Faith & Life Inspirational Message

Much of the time I get material from the things I read.   But sometimes I hear interesting things.   Such was the case yesterday.   I was with a group of people whom I very much like.   They are gracious.   They are warm and quite hospitable.   I like to sit back and watch them do what seems very natural.   I long ago concluded that people who live in the Spirit do what comes natural to the Spirit.   I think people of the Spirit naturally begin to focus on others, rather than themselves.   People of the Spirit know the first thing you do is to welcome the other.   They do this even if the “other” is stranger.   I am sure they see a stranger who has not yet become a friend.   That is a neat way of looking at the world.   It certainly is a way of peace making. It is a way that begins in trust and hopes for the best.   Some would call this naïve.   The bolder critics would call it stupid!   It is naïve an...

To be free, oh, to be free.   Freedom has always been a major theme of American culture.   Indeed, this country was rooted in a political and religious quest for freedom.   Any of us with any age hears the resonant voice of Martin Luther King, Jr. and others in the turbulent 1960s calling for freedom to ring out.             But freedom is a much older concept than these North American colonies, now global super-state.   And freedom certainly is not an American concept alone.   Freedom goes back to those Jews who experienced liberation from Egyptian bondage.   It is as old as those Greek philosophers, like Plato and Aristotle.   Freedom has been an issue on the national scale as well as on the individual scale.             Freedom is always the opposite of bondage and slavery. In many ways I would claim never to have experienced bondag...

Anybody who lives to adulthood knows that there are times when life gets tough.   I suppose Adam and Eve had it made in Paradise, but they blew it and found out even then that happiness was not guaranteed!   God had told them not to do one thing.   Of course, they could not resist!   So they grabbed the fruit, ate it, blamed the serpent and each other, and paid the price.   They were kicked out of Paradise.   To quote the famous book title of John Steinbeck, East of Eden, that is precisely where they were condemned to live.   And all of us know we live “East of Eden.”   In that place---our place really---is the place of toil, pain, and often, unhappiness.   I could ask for a better deal, but it won’t matter.   We are no longer in Eden.   We are in Cleveland or New York or London or Moscow.   It does not matter where we are in the globe, because the whole globe is East of Eden.      I am not sure Eden was ev...

Recently I have been giving thought to the idea of “the sacred.”   Not long ago we had a visitor who led us into thinking about nature as sacred space.   I find that intriguing.   Since the majority of Americans are now urban or suburbanites, I don’t think we give nearly as much consideration to nature and our natural world as in the old agrarian days.   Having grown up on a farm, I know I am much less aware of and observant of my natural world. Most of us probably don’t live very close to nature.   Of course, we are all in nature, but it often is not “natural.”   If I am honest, I leave my house and jump in the car.   If it is cold outside, the windows are up and the heater is on full blast.   Most of the time the radio is playing some kind of music.   If it is hot, the windows are up and the air-conditioner is on full blast and the radio is playing some kind of music. I arrive at the building where I have a pleasant study and where...

To be free, oh, to be free.   Freedom has always been a major theme of American culture.   Indeed, this country was rooted in a political and religious quest for freedom.   Any of us with any age hears the resonant voice of Martin Luther King, Jr. and others in the turbulent 1960s calling for freedom to ring out.             But freedom is a much older concept than these North American colonies, now global super-state.   And freedom certainly is not an American concept alone.   Freedom goes back to those Jews who experienced liberation from Egyptian bondage.   It is as old as those Greek philosophers, like Plato and Aristotle.   Freedom has been an issue on the national scale as well as on the individual scale.             Freedom is always the opposite of bondage and slavery. In many ways I would claim never to have experienced bondage a...

The phrase, freedom of exploration, I read somewhere.   I have no idea, since I read fairly widely.   I do remember when I saw it that my interest was piqued.   Perhaps it is because I have some interest in the process of innovation that it intrigued me.   But I also thought about my work in the discipline of spirituality.   Let’s look at both of these arenas.             The freedom of exploration seems like a suggestion or, even, advice to me.   I can imagine saying it to someone.   “Go ahead, explore freely.”   I do not know how you could order or command someone to do this.   It feels more like permission.   “Go ahead.”   There is an element of encouragement that I very much like.             I value both words, freedom and explore.   Our American culture talks a great deal about freedom.   It is assumed ...