Gene's Blog

I was wrong about something. Yup, me.

About the two greatest threats to planet earth. There is one greater. Franklin Delano Roosevelt famously named it: Fear. We have nothing to fear but fear itself. I’m reading a book, of late, about transcendence, I’m going to talk it about later this week, but it is about transcending biology, ostensibly, but it isn’t biology we need transcend. It is fear. It is fear that grips this world by the throat. It is fear that our media, all versions, spew out in hurried, harried phrases. Often, not what has happened, on a slow day, but what MAY happen if nothing horrible can be found to frighten us with. That is where the transcendence part comes in. Our world, we, its people, must learn to transcend fear. How may we do that? It is a reasonable question and one I’m going to explore later this week. But for the moment, I just wanted to make it clear that fearing religion and global warming aren’t going to cure either. What will then? Transcending them with love.

So, tonight, as I am a bit harried and hurried myself, I’m going to borrow a bit from Steve Goodier again, as always from his newsletter, Life Support, and it does, he does.

FINER THAN WEALTH

I love the story about an angel who suddenly appears at a faculty
meeting and tells the dean of the college that, in return for his
unselfish and exemplary behavior, he will be given his choice of
infinite wealth, wisdom or beauty. Without hesitating, the dean
selects infinite wisdom.

“Done!” says the angel, and disappears in a cloud of smoke and a bolt
of lightning.

Now, all heads turn toward the dean, who sits surrounded by a faint
halo of light. At length, one of his colleagues whispers, “Say
something wise.”

The dean looks at them and says, “I should have taken the money.”

Though wealth is highly regarded in our world, I rather suspect this
fictitious academic made the better choice. Wisdom, like many other
virtues, is usually more difficult to obtain and can be far more
satisfying.

I’ve heard it said that when our hearts are empty, we collect
“things.” On the other hand, when our hearts are full, we tend to lose
interest in most of the “stuff” of life. The “things of the heart”
become all important. Things like love and joy and peace. Or wisdom.
Or hope. Or faith.

And the wonderful truth is that these gifts are given freely to any
who will take them! None of us has to live without love. There really
is joy to be found in this life. And we can know peace – now.

Fra Giovanni gave us these immortal words in 1513:

“No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in today.
Take heaven!
No peace lies in the future that is not hidden in his present
moment. Take peace!
The gloom of this world is but a shadow.
Behind it, yet within reach, is joy.
There is a radiance and glory in the darkness, could we but see,
and to see we have only to look. I beseech you to look.
Life is so generous a giver….”

You have already been offered things even finer than infinite wealth.
Will you grasp them and make them yours – today?

Steve is right. None of us has to live without love. None of us should. If there is anything those who oppose the light would take from us, it is our ability to forgive without restraint and love that which ennobles and frees us. That would be the indomitable spirit born in each of us. There is a new “resident evil” movie out this past weekend. It amuses me how even our “entertainment” wants to make us afraid, wants to appeal to the dark side of life, feels it must lest no one care. But my favorite movies are all those in which love transcends fear. What IS resident in us is love and light.  When the light wins. I lost my taste for the dark many years ago though I have lived in its shadow all of my life, as have we all. The cold war, terrorism, global warming, gangs, radicals of every stripe and persuasion. All want us to live in fear because it is in that fear that we give them our power, that we allow them to run the world as THEY see fit. Well, I think it is time we take back our power, that we who know the light exists, who have felt it, who have transcended it, even if for brief moments, begin sharing those moments, begin talking about those moments, we can all emerge from our long dark night of the soul into the light that is our birthright. As a child, a song we sang in Sunday School every week as little ones, has new meaning, new purpose in my life, in all of life, I think. “This little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine” we sang each Sunday morning. I think we need to start singing that song every morning, every evening, until the light of those small candles overwhelms the dark, and lets us see that there is nothing there in the shadows but sad, little people, who have lost the ability to see their own light. We can teach them to love too. We will. How’s THAT for a goal for the 21st century? It is coming, it is ALL coming. Sooner than any of us think. The gloom of this world is but a shadow, and we know shadows are not to be feared, because they are caused by the light. much love, :^) gene

If today brings even one choice your way,
Choose to be a Bringer of the Light. :^) gene