Meirothea

Meirothea. First Mother. Firstborn. First Thought.

found the art here.

prayer request

if those few of you who read my blog would pray for me, i would appreciate it. my list of intentions for today if you please:

1) that my intention regarding a new employment position come to fruition--and soon;
2) that my astral and physical bodies be protected, integrated with themselves severally and jointly as they have just undergone a deep surgery by the divine. I'm sure i'll be fine. but i felt the need to express that intention with you.
3) that my knowledge increase sufficiently to allow me to more safely traverse the new, more powerful and deep paths that i am traveling upon. i am doing so in complete trust, with very limited knowledge. and so far, i've been fine. but lift me up if you will in your hearts to keep me safe and able to make the journey both there and back, and the journey whilst in that other world. i know now that i am deep in the wild honey jar.

shalom. shalom. shalom.

Dialogue with Sister Laurel

Thanks to Sr. Laurel for responding to my query re her post on mysticism. Her response was very beautiful, well-thought-out, and reasonable. Read it here. And yet . . . .

It is funny. I agree and yet disagree at the same time with most of her text. I suppose it goes back to (what she says so rightly) is the surprising nature of God: he manifests himself to each of us uniquely and who is to say which is good, better, best for a particular individual? He is the lover and we are the beloved. He comes to us each as a unique creation. And I emphatically agree that we must not enter into prayer with expectation per se: we let him do his work. Although I suppose there are degrees of expectation. "I expect to push my body to the extreme and i expect to sweat and breathe hard and my body will begin to respond" and yet we are open to the result. By the same token, we can enter through that door by the grace of another's guidance and go to the 'temple' inside and be open, and see what happens--but expecting to rend open one's heart and bleed and sweat and THEN see what happens.

At any rate, I do think Sr. and I have cleared up the semantic issues and gotten down to the meat. It appears that we disagree that the ecstatic union with the Divine that she categorizes as 'mystical' is a relatively rare experience, or need be. Conversely, I believe that the ecstatic can 'invade' our everyday life---in my own experience, it is both voluntary and 'involuntary' prayer--both sought after and unexpected visions, secret knowledge, desperate passion, etc. For me, in this stage of life, it is a daily thing. Not that every day is the same--nor does he approach me in the same way every day. And yes, of course, there are surprises; big ones. But I still maintain that at least as for myself, we can live on the mountaintop and sojourn in the valley at the same time. Although I admit, it is a strange existence.

I also have a 'contemplative' (apophatic) prayer life, although for me it is almost the inverse. These experiences of profound quiet and peacefulness are for me more rare. Well.

At any rate, I DO agree that a 'whiz-bang' prayer life is not indicative of spiritual (or any other kind of) maturity. Too bad. That would be a great 'built-in' option. Nope. We're all slogging along with our yolks, sometimes heavy, sometimes light.

So, while in my own experience, my day begins and ends and is punctuated by ecstatic and vivid visions, trembling, fear and joy, and more--it doesn't get the laundry done by itself nor does it bring me my material needs. Thus, I guess in Sr. Laurel's reference, I have had to learn to ascend and descend the mountain quickly. Or, perhaps, I've lucked out and been able to bring the mountain with me. Or, perhaps I have the valley in my heart while on the mountain. I don't know. AND YET, this openness has had the tendency to move my feet in directions I had not planned. So the openness I experience in my 'mystical' life, absolutely has made a tremendous difference in my life: it just hasn't made it any less fraught with peril or conundrum: just different ones than I likely would have had otherwise.

Further, there are always gradations. So, although my life seems to be lived between the holes in the fabric of life, and this Terran world to me seems more and more like an elaborate 'Star Trek'-kian holodeck rouse, I still love mowing my lawn, pruning the bushes, and I still worry about money, etc., etc.

But I will venture one thing further: I have a hunch--I'll admit not a well-thought-out opinion--but a hunch, that this life of ecstasy and visions and profound daily 'mystical' union with god, is something that all men and all women, and perhaps even all children, could, and perhaps, should, experience. Is there a reason why this should not be the case other than for ignorance and lack of 'gatherer's/teachers'? Why should this precious ladder not be climbed by us all? Are we not all priests before his eyes? Are we not all prophets? Are we not all Christ? Then let us be ourselves, and be Him, and live to our utmost. The ecstatic life is open to all. Although I can't say I have any basis for the belief.

