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Hell III: The Human Animal in Hell
2008-02-19 22:41:00
?Blessed are those for whom pain is a metaphor.? Of course, there are metaphorical pains that are bad too, and can even prove fatal, as when they lead to suicide. But to riff off the old jazz ballad, nothing says ?My pain is here to stay? like the intractable physical pain connected with an untreatable progressive illness.Remaining who we are can be tough. Real pain that is severe and protracted enough can make an animal lose sight of everything, including, at first, the human animal.The human animal has one essential advantage over other animals when it comes to hell: we can keep our eyes open longer. When other animals would have reached the point of growling and groaning huddled in a corner of the room, we can still rouse the convolutions of the cortex and raise our fat heads, so to speak, to notice things around us and about ourselves, even as hell deepens.We can overhear the happiness of others ? and eventually, most of the time, with little to no jealousy. We can remember the ...
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Hell II: Beyond the Costume Party
2008-02-16 06:00:00
So finally you say something like, ?Oh Lord, why have you forsaken me?? ? but after that, there?s just this long silence lasting until the end of your life. One of the things about hell is that it defies your expectations, especially the religious ones.In irreligious terminology, this is called, ?really getting nailed.? But if you?ve managed to survive this long, you come down from your cross. And again, since you?re only human and this is hell on earth, you just quietly walk away. For you, there is no ascent into heaven or saving the world.However, you now begin to be governed by the instinct above instinct. It tells you to stop howling. You walk slowly and carefully, picking your way over the flaming logs, trying hard not to stub your toe even though it?s on fire, or to unnecessarily hurt others by throwing flaming objects at them. You start being kind again and smiling sometimes. People think you are becoming yourself again. In reality, your self is dying back there on the cross....
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Hell Trilogy, I: Going to Hell
2008-02-12 22:32:00
Hell is where nothing is as it should be, and all your concentration has to start going into remaining your most simple self.Hell is where you let go of every expectation, every ideal - the way you would have wanted it, your personal favorites ? in order not to let them weigh you down and drown you in the flames. Hell is the place of places in which to say: what the hell.In hell, everything is instinctual and reflexive. Even this thought is instinctual and reflexive. Even your thoughts about your thoughts are instinctual and reflexive when you?ve been in hell long enough.At first, however, you are ungovernable, governed by the instinct below instinct. You jump over flaming logs, your feet on fire, tripping, nearly falling off ledges. (Some do.) You are the anti-human animal, ranting and raving, threatening to bite off their faces ? anyone and everyone?s. Because the world has let you down by sending you down here.You roll around the hell-forest floor howling tears of abandonment and...
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Nobody?s-Listening Spirituality: When Hell Isn?t Just a Place for Others An
2008-02-09 17:44:00
People don't generally like to hear about stuff like this. Still...Hell o HellImagine a disease progression in its 15th year that affects your nerves, muscles, connective tissue and bones and that by now has you mostly bedridden and in widespread, intractable pain. Picture the associated losses, the least of which include career and friends. You?ve been unable to leave the house for over 3 years. You can?t sit to use a wheelchair and you almost can?t walk, spending your upright time kneeling at a keyboard, a lot of it holding your bladder because you can only make so many trips to the bathroom each day. Your reach has deteriorated to about the length of your forearms, and to make a long story a short metaphor that often works literally, your physical state puts most of life?s comforts as well as pleasures out of reach.Helpful idea? You?ve tried it. Prayers, words of hope? Whatever you have - it's eluded diagnosis even at NIH and Johns Hopkins - is innately progressive, similar to M...
