AN INSIDE JOB

Dear All Of Us,

A main stay and stream 

of many a detective stoy

is the discovery that

"It's an inside job."

The answer to the mystery 

isn't out there somewhere.

Rather, the answer is right there 

within the mystery.

It's "an inside job."




Augustine, the sinner become saint,

the great theologian of the early church,

was also a great detective in his own way and time.

After a lot of evil doing on his part, 

he "cracked the case," 

the mystery of love and joy.

He had spent half a lifetime wrong focused -

fouled himself and cohorts of other wrong seekers.

He flung his body and mind wide and far.

He bedded and embraced all sorts 

of people, pleasures, persuasions, 

concepts and contrivances

seeking satisfaction and exhilaration,

seeking love and joy.

His torrid living ended 

in a "cold case" -

no resolution.

He was deadened, cloyed.




Like all great detectives  

Augustine finally realized that 

he was looking

in the wrong places, 

in the wrong directions,

for the right thing.

Refocused, redirected,

he discovered that 

in the case of love and joy

it's always 

          "an inside job."

What he pursued wasn't outside him,

it had been within him all along.



He summed up the case 

of love and joy this way:

     
      "Late have I loved you,
       O Beauty ever ancient,
       ever new,
       late have I loved you!
       You were within me,
       but I was outside,
       and it was there 
       I searched for you.
       In my unloveliness
       I plunged into 
       the lovely things 
       that you created.
       You were with me, 
       but I was not with you."



Like Augustine, 

we too are like detectives.

We are always trying 

to "crack the case,"

to solve the mystery.

What works the good?

Where lies love and joy?




How has it been with us?

How is it with us right now?

Where are we focused?




I'll try to answer my own question.

I so regret those years longing and looking 

from the edge of my body outward, 

looking and longing out there as far as my money, 

my pride, position, passion could propel me to dead ends.

Slowly I realized  this perfect love and joy we all seek isn't out there at all.

It's "an inside job," one that grows from the inside outward.

 It does so with care and sharing for

"...the lovely things that you created."

It has meant being centered.

It has meant living from the inside out.

It has meant accepting that "Beauty ever ancient, ever new"

the Beauty that is my core and center.

It has meant embracing The Being 

that embraces me into being.

It has meant embracing all "the lovely things you have created," 

one with their Creator




Long ago the Zen Buddhist realized the centrality 

of just that - the Center.

For them satori refers to the experience of kensho,

"seeing into one's true nature,"

They named it enlightenment.

An inside job.



The Pharisees quizzed Jesus 

about when that perfect love and joy,

that kingdom of God,

would come.

He told them it is 

"not coming with things 

that can be observed, 

nor will they say, 

'Look, here it is!' or

'There it is!'

For, in fact, 

the kingdom of God 

is within you." (1)

It's not out there somewhere.

It's "an inside job."




Paul chased around 

looking for the answer

to life out there 

in observance of the law.

He got rerouted, righted:

"And it is no longer I who live,

but Christ who lives in me." (2)

"An inside job."



                         God is centered in us

                         and God sure wants 

                         our company right there

                         because with God it's 

  
                            AN INSIDE JOB



                that works out ever so beautifully.




Thanks for this chance to

       Soul Sleuth.


  In God's Dear Love,

       John Frank

             *****


   (1) Luke 17:21

   (2) Galatians 2:20

         *****


A FEW PRAYER PROMTS


In bare, naked honesty

- how much am I 

  soul centered?

- what are the ways and times

  I soul center?

- in deciding/choosing

  do I start at soul center
 
  and work outward from there? 

- what are the main draws

  that tempt me to skip that 

  and first seek love and joy 

  in someone/something "out there"?

- how willing am I to let God

  "love the socks off me"

  in the chamber of my deepest innerness?

- how convinced am I that

  one with the Creator at my center 

  I can then move outward with the Creator

  and most fully experience

  "the lovely things you have created"?

- where and in what is my day to day life centered?

                       *****



 Welcome to those joining us for the first time this week.

Great to be together and share, to crack the case from the inside out!

                                     *****



                              Postings go online 

                              Thursday evenings

                              east coast USA time. 


                            See you all next week!!




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, 

LABOR OF LOVE

Dear All of Us,

Good gravy!

Labor Day's here! 

Summer's over.

It's back to work and school.

Speaking of work, let's.




Work is the setting, 

really the center piece, 

of our days.

It's the major span of our spiritual lives.

How do we do with that?

Is work a burden or a blessing?

Do we delight in it or do all we can to dodge it?

Is it a contemplative time,

a time of aware oneness with God?

How we do with work 

is how we do with our spiritual lives.





Good old St. Benedict pegged it just right:


            "Laborare est orare"

            "To work is to pray".



Prayer is oneness with God.

So is work.

"God is love," 

and in that love 

God is working out 

the magnificence of creation, 

and we're in on it as co-creators 

through our work prayer,

our labor of love.




So ok, what's this work prayer, this labor of love,

look like out here on the street of everyday living?

It means that everything we do, 

we do in and with God's love.

