Wöchentliche Lesung 27.09.2009 |
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Readings for the Week of September 27, 2009 Laurence Freeman OSB, THE WEB OF SILENCE (London: DLT, 1996), pp. 18-19. For many years now physicists have been searching for a unified field of theory which will express the basic laws that unify the forces of nature. [Recent discoveries bring] that goal closer. At the same time, it reminds us of the different levels of consciousness on which scientific and spiritual vision take place. The “edge of the universe” has perhaps been photographed and we may be able to measure the beginning of time---and this is exciting and important---but the spiritual exploration of reality, which unites the inner and outer manifestations of God, meets a horizon rather than an edge. The horizon is real and perceptible but it is always receding. It is the point of departure as well as the destination. The journey of meditation is the journey home, the process of awakening to where we are, always have been and where we timelessly belong. The pilgrimage of meditation reveals, through experience rather than theory, that each of us is an intrinsic part of the unified field of God. The meeting of science and religion in our time is healing one of the great divisions of the modern mind. Today indeed it is often the dedicated physicist who shows more real reverence, humility and joyful wonder in his or her contemplation of reality, than the over-stressed and skeptical administrator of organized religion. On the other hand, the great scriptural traditions reminds the scientist that the universe cannot be studied realistically without accounting for the mystery of human consciousness. They know that the whole universe is embodied in the human being and that body, mind, and spirit are not separate forms of energy. St Gregory Palamas wrote that the human being is “the concentration of all that is, the recapitulation of all things created by God.” The ordinary meditator can be helped by these deep changes in our culture and religious mentality. A feeling of foolishness, a sense of failure or discouragement, for example, often undermines the commitment to daily meditation. This can be challenged by the new sense of wonder awakening among us today, which is such a source of hope for our planet as well as of healing for our psyche. We can be reminded that what is foolish is not to give time and space to see beyond time and space. It is foolishness to have almost lost the gift of paying pure attention without counting the cost or calculating a return. Nothing is more foolish than to let the ego’s petty obsession with success and failure deter us from finding our true self in union with God. “The fool has said in his heart, there is no God above, “ as the Hebrew poet sang thousands of years ago. The deepest and unfathomable wonder of creation is not in what can be measured but in what can be listened to at both the innermost and the outermost reaches: the silence of God. Meditate for Thirty Minutes.... Remember: Sit down. Sit still and upright. Close your eyes lightly. Sit relaxed but alert. Silently, interiorly, begin to say a single word. We recommend the prayer-phrase "Maranatha." Recite it as four syllables of equal length. Listen to it as you say it, gently, but continuously. Do not think or imagine anything—spiritual or otherwise. Thoughts and images will likely come, but let them pass. Just keep returning your attention—with humility and simplicity—to saying your word in faith, from the beginning to the end of your meditation. After Meditation... Ken Wilber, THE MARRIAGE OF SENSE AND SOUL: INTEGRATING SCIENCE AND RELIGION (New York: Random House, 1998), p. 173-174. In the West, since Kant. . .religion. . .has fallen on hard times. I maintain that it has done so precisely because it attempted to do with the eye of mind that which can be done only with the eye of contemplation. Because the mind could not actually deliver the metaphysical goods, and yet kept loudly claiming that it could, somebody was bound to blow the whistle and demand real evidence. Kant made the demand, and metaphysics collapsed—and rightly so, in its typical form. Neither sensory empiricism, nor pure reason, nor practical reason, nor any combination thereof can see into the realm of Spirit. . . .[But] religion [can] regain its proper warrant, which is not sensory or mythic or mental but finally contemplative. The great and secret message of the experimental mystics the world over is that, with the eye of contemplation, Spirit can be seen. With the eye of contemplation, God can be seen. With the eye of contemplation, the great Within radiantly unfolds. And in all cases, the eye with which you see God is the same eye with which God sees you: the eye of contemplation. |