GARDEN

     FRIENDS

May I please have 

a word with you?

As many here know,

I am eighty-five.

I am also a rather 

mild mannered

  old fellow.

  However,

Given The Givens 

  right now, 

this posting and

some recent ones

  are decidedly 

  strong and 

straight forward,

not my usual fare.

That's because

frankly speaking

      is about

   "spirituality 

    for the street."

Out here on 

the streets 

of our striving

right now 

things are rough

getting rougher.

How do we walk 

these streets of stress?

That calls for 

     strong, 

straight forward

  spirituality.

I pray this is.

Thus the staunch 

tone and tenor.

Thanks for letting me

be as candid and clear

      as I can be.

     Much love,

     John Frank

       ******

 

Dear All of Us,

Here we go again! 

The Middle East roils 

in turmoil and tension.

It springs bad from wrong.

So, too, the fiery flames

of war: 

The Congo, 

Russia-Ukraine,

Isreal and Gaza, 

Isreal and Iran

Sudan ...

So, too, the trend 

to autocracies,

cultural dictatorship,

the global migration 

shift and crisis,

exclusionary nationalism,

Nature violated ... 

We need to see 

the patterned folly

from which it erupts

 

   The pattern

   shows that 

all through history, 

  and to this day, 

   one percent 

       of us

dominate and hoard 

 - power and stuff -

      check out 

the Bezo's wedding

     and weep. 

The one percent 

develop and indulge an

       upper class 

to manage things for them.

Bread and circus reward

      a middle class, 

some to secure and fight, 

others to grind out 

product and profit.

    The enslaved and 

    impoverished 

are herded to service 

dirty and demeaning, 

dumped in trash piles 

     of neglect.

Such evil is Empire.

     It wrongs.

     It’s into 

    full blown 

    wronging 

    right now.

 

What’s particular 

to our current plight 

are technologies of 

mass destruction 

(nuclear and AI) 

   the push for

   autocracies

 degradation of 

    Nature

      and 

   cultural 

 dictatorship

in the hands of 

the one percent.

They are not 

  innocent,

sweet, pure,

 choirboys.

It is said that asteroids 

whipped out the dinosaurs. 

We are close to

being whipped out by these

   myopic, heart, head,

       soul dulled

       narcissists 

          and 

     egomaniacs

      They are 

duping and doping

large swaths of many

       societies.

        

“Is there a prophet in the house?”

 

To get our grounded bearings,

let’s scroll back to our start up.

It was pretty darn good.

 

Genesis is the story 

of God’s delight.

    It portrays 

    an artisan 

ecstatically creative, 

lavishly generous.

“…and it was good, 

very good”, very God.

   

        The First Folks

            lived in a

      Garden of Delight

              Eden 

       from the Hebrew

            "eden" 

   "delight, pleasantness"

It didn’t stay that way.

Those First Folk

  gifted with 

God closeness,

entrusted with 

Creation’s Care 

    violated  

 gift and trust.

They walked 

the Garden 

with God.

They were blessed 

   with knowing 

    only good.

           For the 

ancient Hebrew writers 

       of Genesis

       "to know" 

         meant 

"intimate experience"

 At the genesis of us

          it was

        Paradise

          Bliss.

       All they 

      "knew" 

     was good.

      

              BUT

       They insisted on 

          "knowing" 

    its opposite, it's lack.

       The symbolic 

    tree of "knowing" 

     good and evil

             Their

 "intimate experience" 

             of

            evil

    that lack of good

     hurt like hell.

   Their self-exile 

 confirmed by God.

     Paradise lost.

   Entrusted with

   Creation Care, 

 they took it down

    with them.

   Now good 

  AND EVIL.

Place and people

  off balance.

         

We have "known" evil 

       ever since.

 

God Good got busy, 

formed a team to be 

“A light to the nations.”

From them sprung one, 

a God Good union of 

human and divine.

He came to recreate, 

right the wronged, 

repair the breech,

redeem, rebalance.

