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You're listening to a podcast

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by the Center for Action

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and Contemplation. To learn more,

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visit cac.org. Greetings. I'm

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Jim Finlay. Welcome

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to Turning to the Mistakes. Good

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morning, everyone, and welcome to

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our time together, Turning for Guidance, to

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the teachings found in T.S. Eliot's

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poem, Four Quartets. We

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are now turning to the third of the

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four poems, which is titled,

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Dry Salvages, and an

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explanatory note in my edition explains

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that Eliot has his parents when

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they left England and settled in America.

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In the summers, they vacationed in New

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England. And

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in New England, off the

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coast of Cape Ann, Massachusetts, there's

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a small cropping of rocks in

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the distance, which are called the

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salvages. And it has

1:07

a little beacon or a little lighthouse in it

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to warn the ships going by so they don't

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crash and sink on the rocks.

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And so he's going to use that as the place for

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the poem, around time and eternity. And

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really what the poem is about, deeper down,

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are the ways in which

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we in time, especially in

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the time of technology and engineering

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and achieving things, it's

1:35

really about the ways that we

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interface with the primordial, with

1:40

the primitive. There's a

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saying that nature is God's first

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scripture. It's the world. And

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so there's the primordial world, and

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then there's the effect of

1:52

technology and engineering and science

1:55

about being exiled from the primordial.

1:58

And also the primordial depths of our self. That's

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really the poem. And how do we be healed

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from that exile? So

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the poem begins, first stanza. I

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don't know much about gods, but

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I think the river is a strong brown

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god, sullen, untamed,

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intractable, patient to some degree,

2:20

at first recognized as a

2:22

frontier, useful,

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untrustworthy, as a conveyor of

2:27

commerce. Then only

2:29

a problem confronting the builder of

2:32

bridges, the problem

2:34

once solved, the brown god is

2:36

almost forgotten by the dwellers

2:38

in cities, ever, however,

2:41

implacable, keeping

2:43

his seasons in rages, destroyer,

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reminder of what men choose

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to forget, unhonored,

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unpropitiated by worshippers of

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the machine, but

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waiting, watching, and waiting. I'd

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like to reflect on this. You

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know, it's really true that in

3:03

the ability to build bridges over

3:05

the river, traffic

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can move freely. And

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once the bridges are built, the river is

3:12

forgotten and moves

3:14

on. In terms of conditions

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of comfort and practicality, it's true.

3:20

But not completely forgotten, because

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the river has its own primordial

3:25

time in which floods occur, and

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homes and streets and so on

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just filled with water, destroyer, this

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way. And we're shocked when that happens. And

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then it drains off, we wrote, till it happens the next

3:39

time. And

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so he's talking about this kind of estrangement

3:44

from the primordial, but it's not

3:46

just the strange way in which

3:48

technology really keeps us

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safe from the destructive powers

3:53

of the primordial. And it could not just be

3:55

water here, it could also be tornadoes, earthquakes,

3:59

fires. The realm of

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nature reminds us we're not

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in complete control. There's

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a deeper problem that he sees

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in this. And the deeper

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problem is what happens

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is what's not recognized by worshippers

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of the machine. But

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the primordial force of nature, the

4:18

river, is waiting, watching and

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waiting. His rhythm was

4:23

present in the nursery bedroom

4:26

in the rank, Elantas, of

4:28

the April door yard in the smell of grapes

4:30

on the autumn table. So I want to reflect

4:32

on this for a minute. That

4:35

really the infant's bedroom

4:37

is primordial because

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the infant is primordial. And

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that's why I use this image I've used it

4:44

before in these reflections where a

4:47

mother is holding her newborn infant and

4:50

she holds it. It's so limited. It

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can't sit up by itself, dress itself,

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feed itself, talk. It's

4:57

like the essence of limit. And

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yet with the imperial strength with

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which her infant is clasping her

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extended little finger, it all but

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carries her heart away. She

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knows that if she were to die in the

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act of saving the infant, she would die in

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the truth. What's also

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true is this infant,

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in the limitless nature of its limits,

