Embers To Fire

The wood stove is cold upon rising, metal cold,

barely 10 degrees Fahrenheit outside

55 in the dimly lit room,

cold air echoing from the windows.  

No fire has yet been started in the stove upstairs,

but downstairs, in the laundry room—

an ash log, not fully consumed in the night,

its underbelly still glowing red. 

Winding some packing paper around cedar chips,

wielding the ax to split several slender strips

now set atop the paper, near the burning embers,

and still more wood placed upon the heap.

Soon a fire burns brightly in that large stove,

then some cedar and pine set beside the fire,

flue fully open, door ajar, to build a blaze,

split wood waiting and ready to burst aflame.

Not so upstairs, no red coals smoldering

cold metal feeling hard as death,

the night’s last log barely burned

yet lying lifeless in its ashen grave.  

No embers to kindle a new fire here,

nothing to stir up into dancing flames—

no fire, no warmth, no friendliness

to warm my outside and soul within.

What shall I do?  Half awake I must wonder—

scraps of paper, slivers of hewn cedar,

and smaller limbs from a felled pine tree—

a match, a flame, some wind, then fire.

Fire burning by my side, warming

slowly penetrating out through the chill air,

light from flames crackling, expanding metal:

and I, too, rekindled at 0400. 

Epiphany 2017

What is joined in consciousness is separated in physical reality.  And what is joined in consciousness is separated in stories to communicate meaning.  The reality of Christ, definitive presence of God-in-man, is the truth of humanity. We celebrate this reality in every Eucharist. But for the sake of our limited understanding, what is truly one is separated into parts.  And so at Christmastide, the mystery of God in us, of incarnation, is separated into the birth of Jesus Christ, and then the Epiphany of Christ to the Gentiles, symbolized in the traveling Magi. Even children can appreciate the parts; our adult task is to bring the parts back together in the truth of consciousness and action.

You may have noticed over the years that the evangelist Luke has no need for the feast of the Epiphany, because he has the equivalent experience take place in the scene he sets for Jesus’ birth. No Magi or astrologers are mentioned coming to see what God has done for humankind, but lowly shepherds, the “poorest of the poor,” representing all those who are open to what God is doing here and now, with minds not limited to beliefs about past events. The shepherds live in the present of God, under God, and so are moved by God to find His Presence in the new-born Christ. Open to God, we behold God by faith. The evangelist Matthew has a different tale to tell, and wants to emphasize that Christ has come for all peoples (as the angels announce in Luke’s Gospel), and so has the Gentiles represented by three men, attuned to heavenly signs, journeying from the East. That the Magi recognize the divine Presence in the baby Jesus is artfully symbolized by their gifts, as described in our familiar Christmas carol:  incense pointing to divinity present; gold witnessing to the true ruler of humankind; myrrh foreshadowing the saving death of Christ for all.  

From beautiful stories and rich symbolic meanings one needs to return again and again to the truth of spiritual experience.  For our foremost goal is not to tell stories or even to think about their
meaning, but to grow into a deeper and lasting union with the God present to the consciousness of every human being open to receive him. Genuine openness is a demanding spiritual work, requiring prayer, study, recollection, action, love. That many refuse God’s gift of presence is symbolized by Matthew’s bloody story of the slaughter of infants in Bethlehem, ordered by the wicked Herod, a shrunken soul jealous for his own power. We may have obstacles in our hearts and lives that prevent us from living in the presence of the presence of God. And so our task includes reflecting on habitual and actual ways in which we fail to respond wholeheartedly, or let our awareness of God shining into our minds be obscured by the smoke of worldly preoccupations. The task of openness to the divine light shining into consciousness is endless. 

The reality of Epiphany is now—for you, for me.  Our Christian and human duty is to enkindle in our hearts a flame of the fire of God’s love, which means allowing his love to flood in. What good is it for us to celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus, as we did on Christmas, and refuse to live in the light shining in? If God is not here, then where could he be sought? The stable and the manger in Bethlehem are gone, or just rebuilt monuments to what God has done. But God is here and now; living in his light, love, peace is indeed the constant gift and burden of our lives.  

Blessed New Year to each and to all.

Thoughts Ater Rising

Eyes first opened, covers pushed back, up in bed

Chaucer’s words sleeping all the night with open ee-ye,

so pricks them nature in their `corages,’ 

`than longen folk’ to go on `pilgirmmages’ 

from every shire’s end of ‘Engelond, 

to Caunterbury they wende’… Empty bladder.  Start the fires.

Pull on coveralls, downstairs to my calefactory,

laundry with a large wood stove, still warm,

red coals, fragments of cedar added, split wood

providing a desired-hot office for Raymonde.

Coals smoldering, fire rekindled up above

providing warmth for the living room 

temperature still falling already -10 F  -23 C

world still whirled here and so I am awaking

warm inside my quiet-friendly rectory.

It was not only cool that greeted me on rising;

the lovely humble Christmas tree luminous

standing silently in the living room, shining

brightly seen or unseen, saying nothing,

speaking silently by silence to silence.

Drinking coffee comes right to mind—wake up juice— 

Instant should suffice early building and tending fires

after letting Moses out business-like before

he finds relief atop a snow drift in the kennel yard

under a sliver moon set in frigid-black heaven-sea.

