|
* * *
From Buddhist teaching, we see another insight into our belonging together, yet a Buddhist would deny this has a dogmatic nature. This is simply how Life is and works. And how Life works, is how Grace works, for Life is Grace.
When the Buddha received enlightenment beneath the Bodhi tree in Bodh Gaya, India, he had insight into how the universe works.
It was from this insight that he revealed the powerful principle of pratityasamutpada, which is commonly known by its English translation, "dependent arising." Pratityasamutpada describes how everything we experience - both material and conscious - arises, plays out, and falls away in reliance upon an infinite web of contingent relationships. In other words, it is because things depend that life moves and we can experience it.
*Elizabeth Mattis Namgyel. The Logic of Faith: A Buddhist Approach to Finding Certainty Beyond Belief and Doubt.
Two important words stand out in Namgyel's concluding sentence: depend, moves.
1) Depends. Simply put, everything is for everything is. Likewise, I am for you are. With all the talk of being independent, we are dependent beings. Everything leans on everything. Being dependent is central to being a human being. We are not only part of the web of life, we are the web of life.
2) Moves. To live is to move. Movement is not only happening all about us, we are moving. We are diversifying. Change is a constant. We are moving together. No one from one moment to another can say who and what we are, not definitely. This encourages us with the possibility of seeing others and ourselves differently.
* * *
A Christian sage, in discoursing on the Apostle's Creed, writes of this oneness diversifying. He points out this "dependent arising" is true for those who worship Jesus, for it is true of all Nature.
The whole evolves through the interaction of all its parts. A closer look at any field, hedgerow, or plot of wetland will show us the "Yes!" to belonging in action. We need only allow this power, which is so obvious in nature, to flow also into human culture. What is true of a forest is also true of any society: no living creature can survive in isolation.
*David Steindl-Rast. Deeper Than Words: Living the Apostles' Creed.
Steindl-Rast, seeing "Christ" to be what Jesus embodied, means "Christ" being your and my essential nature. The Buddhist points to the same, when saying we each are the Buddha. To become Buddha, to become Christ, happens in our acting in union with others from our essential, one Self. Unity is not simply a static state of being, unity is happening. Belonging is both an ontological fact and a pragmatic process.
* * *
In a single birth of a single being, the entire universe is present and active. We already belong, we cannot not belong. The act of being included brings gratitude, for it resonates with our nature as belonging.
* * *
Longing arises as the expression of the felt-distance from the fact of belonging and the need to belong, to actualize our True Self. We, as all in Nature, seek to express our true nature. So, we reach out to connect, and not just with other humans, but other forms of the one Life, seen and unseen. In this dance of belonging and longing, God is goding, Love is loving.
* * *
We live within
each other
A "Yes" in being-togetherness
Christ-becoming, Buddha-happening, Love-loving
Belonging is not only something we are
is something we become
Longing finds resolution in
this belonging
Does, however, this resolution become
a final resolution, so that one
is beyond longing?
If there are increasing depths of intimacy,
is there not longing that naturally arises
to lead us to a closeness deeper than any one depth,
longing and belonging complementing each other?
Or is it possible to reach
that rest in belonging,
longing ceasing in belonging?
* * *
(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2020
|
