• • •

“Pass,
You have many questions. The questions are good. And to form the question is often more helpful than answers, as you may have noticed. Questions seek answers, and the answers to most questions we don’t know. Much remains a mystery, and many great truths are paradoxical. Please know that if you seek my observations, they will always come with the caveat that I will tell you what I understand today. I am clay in the potter’s hands. I try not to imagine what I will believe Reality to be tomorrow. As Fr Richard once wrote,

“A viewpoint is only a view from a point.”

And,

“Those who know always know that they don’t know.
That’s the character of the mystic.”

But let’s be clear about this: our beliefs or lack of beliefs in something have no effect whatsoever on reality. Often, I have heard, “Well…I don’t believe that,” in response to my suggestion or observation, as though that settles the point. It doesn’t. Believing or not believing is not what makes it true or false. Whether you fully comprehend reality is never the point. You don’t and won’t ever, and it’s okay. Only your Love matters.

For the record, as Fr Rohr has said,

“We recognize the truth because truth is true everywhere, all the time, or it isn’t truth.”

Passerby,
Read everything by Fr Richard. While, in my opinion, his Catholicism sometimes gets in the way, the Spirit is upon him, and he has written nothing that is not consistent with his passion for Her. May I offer you a glass of Tempranillo? Spanish wines have so much more to offer than SoCal wines. What do you think?

• • •

Spirituality is not a formula; it is not a test. It is a relationship.
Spirituality is not about competency; it is about intimacy.
Spirituality is not about perfection; it is about connection.
—Mike Yaconelli, Messy Spirituality

The journey into the open arms of the one who loves your true self (Thomas Merton popularized the terms true and false self. More about that another time.), whose voice you already know, is short, only one step, but in the opposite direction, you have traveled to get here. You need to turn around. The meaning of repentance. That one step can be a fairly easy one if you are ready. She is waiting to embrace you—behind you toward the beginning, where you took the original wrong turn. She never left you. There was never a time that She didn’t desire you or didn’t love you and wasn’t pursuing you, and you cannot outrun Her, and this is important…you are not a disappointment to Her.

“We are already one [with Her]. But we imagine that we are not. And what we have to recover is our original unity. What we have to be is what we are.”

—Thomas Merton

Yes, I know, Passerby. They told you that something, at the beginning of time, had tragically separated all humans ever to be born from Her. Trust me when I say that is simply false. It has never been true.

The motive of patriarchy for teaching that we are lost and need to be reconciled to Her is clear. Power. If you believe it, and I establish myself in your mind as the one who can facilitate the reunion between you and god so that you are ‘saved’ from Her displeasure, I have power over you. The twisted path those who have perverted the way would have you take is always about money, sex, and power. We will speak more about that another time.

Come, She is waiting.”

• • •

Turn Around

Messiah Jesus announces the Great Spirits initiative, saying, “Turn around and come back! The ‘Companionship of Empowerment’ (COE) is already here and now. Trust this good news.” Often translated as, “The time is now, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” (Mk 1:15). The COE language which I Love, is courtesy of Diarmuid O’Murchu from his book, Incarnation, a new evolutionary threshold. Companionship speaks of the relationship with Her for which She created us, and Empowerment speaks first of our partnership with Her as co-creators for which She created the human-kind and second of our vocation to tend and to keep, guard, and protect all Her good creation. (Genesis 1.26ff)

Passerby, I recommend you read anything by O’Murchu, a prophet of our time.

• • •

Trust

Based on my experience, She will not introduce you beforehand to the pain retracing your steps will involve or how dying to the things you are about to die to might feel. I can tell you there will be, at least, existential pain, anxiety, anger, despair, loneliness, and feelings of betrayal. There will also be joy—however unimaginable that may be from where you are currently—as the soiled layers of your false self sluff off. Trust Her.

“Trust. When my eldest son could stand by himself, I would stand him on the mantle, face him, and say, “Jump, Matt!” He hurled himself into my arms, squealing with delight, and we fell to the floor laughing and wrestling. On subsequent jumps, I would increase the distance with the same result.

His trust in me was immaculate, and he never doubted I would catch him. When you hear faith, think trust.”

• • •

There is a true, faithful, and honorable self underneath your unfaithful self that looks like Her since She created Us (Genesis 1:26-31.) in Her own image. She knows every wrong step you have taken to get away from Her Love. And we must encounter each, one at a time, from the opposite direction as you return to the beginning to become a new creation.”

When you took the faithless path in the beginning, you were no doubt encouraged to do so by those who loved you—those you trusted. They invited you to share their journey and their path. The intent was praiseworthy even though the reality was not helpful. It was partly from them that you gained your false self.

Even if innocently, taking a path that is only one degree off of true North will ultimately take you just as far away from Her as starting 180 degrees off, but it is much more difficult to see—except in hindsight. Evil understands how much easier it is to sell us deviance by just one degree.