on bread :)
a dear friend shared with me a sermon yesterday that i found most enlightening. i include here a passage that especially resonates.
What is necessary is not great efforts of renunciation of the joys of the world, great accomplishments and good deeds or heroic meditation, as we often hear extolled. What is expected from us is weeding: a cleansing of our internal garden, an examination of our deeper impulses and motives, and making efforts to change, searching for the life that is indicated in the Sermon on the Mount--the real world of love that alone can bring fulfillment. This means rejecting and eliminating all that is opposed, hard, and cold; all that does not contain life from God.the rest of it is here. and on the same site, i found this enlightening read on listening.
3 comments:
Hmmmm, "This means rejecting and eliminating all that is opposed, hard, and cold; all that does not contain life from God."
this strikes me as too easy to say, too clear cut. If this were all there is to it, then wouldn't more sincere souls than me or the ones I see around me have done this generations ago? If so, what prevented them? If you say it is man's free will, then why is that? My question is only partially rhetorical ;-)
Christ paints a picture of a one to one relationship, I think, primarily to get us to see the values that are inherent in that scale. However our existence is not only in that scale, (well, it wasn't solely then either, but not global, or even national yet). There was a time when we lived in all white neighborhoods, and that live, I venture to suggest, could be lived well within the guidelines that are presented here in your synopsis. Yes, Christ is full of allusions and metaphors that suggest more, but primarily the world for His listeners was not so complex that they could believe it would be a violation of civil rights to live in segregated housing, and not wonder if their black brother might want to live nearby, and couldn't. Those comparatively innocent hearts, then and now, were certainly comfortable NOT making great efforts of renunciation, etc, and I wonder if they ever in their temples and churches and synogogues heard them extolled :-), but a gentleman or woman's weeding between the hours of 10AM and perhaps 11:30AM only to resume sometime after lunch and break for tea. The "cold and hard were those ideas like slaves rights, or minority rights, or handicapped rights, or civil rights could safely be rejected without feeling too much regret that a satisfying evening meal whouldn't set right again.
Sorry I should have previewed more carefully. Maybe next time
Regards from Japan.
Edo: greetings! to be honest, i am not sure what your question is. and in fact, even if i understood it, i am doubtful that i would have the answers :).
true that this quote is easy to say, because the question then is - how does one decide what is "opposed, hard and cold". further, even if one knows from an intellectual standpoint, how does one discern these within oneself?
the answer, as far as i can tell at this time, lies in increasing one's knowledge and deepening one's awareness. neither is easy, and even with a sincerity to acquire knowledge, knowledge does not always come :). energy must be focused toward the pursuit of this knowledge, and with it there must be openness to receive this knowledge, in whichever form it may come.
when knowledge goes deep within, and coupled with awareness, begins to guide one's conduct - that is when the process of self-realization begins.
are there questions i can still address for you, in my limited knowledge? if so, do feel free to write again.
all the best.
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