A whole new and 

wonderous community, 

a kin domain of

God Good people 

being repaired 

   and to be 

agents of repair,

was initiated.

It's ours for the

   Goodness

     of it.

While we have time, lets!!!

 

That will not be 

a top-down deal.

It will spring bottom up.

We need to unload 

the illusion that 

politicians, programs 

pundits, policies 

and military might,

can pull this off.

We need to stop fretting 

about the whole mess 

and get busy 

cleaning it up

as best we can 

where and 

as we are.

Fretting saps 

the life out of us 

and we are then 

"double done", 

unable to do 

what and where 

we can.

Remember, 

Jesus told us 

to carry our cross, 

      not his, 

nor everyone else's.

 

          To be 

faithful and effective 

we need to break free from 

soft, safe, domesticated, 

culturally conforming 

and acceptable, 

limp religiosity. 

Check the record.

It not only 

hasn’t been up to 

the task nor real enough.

It gets in the way and 

slows us down 

often and a lot.

“By their fruits…”

 

A way forward:

We find or form

     a small group

     of "all in" folks 

             for

     actual, practical, 

     Gospel living

        together.

We all deep dive into 

    divine intimacy.

We take real care 

    of each other.

We work our toes off 

    helping the needy.

We live justice.

We soak in scripture.

We worship, pray 

      and be a 

     Holy Communion.

We are deliberately

    counter cultural.

We thrive in 

     a modest lifestyle.

We reverence and 

     care for Nature.

We let The Spirit 

     turn where and 

     how we live 

         into a

      Garden of 

 God Love Lived

    through us.

As more and more 

just plain folks do so, 

earth well be canopied 

    right and real,

a freshness and beauty

right in the midst of

      dark, dirty

       Empire

“Thy kin domain come 

  on earth as in heaven.”

               a

         Garden 

            of 

  God Love Lived

         ******

         REMINDER

       frankly speaking

        is now posted

        THURSDAY 

      AFTERNOONS

  East Coast USA time

      Next Posting

       Thursday

    July 3, 2025

  Email Delivery

     Fridays

Next delivery 

Friday, July 4, 2025

   SIGN UP

   top right 

   above

Lots and Lots

of new friends

have joined us 

     lately

particularly many 

      from

     Brazil

The Netherlands

    Vietnam

    Russia

   Argentina

  and a first ever 

    group from 

    Ecuador

Many from many 

other lands have 

     as well 

 and well it is!

 WELCOME

      ALL

LAST FIVE POSTINGS

     AVAILABLE

      by scrolling 

         down

       beneath 

   this posting

How great to be part of 

         God's 

    Rebalancing

     Love to all.

     God Bless,

     John Frank

                   frankly speaking

               spirituality for the street

           johnfrankshares.blogspot.com

                       ******

A DURABLE TRUST

             Hi/Hello

         "If at first..."

       The experiment 

          continues.

          Let' see how

          posting on

          Thursday

          evenings,

          east coast 

          USA time.

          for awhile

          works out. 

     

        Email Delivery 

          will continue 

          to be on 

          Fridays.

          Thanks

          for your 

         patience.

        John Frank

         ******

Dear All of Us,

It was sheer terror, the kind that makes you wet your pants. Somewhere

over the Appalachians all heck broke loose in swirling black and gray. We were

tossed up, down and sideways all at the same time. The plane creaked and 

groaned. Would it break apart? Dinner, drinks and denial were in free flight, and 

we weren't sure we wouldn't be next. It definitely was one of the top ten traumas 

of my life.

The global drama-trauma we are flying through right now is like that flight. We 

can't step out of the room until things calm down. There's no denying it nor 

ducking it. Its continence and outcome are up in the conflicted air as is our 

immediate future. We have no choice but to ride it out. But how?

                               DURABLE FOR THE DURATION

               

             ("deru" - Indo European root, "durable, firm, hard, solid")

We have a baseline faith firm, a trust true, in the rock-solid foundation of 

Existence and Creation unfolding within it.  We have A DURABLE TRUST 

that Creation, as Genesis says it, is good, is "...very good (1), so good that no 

punk evil will undo it.  Sadly sure, Creation suffers the stormy attacks of rogue-

wrong-wronging denizens of Empire and many too many soul sick sorts. That's

because Creation itself is a free gift. Some reject the goodness of it, abuse it to 

our hurt and their demise. We don't have to perish with them. 

