What if the truth got out?

I better sound smart once in a while,
in case someone is spying.

What if the truth got out
that I really prefer silliness and silence
to offering fancy clues to the universe?

- Hafiz

I love this! And yes he does say "silliness" not "stillness" as I first thought!

It's all about letting go.

I am convinced that a healthy spiritual journey is primarily about letting go. I could say a lot more about that but for now a few quotes from the latest issue of Parabola, a journal we receive regularly. The theme of this issue is Liberation and Letting Go. (You can see more content from this issue on line.)

Where is God
 - Mark Nepo

It's as if what is unbreakable -
the very pulse of life - waits for
everything else to be torn away,
and then in the bareness that
only silence and suffering and
great love can expose, it dares
to speak through us and to us.

It seems to say, if you want to last,
hold on to nothing. If you want
to know love, let in everything.
If you want to feel the presence
of everything, stop counting
the things that break along the way.

(Like most poetry this repays a repeated reading in a reflective, open-hearted way.)

"Death is not extinguishing the light, 

it is only putting out the lamp because dawn has come."

- Rabindranath Tagore

Praying the News

On my recent holiday, in the midst of so much freedom and beauty ...

(Jacarandas in Adelaide)

… I was very aware of the contrast for the people of the Philippines -

It is hard to comprehend - and respond - to tragedy of such magnitude. Giving financial support is one way and all the aid agencies are appropriately asking us to do that. I was encouraged to learn that Campbell Live (TV3) promoted an appeal to donate just $3 via a text. This raised more than half a million dollars! This shows that "every little bit" does make a difference.

Praying is another response. But this too can be difficult. How to pray? What to pray? Does it really make any difference? The website Spirituality and Practice has a Blog that specifically focusses on "praying the news". I found their prayer for the people of the Philippines very helpful. You can read it (and pray with them) here.

Internet withdrawal symptoms!

On a recent holiday I stayed for a week at a house where Wi-fi internet was not available. Ouch!
Surely I can't be that addicted to "having the world at my fingertips"! After all I don't even have a Smart phone… But my trusty iPad was supposed to connect me to emails, Blogs, weather forecasts, timetables for transport, "what's on" in a strange city… etc etc

I have to admit I was frustrated! 

But it got me thinking. 

Like most things, there are pros and cons to being constantly "connected". 

Used wisely the World Wide Web (www) is an amazing tool that demonstrates an even deeper reality that both scientists and mystics have known for some time - 

we really are all connected at levels far beyond the internet. There is much food for thought here. I might have lacked Wi-Fi connection but at deeper levels connection is never lost. Unfortunately though, we are often completely unaware of it.

Synchronistically (!) I'm currently reading a book by Ilia Delio called The Unbearable Wholeness of Being: God, Evolution and the Power of Love.

Delio is a Catholic Sister who is the winner of a Templeton Course Award in Science and Religion. I haven't read very much of the book so far but as the title and sub-title suggest she is delving into the spiritual and scientific depths of our connectedness. She will be in Auckland and Christchurch later this month and I am looking forward to attending a series of lectures she will give. (If you are interested email Joan Roberts for a brochure and registration: jroberts@somauck.org.nz )