TRIP

             GREETINGS ALL

There seems to be a growing number 

of folks seeking our just past posting, 

             " IN THE LOOP "

  It is available for those online 

            by scrolling down 

     through this current posting.

           Love being with you 

             " IN THE LOOP "

******************************************

Dear All of Us,

Life sure is "a trip" -

one hell/heaven of "a trip".

And am I ever "trip'n" along.

As recently mentioned,

I am past mile marker 82. 

Moving right along.

Getting ever closer 

to the airport 

and take off for 

next and beyond.

In my right now,

tripping along,  

there's a lot to see 

of me and we

in both the rearview mirror

and out front.

What's ahead seems to be 

of two sorts.

There's something 

so blindingly 

bright right beautiful 

that I can't describe it, 

just rejoice at it.

Almost there!

Can't figure it.

Don't have to.

Don't want to.

It's limitlessly

      REAL

  REAL GOOD

It'll be so wonderful 

to finally get there

     better

    Be That.

It's paired with a slowed, 

wider, fuller view 

of life's terrain 

out front and all about

in the here and now

as it actually is.

With eyes dimed by time

I see simple,

clearer than ever before 

in these many miled years.

The right now of Now

is laced with potential and peril.

A world of wonderful people

captive to a handful of

sick souls directing Evil Empire.

A mix.

Good will, talent, technology,

rich recourses of 

soil, soul and society

and those aplenty.

Domination of those good people

by polluted politics, 

massive misinformation,

fearing them into troubled tribes 

at dangerous odds.

The wrecking ball of selfishness 

demolishing the planet.

Nuclear incineration horridly possible.

Young couples "familying forth."

A pope who is truly a holy father.

College kids striving for

a degree of competence

and creativity.

The majority of people

living lives of simple goodness

yet struggling with anxiety,

many with grinding poverty 

and oppressive injustice.

Grassroots groups of 

spiritual vibrancy and 

supportive community.

A quest for justice

that actually wants to rebalance

society real and right.

A terrain of potential and peril.

What's in the rearview mirror

of my personal journey 

is so, so clear - 

even the dark parts.

     Going along 

I went along with God.

     Going along 

I did not go along with God.

I've been like the ancient Israelites

on their way to the Promised Land.

Sometimes I followed God 

as God manifested and led

even if so in somewhat mysterious, 

contemporary versions 

of pillars of fire and cloud.

Often, I didn't "get it" 

about God,

but did get direction, took it, 

and got on down the

    Road to Real.

Other times I split, went solo, 

fashioned my own ways and gods.

What a mess!

Detours, dead ends, disasters, 

ditches - did a lot of damage

trip'n on down Delusion Drive.

I share this 

in the hope 

we all will be wiser 

than I often wasn't

and will rejoice 

to be guided by

the wondrous mystery 

that 

            is All

            is Good

            is God 

            as "is"

and follow the signals given

          as given.

    It takes humility

    to get steered right.

We don't get to decipher God

nor God's directions.

We do get to follow a

     Lover's Lead.

And we certainly can't fashion 

a god that is more than 

a mess that messes.

We're a Chosen People,

an Exodus People,

on a trip from 

potential to Promise.

And it's quite a trip.

Following the Lover's Lead signals 

right and real indeed.

Refusing the Lover's Lead

we end up nowhere fast,

messed up and messing up.

Lover's Leads 

are signaled in

sacred scriptures,

religious traditions,

trustworthy council,

Spirit filled community,

Spirit infused intuitions,

honest discernments,

seeing positive possibilities,

serving other's needs,

learning from pain,

noticing nature,

watching children play, 

being stilled to Center,

immersion in collective wisdom,

streaming in beauty,

open hearted meditation,

and these are just for starters.

Each and all are 

locations, moments

 along the way of

     Living Love

   "He said love 

    the Lord your God 

    with all your 

    passion and prayer and

    muscle and intelligence -

    and that you love 

    your neighbor as well 

    as you do yourself."

       Luke 10:27

      The Message 

What a way 

to get on down the

Road to Real.

   

Thanks for letting 

this little old man 

muse on a bit about 

trip'n on along.

I pray each 

and all of us 

have a good trip, 

a God Good Trip

from potential to Promise.