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EZ Listening Religion & Spirituality
2008-02-05 19:39:00
Please note: In what follows, I'm not rejecting concepts like blessing, grace, or God's purpose for one's life; I'm rejecting what strike me as misunderstandings of these ideas.Have you been good? Then you're so very special that God won't let YOU suffer!In times of trouble:Ask and you will receive. Receive what?Guidance toward your soul mate, resolution of marital problems, a meaningful career, restored heath ? or even, with ?prosperity theology,? more stuff!Grace, grace, abundant grace! Only open yourself up to it and all will be well.Turn to the angels and no harm can come . . .Only believe . . .In good fortune:I?m blessed . . .Heaven and earth support those who pray to the Lord!We?ve led good lives; God has opened doors for us.I survived the crash because God has a special purpose for me - and apparently not for those other folks that got killed.In Sum, and with reference to all of the above:Blah blah blah . . .Beyond Spiritual MaterialismFeel-good spirituality isn?t the r...
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A Great Awakening or Genuine Indifference?
2008-02-02 16:35:00
On the previous post, a couple of people mentioned having a sense that a spiritual awakening is underway. Several days ago, I read a Jim Wallis post on his God?s Politics blog where he says the same while promoting his recent book on a clip that includes references to the civil rights movement. I questioned Wallis' Awakening concept ? in particular, his idea that this is happening on a large scale ? in a comment to his post that I?ve slightly revised as follows:Not God?s PoliticsFrom what I can see, there is religiosity on the one hand and authentic religion/spirituality on the other. The first is borrowed and proves either superficial or perverted - used for egoistic purposes. The second connects to first-hand experience and gives a person tremendous motivation and purpose, which is what my own book is about.My book isn't directly about politics. That said, to me it looks as if the key political problem in America is that moneyed interests - large corporations and wealthy individ...
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Author Nancy J. Nordenson on Faith, Writing and Art
2008-01-26 06:56:00
The clear and thoughtful writing of Nancy J. Nordenson, author of, Just Think: Nourish Your Mind to Feed Your Soul, first caught my attention on her blog. She was kind enough to agree to an interview and will respond on this discussion thread to questions or comments that readers may wish to direct her way.Paul Martin: Nancy, thanks for stopping by. Please tell us a little about your faith perspective.Nancy Nordenson: My faith perspective aligns with the ancient Trinitarian Christian creeds, such as the Apostle's Creed and the Nicene Creed. These creeds with their statements of belief seem at once to be so concrete yet at the same time so mysterious that one's intellect and imagination could work forever on the possibilities of what is really going on in terms of reality, the flow of grace, and the nature of love. But they aren't just academic or philosophic exercises. They require something of their confessors, they require something of me. What difference does it make to have t...
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Getting Religion, Sort Of
2008-01-23 04:54:00
I liked going to confession. There was a little built-in cage with a sliding door like for your hamster, but a whole priest could fit inside. Only you could just make out his face.I would say, ?Forgive me Father, for I have sinned.? The priest would say something like, ?And how have you sinned, my son?? I could never think of anything, but I always wanted to help out because I liked being called ?son,? plus there he was, stuck in the cage all the time.?I lied, Father.??And whom did you lie to, my son???My friend.??And what did you say???I said my mom was twenty-seven.??Oh. . . And how old is she???I think twenty-seven.??That?s not a lie, son. . .??But she might be twenty-six.?
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God Be With Us
2008-01-20 03:20:00
Blessed are the oppressed who do not become their oppression. Blessed are the God-forsaken who do not forsake God (Cf. Matt. 27:46).Blessed are the great-hearted. For great-heartedness is God-be-with-you not as hope or prayer, but in fact. Great-heartedness is really living what the world under the sun still dreams of.Many are those who identify God with themselves. Few are those who identify themselves with God.

Tuning In (to MLK)
2008-01-16 06:00:00
This is something I wrote for morning announcements at Patrick Henry Elementary School around this time of year during one of my last years at work.When I was a boy I didn?t watch the news much. When I watched TV, I?d usually skip right over it and change the channel to something I thought was more interesting.But once in a while when I got to the news, I?d hear this -- voice. It was just a man speaking, but his voice sounded almost like music ? the way that it would rise and fall, the way that sometimes he would hold a word long, almost like a note in a song, then let his words rest for a moment ? to suddenly pick them up again with even greater power and purpose and energy than before. I had never heard anybody talk like that.So my arm would be getting tired, because I wanted to change the channel ? because back then there were no remotes, and you had to have your hand up on the knob on the TV to do that ? but I couldn?t seem to change the channel while this man was talking.And so...
