Ah, thanks to Gavin Ortlund, I came across this sweet honey of a gem from Augustine: "This is the chief cause of this insane profanity, that the figure resembling the living person, which induces men to worship it, has more influence in the minds of these miserable persons, than the evident fact that it is not living, so that it ought to be despised by the living." Perfect anthem for this whole series. (https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801115.htm)
I'm pretty sure this video -- "Orthodoxwave" -- is attempting to promote, not critique, Orthodoxy, but I think it does an excellent job of encapsulating the sense of "bombardment" I'm talking about in the essay:
Good morning, Graham. Your essay and the tidbits of comments I’ve skimmed are so nourishing. I can’t muster the patience to read through them all on a screen, and wish this community could sit in a field somewhere and explore all this.
Your reflections stirred up more than I can write here, so I’ll just share a little: For more than a decade our family tried to pray with no vessel but our own longing to be reintegrated with holy Creation. But with no collective vessel – just books, some like-minded friends and our own will – we found ourselves frustrated, wandering, often lost. I'm grateful for those years, but now we are walking into Orthodoxy, and I find the veneration of icons to be very healing, very nourishing, fostering a pattern of perception and relationship that lasts beyond the momentary prayers I make before them.
Like many people, I also think a new Way is emerging – that God is doing something new in the world – and for me praying in a temple and also praying outside is a practice in working the opposites while the new thing grows beyond anyone’s will or intentions or ideas. We're in a liminal state, and for me, praying in a church feels like praying in an egg, or praying in a womb.
Anyway, your essay was good fodder for family discussion, and my children have this to say…
My son (7): I mostly agree with him, but you should just tell him to take his icons outside.
My daughter (11): I know some people don’t understand the world is as holy as the church, but the church is also just as important as outside. They’re two different spaces for prayer, two different ways of praying. If church was outside, it would be beautiful but in a different way.
Also, I'm glad-- and not surprised, of course, since we "get" each other, and your beautiful writing also reflects this -- to hear you say: "Like many people, I also think a new Way is emerging – that God is doing something new in the world." I will be interested to see how this openness unfolds for you in Orthodoxy, if you find space and even nourishment for it. I think a large part of why I feel it's time to hit the trail again is because the mentality of "There is nothing new in Orthodoxy, and no need for anything new, either - in fact, whatever is new comes from spiritual pride, if not demonic delusion" is the dominant note I hear struck again and again. There is a reason why "Orthodoxy" is what it sounds like! -- it's correct. And complete. And always has been, according to the story told by those who wish to tell that story, the guardians of Orthodoxy: it's the faith "once and for all delivered to the saints." This is one thing that attracts people away from the ever-shifting sands of Protestantism, especially where it feels like *everything* is new *all* the time (an exhausting, perpetual shallowness, to which I will never return, God help me!) Orthodoxy is so *not* new and so complete and entire, there is not even the sense -- as in Roman Catholicism -- that there is such a thing as doctrinal development. Whatever Orthodoxy is, has been there from the beginning (says the story) -- it only needs to be articulated in new ways, during the era of the Ecumenical Councils (after that, it doesn't even need to be articulated in new ways). This is why, to justify icons -- which certainly were new, if you look at history -- the story is told that St Luke was the first iconographer, and he painted the first icon of Mary, whom he knew personally. This "proves" that icons were not an innovation, or a development, but always there from the beginning. (But for someone who knows and respects history, and knows and respects the Judaisms of the first century, would find this not only implausible, but actually disrespectful to the real Mary, who would have ripped her garments and wept in dust in ashes, had anyone even suggested painting a sacred picture of her....) Anyway -- if you do discover that there is this openness in Orthodoxy to the new thing God is doing in the world, do let us know...I have read a zillion Orthodox books, but have only been to maybe a dozen parishes, and only known a dozen priests...it could be I've just been spending time inside a very insulated part of the Orthodox world...
