentiated ourselves, we have created the problem of individual mortality. Shall we live on in our differentiated fashion? We fret and moan. We have faith in yes we will. We have faith in no we won't. We have faith in don't know. Faith is a bridge to the unknown. When we realize we are the Unborn borning, we need no faith bridge. We are This Now. Not only is all in our heads, All is our head. No bounds.

The little separate self dies laughing.

now is the time

A difference in understanding of "the rapture" and of "the afterlife" I seem to have with some of my good Christian friends is based on the experiencing of space and time. Rather than experiencing time as stretched out in a long line, as if it were the substance of an old-fashioned taffy pull, with a Rapture coming in the future and Heaven and Hell also out there somewhere for each of us, I experience Now.

Now is the time and is always the time. Now is the space and is always the space. Now is eternity. Now is infinity in all "directions."

God is a sphere with no surface whose center is everywhere. Everywhere includes us. Each of us is a microcosm of the macrocosm, a minicosm of the maxicosm. Each of us is a centering of the cosmos, an energetic sphere with no bounds (except the ones we set).

The imagery of Indra's Net is also relevant here. As minicosms, the quality of our being affects the entire cosmos.

"The Net of Indra is a profound and subtle metaphor for the structure of reality. Imagine a vast net; at each crossing point there is a jewel; each jewel is perfectly clear and reflects all the other jewels in the net, the way two mirrors placed opposite each other will reflect an image ad infinitum. The jewel in this metaphor stands for an individual being, or an individual consciousness. Every jewel is intimately connected with all other jewels in the universe, and a change in one jewel means a change, however slight, in every other jewel." (Stephen Mitchell)

 Hell and Heaven are Now. The Rapture is Now. Jesus has always already returned. Jesus is here Now.

jesus must stay in his jesus box

I do not know why people have so much trouble with the idea of Jesus being married. Is he not often spoken of as the bridegroom and we are the bride? I suppose the trouble comes from having a set idea of Jesus, a form to which he must adhere. He must not venture outside the box in which we have placed him. I do not know if Jesus was married or not. We know very little about his personal life. But if he was, so what? Is the discomfort felt with the idea because marriage (and sexuality) are thought of as sin?

Some who love and appreciate Jesus seem to have their own idea of purity to which Jesus must adhere. He was often bumping into this with his disciples who wanted him to be a certain way.

If Jesus, as many believe and I am no exception, was a representation of the Divine, of God, on earth, are folk saying that the Creator of all life is asexual? That makes no sense to me. So I do not get alarmed if Jesus was married. Nor if he peed and pooped or belched and farted. It just makes me closer to him and him to me.

I deeply understand that folk who worship Jesus worship him as a spiritual being, as THE spiritual being, as one of unvarnished purity and perfection. But I go along with Meister Eckhart here: "If you want the kernel, you have to break the shell" and "Therefore I pray God that he may quit me of god."

hose and nozzle

We are nozzles on the hose of flow of Spirit into this world, the flow of the Life Force. We adjust the nozzle to various settings with which we spray all life around. The quality of spirit we bring into the world is determined by ourselves, by our nozzle settings if you will. We may even try to shut off the flow entirely by clamping down in misery and depression. Each of us has our favorite nozzle setting or settings. We call it "the way we are" as if our habit is our excuse. I pray to drop both nozzle and hose and flow directly out of and as the springing of the Wellspring.

clinging to jesus

If you are thinking about clinging to Jesus to effect your own sorry salvation, clinging like a barnacle to a boat that will take you to the other shore, forget it. You are still in kindergarten christianity -- christ-inanity! Do just like Jesus said: "Take up that cross and follow me!" Take up that cross and fling it down! Jesus no longer carried it around. Neither should you. You want to follow Jesus? He went that'away! Hurry and you might catch up.

christian

To be a Christ-ian does not mean to be a follower of Christ. It means to BE a Christ. All bread you eat is your own flesh. All wine you drink is your own blood. You are a child of the Father and you know it. You are an offspring of the Wellspring, forever springing.

The spirit you are now assumes this form, now that form, forever forming and unforming, unforming and forming. You are an embodying of the life force. The creature you create is nailed on the cross of space and time, hanging between heaven and earth, a tale of great suspense. That creature dies. The cross dies with it.

An empty tomb is left behind, the grave clothes neatly folded. Where are you now? Everywhere and no where. In particular. And at the heart of all particular is space, resonant and full and empty, no bounds. This space is the outbreathing of the Father, of the Mother. You are its offspring. You are a Christ.

everything you hold on to

Everything you hold on to is an idol -- a juju doll created by the necessities of your fear. No clinging! And especially no clinging to not clinging! We have enough religions. Pry those rigid fingers loose laughing and waving! I know. You think if you stay real still it will pass you by. You are safe. A safe: a rigid vault for storing valuables in airless doom. Throw your valuables into the air! If they don't come down, they are truly valuable. They have disappeared. Just as you.

Notice

All consciousness structures requiring belief in a past or future are hereby revoked. Only now exists. Political and religious consciousness structures requiring belief in "progress" and "a better world in the future" are hypnotic devices of death. If one is looking for salvation, salvation is now or nowhere at all. One drops the schizoid stances of me versus them (external schizomania) and of myself versus myself (the schizomanic internal). We are not at war with our members and everything existing is a member. We open as the cosmos we are. Now. This is the shift that is upon us. The end of the world is not the end of the earth. The end of the world is the end of separative consciousness.

those too-tight Jesus shoes

I cannot and will not wear those too-tight Jesus shoes that orthodox Christianity seeks to force upon me -- especially the evangelical our-interpretation-of-Jesus-is-the-only-true-one hardcore Christian orthodoxy.

