The Apokatatastasis: A Poem

Breathing Under Water: A Poem

I built my house by the sea.

Not on the sands, mind you;
not on the shifting sand.
And I built it of rock.

A strong house
by a strong sea.
And we got well acquainted, the sea and I.
Good neighbors.
Not that we spoke much.
We met in silences.
Respectful, keeping our distance,
but looking our thoughts across the fence of sand.
Always, the fence of sand our barrier,
always, the sand between.

And then one day,
-and I still don’t know how it happened -
the sea came.
Without warning.

Without welcome, even
Not sudden and swift, but a shifting across the sand like wine,
less like the flow of water than the flow of blood.
Slow, but coming.
Slow, but flowing like an open wound.
And I thought of flight and I thought of drowning and I thought of death.
And while I thought the sea crept higher, till it reached my door.
And I knew, then, there was neither flight, nor death, nor drowning.
That when the sea comes calling, you stop being neighbors,
Well acquainted, friendly-at-a-distance neighbors,
And you give your house for a coral castle,
And you learn to breathe underwater.

— Sr. Carol Bieleck, RSCJ

The Franciscan Vision

St. Bonaventure of Bagnoregio (1217–1274) took Francis and Clare’s practical lifestyle to the level of theology, philosophy, and worldview. Unlike many theologians of his time, Bonaventure paid little attention to fire and brimstone, sin, merit, justification, or atonement. His vision is positive, mystic, cosmic, intimately relational, and largely concerned with cleaning the lens of our perception and our intention so we can see and enjoy fully!

He starts very simply: “Unless we are able to view things in terms of how they originate, how they are to return to their end, and how God shines forth in them, we will not be able to understand.” [1] For Bonaventure, the perfection of God and God’s creation is a full circle, and to be perfect the circle must and will complete itself. He knows that Alpha and Omega are finally the same, and the lynchpin holding it all in unity is the “Christ Mystery,” or the essential unity of matter and spirit, humanity and divinity. The Christ Mystery is thus the template for all creation, and even more precisely the crucified Christ, who reveals the necessary cycle of loss and renewal that keeps all things moving toward ever further life. Now we know that the death and birth of every star and every atom is this same pattern of loss and renewal, yet this pattern is invariably hidden or denied, and therefore must be revealed by God—which is “the cross.”

Bonaventure’s theology is never about trying to placate a distant or angry God, earn forgiveness, or find some abstract theory of justification. He sees humanity as already being included in—and delighting in—an all-pervasive plan. As Paul’s school says, “Before the world was made, God chose us, chose us in Christ” (Ephesians 1:4). The problem is solved from the beginning. Rather than seeing history as a “fall from grace,” Bonaventure reveals a slow but real emergence and evolution into ever-greater consciousness of Love. He was the Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955) of the 13th century.

One reason Bonaventure was so hopeful and positive is that he was profoundly Trinitarian. He saw love always and forever flowing between Father, Son, and Spirit and on to us. Bonaventure’s strong foundation in the Trinity gave him a nondual mind to deal with the ineffable mystery of God and creation. A dualistic mind closes down at any notion of Trinity or infinite love, because it cannot process it.

For Bonaventure, God, is not an offended monarch on a throne throwing down thunderbolts, but a “fountain fullness” that flows, overflows, and fills all things in one positive direction. Reality is thus in process and participatory; it is love itself, and not a mere Platonic world, an abstract idea, or a static impersonal principle. God as Trinitarian Flow is the blueprint and pattern for all relationships and thus all of creation, which we now know from contemporary science is exactly the case.

— Adapted from Richard Rohr, Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi (Franciscan Media: 2014), 162-165.

[1] Bonaventure, Collationes in Hexaëmeron (Lectures on the Six Days of Creation), 3.2. See Ilia Delio, Simply Bonaventure: An Introduction to His Life, Thought, and Writing, 2nd edition (New City Press: 2013), 171.

(Source: Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation)

Panentheism Anyone?

