Spirituality, heresy and reformation

. . . continued from my examiner post http://www.examiner.com/interfaith-spirituality-in-columbus/spirituality-heresy-and-reformation . . .

Every one of the Christian churches claims to be the one true way. One of the fastest growing branches of Christendom, the Protestant charismatic churches claim to do away with un-necessary tradition and ‘baggage’ that developed before and since The Reformation (including all the scholarship), and return to the model of the early church, laying on hands, healing, speaking in tongues and prophesying end times, living as it is literally perceived the apostles did in the book of Acts. This rapidly expanding movement is hugely popular in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe, making mainline Christianity seem very stuffy and out of touch.

The Eastern Orthodox Church stresses that ‘we are the early church’, which upholds centuries of sacred tradition. It goes on to claim ‘The Eastern Orthodox Church dates its existence from the time of Christ and the Apostles. It was the Apostle Paul, for example, who established the early Christian Church in Greece through his early missionary journeys. The Apostle Peter founded the church in Antioch which exists to this day as the Antiochian Orthodox Church. Other Apostles established the church in Jerusalem, Alexandria and Cyprus. . . .The Church … founded there has never ceased to exist. . . . the Orthodox Church is apostolic because she teaches what the apostles taught and can trace her existence historically through the ordination of the bishops directly back to the apostles, and through them, to Christ. . . . Thus, the Orthodox Church is the legitimate and historical continuation of the early Church. She has the same faith, the same spirit, the same ethos.’ from The Eastern Orthodox Church, Who Are We?

Lutheran churches today- now 4 branches: ELCA, LCMS, WELS, including the new North American Lutheran Church in America -a recent split over the ordination of gay and lesbian clergy- all probably feature prominently the rallying hymn of the Reformation: A Mighty Fortress Is Our God. It is magnificent performed with a full choir, symphony, kettle drums and organ. You might not even get a nod to the historic significance of this day in community churches. Yet others would stress the eve of All Saint's Day and remember members of the church family who had died in the past year. You'll find something completely different at one of St. Brendan's six masses than at Rhema Christian Center on this day, 2010.

When we ask, ‘will the real church please stand up?’ people engage in every conceivable argument to establish what is orthodox and what is heresy to bolster the position they have created. It is attributed to 'God', yet millions have been killed over interpretation in Christendom. Red is the color of martyrs, the sacrifice of Christ and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but one questions whether it ought to be worn on October 31st as one reflects on the legacy of violence in a religion Jesus taught, was most centrally about LOVE.

[photo shows a Memorial of the Protestant Reformation in Sagsdorf, disctrict Parchim, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany posted under Wikimedia GNU free license by Niteshift]

Halloween, hauntings and the hereafter

continued from my examiner blog . . . http://www.examiner.com/interfaith-spirituality-in-columbus/spirituality-halloween-the-hereafter

Here are some bigger minds weighing in on the possibility of continued existence and continuing consciousness. Author Michael Talbot says, in The Holographic Universe, ‘At a 1985 symposium on the possibility of life beyond biological death held at Georgetown University and convened by U.S. Senator Claiborne Pell, physicist Paul Davies expressed, ‘We are all agreed that, at least insofar as human beings are concerned, mind is a product of matter, or put more accurately, mind finds expression through matter (specifically our brains). The lesson of the quantum is that matter can only achieve concrete, well-defined existence in conjunction with mind. Clearly, if mind is pattern rather than substance, then it is capable of many different representations.’ Even psycho-neuro-immunologist Candace Pert, another participant at the symposium was receptive to the idea. ‘I think it is important to realize that information is stored in the brain, and it is conceivable to me that this information could transform itself into some other realm. Where does the information go after the destruction of the molecules (the mass) that compose it? Matter can neither be created nor destroyed, and perhaps biological information flow cannot just disappear at death and must be transformed into another realm,’ she says. . . . In discussing levels of reality and continuance of consciousness, University of London quantum physicist and protégé of Einstein, David Bohm says, ‘the separation of the two- matter and spirit- is an abstraction. The ground is always one.’ pp 270-271.

Drawing from physics and study of how the brain stores information neuro-psychology researcher Karl Pribram developed the idea of the brain as a hologram. He said in a Psychology Today article, ‘It isn’t that the world of appearances is wrong; it isn’t that there aren’t objects out there, at one level of reality. It’s that if you penetrate through and look at the universe with a holographic system, you arrive at a different view, a different reality. And that other reality can explain things that have hitherto remained inexplicable scientifically: paranormal phenomena, synchronicities, the apparently meaningful coincidence of events.’