I'm really happy to hear that venerating icons within the encircling womb of the Church has been healing for you, and I'm sure this is one of the reasons, maybe the main one, that they're there (the usual theological apologies for icons, as usual, being beside the real point). Faces -- even images of faces, not real ones -- have their nourishing effect. The stability and childlike brightness of a picture of a face, too; they're nice. I think if my experience of church were generally like what it was like at St Ignatius in Madison (I cherish being there for a liturgy with you) and if icons were generally what Ethiopian or Coptic icons were like (not Russian, not Byzantine), I think my feelings now would probably be different. And anyway, I wouldn't wish my particular mental issues with over-stimulation from the artificial on anyone else! I love what you say about the creative, fruitful tension between praying outside and praying inside for you. I think that is where I'd really like to go, too. But there is a lot that needs to happen (again) to make "inside" much more womblike, earthlike than it is (see the next essay, coming in a couple days). I'm going to make a practice of pushing in the extreme of "outside not inside," having -- the opposite of you -- spent 13 years feeling more and more lost inside of Orthodoxy, cut off from Creation. But it won't be absolute. "Inside shall be out" to sort of misquote a very beautiful William Carlos Williams poem. That's the goal. I am willing to take an institutional "hit" for the team, to work towards moving inside back outside, and outside back in; that's how I see it.
Thank you, Graham. I printed out your comments here and my daughter read them in bed before falling asleep the other night. And that’s my first answer to where I see the openness in Orthodoxy to the new thing God is doing: In your own words, and the folks who find them resonant.
If you were writing about Orthodoxy without your longing for Creation, would it be as compelling? If you were writing about your longing for Creation without your Orthodox background, would it be as compelling? Maybe, but probably not for me. It is the loving tension that draws me in.
I suppose I’m not necessarily looking for the new thing God is doing directly within Orthodoxy – meaning I’m not looking for those conversations in church nor in Orthodox books I read. If they happen to come up, of course, I will be glad. But I’m also not sure any of us can consciously perceive very much of it anyway. We get hints, maybe, notice a pattern here or there, but mostly whatever is happening is beyond intellect, intent or will. When I do find myself in conversations about the new thing, they happen more around the fire, with friends who are Orthodox or not, or in intimate, one-on-one conversations, rather than in church spaces. And I’m fine with that. We are in a liminal time, and I think holding the tension of opposites – and there are lots of opposites to hold right now! – is a good road to walk.
In talking about creating a new metaphysics, Vine Deloria says this, which I think is relevant to all this: “We need not be radical in a disruptive sense. The transformation of the manner in which any culture interprets its heritage of remembered human experiences and knowledge cannot be radical if it is to have any effect on the respective human societies. Rather, it must relate to the various human traditions at as many points as possible so that continuity and identity of traditions can be understood. Without this natural development, any new metaphysics would appear abstract and unrelated to people.”
Anyway, it looks like you’ve given us another treasure of an essay, and I look forward to getting to that soon. Thanks for lingering back here with me. I appreciate visiting these liminal spaces with you and your circle of readers.
I love this, Joseph. I'm much less mature than you are, and so what immediately comes to mind for me is a crazy line that I think went unnoticed in "Waving Farewell" where I imagined some "collective dirtbag Prometheus stealing the holy fire of Byzantium"--very much an image in line with my deeply "scavenger" heart, but what I've always really wanted, and needed, is a "long obedience" as Nietzsche says; or, as you say, "loving tension" -- as a steadfast lifestyle. I do sense that there is a way for me, an uncomplicated one. I just get so tangled up in Orthodoxy. I'll keep this side of the tension going by walking away, holding on to enormous fistfulls of as much Orthodoxy as possible, if I can. All I really want is what I said in my poem "The Way":
To splash rainwater on the arms, the legs
The face—as cold as clouds
With the fragrance of awakening green moss
Everywhere around the rushing stream of clouds
And to chant a psalm or two
With two or three friends—meadowlarks, cypress trees
Precious human bodies born of clay—all sunlilies
Dancing in the breeze of perfect freedom
And eating wild fruits and nuts and roots
And cathartic flickering green herbs
And making prostrations on the bare Earth
And kissing the face of the Earth murmuring Lord Yeshua Messiah
Have mercy on us, your perishing creatures
—The mind shining sunlike in the depths of the heart
Beautiful, Graham. Your words are the proper ending to this dialogue for now. I receive them with gratitude. May these longings seep into the soil of the world and take root! Peace, Joseph
‘The living things of Earth, which come from God, can awaken new life within us—like a fresh breeze—in a way that artifacts of other peoples' religious imaginations can't.’
