We face a muddle of irrelevant concepts patched together from knowledge borrowed from those who pretended to know.
*Kabir Edmund Helminski. Living Presence. Rev. Ed.
* * *
"What is truth?" he asked. The Sage said, "Truth is the bird's birdness, the sky's skyness, the breeze's breezeness, and the leaf's leafness. Subtract or add, you slide down the hill." The man replied, "I don't understand." "That," said the Sage, "is truth."
*Brian K. Wilcox. "Meetings with an Anonymous Sage."
* * *
I had been a clergyperson serving in varied roles, including a revival and radio preacher, youth leader, professor, chaplain, and pastor - over three decades, mostly in conservative, evangelical groups. Now, I had no spiritual home - a place of feeling at home with others, a spiritual community of like-minded, like-hearted people. I decided I had found it.
The night arrived to make official this new beginning in this new faith community. I had waited over five years, following leaving my role as pastor, for this moment. Indeed, over the past years, I had rarely stepped inside a church building.
I walked forward when my time came and knelt before the bishop. He had arrived to place hands on all who were present for their confirmation. I did not have a veneration for such clergy hierarchy, and I did not think it appealing or rightly modest how some dressed in their high church attire, like royalty from another age, such as in the big, weird-shaped hat this bishop wore. Yet, this was part of the new beginning.
When kneeling, I felt the bishop's two hands on my head and heard his words of confirmation. And, strangely, what occurred was like an opening in the brain; a window flew open in my mind. I did not hear words but saw the message inside the brain.
The vision confirmed I did not honestly believe what this group taught; I had strong doubts. I was shown the truth of the matter, a truth from which I had been hiding in my ardent wish to belong to some faith group. I had rationalized how I agreed... the heart knew otherwise.
I got up and returned to my seat. I did not tell anyone else about this happening. Yet, I could not forget what I saw.
The Heart always knows the truth, even while the mind still dallies with the lie.
* * *
As the Light draws us closer to Itself, It graces us with the blessing of being exposed to the truth. This exposure invites harmony within, healing the split from denying with the mind what the heart knows. In seeing and acknowledging the truth, we become more whole.
What we come to know within is aligned progressively with the self we show to others. The more we move from pretense, the more we move into authenticity. We could say the entire spiritual Way is a healing of the split between mind and heart and, thereby, between our inner life - what we are and believe to be true - and our public presentation - the self displayed before others.
* * *
Many persons seem able to live with the inner split between demanding something be true and knowing, as some say deep down, it is not or may not be true. This creates an inner split manifesting in a lack of realness in one's life. Whole communities, even nations, can live with this split and shape its life around protecting it.
One cannot live a life of integrity demanding the facts not be the facts - how foolish, yet such is how much of the human race lives, and much religion is plagued with this lack of truthfulness. Yet, we find freedom in accepting truth when it either displeases or comforts us.
We say the One is the truest of the true, true is the place of the true One. Those who embrace truth, who place their mind on truth, we know their minds and mouths are pure. These wise ones face the guru [or, inner Teacher].
*In "Sirirag Raga" 16, Guru Nanak. Poems from the Sikh Sacred Tradition. Trans. Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh.
*Use of photography is allowed accompanied by credit given to Brian K. Wilcox and title and place of photographs.
*Brian's book, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse.