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reveals her to herself as capable of

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seeing that, which is

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the primordial. And she also

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knows underneath the layers of all the

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things she is able to do, there's

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also a limitless limit within her to

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the sacred that never dies. We're

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touching on a big theme now we'll be looking

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at in further sessions with later mystics. William

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Blake, the poet, the

5:43

Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins on

5:46

beauty and nature. He says, he

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has a poem, he says, if you're holding a leaf

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in your hand, know that of

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all the trillions of leaves throughout the whole world,

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only the leaf you're holding is that leaf. And

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the leaf is still there. saying, in effect, I came here

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to be me, inside

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of Duns Scotus. We

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also see it in Martin Heidegger, people

6:08

on their farms in Germany, he said after the

6:10

war there were so many refugees after

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the war. But on the farmland,

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there's people sitting in their farmhouse that

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the father lived in, the grandfather, the

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grandfather, the great-grandfather, the great-grandfather. And

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the primordial darkness is falling about the house,

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but they don't even know it because they're

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huddled around their radio. They

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were exiled from technology by

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the primordial depths, which really

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is the divinity of the

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concreteness of everything. He

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takes it deeper. The river is within us.

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The sea is all around us. The

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sea is the land's edge also. The

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granite into which it reaches. The

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beach is where it tosses its hints

6:51

of earlier and other creation. See

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the river is within us. We have

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our body. We're doing fine. But

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then we get sick. Where

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we fall down and we get, have

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to go to the hospital. Where

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we get a terminal diagnosis. So

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here the primordial mystery of the body, the

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primordial is within us. And we're exiled from

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the primordial depths of it all. Like what's

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wrong? Not that we shouldn't try to fix

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it. We should. Good

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luck with that. Sometimes it works.

7:20

Sometimes it doesn't. Eventually it doesn't because

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we all die. So although eventually the

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body that is in time dies by

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discovering and sitting deeply with the fact

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that it's endlessly ending, we can come

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upon within the beloved, within ourselves that

7:33

which never ends. Like

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the divinity of ourself. And the

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poem is really inviting us to

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be stabilized in this sensitivity, which

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is a meditative state to be conscious,

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not to be in time. This

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hints of earlier creations. So we're walking along

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the beach. The

7:51

starfish, things we see

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there walking along the shoreline, the

7:55

horseshoe crab, the whale's backbone, the

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pools where it offers to. our curiosity,

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the more delicate algae in the sea

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anemone. It tosses

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up our losses, the torn seine, the

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shattered lobster pot, the broken ore, the

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gear of foreign dead men. The

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sea has many voices, many gods

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and many voices. The

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salt is on the briar rose, the

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fog is in the fir trees. The

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sea howl and the sea yelp are

8:23

different voices, often heard together. I'm going

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to skip down some lines now. Are

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all sea voices and

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the heaving groaner and a groaner is a whistling

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buoy that floats in the

8:36

water to warn ships about the shoreline. Rounded

8:40

homeward and the sea gilt and

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under the oppression of the silent

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fog the tolling of the bell,

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autumn, clang, clang, a

8:49

warning about the rocks and

8:51

the oceans. There's

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time, not our time, rung

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by the unhurried groundswell

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but a time older than the time of

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chronometers. And a chronometer, look

9:04

this up, are clocks that keep steady time

9:06

in the midst of movement so they're used

9:08

on ships at sea. So

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there is a time that's older than the time

9:13

kept by a while, like a timeless time. Older

9:17

than the time counted by ancient, now

9:19

he's going to bring it

9:21

now to an experience. Meditative

9:24

mind. Older

9:26

than the time counted by

9:28

anxious, worried women lying awake,

9:30

calculating the future, trying

9:33

to unweeve, unwind, unravel and piece

9:35

together the past and the future

9:38

between midnight and dawn when the

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past is all deception and

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the future is futurless before the morning

9:45

watch when time stops and time is

9:47

never ending and the groundswell that is

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and was from the beginning clangs the

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bell. I like to reflect on this.

