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Some Sayings from Meister Echart When I give birth to Christ We are all meant to be mothers of God. What good is it to me if this eternal birth of the divine Son takes place unceasingly but does not take place within myself? And what good is it to me if Mary is full of grace if I am not also full of grace? What good is it to me for the Creator to give birth to his Son if I also do not give birth to him in my time and my culture? This, then, is the fullness of time. When the Son of God is begotten in us. Meister Eckhart, quoted in Gospel Medicine (Barbara Brown Taylor) There exists only the present instant... a Now which always and without end is itself new. There is no yesterday nor any tomorrow, but only Now, as it was a thousand years ago and as it will be a thousand years hence
We are celebrating the feast of the Eternal Birth which God the Father has borne and never ceases to bear in all eternity... But if it takes not place in me, what avails it? Everything lies in this, that it should take place in me.
Words derive their power from the original word.
What a man takes in by contemplation, that he pours out in love.
Truly, it is in darkness that one finds the light, so when we are in sorrow, then this light is nearest of all to us.
To be full of things is to be empty of God. To be empty of things is to be full of God.
The outward man is the swinging door; the inner man is the still hinge
The eye with which I see God is the same eye with which God sees me One person who has mastered life is better than a thousand persons who have mastered only the contents of books, but no one can get anything out of life without God
Man goes far away or near but God never goes far-off; he is always standing close at hand, and even if he cannot stay within he goes no further than the door
If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.
If God gave the soul his whole creation she would not be filled thereby but only with himself. God expects but one thing of you, and that is that you should come out of yourself in so far as you are a created being made and let God be God in you
The knower and the known are one. Simple people imagine that they should see God as if he stood there and they here. This is not so. God and I, we are one in knowledge.
Some sayings from Julian of Norwich, 14th Century Mystic in her book `Revelations of Divine Love’
GOD OUR TRUE HOME In our Father, God Almighty, we have our being; in our merciful Mother we are made and restored. Our fragmented lives are knit together and made perfect.... And by giving and yielding ourselves, through grace, to the Holy Spirit we are made whole. (LT58)
This is the life of faith which is “our light in our night. This light is God, our endless Day”. (LT83) Fragmented and alienated, yet one and whole in our Mother-Christ, visibly and painfully sinful, yet invisibly and delightfully “at home”. For Julian, according to Thomas Merton, the “heart of theology [is] not solving the contradiction, but remaining in the midst of it, in peace, knowing that it is fully solved, but that the solution is secret, and will never be guessed until it is revealed”. What difference will it make to realise that you are already home, that what you long for is already yours, that your future (Jesus Christ) has already appeared? Instead of becoming something you are not, God is calling you to become more fully who you are — “Becoming what I am” This is truly the good news — letting go of striving and struggle, and living our lives as gift. What’s it like for you not to have all the answers, not “solving the contradictions”? What’s it like being with yourself or someone in great need and not knowing, not fixing things up....? Notice Merton says ‘remaining in the midst of it, in peace”. Do you think it is possible for you? Merton seems to think being met by God is more important than solving the problem. |
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Something to Ponder |