Open Canon - the poets - Rumi

Geoff Browning shares, "Love this exploration. How 'bout Rumi, Rilke, Muir, Thomas Berry, Shakespeare..." So which of their writings would you include?

Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, but known to the English-speaking world simply as Rumi, was a 13th-century Persian poet, Sunni Islamic jurist, and theologian and mystic:

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Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.


The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along.


When I am with you, we stay up all night.
When you're not here, I can't go to sleep.

Praise God for those two insomnias!
And the difference between them.


Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I will meet you there.


Oh soul,
you worry too much.
You have seen your own strength.
You have seen your own beauty.
You have seen your golden wings.
Of anything less,
why do you worry?
You are in truth
the soul, of the soul, of the soul.


Only from the heart Can you touch the sky.


Let the beauty of what you love be what you do.


Don't grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form.


You were born with wings. Why prefer to crawl through life?


The way you make love is the way
God will be with you.


Everyone has been made for some particular work, and the desire for that work has been put in every heart.


Every tree and plant in the meadow seemed to be dancing, those which average eyes would see as fixed and still.


Christian, Jew, Muslim, shaman, Zoroastrian, stone, ground, mountain, river, each has a secret way of being with the mystery, unique and not to be judged.


Everyone is so afraid of death, but the real sufis just laugh: nothing tyrannizes their hearts. What strikes the oyster shell does not damage the pearl.


If in thirst you drink water from a cup, you see God in it. Those who are not in love with God will see only their own faces in it.


He is a letter to everyone. You open it. It says, 'Live!'


In truth everything and everyone

Is a shadow of the Beloved,

And our seeking is His seeking

And our words are His words...

We search for Him here and there,

while looking right at Him.

Sitting by His side, we ask:

'O Beloved, where is the Beloved?'


God turns you from one feeling to another and teaches you by means of opposites, so that you will have two wings to fly - not one.


Remember, the entrance door to the sanctuary is inside you.


Load the ship and set out. No one knows for certain whether the vessel will sink or reach the harbor. Cautious people say, "I'll do nothing until I can be sure". Merchants know better. If you do nothing, you lose. Don't be one of those merchants who wont risk the ocean.



When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.



Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.



Conventional opinion is the ruin of our souls.



Whatever possessions and objects of its desires the lower self may obtain, it hangs on to them, refusing to let them go out of greed for more, or out of fear of poverty and need.



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What are your favorites? What would you add from Rilke, Muir, Thomas Berry, or Shakespeare?


"Be patient with all that is unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves. Do not seek answers which cannot be given to you now because you would not be able to live them now. And the point is to live everything, to live the question now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."

- Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

Open Canon - U2's "Pride (In the Name of Love)"

This song has been around for a while, since the 1984 "The Unforgettable Fire" album.



One man come in the name of love
One man come and go
One man come here to justify
One man to overthrow
In the name of love!
One man in the name of love
In the name of love!
What more? In the name of love!

One man caught on a barbed wire fence
One man he resists
One man washed on an empty beach
One man betrayed with a kiss

In the name of love!
What more in the name of love?
In the name of love!
What more? In the name of love!

...nobody like you...there's nobody like you...

Mmm...mmm...mmm...
Early morning, April 4
Shot rings out in the Memphis sky
Free at last, they took your life
They could not take your pride

In the name of love!
What more in the name of love?
In the name of love!
What more in the name of love?
In the name of love!
What more in the name of love...


It has also been linked with Dr. King's life and assassination. For a full history of the song, go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pride_(In_the_Name_of_Love)




Adapted from Songfacts.com:

Bono is speaking about those throughout history who have died because they preached of the equality of all humanity and practiced non-violence as the only way to achieve their goal of having this equality universally recognized. MLK is the primary example of non-violent resistance as the only way to bring about changes in civil rights. But there are allusions to others; Christ for example. The song is about individual people who lived their life with pride – not in a boastful way, but with the pride a person has when their thoughts and actions are motivated by their understanding and full awareness of the dignity and sanctity of ALL human life.

The song is a tribute or illustration or reminder to us, of martyrs to this ideal. It speaks to how they lived their life with an inner Pride in all of humanity and that this Pride is really an expression of God's love for all of humanity. These people did what they did because they were trying to spread this message of God's love for all of mankind.


videos at http://willymac4.blogspot.com/

Open Canon - Bob Marley's "Get Up, Stand Up"

We were created for love, and we were created to live in freedom.