It means that everything we do 

is a moment and motion of God's work, 

of God's evolving creation forward and fuller, 

and we are actively part of it 

through our Labor of Love.


Everything means everything:

doing the dishes, plowing a field, sorting the laundry, 

investing our client's funds carefully,

dealing with commuter traffic on our way to work, 

teaching class, delivering the mail, 

developing a better program and product,

improving our company's service delivery, 

working the line with vigor and attention, 

pleasantly checking out our customers at the store, 

washing the car, cooking dinner,

mounting a principled political campaign, 

humanely screening passengers through the TSA process, 

stringing line, reporting the news, 

painting a picture or the house, 

installing internet connection, changing diapers - 

Everything!

Work prayer is our part in the rollout of Reality.

Work Prayer is the joy of creativity in concert with the Creator.

It is a labor of love.



However, that rollout can be pretty rough at times -

working with a nasty boss, 

being pressured by capitalistic greed 

to rush and work excessive hours, 

company preference for profit over product 

and the people making the product, 

horrible working conditions, lazy co-workers.

Then there's things like removing that tree stump 

and it resists you right into frustration and pain, 

the truck that keeps breaking down, 

the back ache from all that heavy lifting.

Why?




Well it seems that from the get go of creation 

human arrogance 

has thrown sand in the gears.

Rather than work with God 

we people have tried to play God.

We just aren't up to it 

and that causes all sorts of discord, pain and chaos.

That discord, pain and chaos 

filter into human relations and into nature,

polluting, distressing and disturbing both.

Sad examples: the cremation of the Amazon rain forests

                      the white nationalist movement.

The Genesis Story of Adam and Eve 

attempting to be "like unto God"

and its sad consequences (Genesis 3) 

is a simple folk way 

of telling the tale 

of that spin out right from our start. 



So work is both a joy and a pain.

In both and all cases, though, 

it can be prayer, 

a holy, sacred experience,

a "Oneing" with God,

a divinely creative sharing,

a Labor of Love.

We go it with God 

as God goes it with us, 

bringing order to chaos,

harmony to dissonance, 

rolling out an ever more expansive 

and divine creation, 

be it a diaper changed,

a transmission repaired, 

a corn field harvested,

or a symphony composed.



I  learned that as a boy from Crainie. 

She was a warm, happy, vigorous farmer.

She was so matter-of-factly and genuinely spiritual.

She and God did everything together.

Milking cows, tending the garden, 

churning butter, making bread,

canning, collecting eggs, 

were delightfully unitive, 

creative encounters with the Creator, 

moments of marvel.

Mucking the barn wasn't a whole lot of fun, 

but it cleared things for healthy, fresh growth.

Crainie worked with a playfulness, 

be that work easy or hard, 

and had one heck of a sense of humor.

While milking the cow 

she turned an utter my way, 

squirted my face and laughed:

"Have some fresh milk!"

I not only "learned" about work 

as prayer from her, 

I got to taste its good fruits as well, 

treated to the best ever home made bread

covered with farm fresh-just-churned butter 

and topped off with jam from the garden raspberry bushes.

"Taste and see the goodness of the Lord" for sure!!



Years later I learned yet more about our labor of love 

from dear old Brother John at the seminary.

This simple lay brother was an artist in all he did.

With God he created goodness and beauty

in the most mundane and practical ways.

Watching him fold laundry, repair a window, prune a bush

was to see and sense a contemplative oneness with God,

a oneness at work furthering order and creative evolution

in humble, immediate ways.



Jake showed me how to go about a labor of love 

under stress, while in danger.

He was on our local fire department.

With disciplined skill and self giving 

he entered burning buildings to rescue people.

He climbed ladders against burning walls 

to  reorder the flaming energy 

that had become destructive.




Like Crainie, Brother John and Jake,

be it easy or hard, big ways or little ways,

we get to team up with God 

and be part of creations marvelous evolution.

It sure is a

                 LABOR OF LOVE.



Here are a few prayer prompts as we reflect on our labor days:


- If our goal is to make a lot of money, we are working for a false god.

  If we are working in tandem with creation's evolution 

  we are co-creators with God.


- "Whatever you do, 

   work at it with all your heart, 

   as working for the Lord, 

   not for human masters."  

   (Colossians 3;23)


- "Americans live to work.

   Italians work to live."

    ("A Year In Italy" - DVD)



- "In life's work, bliss and sacrifice 

   are two sides of the same coin, 

   complementary opposites."

       (Lawrence Boldt)


- "One's true work is never merely 'my work,'

   but humanity's work.

   It's not really self-expression, 

   unless by 'self' we mean it with a capital S,

   and that self is the self within mankind."

       (Lawrence Boldt)


- "Where your talents 

    and the needs of the world cross,

    there lies your vocation."

       (Lawrence Boldt)



      
      This Labor Day and all the days of our labor 

     "Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us, 

      and prosper the work of our hands...",

                                 our

                         LABOR OF LOVE.

                      See you next week.

                           John Frank

                              *****

               (Psalm 34:8  and Psalm 90:17 above)

                              *****

"frankly speaking" spirituality for the street is posted online

                       Thursday evening

                     east coast USA time.