On the other hand, I suppose some would say the same thing about extreme sports or physical fitness: to me, an hour's walk a day is the MAXIMUM. Three hours' prayer snuck in between my worldly duties (and they are many) is my FLOOR. So we are all craftsman, I suppose, in this great edifice of holiness. But as for me, I will keep trying to pry open doors, just a little, in everyone. We are creatures of fire and water, mind and power; this mere vegetable 'flesh-sack'--beautiful and wondrous as it appears--is as nothing to that glorious body, which exists NOW NOW NOW.

OK. Whoops. Got carried away there . . . .

Peace.

p

Well. That's just one layman's perspective.

7.6.10

cry not out for god.
he is here, child, here, always.

there is no glass. there is no separation.

there is only joining. there is only coupling. there is only nakedness between us.

our voices one, our eyes see as one, our hair flowing together as we stand on the precipice.

do you not yet see?

we cry out as babes cry. not because we seek god. but because,

but because, he is i, and i see all, and my eyes, lidless, my ears, with no hands to cover them.

my skin, with no way to stop his caresses.

we are full, full to brim with God. awake now, gently. you have not yet used your legs.

fear not to fall. the earth will move to catch you.

fear not to stumble, the grass is new and lush.

feel his soft blowing on your neck. if too much for you, you may sleep awhile. return to your waking when you do not fear so much.

and you will see, you will see the goodness, the light, and that dark here is wondrous.

oh please, please, return often. for we miss you when you sleep, sweet.

7.6.10

For unto us a CHILD is born. Unto us a SON is given.
And his name shall be WONDER-COUNSELOR.

Every morn' the advent of ADONAI in my heart.
Every breaking of the fast, the first from a parched 40 days.
Every prayer the first rain of spring on a weary land.
Each noon the sun's virgin journey!
Each dusk, the first traverse of newly-arrived ancient spirits across the land,
with trepidation and wonder.

Each night, my first duel with my demons.
Each sleep, my first death, my first longing after the FACE.
Each morn', i am the child. my breath as fire and water.
My sweat as blood and tears.
My ablutions my holy anointing for the sepulcher.
Morning and evening and morning; the first day.

7.2.10

Found this interesting page with St. Catherine of Genoa's treatise on purgatory. Interesting.

7.2.10

i say the names. i expect nothing. see only.
i conjure god within. he is black and red. forming, to see him forces the eyes away--the brain cannot composite him. cannot visualize him. cannot contain or control or describe him.
he is on the throne, out of courtesy.

vivat rex! be conscious! see us and rule us gently! the room is spinning around. i am earth-sick. i must run to keep in place.

i live into, unto, myself. yes. now. i find the ground floor. there are monsters here. good.

Wild Kabbalah

I proclaim a year of jubilee. All in my nations shall rejoice and be glad; put on your festive robes, your finest.

Come out into the streets, stream into my citadel, and I shall hand out rings and honors.

For I have been in the hell of hells, I have soared through the heavens above heavens, I have walked the paths of nothingness in the middle-world.

For I have seen the divine mother come down to me as a great coverlet and command my performance. I have kissed the spirits of fire and caressed the gods, sweet and yielding.

For I have been father and mother, concubine and keeper of the keys of the harem. Wands, scepters and jewels, caskets of pure honey and wild red gold overflow in my basilica.


Be ye born! O world, be ye aquiver! May the stars come into Our orbit. May our grace and our love be felt to the outermost regions of our great galaxy. As all willing stars and world and spirits circle me in holy dance, may they rejoice! For I am a giver of joy and a giver of peace.




And protection I offer to all who will treat with me as servant or equal. I hold a sword, red, red from fire within, and I have removed the hands of the power of this earth and replaced them with my one. I have occupied the citadel of the great matrix of this Terran vegetable fable and hold it for tribute


FOR THERE IS NO TRYING, NO ASPIRING, NO GROANING AFTER THE GOD--SEE! THE SPIRIT IS POURED OUT ON ALL, THE JUST AND THE UNJUST, LIKE PUREST, RARIFIED GOLDEN WINE UPON ALL SOULS. THE ENTIRE EARTH IS COVERED, IS COVERED IN THE GOLD AND WINE OF THE DIVINE. STRIVE NOT! RECEIVE ONLY! AS A CHILD RECEIVES CARESSES, SO WE RECEIVE GOD. HE IS NOT FAR. NO! HE IS CLOSER THAN YOUR BREATH. DO NOT PRAY. BE. BE. BE. SIT AND DRINK. SITE AND EAT. BE FULL!!!!!