9:55

You know it's the experience of insomnia. It's

9:58

like you're lying there at night. And

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also, it's women lying at night worrying

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about their husbands or sons out in

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the open sea about returning, and she

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can't sleep. And

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the ego in time, knowing

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the sleep that it's missing, would like to get

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back to sleep. But here's the

10:17

thing, sleep is primordial. Sleep

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is primordial. But here's also the inability

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to sleep is primordial. It's

10:26

the primordial nature of your own body. And

10:29

our ego in time, understandably, we don't like

10:31

this. We don't

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like it. But instead of resisting

10:35

it, we would quietly listen to

10:38

it as the gate of eternity. And

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that's the meditative state. It's

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like the discomfort of the very place that

10:45

lets us go deeper. If only

10:47

we would give it a chance to take us there.

10:50

I was giving a retreat somewhere, and a person

10:53

talked about insomnia, never waste a

10:55

sleepless night. And I was like, what

10:57

is the power lounging this way? You

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know, insomnia, sleep is

11:02

so mysterious, it's primordial. But

11:04

not being able to sleep is primordial. So

11:07

if instead of trying to get to sleep,

11:09

we would lie in the dark and think

11:11

about the mystery of insomnia, like insomnia. And

11:14

you would ponder your insomnia. You'd probably be asleep

11:16

in three minutes. So

11:18

it's like to give up the resistance

11:21

to the deeper place, which carries us

11:23

beyond the edges of sequential time. See,

11:26

it's where time stops, namely when the dawn comes,

11:28

the time of night stops, you get out of

11:30

bed. But the time that stops

11:32

doesn't stop, because then you go through the time of

11:35

the day. It goes on and on and on. Part

11:38

two of the poem, section two.

11:42

Where is there an end of it? The

11:45

soundless wailing, the

11:47

silent withering of autumn flowers,

11:50

dropping their petals and remaining

11:52

motionless. Where

11:54

is there an end? To the

11:56

drifting wreckage, the prayer of the

11:58

bone on the beach. the

12:01

unprayable prayer of the calamitous

12:03

enunciation. There

12:05

is no end, but addition,

12:08

the trailing consequence of

12:11

further days and hours, all

12:13

emotion takes to itself the emotionless

12:15

years of living among the breakage,

12:18

what was believed in as

12:20

the most reliable and therefore the

12:23

fittest for enunciation. There

12:26

is the final addition, the failing

12:28

pride or resentment at

12:31

failing powers, the unattached

12:33

devotion which might pass for

12:36

devotionless, in

12:38

a drifting boat with a slow

12:40

leakage, the silent listening, the undeniable

12:42

clamor of the bell of the

12:44

last enunciation. I want to reflect

12:46

on this. See,

12:49

where is there an end to

12:51

all that is perpetually ending? And

12:53

our struggles with it, it never

12:56

ends. It's the

12:58

endless nature of endlessness, of everything

13:00

ending in the midst of our

13:02

toil. Emotion

13:04

takes to itself the emotionless, because when

13:07

we sit very deeply with it, it's

13:10

beyond affect. That is,

13:12

there's no emotion that's adequate to

13:14

it. And

13:17

also an unattached devotion which

13:19

could pass for devotionless, it

13:22

could be as if you don't care, but

13:24

it's an unattached devotion, namely

13:27

it's a deep kind of

13:29

in the eternal depths, like a

13:31

devotional sincerity in the midst of

13:33

the eternality, of the passing away

13:35

of everything that lays bare that

13:37

in us and never passes away.

13:41

In a drifting boat with a slow leakage, what's

13:45

it like being a human being? It's out

13:47

in the middle of the ocean in a little rowboat and the

13:49

boat's leaking. See, it's going down, and

13:51

that's us. The silent

13:53

listening to the undeniable clamor of

13:55

the bell, the last enunciation, the

13:57

ending of everything, the inevitable ending.

