Passionate encounter

This morning God talked to me about the kind of love affair he wants me to have with him. He wanted me to know that it should be passionate.

I thought whine-ily, in response:

"But I've never encountered you physically".

To which he replied:

"Oh, you haven't?"

Becoming like Him

The steady discipline of intimate friendship with Jesus results in men becoming like Him.

-- H. E. Fosdick

Construction vs Creation

“The whole difference between a construction and a creation is exactly this: that a thing constructed can be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists.”

--G.K. Chesterton

Welcome home

Ahh, the deep comfort of saying "Welcome home".

Tales more beautiful and amazing

"It involves us in all kinds of difficulties in which human ingenuity, unable to discover or imagine a way out, realizes its own feebleness and finds itself at a loss and confounded. It is then that God's purpose is manifest in all its radiance, rescuing souls more miraculously than any writer of fantastic tales, who, straining every effort of his imagination in the seclusion of his study, unravels the intrigues and perils of his imaginary heroes and always brings their adventures to a happy conclusion. It leads souls far more ingeniously past mortal perils, past monster, hell-fire, demons and their snares and carries them up to heaven. All are the subject of mystical tales far more beautiful and amazing than any invented by the crude imagination of mortal man."

page 24 of "The Sacrament of the Present Moment" by Jean Pierre de Caussade

The road to contentment

If I had a car
and pulled up next to you
would you hop in
and let me drive
God knows where?
I wouldn't care
as long as you were with me
the open road
promising miles of you
and quiet contentment.

On prayer for the dead

A formerly Baptist friend asked me about the Catholic practice of praying for the dead. I passed along some info on this ancient Jewish and Christian practice, but concluded with the following, describing the concept of being saved as by fire as St. Paul educates us.

I have a vision of this state of purification as being in his presence but at a distance because the heat and light are too great. And as my attachment to sin is burned away I am able to move closer and closer and closer until I can stand before him, face to face. That process of purgation, of being saved as by fire, is a stage of heaven, one of the rooms in his mansion. The heat of his light and love are the fire which purifies. And the pain of the purification process is the pain of the distance which remains, until that distance is no more.

I just adore the concept of purgatory; it is so very beautiful.

Question du jour

Are we, also, begotten not made?

Crazy with Desire

I need to look at more Sufi poetry:

Tonight I am crazy,
crazy with desire for You.
This impassioned heart of mine
overflows with longing for You

http://ryanbeggar.blogspot.com/2009/02/sufi-poems-four.html

Sureal-ity

One day in December I cried so much that the skin on my face changed, permanently.

Perversion of the magnificent

While driving into the city today I went past a large billboard right next to the inner loop. As usual, it displayed an ad for our area's most prosperous porn shop. As porn shop ads go, these are usually pretty tame. This time it said something about going red for valentines day, with a picture of a provocative red head.

And I thought to myself "ewww."

Then I wondered, why "ewww"?

And I realized that we -should- react to pornography the way we react to a plate full of rotten meat, crawling with maggots. Pornography takes something which is whole and beautiful and full of God's grace, and twists it and destroys it and turns it into something prurient.

Pornography perverts the magnificent.

Ewww indeed.

Love transcends human sense and reason

Love transcends all the human Sense and Reason can reach to.

-- Jacob Boehme

How to read a love letter

A friend forwarded this to me today, from some sort of devotional email list. It connects to a discussion in my women's group this morning.

When your words came, I ate them;
They were my joy and my heart's delight,
For I bear your name, O Lord God Almighty.
Jeremiah 15:16

"Mortimer J. Adler in his classic How to Read A Book makes this insightful observation. "The one time people read for all they are worth is when they are in love and are reading a letter from their beloved." Adler goes on to say that folks read love letters by analyzing every word. They even read between the lines and the margins. The whole is read in terms of the parts, and each part in terms of the whole. The reader becomes sensitive to context and ambiguity, to insinuation and implication. When reading a love letter there is an acute awareness of the color of the words, the order of phrases, and the weight of sentences. Punctuation is taken into account and the imagination is aroused. If never before, or after, each precious word of the letter is read carefully and in depth.

Drawing on Adler's comments, the New York Times published a review for How to Read A Book under the heading, "How to Read a Love Letter." The reviewer noted that when we read a letter from our beloved, it is read so thoroughly and with so many questions, that soon the reader can quote the content by heart. And, in fact, does so—to him- or herself—for weeks to come. The review ended with the conclusion that if people read books with anything approaching the same concentration and zeal, we'd be a race of mental giants!

Using Adler's words and the New York Times review, ponder for a moment what would happen if we read the Bible—God's perpetual love letter to His beloved—with the same zeal! We would indeed be a race of "spiritual giants," mature in our faith and able to withstand the wiles of the enemy. With God's Word hidden in our hearts and echoing in our mind, there would be no room left for Satan to inject doubts and fears! Answers to life's questions and perplexities would come easily. Our prayers would be powerful and effective. All of nature would become our classroom. We would walk in harmony with God and enjoy the intimate fellowship with Him for which we were created.

Now ask yourself another question: when was the last time you read the Bible as if it were a precious love letter? When reading Scripture do you hang on every word and read between the lines and margins? Have you seen the whole in terms of the parts and the parts in terms of the whole? Do the words take on colors and arouse your imagination? Or is Scripture reading just another obligation you must fulfill before you go about the busyness of your life, unaffected by the precious words you gulped down rather than savored and allowed to permeate every fiber of your being? Jeremiah tells us that God's words are to be our joy and our heart's delight.

Today I invite you to read God's word with the heart of a lover. Learn to delight in your beloved because He delights in you and invites you to enjoy Him forever."

Chesterton on religion

"Let your religion be less of a theory and more of a love affair."

--Gilbert K. Chesterton

Sole Deep

In a moment of magic I was with you.
You were in me, and I surrounded you.
Music played and we danced
as if time were a fiction.
Now I am empty, and waiting
carried from place to place
in hope that the right door will be opened
and you will be there
to step into me; sole-deep
companion of my heart.

--Chantelle Franc

Poetry for Valentines Day (I)

Longing

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again.
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.

Come, as thou cam'st a thousand times,
A messenger from radiant climes,
And smile on thy new world, and be
As kind to others as to me.

Or, as thou never cam'st in sooth,
Come now, and let me dream it truth.
And part my hair, and kiss my brow,
And say My love! why sufferest thou?

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again.
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.

--by Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)

Poetry for Valentines Day (II)

Love's Philosophy

The fountains mingle with the river,
And the rivers with the ocean;
The winds of heaven mix forever,
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one another's being mingle;--
Why not I with thine?

See! the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower would be forgiven,
If it disdained it's brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea;--
What are all these kissings worth,
If thou kiss not me?

-- Percy Bysshe Shelley

Planes

I didn't want to hear about a plane crash today.

The first duty of love

The first duty of love is to listen.

-- Paul Tillich

Chesterton on absurd happiness

Jesus promised his disciples three things - that they would be completely fearless, absurdly happy and in constant trouble.

-- G. K. Chesterton