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This Is Not My Real Post
2008-01-13 19:46:00
I don?t normally post two days in a row ? my real post is the one under this one. It isn?t my fault that contemporary politics, like all great art forms, has power to inspire.The Times They Are A Changin'-O?Change? is all the rage today,At least this week it?s what they say;O Change, O Hope, O Vagueness Great,I think I?ve got a belly ache.But then HC is so specificYou?d almost think there?s nothing to itBut to suggest that she?s the bestBy virtue of experienceThat knows pie charts and power pointLike Colon Powell?s give-a-showThat demoed danger at the timeAnd made her say: ?You're right; let?s go??Money Talks: Our present system of financing political campaigns, which protects monetary donations as free ?speech? under the First Amendment, assures us a steady supply of political animals in leadership positions as collared and leashed by wealthy individuals and corporations for as far as the eye can see. (Not to say, of course, that we can?t do better than the present administration...
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Does Right Religion = Right Politics ?
2008-01-12 15:38:00
Last post there seemed to be general agreement with my position that religious affiliation has no bearing on how well equipped a leader is to govern. Yet I thought that a couple comments on last post?s thread suggested that some of you might be inclined to modify my position into something like ?Religion may tend to have a positive influence on fitness for leadership, but it isn?t the main thing.?Crystal: I'd be happy to have an atheist as president rather than a religious fanatic. I think that it is true, though, that a person really cannot very well compartmentalize their life - what you believe will affect every part of your life, even the public spectrum.A.V.G. Warrier {this is my paraphrase of part of his comment}: The morality of power depends on the ideals and values of the person in power. Few people derive their ideals and values from abstractions; most depend on guidance from institutions.What these remarks suggest to me ? my own inference, I?m not trying to represent wha...
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Christian Presidencies and God’s Politics
2008-01-08 19:20:00
On Jim Wallis' “Two Fundamental Shifts”When I began reading Jim Wallis’ “Two Fundamental Shifts” on his “God’s Politics ” blog, I thought I was about to disagree. Early in his article, Wallis finds encouragement from the fact that “. . . Democrats now speak as much about faith and values as the Republicans do.”Then my mind did a fundamental shift. I found the general tenor of the remainder of Wallis’ remarks more in line with a trenchant observation that he soon proceeds to make: that Martin Luther once stated that he would rather be “governed by a competent Turk than by an incompetent Christian .”An Adjective-Free PresidencyMe too. I want a president – and not the “Christian president” that I heard, in a recent sound bite, that Huckabee would be. Eight years of Christian presidency, if we must call it that, has been more than enough. But neither do I want someone proclaiming him or herself a Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Taoist, Buddhist, atheist or agnostic...

Spirituality and Childhood
2008-01-05 23:02:00
Here are links I received to two short poems for today's post on spirituality and childhood. They are by Irving Karchmar and dedicated to the birth of his children. There follows a link to a short poem I posted last May, then the text in full of an essay by Sabah Negash on children and prayer. Thank you Irving and Sabah.Little Girls, Like Butterflies (for Becky)When a Child is Born (for Matthew)Sky Smile (Scroll down a little ways after you click.)Belief Comes Even to the Hearts of ChildrenDefinitions: Allah = God; Masjid = prayer house; Dua = prayer; Alhamdulillah = all praises are due to AllahMy mom (May Allah (swt) have mercy on her soul) instilled in us at an early age that Allah (swt) listened and answered the prayer of His servants. Of course, as children, we simply believed because our mother believed and we always knew her to be a truthful woman. But our faith in what she said would one day be tested.My mom raised us in the high desert of California. She wanted us to be rai...