“Two practical conclusions follow from panentheism. A panentheistic consciousness demands ‘more of our powers of awareness’—we see ‘God in a grain of sand; and in a towering mountain; and in a crippled old man; and in an act of love; and in a tragic happening.’ To be panentheistic is to believe ‘in a living God, a God living everywhere.’

The second consequence of moving into panentheistic awareness is ‘the democracy of it all. A God who is everywhere is everybody’s. A truly democratic God. Available to the least as well as the greatest.’ The God of panentheism is not a ‘God of power-control; a sort of commander-in-chief of the universe’s ecstasies….No, a panentheistic God has shared the fun, the ecstasy, the joy, and the pains…with the littlest among us. That is spiritual democracy.’ Following that path will move us from an ‘I’ consciousness to a ‘We’ consciousness. It will render us vulnerable and may make us enemies of powers and principalities. A panentheistic God is an incarnational one in whom we recognize that ‘the world, and all of its pieces, is ultimately a manifestation of God.’…

…A panentheistic theology is an ecological theology in the deepest sense of that word. Why? Because panentheism restates the sacredness of all things, the Divine in-ness in all things, the presence of God in all things, creation (basileia) as ‘kingdom or reign of God.’ Recovering the sacredness of all beings from forests to oceans, rivers to polar bears, eagles to tigers, is to recover a lost relationship with the holiness of being. In this way, we are in a position to re-imagine our politics, economics, education and religions as agents for honoring the rights and dignity of all beings. Our home (‘eco’ in Greek) becomes livable again. Theism distances the Divine from the rest of nature. Panentheism reunites them. No wonder Carl Jung warned that one can lose one’s soul by worshiping a ‘God out there.’ Theism does that (and atheism is not far behind).”

— Matthew Fox in "How I found God in everyone and everywhere" by Andrew M. Davis(p. 149,154)

There Be Dragons!

HERE THERE BE DRAGONS...

Mystics are the map-makers of the landscape of God's Mystery. Never popular when alive, nor acknowledged by the conclaves of the religious establishments, Mystics wander alone… toward the map-less boarders of Inner Reality.

It used to be when cartographers developed maps of the ancient world they would leave the edges of the known world as a mysterious place of vagueness and danger. “THERE BE DRAGONS HERE", was the phrase left at the edges these maps, the edges of the known world, warning ships brave enough to voyage beyond the boundaries of reality that there could be danger. Wayfarers would be crossing the POINT OF NO RETURN.

Whenever we venture out beyond the maps of conformity: whether they be religious maps, theological, social, educational, conventional, etc., we head full on into the unknown. This unknown, far from frightening off the mystic, is where we prefer to tread. Mystics find their comfort in the ineffable Mystery of Reality, because their goal is not to try and conform this Mystery to conventional parameters, but to let it be Free and untamed.

Mystics don't run from dragons; they learn to ride them.

Out beyond the boundaries of orthodoxy and religion, you find, on whatever religious or philosophical “map" you are using, a clear end to what is knowable by the words, rites and rituals of religions. It’s at the edge of these knowable boundaries, written on virtually every religious map, ”There be Mystics here".

Mystics are the outcasts of religion. They play with dragons, frolic in the Mystery of God and come and go in and out of sight from the safe shores of orthodoxy. No one plays with Mystics. They are used as live bait for casting into deep oceans of being. Religionists wait to see if they return from the lands of dragons and mist covered mountains.

Some Mystics return with amazing stories of other worlds and indescribable sights. Their language changes to match the ineffable they have seen. Their appearance altars: a far off look in their eyes, their hearts on fire with the oblation of distant worlds and the songs of the Tathagata. Other Mystics never return, having befallen the lure of the boundless ecstasy of Divine Bliss.

The thing is, either way, religion needs the Mystic. Mystics are the offerings churches throw to the dragons to appease their gods of orthodoxy, not knowing that these offerings actually merit the entrance into Mystery. Truth needs the unorthodox journeys of those who climb to dragons lairs, map the cloud covered landscape of God's hidden Face and brave the journey across the Tintagel sea.

Mystics change the maps of the religious world. They rewrite the boundaries of Mystery to tell us: “Here there be Boundlessness", “Here there be Vast and Infinite Love”, “Here there be Radiant Emptiness", “Here there be Endless Bliss", “Here there be the Face of God".