You are speaking a language my heart knows, Graham. Thank you.
I read through many of the responses to your essay, and I love the thoughtful debating as this audience works through a form of Socratic dialogue. I will not add to the argument of iconography. I was going to write “though I am not Orthodox” and share more, but caught myself at drawing a lined division. I am a follower of The Way and recognize the Orthodox as my brethren, whether they recognize me or not. I am a servant of the Most High and He has always blessed me in cathedrals of His Creation. I have always heard His voice clearer in the chatter of nature versus the chatter of man. Man is nature as well; I just prefer some nature to others.
And YET, I attend a church that now has cameras and ‘black mirror’ screens in every room. It saddens me to no end. Is nothing sacred? So unnatural! So oblivious to the signs of the time. But I push it aside (with difficulty) and meet my brethren regularly. I am learning to be quieter. I very, very much want to be someone who ‘continues about my business’ in the midst of every storm. Even the technological ones.
Just for fun:
The Lilies-of-the-Field photographed a century ago in Palestine, is Anemone coronaria. Both words come from the Greek. Anemone literally means “daughter of the wind” and coronaria means “crown”. Crowned daughter of the wind. Such holiness! As the scripture says, nothing manmade can even compare to such glory.
I am blessed by reading your journey, Graham, and I can appreciate the gumption it takes to open up sides of your mind that others may not want to see. Keep going about your business, as only you can.
"Man is nature as well; I just prefer some nature to others" are my feelings about it, also; exactly. I don't quite go as far as Nietzsche's "I found it more dangerous among men than among animals," but I'm pretty far in that direction. I certainly find it the least dangerous to be among the lilies of the field.
"Crowned daughter of the wind" is so, so lovely...
Personally, I'm a sort of Blakean, such that I see a powerful nexus between the spiritual human imagination and the Holy Ghost.
But I'm also aware of the dangers of the imagination, like you saw in the essay on my blog: specter versus presence, muddled romantic vs. lucid romantic. So I think that I have mixed feelings about your thoughts here—because while I agree with you about not building an illusory realm of unreality for ourselves, I also believe that's an abuse of the imagination, not the only thing it can do or what it is made by God to do.
I've also thought in terms of idols vs. windows. Basically, an idol is a self-enclosed specter that cuts us off from God, whereas a window allows our minds to become more translucent to the Light from Above and perceive the shining-forth of that Light through the Creation. So, I would consider icons to be windows that help to enchant the Creation, not a virtual simulation (or idol) that cuts us off from the Creation.
Overall, I believe that artistic creativity has real spiritual value. I love trees about as much as you do—but if the tree was enough, then why do we have symphonies and novels? And for that matter, why do we have your quite poetic writings? It seems to me that we have a co-creative role to play with God in the realm of the spirit, even if that role primarily consists of purifying and elevating consciousness to a point where we can fully perceive what is already there.
Finally, I've also suggested somewhere that there will be no art in the Kingdom of Heaven, because there will be no need for windows when all the walls have tumbled down. But in the meanwhile, we have art and need it, and I tend to think of icons in those terms.
I like this, Sethu. That last bit was especially helpful -- "Finally, I've also suggested somewhere that there will be no art in the Kingdom of Heaven, because there will be no need for windows when all the walls have tumbled down. But in the meanwhile, we have art and need it, and I tend to think of icons in those terms." I'm all for the imagination (as I think is clear in my writing)...it's the sacred task of artists -- in many forms -- to rearrange matter to make the energies of God more visible to ourselves and others, not less. In this essay, though, I'm raising the question of whether mass reproduced canonical Byzantine iconography is making God less visible than just leaving the trees alone. I think it does. That's been my experience, anyway -- icons make me feel God is far away, trees make him feel close. I think this has to do with the idea of an icon not just as a means of clarifying consciousness or intensifying spiritual energies, but as a (motionless, unsmiling) face through which to talk to the person depicted.