Dale suggested this song, and I wholeheartedly agree.



videos at http://willymac4.blogspot.com/

The Ultimate Open Canon - Nature

My friend Jesse Perry said, "I'm for voting creation into the Canon, and following the Spirit--no more texts needed, unless I inherit a publishing house." Knowing his great love for music and his musical ability, I then asked, about songs. He said, "Ah, yes -- all songs, whether sung by children, trees, humpback whales, or church choirs. and the Book of Nature."

I have to agree, having heard many times the wisdom of the lilies of the field, and the ravens of the air. While this video includes the Beatles song, Across the Universe, I hope it doesn't distract too much from the beauty of the universe.



Paul (if you can call him a saint) says, that creation or the universe is the second book of scripture. I would say that if the Hebrew and Christian scriptures are proven wrong by what we can learn from the universe, then we need to reconsider our scriptures. Either way, Jesus remains the living Word of God – while we understand his message as it is mediated through the scriptural accounts and our experience of human life.

Still, I recently heard of a Presbyterian minister who had never heard of Panentheism (god is in everything), and when they were exposed to a Christian who described their relation of the sacred in terms of the nearness of God in nature, they automatically referred to it as Pantheism (god is everything). It's as if every theologian since Jurgen Moltmann is rolling over in their graves. (I thought Presbyterians were supposed to be the educated, and rational form of Christianity?) What is so threatening about recognizing god's presence in all that is? I imagine that some would attempt to preserve their view of a theistic god in as many personal, holy, and "wholly other" terms as possible, but still I don't think it does any of us any favors by separating the life of spirit and nature.

How do you experience god in nature? What song does it sing to you?



videos at http://willymac4.blogspot.com/

Open Canon - not just what Dr. King would do - but what we are called to do.

Open Canon - Rev. Lee points out that we are called to be on the side of right.

Discerning "right" is a hard thing to do, and can get messy within a community that has differing values. While Rev. Lee believes Dr. King would do the right thing by opposing Prop 8 - he doesn't mention that one of Dr. King's closest advisors was Bayard Rustin. While Rustin was openly gay at a time when that was almost unheard of, the enemies of the civil rights movement – especially Strom Thurmond – used Rustin’s homosexuality as a weapon against Dr. King, and Rustin was forced into a background role to help save the movement.

The question remains: What are you are called to do? What in the world is worth standing up for, even at the cost of your livelihood?

Still Exploring an Open Canon - God is still speaking – Share your ideas.

Still Exploring an Open Canon - Share your ideas.

What are the texts (sacred and secular), poems, songs, art, short stories, videos and movies that you would include into the canon that give expression of what it means to be human, to live fully, and to explore the meaning of life? What additional human expressions would you add to make sense of the Jesus experience?

If you are viewing this as a Facebook note, check out the blog version for the videos and links at http://willymac4.blogspot.com/

Open Canon - Dietrich Bonhoeffer “Life Together: A Discussion of Christian Fellowship"

After his martyrdom at the hands of the Gestapo in 1945, Dietrich Bonhoeffer continued his witness in the hearts of Christians around the world. In his book Life Together we learn of Pastor Bonhoeffer's experience within Christian community. This story of a unique fellowship in an underground seminary during the Nazi years reads like one of Paul's letters. It gives practical advice on how life together in Christ can be sustained in families and groups. The role of personal prayer, worship in common, everyday work, and Christian service is treated in simple, almost biblical, words. Life Together serves as bread to all who are hungry for the real life of Christian fellowship. (www.christianbook.com)

An introduction to the book by Professor Brian Hartley of Greenville, Ill.
http://religionprofessor.blogspot.com/2009/09/introduction-to-bonhoeffers-life.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_Bonhoeffer

Quotations from Life Together:

"For Christians the beginning of the day should not be burdened and haunted by the various kinds of concerns they face during the working day.... Therefore, in the early morning hours of the day may our many thoughts and our many idle words be silent, and may the first thought and the first word belong to the One to whom our whole life belongs" (51-52).

“Only those who give thanks for little things receive the great things well.”

“Pastors should not complain about their congregation, certainly never to other people, but also not to God. Congregations have not been entrusted to them in order that they would become accusers of their congregations before God and their fellow human beings. When pastors lose faith in a Christian community in which they have been place and begin to make accusations against it, they had better examine themselves first to see whether the underlying problem is not their own idealized image, which should be shattered by God.”

