I placed the plant, gifted in memory of my dad, on the kitchen table. Next to the window it grows and grows, with more and more shoots arising from the dark soil, into the openness. Each shoot and leaf reaches toward the light, as though it is in Love with the light. Why is all this possible?

Plants are made for light. By the light, leaves produce sugar, which feeds the roots. The process goes on and on in the openness of the air. We call this photosynthesis. Without the plant moving into the openness from the dark soil and receiving from the light, its life would not be possible. And each plant is an expression of the one Life.

Spirituality is like this. Whatever we choose to do for unfolding innate grace, our union with our Source, we let ourselves be drawn into the open. So, a spirituality is not a means to keep hiding, but to grow to open up into the Openness. As an image, we stop guarding the heart, and simply unfurl and see what happens. Yes, the spiritual path we choose may lead us to hide for a time, such as to give time to heal or to learn alignment within with Grace. Yet, this natural stage is a prelude to a new coming out, this sharing a freshness and aliveness we could not before.

Then, we know the Light that draws us to Itself, we have been drawn to, for that is our innate need and destiny: experiential union with the Light. The Light in us draws us to the Light all around us. We are not our Source, even though one with the Source. All spirituality is simply a learning to live here facing the Light, receiving the Light, being transformed by the grace of the Light, and sharing the Light in an unselfconscious manner. We become that we face.

At some point, then, we transition from thinking that we are spiritual, doing spiritual practice, or being spiritual. We no longer seek liberation, enlightenment, or salvation. We have so imbibed the Light, we emanate a naturalness, and we discover no word need to be added to say what we have become, what we were already. Contemplation is a word oft used for this, this being beyond the idea of being anything, when being is prayer, not anything needing to be added to being. Life, we could say, becomes a Rite of Grace, all of it, as much the depths of loss as the heights of gain, and we graceful. We see being is enough, for in being is all truth and all potential to become and keep becoming, to the glory of the Light.

©Brian Kenneth Wilcox 2017. Brian is a Hospice Chaplain, living out his vow to serve all living beings by serving those preparing to die and their friends and family. Brian lives a vowed life, alone in a quasi-hermitic life, and integrates varied religions, but most especially the contemplative paths of Buddhism and his native faith, Christianity. Brian received a 'mystical' Christ-experience at age 9, and was introduced to a peace untouched by pain and suffering. Later, in his mid-30s, after surviving a dark night of despair, Brian was vowed to a contemplative Christian way of life on St. Matthew's Feast day, 1995, by Greenbough House of Prayer, in Georgia, USA. This began many years of ardent reading, spiritual practice, and exploration of many spiritual paths, including publication of his book An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love. The Journey has led Brian to the joy beyond the ache, a contentment in experiential union with Grace. Brian lives with the affirmation that Love, not as emotion but Divine Presence, transcends all paths of religion and is our Source and Destination. As St. Paul writes in the Christian Bible, "Now remain always, faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love." Peace to All!