Traveling mercies. 

   John Frank

     ******

    Prayerful oneness and love

 - really the same beautiful thing -

   with our Jewish sisters and brothers

   during these High Holidays and a 

             Happy New Year

                  ******

     frankly speaking

spirituality for the street

johnfrankshars.blogspot.com

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HELLO and WELCOME

     to all new to 

   frankly speaking

So glad you are here.

We'd love to have you 

   part of our weekly

     time together.

We were blessed this week

by a first time visit from 

Cote d'lvoire. Great!

        ******

On we go right on down 

     the road to UP!

        ******

              

 

IN THE LOOP

Dear All of Us,

I'm retired, 

well, at least officially.

In the last five years

I preached the funeral service

for a darling dear friend

and baptized my much loved,

Spirit Sharing Grand Son.

That's it.

So, as far as churchy things go,

I am "Out of the loop."

And it doesn't stop there.

In my day I was

a competent "techie" - 

ditto copying, microfiche, 

(if you remember that one,

do be sure your will, 

power of attorney and 

medical directive 

are all up to date),

Xerox, email and texting.

At about seventy-five it was 

"No more already!!" 

I opted out of the loop.

I now count on my kids 

to navigate for me 

the spooky,

weird waves of 

apps for apps, media mania, 

changes changing changes,

so artificial as not to be 

all that intelligent!

When it comes to 

gigabytes I scratch.

When it comes to platforms, 

well happily I can still find 

the right one at train station.

Yep, "Out of the loop."

Of special interest to me 

in these days of difficulty, though,

are the topics and techniques 

that deal with trust.

I so hope all of us

will be full free

   In the Loop

because we live 

in a time 

when trust is out,

doubt and fear are in.

Folks are full of 

self-doubt, 

doubt each other,

fear for the future -

if we even get to have one.

 

There's train loads of a 

not-one-bit mild mistrust of 

corporations, politicians, governments, 

the rule of law - and its lack -

media, religion.

All this leaves so many 

of us naked to

thrashing turmoil

within and without.

If we can't trust, 

we fear we'll get trashed,

and we will!

So, is there a 

Trust Clause 

somewhere, somehow

accessible in all this,

one that really holds up

         TRUST

There sure is.

In the legal loop there is the

principle and practice 

        of

  Good Faith.

In our spiritual lives 

we have that and way more. 

Available to us is a 

    Good Faith 

ever so much more 

pervasive, solid,

and dependable.

It is the reality, 

the principle, 

the potential 

and power of a 

      God 

  Good Faith

Sad to say, though, 

the word 

          "faith" 

too often translates as

"Whistling in the dark" - 

at best it distracts but 

has no actual impact.

It's a placebo for the 

psychologically, intellectually,

emotionally weak kneed, 

a mythic rabbit's foot.

Such is the unfortunate folly

caused by the folks 

in the front office of

Corporate Religion.

   Heavy Headed

   Heavy Hearted 

   Heavy Handed

   Churchy Titans

    playing God

    about God,

dogmatizing to death, 

the death of lots of 

good peoples' faith.

They make faith 

a head trip,

a required assent

to tenants about God

that thy fashion

then deem divine. 

It's assent or be dammed.

They replace a faith that is 

   Love Lived Goodness

- one that never takes a day off- with

Man (yes, male mostly!) Made

mandates of their invention.

What a perversion.

It has run off generations 

of intelligent seekers,

and dulled billions more into 

     Dogma Religion

- affirm these tenants and 

  you are safe and saved.

It's a theology they devise 

and then canonize as divine.

                                        

For sure, theological study 

in its purity is a good thing, 

a help as St. Anselm said:

" Theology is faith

  seeking understanding."

It is, though, limited.

Theological understandings and 

statements are not faith.

They are human comments 

on our frail "figurings"

and slender experiences of 

the ineffable goodness

we call God.

   

Here's a wonderous key.

It unlocks so much more and better.

The word for faith in the Bible  

is most accurately translated not

as faith but as active, vigorous

          TRUST

         It is living 

        in and with 

      God Goodness

     and that with real,

    personal, practical 

       Confidence

A wimpy-weak analogy

is to take the confidence, 

the trust we have,

in the pilot when we fly.