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

IMPORTANT

Dear All of Us,


You know, it's important to know what's important.

We sure don't want to get short changed by spending our lives 

on less than the important.

Plus, what's important to us says oh so much about 

who and how we are just now.




OK, so what are we talking about here?

Etymologically, the word important means, 

             
              "to import, to bring in"

           
           (L) in means just that, "in" 

            and  portare means " to carry," "to bring" -

            thus to bring in, import. 



No, let's not talk about tariffs.

Let's talk about what's so valuable that we do well to "import" it,

"to bring it in" to the living of our very selves whatever the cost.




So, what is truly important to this living of our very selves:

career, wealth, family, friends, sex, reputation, the spiritual/mystical,

education, exercise, entertainment, sports, politics, social justice, abs,

saving planet and civilization, the arts, community, smoking, popularity,

porn, power, alcohol/drugs,  trying to be stress and pain free, 

romance, health, - what?



About now a little calm, quiet, honest reflection 

might just be a great big plus.

It'll give us some space and time as we review

what's important to us, 

not what we say is important, 

but what is actually, practically, 

functionally important 

in the living of our very selves 

as is and right now.

What are we importing?  



Let's pray for light and courage.

Let's pray that for each other,

and do that right here and now

for a little while.

             Let's pray.




Next let's focus on what is most important 

from someone who missed it for years.

Let's ponder the learned wisdom of Theresa of Avila.

For years she lived a rather shallow, superficial,

self referenced life as a cloistered nun.

Taking it easy, having it easy was important to her.

One day the cards got really shuffled on her big time.

That changed everything.

She played a whole new hand.



A friend gave her a painting of the Suffering Jesus.

It got to her like nothing ever before.

It was a break through.

It spoke limitless love to her,

limitless love for her,

limitless love for all people,

limitless love for all that is.

It opened her to a whole new awareness of what is important.

Import that love she did, and that to ecstatic, mystical heights.

She was in Love.

That's what was important.



This bright, well educated  woman shares what's most important with us all:

                 "The important thing is 

                   not to think much, 

                   but to love much;

                   do then, 

                   whatever most arouses you 

                   to love."




Thinking is just fine thank you.

It is also limited.

Do what thinking is necessary and helpful,

but don't get trapped in the head.

Go where there are no limits.

Import the Love Who Is God,

which really means let Love in.

Do that by "whatever rouses you to love."

It could be gazing at a picture of the Suffering Jesus.

It could be taking in a foster child.

Just do what opens you to Love, 

"whatever rouses you to Love."





If you will, please permit me to share some of the things 

I do that rouse me to Love.

In no way do I suggest they are universal, preferred or prescriptive.

They are simply and uniquely mine.

I offer them in the hopes of encouraging you to take time 

to see what are your wonderful, unique openings 

through which Love can enter in, can be imported, 

so as to see what's ultimately important and what opens you to it. 




Some of the rivulets through which Love pours into me,

some of the things that "rouse me " to Love are:

         - gazing at a child

         - reading a novel by Morris West

         - helping the hurt

         - holding hurters in God's Love

         - quieting up to the Still Point

         - caring for my family and friends

         - writing this blog for you

         - being swept upward in a Bach chorale

         - spending a day at the National Gallery of Art

           and the next one at the National Cathedral 

         - deep listening to others

         - immersion in sacred wisdom writings

         - spending an evening with its sunset

         - people watching with God in the supermarket 

           and at Holy Communion

         - letting the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins 

           take me to the deep down beauty of things

         - grieving the rape of Mother Earth and helping in her healing

         - having a date with a flower

         - feeling the passion in a Rodin sculpture

         - doing a road trip with nature

         - a retreat at The Abbey of Gethsemani

         - a wedge of sharp provolone wedded with a classic Chianti

         - happily and endlessly more.





Enough about me.

How about you?

What is it that "rouses you to love" and the doing of it?

That question is a helpful prompt to personal prayer and reflection.

That question is pen worthy for those who journal.

That question is discussion ready with a spiritual director or Soul Friend.

That question is action ready and ever so important answer actively.



However we notice and note 

"whatever most rouses you to love"

            may we 

              "do" 

            just that - 

         "love much."

          Of all that is, 

          it is the most

          IMPORTANT.





Thanks for doing this spiritual exercise together with 

all the rest of us whether we are in 

the USA, South Africa, India, The Neverlands,

Russia, Nigeria, India, , Australia, Canada, South Korea 

(the countries online for "frankly speaking" at the moment)

 and all the other homelands from which we gather here each week.

I pray for us all each day and hope you do as well.


                       In The Love Who Is God,

                              John Frank


                                *****


              REFERENCE AND RECOMMENDATION


A "Real Find" that links to numerous and varied sites and sources

supporting our spiritual life out here on the street of everyday living

is available at 

                             ecatholicism.org

                      - click Topics of Interest 

                            the tag at the top

                      - click Spiritual Life/Prayer

                           elect you choice

                                 and 

                                enjoy!


                                 *****


                        "frankly speaking" 

               is posted every Thursday evening,

                     east coast USA time.


                        See you next week!

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