And whatever words can be grasped of their ineffable mutterings, the esoteric maps of reality begin to be rewritten by the fire of living, breathing dragons.

For 56 years I have looked for my place among the religious landscape and finally know where I was meant to play:

Out here…

At the edge of the known…

Within the Mystery...

Where the boundaries of knowledge end and scriptures grow silent..

Out here…

Where there be dragons….

By~rOn Wright

Matthew: Jesus is the Embodiment of Torah

The Greek word translated "genealogy" at the beginning of Matthew's gospel is the same word for "genesis" translated from the LXX in Genesis 2:4. Matthew uses apocalyptic imagery to reveal Jesus is the new genesis of creation as well as the fulfillment of OT promises and prophecies.

Jesus is greater than Jonah and Solomon (12:41-42) and even greater than the temple itself (12:6). The Torah says the Shekinah glory of God is present among two who study the Torah (Mishnah, Avot 3.2, 6). Jesus very presence embodies the Torah when he says, "Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them" (18:20).

Matthew's last supper scene has intertextual connections to Ex.24 of the covenant banquet and the messianic promise of deliverance found in Zechariah 9. When the crowd later cries out to Pilate "His blood be on us and our children" and Pilate washes his hands of "this man's blood" in Matthew 27, these are not statements of condemnation of the Jewish people but following the promise of Zechariah, is to secure their liberation and salvation that goes all the way back to the beginning of Matthew's gospel, "He will save his people from their sins" (Matt.1:21).

Throughout Matthew's gospel Jesus is portrayed as the embodiment of both Israel and the Torah. The messiah is a sufferer like Israel and the Messiah is like the Torah where God's presence is with His people. The same language of "I am with you" in Matthew 28:20 is identical to Haggai 1:13. Jesus is Emmanuel, "God with us."

Is Jesus Moses 2.0?

Why does the modern church mix and match and patch together the Old and New Testament Scriptures reading the Bible like a flat one-dimensional book?

Why do modern Christians post the ten commandments in classrooms and courthouses but not portions of the sermon on the mount?

Why do we parrot Billy Graham "the bible says" giving equal authority to every text within the written scriptures and usually not distinguishing between the written word and the living Word?

It is easy to promote violence form the Old Testament but not as easy to promote violence from the New Testament.

Is Jesus Moses 2.0 or is Jesus something greater?


(questions and ideas from Andy Stanley's new book, Irresistible)

Mark: God's Wisdom and the Riddle of Christ

Jesus was God's wisdom incarnate and his teachings and actions were filled with riddles and irony. Jesus' riddles can awaken our stunted imaginations and draw us deeper into the character and life of his loving Father. Jesus disciples find him asleep on a boat, save us. They did not see Jesus' deeper meaning of him dying for humanity. Jonah is also found sleeping on a ship and he saves them by throwing himself overboard to what he thought was his death but turned into a kind of resurrection.

Jesus says his followers will be baptized in the waters and rivers of the Spirit of God. Like the first creation where the waters rise up, so Jesus is living water to those who will drink from him. The Gospel of Mark is about multiple healings of blind people as God wants to lift all of vulnerable humanity out of the swamp of spiritual blindness. As Israel listened to Moses with radiance glory, at the transfiguration, God speaks to Jesus disciples to listen to him as Jesus radiated with the glory of God.

Mark's Gospel starts his gospel out with the baptism of Jesus where the verb "torn" is the only place used in the gospels as in Isaiah 64:1 were Isaiah cries for God to tear open the heavens and come down to Israel. Mark's gospel is God's answer to Isaiah's cry for God to come and rule over Israel again. There is also this purifying judgment in Mark where he speaks of Isaiah but also alludes to the messenger preparing the way for the Messiah in Malachi as God purifies his people.

Mark reads Israel's story figurally as God radical love for Israel and all people. Some of us are bad interpreters of riddles and we miss in Mark's apocalyptic vision in chapter 13 is not about cosmic annihilation but rather the restoration of Israel. This morphs into the restoration of all things in Luke, Paul, and John's apocalyptic vision which the reader often misses.