The way I see and experience it is pretty simple. Jesus and Christ Consciousness are the same. Sin is separation from God. Jesus "dying for your sin" means Christ Consciousness dies when we separate ourselves from our Source. We separate ourselves from our Source by living in the realms of I, Me, and Mine and in the resultant energies of Hostility, Greed, and Stupor. I love Jesus and will open to his example forever but will not submit to a religious structure claiming exclusive rights over his franchise.

I will and do, however, open to Christ Consciousness and find myself great friends with Buddha and Lao Tzu. I could tell you more about this but only if invited to speak.

re-tired: outfitted with new tires

In the well-written and informative announcement by Anamchara Books of their publication of my forthcoming book, Zen Baptist, it is said that I am a psychologist (retired). While I understand what is meant by that (I no longer schedule individuals for sessions nor submit insurance claims nor pay dues to the local or national association), I am far from retired as a psychologist.

A psychologist studies and works with the dynamics of the psyche, of the soul. As such I am a socio-cosmo-psychologist, engaged in understanding the interplay of the dynamic spheres of the individual (both intra and extra), society, and the cosmos. Such actively engaged study transcends cultural, religious, political and all other thought community bounds. Yet it is a "boots on the ground" approach.

Each individual is regarded as a sphere of influential energy affecting all other spheres. World views are seen as enhancing or restricting the quality and volume of energetic flow. Transformation of individual consciousness is produced by application of specific practices and principles of the martial arts, contemplative arts, and other consciousness disciplines. Attention is a major tool of transformation and increasing Awareness is the continuous result.

As a cosmo-socio-psychologist, I am not just a studier of these realms, some intellectual egghead in an ivory tower. I am a practitioner (applying these methods to my own consciousness realm) and a teacher of these methods and practices to others. I would say I am very much an unretired psychologist.

an uncivil war

A religion is a world view which has swallowed the heads of its members. A political party is a world view which has swallowed the heads of its members. This is more readily seen in an opposing political party or in someone else's religion. In both instances, the members of the "other" groups are viewed as benighted souls wallowing in ignorance and needing salvation. But...! you say, that's not true for my religion, my political party! We have the truth and wrapped in our religio-political flag, we march on to the world's salvation. If it were not for those others, we could more readily do so! That is exactly what the "others" are saying. My point is this: a political party is a religious structure, a religion is a political structure. Both swear allegiance to a world view and look for its dominance on earth. Whose religion is the "right" religion? "Mine!" you say. Otherwise you would be a hypocrite. And this is where we are stuck. We are in the midst of an uncivil war, each group proclaiming its own righteousness and looking to inflict its views on the rest of us, views backed by law and law enforcement. Each is looking to be the Supreme Church. I think we have been here before.

total surrender, openness, and vulnerability

The only way Christianity as a religion can redeem itself from the swamp into which it has fallen is for Christians to turn away from the dogma of Christianity, to stop following Christ, and to become Christs, to put on the mind of Christ. Embodying the consciousness of Christ is an ongoing process requiring total surrender, openness, and vulnerability. This means discarding all previous thought of what it means to be a Christian. The ego cannot do it but the experiencer of the ego can. Two states of being are required: humility and attentiveness. This is not easy. It is easier to lollygag along, to do "good works," and to insist that others live up to your standards of moral virtue -- the path of death.

the post-christian jesus

Marcus Borg writes eloquently and well of the pre-Easter Jesus (the human historical Jesus) and the post-Easter Jesus (the experiential Jesus of Christianity). I write of the post-Christian Jesus, who has escaped the mindset, dogma, and doctrines of Christianity, who has gone beyond human consciousness structures, who cannot be captured by a net of moral values and triumphant righteousness. I know and love all three.

my idol can whip your idol

Idolatry is created where the eye stops, becomes idle, eye dull. One's consciousness state becomes framed and bound. An eye doll is created and one succumbs to its attraction. This is a danger for us all, but especially for those swearing to a political or religious doctrine. One swears one's idol is the only true idol and is no eye doll at all.

There is some energy in this. One is encased in a form, in armor and enjoys the companionship of others encased in similar form. Uniforms are recognized. Passwords are given. Those in other uniforms are shunned, regarded as barbarian or heathen. Solution? Get naked. Open to the eternal now. But I can't say too much or more clothing will be manufactured and another eye dull formed.

sin: a matter for theologians caught in outworn definitions

The definition of sin as missing the mark is erroneous, or rather, of shortened vision. One cannot miss the mark. The Mark is everywhere. Sin is separation, separation from the Source -- from the One, thus from Intelligence and from Soul, to use Plotinus's terms. One has isolated oneself from the Current, from the Flow. One has made oneself a separate god, a false image, an untrue idol. Sin is not a physical action. Sin is an attitude.

There is no mark out there (or in here) that one is trying to hit, no X marks the spot, no bulls-eye. You are not missing the mark. You are missing Soul.

We could dispense of the concept of sin altogether and speak instead of losing Soul. We shift instantly from living or not living up to a code of moralistic standards (the law dead without spirit) to the embodying or disembodying of Soul itself, the life force or current ever flowing from the One, the current that we are, without which we do not exist.

It is not that we are "full of sin." It is not that we are "missing the mark." It is that we are not living with Soul.

the cross as symbol of human transformation

As a prime symbol of human transformation, especially for Western consciousness, the Cross immediately shows the human situation. Anchored in the ground, both in the ground of Earth and the Ground of Being, and open to the Heavens, the Cross depicts a firmly implanted vulnerability.

Grounded. Made of earth and feet firmly planted on earth, I fulfill one of the defining characteristics of the Cross: grounded being. I spend the days of my life as an earthling, as earth touching earth. Following ancestral practices, I settle and sink. Weight underside. For now, this is where I belong. And now is all I know.

When I settle, I settle down. The gravity of my situation gets to me. I allow it, encourage it , get more grave. I become dead, thoroughly dead, and thus more alive. The portal, the opening to life is through this death. The rule of opposites works here. The more I sink, the more I release.

