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* * *
The theme of this work, Lotus of the Heart, is "Living beyond Beliefs." This can mislead. What is meant is not the presence or absence of belief. One can live beyond and include both belief and unbelief. This is the gift of contemplative spirituality. This embrace only occurs outside the duality of the mind, so arises from pure Grace, or Spirit, or Life. So, one may live in this gift of Grace, while, also, having beliefs. Yet, how one relates to the beliefs one holds to and others hold to is transformed from the duality that characterizes most of religion, indeed most of our life together. The personal self is no longer needing to be right and someone else wrong. This Grace is a reconciliation of opposites, a making-peace between what was once seen as contraries. The fruit: inner harmony, a harmony others witness through your presence, your words, the way you are among others.
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One reason we need to be receptive to what others believe and not get locked into beliefism - where we live from what we believe in contrast to what other persons believe; the egocentric greed of what I myself believe to be true absolutely and what you believe to be false absolutely, so that is settled before I even give you a chance to clarify what you believe - is often the beliefs of others both clarify our own and transform our own. If I cannot listen compassionately to the other, I miss the gift of learning from the other and, more, the joy of communion with the other. In this communion, we can find that there is something more our beliefs point to, a mystery in which we find we are together, we are one, and we can live in harmony, for we most deeply want to. Once we taste of this harmony, this peace together and within, that transcends the opposition to others, we never wish again to live in the world of beliefism.
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beyond beliefs
we are taken into the arms of Grace by Grace
then our whole being expresses Grace
we become the communion that draws other beings
beyond the thoughts that divide us
to the Truth that unites us
this Truth
is a living Truth
cannot be put into ideas or words
cannot be contained in any belief system
so frees us to share in that Mystery
our home, our heart
*Cheryl. 'Tranquility'. Flickr
Grace and Peace to All
*(C)Brian K. Wilcox, 2019
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