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God's Political Will - ?
2008-01-01 23:34:00
Dubya: Representing More than You and MeI’ve noticed references to George figuring that it’s God who put him in the Oval Office. This makes me wonder if he also figures that his dad’s presidency and his family’s powerful connections to the corporate world, not to mention Texas state government, were all just a coincidence. Of course, it could be said that the whole package was God’s will – but then what meaning are we to attach to the concept of “God’s will?” Anything that happens? Anything that happens that we like?God’s Own “To Do” ListTake that familiar laundry list of political positions that their proponents often try to present as God’s will, including anti equal rights for gays and support of equal rights for stem cells and fertilized ova – because they’re really just like you and me, only without the central nervous system. Spare the lives of fertilized ova that are destroyed at fertility clinics anyway because the Bible says to (I’m still loo...
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Is that God Calling?
2007-12-30 02:14:00
Exactly what is “will?” Have you noticed differences in your depth of intentionality on different occasions and at different times in your life? New Year’s resolutions, for example, are known for very often not being followed through with. In contrast, it’s possible to feel ourselves turning in a new direction and giving assent to this at a profound level. Our lives can take on a new or renewed course and purpose. One example of this is the sense that people sometimes have of being called to their work. The will to perform work to which we feel called is indefatigable.How do you account for life-altering changes in intentionality that feel less like we initiate them and more like we respond to something greater than our personal volition?
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Bright Silent Night
2007-12-23 16:31:00
I posted this elsewhere a couple years ago, but it’s seasonal and I think few of you have seen it . . .It was Sunday, but there would be no school tomorrow. Winter break. It was pretty late. It had snowed all afternoon.“Hey Mom – can we take the sled to the Pines?”“I don’t see why not,” Mom said. I was thirteen, Lynne five. Even though I called her “Punko Kid” and “Scrubby Head” around the house, I was pretty responsible for her everyplace else.We dressed in what you needed: long underwear, big mittens over gloves, layers of shirts, knit sweaters, hats, and heavy coats with hoods. We made our way to the door, closing it hard behind us.I stepped inside the big old barn that was our garage and flicked on the single light bulb that threw its dim yellow light into the large interior. It felt even colder in there than outdoors, like the air had tried to go inside to warm up but didn’t realize there wasn’t any heat in the garage. Lynne waited near the light switc...
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Spirit of Transfiguring Love
2007-12-19 23:25:00
DreamI have entered my grandmother’s apartment through the cellar of the house that my mother, sister and I shared with her growing up. Although she died back in 1976, it’s as if “Memere” were alive and well, and still living there.I climb to the top of her stairs just as she opens the door – apparently she’d heard my approach. I realize that until then, she didn’t even know I was in the house; I’m enjoying the prospect of seeing her reaction to my unexpected visit.It’s been a long time. For half a second, she doesn’t comprehend who she’s looking at. In response to her blank expression, it’s almost as if I’m not entirely certain that it’s really her after all.Then, she recognizes me. Through her surprise, she now looks at me in the manner that I recall she always did. Instantly, her face becomes itself, allowing me to recognize her.Only the remembered light of my grandmother looking at me with love allowed my dream to carry the vividness and warmth of her...
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Original Faith: Book Note
2007-12-16 17:08:00
Due to production delays, we have had do adjust our publication date and expect Original Faith to be released in spring of this year.Original FaithFinding the Interfaith Soul of Progressive Religion and SpiritualityFrom Author’s Preface:The Word of our own nature begins and ends with something infinitely greater than ourselves, yet here and now resonates in our own voices. The Word that rises on our own breath is consistent with anyone’s beliefs or lack of beliefs. To speak the Word in this way is to feel and know something original to ourselves. It can only enrich us. It can only unite us. It is time.Paul Maurice Martin
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Faith and Morals
2007-12-12 02:18:00
Lately I’ve heard the phrase “faith and morals” come up around political candidates from time to time, as in polls that ask voters if a candidate's faith and morals are important to them.Do you think a relationship exists between faith and morality? I'm sure we can rule out the assertion sometimes made that atheists are immoral. Anyone who pays attention to the news or looks honestly at other people in day to day life knows that neither atheists nor theists stand out as being any more or less moral than any other large group of human beings.That said, it may still be that a relationship between faith and morality exists. If you consider yourself a person of faith and you lost faith, would you behave differently? If you consider yourself without faith and then had a powerful experience in which you found it, or it found you, do you suppose your behavior would change?For a working definition of faith, how about something like "a hopeful view of life as a whole?"Spirited Child ...