14:00

on and on it goes. I want

14:04

to skip down a few stanzas. There

14:06

is no end of it. The

14:08

voiceless wailing, no end

14:10

to the withering of withered flowers,

14:12

to the movement of pain. It

14:15

is painless and motionless. The drift

14:17

of the sea and the drifting

14:19

wreckage. The bones prayer to death.

14:21

It's God. Only the

14:23

hardly barely prayer of the one

14:26

annunciation. And their annunciation is capitalized

14:28

because it's the angel Gabriel announcing

14:31

to marry the birth of Christ.

14:34

And when the annunciation was used earlier in

14:36

lowercase letters, nyxtanza.

14:40

It seems as one becomes older

14:43

that the past has another pattern

14:46

and ceases to be a mere

14:48

sequence or even development. The

14:51

latter a partial fallacy encouraged

14:54

by superficial notions of

14:56

evolution, which becomes in

14:58

the popular mind a means

15:00

of disowning the past. Progress.

15:03

The moments of happiness. Not

15:05

the sense of well-being, fruition, fulfillment,

15:08

security, or affection. Or even a

15:10

very good dinner. But the sudden

15:13

illumination we had the experience but

15:15

missed the meaning. There was the

15:17

experience that we missed the meaning

15:20

and this is the meaning. That

15:23

in the very cutting edge of that which

15:25

even now is passing away is being laid

15:27

bare that which never passes away. We're

15:30

experiencing it but we miss the meaning

15:32

of what we're experiencing. Until

15:35

in a state and consciousness when

15:38

we're not in time, which are

15:40

these moments of meditative awakening and

15:42

which in sitting with the poem is trying

15:44

to invite us to stay there. Kind

15:47

of the poetic elegance of

15:50

this depth dimension of the eternality of

15:52

the passing away of all that never

15:54

passes away. And

15:57

to approach the meaning restores the

15:59

experience. But if we look back at the past

16:01

of experience and the light of this meaning it

16:04

restores the true nature of the experience Because

16:06

we see it in the light of eternity

16:09

Tipping down a few lines. This is

16:11

not the experience of one life only but

16:13

of many generations Not

16:16

forgetting something that is probably

16:18

quite ineffable. This isn't

16:20

just us. It's always been this way

16:24

Down through the Middle Ages down through

16:26

the centuries people were living their lives

16:28

now long gone Just like someday will

16:30

be long gone not only

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will we be gone? 10,000

16:35

years from now, but the people remembered us will be

16:37

gone 10,000 years from now, but

16:39

then also they'll be gone It

16:42

goes on endlessly this way and yet spiritually

16:44

none of us are gone because nobody dies

16:47

spiritually The

16:50

backward look behind the assurance of

16:52

recorded history the backward half look

16:54

over the shoulder Towards

16:57

the primitive terror now

16:59

we come to discover that the

17:01

moments of agony Whether

17:03

or not due to misunderstanding Having

17:07

hoped for the wrong things or dreaded

17:09

the wrong things is not in

17:11

question are

17:13

likewise permanent When

17:15

I look back at my life There

17:18

are things that I was hoping for But

17:20

having grown older over time I was hoping for

17:23

the wrong things because they were perpetuating

17:25

the very thing I was trying to be free from And

17:28

I was dreading the wrong thing Because the

17:30

very thing that I dreaded and no wonder I dreaded

17:32

it was the very thing that set me free When

17:35

I passed through it and that's

17:37

going on right now in this

17:39

moment with

17:41

such permanence as time has We

17:45

appreciate this better in the

17:47

agony of others nearly

17:49

experienced evolving

17:51

ourselves than in our own

17:55

When we love someone in

17:57

our empathy with them when they're safe suffering

18:00

and we see their fragility, it helps us

18:02

to see this. Because

18:04

in the fragility that's very real, we see shining

18:07

out in our love for them that which never

18:09

dies. Roman

18:11

numeral three, I'm moving down to the next part. I

18:16

sometimes wonder if that

18:18

is what Krishna meant, among

18:20

other things. We're

18:22

one way of putting the same thing, that

18:25

the future is a faded song, a

18:27

royal rose or lavender spray

18:30

of wistful regret for

18:32

those who are not yet here to regret.