We don't know or understand 

anything about her/him.

We do trust her/him enough

to stake our lives on her/his

competence and care.

Ramp that kind of trust up

      to living in a 

Limitless Loop of Love.

    That's Faith!

    That's Trust!

We don't/can't come 

intellectually close 

to understanding it.

Way better, 

we are integral,

solid and secure in

the lived experience of it,

The Limitless Loop of Love

that's center is everywhere 

and circumference is nowhere.

It's What Is, 

         Ex-"IS"-tence, 

              "Act"-uality 

              "Be"-ing 

              "Life"-itself

              "Good"-fundamental

                    GOD

   And come to find out 

   it is not only benign,

   it is sheer, pulsating, 

            ecstatic

        Love Making

        It is bedrock 

           Reality 

  and it does not fall out 

    from under us ever

        no matter 

 the intensity of trouble.

If Mother Earth 

is raped numb,

if the atmosphere 

is traumatized 

to death dealing,

if neo-fascists

grab governance,

if some sorry soul 

pushes the button 

and sets off global

nuclear incineration,

we will hurt terribly,

but we will not cease/stop.

We are indestructible.

We spring free forward

in the divine dynamic,

The Limitless Loop of Love.

That loop is so good it is God.

        "God is Love."

          1 John 4:8

      That's what "IS"

      We're already "in"

          "IN LOVE"

    We more and more 

         en - Trusrt 

 ourselves and all creation 

in the reality and power of it.

       This Love Loop

has no beginning, no end.

It's ever now, a swirl 

of creative energy,

a gyre of goodness,

God Goodness.

Faith is trust in it.

Faith is confidence 

that affirms and 

embraces it and 

our oneness 

in its Oneness.

For us, as for the people 

Jesus cured,

       "Your trust 

  has made you whole."

           Jesus

My Mom really, practically,

trustingly lived God Love.

When she was dying 

she teased about 

her meds making her mind

more and more Loopy.

At 1:30 in the morning 

she awoke, smiled and 

peacefully passed to next,

evermore and forever

     IN THE LOOP

           OF

   ENDLESS LOVE

She was completely

     LOVE LOOPY

    

Now and then 

and for all whens,

we live by trust.

As Proverbs 3:4-5 in

   The Message 

       has it:

 " Trust God 

   from the bottom 

   of your heart; 

   don't try to 

   figure out everything 

   on your own.

   Listen to God's voice

   in everything you do,

   everywhere you go,

   he's the one who will

   keep you on tract." 

     Yes, keep you 

      In The Loop.

Happy to be "on tract"

     In The Loop

       with you.

      John Frank

       ******

     A Warm Welcome 

   to all visiting here 

   for the first time.

   So glad we can 

   be together.

        frankly speaking

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         ******

         Have a 

    Love Loopy Life

         ******

    

 

 

       

 

TRANSFORMATION

Dear All of Us,

Thanks a bunch of much

for this chance to be together.

It's altogether wonderful.

You know, if together 

we step back a bit and take

a really good long look,

we see there's a

wondrous good energy 

having a ball creating us, 

and it has no intention 

of letting up or stopping. 

It not only surges us 

into liveliness,

it wants to surge 

right on through us

and outward from us

in all sorts of 

creative aliveness.

Wondrous good energy 

on a happy tare!

We're being created

to join in and 

create in tandem.

That's our life work.

How good is that!

This power positive 

doesn't just make us tick.

It makes us rock,

transforming this

wonderous good energy

one way and many into

friendships, families, teaching, 

counselling, singing in a chorus,

fair trading goods and services,

driving responsibly,

painting a picture or the house,

hosting on holidays,

having lunch with the 

left out at work or school,

caring for kids and old timers,

supporting social justice and 

ecological strivings,

- endlessly, wondrously more.

It is a positive and powerful

      TRANSFORMATION

The energy that creates us 

and gets us creating,

is what we know 

and name as God

and we get to be 

in on the goodness

of it, vigorously so.

We get to be 

junior partners,

  cocreators.

How about that!

As we widen our 

really good long look

we also see 

sadness and suffering.

Some powers and people

are way out of whack.

They hurt and harm.