These seem to be made by artists and not mass produced, which I think might be part of the real point: the way that mass production under the Machine alienates the imagination and turns it into a specter.
Also, I'll add that I totally ignore the folk who keep insisting that an icon is something differerent from a work of art. I find that silly. Icons are art, and all good art is iconic—I take this as axiomatic.
I really like your mention of “mass reproduced“, here—I think that may have a lot to do with how an icon is turned into a fetish and a specter. Are you familiar with Walter Benjamin’s essay on this topic?
I’ll send you a link to the essay, as well as some icons I like, once I get back to my computer a little later this evening.
Ah, you're right: I was looking with a yellow tint on my screen. Between Isaiah 53:2 and the way He could disappear into crowds, it sounds like He looked like pretty much a typical Jew of the time, and so I just figured that His eyes would've been brown. But, hm, that radiant green is what I understand to be the color of the heart chakra and the Holy Ghost.
Years ago I was given a mug with Van Gogh's "Starry Night " printed on it. I used it, sure, but always felt unsettled; the marketing, the ubiquity, the aesthetic blindness. Well, over in the Orthodox "market place" one can find a mug with the Theotokos of Vladimir printed on it... to be filled with the drink of your choice.
Your quote from Ohiyesa Charles Eastman:
"He who enrobes Himself in filmy veils of cloud, there on the rim of the visible world where our Great-Grandfather Sun kindles his evening camp-fire, He who rides upon the rigorous winds of the north, or breathes forth His spirit upon aromatic southern airs, whose war-canoe is launched upon majestic rivers and inland seas—He needs no lesser cathedral!"
...or, you could just go online and buy a mug.
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The heart is deep. We stay in the "shallow end" - the deep is too mysterious.
In the 21st century we are programmed to be led away from our heart, though something mysterious, and natural, draws us. That which draws us (ever so gently) is wind, real wind that blows through trees. We may not recognize the wind that is calling our deep heart to the Messiah if our skin and face our skin and face have not felt a gentle breeze, or a strong, wet, gale at the edge of Mother Superior.
Forgive me Graham, and commenters here- the above relates to the image, though I don't have the words to say it (I'm a bit...simple).
You always understand, because you're as weird as I am. Weird, meaning "That which draws us (ever so gently) is wind, real wind that blows through trees. We may not recognize the wind that is calling our deep heart to the Messiah if our skin and face our skin and face have not felt a gentle breeze, or a strong, wet, gale at the edge of Mother Superior" makes good and perfect and total sense.
The wind! The real wind IS spiritual -- the force that moves the trees!
You had me at that Black Elk prayer, of course. So much in that simple.
This place hasn't been the same with you gone, Bud.
There is a theory that the Adams Event 42,000 years ago, when the magnetic poles reversed, the increase of UV rays, electric storms and other wild events caused mass extinctions and made sanctuaries of places like caves. Many of the images made in those sanctuaries, in some sense from the sky, where human embellishing of forms already present that recalled bull or bear or horse. One gets more of a sense of a forming of company than of worship.
Both the coming in to sanctuary from out, and the people-ing of the sacred topography appeals to me. I don't know how that relates to icons but the mere fact that something might be "made" from a tree or a stone, even fashioned with a tool also attracts me and feels as capable of being sacred work as it is capable of being desecration.
Maybe its the direction of the company's gaze. Peers would be in a circle, deer, serpent, human, satry all circling from equidistant points the unnamable Ein Sof of our center, maybe? While worshipers line up before the image looking down, several types of hierarchy established at once.
Then again, there is that story of the serpent held up by Moses, surely an older Hebrew way that is buried under later whittling of the animal and weird of it. And there is Yeshua tied to that ancestral animal image aloft.
