After the Scream

Last week, I listened to the CBC radio program Tapestry which was discussing an exposition of The Spiritual Impulse in art, https://www.cbc.ca/radio/tapestry/mystical-landscapes-1.3842067/the-spiritual-impulse-in-art-from-van-gogh-to-monet-1.3842081.  It gave wonderful examples what could be described as mystical art by artists such as Van Gogh and Edvard Munch.

One example that engaged me on a deep level was the painting by Munch that directly followed his most famous work – the Scream which has that iconic image of a man in agony; a portrait of existential dread.  Munch was, not surprisingly, challenged by mental instability and spent some time in an asylum.  When he was released, he produced a work that expressed absolute radiance and joy – the absolute opposite of the anguish and despair of the Scream.  From his depths came the explosion of another kind – one is absolutely opposite in feeling and effect.  Rather than agony what was brought into being was  “The Sun”.  From the depths of darkest despair depicted in The Scream we travel to the heights of brilliant bliss of The Sun.

 

     
                                                    Edvard Munch. The Scream 1893
 

                                                   Edvard Munch. The Sun. 1910-13.

These two pictures are a wonderful exposition of the mystical journey or The Mystic Way as it was called by Evelyn Underhill.  As noted in the Tapestry program:
The Mystic Way (was) described by Evelyn Underhill as a five-part journey in which light periods alternate with dark.  It begins with an awakening, followed by a period of purgation, which can be seen as dealing with the shadow side of the psyche.  Then you come to a period known as illumination, where you start to see things in a new and perhaps original way.  For some this can be followed by the dark night of the Soul where there seems to be the absence of the divine.  The final stage is unity in which you understand that you are one with the divine.  Underhill understood this to be analogous to the artistic creative process.

For me, The Sun is an illustration of the beginning and the end of that journey – the alpha and the omega.  The image captures the essence of the journey which is the return to the beginning as described by T.S. Eliot, “We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”

The image in the Sun is the explosion at the moment after creation - the Big Bang, when the universe was brought into beginning by the Word and began that Mystic Way.  It is also a final return to what Teilhard De Chardin called the Omega Point.  When all is joined in the ultimate unity. 

My you be blessed on your Mystic Way.

Women in the Parables of Jesus

Jesus was someone who was out of sync with his culture in so many ways, least of all in his attitude and relationship with women.  There are many accounts of his interaction with women in his culture that was not how a man would react to women.  Just looking at a few examples, we have the woman caught in adultery who he saved from being stoned to death; there is the Samaritan woman at the well who he engaged with and who he offered the living water;  there is his close relationship with Martha and Mary; and there is the woman – who is not identified  - who anointed his feet with precious nard.  There are all very positive perspectives.

There are also some encounters which are not entirely positive.  There is, first and foremost, his seeming reject ion of his mother who came to him with his bothers and wanted to speak with him.  His response being “who is my mother?”  There was his less than enthusiastic response to his mother at the marriage at Cana when Mary pointed out to him that the wine had run out, “Oh Woman, what has this to do with me?”  There was also his initial rejection of the Canaanite woman whose daughter was suffering from demon possession.  Jesus answered, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel." 

However, these apparent negative events are the exception rather than the rule.  He did address the wine shortage by his first miracle recorded in John’s Gospel; he did come to the aid of the Canaanite woman when she persisted; he did ensure that his mother would be taken care of as one of his last acts on the cross. 

Given his positive relationship with women during his ministry, what was the role of women in his parables?  At first glance, it could be concluded that women were, for the most part, missing in action in those brilliant moral lessons that Jesus used to teach those in his circle and beyond.  His in most well-known ones, women seem to be entirely missing or at most play a minor role.  There is the parable of the Good Samaritan or where the traveller is robbed and left on the side of the road.  A priest and a Levite pass by on the other side but is rescued by a Samaritan.  The traveller is identified as a man, the robbers are assumed to be male, as is the Samaritan-the priest and Levite are undoubtedly male. 