They twist and turn the 

wonderous good energy

in them and about them

into sad sick deformity.

It hurts like hell.

It is hell.

So, as cocreators we also 

become recreators, 

transformers in another 

and challenging way.

We are one with the

wonderous good energy

that is God in bringing good 

to its lack and abused domains.

We enter the field 

of errant energy, 

embrace it,

suffer it,

absorbing it,

letting it be transformed

in the sheer good, real, right 

and love that is God

surging in and through

the unity we are - 

creator and cocreator.

The wrong of it is rung right.

Those of us here in the USA 

live in a land of plenty and of pain.

It is a place and way of life  

magnificently enlivening and 

sadly death dealing.

We share the plenty and 

we share the plight of the damaged.

We connect with and champion the

devastated, work for healing, 

striving for righting, for

  TRANSFORMATION

              

As a consequence, we take 

all the hits involved to our 

reputation, social standing, 

cash, career, security 

and convenience.

It is a powerful and painful 

    TRANSFORMATION

We don't come at all this 

on our own.

Way better than that.

We get in on 

God's reclamation.

We companion Jesus,

in this recreation, 

his transforming

his remedy, 

his redeeming.

Jesus is the 

Love Energy of God

humanized, personalized, 

present in our mix -

marvel and mess.

In his person and love 

he absorbs, suffers, 

transforms wronged to right,

negative to positive. 

His death was not 

some savage sacrifice

to satisfy a ticked off God.

He is God Good Man

taking in negative charges,

correcting current and flow, 

righting energy wronged

to real, to positive.

He loves death to life.

He takes the hit.

It kills him.

He gives up as was

for as can be.

All that in the sheer,

divine Love 

     That Is God.

He died to evil and  

rose up through it to good,

died to death 

and rose up through it to life.

He took in and on the negative, 

transforming it in the positive he is.

He died with all that is dead, 

gave it the life he is.

He rose above it

and raises all with him.

It happened two thousand years ago.

It goes on right now.

It's a transtemporal dying and rising,

realigning right wronged currents of energy.

           TRANSFORMATION

Paul speaks how we are invited into 

this transformation:

   "Do you not know that 

    all of us who 

    have been baptized 

    into Christ Jesus 

    have been baptized 

    into his death?

    Therefore we  

    have been buried 

    with him by baptism 

    into death, so that, 

    just as Christ was raised 

    from the dead 

    by the glory of the Father, 

    so we too might walk 

    in newness of life."

      Romans 6: 3-4

We're transformed

and we are in on the

transformation of 

others with/in Jesus.

Richard Rohr 

puts us right about wronged:

pain that is not transformed

is transmitted.

Immersed in Christ Jesus,

in our here and now,

we absorb evil and pain.

We transform, 

not transmit them.

We return good for evil.

We forgive.

Delt the deadly, we enliven,

    "...a new creation"

I know of what I speak.

I've driven this vehicle of 

   TRANSFORMATION

down the ways and waywards

of my many days.

I let God Good Energy

surge through me to:

heal my father wound,

to go on after a senior pastor 

cut me off from

the ministry of preaching

"Because people like 

 your sermons

 better than mine",

 when the bishop 

 blocked my pension

 because I relocated,

 when one I dearly loved

 threw me and my love

 under the bus after 

 miles of sharing.

I opened, often slowly, 

and let God Love

touch my wounds and pride,

flow through me, 

right those wrongs.

It meant joining God 

in loving the people 

who damaged me.

It is transformative.

Hurt is healed.

I am freed from the dread 

of inflicted disorder

and I don't pass it on 

in chaotic, negative charges.

Currents are clean, 

clear and positive.

I pray that 

all I have wounded

over my miles of years 

will be helped and healed.

I am daily aware of them,

often dream about them,

so sorrow at the pain 

I caused them.

I do all I can to love them right,

hold them in heart and prayer 

every painful/hopeful day. 

May their hurt be healed, 

their pain relieved.

    TRANSFORMATION

The Mysterious Reality of Love 

pulsates positive,

and that with a passion.

That Energy surges us lively

and surges through us to enliven.

It transmits positive currents.

We're in on Creation.

That Energy also surges  

when and where 

the positive has been

rung wrong.

