Toujours, Encore (Puck's Final Speech, With Confetti)

"...went to see Midsummer Night's Dream tonight -- recited Puck's final speech with him sotto voce -- he threw confetti just before the end, and a purple, a gold, and a green piece fell right at my feet.  I am not kidding."

Do you remember?  I can't forget.

ALS / ICE, ICE, BABY

ALS Ice Bucket Challenge / ICE, ICE, BABY

Evelyn Underhill - Mysticism 30

pp. 139-146

WORDS/PHRASES: DETACHMENT, HOLY INDIFFERENCE, POVERTY-CHASTITY-OBEDIENCE, A SCRAP OF THE COSMOS

"As  little as the bright eye can endure aught foreign in it, so little can the pure soul bear anything in it, any stain on it, that comes between it and God.  To it all creatures are pure to enjoy; for it enjoyeth all creatures in God, and God in all creatures."  --Eckhart, quoted in Mysticism.

"Since spiritual no less than physical existence, as we know it, is an endless Becoming, it too has no end."


So, it is not things that are bad, but one's attachment to them.  All sin is idolatry of some sort, i.e., treating things--or, in older parlance, creatures--as God.

p. 143 - "Poverty, then, prepares man's spirit for that union with God to which it aspires."
p. 145 - "...the paramount importance to the soul of an undistracted vision of reality."
     - "The true rule of poverty consists in giving up those things which enchain the spirit..."

isaiah 40:31

but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength,
   they shall mount up with wings like eagles,
they shall run and not be weary,
   they shall walk and not faint.

 

If Only

Je me souviens.  Toujours.

There's no escape, even now.  Stopped at Publix for a couple items.  Hadn't heard it in months.  Avoided it on YouTube.  But tormenting me from overhead, "You Make Me Smile."  Except not any more.

Just Like Heaven II

"Wow, thought Mooch.  What a great place."

I Take Comfort in Saul Become Paul

"That day a severe persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout the countryside of Judea and Samaria.  Devout men buried Stephen and made loud lamentation over him.  But Saul was ravaging the church by entering house after house; dragging off both men and women, he committed them to prison."

--Acts 8:1-3

"Money raised by evangelical Christians in the United States is fueling a violent antigay movement in Uganda, according to the “Gospel of Intolerance” by filmmaker Roger Ross Williams.

'American evangelicals are sending millions of dollars in donations to Africa to spread their message by funding Ugandan pastors and sponsoring missionaries, many of who do good work feeding the hungry and providing shelter to orphans,' Rev. Kapya Kaoma explained in the mini-documentary, which was published online Tuesday by the New York Times. “But some of that money just goes to feed a dangerous ideology that teaches that gays, lesbians, transgender, and bisexual people do not have a place in God’s kingdom and are a threat to society.”

Evangelicals from the United States have a strong influence in the deeply religious country, where antigay sentiments are mainstream. A number of Ugandans faced harassment and threats in 2010 after a newspaper published of list of alleged homosexuals. 

Kaoma said he was forced to flee the country after supporting LGBT rights.

Dolan, Eric W., "Film Exposes Link between U. S. evangelicals and violent anti-gay Ugandan movement."  2013. http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/23/film-exposes-link-between-u-s-evangelicals-and-antigay-ugandan-movement/

Luke 24:35

I Kings 19

Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword.  Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life like the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.”  Then he was afraid; he got up and fled for his life[1][1], and came to Beer-sheba, which belongs to Judah; he left his servant there.

But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree.  He asked that he might die:[2][2] “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.”  Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep.  Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.”[3][3]  He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water.  He ate and drank, and lay down again.  The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.”[4][4]  He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.  At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there. 

And here follows the well-known story of the earthquake, the fire, then the STILL SMALL VOICE.  How many times have I read that story since I have been reading the Bible through since high school?  How many times have I read it aloud or heard it read at Sunday Eucharist or retreats?  Dozens!  Yet, until now, I have missed that the STILL SMALL VOICE story is preceded by a nourishing meal provided by the angel of God.  I am posting this entry to memorialize that profound revelation.  It has been there all along, but this is one of those instances where I am tempted to say, “Was that in the Bible the last time I read it?”

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[1][1] A very reasonable fear.

[2][2] How many times in the past year+ have I asked this?  The intensity of God’s work in my life felt unbearable and the feeling returns again and again.

[3][3] Get up and feed on the food provided by God’s angel and don’t try to tough it out on your own.

[4][4] A reminder to remain in good nutrition from that angel food.  One meal will not suffice.  Maintain, maintain, maintain.