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Cosmic Christ: God in All Things

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God in All Things
Sunday, October 23, 2016

(Daily Meditation Oct. 23, 2016, Fr Richard Rhor)

The day of my spiritual awakening
was the day I saw and knew I saw
all things in God and God in all things.
—Mechtild of Magdeburg (c. 1212—c. 1282) [1]

Understanding the Cosmic Christ can change the way we relate to creation, to other religions, to other people, to ourselves, and to God. Knowing and experiencing the Cosmic Christ can bring about a major shift in consciousness. Like Saul’s experience on the road to Damascus (see Acts 9), you won’t be the same after encountering the Risen Christ.

As with the Trinity, the Cosmic Christ is present in both Scripture and Tradition and the concept has been understood by many mystics, though not as a focus of mainline Christianity. We just didn’t have the eyes to see it. The Cosmic Christ is about as traditional as you can get, but Christians—including many preachers—have not had the level of inner experience to know how to communicate this to people.

The Cosmic Christ is Divine Presence pervading all of creation since the very beginning. My father Francis of Assisi intuited this presence and lived his life in awareness of it. Later, John Duns Scotus (1266-1308) put this intuition into philosophical form. For Duns Scotus, the Christ Mystery was the blueprint of reality from the very start (John 1:1). Teilhard de Chardin brought this insight into our modern world. God’s first “idea” was to become manifest—to pour out divine, infinite love into finite, visible forms. The “Big Bang” is now our scientific name for that first idea; and “Christ” is our theological name. Both are about love and beauty exploding outward in all directions. Creation is indeed the Body of God! What else could it be, when you think of it?

In Jesus, this eternal omnipresence had a precise, concrete, and personal referent. God’s presence became more obvious and believable in the world. But this apparition only appeared in the last ten seconds of December 31, as it were—scaling the universe’s entire history to a single year. Was God saying nothing and doing nothing for 13.8 billion years? Our code word for that infinite saying and doing was the “Eternal Christ.” (See John 1:1-5, Colossians 1:15-20, Ephesians 1:9-12 if you think this is some new idea.)

Vague belief and spiritual intuition became specific and concrete and personal in Jesus—with a “face” that we could “hear, see, and touch” (1 John 1:1). The formless now had a personal form, according to Christian belief.

But it seems we so fell in love with this personal interface with Jesus that we forgot about the Eternal Christ, the Body of God, which is all of creation, which is really the “First Bible.” Jesus and Christ are not exactly the same. In the early Christian era, only a few Eastern Fathers (such as Origen of Alexandria and Maximus the Confessor) cared to notice that the Christ was clearly historically older, larger, and different than Jesus himself. They mystically saw that Jesus is the union of human and divine in space and time, and the Christ is the eternal union of matter and Spirit from the beginning of time.

When we believe in Jesus Christ, we’re believing in something much bigger than just the historical incarnation that we call Jesus. Jesus is just the visible map. The entire sweep of the meaning of the Anointed One, the Christ, includes us and includes all of creation since the beginning of time. Revelation was geological, physical, and nature-based before it was ever personal and fully relational (see Romans 1:20).

Gateway to Silence:
Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.

References:
[1] Sue Woodruff, Meditations with Mechtild of Magdeburg (Santa Fe, NM: Bear & Co., 1982), 46.

Adapted from Richard Rohr, The Cosmic Christ, discs 1 & 2 (CAC: 2009), CD, MP3 download; and
Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi (Franciscan Media: 2014), 185, 210, 222.

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Sabiduría Universal

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Sabiduría Universal

Domingo, 20 de Noviembre, 2016.

La Tradición de la Sabiduría Perenne…ofrece conocimiento antiguo para la vida contemporánea que es relevante para todo nosotros, y no solo para unos pocos. ­­­­–David G. Benner [1]

La Tradición Perenne abarca los constantes temas que se repiten recurrentemente en todas las religiones y filosofías que continua diciendo:

  • Hay una Realidad Divina por debajo y es intrínsico al mundo de las cosas;
  • En el alma del ser humano hay una capacidad natural,una similitud y un anhelo por esta Realidad Divina;
  • El objetivo final de la existencia es la unión con esta Realidad Divina.

La “filosofía perenne” o la “tradición perenne” es un termino que ha entrado y salido en popularidad en la historia Occidental y religiosa, pero nunca ha sido desechada por la Iglesia Universal. Yo fui entrenado en teología Católica sistemática, y alternativa ortodoxa Franciscana; esto y la tradición completa Judeo-Cristiana me enseñó a honrar la visibilidad y la revelación de Dios en todas las tradiciones del mundo y no solo la mía propia.