Author Michael Talbot explains the idea that the universe itself may be a giant hologram thus: ‘there is evidence to suggest that our world and everything in it-from snowflakes to maple trees to falling stars and spinning electrons-are also only ghostly images, projections from a level of reality so beyond our own it is literally beyond both space and time.’ (p1 The Holographic Universe) This view defies the typical mechanistic, atheistic or religious boxes many reside in, and help to explain what might be termed ‘super-natural’ in scientific terms. In this view, ghosts and energetic ‘ghostly memories’ that some might experience can be potentially explained. One example, ‘Bloody Lane’ at the Antietam Battlefield of the Civil War, where thousands died, is 11 degrees cooler -to this day- than the surrounding air temperature. There are still ghostly soldier sightings.

Hindu sage Sri Aurobindo claims that spiritual beings are pure vibration. ‘In his two-volume work, On Yoga, he even likens their ability to appear as either a form or a vibration, to the wave-particle duality discovered by modern science. He said most humans beings possess a ‘mental screen’ that keeps us from seeing beyond ‘the veil of matter,’ but when one learns to peer beyond this veil one finds that everything is comprised of ‘different intensities of luminous vibrations.’ He asserted that consciousness is also composed of different vibrations and believed that all matter is to some degree conscious. Like Bohm, he even asserted that psycho-kineseis is a direct result of the fact that all matter is to some degree conscious.’ (p 264 The Holographic Universe)

There is so much to learn, so much to explore- past, present and future, that those who remain rigidly dogmatic and refuse to engage in interfaith, intercultural and scientific inquiry may face a very big surprise. Perhaps more our better responses are a) agnostic, with a wink; b) humanist with a twinkle in the eye; or c) studied believer with an open heart and mind.

[Benjamin Joseph Sheppard house-1880's N.C. shown here]

continued from my examiner post: http://www.examiner.com/interfaith-spirituality-in-columbus/spirituality-and-who-is-durga

Theologian and philosopher of religion John Hick looked into the future. In his chapter entitled, ‘Spirituality in a Pluralistic Age’ he says, ‘When we have come to see the other great religious traditions as different but (so far as we can tell) equally valid human responses to the ultimate reality that is the ground and source of everything and the condition of our highest good, we have no reason to restrict ourselves to the spiritual resources of our own tradition. This is our home ground; but just as a citizen of the United States or Britain, or France, or Japan, or any other country can become a better informed and more open-minded citizen, through travel abroad, learning other languages, reading other literatures, contact with other cultures, so also in the realm of the spirit. As Christians we can usefully explore some of the methods of meditation developed within the Buddhist and Hindu traditions, where meditation is used far more widely, and often more expertly practiced than among ourselves. And when we feed our minds and hearts by reading the scriptures and the writings of great saints, we do not need to restrict ourselves to the Bible and to Christian writers.’ -139 A Christian Theology of Religions

In Hicks paradigm, it becomes apparent that each religious tradition has had a different contextual paradigm as it evolved. He points out how very different the Christian faith was 1000 years ago with a terror provoking concept of God versus the idea of God as love- now. A similar thing exists within other religious traditions as the faith evolved (or devolved- as also happens). He discusses the conflicting pull between those seeking to hang on to and preserve a ‘pure, fundamental, traditional’ understanding of the faith from past times versus a more liberal interpretation informed by modern times, findings and sciences – an influence felt in all traditions.

Hicks cites a beautiful paragraph from Songs of Kabir, I and XVIII, translated by Rabindranath Tagore, New York: Weiser 1977, pp45 and 91. ‘O servant, where dost thou seek Me? Lo! I am beside thee. I am neither in temple nor in mosque; I am neither in Kaaba nor in Kailash: Neither am I in rites and ceremonies, nor in Yoga and renunciation. If thou art a true seeker, thou shalt at once see me: thou shalt meet Me in a moment of time. Kabir says, ‘O Sadhu! God is the breath of all breath.' The author explains that 'Kabir lived in India in the fifteenth century and was revered by both Hindus and Muslims. Similar sentiments are expressed in the Bhagavad gita and the Japji morning prayer first recited by Guru Nanak, founder of the Sikh tradition.’

