Kindness

"Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind." ~ Henry James

Marking Borders

"Mammals mark their territorial borders with their excrement.  Human beings have long done the same thing with that particular form of excrement that we call their scapegoats."

Rene Girard and James G. Williams
I See Satan Fall Like Lightening

In The Arena of Archetypes

“It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat.”  Theodore Roosevelt

This quotation by Roosevelt brings to mind a fellow I once knew in church.  He was the eternal critic whose role in life was to find fault in the efforts of others.  He was a blustery guy, full of loudness and bad jokes, and he effectively shut down an entire church.  Why?  Because he signed up to be in charge of everything, but he never followed through, and he seriously resented people who did.  Many in the church enabled him through a dysfunctional institutional co-dependency; then again some of the old steel magnolia matrons sent him out to be their attack dog to keep under control the uppity women who were not "their kind" (as we so archetypically understand The Mother to be in small southern towns that have not progressed beyond 1963).  He was the archetypical Sinister Clown, a buffoon posing with The Mothers as a gigantic fish in a very small pond that had dried up long ago.  No life, no life.  And no valiant striving.  Entitlement doesn't even remotely resemble valiant striving.  Likewise there is nothing marred by the dust and sweat and blood because all that dried up with the pond, and Mother is very happy. 

I believe Jung was right about the collective conscience and living out the unconscious as archetypes.  All places have their archetypes, and we can become caricatures of humanity through the incestuous interrelating that happens when people do not think, do not face their own dark sides and do not grow.  I would say that this is a product of failure to travel and exposure to new ideas, but that is not the case.  Some of the Mothers of whom I speak travel with frequency to places above and beyond their power trips.  I doubt, however, that they have very good reading material.  And the Clown probably reads only what reinforces his garish role as ineffective masculine "big daddy" patted on the head by Mother.  Poor thing.  He doesn't know that they are one step away from changing his diaper.  Sadly Christianity sometimes reinforces these dark archetypes with such emphasis on trivialities that do not require an inner journey to look for the kingdom.             

The truth is...

"The truth is I gave my heart away a long time ago - my whole heart - and I never really got it back."

From Sweet Home Alabama

Eternal Roses

The Rose that here on earth is now perceived by me,

Has blossomed thus in God from all eternity.

~ Angelus Silesius (1624 – 1677)

Pleasant Lies

The truth that survives is simply the lie that is pleasantest to believe.

                                                                                                       H. L. Mencken

Our Safest Eloquence

"Dangerous it were for the feeble brain of man to wade far into the doings of the most High; whom although to know be life, and joy to make mention of his name; yet our soundest knowledge is to know that we know him not as indeed he is, neither can know him: and our safest eloquence concerning him is our silence, when we confess without confession that his glory is inexplicable, his greatness above our capacity and reach.  He is above, and we upon earth; therefore it behoveth our words to be wary and few." (I.2.2)   Richard Hooker from Lawes of Ecclesiasticall Politie

Profound Sensualities

"The profoundest of all sensualities is the sense of truth and the next deepest sensual experience is the sense of justice."  ~  David Herbert Lawrence

Say It Hot

"Be still when you have nothing to say; when genuine passion moves you, say what you've got to say, and say it hot."

                  ~David Herbert Lawrence

A Dose of Wisdom Revisited

I want to revisit the words of Martin Luther King on dealing with evil triumphant.  I want to remember that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the "final words in reality" and that the strength of right is seen in grace and beauty, qualities eternal and indestructible, world without end.