21st September 2001 23-20 CET
Great truths
Muhammed Ali (Cassius Clay) visited 'Ground Zero' yesterday. This
'charismatic warrior', who so often has touched the hearts of millions
around the world, once more had some gems of truth for us all.

I remember the young Cassius Clay speaking, when asked on an
english television programme in the 1960's about the subject of
'racial discrimination.' This was the time of the Civil Rights
movement, Martin Luther King, and obscene scenes of
institutionalised violence and repression in the southern states.
He spoke of every person being like a flower in God's field, different
but complementing each other - the individual adding to the beauty
of the whole.

He spoke yesterday of the fact that ALL the major religions contain truths.
So, here's one that seems appropriate to the subject of 'fundamentalism':

"If One
Ponders on objects of the sense, there springs
Attraction: from attraction grows desire,
Desire flames to fierce passion, passion breeds
Recklessness; then the memory - all betrayed -
Lets noble purpose go, and saps the mind
Til purpose, mind and man are all undone."

As a young man, about 20 years old, Gandhi read the Bhagavad-Gita
for the first time (fully) whilst studying in England. He read the Gita,
the Koran, the Bible all in one year! The above words made a deep
impression upon him (he writes in his autobiography). They are
from the Gita (Chapter 2) but could just as easily have been from
the Koran or the Bible.

Fierce passion, whether fundamentalist or otherwise, betrays the noble
purpose/s that are the foundations of the major religions and the
truths that they contain. Purpose, mind and man are all undone
in the emotional and often violent recklessness that follows.

Those that desire to wage 'holy war'...or 'unholy war'... are more advised,
by all the great religions of the world, to wage that war within themselves
.... where, to quote Gandhi again, 'most of the devils truly reside.'

Those that use their knowledge and power to inflame the passions
of those who trust them..they are the greater devils, huh?

return to website....................................... lo.2ya.com

September 20th 2001 13-30 CET
UNCONDITIONAL
That's the word. That's the meaning.
That's what Divine LOVE is! Unconditional.

Anything less than that is a restriction upon the God given
'freedom of choice' which is the birthright of every, every
single human being. Free will. Free choice.

Unconditional LOVE.

God IS LOVE...and is therefore unconditional in the lovingness.

return to website..................................http://lo.2ya.com

September 20th 2001 12-40 CET
Principles of religious 'Justification'
As a young man, 20 years old, I attended a 'religious college'. It was a
college that accepted all shades of 'Protestant Christian opinion' I was horrified
to discover the extent to which the belief system of an individual was
so often founded on 'misinterpreted texts'. It was at that time that
I developed the principle of always, always attempting to understand
the social and historical meaning of the words spoken..at that time they
were originally spoken! For language and social customs are not static, they
are ever changing and adapting.

For example, in the Christian faith much is made of the words of
Jesus upon the cross,"My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?".
These words are used as a symbol of Christ's total isolation in his act of
supreme sacrifice. Many 'christian fundamentalists' use this text to show
the absolute horror of His sacrifice...He even was seperated from God
'His Father', they say in order to save you! (How is it possible to be seperated
if God is Omnipresent?)
Jesus was accepted as, and understood to be, by the society
of the time, a learned Rhabbi. A man whose knowledge of the
scriptures, the 'Holy Books', was even evident in His childhood when
He was found at the temple discussing with the 'learned men'.

Hey, did you know most people couldn't read at that time?
Hey, did you know it was the practice to learn passages by heart?
Hey, did you know a Rhabbi only needed to quote the opening words
of a passage and most understood what he was referring to?
Hey, did you know the opening words of a Psalm that speaks of
victory over evil, that speaks of God's protection of His servants,
that speaks of total trust?

Hey, do you know the opening words of Psalm 22?

Now, how can it be that a statement of final victory - such as Jesus
made in the words 'My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" -
can be made/turned/corrupted into a statement of rejection and defeat and
used to 'enslave your hearts' in a prison of guilt?
It takes a good imagination to be able to do that...oh, and a lot of ignorance!

So what?
Well here's what! Did you now that almost 1000 Muslims are reported
killed or missing at the World Trade Centre tragedy?
Did you know that the Koran clearly, unequivocably, states:
"If anyone murders an [innocent] person... it will be as if he had murdered
the whole of humanity."
And Muhammad is recorded as saying that Muslim rules of engagement forbid attacks
on non-combatants, women, children and men of religion; they outlaw attacks on the
"means of subsistence" of those who "offer no resistance". No miscreant should be given
succour or refuge by Muslims.

But fundamentalists in all religions share common characteristics beyond the fact that they
interpret symbols literally. All are highly selective in "the fundamentals" they chose
to return to, and in what part of modernity they accept. All take traditional texts and use them
out of context (Paul Vallely)

Ignorance and hatred are yet another form of violence...especially so when they are used
by people who know better and seek to defeat 'the lovingness' in order to control people
who do not know.
If it isn't loving..it isn't from the One God. Anyone who argues differently has a
problem with the concept that 'God IS Love' and by definition, therefore, cannot be
anything else!
The One God does not use means understood by our limited 'lovingness' to influence
creation. Violence, hatred, belief system control mechanisms - anything that limits the free
expression of our potentiality for lovingness.....these are man made misinterpretations.

(thanks for reading this far...smile)

return to website................................... http://lo.2ya.com

September 19th 2001 11-00am CET
The silence of grief
Occasionally in our lives we meet circumstances that so overwhelm our
senses that we are directed into the silence, we walk, as it were, into
a noneness - a no-consciosness.

This past week has been such a time. Not for everyone, for there are
many many who have had little time for the introspective calmness
of loss, they have been too busy trying to rescue...they have set
aside themselves in supremacy of service motivated by astounding
compassion. Their satsang of silent grieving is yet to come, postponed
for the 'now' in the cause of serving their fellow humanbeings.

For almost all of us the need to make comment, to vocalise our
lovingness, was both immediate and urgent. People from all
over the world uniting in a common bond of horror and loss.

This 'blogspot' has been absent for a week, partially in tribute
to those whose lives were taken in unimaginably horrendous
circumstances. It was a time for silence, for observing, for
watching the outpouring of love and compassion that has
been the circumstance, worldwide, in these past days.

Former bitter enemies offering help, allies standing together,
ordinary folks (like me) communicating lovingness in all it's
wonderfully gracious diverse forms.

It has been a time for silence. A time for listening in the hope that
we may hear a knocking or a moaning that led the rescuers
to someone trapped in 'Ground Zero'. The silence of that
unrealised hope guiding us into an even deeper silence
within ourselves.

In that silence the voice of LOVE, the tones of togetherness,
have been whispering gently in our existing:

"The best of humanity always overcomes the worst.....always."

Stop! Look! Listen!