The Cross is planted into the earth to bear and to release. I walk the earth and bear up. The more solidly I am grounded, the more up I can bear. Symmetry. A positive correlation between deep grounding and expansive opening. The greater, the greater.

How firm is my foundation? As firm as I allow.

I breathe deeply. I settle. I settle down.

Down, the nether region, is looked down upon. In this “have a nice day” society, one is not supposed to be down. One will be called on it, told to cheer up. A vast entertainment industry awaits. Drugs will “cure” you.

And yet the Cross, great transformation symbol that it is, does not come with a smile button. Unless it is a grinning death head. For the Cross means my death. It does not fool around. To be on the Cross, or more intimately still, to be the Cross is death. To be on the Cross is to be grounded for life.

That is not all there is to it. If it were a matter of being grounded and nothing more, the Cross would be a Hole that I would jump into, pull the dirt over my head and snuggle in. No, it is more fiendish than that. I am elevated. I am in the Hole but raised up.

I am anchored not only in this Earth as a living sacrifice. I am anchored in this Cosmos. Infinity extends from the Ground of my Being in all “directions.” It is vast. I see no end to any of these lines, no circumference of this circle, no surface to this sphere. I am anchored and grounded with no bounds.

Horizontal. The horizontal beam is the linear plane, the plane of history, where my incarnation story is told, is acted out. Like all the crucified, I am destined to carry the horizontal beam through town, through Vanity Fair, through the masses for entertainment and viewing pleasure.

This beam of horizon energy convinces me there is a past, a future, that I came from somewhere, am going somewhere. I am a straight arrow shot from some distant bow aimed at some unknown target. I come from my mother’s womb and am headed for a certain grave. Once again it is a grave situation.

Make something of yourself, they say. You only have so long. Gather stuff in piles. Couple in orgasm. Run around and do things. Plan your security. Attend violent events. Be somebody. Build an erection to yourself that will last.

Soon enough. Soon enough. I will lay me down in horizontal posture soon enough.

Pardon me. I need to get through here. I have a stake in my future.

Vertical. Affix that cross beam to that stake. Don’t hesitate. Now stretch those arms out. Drive those nails in. Not that way! Not that soft little pity tapping. One blow each nail maybe two should do it. Yeah! Like that! You see why you need help. That last hand hangs loose.

What’s that? No. Your horizontal days are about over. It’s all vertical now. You are on the pathway of the Divine. The Present. You are the present for the present.

A line of light, of energy, moves through the infinity “above,” through the top of my head, through my body, through my feet, through the earth below, and extends infinitely through the infinity “below.”

I am transfixed, pinned to this spot, this spatio-temporal location that is mine, truly mine and no one else’s. No trespassing is allowed simply because no trespassing can occur. I am this universe that spins around this axis. Others have their own spin, their own axis. This is my Cross, my Cross to bear.

taking IT personally

Yes, we are "children of God." One can and does experience this. In stepping back, we can see that it is also a metaphor, a vehicle of transformation, for a species that bears children and thus knows what it means to be a child.

We are "children of the Living God." That warms our hearts more than to say we are "fractals of the Fractal Interflow." Yet both say the same.

Personal. We want it personal. We open more to person metaphor than impersonal, though the latter are just as true, point to, and will carry us to the same Truth.

Part of us wishes to feel that we are in our snuggy pajamas close to God rather than to walk by His side as friends. And we would rather walk by His side as friends rather than suffer the loneliness of the advance scout of God emerging. Snuggy pajama children, friends, advance scouts. All metaphors.

A next move is to step outside all metaphor and be nothing, no thing at all. We cannot handle this. It has no handle to grasp. It cannot be grasped at all.

becoming mary

Warning to the Overly Sensitive! Christian symbology is in use here! Hey, you Christians! When we give our assent, as Mary did, the Father approaches us and the Son and the Spirit merge within our spiritual womb. Every nanosecond a virgin birth! This is a mystery. But if you know what I mean, you know what I mean.

reading

The Bible read with a scoffing eye is not the same Bible as that read by the natural eye. The Bible read by the natural eye is not the same Bible as that read by the spiritual eye. The first is a mockery. The second is a semipermeable wall. The third is infinite depth of vision.

opening to the Sea

Jesus, through his own personal resolve, will, and steadfastness, became the Christ. A Light shone in the world. A similar path of personal effort occurred with Gautama becoming Buddha and Muhammad becoming the Prophet. Rather than dropping anchor in neighborhood ports of conventionality, they opened widely and completely to the Sea. So it is and can be with each of us. This is little known and even less understood. We would rather trail around forever as followers staying in our small containers.

how odd!

How odd! I love the story of God becoming Man and walking among us, but I do not ever wish to be a Christian.

the forming of Jesus

Just as water assumes the form of its container, so does the comprehension of Jesus assume the form of the comprehender. Thus you have the phenomenon of a Jesus who carries a gun and votes Republican.

sin and salvation

Regardless of one's religion or philosophy of life, the universe is one dynamic interflow. Inwardly, we are in relationship with and as that interflow. Outwardly, we express the nature and depth of this relationship.

When we lapse into contracted constipation, this is what is traditionally known as "sin." We become knot heads. No interflow for us. We clench our teeth and tighten our jaws and, by damn!, make our way. All is difficult and an obstacle.

When we move with the interflow both inwardly and outwardly, this is what is traditionally known as being "saved." Our open heartmind pulsates in rhythm and synchrony with the open heartmind of the universe. All becomes simple and easy.

Why didn't the evangelist in the lime green pants and lemon yellow coat explain it this way to me as a child? He did do one thing though. He got the interflow moving in that little Baptist church.

And where is Jesus in all this? Laughing and saying things like "Right on!"

what about this rapture thing?