When I was on that fright flight of terror, I certainly was first class scared. I was 

also concrete confident that, if the plane was destroyed, I wouldn't be. I trusted 

that we are more than extinguishable flesh for a time. Sure, I was shaking. I also 

had that faith firm that we are part and parcel of a God Good Existence that is so 

intensely real it just can't quit, ware out or ever be put out.  

                      

                      "For truly I say to you, if you have faith

                       like a mustard seed... 

                       nothing will be impossible for you." (2)

                                          Jesus

                                  

Trust like that is a gift, a grace to be accepted. We need each other to do that 

and to live it. So, we do both. We bond in trust and live it freely, vigorously, 

joyfully in community. We work, love, plant flowers, raise kids, look out for each 

other, stick our necks out for justice, pray for the distorters and destroyers, we 

have family and friends over for dinner and laugh like heaven. We don't let 

anyone steal our souls, pollute our spirits, or try to extinguish the Flame of Real in 

us and in all Creation. We just exuberantly go on, lightsome no matter the dark. 

Being durable for the duration probably won't be easy or all that surface safe.

We refuse, though, to fear-forfeit our right now and right here, flat out, full fledge 

and creative living in this marvelous gift of Existence. We trust it. It's a

 

                                              Durable Trust

                                                 ******

                                           

(1) Genesis 1:31

(2) Matthew 17-20

      

      WELCOME

each and every of us.

NEXT ONLINE 

   POSTING

Thursday Evening

East Coast USA time

June 26,2025

NEXT EMAIL Delivery

Friday

June 4, 2025

     ******

LAST FIVE POSTINGS

      AVAILABLE

          by

   scrolling down

     beneath 

   this posting

     ******

No matter how rough 

it gets, we'll get it right 

        because 

   "The righteous 

    shall live by faith."

    Romans 1: 17

Love to all.

God Bless,

John Frank

           frankly speaking

    spirituality for the street

johnfrankshares.blogspot.com

              ******

 

DUALITIES DONE ONE

               Hello All,

Change is a constant for sure.

Lately there seems to be a change

in when an increasing number here

look for the new/next online posting of

          frankly speaking

So, let's continue to test out our

         posting day and time.

    As always, many much thanks.

             John Frank

              ******

                 

             

Dear All of Us, 

It was High School

Freshman English.

That was 1954 BAI.

(Before Artificial Intelligence)

My evolving adolescent intelligence 

was stressed to quiver cracking.

How ever can I get through the

544 pages of Charles Dicken's

     A Tale of Two Cities?

Comics, even short stories, ok, 

but 544 single spaced pages 

         of Dickens?

      

      Well, with the 

patient encouragement

          of dear 

  Sister Eleanor Frances 

    I did and that with 

    a wondrous reversal.

             For me:

   "It was the worst of times, 

    became the best of times."

    

    I was captured by literature.

    I was introduced to the

          DUALITIES

     in human experience

     as they strive-struggle 

         for resolution 

     in the unified field of 

           Oneness.

     I began the swim of 

     adult intellectual life

 and I got a healthy dose of

          Word Ways

starting me on my own unique 

          Word Work.

     

     Our personal and shared 

           spiritual lives,

          our whole lives,

                 are  

         A TALE OF TWO'S

         A TALE OF TUGS

         A TALE OF DUALITIES

    

    Our life "field" sure isn't unified.

Somehow, somewhere, somewhen,

                 Reality 

         got split-splintered.

            Original Bliss 

         was sever sundered.