Rejoice! And rejoice! And sing songs of exultation! You shall live. I shall hold you as my precious children, my precious brothers, my precious lovers, my precious vassals and allies---and all shall overflow with gold imperishable, silver of perfection, jewels as bright as suns. Robes and rings I give. Come!


My table is full to groaning and seats 10,000 times 10,000 times 10,000. Come! Yea I command you! I entreat you! Come!

Family support

Another mundane post. Just don't have the poetry in me at the moment, and I'm trying not to allow myself the space or time to linger--just the one hour for prayer and then to work! Although this morning I slept in until 5:30; I had to discipline myself for that one.

At any rate, I was going to say that I am so grateful that my IMMEDIATE family (meaning, my folks and siblings, well, one of them) are supportive of my vocation (although they don't understand it at all). But my extended family refuses to discuss it---it simply cannot exist in their minds. This whole 'gnostic' thing sounds like devil worship to them. Literally. It's not worth explaining; they just change the subject. It feels like an Amish shunning--except that at least we can talk about mundane things: just nothing that is close to my heart. And of course I'm lucky that my wife is supportive.

I'm waiting for the right moment to tell my kids that i'm a seminarian--that will be tough--we as a family are still good little practicing Catholics; daddy becoming a priest in another church (still catholic, though!), might be confusing. I think I'll wait until the deaconate to tell them . . . .

The "eye" is giving me shivers. Time to go to the library and do my seminary reading. Ciao!

6.29.10

say hello to my little friend (pictured). he helps me stay on track during work. I don't have a "discipline" to keep me in line, so I'm considering other means. Drastic times call for drastic measures if reason will not speak to one aspect of ourselves.

re sr. laurel's vision of 'mystical'

I can't comment directly to sr. laurel's blog (it isn't set up this way), but I wanted to comment on her post regarding the mystical state. First of all, I should ask for clarification, because I wonder if we are dealing in semantics. But I'll plunge ahead:

She seems to relegate 'mystical' experiences to 'mountain-top' experiences only, or only as the apophatic ecstatic state, and/or (sometimes) as sort of ER help from the divine for the spiritually weak or immature. At least, that's what it sounded like she said.

Um. Not my idea of what mysticism is about.

To me, mysticism is a vocation; a way of life, an every minute, every day experience. Certainly it is not the normal province for the spiritually immature--isn't it usually the mark of the spiritually grounded? At least, some of the most spiritually 'powerful' saints in our canon were marked by a marked mystical life.

So, as I am certainly inferior to Sr. Laurel in terms of knowledge of theology and church history, all I can speak to is my own experience.

My own experience is that the mystic is one who experiences god in all things, and especially in prayer, in an imagery, a fully-sensual experience, simply by grace. There is no 'advanced' or 'beginner'. At least in the most fundamental sense. Mysticism is life with god where god is in all and in ways we could not, would not, have guessed or imagined.

Frankly, in my 26 years of an intentional spiritual life, we experience, usually, what we EXPECT to experience. And there is no contradiction here. If we expect for 'mountaintop' experiences to happen only once per (fill in the blank) then that is what we shall have. If we anticipate that god will intersect with us daily, strangely, physically (so it seems), then he does. This is no mere 'wish fulfillment'; in my view it is a very fundamental and profound and sublime truth. If we wish the spiritual life to be difficult, to be dry, to be 'i-thou', to be usually 'reaching out', then it shall be.

To each his own. But as for me, a different path has chosen me. As sister said so eloquently when she expressed her feeling of the inexpressible joy of the Jesu during one of her own mystical experiences, 'where have you been, I'm so glad you are here'---does this not intimate that the Jesu expects us to be with him always, in every moment, and in that same sublime and inexpressible and mystical way? Why could it not mean that? I don't doubt that sister experiences god in a intimate and even in an ever-present way---but why must a 'mystical' union with god play so infrequent a role?

At any rate, this may not have been sister's intent, but her comments seem reminiscent of the old, old suspicion of the church hierarchy to mystical experiences----and mystical experiences and mystics are as varied, and unorthodox in their imagery and expression, as snowflakes. Certainly, the more the saint is described as 'mystical', the more shocking, surprising, and frankly heterodox their writings appear (I mean, St. Clare sounds simply Crowleyian at times!).

At any rate, I certainly experienced 'mountaintop' experiences before my mystical life burst into my consciousness, but now that the mystical state, both the apophatic ecstasy (in jest i call it the 'black out' prayer) and the definitely 3-d, full-color visionary state (also mystical) are, can and perhaps should be a gift of the divine to all and at all times (imagine!)--it's just that the door must be opened by someone--usually by someone else. I don't think the god-person link can be opened any other way. But I digress.

