Friday, June 29, 2007

what is contemplation?

Contemplation is spontaneous awe at the sacredness of life....It is gratitude for life, for awareness and for being. It is a vivid realization of the fact that life and being proceed from an invisible, transcendent, and infinitely abundant Source.

Thomas Merton

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

What got bombed?

Two minarets of the historic and beautiful Golden Mosque have been destroyed. The mosque is located in Samarra, Iraq; it has already lost its golden dome to bombing.

I am a Unitarian Universalist, not a Muslim; looking in from the outside, it seems to me that the symbolism of the dome of a mosque relates to the spiritual growth of the community of the faithful, while the symbolism of the minaret relates to communication of a message. If those ideas are approximately correct, the bombings not only damage the physical structure of the mosque, but attempt to negate the reasons for its existence and its spiritual life.

My prayers in this situation are for those who are physically and emotionally shocked by the destruction of more of a remarkable building, and for the focus that will allow people of all faiths to remember that the core of our spiritual lives is our beliefs and ideas expressed through actions, not buildings that may be created or destroyed.

Saturday, June 9, 2007

Summer/Winter solstice

It will soon be summer/winter solstice. For me, the solstices and equinoxes are holy day because they can make us think and feel about where we are on our year-paths and life-paths, about how we deal with the different forms and intensities of life energy, and about things that happen all over the world

I live in the northern hemisphere, so summer solstice will occur where I live, but I am naturally aware that in the southern hemisphere, people will experience and perhaps celebrate the coming of winter. Light will be changing everywhere (except at the equator).

I'm deciding now how to decorate my home altar for the summer solstice: I will put oranges on it to celebrate the sun, leaves, candles, and an obsidian sphere to make me think about winter's long nights....

What about you?