     We experience and note 

     the resultant DUALITIES

  in many much ways and names:

           Good and Evil

           Right and Wrong

           Love and Hate

           Help and Hurt

           Creation and Destruction

           Truth and Deception

           Positive and Negative

           Evolution and Regression

           Real and Unreal

           Freedom and Fascism

           Haves and Have Nots

           Too Much for Few and

           Not Enough for Multitudes 

           Peace and War

           Justice and Injustice

           Holiness and Sin

           Shared Life/Land and Genocide

           Creation Care and Creation Abuse

           Best and Worst

               with countless others 

           and lots of in-betweens.

Right now we are in one heck 

of a painful and potentially lethal 

         worldwide split

     The Duel of Dualities, 

        Real and Unreal 

          Looking closely,

              though,   

             we see 

                the

   Death and Resurrection

                of 

          Jesus Christ 

        working out the 

            Dualities

              to a 

         unified field 

               of

        Love Oneness

     in our here and now,

     in our immediacies.

     One in Christ Jesus,

         we suffer

    a lot of dying that 

  loves the deadly to life.

 

          It's hard.

          It hurts.

         Dualities 

        clash-crash 

       in a cross up.

       Cross Friday 

 didn't look like such a 

      Good Friday

      back when.

    Our right now 

    Cross Fridays 

     don't either.

  

  These wipe outs, 

       though, 

 consume in good

      the evils  

 that cause them, 

 transform them

 God Good Real,

      Love Lift 

  the put downs 

       by our: 

shedding selfishness,

sharing liberally

who we are 

      and 

what we have,

caring for people 

and planet,

not "going to" 

      but

   "being"

   Church,

suffering for justice

locally and as far 

as we can reach,

liberally spending self

soul centered in prayer,

wrapping in the left outs,

being unified in diversity,

changing transactional

religion transformative,

driving safely/sanely,

contemporizing and living

     The Beatitudes

             and

The Sermon on the Mount,

paying just, adequate wages,

refusing rushed, compulsive

    consumer driven, 

Empire values and lifestyles,

speaking truth to power,

using media truthfully,

daily, practically, ever more.

       

       Resolution 

        Universal 

      Resurrection

    is in the works.

          AND

   It works its way, 

   slow, steady, sure.

      RESUERECTION

Don't be fooled by the way 

we tell the story.

Resurrection is rarely 

a swift occurrence.

Just look to the forest floors 

or the pages of history and

find the pace of sacred things.

Trust the hidden work of god

quietly moving beneath 

the fractured and fissured surface:

tending and holding.

pruning and clarifying.

undoing and recreating.

If all is still quiet,

take heart and remain.

There is so much courage in 

hope that resists timelines

compressed by technology and profit.

There is so much power in

refusing to rush or be rushed

in righteous labors 

of reorienting and repair.

May divine unfoldings be granted 

all the space they need.

May the testimony 

of freshly budding things

strengthen and inspire us.

May the wisdom of generations 

be our teachers, 

our anchors, our comfort.

- m jade kaiser (1)

      DUALITIES DONE 

            ONE

          ******

      (1)  m jade keiser

            enfleshed

      spiritual nourishment 

      for collective liberation

            (Website)

       

       HELLO and WELCOME

         to all our visitors.

         Sure hope you'll stay 

         for more than lunch.

 Delighted to have so many from

             Brazil

             Indonesia

             Ecuador

             Argentina

             and more

      join us this past week.

NEXT ONLINE POSTING

Tuesday morning

East Coast USA time

June 24, 2025

NEXT EMAIL DELIVERY

Friday

June 27, 2025

LAST FIVE POSTINGS
  
     AVAILABLE

          by

   scrolling down

      beneath

    this posting

Have a good week.

    Love to all.

    God Bless,

   John Frank

        frankly speaking

   spirituality for the street

johnfrankshares.blogspot.com

            ******

Tempted to cave to restless worry

  

  

        

     

          

        

Like people during the 

French revolution,

 

REROUTE

    

     Friends,

Again, this week 

 

it is necessary 

to post a bit early.

       CIAO

    

     ******

Dear All of Us,

  "How do you 

    get there 

    from here?"

   Well, here in

   Washington, DC,

   not the way 

   we used to.