As I return to the discussion of the Hindu Goddess, Durga, and Diwali, the festival of light, its timely to note that John Bowker says ‘80% of India’s one billion people consider themselves Hindus, and there are about 30 million more dispersed throughout the world. . . .’ (yet) ‘there are many ways of being Hindu: village religion, for example, is very different from philosophical religion.’ He explores the different periods of this faith from its beginnings in the Indus River valley, the cradle of civilization. And so it is with each of the world’s traditions which enter periods of building up and breaking down. We don’t often think of how different our tradition was taught, perceived and practiced at each point through-out it’s history because heritage is revered more as a point of bonding with others (bondage for some) than the detached observation that goes with scholarship.

In closing let’s look at a teaching of Khalil Gibran from The Prophet: ‘Then said a teacher, Speak to us of Teaching. And he said: No man can reveal to you aught but that which already lies half asleep in the dawning of your knowledge. The teacher who walks in the shadow of the temple, among his followers, gives not of his wisdom but rather of his faith and his lovingness. If he is indeed wise he does not bid you enter the house of his wisdom, but rather leads you to the threshold of your own mind. . . For the vision of one man lends not its wings to another man. And even as each one of you stands alone in God’s knowledge, so must each one of you be alone in his knowledge of God and in his understanding of the earth.’ P 64-65 Let your understanding take wing and free your soul.

[Note: Photo uploaded from Wikimedia Commons. Taken by photographer Deb K. Roy 1995 Calcutta- for the Internet 1996 World Exposition; author Carl Malamud]

David and Bathsheba and soul searching . . .

continued from my examiner blog at http://www.examiner.com/interfaith-spirituality-in-columbus/spirituality-and-soul-searching

David and Bathsheba . . . the rest of the story. (photo is a manuscript from The Morgan Leaf, Scenes from the Life of King David)

I could not help but think with this tale: 1. ‘What kind of God would have such an insatiable ego? 2. What an awful thing for God to do to David’s wives in revenge. So its okay to just rip them away from their husband (polygamy was common) and give them over to other men to be raped in broad daylight? I’m sure it wasn’t consensual. It is likely Bathsheba’s encounter with David wasn’t consensual either, but a king’s power can sway one. 3. What kind of God deliberately murders (and that’s what it is) David’s first born to get him back and teach him a lesson? A lot of people literalize this and then attribute every manner of awful, untimely tragedy to God’s will. You will hear Pat Robertson do this often re.: earth quakes, Tsunami's and so forth. This is the writer’s theological point of view of what happened, not a verbatim 'automatic writing' from God (which still needs a fallible human scribe).

However, interpreter's points of view are suspect too! I have heard the blame laid at Bathsheba's feet for being a temptress and luring the King. One preacher got positively lurid describing the temptations women engage in. Made one wonder. The nifty little book, 'Preaching Law and Gospel' by Stuempfle discusses 'the mirror of existence'. Recent authors have pointed out that it was a time for ritual bathing ending a time of uncleanliness before worship. Face it, David looked and took it a whole lot further.

The author was probably writing the story during the Babylonian exile from oral tradition as a handful of learned Hebrew scribes attempted to gather (and create) all the ancient history of their peoples together so it would not be lost in assimilation. It is intended to glorify their ancestor King David, who united Israel and started the kingdom which would flourish under his son, Solomon. Many archeologists and scholars question much of the David story as legend, though there are stele with his name and archeological evidence of a tribal leader named, 'David'. Yes, soul searching is in order. What might spiritual practices reveal?

If you follow the lectio divina spiritual practice where you read a story, imagine it in vivid detail and meditate on it, each person in a room full of bible study members might have a different take or derive a different meaning from the text. When you examine the story from each of the character’s viewpoints – say Uriah, the Hittite, you would probably see things differently. Try on the perspective of one of the second string wives who were regarded as the ‘king’s property’ presumably for sexual sport, bearing sons and making Hebrew tortillas. There were probably slaves to do the laundry. Try on Nathan, the prophet, who confronted David with his sin via a folk tale about a poor man with one little sheep who the rich man seizes for dinner for a dinner party meal for a visitor, rather than taking it from his own flock. Those folk tales have a lot of truth and pathos in them. Then, as now, they help us ‘see’ in a different way, which is the purpose of a good parable- not literally true, but a wonderful teaching tool.

Soul searching can lead us to uneasy conclusions. The 'hero' is flawed, but then, is there a hero?

Our cultural dynamic looks for the flaws in political and Hollywood figures and seems to relish in every fall from Tiger Woods to Brett Farve- especially of the sexual nature. For certain in our biblical story- as in life- there are many layers of meaning, many players, many angles, different contexts than yours, mine, our culture and times. That’s true of life in general. Having a compassionate heart and a questioning mind are important traits in the complex spiritual stew in our world today.