18:36

Pressed between yellow leaves of a

18:38

book that has never been opened

18:40

and the way up is the

18:43

way down, the way forward is the way

18:45

back. You cannot face

18:47

it steadily, but this thing

18:49

is sure, that time is

18:52

no healer, the patient is no

18:54

longer here. I

18:56

would now like to stop because here he's referring to

18:58

Krishna and what he's referring to

19:01

is the Bhagavad Gita. So

19:03

I'd like to read this passage in the

19:05

Bhagavad Gita, one of these beautiful mystical passages

19:07

in the Hindu tradition, and they panish heads.

19:12

What the Bhagavad Gita is

19:14

about is a person

19:16

in a chariot is going into battle because

19:19

of a conflict of the clans in India

19:22

at the time, it's going to be this

19:24

battle. And with him in

19:26

the chariot is the Lord Krishna. So

19:29

the first part of the poem is he

19:31

asked Krishna to lead him out into the

19:33

middle of the battlefield so he can look

19:35

around to see what's happening. And here it's

19:37

his own relatives, his own family,

19:40

his own cousins and family, the clan members.

19:42

And he said, I don't want to do

19:44

it. I don't want

19:46

to kill these people and I don't want to die

19:48

either, which is understandable.

19:51

That's even time. And

19:54

then here's Krishna's answer to him. Krishna

19:57

said to Arjuna as if smiling. You

20:00

mourn those, Arjuna, who do

20:03

not deserve mourning. To

20:05

learn it mourn neither the living nor the dead.

20:08

Your words only sound wise. Do

20:11

not think, I did not

20:13

exist, that you do not exist,

20:16

that all these kings do not exist, and

20:18

it is not that we shall ever cease to exist

20:21

in the future. To the

20:23

embodied Atman, the embodied Atman, the

20:25

Hindu god of Brahman, Vishnu, and Shiva, that

20:29

Vishnu sends avatars, sends

20:31

messengers to earth to reveal the eternity

20:33

of time to people, and Krishna is

20:35

an avatar of Vishnu. They also believe

20:37

Jesus is an avatar of Vishnu, an

20:40

incarnate presence of the divine. To

20:43

the embodied Atman, boyhood,

20:46

maturity, and old age

20:48

continue imperceptibly, and

20:51

just that happens with the acquisition

20:53

of a new body. This

20:55

has not confused the steady soul.

20:58

Heat, cold, pain, pleasure,

21:00

these spring from sensual

21:02

contact, Arjuna. They

21:05

begin and they end. They exist for the

21:07

time being. You have to learn to put

21:09

up with them. The

21:11

man whom these cannot distract is

21:14

the man who is steady in

21:16

pain and pleasure, is

21:18

the man who achieves serenity. The

21:21

untrue never is, the true never

21:23

isn't. The knower is the truth,

21:25

know this, and the self that

21:27

pervades all things is imperishable. Nothing

21:30

corrupts this imperishable self. Once

21:33

I see, I'll put it in

21:35

Christian language, that I see that I'm

21:37

created by God in the image and likeness of

21:39

God. I'm the beloved. That

21:41

God contemplated me in Christ before the

21:43

origins of the universe. And

21:46

for all of eternity, God will continue

21:49

to contemplate me in Christ in eternity,

21:51

in divineness, in God. Therefore,

21:54

the very mystery of

21:56

myself, the divinity of

21:58

myself, that I'm subsistence. and God

22:01

like light subsist in flame, it

22:03

never ends. So

22:06

I discover that which never ends, and the

22:08

deep acceptance of that which ceases to end.