La Tradición Perenne fue afirmada, en muchas formas, en el Concilio Vaticano Segundo (1962–65) con miras al futuro en documentos sobre ecumenismo (Unitatis Redintegratio) y en religions no Cristianas (Nostra Aetate). Estos afirman que hay constantes temas, verdades y repeticiones en todas las religiones del mundo.

En Nostra Aetate, por ejemplo, los Padres del Concilio comienzan por decir “ Todas las personas constituyen una sola comunidad y tiene un solo origen [creado por uno y el mismo Dios Creador]… Y solo un destino final: Dios…La Iglesia Católica rechaza nada que sea verdad y sagrado en estas religiones”. [2] Luego el documento continua alabando las religiones Nativas, Hinduismo, Judaísmo, Budismo e Islam como “un rayo reflector de la verdad que ilumina a todas las personas.”[3] Usted puede darse cuenta el coraje y la brillantez que tomó en escribir esto en 1965, cuando muy poca gente en cualquier religión pensaba de esta manera. De hecho, la mayoría todavía hoy aun no piensa en esta forma.

Una excepción temprana fue la de San Augustin (354–430), un Doctor de la Iglesia, quien escribió: “Precisamente esto que es ahora llamado la religión Cristiana no estaba presente entre los antiguos desde el comienzo de la raza humana hasta la venida de Cristo en la carne. Después de este tiempo, la religión verdadera, la cual ha existido siempre, comenzó a llamarse ‘Cristianismo.’”[4] San Clemente de Alejandría, Origen, San Basil, San Gregorio de Nisa, y San Leo el Grande todos ellos mantuvieron entendimiento similar antes que el Cristianismo se volviese luego defensivo (¡ y ofensivo!) en modos de cazar herejías, de anti-Semitismo, y las varias cruzadas. Cuando cualquier religión se convierte orgullosa, también se torna en dualística y oposicional.

En algunas maneras cruciales, nosotros hemos retrocedido actualmente de los profundos pensadores y escritos de la Tradición Perenne. Como Ken Wilber repite frecuentemente, una buena religión está hecha para ordenar como servicio tal como “una cinta transportadora” hacia adelante a través de todas las etapas de la conciencia humana. Que triste cuando nos quedamos bloqueados en la etapa de servicio personal..

 

 

 

Referencias:

[1] David G. Benner, “Ancient Wisdom for Contemporary Living,” “The Perennial Tradition,” Oneing, Vol. 1, No. 1 (CAC: 2013), 24.
[2] Nostra Aetate, Vatican II, 1965, #1, 2. 
[3] Ibid.
[4] Augustine of Hippo, Retractions, 1:13.3, emphasis mine.

Adapted from Richard Rohr, “Introduction,” “The Perennial Tradition,” Oneing, Vol. 1, No. 1 (CAC: 2013), 11-12. (This issue of Oneing, a limited edition publication, is no longer available in print; however, the eBook is available from Amazon and iTunes. Explore additional issues of Oneing at store.cac.org.)

 

Richard Rhor Daily Meditations

Universal Wisdom
Sunday, November 20, 2016

 

Universal Wisdom

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The Perennial Wisdom Tradition . . . offers ancient wisdom for contemporary living that is relevant to all of us, not just to a few. —David G. Benner [1]

The Perennial Tradition encompasses the constantly recurring themes in all of the world’s religions and philosophies that continue to say:

  • There is a Divine Reality underneath and inherent in the world of things;
  • There is in the human soul a natural capacity, similarity, and longing for this Divine Reality;
  • The final goal of existence is union with this Divine Reality.

The “perennial philosophy” or “perennial tradition” is a term that has come in and out of popularity in Western and religious history, but has never been dismissed by the Universal Church. I was trained in Catholic systematic theology and Franciscan alternative orthodoxy; these and the whole Judeo-Christian tradition taught me to honor the visibility and revelation of God in all the world traditions and not just my own.

In many ways, the Perennial Tradition was affirmed at the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) in forward-looking documents on ecumenism (Unitatis Redintegratio) and non-Christian religions (Nostra Aetate). These affirm thatthere are some constant themes, truths, and recurrences in all of the world religions.

In Nostra Aetate, for example, the Council Fathers begin by saying that “All peoples comprise a single community and have a single origin [created by one and the same Creator God]. . . . And one also is their final goal: God. . . . The Catholic Church rejects nothing which is true and holy in these religions.” [2] Then the document goes on to praise Native religions, Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, and Islam as “reflecting a ray of that truth which enlightens all people.” [3] You have got to realize what courage and brilliance it took to write that in 1965, when very few people in any religion thought that way. In fact, most still don’t think that way today.

