 My experience of Christ whose Resurrection we celebrate this Easter is actually very simple. I know Christ as a radiant warmth - a tangible love that gently melts all creatures, both human and more-than-human, together into One. This radiant warmth is filled with personality, one that is actually the union of Two: both Logos Wisdom and Sophia Wisdom. Logos or masculine Wisdom is the "radiant" aspect, the spiritual enlightenment of insight that - like the sunlight - enables us to distinguish the uniqueness of each and every creature and how each is different from the others. This masculine Wisdom is embodied in Jesus. On the other hand, Sophia or feminine Wisdom is the "warmth" aspect of Christ - felt primarily in the heart - that we can feel viscerally, and which shows how all of the distinctions fit together into one multi-faceted Whole. This is the "aha!" aspect of insight that energizes and vivifies our entire body, soul and mind. This feminine wisdom is embodied in Mary Magdalene. Together, the two form the "Christ." The presence of Christ is a reality that we experience through transmission, just as the state of mind of a Buddhist or Hindu master comes to the student through an actual in-person encounter. For me, this transmission has occurred in many ways since childhood, but a primary vehicle of this transmission was through my spiritual mentor, Thomas Keating, the Trappist monk. In his presence, I felt a love which I KNEW was the presence of Christ awakening that same presence residing deep within my own being. The task of Easter is for EACH OF US to embody this Presence for one another. In other words, to be the vehicle of transmission for each other. Here, Christ is NOT the possession of Christians. Rather, he and she is that warm and radiant aspect of divinely personal love that indwells ALL of us. May each of us embody Christ for one another this day, and so - together with the wisdom energy of ALL of the major figures of the world's other great wisdom traditions - bring all things together into One. Photo: Icon of Christ of Zvenigorod, painted by Andrei Rublev in the 1420s in Russia, discovered by accident in a dilapidated woodshed in 1919. For Spiritual Direction or Workshops, please visit: http://www.resourcesforspiritualgrowth.com/
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 This universe, which was capable of engendering beings capable of vision, must possess vision itself . . . This universe, which was capable of engendering living beings provided with eyes, must itself be moved by the need and the capacity to see." Francois Cheng  Photos: The Lumpy Ridge in Rocky Mountain National Park, and Pasqueflowers in Lory State Park, CO   "When I got to New Mexico that was mine. As soon as I saw it that was my country. I'd never seen anything like it before, but it fitted to me exactly." Georgia O'Keeffe  Well, actually this isn't New Mexico; it's in Golden, Colorado, where my nephew, his wife, and their daughter live in the Harmony Village co-housing community. Our family spent Easter here yesterday. Even though it's only an hour and a half from our home in Fort Collins, I've gotten in the habit of calling it "Little Taos" for obvious reasons. As you might imagine, I had a field day reveling in the lovely aesthetics of the place, and enjoyed an amazing dinner and family time, besides!    "Beauty is the light of ideas; beauty is the splendor of the true. Beauty illuminates goodness and makes it desirable." Francois Cheng Photo: Lumpy Ridge, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO For Spiritual Direction or Workshops, please visit: http://www.resourcesforspiritualgrowth.com/  Lakota elder and chief Albert White Hat, Sr. tells the story of the Creator - Inyan - who "began creation by draining its blood and from this blood created a huge disk around itself. Inyan called this disk Maka, the earth." Then, "Draining its blood for each new creation, Inyan became weaker and weaker. The last to be created was the Human nation." "When creation was complete, Inyan was dry and brittle and broke apart and scattered all over the world." Similarly, in the Christian mystical tradition, we have a God who creates by kenosis - by self-emptying bliss. Jesus embodies this kenosis when he compares himself to a seed which must fall into the ground and die in order for all things to be brought to birth. Tibetan Buddhists speak as well of releasing all thoughts, emotions and perceptions into spacious awareness - the Dharmakaya - and then presiding over their spontaneous reemergence - in all of their profound vividness - from that vast, transparent "Emptiness." During sitting meditation, we watch in spellbound awe as this process occurs in all of its magic and wonder, over and over again. I'm reminded of this principle of death and resurrection as well in the lives of so many of us. Because of some early trauma, each of us has ended up going into a field of work that will help heal others who've been through similar sufferings. In this way, the "death" we've experienced truly leads to the "resurrection" of life in others! Photo: Scene from the High Park Fire, Larimer County, CO, July, 2012 For Spiritual Direction or Workshops, please visit: http://www.resourcesforspiritualgrowth.com/  How can there be an end when the sun sets or the moon goes down? It looks like the end; It seems like a sunset; But in reality it is a dawn . . . Have you ever seen a seed fallen to earth not rise with a new life? Why should you doubt the rise of a seed named “human”? Have you ever seen a bucket lowered into a well coming back empty? Why lament for a soul when it can come back like Joseph from the well? Jelaluddin Rumi Photo: Pasqueflower emerging through the snow, Lory State Park, CO, March 25, 2016 For Spiritual Direction or Workshops, please visit: http://www.resourcesforspiritualgrowth.com/  In Wilderness Insight Meditation, we let go of every thought, emotion and perception in order to melt into and identify ourselves with the vast expanse of divine awareness. But this empty awareness - even though it is brim-full with the vastness of Divine Love - is never meant to be considered as an isolated end in itself. Detachment from the particularities of life as expressed in thoughts, feelings and perceptions is simply a stepping-stone into a magical world in which open awareness - filled with the blissful, self-emptied presence of the Beloved - gradually manifests itself as the humble BACKDROP out of which those same thoughts, emotions and perceptions can then arise and shine in all of their magnificent glory! Thus, detachment and union with open, empty awareness become the vehicle for watching IN UTTER AMAZEMENT as all of the particularities of life arise and shine - highlighted by divine love - as though they are echoes appearing out of NOWHERE! Photo: Pasqueflower in the snow, with Arthur's Rock in the background, Lory State Park, CO, March 25, 2016 For Spiritual Direction or Workshops, please visit: http://www.resourcesforspiritualgrowth.com/ These are the ancient, overpowering silences this planet knew before the advent of modern man . . .3/25/2016  "The great silences mean more than stillness. They are the ancient overpowering silences this planet knew before the advent of modern man . . . , a sense of being engulfed by something greater . . . Quiet is a temporary thing, the old silence ageless. It is the background of man’s inherent feeling for the earth, part of his inner self and of the cosmic point of view, the core of mysticism, of religious belief . . ." Sigurd F. Olson  Photos: Notchtop Mountain and Lake Helene; Blue ice on Lake Haiyaha; Pasqueflowers; Rocky Mountain National Park, CO and Hewlett Gulch, CO   "Human beings have needs that are more than just physical and social; we are spiritual animals. I believe we have a built-in need to experience wilderness and nature, a craving that can be fulfilled partially by knowing that there are such cathedrals to nourish the soul. In trashing wilderness areas that only time and nature create, we diminish ourselves with the loss of an integral component of our spiritual makeup." David Suzuki Photo: Ice patterns on Two Rivers Lake, with Notchtop Mountain in the background, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, March 22, 2016 For Spiritual Direction or Workshops, please visit: http://www.resourcesforspiritualgrowth.com/  “I care only to entice people to look at Nature’s loveliness. My own special self is nothing." John Muir  Photos: Lumpy Ridge, Blue-iced Lake Haiyaha, and Notchtop Mountain from Two Rivers Lake, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO  |
AuthorStephen Hatch, M.A. is a spiritual teacher and photographer from Fort Collins, Colorado. His approach is contemplative, inter-spiritual, and Earth-based. Archives
June 2016
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