Rapture. The very word immediately prompts images. Rapture. Along with the images come feelings. Tears of joy, scoffing, indifference. Those indifferent are caught up in images of greater import (to them). Those who scoff are touched by rapture images but due to wounds of the heart protect themselves through disdain. Those with tears of joy are perhaps looking for the event known as rapture to take place out there in the sky and descend to the earth.

All three overlook the understanding that the rapture occurs within. When one withdraws from the hurtling burbling of the world into quietness, one can and does become enrapt. What is rapture but full delight, ecstasy, radiant awareness?

The site of rapture is the location just above one's crown chakra (the top of one's head). One's awareness is focused there. (Focusing awareness in one's butt or feet or stomach will not do it.)

Paintings of holy (enraptured) people often show a radiant light around their heads. One climbs the chakra ladder and takes the leap. One is still in the body while out of the body. Just as in the story of Jacob's ladder, angels (light energy) descend and ascend upon the ladder that you are. This is rapture.

For followers of Jesus (those who follow the path he took), this is a meeting place with the radiance and loving powers of Jesus. One is raptured -- taken out of the body. The heavens split open and the Son of Man descends. One rises to meet him and a merge occurs. This is rapture.

I write of delicate and sensitive things here. Those who scoff can stomp them with their boots. But those who hear can hear.

revisiting "drinking Jesus's blood"

I removed the post "drinking Jesus's blood" from Zen Baptist a few days ago because I evidently did not give it enough context to allow full understanding of its intent and meaning.

Here it is back within the context I was envisioning. Zen is brief and to the point and slices right through. It is sometimes called the grandfather approach. Here is an attempt at a little grandmothering. It is from my blog "the bubbling spring" of this very morning.

Jesus said: Foxes have holes and birds have nests, but the son of man has no place to lay down his head and rest. Saying 86, The Gospel of Thomas (Tr. Stevan Davies)

For those who follow the path that Jesus walked, there is no place to lay down one's head and rest. What is this path? It is the path of the "son of man," the path of those who are evolving beyond ordinary consciousness. The son of man is a further developing of man, a birthing beyond man. Ordinary consciousness opens to integral consciousness.

As this transition occurs, one finds there is no place to lay down your head and rest. There is no doctrinal matrix, no set of rules of worship, no ritual formula to follow, no ritual. While others may find comfort in such, one has moved on down the road. All falls away and one stands transparent and open in a full disclosure cosmos. Nothing is hidden. One's awareness continues to open.

To lay one's head down in a hole or nest is death to a son of man (gender is not an issue here), to one who has moved on. That is why rituals and creeds have lost meaning and are no longer necessary. When one opens to participation in and as the cosmos, one does not look back. Once the goose has escaped the bottle, it does not turn around and try to fit back in.

It is from this standpoint that I wrote "drinking Jesus's blood" as a post in my blog Zen Baptist which produced offense in some and an opportunity for unnecessary derision in at least one other. I reproduce it here:

If Jesus visited a church on communion Sunday, would he drink his blood and eat his flesh? I doubt it. I think he would say: Enough already! Quit toasting my demise and resurrection! Stop slamming down shots of my blood! Cease munching on dry wafers of discontent! Get off your butts and out into the street! The time has come! Stop drifting off into some realm of spiritual euphoria! Wake up! I'm here!

The son of man has no place to lay down his head and rest. Once one goes through a door, it is not necessary to go through it again and again. One does not become attached to the door, no matter how sacred or holy it appears. One moves through to the other side, to the next room. Nor does one make a nest there. No need. The nest of the son of man is a sphere with infinity in every "direction." One's nest is the eternal ever-expanding cosmos of radiance, grace, and mercy with a strong sense of loving humor. One is at home so needs no home.

the baptist crime

Here is the Preface I originally wrote for "The World's First Ever Baptist Crime Novel." I focused instead on how the novel came into being.

Preface

In writing a Baptist Crime Novel, the question eventually arises: what is the Baptist crime? Upon reflection, one sees that the Baptist crime is the carrying out of the crime embedded in a much larger system – the Judeo-Christian-Islam system. Though those three subsystems may not like being put into bed together (as evidenced by their continuous warring with each other), they are nevertheless based upon the same premise: a great gulf exists between God and man. This premise of alienation and separation of man from God automatically requires that the gulf be breached. It is insufferable otherwise. And each of the three has its formula for and path of reconciliation.

So keep in mind that as we look at the Baptist crime, it is embedded in a much larger crime system – a system of alienation. You might object and say, no, it is a system of redemption. But there is no need for redemption if there is no alienation. And that is precisely the Baptist crime – basing an entire world view on a dualistic premise. God is over there. Humans are over here. This is schizophrenic (split-mind) thinking. One starts with a splitness, a fracture that must be healed, a gulf that must be spanned. A religion is born. Many religions. Each claiming to be the healing of the splitness that was manufactured in the first place.

Now if you are a firm believer in any one of these subsystems (Jewish, Christian, Islam) you are not going to want to hear this. Your entire life has been based on alienation and redemption. You are probably also under the illusion that you are, or have (which is even more peculiar, for who is doing the having?), a separate free autonomous soul. This separate self concept is a requirement of any alienation-redemption theological or metaphysical system. Something has to be alienated and redeemed and that would be you, right?

In this Baptist crime novel, the crime is not Bagston’s lifestyle, nor his selling out the church, nor his possibly being murdered. The crime is in the alienation - redemption mindset.

bottom of the food chain

By the time communion got to us Baptists, drinking the actual blood of Christ had downshifted to drinking wine and then to the low gear of drinking Welch's Grape Juice. Eating the actual flesh of Christ had transformed to eating a nice communion wafer to our eating a dry morsel of crumb from a bread heel. We might sing of being washed in the blood but we weren't about to drink it nor wine either -- too many reformed alcoholics among us. We might eat hog and chicken and even rabbit and squirrel but drew the line on eating Jesus's body. And forget those fancy paper-thin wafers. We figured Jesus didn't have those things at the Last Supper. He had loaf bread.