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Spirit of Scriptural Jazz: A Parable
2007-12-09 01:27:00
Scriptural ImprovisationAs long as I managed to confuse half of you with my previous post, thought I may as well take the opportunity to dig myself in deeper while raising the question: what do you think about the idea of improvising scripture? Something that God and nature never intended? Or is this a valid way of trying to understand it? The prophetic-sounding overtones in the first and third paragraphs below, which I obviously wrote, involve no delusions on my part; just trying to maintain a New Testament style.Parable of the HarvestJesus did not come to bring complacency to worshippers and self-satisfaction to a corner of the earth, but came carrying a sword of spiritual discernment for anyone with eyes to see and ears to hear (cf. Matt 10:34). And he said:“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain...
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Spirit of Approaching Truth
2007-12-05 15:48:00
“’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” Mat 22:38-39.I wonder if there may not be a third great commandment which is also like the first. Its perfection would come with following, not leading: love truth.______You try to be succinct, but end up being ambiguous. How often do we wake up with this realization? Not often, I think, but this morning . . . For those who found this post confusing, please see Hayden's comment on the discussion thread and my reply. Verily, I command it unto ye, lol, because it looks like it's just semantics. Thanks, Hayden, for the opportunity to clarify. 12-07______I’m out straight with other things and have been unable to spend much time blogging this last week; it could go on like this for at least another week, but I do plan to at least keep putting up new posts ....
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Spiritual of Truth –?
2007-12-02 19:39:00
There was the Truth of the Roman Emperor. There is the Truth of Christianity, including the Truth of every denomination. There is the Truth of Islam, with Sunni Truth and Shiite Truth. There was the Truth of Communism and now there is the Truth of Capitalism. Here is a truth: flesh often bleeds for the sake of words we spell with capital letters.Have an inspiring story or poem to share about a child? Please see previous two posts.
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A Spirited Child: Caroline
2007-11-27 23:42:00
Caroline was a tiny third grader with big brown eyes. A little shy, she was still friendly and sociable. When she’d stop by my office at lunch now and then for a student mediator meeting or to get ready for a Character Counts Club presentation, she was more of a listener than a talker, yet fully engaged in the conversation. Not a giggler, she still smiled readily and expressively – with her eyes even more than her lips.Near the end of her third-grade year, the whole school took part in the annual awards ceremony, along with many parents and relatives. The large gym was filled with about six hundred people. Microphone and clipboard in hand, I had to step forward from time to time to describe student programs that I had coordinated and recognize students for their achievements. Frankly, this wasn’t the part of my school counselor job that I enjoyed most; it made me feel a little shy myself . . .I was in the middle of a sentence when I felt a sheet of paper slip from my clipboard...
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Spirited Child Diablog
2007-11-24 23:33:00
Children don’t cover up nearly as well as adults. Sometimes this makes a child’s self-centeredness easy to spot. Other times it reveals undisguised wonder, innocence, bravery, or wisdom.Do you have an inspiring child anecdote, story, or poem to post on your blog? It might concern your own child, someone else’s child, or come from your own childhood.After you post, email the permalink by Friday January 4th to martin22204 [at] yahoo.com with “child diablog” in your subject line. Please provide a link to this post at Original Faith so your readers will know about the Spirited Child Diablog too.On Sunday January 6th I’ll post submitted links along with a brief description of each. Included will be a link to my own “spirited child” post, which is coming up next . . .From: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early ChildhoodNot in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory do we comeFrom God, who is our home: He...