The other parable at the top of the charts is the Prodigal Son where there is no mention of a mother in the little family of father and two sons.  We are told the younger son, “squandered his wealth in wild living” so we can assume that women were probably involved in that episode in the younger son’s life.  There are other notable ones such as The Rich Man and Lazarus, The Great Feast (or Wedding Banquet), The Pharisee and the Tax Collector, the Unforgiving Servant, and The Labourers and the Vineyard where women are absent. 

There is a group of lessons which are classified as parables which do not have a story line such as. The Parable of the Mustard Seed, The Parable of the Net, or The Parable of the Fig Tree.  In these, there is no reference to a person so it is moot for our discussion.

However, there are parables which definitely involve women as central figures. The Parable of the Lost Coin is a prominent one in this category.  It is the widow who loses the coin and diligently searches for it.  This balances the Parable of the Lost Sheep in which the shepherd (male) seeks the lost sheep.  Also, to this point we have the Parable of the Persistent Widow who pesters a judge (male) until she received justice.  There are also parables which use work which would be in the woman’s domain such as the Parable of the Old Cloth on the New Garment, or the Parable of Yeast which a woman mixed with flour. However, these are over all in the definite minority. 

So, does this mean that Jesus is not that much of a feminist - to put it in 21^st century term?  Was he a product of his time and culture to an extent that is greater than we often admit?   One of the strengths of Jesus’ parables is that they were stories that took place in settings that we common and very familiar to the listener.  Men and women each had their place in society and the parables were set in that culture.  This gave them all the more impact when he gave a surprize twist to emphasize the lesson he wanted the listener to appreciate.   To accomplish this, they often contain “elements of reversal” as one source noted e.g. the use of the despised Samaritans to emphasize the correct moral behaviour and attitude. 

All in all, I don’t believe that Jesus parables change the way that we can understand Jesus’ relationship to women and the important place they held in God’s kingdom.  After all, the women were the first to see the empty tomb and spread the news of the Resurrection. 

Blessings on your journey.

Don’t Try and Fool Mother Nature

Somehow, talking about Hurricane Dorian on September 11^th is ironic but quite appropriate.  Both events were devastating to the world, or large parts of it in any case.  Lorna and I are getting back to normal life here at our cottage on P.E.I.  We got off rather lightly with no damage to our cottage and other buildings.  We had a few trees and branches down but fortunately nothing serious – except for Lorna’s gardens – especially the corn which Lorna had high hopes for this year.  We were without power for almost exactly 48 hours with the power back on at 6:30 Monday night to our great relief. 

Unfortunately, many people here on P.E.I. did not get off so lightly.  Some people are still without power as I write this and may not be fully restored until the end of the week.  There are many trees down and crops have been adversely affected and life in general disrupted.  A couple of building fires were a result of the hurricane with one caused by a stove which was on when the power went out and when, it was restored, there was no one home and the stove came on automatically causing the fire from a pot on the stove. 

However, the overall devastation caused by Dorian was much more significant and far reaching than anything experienced on P.E.I.  The devastation in the Bahamas was beyond measure and will be felt for many years.  Any assistance that people feel able to give will be undoubtedly greatly appreciated by the Bahamians. 

We can only sit and perhaps cower in awe and wonder at the power of nature when it is unleashed.  I was reminded of that line in the old commercial, “It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.”  As fortunate as I was being relatively unscathed by Dorian, there was nothing that I did or could have done about that situation.  We are all basically completely at the mercy of the unimaginable forces of nature.  I could have just as easily felt the full power of Dorian as not.  AS much as I hesitate at times to admit, so much of my life has been completely beyond any direct action of mine.  I did not choose to be born as a male child in a white middle-class family in Canada as part of the baby boom with all that was handed to me and all the privileges without any action on my part.  So many other have been less fortunate than I have been and continue to be.