The climax of the Jesus story is his crucifixion and vindication. When Jesus tells the parable of the wicked tenants in chapter 12, there are echoes and riddles to disclose in this parable. When the wicked tenants say "come, let us kill him" (Mk.12:7) this echoes back to the sacrifice of Isaac, the murder of a vineyard's son where death is not the final word. Or how about the story of Joseph plotting to kill their brother who used the exact same language of murdering him (Gen.37:20). Again, this figurative resurrection of Joseph foreshadows Jesus' fate.

What the Hell?

The word "hell" actually does not show up in the original Greek Septuagint Bible. It is an English translation from the Greek words, Hades, Tartaroo, and Genhena. If you want to see how bad our English translations are with the word 'Hell,' check out how many times it is used in different translations and then you will start to see the problem.

The message - 56 times

King James - 54 times

New King James - 32 times

New Living Translation  -  19 times

New International - 14 times

New American Standard - 13 times


Any Questions?

The Rich Man, Lazarus, and Jonah Stories

"The chasm between "heaven" and "hell" in this story does not seem infinite. The rich man, though dead, is not beyond the reach of love. All he needs is for someone naked and alone to seek him out in hell---a loving emissary of the naked God, come to liberate him from his own internal prison."
- Doug Frank  (A Gentler God, p.302)

"Jesus once treated a crowd that had gathered around him to these cryptic words: "This generation is an evil generation; it asks for a sign, but no sign will be given except the sign of Jonah. For just as Jonah became a sign to the people of Ninevah, so the human son will be to this generation (Luke 11:29-30).

How does Jonah point to Jesus? Perhaps by spending three days in Sheol and then returning----a human son who goes to hell and back. When Jonah finally meets the Ninevites and warns them about God's judgment, he speaks with the conviction of one who has experienced that judgment----not as condemnation, but as salvation. He knows that hell's eternity is not literally eternal, and those who find themselves alone in their sufferings there are not literally alone.

It will be a cold day in hell before evangelical preachers use the story of Jonah to explain that "eternal" flames are not without end and that Jesus is present in hell. But large sectors of the Christian church have kept alive the strange idea that Jesus went to hell to put and end to its tortures."
- Doug Frank, pp.309-310).

Jewish Midrash as an Invitation to Conversation

The church has not taught the faithful how to read comparative stories in order to form their faith. Have you noticed there are two creation stories noting their similarities and differences? Even the names of God in the original text are different. What about three versions of the ten commandments (Duet.5; Ex.20; & Ex.34)? Some of these promises from God are unconditional and some are conditional.

How do you hold onto that the Lord is a "God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression of sin" (Ex.34:6-7), and also ascribe the idea that "if you seek (God), he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will abandon you forever" (1 Chron.28:9).

God's Word invites us into a conversation with competing ideas and stories. Some Christians will focus on one story and others on an another but what do these stories tell us about God? What circumstances may be behind the words to divergent audiences? Do we silence the dialogue by picking and choosing who we want to listen to? How does the conversation change or progress in the light of God's final revelation---Jesus?

New Books Coming Out in 2019 That Look Promising:

Castelo, Daniel & Wall, Robert W. The
          Marks of Scripture: Rethinking the
          Nature of the Bible (Baker Books,
          Feb. 2019)

Enns, Peter. How the Bible Actually Works

         (HarperOne, Feb. 2019)

Hawk, Daniel L. The Violence of the

          Biblical God (Eerdmans, Jan. 2019)

Levine, Amy-Jill. Jesus for Atheists: Why

           He Still Matters in Our Secular
           World (HarperOne, Mar. 2019)

Rohr, Richard. The Universal Christ: How

           a Forgotten Reality Can Change
           Everything We See, Hope For, and
           Believe (Convergent Books,
           Mar. 2019)

Work, Telford. Jesus—The End and the

           Beginning: Tracing the
           Christ-Shaped Nature of
           Everything (Baker, Jan. 2019)

And God Separated the Light from the Darkness

"The Holy Spirit fills the heart with illumination to unite ourselves with Jesus Christ and to live a life in Christ. A person can be very religious and still be filled with darkness, we become cruel, destructive, full of hatred for others, full of malice and convinced that we are absolutely right and the rest of the world is absolutely wrong. Light and darkness both stand together until the end. But even our darkness with yield to the light of Christ's love and glory will burn like an everlasting fire.