Well. I'm rambling now. But I was confused and somehow hurt by sister's post and felt like sharing. I apologize for the disorganization and apparent contradictions above; it's all very hard to express. It would be great to get a comment-string going on this one . . . .

mundane

well, one of my beloved eremite sisters asked that i post once in a while about my vocation--basically, anything that wasn't more of my 'poetry.'

so. all is well. I had my second meeting with my Bishop--he is such a jewel. And very tender. That's nice, because that's exactly what I need right now. I'm beginning to get tired of pretending to be strong all the time, even to myself. So, when I speak with him, i get to be vulnerable; it's nice. I've read two books on my list! Although my Bishop isn't interested in milestones, just LIFE. well. i can't help but feel as though I need to keep up my end of things and study diligently. although, as with brother Merton, I only get one to two hours a day to read (well, his was to write, but you know what i mean), so I have to read quickly.

And today i 'invetend' a new prayer form for myself. I used quotations because of course there is nothing new under the sun, but it is new and idiosyncratic to me at least.

I have been going through an anti-theurgic phase--focusing on a more 'magickal' approach (a term I use rather loosely so don't freak, mom). But, lately, there has been growing a more theurgic nature to my praxis. It started as a prelude to my 'real' prayer while my coffee water boiled. Then became a sort of necessary part of my preparation for my 'work', as well as a psychic opening of myself into, um, myself (hard to explain). But anyway, I would extend the slit in reality, vulva of the Divine and let it grow until instead of being a tiny part of my mind, it would be large enough to engulf my entire body, and my entire prayer carpet (um, it's big).

But the breakthrough was today when I stayed in that prayer mode for the entire morning. It started out as visualization (fantasy exploration) of what it would be like with my first parish, mentoring other men (and women, if they would have me) into either a deeper spiritual life or the priesthood--and it became a very interested extension of my older phase of pure worship prayer. I can't explain it now, but it is in the nature of becoming that bridge between humanity and God--that true becoming of priest. I feel that every week has become like a 'minor order' advancement in my calling as priest. Today, and only today, i began to understand that 'nothingness' that mystics are continually talking about. It is not nothingness to me, though---it is complete passivity, i am the phallus, the vulva, the holy canal and the womb, and i am the child.

i should put ratings on these posts at the top. This one got kind of pg-13-ish. But that's what happens. Sexual imagery just seems to be the only way to describe what is happening. Actually, it IS what is happening. I guess you just have to be there . . . .

Peace . . . . Maybe I should keep this sort of stuff on my private Shadowbook. But there you go. A brief glimpse into my unmasked spirituality, if you've stuck with me this long. . . . .

6.24.10

the student tries to impress.
the teacher laughs gently.
the student strives to know.
the teacher laughs serenely.
the student learns to look inside.
the teacher laughs whistfully.
the student sees all.
the teacher laughs and his sides pain him.
the student sees himself and a bird and a breeze and is nothing.
the teacher dies.
the teacher is born.

6.22.10

ye powers! all this talk, talk, talk, chatter, chatter, chatter about the divine.
christian, jew, muslim, pagan, witch.
my mind will explode with their words.
escape! escape! escape into the prayer closet and firmly close and bolt the door.
set wards to keep out their incessant pollution, their defilement.
how can i talk to, to, THE GREAT, MYSELF, THE OTHER, THE SERVANTS, with their terrible words as roars and gnashing and rolling of eyes.
may their words fall into the river!
may they sink into the ground!
may the birds eat them and leave a desert plane!
and i shall remain, alone, in sackcloth. at rest.

6.22.10

trust. fiercely. wildly. with abandon.
i go now to the lion's den of truth.
if i don't return, tell my wife i love her. so much.

for if there is a stain at all upon my soul, his fire shall consume me.
the funny thing is that everyone always thinks that these statements are allegorical, metaphorical, NOT TRUE.

but the godhead is a ruthless fire. a consuming blast. a gravity-well unforgiving, inescapable.

yet i fly to thee anyway. there is naught in this world that satisfies.

all joys are ashes to me. wine is as piss. choice foods are dung to me.

praises are poison drinks in golden cups. encouragement; that is honest, but foolish.

there is no escape, no help, no path but his deadly trail. i will go now. now to pick my way.

fear not, it is not a long path.

if i return. i shall have the tablets. if not, leave me in the altar as food for the demons.

i reject this physical life. i cast it aside. i come.