22:11

So don't be afraid. See,

22:14

it's so interesting, he's saying, look, go

22:16

to battle, don't worry how many people

22:18

you kill, nobody dies. And

22:21

don't worry if you're going to die, you don't die

22:23

either. Because the ottoman is eternal. As

22:26

long as the war is just, that

22:28

is as long as you're fighting for a good cause,

22:30

fight well. It's

22:32

honorable. It's holy, don't worry about

22:34

it. But notice,

22:37

for Jesus, practice nonviolence. See, the

22:39

one who lives by the sword

22:41

dies by the sword. He

22:43

refused to defend himself. And

22:46

so Dr. Martin Luther King, see, following

22:48

Gandhi to overcome the enemy with self-suffering

22:50

sincerity and truth, Gandhi practiced,

22:52

and that so inspired Martin Luther King

22:55

in the movement that started the whole civil rights

22:57

movement, of the beloved community, you

22:59

can't make us stop loving you. You say to

23:01

the people, the white people that are hurting you.

23:04

So it's very different. But

23:07

it's very different in this

23:09

same ulterior understanding. Don't

23:11

fight because the people that

23:13

are doing this to you, God's infinitely in love with

23:16

every one of them. And

23:18

if you fight, you become part of the

23:20

problem. Don't do that. And the other side

23:22

of it, Advaita, like everything is God, like

23:24

the self is boundary-less. Don't worry about

23:27

how many people die. Don't you see? Nobody

23:30

dies. And that's what it means

23:32

to be awakened, Advaita. Now,

23:34

he goes to a specific moment in time, as

23:37

an example of this, where people

23:39

are caught in time. There's something

23:41

he's inviting them to see. When

23:44

the train starts and the

23:46

passengers are settled to

23:48

fruit periodicals and business letters,

23:52

and those who saw them off have left

23:54

the platform, their faces

23:56

relax from grief into relief to

23:59

the sleepy rhythm of the day. of a hundred hours.

24:02

Fair forward, travelers, not

24:05

escaping from the past into

24:07

different lives or into any

24:09

future. You are

24:11

not the same people who left that station

24:14

or who will arrive at any terminus, while

24:18

the narrowing rails slide together

24:20

behind you. Watching

24:23

the furrow that widens

24:25

behind you, you shall

24:27

not think the past is finished or

24:30

the future is before us. At

24:33

nightfall, in the rigging and

24:35

the ariel, is a

24:37

voice, discounting, though not to

24:39

the ear, the murmuring shell

24:41

of time and not in

24:44

any language. I'd like

24:46

to reflect on this. So

24:48

let's say you get on the train and you're going to go

24:50

off on this journey. Don't

24:54

think that you are who you were,

24:56

the person who got on the train.