In the beginning God separated the light from the darkness. The meaning of this is like the meaning of knowledge of good and evil. Let our lives be consecrated to acquire light and cast our darkness from our own hearts and our own minds. Our self-centeredness, all our prejudices, our ill will, our evil feelings towards others and all of those things that constitute this spiritual darkness. The presence of Christ within us is what separates the light from the darkness in us."

(excerpts from Archbishop Lazar Puhalo, The Mirror of Scripture: The Old Testament is About You)

Insights for Living #5

Jesus said God does not live in temples, in a place. Jesus said something new was coming. What is strange is how the word Ekklesia which means assembly or gathering has been translated "church." Church is not a translation, it is a substitution.

Look at Acts 19:32 (NASV) "So then, some were shouting one thing and some another, for the assembly was in confusion and the majority did not know for what reason they had come together."

Church is translated over one hundred times in English and here it is translated as "assembly." The context here is the idol worship in the city and the people were in confusion. It would make no sense to say the church was in confusion but why translate this word church at all? Jesus was starting a revolution, a movement, a people who gathered together in his name. Why do we call it church?

The term Ekklesia remains a casualty of modern English translations. Jesus has always had a group of followers who refused to define church in the terms of location and hierarchy as the modern church has done. It was always a WAY, a movement, a mobile revolution to the ends of the earth and to all nations.

(Excerpts from Andy Stanley's new book, Irresistible: Reclaiming the New that Jesus Unleashed for the World).

Cosmic Christ Consciousness

"Every Christian, even if he lacks any education, knows that every place is a part of the universe and that the universe 

itself is the temple of God. He prays in every place with the eyes of his senses closed and those of his soul awake, and in 

this way he transcends the whole world. He does not stop at the vault of heaven but reaches the heights above it, and, as 

though out of this world altogether, he offers his prayer to God, led by God's Spirit." ~ Origen

Clothed in Glory

I have been reading Jonathan Sacks fascinating book, Covenant & Conversation, which are some of his observations and explorations of the book of Genesis from a Rabbinic perspective. He makes several observations like first comes cosmology and then anthropology and that God creates order and man creates chaos. Which will prevail? We may be a handful of dust be we have immortal longings.

My favorite observation of going through Genesis 1-3 is his chapter on "Garments of light."
Adam names his wife Eve and God clothes Adam and Eve with garments of skin (Gen.3:20-21). Some Jewish rabbis have interpreted this Hebrew phrase as "garments of light." This young couple bathed in divine radiance, clothed in garments of light.

Adam in the story leading up to these verses knows he is mortal and his life will end. His wife would bring new life in the world and immortality would now come through children. She was only woman before but now he gives her a personal name Eve. They were the same unique persons and his life is now as dependent upon her as her life is dependent upon him.

We also see a movement in Genesis 1-3 on the names of God. In chapter one, God is Elokim, God of divine justice. But in chapters 2-3, God is now called Hashem Elokim, the personal God who speaks, loves, forgives, teaches, and so forth. Just like there is a movement from a noun to a name for Eve, there is also a movement from a noun to name for God. In Genesis chapter 4, God is called the personal name Hashem alone. Something changes in these chapters. It is not God who changes but man's perceptions of God that change.

Just like Adam responded to Eve as a person, he could now see himself as a person. So Judaism now understands God through revelation as a personal God. It is then that God clothed this couple with garments of light. Humanity ceased being a biological species and became an enlightened spiritual being in search of God. The whole story of Judaism is the story about love, language, and relationships and the love we feel for another person leads to the love of God who then robes us in garments of light.

(excerpts from Jonathan Sacks, Covenant & Conversation, pp.33-40)