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Spirit of What’s Up with That?
2007-11-21 18:03:00
I imagine that most bloggers in the US have started munching turkey by now. For international readers, this is different from eating crow and is literal, not idiomatic. So I figure not many people will read whatever I post today. Therefore, why not this?Btw, and apropos of nothing, I was recently accused of using too many “big words.” It seems to me that, conversely, I eschew most forms of rarefied, idiosyncratic, and oblique parlance. Please note that when I do use such terms, which have earned my sternest disapprobation as antiquated, anachronistic, and otherwise repugnant, it is only to rebuff them in an archly derisive manner.But seriously, I think . . .The Missing Joseph: Scriptural Musings Befitting a Post-Turkey Day’s Torpid LanguorI was talking to my mom the other day when for some reason it hit me: whatever happened to Jesus’ father? That is, Joseph, the carpenter, and not his heavenly Father.I’m just going by memory here and could be wrong. But doesn’t Joseph s...
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Spirit of What’s Happening
2007-11-17 17:01:00
HappeningYou are fully present when all you do is watch yourself happen.UnsolitudeSee yourself through the perspective that sees you to find that you are not abandoned or alone in any circumstance.
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Spirit of Devil’s Advocacy
2007-11-13 22:50:00
Spiritual/Religious Person: “Death doesn’t particularly bother me.”The Devil: “Yeah, right . . . {erupting into evil laughter}A number of comments to the previous post fell into certain broad categories. Below I’ve briefly summarized each – and then, despite basically agreeing with all of you, played devil’s advocate. Because I noticed that if I hadn’t already had certain experiences that make me see your points, I’d want some further explanation. I thought that by challenging your views on what makes death not so much of a problem, this would give anyone who may want to a chance to expound.And of course, anybody who’s inclined to comment in any other manner is also welcome.Why Death’s Not a Problem – Followed by Sinister Replies1. Continuity/Wholeness of Life: Death’s not a problem because life is all one whole and/or the same energy.The Devil Replies:So then, it’s like your friend gives you a cat. You immediately have it killed, cremated, and put it in ...
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Spirituality and Death
2007-11-10 18:24:00
A Slumber Did My Spirit SealA slumber did my spirit seal;I had no human fears:She seemed a thing that could not feelThe touch of earthly years.No motion has she now, no force;She neither hears nor sees;Rolled round in earth's diurnal courseWith rocks, and stones, and trees.--William WordsworthWhat are your thoughts about mortality?Death isn't a problem because . . .Death is a big problem because . . .Death is something of a problem – for example, when people I love die – but it’s not a big or ultimate problem since . . .Death used to be a problem to me but now it’s not a problem/has become less of a problem because . . .Feel free to comment using one of these formulas – or not.from The Raven"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil – prophet still, if bird or devil!By that heaven that bends above us – by that God we both adore –Tell this soul with sorrow laden, if, within the distant Aidenn,It shall clasp a sainted maiden, whom the angels name Lenore –Clasp a rare and ra...
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Spirituality in Action: The Road Ahead
2007-11-06 23:46:00
In part, God lives, moves, and has being in every one of us, even as we have our being completely in God’s. The cycle of creation by which the One created us without our knowledge has entered into the next bend here on earth; now we must engage with rounding that curve.It may be that what it’s all about for us as individuals and as a species is clarifying the unclarified; bringing definition to our own ambiguities; asserting the possible on the basis of desiring it with the awareness and passion of beings that have begun to know what we want.A well-lived life resonates among stars and galaxies, continuing the widening outsweep of creation’s first Word.If you don’t like the word God, substitute Nature, All Being, or Reality. If you don’t like the word “Word,” substitute something like “impulse.”
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