24:59

And don't think, or don't think

25:01

you used to be the you

25:03

that got on the train and you no longer

25:05

are. And don't think that

25:08

you're the you who's going to arrive and get off the

25:10

train. And don't think you're other than the you that's going

25:12

to get off the train. See

25:14

the passageless passage of time. See,

25:17

fair forward traveler into the timelessness

25:19

of the present moment that never

25:21

ends. I use this image before

25:23

I'm going to do it again

25:25

here poetically. That if

25:27

we do understand the present moment as

25:30

the way the moment concretely is right now, so

25:32

if you would take a picture of me with

25:34

my hands held in a certain position, click. And

25:37

that's the present. That

25:39

we cannot make the present last as

25:42

it yields to what we call the future, namely

25:44

as I move my hands down. We

25:47

cannot make the moment last as it yields

25:49

to what we call the future. And in

25:51

doing so, it's becoming what we call the

25:53

past. But

25:55

the not lasting moment of the present

25:58

moment forever lasts. The Buddhists say, hail

28:00

Mary. And the word became flesh

28:02

and dwelt among us and you say the hail Mary. Then

28:05

there's a third phrase and you say the hail Mary. Then there's

28:07

a prayer. And you hear that

28:09

three times a day. So it's like the

28:11

timelessness of time, like the eternality of time,

28:13

the clanging of the bell tolling

28:15

through time. So when I was

28:18

in the monastery, when we said the Angelus,

28:20

we turned towards the church, knelt

28:22

down on the floor and bowed over and touched our knuckles

28:24

to the floor. And we all bowed over

28:26

and said, so if you're out in the fields, you

28:29

know, picking strawberries, and the Angelus

28:31

rang, you bow over and touch the knuckles. You

28:33

said the Angelus in the middle of the strawberry

28:36

patch. And once the

28:39

woods was, there's a lot of woods surrounded the

28:41

monastery and there was a forest fire. And

28:44

Merton had us go on as a novices to fight

28:46

the forest fire with shovels and so on to stop

28:48

it. And as we were

28:50

out beating away the flame, we heard

28:52

the Angelus ringing and the tower clock

28:54

of the monastery. He says, yeah, kneel

28:56

down. So we all knelt down, bowed

28:58

over, touched our knuckles to the floor

29:00

as the flames were raging, saying the

29:02

Angelus. That's the eternality of time passing

29:05

this way. It's

29:07

a great moment. Roman

29:09

numeral five, last

29:12

section. To

29:14

communicate with Mars, Mars is the God of

29:16

War. To communicate

29:18

with Mars, converse with spirits.

29:21

To report the behavior of the sea monster,

29:24

describe the horoscope, heuristicate

29:26

or scry. Observe

29:29

disease and signatures, evoke

29:32

biography from the wrinkles

29:34

of the palm and tragedy from

29:36

fingers. Release

29:38

almonds by sortilage or

29:41

tea leaves. Riddle the

29:43

inevitable with playing cards, fiddle

29:46

with pentagrams, or

29:48

dissect the recurrent image

29:50

into preconscious terrors to

29:53

explore the womb or tomb or

29:55

dreams. All these

29:57

are usual pastimes and drugs.

36:01

There are only hints and guesses, hints

36:03

followed by guesses, and the rest is

36:06

prayer, observance, discipline,

36:08

thought, and action. The

36:11

hint half-guessed, the

36:13

gift half-understood is

36:16

incarnation. Yes, you know, it's like

36:19

a guess, and it's

36:21

half-understood, but the intimacy

36:23

of my half-understanding is the incarnation

36:25

of what I don't quite understand.

36:27

Like God's the infinity of

36:30

the intimacy of the inability to not

36:32

quite understand the holiness of

36:34

it, because it's

36:36

un-figurable, because it's

36:38

boundary-less in all directions. Here,

36:41

the impossible union of spheres of

36:43

evidence is actual. That is the

36:45

impossible union of time and eternity,

36:48

of the uncreated and the created,

36:50

is actual. Here,

36:52

the past and the future are

36:54

conquered and reconciled. Here, what is

36:56

the here? The here

36:58

is a moment we're sincerely given over to

37:00

the intimacy of what we

37:02

can't grasp, we can't attain, but it's un-explanably

37:05

attaining us in our inability to attain it,

37:07

and we rest in the quiet certainty in

37:09

our heart that it's true, and right there,

37:11

like the holiness of that. Where

37:14

action or otherwise movement are that

37:16

which is only move, see, if

37:18

there's only that which is move,

37:20

which is creation, God's the unmoved

37:23

mover. When God said, let

37:25

there be light, God begins

37:27

the beginning, but to

37:29

begin the beginning, God had to be there before

37:31

the beginning to begin the beginning, but it's a

37:33

beginningless beginning, because every moment

37:35

is a virginal newness of the beginninglessness

37:38

of God, beginning what? The newness of

37:40

this present moment. It's like

37:42

the eternality of now, this

37:44

way and this way. And

37:47

it has in it no source of movement,

37:50

because it is itself the essence of movement

37:52

itself. So it is without a source, it's

37:54

close to Buddhism too. Driven

37:57

by demonic, sonic

37:59

powers. And right

38:01

action is freedom. Right action is

38:03

an important phrase from Buddhism. Now

38:05

what does right mean? It means

38:07

it's right in effective and awakening

38:09

nirvana. So what

38:12

is the action that's right? It's the

38:14

action that awakens the timelessness of time.

38:16

So what is that action? We might

38:18

say it in very broad terms. All

38:21

things considered, what's the most loving thing I can

38:23

do right now? My body,

38:25

my mind, this person that

38:27

I love, this animal, my

38:29

community, this moment of prayer.

