Author: rkcdlitt

Memory

Too soon, death

Are we forgotten

Too soon, I fear

We lived, we loved

Sufficient as a memory

Only God knows

Love transcends life

Love transcends death

Love is the bridge

The only survivor

The only meaning

Memory is nothing

Wholeness

 Here is a thought: what is wholeness and how can we practice wholeness. Wholeness is being undivided; but another word for wholeness is integrity. Mystics look at wholeness as  critical element in the structure of a person. If one achieves wholeness, one can see wholeness in others. One who achieves integrity can see integrity in others. My grandmother used to say that if you look for evil in others, you’ll find evil; if you look for good in others, you’ll find good.

In our heads, hearts and body, we must achieve wholeness to see wholeness in others. When we honor the goodness in ourselves, we honor the goodness is all. We can honor the divine in us (our relationship with God); this lets us recognize the God in others. One way to say this is to see the face of God in those we meet. When we see God in ourselves and in others, we realize that neither of us deserve it; it is given freely by God as one of His eternal graces.

If we can accept the unmerited presence of God in our lives, we can heal ourselves of the disappointments and failures that we meet in everyday life. This only possible if we recognize that others also need to heal themselves. When we accept this, our healing becomes complete. We know that in our imperfect lives, lives that we share with other imperfect beings, we can begin to see God in all that we see. We can achieve wholeness in our lives.

Can we use language that honors others, expresses the beauty of life, the love of God and our joint union with God? Maybe not, but we can certainly try; we can certainly try to achieve the wholeness that we all deserve.

In these modern times, do we really understand

the significance of the cross that bore the body of Jesus.

Many of us have lost what the cross means in our modern daily lives. But this does not have to be the case. The early Christians believed and taught that God, by becoming human, not only approved of our world, but said yes to all humans and their reasons for living. In other words, He approved of our acting on our own behalf. Unfortunately, I think that we have all lost this basic belief. We no longer understand the ramifications of this approval.

We have become so inured to our way of life that we have forgotten that God is the basis of why we are alive; we no longer accept the affinity systems to recognize the actual inner experience of God. We have to return to the concept of experiencing a mystical (spiritual) relationship with God through Jesus, the Christ. This is what the cross represents in my life. Without this inner experience, I cannot follow the ethical example of Jesus.

The vision of Jesus on the cross is the reminder to me that his sacrifice is a vital reason for my believing in the concept of the messiah, or in our words, Christ. Jesus, the human, is Christ, the God, without which I am unable to accept the true purpose of why I live. Ministers of all religions teach us that Christ is everywhere. Jesus, himself, said that God is within us. Therefore, Christ is within us. We can revel in the beauty of this reality.

Many people make a lot of noise about honor; but, what exactly is honor? I am presently reading a book about the journey through the nine circles of Hell by Odysseus and Diomedes; their version of honor was to kill a man if he insulted you. I don’t think that works for us today.

When I was a young boy, growing up in Newark, NJ, Honor meant fighting for your rights, fighting when someone did something to slight you. The phrase turn the other cheek was not honorable; as a matter of fact, it was considered cowardly to turn and walk away from a fight. Life was measured in how many honorable moments you had.

I have a different idea of honor today; I still measure life by doing honorable deeds, but none of them involve violence. To me, violence in the dishonorable way to react. If someone were to make a fortune by cheating others our of their share is also not honorable; to me this is just greed. It may make this person rich and powerful, but we can see that honor has nothing to do with it. Honor is not and cannot be measured in gold, jewelry, or money.

Life is measured honor. God honors us with our human frailty and our families. Being responsible is honorable. Our friends give us honor; we do not ask for it. They honor us just by being our friends. Honor is community. Even if the world throws our lives into a tornado of spinning terrors, our community strength is a gift from God with which we can accomplish a better world. Personally, I ask for God’s help and blessing every day.

God is pleased when He is fully immersed in our limited, loving, and broken human community. We give God honor and love when we build our mutual communities that exclude nobody. We just have to have the patience to earn this, to earn this by listening for His word. I believe that if people sat outside and looked at the stars each night, I’ll bet they’d be a lot more honorable. And happy.

Our lives are truly mysteries; but they are mysteries of our own making. A mystery cannot be explained; we can explain our lives. We are so caught-up in our daily insignificant problems that we forget what life truly means. We mistrust our instincts because we are assured by others that they know better than we do.