The Gospel of Campus 47: 13 - 16

            13 And the henchmen came to the Lord God and said “Verily, those trees in front of Peterson are in our way.” And the Lord God saw the trees as an abomination and said “Remove them from the sight of my eyes.”

            14 The henchmen said, “Should we not, O Lord God, proclaim thine edict to the ones who live there?” And the Lord God became wroth and said, “Fools! No one lives there now. Only some low echelon henchmen like yourselves who work there.”

            15 And the henchmen were sore afraid to tell the Lord God that working there and living there were the same, and did as the Lord God bid.

            16 Much mourning was in the land as the Peterson henchmen regarded as low echelon henchmen of no power by the Lord God arrived at their work life home and found the trees destroyed, removed.

immovable mind

In Zen practice and in the martial arts, much is made by the old masters of cultivating Immovable Mind. Immovable Mind means that one's attention is not caught by anything. One's mind is not stuck in a memory. One's mind is not caught in a fantasy. The mind is not caught in fear or anger or any of the emotions. The mind is not caught in reflection or in how one is doing or in what someone thinks. The mind resides where it resides and all else moves. The mind is like water reflecting the moon. The water does not hold on to the moon and its reflection. Immovable mind is moving meditation.

Meditation is not a hypnotic state. Meditation is wide awake awareness. Awareness without being caught, without catching oneself. Immovable Mind is a necessity for creative rebellion. What one is rebelling against is being caught in any of the "tar babies" described above and any others with which you may have famil-iarized (made part of your family) yourself. Energy is freed up and creative juices begin to flow.

God's Blog

God's Blog

kissing yourself on your lips

Christianity's seeking of salvation of the soul and secular society's pursuit of goodness for the self are similar arrows shot from not very different bows with the same motivation: self-preservation and self-enjoyment. Both are perversions of Spirit.

A human, like all life forms, is a conduit for Spirit to unfold. The LifeForce itself seeks salvation, from us and from all form.

We humans have not been around all that long. For us to make the purpose of life to be our salvation, our fulfillment, is pitiful and laughable. We are conduits through which Spirit flows. Forget the salvation of your soul. Forget trying to kiss yourself on your lips. It's not about you. It's not about us. It's about Something Much Bigger.

Our only duty is to embody That Which Breathes Us, the Formless which assumes (and passes through on Its journeying) all form. All else is a sucking of our thumb.

the crucible of crucifixion

This question appeared to me this morning, as it has before, but this morning it appeared with special urgency. Why does the son of God have to be crucified? (I refer here to the Christian story, though other, and to me less powerful, examples exist.)

Crucifixion is a definition of achieving form. Coming into form is crucifixion. When the Formless becomes form, the Formless is nailed to the spot. We are talking about you here. And me. And all of us. We speak not only of one forming of the Formless. All of creation moans and groans in its birthing,

Why does the son of God, the offspring of God, have to be despised, abandoned, rejected, left for dead? And then spring forth in glorious rebirth? For the crucifixion story is a resurrection story. The Formless forms, the form feels totally abandoned by the Formless. The form discovers the Formless within itself and is resurrected, is twice born. Why does the son of God have to be crucified? Why does a seed have to fall into the ground and die?

when our box is opened

We know that "a thing isn't true unless there is someone to observe it is true" (a la Schrodinger and his cat). We also know that expected results produce those desired results (scientific experiments have to build in safeguards against experimenter expectancy effects).

What we may not have considered is that if we take the position of the cat in the box and we believe there is a Being that opens the box, when our box is opened (what we call death), the Being is there. If we believe there is nothing there, when our box opens, that is what we find.

The dance we dance now (or at moment of box opening) keeps on dancing. We will continue to be proven right, products of our own self-fulfilling prophecy.


(Thanks to Mary Doria Russell, Children of God, for the cat-perspective insight.)

seeing

Plato (427-347 B.C.) wrote "For there is no light of justice or temperance or any of the higher ideas which are precious to souls in the earthly copies of them: they are seen through a glass dimly."

Paul (5-67 A.D. or C.E.) wrote "For now we see through a glass darkly."

One might easily make the case that Paul, who was a learned man, knew Greek, and was immersed in the theophilosophical consciousness of the time, was influenced by Plato. Plato's apt metaphor of seeing "through a glass dimly" thus appears in the Bible.

For many, this is of no or little interest or import. For others, engaged in anti-Christian, anti-Bible polemics, this is additional fodder for their anti-canon cannons.

For me, it is a further understanding and confirmation of how ideas, once born into this world, are here to stay and to unfold in the minds of others. And more than that, it gives me even greater respect for Plato who provided great insights and vast room for those who were to come after him.

He wrote this: "For a man must have intelligence of universals, and be able to proceed from the many particulars of sense to one conception of reason, -- this is the recollection of those things which our soul once saw while following God -- when regardless of that which we now call being she raised her head up towards the true being. And therefore the mind of the philosopher alone has wings; and this is just, for he is always, according to the measure of his abilities, clinging in recollection to those things in which God abides, and in beholding which He is what He is."

"And he who employs aright these memories is ever being initiated into perfect mysteries and alone becomes truly perfect. But, as he forgets earthly interests and is rapt in the divine, the vulgar deem him mad, and rebuke him; they do not see that he is inspired."

May we all have the mind of a philosopher. May our minds have wings. May we all be continuously inspired.

the cosmic pause

"When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound, and time shall be no more." Though this old hymn was written by a Methodist Sunday School teacher (in 1893), we Baptists sang it anyway. After all, the Methodists were mistaken in only a few doctrinal points.