38:32

All things considered. And

38:34

that's right action. And I'm going

38:36

to incarnate it by committing myself to it with

38:39

love. The timelessness of love

38:41

is freedom. It's freedom from

38:44

past and future also. For

38:46

most of us, this is the aim.

38:49

Never hear it to be realized. We

38:51

never quite get there for most of us,

38:53

like right ahead of us. But it's the

38:55

holiness of the sincerity of seeking it for

38:58

most of us. Never

39:00

hear it to be realized. We're

39:03

only undefeated because we have

39:05

gone on trying. The only reason we're not defeated is

39:07

we haven't given up. That's

39:10

why we're not defeated. But we're not going to give up

39:12

and we're not able to do. For

39:14

most of us. Where

39:17

there are some who have been

39:19

graced with the great liberation of

39:22

being undefeated in the unfolding

39:24

of the eternal fullness, unveiling

39:26

itself and giving itself to us. Murnin

39:28

said it beats in our very blood whether you want it

39:31

to or not. And there's a

39:33

moment not just for feedingly graced it, it's

39:35

true. But there are

39:37

those who are habitually established like

39:39

the mystical. I

39:42

also think this one turned to TSL8

39:45

as a mystic teacher. I

39:48

think when we're in the presence of an awakened person,

39:50

like we sense in the depth of his voice, that

39:52

he didn't get this out of books. So

39:55

in the presence of the teacher, we know

39:57

our heart has not deceived us. Because

40:00

we're sitting in the presence of someone in

40:02

whom it's been realized. And

40:04

if we sit with the sincerity in

40:07

which this Master we're in the presence of lives,

40:10

what might unfold in us is what's

40:12

obviously unfolded in the Master. And

40:15

this is the unfolding of this

40:17

realization within ourself. We

40:21

content at the last if

40:24

our temporal reversion nourish. That is,

40:26

if we're willing in time to

40:28

keep revising what we thought it

40:30

was endlessly. Not

40:33

too far from the Yew tree, the

40:36

life of significant soil. And the Yew

40:38

tree, or large trees,

40:40

is poisonous. And

40:43

it was often seen because it's poisonous

40:45

as death and resurrection. So they would

40:47

often plant them around cemeteries. So

40:49

the oneness of death and life in the Yew

40:51

tree, and not too far

40:53

from the Yew tree, the life of

40:55

significant soil, that is the soil out

40:57

of which we live our life, out

41:00

of this timeless eternal mystery of the

41:02

unfolding of our lives and of all

41:04

things. And

41:06

so we'll end with meditation. Again,

41:09

we'll sit for one minute, but on

41:11

your own at home, sit as long as you're moved

41:13

to do so. So

41:16

I invite you to sit still, sit

41:18

straight, fold your hands and bow. And

41:22

repeat after me. Be

41:25

still and know I am God. Be

41:30

still and know I am. Be

41:35

still and know. Be

41:39

still. Be.

41:54

Be. And

43:24

bow. We'll

43:29

slowly say the Lord's prayer together. Our

43:33

Father, who art in Heaven,

43:35

hallowed be thy name. Thy

43:38

kingdom come, thy will be

43:40

done, on Earth as it is in

43:42

Heaven. Give us

43:44

this day our daily bread, and

43:47

forgive us our trespasses, as we

43:49

forgive those who trespass against us.

43:52

And lead us not into temptation, but

43:55

deliver us from evil. Amen. Mary,

43:58

mother of contemplatives. pray

44:00

for us. St. John of the Cross,

44:02

pray for us. Julianne of

44:05

Norwich, pray for us. Blessings

44:08

till next time. Call

44:30

us at podcasts at cac.org

44:33

or send us a voicemail. All

44:35

of this information can be found in the

44:37

show notes. We'll see you again

44:39

soon. Do

44:48

you feel called to walk a more

44:50

contemplative path? The Centre

44:52

for Action and Contemplation is

44:55

an educational non-profit supporting the

44:57

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