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Primitive religion is not believed, it is danced!

Arthur Darby Nock

Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
And only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries.

Elizabeth Browning



Friday, May 5, 2017

Soulless

“When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.”
― Rumi

“Or Not”
--- Stephen
______________________________________

I am speechless today

I know that seems impossible to most of you
but I am simply speechless

too many odd encounters with people
oozing fear and anger
to many headlines that grab my heart
and tear it

it is not so much the views
that rend my soul
nor even the behaviors
of people political
and not political
that assail the fabric of my being

it is the spirituality of fear
and anger
and ultimately hate
that shocks me to my soul

the fruits of true spirituality
should be joy, and peace, and love
and yet we see anger and discord and hate

often in the name of freedom
all too often in the name of God

there is something wrong
deep down
in our souls
when we spend our time and energy

hoarding,
minimizing the poor
trusting violence and guns rather than God
making money the centerpiece of our faith (even churches are doing this)

I was driven this morning back to the prophets
and found them speaking to me
again
out of the years of human wandering
again

It seems we have never left
That place of darkness
never learned
from the hideous mistakes of people past

we are still the people to whom the prophets speak
and their challenges echo strangely here, thousands of years later

it is quite honestly
as if
Christ had never come

deliver us O Lord
from our fears
from our hate
from all those things
that drive us spiritually
into the abyss

____________________________

Isa 58:6-11

6 "Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? 7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter — when you see the naked, to clothe him, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? 8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. 9 Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.
"If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, 10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday. 11 The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.

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