But they don’t. we are not alone in this universe; we are here together, and we belong to each other. We heard a sermon from the pulpit this Sunday on the Parable of the Good Samaritan. They lesson is that we must care for each other. As children of God, we are one people, not separated by color, or language, or religion.

We pray to God and feel that He never answers. Maybe we should thank God for creating all of us; thank him for the beautiful life He has blessed us with. Jesus taught that we should love one another; this means to love the unloved. When are Good Christian tells me that someone does not belong to God, I know that this person is not has he proclaims. Everyone belongs to God; we are all God’s people.

My prayer for the day is that we may all find the Love of God so we can live a better, happier, more blessed life and thus remove the mysteries we are so concerned with.

We do not abide alone

in our subliminal society

disallowing derision and hatred

We rise to be dutiful

to other’s needs

We denounce evil and

accept others as good news

We accept gifts from God

and praise others

as they do God’s work

We do not praise ourselves

we live not alone

we share with all

with people

with butterflies

with hummingbirds

We live

in the newborn rabbit hutch

with the cockroach and rhinoceros

We live in a world of good

We live in the world of God

 A  Simple Prayer of Mission

 Our mission is the one given to us by God. Our mission is to fulfill his command to cherish Him and His creation. We should not ask what the world needs; we should ask what makes us alive, what makes us excited to act. The world now needs people who are excited to come alive in God’s name. He is our stronghold, and therefore, He is our inspiration.

Heavenly Father, our very lives are blessed by your presence; in You we live, we move, we love, we act. Grant us the continued Grace of the presence of the Holy Spirit. The Psalmist writes, let us kneel before God for we are the people of his pasture. God’s Grace is given freely; we cannot learn this or be taught this; it is an eternal gift to all of us. Our mission is to share this. When we look to God we are in awe of His majesty. We are in awe of the strength he gives us.

Our mission is to spread this awe, this majesty, to whomever we meet. Not a gift from us, it is the gift from God, given because we are His children, all of us. We are His sheep, living in His pasture. Let us be assured that He looks upon us with the happiness and satisfaction that He offers. Dear God, we love that you love us; let us walk in the light following in the footsteps of Jesus.

Gracious God,

our human weakness

makes us worthy.

We lift up our souls;

we long to offer peace and love

to all Your worthy children.

Your word brings us peace.

We seek to help those in need,

as are your wishes.

Allow us to teach others

the path You have shown us.

As the Samaritan did, we bring

Your light to those in need.

Gracious God, Your nearness

to us is our blessing.

The best way to have courage when suffering is to pray and then forgive. Dedicate your life as an offering of thanksgiving. We are on this earth for such a brief time without really knowing why, we can lead a fulfilled life by existing for each other. Shared suffering builds courage.

Give ourselves over to something good; begin a new ministries to lift others from their problems, help them succeed, and rejoice in the gifts we share. Work and pray for all men to live by the will of God, no matter what name He is called. Open our hearts to relieve our suffering; God’s kingdom is within us, but we can only leave space for it; only God can ease our discomfort.

Ask God’s angels to watch over us at night; joining us in what we have done and what still needs doing. Ask for God’s help for us to rejoice in His Grace.

Prophets

 Have you ever met a prophet?

I’ll bet you have but have not known it. Prophets are not only in the Bible. A prophet is neither a fortune teller nor a foreteller; a prophet is a person reflecting God’s will. Many prophets are not attached to an organized religion, as it was even 3500 years ago. Prophets follow God’s will, not a religion’s tenets.

Not being a foreteller, a prophet will not and cannot tell us what the future will be; not being a fortune teller, he cannot tell us if we will win the lottery. What a prophet can do is interpret what society does and whether the actions of society are according to God’s will.

Prophets are not political; in the Old Testament, prophets often warned the leaders of possible impending misfortune when the leader was not following the will of God. The diaspora occurred due to the weakness of the Israelites; some interpreting it as a punishment from God for disobeying.

Jesus was himself referred to as a false prophet by the leaders of his time. The Pharisees and Sadducees were too isolated due to their interpretations of Jewish law, thus calling Jesus, who brought God’s word to the people, a false prophet and demanded he be removed. Jesus is truly a Prophet of God, the Son of God, whom even Islam recognizes as a great prophet.

So, I ask the question again, have you ever met a prophet? I cannot think of one that I have met, but I have read several in history, such as Julien of Norwich or St. John of the Cross, who have inspired me greatly in my thinking and my writing. Personally, I use the Bible as a source for most of my writing, although this was inspired by a message from Richard Rohr.

I just want to make us think today!