    The Metro 

    bus lines

    have been  

   reconfigured 

       and 

   recalibrated.

There are fewer

   bus stops 

 

      and a

 much modified

   schedule.

  The goal is 

  to get where 

  you are going

  more directly 

 with less delay 

      and 

 less go round

      and 

cut Metro costs.  

  To do that  

meant a major

   

  REROUTE

        

        

        For our

personal and shared 

    spiritual lives

    it's definitely 

     same such.

 Over time a major

      REROUTE

is more than in order

to get where we are going.

      Destination 

    best directs it.

    For us that is 

 full and vigorous life 

         

            in 

The Kin Domain of God

    The routes are 

simple, clear and direct.

 Jesus maps them out 

          for us 

         in the 

      Beatitudes 

  and the rest of the 

 Sermon on the Mount. 

      Matthew 5-7

At times we and our

spiritual communities 

   need a reset to 

   those directions

   and of how we 

    understand 

    

        and 

      respond 

  so there is less 

 delay and go round.

   Reconfiguration 

         and 

    

    Recalibration

       mean a 

definite and effective 

      REROUTE

We don't get there 

the way we used to.

  

 We want to bypass

      dead stops 

 

       where

   structures of 

thought and practice 

that are "about" God

          or 

  that are mostly

  

  belonging groups, 

somewhat the equivalent 

     of a churchy 

 Kiwanis or Elks Clubs,

have been established.

Such stops stealing the name 

  

            Church

     have stalled us in

     ideologies, structures,

     polities, practices,

            rituals 

             and 

      

         real estate

        that are not 

     pervasively about

      being and living

      as Jesus offers.

   We don't want to be 

       "about" God.

 

     We want to be 

 

        "in" God

    and live out that 

 center and goodness.

 To be real and effective

       means to be

 experiential, committed, 

personally and communally

Yes, many most

 "churches"

do a lot of good: 

food pantries, 

scouts, 

social services,

thrift shops, 

justice advocacy, 

schools, 

cultural offerings.

Essentially and 

qualitatively, though,

such are also the staple

of many other 

societal entities -

The Red Cross, ACLU, 

community food pantries,

local recreational 

and cultural groups. 

The sober sadness 

is that most 

   "churches" 

don't present  

as all that different,

as a group profoundly 

 centered and alive

         in the

Kin Domain of God

          as

joyfully and really 

        all in 

        and

distinctly disciples.

Again, yes there are 

       for real 

disciples and saints 

in many "churches".

That is markedly not 

the case, though, 

with the group as a whole.

The exception proves 

the delinquent rule.

   Jesus gives us a

     movement

        not a 

    monument.

     When we 

  "go to church"

 it is not a building

          or

     institution.

         It is 

      Ecclesia

  "The Gathered"

   a face to face 

    life with life

 interactive lived love 

               of

     God's Love. 

    We are close 

   

         in a 

 small community.

We pray, share The Word, 

 take care of each other

 and the needy in our area,

 be a Holy Communion,

 live a simple lifestyle,

 work for social justice,

 open wide to God's embrace 

 in prayer and oneness

 with all Creation.

 That is what so many crave 

 and do not find in local 

       "churches"

God language/symbols are there.

God experience expansive is not,

  nor are the masses who are 

     so spiritually starved.

    

   Personally, we 

      REROUTE

 bypassing bygone 

  understandings 

        and 

     practices 

for ever deeper the dive 

into mystical intimacy

as God draws us ONE.

We practically, actually, 

      communally,

     live the Gospel 

  just as Jesus offers it.

        

       That gets 

 more and more radical 

   in the best sense 

     of the term

  (L) radix = root

   as we spiritually

   mature, mellow,

        merge

         ONE

To be painfully frank,

Jesus has gotten bypassed

and terribly misrepresented 

by so too much of the

institutional church.

     An example.

From my study here 

(I call it The Shop)

      I can see 

The National Cathedral. 

It is a masterpiece of 

    magnificent art 

         and 

   architecture.

A few years ago 

the rector noted that

it took $17,000 a day 

to run it.