Dorian has been one of the increasing reminders of the hubris of people to believe that we can disregard nature or, if you will, God’s creation and not suffer the consequences.  Despite all the advances in science and technology we are still at the mercy of nature when its full force is unleased on us.  Exploding atomic bombs - the greatest power available to humankind is a mere speck compared to the power of a force five hurricane despite what President Donald Trump fantasizes.  It is doubtful that any action we could possibly take to mitigate the effects of global warming will be able to repair the damage we have done.  However, we can mitigate the extent of that damage and its effects.  But I have serious doubts that we will make any truly serious action until it is far too late. 

We have been called throughout our history to repent our sinful ways.  That is as true today as any other time in our history.  Humankind has seen our foolish ways before - perhaps we will again.  I hope and pray that we will.

Blessings on your journey.

Ultimate Reality

Last week I wrote about the Snowmass Conference which was multifaith endeavor to engage in common points of agreement.  This was an example of how evangelism might move ahead in our multicultural and multifaith society:

In 1984 Father Thomas Keating invited a small group of contemplatives from eight different religious traditions—Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Islamic, Native American, Russian Orthodox, Protestant, and Roman Catholic—to gather at St. Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass, Colorado, to engage in what he called “a big experiment.”

The Snowmass Conference Eight Points of Agreement were the points of common understanding among the traditions.  In those eight points I was interested to note that the word they used for God (in the Christian context) was “Ultimate Reality”.  On consideration, I believe that this is a very good term for God.  It engaged me in part because I had just finished reading the marvellous introduction to mysticism by the wonderful mystic and spiritual director Evelyn Underhill, Practical Mysticism.  This is a wonderful primer on mysticism and contemplation that I highly recommend to anyone who wants to explore that part of life. (A minor criticism of the form and not the content, the edition I have does not include page numbers so it is not possible to give page numbers for quotes from the book.)

Underhill poses the ultimate question which we need to consider, “What is reality”.  Underhill goes further and defines mysticism:

Mysticism is the art of union with Reality.  The mystic is a person who has attained that union in greater or lessor degree; or who aims at and believes in such attainment.

There are many things which prevent us from that union with Ultimate Reality (in the terms of the Snowmass Conference Eight Points of Agreement).  We have personal blind sports which have been called complexes by psychologists.  We have filters that block out much of what is around us as anyone who has noticed, for the first time, something he or she has passed by many times previously.  We have the facility to project onto others characteristics that we don’t want to recognize in ourselves-the shadow in Jungian terms. 

If we move beyond mere psychology there is the reality of other sciences such as quantum physics and astronomy – not to mention astrology -  which reveal a reality beyond anything our natural senses can perceive.  Underhill expresses this, speaking of the artist and the contemplative as people who are able to see beyond the surface of things:

Both have exchanged the false imagination which draws sensations and intuitions of the self into its narrow circle, and there distorts and transforms them, for the true imagination which pours itself out, eager, adventurous, and self-giving, towards the greater universe.

If we are to see the world that the Ultimate Reality (God) has created we must move beyond seeing the surface of things and have eyes to see and ears to hear the wonder of that creation which is beyond the mere sensation that we have learned to perceive the world in ways which we have been required to learn in order to survive on a daily basis.  We are, in so many ways, like that group of blind men (I think in this case it is okay not to put this in gender neutral terms) who are describing an elephant from their different perspectives which Richard Rohr recently used to address our perception of reality:

How do we know what is real? I’m sure you’ve heard the story of a group of people who are blind describing an elephant, each from a different vantage. One person, feeling the elephant’s tail, described a rope. Another, arms encircling a leg, said it was like a pillar or tree. And so on. Every viewpoint is a view from a point. The more ways of knowing we use, the closer we come to understanding, and yet the full picture will always elude us. In this way, mystery is endlessly knowable. 

In so many ways we are people who are blind or deaf or without the sense of touch trying to grasp a piece of the Ultimate Reality – without the realization it is only a piece.  Many accept their experience of the part of the elephant as the whole truth and nothing but the truth of the world.  May your Ultimate Reality give you ears to hear and eyes to see more of that Reality.

Blessings on your journey.