The reference, of course, is to certain passages in the Bible, my favorite among them being "Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." (1 Corinthians 15:51-52 -- see also Matthew 24, I Thessalonians 4, and Revelations 8 and 11)

The trumpet sound and the abolition of time is not just a Christian understanding. The Islamic mystics had (have) similar insights. For example, Shaikh Ahmad Ahsa'i (1753 - 1826) wrote about "the time of the cosmic pause marking the interval between the two blasts of Seraphiel's Trumpet. When Seraphiel causes the Trumpet to vibrate with 'fiery blast,' which is the 'breath of universal reabsorption,' every Spirit is drawn in, reabsorbed in the particular 'hole' in the Trumpet which is its matrix." -- Henry Corbin, Spiritual Body and Celestial Earth, p. 198-199. (Note: Seraphiel is an angel known as "The Guardian of the Throne of God.")

Not only am I continuously struck by the common vision of mystics across cultures, religions, and countries, but by this entire line of thought about the sounding of the trumpet and the cosmic pause.

If you take the time, you will notice there is a pause between your outbreathing and your inbreathing. This is analogous to the cosmic pause. Our Source brought all into existence and continues to do so by an Outbreathing. At some point, there will be a Pause. Followed by an Inbreathing.

The sounding of the Trumpet indicates that we will be notified of this Pause rather abruptly.

(Another Note: If you don't like mythopoetic language, you might translate this scenario into the language of a hardcore materialistic worldview. All that is matter will at some point cease to matter.)

death

As I move further along the actuarial table. a life insurance monetary scheme in which one bets how long one is to live (I have no life insurance -- I have death assurance), I become more friendly with death. I have come to realize that I am death and life is my companion. I have no "death" to die. Death is the Unborn and life is its creation. Death is the unconscious from which all creativity springs -- springs into the light of day.

Death is no foe. Death is who we are. We are the Unborn reaching into, manifesting as the Born.  "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" (I Corinthians 15:55) Death has no sting and the grave no victory because we have no death to die. We are death.

The surface consciousness ( what I call the WalMart consciousness) will not understand this. The surface consciousness insists that it is everything, knows it is not, and seeks to continue existence. It wishes to remain a happy little separative metaphysical chunk and go on forever. Death frightens the shit out of it. And rightly so, because it does have a death to die.

thankful

Whatever your thoughts on the matter, Jesus's suffering helped free millions from suffering. What a blessing! Stomp your feet all you want and curl your lip in derision. The fact remains.

Whatever your thoughts on the matter, Buddha's awakening helped millions to move out of stupor. What a blessing! Grind your teeth and squint your eyes all you want. The fact remains.

Whatever your thoughts on the matter, Lao Tzu's writings set millions free from rigid mindset. What a blessing! Snurl your nose and waggle your ears all you want. The fact remains.

knocking at the door of the unborn

It is interesting to me that Bonaventure (1221 - 1274), an Italian Christian scholastic mystic, and Bankei (1622 - 1693), a Japanese Zen master, advocated similar understandings of the Source of all being as the Unborn.

Bonaventure wrote and spoke of the innascibility (incapable of being born) of God and Bankei spent his Zen "career" pointing folk to awareness of the Unborn Buddha-mind. Both spoke of the Unborn as birthing all born. That which cannot assume form births that which can and does.

Each, of course, uses the language available to him and the consciousness structure of the populace to whom they speak.

Bonaventure develops the concept of the Trinity: the Father (the Unborn) births the Son (the Born) through the generative powers of the Spirit (the LifeForce). He addresses both scholastics and mystics (direct experiencers).

Bankei continuously invites Buddhist folk to open beyond ordinary consciousness to the realm of the Unborn. He does this in a characteristic Zen way by direct pointing to a crow cawing, a sparrow chirping, or the wind rustling the leaves.

I greatly appreciate the way universal truths emerge across cultures and time and spiritual pathways.

room

You will forever know the only Self to which you allow room. To know the Transcendent, you must be capable of the Transcendent. Capable means to have capacity, to be capacious. To know the Transcendent, you must have capacity for the Transcendent. If you only have room for your manufactured sense of self, you will not know the Transcendent. Fortunately, the Transcendent has a way of knocking at the door of the heart, hoping the door will open. Lovers and followers of the Transcendent have a wide open heart door. You will forever know the only Self to which you allow room.

inclusion

An exclusivist stance in one's religion is where one believes that one's spiritual path is the only and true spiritual path and that all other spiritual paths are false and wrong. This is human nature. We each develop ground to stand on and then have a tendency to think that if all others stood on similar ground, their problems would be solved.

An exclusivist stance takes it a step or two further: all others SHOULD take this stance and this stance only. The richness and complexity of life SHOULD follow a single track. All eggs SHOULD be put into one basket and that basket is mine.

We all know the abuses that have followed that stance in Christianity. Lands claimed, people slaughtered, children taken from their homes and forbidden to speak their native tongue, and so on. Though the outward abuse has died down considerably, the attitude amongst exclusivists is still the same: I am going to heaven and you are going to hell.

As a cosmotheandric zen baptist, I take an inclusive stance. We are all members of the Navel Tribe. We all arise out of the Great Mystery we call by many names. Each individual is at a certain level of understanding, of awareness. Each of us is an embodying of the Mystery. The Mystery has birthed us, is birthing us, and the Mystery will take us home.

neo-zoroastrians

In founding the religion of Christianity, Paul and his followers cast it in the mold of the religion of Zoroaster (600+ BCE)-- light versus darkness, good versus evil, earthlings who are either light beings or dark beings dependent on their choice, a good god and a bad devil, a forecast end of the world or aeon by fire, the capture of the bad devil and the tossing of him and his followers into the abyss of hell, the reigning of the children of light on earth and then in heaven where they will be in bliss forever.

Either Paul was very clever or there are forces at work here beneath and beyond ordinary consciousness and continuing to pop up in different clothing. I suspect both are true.