One early exception was St. Augustine (354-430), a Doctor of the Church, who wrote: “The very thing which is now called the Christian religion was not wanting among the ancients from the beginning of the human race until Christ came in the flesh. After that time, the true religion, which had always existed, began to be called ‘Christian.’” [4] St. Clement of Alexandria, Origen, St. Basil, St. Gregory of Nyssa, and St. Leo the Great all held similar understandings before Christianity turned to the later defensive (and offensive!) modes of heresy hunting, anti-Semitism, and various crusades. When any religion becomes proud, it also becomes dualistic and oppositional.

 

Richard Rhor Daily Meditations

Universal Wisdom
Sunday, November 20, 2016

 

Foundations of Contemplative Living

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finleyretreat_stpauls

 

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The Practice of Welcoming Prayer

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The Welcoming Prayer is a method of consenting to God’s presence and action in our physical and emotional reactions to events and situations in daily life. The purpose of the Welcoming Prayer is to deepen our relationship with God through consenting in the ordinary activities of our day. The Welcoming Prayer helps to dismantle the emotional programs of the false-self system and to heal the wounds of a lifetime by addressing them where they are stored — in the body. It contributes to the process of transformation in Christ initiated in Centering Prayer.

practiceofthewelcomingprayer

 

Contemplative Outreach Ltd Welcoming Prayer.

Practicing the Welcoming Prayer

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Practicing the Welcoming Prayer

The Welcoming Prayer Movement One:

“Feel and sink into” what you are experiencing this moment in your body.

Movement Two:

“Welcome” what you are experiencing this moment in your body as an opportunity to consent to the Divine Indwelling.

Movement Three:

“I let go of my desire for security, affection, control and embrace this moment as it is.”

“The reason that Centering Prayer is not as effective as it could be is that when you emerge from it into the ordinary routines of daily life, your emotional programs start going off again. Upsetting emotions immediately start to drain the reservoir of interior silence that you had established during the prayer.

“On the other hand, if you work at dismantling the energy centers that cause the upsetting emotions, your efforts will extend the good effects of centering into every aspect of daily life.”

— Thomas Keating, Open Mind, Open Heart

The Welcoming Prayer is a practice of letting go in the present moment, in the ordinary routines of daily life. It is prayer because of our intention and consent to God’s presence and action in our lives, helping us to remember that the Indwelling Presence is always with us in our experiences.

The daily reminder to practice the Welcoming Prayer is our body. By learning to notice what’s happening in the body in the moment, we can use this new incarnational awareness as our reminder to practice the prayer. That’s why it is so important to practice the scanning exercise given in this Monday’s lesson. We’re developing a new muscle of consciousness, a new way of becoming aware of our next opportunity to consent to God’s presence and action in the ordinary activity of our lives.

 

The Three Movements of the Welcoming Prayer

The three movements of the prayer are:

Feel and Sink Into

Welcome

Let Go

  1. “Feel and Sink Into” what you are experiencing this moment in your body.

Feel what is happening in the body. Sink into — do not resist — the body sensation. Simply experience the energy.

Using your intuitive eye, move gently through the body, scanning for any discomfort, pain, uneasiness, itching, heat, cold, tension, tingling, or any other sensations. When you become aware of any body sensation, rest (stop) and sink into (experience) it. Be alert to any uneasiness in your body — a sensation of heat or cold, itchiness or tingling, tension, or pain.

All feelings, whether perceived as positive or negative, are welcomed. Feelings may intensify, dissolve, or change as we are present to them in the moment. Simply follow their movement.

The body, from the top of the head all the way down to the tip of the toes, is the warehouse of the unconscious. All of our experiences are carried in every cell of our body and imprinted there — the “issues are in the tissues.” The first movement of the prayer helps us to access the unconscious through the body, in the moment.

  1. “Welcome” what you are experiencing this moment in your body as an opportunity to consent to the Divine Indwelling.

 

“Welcome” is the sacred word, the symbol of our consent to the presence and action of the Indwelling Spirit, the Divine Therapist. “Welcome” is to embrace what we find happening within. Saying the word “welcome” interiorly is the action of embracing the Indwelling Spirit, whom we know by faith is always present, in and through our experience.

 

3. Next, we say the “Letting Go” phrase.

“I let go of my desire for security, affection, control and embrace this moment as it is.”

