Spiritual man

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience.
We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”
― Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

(a small framed image of Jesus that my dad has had his entire life sitting on his
dresser from the time he was a young boy until now)

Sitting with my dad who is just shy of 89 and is indeed dying…
who despite my small attempts of diversion when he hangs his head low in despair
and utters a forlorn…
“I’m on my death bed…with this terminal cancer.
I just don’t have much longer….”
As I find myself countering with a rather matter of fact “well Dad,
I suppose we could say that all of us are terminal to some degree or another…”

And it is not my intent to be callous or flippant in my reply but rather to stave off
the black places Dad has always gravitated to.
For you see that not only has Dad been a glass is half empty kind of guy…
his glass has always been nonexistent…
He is A.A. Milne’s character Eeyore come to life

He continues…
“Reckon man just made all this business up about heaven?
How do we really know we go to be with God?
How do we know there really is a God…”
as his warbly voice trails off as his heavy lids flutter over the now glassy tired eyes…

Despite being raised a Southern Baptist, who years ago jumped ship for the
Episcopal Church, and despite serving on the vestry and serving for years as
an usher at church…
Dad has always played the role of doubter…often bordering on the ludicrous.

And always oddly seeming to enjoy drawing my ire when, after watching countless
shows about extra terrestrial life and sweeping galactic space shows,
muses about aliens coming and going verses the foundations of our faith….

He even got caught up in more lunacy after watching a show about the missing
years of Jesus’ growing up…
the what ifs of what happened in those years following a youthful Jesus of 12 being lost
from the family during the pilgrimage for the Passover,
while finally being found in the Temple,
to the next part of the story, years later, as he meets John at the River Jordan….

Dad’s mind wandering to what Jesus did in those 21 yeas in between.
He watched a show that claimed the young boy Jesus took it upon himself to travel to
India to be enlightened during those missing 21 years…
Dad buying hook, line and sinker into the nonsense….

I would get so frustrated wanting to know why in the world he would watch such crazy
farfetched shows…
and for heaven’s sakes…
why on earth would he buy into the foolishness…

And just as easily as I share my disgruntlement over Dad’s willingness to dip deep
into the well of snake oil and falasies,
there are those who are currently reading this post, who in turn are thinking…
“Julie’s dad has a point.”
How do we know?
How does anyone know?

And that’s when I looked at Dad, who is now swiveled and shrinking and racked with pain
in his little hospital bed which has long replaced his regular bed,
as I tell him, “we simply call it faith Dad…”
“Yeah, that’s what John Bruster use to tell me”
John Bruster being Dad’s former parish priest.

“We’ll Dad, it is the foundation of Christianity…
the underpinning as it were…
faith…

Which brings us all back around full circle to the quote by Father Teilhard de Chardin…
that man is indeed a spiritual being.
And he, man, yearns, nay aches, to be connected to that which he seeks.

Many people spend a lifetime seeking to quell the ache.
It is sought so falsely…in so many dark corners of our lives.
Empty and fleeting.
Always grasping for the tangible proof, we run a lifetime into the empty ground of
conjecture while being placated by magic…
wanting, seeking…yet always coming up empty.

It is found in the faith of the God who offered a piece of Himself to be born
into our misery,
Who chose to bear our burdens,
the darkest and most foul reassess of our diseased and blackened minds…
who took upon himself the sickness and brokeness and shortcomings of our bodies…
who faced depravity, deception and falsehoods…
who suffered…
who died and was buried…
Who vanquished hell…
And who rose again…
and is now seated at the right hand of His Father
And who will indeed truly come again…
Who will judge both the living and the dead
And who will welcome us home…

It is that which we claim although our eyes do not see…
For it is in that which we rest our hope in…
our Faith….

“Compel yourselves;
say the prayer;
stop idle talk;
close your mouths to criticism;
place doors and locks against unnecessary words.
Time passes and does not come back,
and woe to us if time goes by without spiritual profit.”
Elder Ephraim of Arizona

You are a spiritual being

(Julie’s east-coast southern feet in the cold Mighty Pacific Ocean at Cannon Beach, Oregon 2013)

“You are not a human being in search of a spiritual experience. You are a spiritual being immersed in a human experience.”
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

I must confess that I am not greatly versed in the works of Father Pierre Teilhard de Chardin–only having read snippets here and there. And knowing that controversy surrounded him during much of his life with his own beloved Catholic Church, as much of his writings/ publications often ran in opposite directions, or more aptly, in uncharted waters.