“Like Christian sanctification, Christian community is a gift of God to which we have no claim. Only God knows the real condition either our community or our sanctification. What may appear weak and insignificant to us may be great and glorious to God.”

"It is not necessary that we should discover new ideas in our meditation. It is sufficient, and far more important, if the Word, as we read and understand it, penetrates and dwells within us."

"The first service that one owes to others in the fellowship consists of listening to them. Just as love of God begins with listening to his word, so the beginning of love for our brothers and sisters is learning to listen to them."

"I can no longer condemn or hate a brother [or sister] for whom I pray, no matter how much trouble he causes me. His face that hitherto may have been strange and intolerable to me is transformed through intercession into the countenance of a brother for whom Christ died."

"So long as we eat our bread together, we shall have sufficient even for the least. Not until one person desires to keep his own bread for himself does hunger ensue."


Other Dietrich Bonhoeffer quotations:

In normal life we hardly realize how much more we receive than we give; life can be rich only with such realization. source: (Letters and Papers from Prison)

To be silent does not mean to be inactive; rather it means to breathe in the will of God, to listen attentively and be ready to obey. (Meditating on the Word)

When we come to a clearer and more sober estimate of our own limitations and responsibilities, that makes it possible more genuinely to love our neighbor. (Letters and Papers from Prison)

There is not a place to which the Christian can withdraw from the world, whether it be outwardly or in the sphere of the inner life. Any attempt to escape from the world must sooner or later be paid for with a sinful surrender to the world. (Ethics)

You have granted me many blessings; let me also accept what is hard from your hand. (Prayers from Prison)

The first call which every Christian experiences is the call to abandon the attachments of this world. (The Cost of Discipleship)

Earthly possessions dazzle our eyes and delude us into thinking that they can provide security and freedom from anxiety. Yet all the time they are the very source of anxiety. (The Cost of Discipleship)

From God we hear the word: “If you want my goodness to stay with you then serve your neighbor, for that is where God comes to you.” (No Rusty Swords)

Judging others makes us blind, whereas love is illuminating. By judging others, we blind ourselves to our own evil and to the grace which others are just as entitled to as ourselves. (The Cost of Discipleship)

We have learned a bit too late in the day that action springs not from thought but from a readiness for responsibility. (Letters and Papers from Prison)

Which of us has really admitted that God’s goodness can also lead us into conflict. (No Rusty Swords)

Our enemies are those who harbor hostility against us, not those against whom we cherish hostility… As a Christian I am called to treat my enemy as a brother and to meet hostility with love. My behavior is thus determined not by the way others treat me, but by the treatment I receive from Jesus. (The Cost of Discipleship)

In a world where success is the measure and justification of all things, the figure of him who was sentenced and crucified remains a stranger. (Ethics)

For the working class world, Christ seems to be settled with the church and middle class society. (Christology)

The future and the hope for the middle class church lies in the renewal of its lifeblood, which is only possible if the church succeeds in winning the working class. (Sanctum Communio)

The believer is neither a pessimist nor an optimist. To be either is illusory. The believer sees reality not in a certain light but as it is, and believes only in God and God’s power towards all and over all that is seen. (No Rusty Swords)

There remains an experience of incomparable value . . . to see the great events of world history from below; from the perspective of the outcast, the suspects, the maltreated, the powerless, the oppressed, the reviled ---- in short, from the perspective of those who suffer . . . to look with new eyes on matters great and small. (Letters and Papers from Prison)

Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness and pride of power and with its plea for the weak. Christians are doing too little to make these points clear rather than too much. Christendom adjusts itself far too easily to the worship of power. Christians should give more offense, shock the world far more, than they are doing now. Christian should take a stronger stand in favor of the weak rather than considering first the possible right of the strong. (Sermon on II Cor. 12:9)

There is no way to peace along the way to safety. For peace must be dared. It is the great venture. (Address at Fano)

The followers of Christ have been called to peace. . . . And they must not only have peace but also make it. And to that end they renounce all violence and tumult. In the cause of Christ nothing is to be gained by such methods. . . . His disciples keep the peace by choosing to endure suffering themselves rather than inflict it on others. They maintain fellowship where others would break it off. They renounce hatred and wrong. In so doing they over-come evil with good, and establish the peace of God in the midst of a world of war and hate. (The Cost of Discipleship)

See also www.dbonhoeffer.org