I am amused to think that today's Christians are in one sense neo-Zoroastrians. Nothing wrong with that. Just funny. But then I seem to have a strange sense of humor.

protestant

I come from a long line of protestants and am a protestant of protestantism. The protest must arise anew with each protestant. "You must be born again." And again and again. One must protest the immediately preceding protest and then protest that. Where does one stop? Where life stops. Life is reborn each moment. As far as religious dogma goes, this makes one a sort of heavenly hellion. One is "playing ball on running water."

when the knees hit the chin

When we make the temporal our temple, we have short-sheeted our cosmic bed.

trance end

A major trap in christianity is the worship of Jesus. One is then let off the hook as far as any major change in self. The way out of this glorified confinement is to BE LIKE  Jesus, a son or daughter of the cosmos in tune with and relying solely on the in-spire-ation of That-Which-Breathes-Us. To do so one must develop and allow great capacity. This requires going out of one's chatter-brain. It seems much easier to be a chatter-brained Jesus worshiper than to be a spiritual sibling of Jesus. All one has to do is keep attending the club and having confidence that one is saved (whatever that means). To live as an offspring of the Wellspring requires that one be totally lost. And to never ever be found again.

consciousness states

All theology and philosophy is a depiction of the theologian's or philosopher's state of consciousness. A particular state of consciousness is then adopted by its followers as the supreme or only state of consciousness worthy of opening into. If one's consciousness is then expanded, the experience is often called "salvation" or "enlightenment." Disillusion with a state of consciousness is called disenchantment and one seeks one's enchantment elsewhere.

the foot of the heart

IF we keep dreaming we are the way we are, we will remain as we are. AS we keep dreaming we are the way we are, we remain as we are. This has nothing to do with "advancing one's career" or "dreaming big." This is no motivational seminar. It has everything to do with soul.

It takes effort to keep dreaming the same dream of oneself, to keep wearing the same set of psychic clothes. Revving up and adding more serves only to decrease and weigh one down.

When you know who you are, you will laugh at how you tried to shape yourself. Wake up, my dear! The foot of the heart will not slip into that too small shoe.

possibles

"All things are possible with God." True. But with us individuals, possibility depends upon and takes shape through our latent predisposition and our capacity to receive. Who we are is an unfolding of a strand of the Web of Being from infinite eternity. Each strand proceeding from the infinite past has/is a fated disposition.

We move within the range of our predisposition. Capacity is capaciousness or room for possibility. Our capacity fluctuates with our mood and with our will. The will to be capacious is the willingness to be a servant of the Divine, the will to be of service. With this willingness comes all possibility.

a whup-ass loving heart

I like it that Jesus could whup anybody's ass but generally chose not to, becoming a servant instead. He could stand up on his hind legs though, go toe to toe with cunning intellectual bozos looking to make him stumble and fall. Jesus knew the spiritual equivalent of a body slam.

So you have this warrior dude who chose peace.

We have the same elements within us. We can easily be at war with ourselves, at war with our loved ones, at war with society. But that's sooo one-sided. We can also be peaceniks with fluttering hearts and little angel wings and tire tracks across our face where others (with our blessings)run over us. But that's sooo one-sided.

A flaming sword of fiery light at the core of a wide open heart: that's how I experience Jesus. No mild-mannered lamb led to slaughter. A loving heart with fierceness of intent. My role model.

My prayer and my practice are the same:
to be a whup-ass loving heart.

water game

We pour the water we are into ice trays.
We want a frame, to be held.
We get rigid.
We put our cubed self
into a glass of water.
Ah! we say.
Now I am both contained and free!
We happily forget the glass.
We take a sip of ourselves
via our metaphysical creed.
Oh, how good we taste!

tossing the baby

Literal christianity is a stumbling block. Mystical or depth christianity is another matter. To throw that baby out with the literal bathwater is an error and ultimately not possible. One may as well try to throw out the writings of Lao Tzu and the Tao because taoism exists. Or trash the Heart Sutra and the "body of transformation" because of buddhist sects. The baby concealed within the depths of christianity is transformational, an open door to regeneration and renewal. It has been clouded over with exclusivism and doctrinal rant. Poof! I blow away those obscurations and sink more deeply into the richness of christianity's deep meanings.

freed

"... permitting the soul thus to free itself from all the schemata of the world." Henry Corbin, Avicenna and the Visionary Recital

At some point, each of us will breath out and not breathe back in. This last outbreath is a prayer with no words, a returning of our breath to the one who breathes us. This is done with joy, with awe, and with a smile. We practice this with our outbreath now, preparing for the moment when we need our breath no longer.

no bounds

I love the breath that breathes me.

When I love the breath that breathes me,
I become the breath that breathes me.

When I become the breath that breathes me,
all boundaries fall away.

extrusion and exclusion

If you believe your god is the only god, you are automatically at war. Never mind that you say your god is love.

love and evol

As a holy joe, you are a schmo.
Sinking into dark, you are a snark.

Jesus and Beelzebub are brothers,
Chasing round and round that tree
Until melding into pancake butter.

Now that takes the cake!
Battered and buttered,
we make our way.

gone, gone, gone beyond, gone way beyond

Christianity as a method of salvation loses all its efficacy as a method when that method becomes a reality. Once one leaps from a springboard (the method), one no longer needs the springboard. One is in and one is the reality one was springing for. To go back and get the springboard is foolishness. One does not sit and worship the springboard.

In another but similar context, the Buddha said when you get to the other shore, you don't carry the boat around atop your head. Once the method has become a reality, one no longer needs that method. One is no longer a Christian, a Buddhist, a Muslim, a Hindu, a Whatever. One exists as the reality for which one was springing.

no theocracy

"The color of water is the color of its vessel." (Junayd, 10th century)

Water also assumes the form of its vessel. Hence, the great differences among religions, philosophies, and thought systems, and among the individuals within each of those consciousness systems.

Same water. Different colors. Different forms.