Not being a theologian nor Catholic, much of my Christian/Catholic theological knowledge has come about merely by my own curiosity and immersion into the studies of the ancient and more current “doctors of the church”…that of their teachings and writings—and that “church” would be the “global christian church” as I do venture into the realm of other theological minds—remember my admiration for Pastor Bonhoeffer—a Lutheran.

This quote by Father Teilhard de Chardin spoke to my heart as it reminds me that I am created in God’s image—and that there is a connective cord between me and my Creator Father–that of a spiritual cord—a spiritual umbilical cord if you will. It is said that we cannot even pray be it not for the small tiny spiritual piece of God already planted in our very being at the time of our very beginning. A tiny piece of the Divine that resides so deep within that I am not even aware of its very being—The Spirit is living in me and It connects me to my Father.

The ancient Desert Fathers and Mothers were aware of this piece of the Divine planted deep in our being as they sought quiet and solitude in order to focus all of their life energies seeking and engaging with this most Holy treasure. We all have an innate desire to connect with this Sacred piece…many seek it, not even aware that it is the very “longing” of which they so seek—or more aptly, long for.

And that is how it is with me—a deep longing that I often cannot define or put my finger on. It is often a sense of melancholy, possessing a palpable pain. St. Teresa of Avila wrote of this as she spoke of the holy arrow that pieced her heart, wounding her with such a beautiful pain that she described herself swooning, wounded–yet as if in a state of ecstasy (see Bernini’s statue The Ecstasy of St Teresa/ Cornaro Chapel, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome/ for a beautiful physical rendering of this “wounding”)

St. Hildegarde von Bingen, the medieval German mystic nun who wrote of the trance like states she would find herself falling in—leaving her with severe headaches giving way to Divine visions, is another example of one who knew of this Divine piece resting in her very being. In our own life time there was Padre Pio of Pietrelcina, the southern Italian Capuchin monk who wore the actual wounds of Christ on his body, just as did St. Francis– as they each recieved the Stigmata—the bleeding wounds of Christ from the Crucifixion.

Others, which is the majority of us, go about most of our lives seeking this piece of the Divine, not even knowing that is what we are actually doing—-we fill ourselves and our lives, in an effort to fill this unseen void, with so much “emptiness”– thinking that these things will satiate this longing—we fill the void with material goods, be it electronic gadgets, clothing , jewelry, cars, homes–multiple homes–one to live in others to “vacation” in, (have you ever thought about that? only in our world do some people have no home, and others have multiple homes–why do we really need multiple homes…? but I digress)—then there are the “addictions” which we think will fill this longing—food, drugs, sex, gambling—-all in an effort to stanch the endless bleeding so to speak….make the gnawing of this longing stop—the ache must be stopped as it makes us hurt and uncomfortable……

But what we don’t understand is that this ache and longing, which we just simply can’t explain, define or put our finger on, is the Spiritual piece that is planted in our very being, longing to connect us, our Spiritual selves, with that of our Heavenly Father….and the majority of us spend a lifetime trying to do this, but don’t even know that that is what we are even doing—-so we spend our lives running in circles as it were…some of us chasing after mystical experiences that are not of our Father…those who engage in zen experiences, satanic or witchcraft ceremonies, various cult rituals… all in an aimless attempt to ease the longing…and yet the longing seems to still remain along with the frustration and undefined emptiness —-that is,until, luckily, we finally realize, and it is often through the trial and pain of life, that the longing of what we seek, has all along, simply been a relationship with the Creator Himself, our Father.

There are many who would disagree with me and that is fine—it’s just that it’s taken me many pains and sorrows along this life of mine to finally figure this out—but most of us seem to learn best by the harsh reality of life’s trials and pains… so I can’t force you to agree with my observation and where it is that I have finally come to in order to finally “get this”—-it must come about by your own stumbling…and yes various types of meditation practices may augment this seeking, but are not the final answer, just more pieces along the way….

It was through the death and Resurrection of the Christ, the Χριστός, the Christós, מָשִׁיחַ (Māšîaḥ), the Messiah, that allowed for the final connection to be made possible. But I can’t make you believe this—this is the conncection you must find on your own….as we all seem to learn best the “hard way” but that is the way in which we learn of the cemented truth.

My point today however is simply to remind you that you are indeed a spiritual being—and it is a relationship of which you are seeking—as the Spirit resides in each of us, simply longing, along with us, to make the Connection…………..