Juno Beach Methodist Church: Beginings : 無料・フリー素材/写真
Juno Beach Methodist Church: Beginings / Dreaming in the deep south
| ライセンス | クリエイティブ・コモンズ 表示 2.1 |
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| 説明 | “Stones, flesh, stars, and those truths the hand can touch.”— Albert Camus, from The Myth of Sisyphus & Other Essays; “Summer in Algiers” *It's Easter Sunday so I'm remembering past Easters - as well as my own spiritual journey which began with my parents and extended family of organists, music directors, choir directors, chaplains, builders of churches and devoted Sunday school teachers.Sometimes I wonder - what happened to our family? We had so many good things between us, so much love and devotion. All destroyed to the point that my mother never attended church at all and my father went but would shrug and indicate that he didn't believe much of anything anymore.Loss of faith. Not even about belief, really. It was deeper than that. The world that had birthed them and the world that they had fought for had moved on and they were left behind in some fundamental way.Their own church communities had abandoned them, let them down and in turn been abandoned by them. Human relationships are so difficult. Leadership, especially spiritual leadership is really tricky. Or maybe it isn't, it just has a lot of pitfalls that are just too easy to drop into. Our Church in Juno started in a building that began as a restaurant and became a Methodist Church. This church and it's rector were my spiritual roots and served as the fulcrum to destroy my parents' marriage. The good the bad, the unexpected, the tragic. I'll never know the whole story. Nobody will. I think most groups that are attempting the most deeply transformative work run aground in similar ways. But at the time, I was mostly ignorant, blissfully unaware, filled with my own fantasies and puzzlement. I wasn't much help. But neither was anybody else.*“Like wind - In it, with it, of it. Of it just like a sail, so light and strong that, even when it is bent flat, it gathers all the power of the wind without hampering its course.Like light - In light, lit through by light, transformed into light. Like the lens which disappears in the light it focuses.Like wind. Like light.Just this - on these expanses, on these heights.- Dag Hammarskjöld*"I am half inclined to think we are all ghosts…it is not only what we have inherited from our fathers and mothers that exists again in us, but all sorts of old dead ideas and all kinds of old dead beliefs and things of that kind. They are not actually alive in us; but there they are dormant all the same, and we can never be rid of them. Whenever I take up a newspaper and read it, I fancy I see ghosts creeping between the lines. There must be ghosts all over the world. They must be as countless as the grains of the sands, it seems to me. And we are so miserably afraid of the light, all of us." [Henrik Ibsen’s Ghosts (1881); Act II]*Rob Brezsny's Free Will AstrologyIs it really healthy to have a shrill, 25-words-or-less opinion about everything, as radio and TV talk shows seem to imply? Would anyone object if now and then you served as a compassionate witness about the hot-button issues?Is it conceivable that you could simply sit on the fence in the midst of the wars of words and beam articulate sympathy at both sides?Yes, you can. I bet you have the rebellious resourcefulness to be a freedom fighter without hating anyone.*The world is full of half-enlightened masters. Overly clever, too “sensitive” to live in the real world, they surround themselves with selfish pleasures and bestow their grandiose teachings upon the unwary. Prematurely publicizing themselves, intent upon reaching some spiritual climax, they constantly sacrifice the truth and deviate from the Tao. What they really offer the world is their own confusion. The true master understands that enlightenment is not the end, but the means. Realizing that virtue is her goal, she accepts the long and often arduous cultivation that is necessary to attain it. She doesn’t scheme to become a leader, but quietly shoulders whatever responsibilities fall to her. Unattached to her accomplishments, taking credit for nothing at all, she guides the whole world by guiding the individuals who come to her. She shares her divine energy with her students, encouraging them, creating trials to strengthen them, scolding them to awaken them, directing the streams of their lives toward the infinite ocean of the Tao. If you aspire to this sort of mastery, then root yourself in the Tao. Relinquish your negative habits and attitudes. Strengthen your sincerity. Live in the real world, and extend your virtue to it without discrimination in the daily round. Be the truest father or mother, the truest brother or sister, the truest friend, and the truest disciple. Humbly respect and serve your teacher, and dedicate your entire being unwaveringly to self-cultivation. Then you will surely achieve self-mastery and he able to help others in doing the same. from the textHua Hu Ching[via livethetao]*“Hope means to keep livingamid desperationand to keep hummingin the darkness.Hoping is knowing that there is love,it is trust in tomorrowit is falling asleepand waking againwhen the sun rises.In the midst of a gale at sea,it is to discover land.In the eyes of anotherIt is to see that he understands you.….As long as there is still hopeThere will also be prayer.….And God will be holding youin his hands.”*-Henri Nouwen-With Open Hands"[With thanks to "spiritually directed…"]*Everything always passes, and everything is already okay. Stay in the place where you can see that, and nothing will resist you.~ Martha Beck, Steering by Starlight*"Today is the feast day of George Herbert who wrote the poem whose words incorporate the most beautiful hymn in the 1982 Hymnal of the Episcopal Church, wherein the hymn is called General Seminary. Other hymnals have the words, but none of the others have the hauntingly beautiful melody: "King of Glory, King of Peace, I will love thee"..."George HerbertKing of glory, King of peace,I will love thee;and that love may never cease,I will move thee.Thou hast granted my request,thou hast heard me;thou didst note my working breast,thou hast spared me.Wherefore with my utmost artI will sing thee,and the cream of all my heartI will bring thee.Though my sins against me cried,thou didst clear me;and alone, when they replied,thou didst hear me.Seven whole days, not one in seven,I will praise thee;in my heart, though not in heaven,I can raise thee.Small it is, in this poor sortto enroll thee:e'en eternity's too shortto extol thee. |
| 撮影日 | 2018-03-25 19:51:52 |
| 撮影者 | Dreaming in the deep south , Atlanta, USA |
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