As a building 

and cultural center, 

it is superlative.

Reading the Gospels,

well, those 

Gospel blueprints

are not obvious

in the rendering.

It just is not church,

  

  "The Gathered"

   in full fledged

 Kingdom Coming

   

    Community.

It is impressive culture 

wrapped in medieval splendor.

Spiritually, it is antithetical 

to the simplicity, purity and

       community

    that Jesus lived, 

    said, gives, invites. 

Jesus is hard to find there,

   the actual, real, live, 

           Jesus 

A huge swath of people 

  can't find him either,

         there or 

   in most "churches" 

   such as they are.

     Masses are 

spiritually homeless.

Across the globe there is 

a soul screaming need 

for God Goodness, 

for genuine spirituality,

for religion pure and simple.

That cry is not being heard 

nor answered by comfy, 

casual, compromised, 

       cafeteria 

     Christianity.

It's not so much that 

all those spiritually orphaned 

are missing the bus.

  They are taking 

  a pass because

  they know 

  the institutional 

 

     church bus 

   isn't really going 

   anywhere near

  Kingdom Spiritual.

  Bonhoffer warmed of 

     "cheap grace"

 

  It is a phony token.

  It gets us a ride nowhere.

  

   Hopefully we are 

wise and ready enough

not to shortchange the ride,

  by getting off the bus at

            stops 

  that spiritually stop us.

"How do we get there 

       from here?"

Individually and together 

it's more than a good idea 

             to 

        REROUTE

         ******

A PERSONAL NOTE

For many the above 

is hard to read.

That's for sure.

I assure that it

has been hard 

to write.

Dealing personally with 

the whole concern  

has been a

significant struggle

for me in these 

my late last years.

I worked seventy 

to eighty hours a week

way well over half a century

as a pastor in the 

institutionalized church.

I know of what I speak.

I care deeply.

I recognize a lot  

of misdirection,

I call myself and 

all of us to 

to purer and 

more actual 

spiritual life.

Looking at a typical church

what do we see?

How many people 

actually know each other, 

deeply care about each other?

How many and much 

are most people

deliberately living 

a simple and 

modest lifestyle?

How many and much 

live the guidance of 

         Jesus:

"Do not store up 

for yourself 

treasures on earth...

But store up 

for yourself 

treasures in heaven...

for where 

your treasure is, 

there your heart 

will also be" ? 

 Matthew 6:19-21

How real and practical are

the community's welcome 

and care for the 

local last, lost, least?

Can those whose 

political persuasions 

are bright red 

or bright blue

respect and embrace, 

live and work together

deeper than their ideologies?

How much of the community's

focus, attention, time and money

go to institutional maintenance?

How intergenerational 

and gimmick free are

the community's 

worship and activities?

If we spend a week with

The Beatitudes and 

The Sermon on the Mount

how much of it is 

evident and actual 

in attitude 

and atmosphere, 

translated in current 

and contemporary 

practice and action:

significant salt 

and bright light,

anger management,

lust and love, 

divorce and oaths,

patient response 

to attack or demand,

actually loving enemies,

unostentatious 

giving, prayer, fasting,

being worry free 

and nonjudgmental,

trustfully asking God,

entering the Kingdom 

through it's narrow gate,

watching out for 

spiritual phonies,

judging by fruit 

not claim,

putting Jesus' word 

to practice on

rock solid foundation.

Put simply, 

if Jesus showed up 

at our church 

would he 

recognize himself 

alive and well there?

If so, Praise Good!

If not, what are we 

going to do about it?

      ******

Thanks to all stopping by 

for a first-time visit with us.

NEXT ONLINE POSTING

Tuesday morning/afternoon

East Coast USA time

June 17, 2025

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June 20,2025

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  Thanks 

to everyone 

who is sharing 

frankly speaking 

with others.

You are our 

one and only 

Circulation 

Department.

Great being together here.

        Have good week.

        Love to all.

        God Bless,

        John Frank

         frankly speaking

    spirituality for the street

johnfrankshares.blogspot.com

              ******