Pain is transformed 

not to be transmitted.

Varied, unlimited, ongoing,

    TRANSFORMATION.

Glad that together we could take 

a long good look at all this,

our life's work of 

   TRANSFORMATION

      John Frank

         ******

           A rich autumn 

             WELCOME

           to one and all.

    This week we were graced 

     with first time visits from 

      Lithuania and Greece.

       So good to be with you.

            

             THANKS

once again for sharing with others

        frankly speaking

   spirituality for the street

johnfrankshares.blogspot.com 

    Click frankly speaking 

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 Have a transformative week.

             ******

         

SEASONING X2

Dear All of Us,

Hi there from here!

If you please,

two questions: 

- what is your favorite season 

  of the year?

- how do you like to season 

  food and drink?

        Seasoning X2

 

Is your morning coffee or tea  

solo or sweetened?

How about at dinner

with all the fine foods 

that fill our plates 

and tummies?

Seasoning with 

salt and pepper? 

How about horseradish, 

even chilly power?

Ever kick it up with 

Tabasco Sauce? 

Condiments condition.

Seasonings flavor.

They make a

decided difference.

Same so for the 

seasons of the year.

Each quite different,

making quit a difference -

indoors, outdoors, 

surfing or shoveling.

They condition, tone, 

flavor how daily life 

is served up.

Same such is such 

in our spiritual lives.

We go through 

four distinct seasons

and at the same time 

we experience contrasting 

soul seasonings.

Sometimes there is overlap.

All this makes for 

many more than 

Heinz's 57 varieties 

of flavoring in our

spiritual seasons 

and seasonings.

SOUL SEASONS

        Soul Spring

A warming brightness, 

budding newness. 

Sprung spirit free,

basking in euphoric promise.

  

    Soul Summer

Heats up for a time 

and the work 

of growth and fecundity.

All in with spirit sweat -

weed, water, cultivate -

soul-grow-maturing.

       Soul Autumn  

Splendor and harvest, 

A Sung Mass of Thanksgiving.

Mellow maturity,

landscape of kaleidoscopic

beauty and produce.

     Soul Winter

Slow sabbatical 

for soul as for soil.

Freezing insistence on

innerness of habitation,

stilled centeredness,

plain quiet of spirit,

death to what was and 

germination for what will be.

SOUL SEASONINGS

Throughout these 

soul seasons 

there is a pantry full of 

spiritual seasonings - 

insight, aridity, grace,

inspiration, darkness,

expansion, deepening, sin,

chaos, confidence, consolation, 

doubt, faith.

Such seasonings sure do 

condition and flavor our

Soul Seasons

sweet to sour.

The seasons 

we don't get to choose.

Some of the seasonings 

we do get to choose.  

Many to most we don't.

So important to both 

understand and accept.

It's how things are 

at this point with us.

It's also how things are 

with others at 

their this point.

These seasons and seasonings 

condition not only 

our individual lives 

but also our shared living 

and interactions with others.

That makes for quite a mix.

For example, I am in 

the overlap of Soul Autumn 

and Soul Winter,

the richness of long living, 

the quiet of dying to that

and the geminating of next.

Some days are 

peppered with pain,

others sweet with 

peace and gratitude, 

and most of the time

the flavor of the week 

is simple, quiet waiting

in the is of now as it 

prepares to hand off 

to timeless forever.

Family and friends 

are otherwise

and other how -

different seasons 

and seasonings.

I need to be sensitive 

to that and them.

I am blessed when

they soul such me.

Whatever the 

context and conditioning,

in whatever season,

hot, cold, budding, fading,

tasting comfort or conflict,

and many bitter sweets

in-between, it comes to 

simply, fully, appropriate to 

season and seasoning,

loving God, neighbor and self

as we are, as they are, 

with all we've got.

That makes for seasons 

and seasonings of grace.

    God Love to All,

       John Frank

         ******

           THANKS

to so many who have shared

     frankly speaking

with so many others and 

           WELCOME

to all new, occasional, regular

in our weekly sharings here.

We are from many lands and 

we are experiencing varied 

Soul Seasons and Seasonings.

A blessed mix.

       frankly speaking

  spirituality for the street

johnfrankshares.blogspot.com

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