Attachment is an important concept to explore here. Attachment can be defined as something that fastens one thing to another (clinging) or an attempt to possess and control the perceived source of happiness. Attachments imprison us, like a fly stuck to fly paper. Attachment to the instinctual drives for happiness (security, affection, control) creates compensatory needs, like when we eat or drink when we feel in need of love and affection. We let go in order to open to the will of God in our life. We “let go” and “let God.”

“Letting go” means passing through the energy and not around it, not running away or pushing it back into the unconscious through denial or distraction. One does not identify with the feeling, emotion, body sensation, thought, or commentary, and act it out, but allows it to be transformed by the simple act of sticking with it and experiencing it.

Saying the “letting go” sentence helps to dismantle the emotional programs for happiness that can’t work, uprooting the dis-ease in the unconscious. As we “let go,” it is not necessary to identify which energy center was triggered, or focus on one or the other of them.

It is important to say the “letting go” sentence, even if one has experienced a release of the energy after the first two movements of “feel and sink into” and “welcoming.” There is no need to try to determine which of the three energy centers is the source of what we are experiencing – they are all inextricably connected.

Energy is a force for expression. It desires to express itself somehow. Releasing energy by “letting go” is a healthy and useful way to handle a feeling. Each release undoes a bit of the repressed energy. As time goes by, we become freer and have greater clarity of mind. Purpose and direction become more positive and constructive, resulting in more conscious choices, decisions, and actions.

“It is the most difficult thing for us to let go.

We have a mind that tells us that we’re always right;

everybody else is wrong, but we are right.

Then we have emotions and feelings

that sort of validate those thoughts.

And what we need to do is to let go of

whatever is happening on an interior level

and surrender so that we can see reality

and what is actually happening

instead of perceiving through our thoughts and feelings.”

  • Mary Mrozowski, creator of the Welcoming Prayer

From Contemplative Outreach Ltd

 

practiceofthewelcomingprayer

Humility of Christ

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It is found in the second chapter of the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Philippians:

5 Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:

6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:

7 But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:

8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

9 Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:

10 That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;

11 And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Philippians 2:5-11 King James Version (KJV)

 

Humility

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I just finished  reading a book title Humility Matters by Mary Margaret Funk (2005) and I am trying to make a summary of my reading so it will help me to integrate its content.(p.180-185)

 

We Christians follow the way by imitating Christ who revealed to us how to live our human lives as we return to God.

Jesus of Nazareth stated, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him” (Jn 14:6-7)

In our tradition,

– We renounce all  that is not contributing to the construction of the reign of God here and now.

– We take on the spiritual journey, living our life from our depths and in tune with our motivations, desires and passions. “We renounce the thoughts that, when unchecked lead us down the slope toward our afflictions: the classic afflictive thoughts of food, sex, things, anger, dejection, acedia, vainglory and pride.”

– We renounce our self-made thoughts of God, therefore we can know God as God is.

– We renounce the thoughts of our self, accepting the change from self centeredness to sacrifice  on behalf others.

Suddenly develop what we call humility by replacing attachment to ignorance, illusion and greed. We begin to give importance to creation and celebrate life with our spiritual senses, awake and get involved in the Mystery. We begin to integrate our body, mind and soul into a single being. (Purity of Heart)

“To become humble is to embrace the human condition as it is and yet also to renounce attachments to any self-made illusions about that human condition.So comprehensive is this teaching that we may say that humility is for a Christian what enlightenment is for a Buddhist, realization for a Hindu, sincerity for a Confucian, righteousness for a Jew, surrender for a Muslim, and annihilation for a Sufi. Through the four renunciations, we come to purity of heart: the face of humility.”

Trinity Prayer

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God for us, we call you “Father.”
God alongside us, we call you “Jesus.”
God within us, we call you “Holy Spirit.”
Together, you are the Eternal Mystery
That enables, enfolds, and enlivens all things,
Even us and even me. 

Every name falls short of your goodness and greatness.
We can only see who you are in what is.
We ask for such perfect seeing—
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be.

Amen.

Trinity: Week 1

The Importance of Good Theology
Sunday, September 11, 2016

Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM

God is this very moment giving to you

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…“salvation” has little to do with belief systems, belonging to the right group, or correct ritual practice. It has everything to do with living right here, right now, and knowing a beautiful and fully accepting God is this very moment giving to you. All you can do is sit down at the banquet and eat. If you can enjoy heaven now, you are totally prepared and ready for heaven later.

Richard Rhor . Daily Meditation Sep 2, 2016