Fragments of dreams return to consciousness:

again in a monastery, this time with Sr. Marielle,

dear friend and sister in Christ, welcoming pilgrims

seeking spiritual refreshment with Benedictines

gathering them in their warmly lit calefactory.

Today January 3rd, Voegelin’s birthday,

and first day of trading for the year—

Fox Business: market futures up, green letters,

and I wonder what I might buy for my Roth-IRA,

freshly stocked with New Year’s contribution.

0320 when I first saw a clock, 

now 0426 on my Apple Watch,

sipping Taster’s Choice, jotting down these notes,

not listening to market analysts’ banter

but striving to find and build a little consciousness.

Before Mass - 02 January 2017

How prayerful can one be with television,

with snow needing to be shoveled,

with wood needing to be split,

with fires needing to be kept burning,

with a dog needing to be walked and fed?

How prayerful can one be with politics,

news, weather, sports, entertainment,

emails to be written and read,

tweets to be scanned and retweeted,

with a dog needing to go out.

And the necessities of nature,

and cleaning up and shaving,

brushing teeth, combing hair,

taking off one’s favorite coveralls, 

putting on clothes more fit for public exposure.

Looked over the readings for Mass,

have given them quick thought, 

decided on a theme to be preached,

eaten enough food to sustain me,

and sipped more coffee to be awake.

But I am not really awake, am I?

If this is wakefulness, what then is sleep?

Yes, my eyes are heavy after a busy week-end,

I feel fatigue after all the explosions the night before.

And soon I must depart for morning Mass.

Where in the noise and busyness is God?

Where in my drowsiness is clarity of thought?

Where in my passions is stillness and quiet?

Where in my heart is a longing for God—

and if not for God, for peace in his will?

If for a single moment I turn towards,

if I can will to turn towards the remembered one,

if I can allow his mind to shine into mine,

and be content with my poverty and smallness,

perhaps then the divine can use this tattered weed.

Come, holy Spirit, and fill the hearts of your faithful—

even in our faithlessness, or half-heartedness,

and warm our chilly wills and frozen fingers,

refresh us in our tiredness, and wake us up again—

You most generous giver of good gifts, come.

To My Brother, Paul

The Apostle Paul, by Rembrandt

You were Paul of Tarsus even when still Saul, 

a Hebrew born of Hebrews in an alien land,

fiercely zealous for the Law and traditions of elders,

a man considered “blameless” by yourself, no doubt,

until you were fiercely arrested by the fraudulent Christ.

According to Nietzsche, dear friend, you are the fraud,

the lying deceiver who gave birth to Christianity,

that most pathetic, womanish religion known to man—

you, filled with spite and overcome by a psychotic hallucination

self-convinced of your self-created self-deception.

And then I hear a more convincing song by Schütz,

“Saul, Saul, was vervolgst du mich”—

communicating the shattering of your consciousness,

not by a self-generated hallucination or wish,

but by God-in-Christ ripping you open wide.

Never again were you Paul alone, just you—

“For now I live, not I, but Christ lives in me”—

no mere religious belief, no formulaic faith,

but the living experience of a man raised up

from death-in-self to life enlivened by the risen Christ.

Your words, you know, are dynamite, 

and ever will be in domesticated Christianity, 

in these churches “that are tombs and sepulchers of God”—

for you are the voice of the experience of God in Christ,

as surely as Plato voices the God of the Beautiful and Good.

“For now we see through a glass, darkly, 

but then face to face.

Though outwardly we waste away, 

inwardly we are being renewed from glory to glory

until God is all in all.”

In Praise of Moses

Ish ha Elohim, Moses the god-man—

mummified by Deuteronomy,

revered by the children of Israel,

relegated to shadows by Christians 

seeking to protect the supremacy of Christ.

Who are you, true man of God,

chosen to receive the decisive revelation

of what by tradition we call “God”—

Ehyeh-asher-Ehyeh—I AM that I AM—

the one who broke into Moses’ consciousness?

Moses the man to whom the divine itself

irrupted into his very consciousness,

Moses the man who did not see or touch

but became one in spirit with the one he bore

lovingly to the people of God.

“The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth

came through Jesus Christ,” writes beloved John.

O Christians, open your eyes afresh to Moses,

who was himself full of grace and truth

if any man on earth ever was.

The man Moses encountered by the god unknown

out of the burning bush on Sinai,

is the man who became the carrier of Life itself,

the living in-breathing of the eternal I AM

to the Hebrew people, children of Abraham.

Having encountered the divine in Christ, you Christians,

can you not see and hear the same God speaking in Moses,

delivering in Moses, presenting itself 

in every tree, bush, and living thing,

radiant with the beauty and truth of God?

To Moses

If you are not Moses, then who are you
o little man of God, blessed soul
denied a home in heaven by heaven-bent souls,
but ever at home in this poor heart of mine,
and if in mine, how not in God’s?  

What is the fire I see still-smoldering in your heart,
though tame in eye, most gentle in your breast,
you love with a love that is more than love,
you most blessed soul and fellow creature of a day
here but today and away in a moment.

Who you are in yourself remains a mystery
but the who in you is the same who in me
the self-same I that dwells within the eye
and deeper down, unseen by wandering eyes
but glimpsed by the piercing arrow of love.