I reckon the Great Ah-Hoo-Ah-Hoo-Ah did not desire to set up a state religion. The Theos wants no theocracy.

two tines tuning

The tuning fork that we are consists of one tine of pure animal and one tine of pure spirit. The call is for both tines to vibrate fully, openly, and simultaneously. Trying to be a "respectable" animal will not and does not work. Nor does constricting one's soul for fear of full flow-through of spirit.

Animal awareness and spiritual awareness are different from shrivel-ized awareness. The first two see (and exist in) full Being. The latter, the state of ordinary consciousness, vibrates hesitantly and weakly and resides in death.

Fully animal and fully spirit simultaneously: this is the way to fly. We are embodyings of spirit. We are spirit embodying. We are these two simultaneously.

What is the sound of two tines tuning?

the realm of the highest human endeavor

1. The Not-Even-One, the One, and the dualistic Two which we embody ("on the one hand and on the other hand") merge to make the Three, this interwhirling we call life. 
2. General consciousness dwells in and as the dualistic two. 
3. Intuitive awareness opens to and as the Three. 
4. The Not-Even-One can be felt as, through the Three, one approaches the One. 
5. The Three is the realm of the highest human endeavor. 
6. Opening to and as the Three consists of one part attitude and three parts Grace.
7. Humility, will, faith, intellect, and love make up the attitude. The Grace is free.

trinity

0 - wu- nothing - source - father/mother
1 - yu - something - emanation - son/daughter
2 - t'ai - everything - interflow - holy spirit/chi

3 - wu-yu-t'ai - trinity - perichoresis

easter

I love Easter. Life arising out of Death. All of Nature displaying this pattern mysterious yet familiar. Famil-iar: in the Family. Even and especially our very God, Source and Wellspring of All, volunteering to go through this Recycle to show Us how It is Done.

without sin

"Sin" is not a popular term and is open to ridicule by those who reject an out-moded Christian paradigm based on guilt. To me, sin is still a viable concept and useful construct, but in the emerging cosmic citizenry paradigm (which includes Christianity), it is defined more realistically. No longer are we penitents flogging ourselves with penance nor the rebellious daring all blaspheme -- two categories of being which the old conception of sin produced in abundance.

Sin is separation. Sin is cutting oneself off from one's full being. Rather than opening to cosmic citizenry and full participation in the interflow of being, one shuts oneself down, proclaims oneself a separate tiny kingdom, refuses to open to the synchronous and the synthronous.

I know. Folk are fond of saying that sin means "missing the mark." Same thing. Separation. Separation from the mark. The shot arrow thunks off target or off bulls-eye.

When we are no longer whining petitioners or rebellious buttheads but actively involved as cosmic citizens (in Christian language, Christ consciousness), we are no longer separate. We have opened into a realm that is without sin. Our Source is within us and we are within our Source. We do not stand aside to look at It. We are It. And It is us.

excerpt from the anthropological study of phenomenological endeavor

"He said hello to the Morning Jesus. The Morning Jesus is calm and bright, good sunshine colors. Humorous, the Morning Jesus is humorous, laughter in his heart. Not like the Evening Jesus who is blue and silver. The Evening Jesus descends on him like a cloud of dreamful sleep." (From the Anthropological Study of Phenomenological Endeavor)

humus humor human

Humans: a cosmic experiment whose outcome is yet to be known, except by the Great Ah-Hoo-Ah-Hoo-Ah whose end is only a fresh beginning and whose beginning never was.

amniotic sac

Self-reflection: absorption in the echoes bouncing off the thin, tough, and shifting membrane of the imagination.

heart and sole

Heart in the cosmos,
feet in the world of men,
I make my coffee,
I dance and sing.

the preachers of yore

The preachers of yore, of my childhood, whether on Sunday or one of those hot eternal Revival summer nights, would get up in the pulpit, the cockpit of the church, and give chase to that same old fox, the fox without which those little churches would not exist.

He, the preacher was always a he, a woman could play the piano but not preach, he would unleash the ravenous hounds of hell, fangs dripping with fox-ripping saliva, followed closely by the four apocalyptic horsemen thundering on fox-stomping hooves. The fox? Well, it was you, of course. You that put Jesus on the cross. You that killed the only beauty in the cosmos. And the hounds of hell were breathing down your neck and if they didn't finish you off, the horsemen would stomp your sweet ass to nothingness, are already stomping.

I learned a lot from those preachers. I learned the power of imagery, of story, of mythology. I learned the power of words. I learned the power of rhythmic repetition, of a speaking cadence that caught folk and bound them into one attentive ear. I learned the power of creative imagination and its effect upon the physiology, of creating images that lead one from heart-pounding stress and ache to soothing waters of eternal bliss.

We might leave church and revert to our worldly ways but for an hour or so we were tightly knit as one body and the world made sense and our sins were forgiven and life was good.

A salute to you old preachers and revivalists! Masters of your art! My first tutors.

the eternal pacman

I am
the Eternal PacMan
chomping life
while monsters chase.

A golden sun
with pie wedge mouth
devouring all before me
monster in disguise.

The monsters are hungry suns
floating down thin corridors
to have their turn
at chomp . . .

circumincessio

the rooster crowing
the hen clucking

the flower opening
the corpse rotting

the lotus blooming
the root mucking

the spirit fleshing
the matter at rest

I Am This
The Eternal Interplaying

jingo

When we say
it's this or that
we've now shat
in our own hat.

When we say
it's them or us
we've become
a spiteful cuss.

When we say
it's mine or mine
we believe
we're now divine.

on heaven and hell

Early thought was that hell existed below (beneath the earth) and heaven existed above (in the sky). That gave way to a belief that both heaven and hell are inside of us. Now we open to the understanding that we are embodyings of the cosmos. We are the universe universing. Where does that put heaven and hell? Hell is when we continue to encapsulate ourselves in our seed husks while being pulled to open and flower. Heaven is when we open to the flowering of the universe that we are and move beyond the shuffling zombie existence of a  seed refusing to die and be born.