The orb of love

When I raced to see the Book of Kells recently in Dublin to discover the museum was closing early, a rarity, in 10 minutes, I took my chances and entered. For five minutes I was alone with the manuscript on view. A friend told me that was a gift for it’s often so crowded that you can’t get close. It was opened to the beautifully depicted John 1:1:

In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.

This scripture is pivotal for me, even before viewing the sacred manuscript artistically and painstakingly rendered by Ionian monks during the 500s. For some time, I have labored with what “Word” means in this context. I clamored for my interpretation, not the dictionary's or anyone else's. I was looking for the deep-in-my bones, soul meaning. Beyond contemporary usage,  I searched for the Aramaic meaning, the language used in Jesus' time. Rabbis used the term "Memra" to mean divine wisdom, sometimes distinct from God.

Looking at it since my experience in Dublin, it is clear to me it references Christ or, more precisely, what I call the Christ Energy. Word is a mystical energy that carries God’s promise of love. That very same energy bounced off the dome of Paris’ Sacre Coeur basilica – where Jesus is depicted in white and gold, rays permeating outward – when I took an overnight pilgrimage one week after visiting the Book of Kells.

“Promise of the sacred heart: I don’t have to do anything special, but focus on God and Jesus. I [really] don’t have to do anything, God just loves me. I need to feel that in every cell." – Journal entry 12th June, 2014 during Sacre Coeur Night of Adoration

Sitting last week in on an afternoon session of QuakerSpring , the annual gathering of Friends across all branches hosted by Conservative Friends, a Dublin Friend, coincidentally, who has been living the peace testimony since the 1970s, unpacked his research into the authentic words of Quaker founder George Fox. Clearly, for this Friend, Fox, too, heartily believed Jesus is the Word, the Word we are to follow. Apparently Fox could debate and recite Scripture with the best of them, which he did. Yet he and early Friends espoused that Christ is the word of God and they would always follow Jesus even when contradicting the Old Testament. According to Charles Lamb, the Irish Friend and peace activist, Scripture included the laws and prophets until John and, after that, the kingdom had come and was "now being spoken by his son."

The thread of Christ ran through my two days at QuakerSpring, knitting in more keenly the idea implanted in me at Trinity College's Book of Kells and Sacre Coeur that Christ is present now to all. Of course I have known this intellectually, drummed into me since I was a child, and, as Fox would say, experimentally – from my own experience. This time, however, I see the implicit promise of sacred, unconditional love, even for me. I must do nothing.

• Who or what does Jesus represent to me?
• What are my intellectual ideas about him?
• How have I experienced Christ?
• What has challenged me to refine my understanding?
• How do I share my experience of God's eternal love?


cutting through centuries
on a gilded page
crafted far away

yet present today

and on a ceiling,
radiating golden
rays that pull
me into the
orb of love

again from
the lips
of a Quaker
interpreting
George Fox,
who knew
the Word we
are to
follow

for it
is there for 
all,
patiently
waiting to
transform us

Listen to this post:

Unwinding in the heartland

I had not expected that the journey to the friend’s condo where I am staying a week to write and “be” would have been so eventful and evocative. I had been warned that once I exited the highway, it would be scenic.

I am discovering that many of my recent pilgrimages have been to Indiana, the heartland, in an unconscious sort of way. I adore the countryside here. The Hoosier flair is distinct from that of the Buckeye. There’s more of a “homey”ness and charm. A simplicity and acceptance of a plainer, yet richer, life.

The first hour was about unwinding and remembering who I am. Just me. Not me and anybody else or their needs. Merely mine.

At the hour mark, I was retracing an old and painful path to a job I had over a decade ago at a casket company in the middle of Nowhere, IN. The stark, contemporary structure still stands again the farms and spires as it did then. The memory of spilling up the steps with the other clones every morning is as clear as a zombie movie. Like lemmings marching to their death in a mindless trance. For the first time, I encountered the glass ceiling. I drove 65 miles each way for three years and tapped that angst today. I’m still waiting to write: “Whose dream is it, anyway, to work at the casket company?” 

With a sigh, I passed Batesville and veered off the freeway a few exits later and immediately into farm country: extended barns collapsing into the road, muddy white peaked houses, laundry fluttering in the chilly sun and wonderfully snaking two-lane roads.

Until Columbus, IN, a contemporary architectural Midwest marvel I visited as a Girl Scout [the few years I wore a very constrictive uniform … never to be repeated] that had mesmerized me with the juxtaposition of soaring art rising above the cornfields.

More curves and I was breathless passing through very familiar territory: a state park and environs we frequented as kids; one of our family’s favorite haunts. I had not had time to study the route, so this leg was a gift of time travel. I took a quick detour through town and spotted the local restaurant still there, decades later, and the antique shop that used to boast a real-live skeleton in a coffin; a highlight for us kids. What is it with me, Indiana and death?

On toward Bloomington and the GPS rankled me, undermining the written directions I had from the gracious condo owner. It sent me the wrong way on a one-way street. Instant terror easily overcome by climbing the curb. Not to be repeated [hopefully].

Finally ending my journey in the woods overlooking a lake with nothing but me, my computer and book calling.

• What's my current journey?

• Am I taking the time to travel the scenic route?

• What's unraveling for me along this journey?

• What places is it touching in my memory?

• How is it shaping my future?

hurriedly leaving

slamming the trunk closed

and taking off

only aware of getting away

unprepared

for the beauty

of the journey

because, often,

the journey

is the destination

only we seem to forget