Vital truth in that sense though of gathering before an iconic company of countenances that do not wish to be Here. The conflation of the World with the Earth may be the great poison of Christianity. That and the aberration of Eternal Seperation/Torture Chamber. Remove those two knives from the body of the Way and so much of the mischief of Christedom can come clean.
Of course I am remembering here your taste for Angkor Wat and suspect you of leaving more room or great feats of sanctuary making and company forming in the end.
Yesterday for the first time ever I stood at ground zero of a new beaver pond-to-be. They are taking large trees down along the creek, in a lowland. two days begun, a grand beaver sanctuary raised in the middle and the water level just beginning to rise. It was as total in its adjustment of the earth as any clearcut but somehow it was magical. The valence was different. I will take photos when the snow stops. SOmething in there 'making' , there un-treeing yet still wilding is related here.
So much to ponder here, Andrew, and so much to rejoice in.
As is our way, we seem to be heading in the same direction -- uphill -- following various streams of life we've found, back to their one source: "Maybe its the direction of the company's gaze. Peers would be in a circle, deer, serpent, human, satry all circling from equidistant points the unnamable Ein Sof of our center, maybe?" --> that's exactly where I have a mind to go next, only switching from maybe to definitely. The difference between a circle of peers and an ecclesiastical phalanx is almost everything, I'm beginning to wonder. I'll mention now also that one of the many things I didn't include for the sake of brevity is I love the ruins of the churches in Cappadocia, where the cave-sense is strong -- the feeling of a cave in living rock, as going down into the womb of the Earth. Chant strange harmonies in there resounding around the womb-walls, and I'm there. Especially if the whole thing is round, like the way the beavers build their own sacred lodges. I'm 100% all for humans making things -- imaginative things, crackling with metaphor and spiritual energy -- from wood, stone, leaf, sky. More than 100%. Eventually -- like in 15 essays -- I hope to finally get to Christopher Alexander and talk, with his help, about how to really make stuff, in a way that's coherent with this beautiful Hebrew aspiration of man as a gardener of the Earth. But the air has to be cleared of a whole lot of religious kitsch first...
Alot of talk this week about Patrick and sainthood and Yeshua in Ireland. I am struggling with it though I have no doubts about the true heart of the speakers like Martin. You know a tree by its fruits and so much misery came to that land in the cargo hold of the church. Seems like the ones I hear on the edges, also good ones and true, need more of reckoning about such things. Black Elk is a guide here certainly. And Fool's Crow and the rest. Plus the living first nations church today.
Jenkinson says Christianity never belonged here. I dunno. I trust Oyihesa was wise enough and of here enough to call it as he saw it, the common ground and welcome home of it all. Maybe it in Force and Empire that it never belonged, and having passed through that could it ever come clean? I don't know. We need a table that as it passes through to remember the murder of G-d/man it passes through in rememberence of all that has happened with enough depth of empathy and consequence that it can't abide with certain remnants and devices now integrated in the word and way.
That table will be animist or it will be nothing. It will be woman-ed or it will be nothing. From the very roots there was something ancestral, something deeply of the land and from the beginning to build up on. Stone. And there was something else present. A wish to defend and preserve and uphold and spread by force. That He called Satan. Mere minutes apart they were born. Mathew 16. Twins even. It was the latter that conquered the world and greyed it with its breath. But the messiah of the former remains with us. Bulgakov I think was onto this when he saw in John 19 that the blood and water of the murdered G-d/man pour down into the chalice that is the mother earth herself. And remain. What is that table? Round no doubt. And Here.
And Apollo-worshipping "saint" Constantine stares at the sun so long the cross of non-power becomes a weapon for slaying his enemies, and he's called "equal to the apostles." The subversion is real.
"Just quietly walk away". Amen. I am doing that rather regularly. It seems like a pretty good response to so many situations. Anyway, great to have you back. Sounds like a lot has transpired since we last heard from you... Thank you for the photo of the lilies in Palestine! I won't comment on the other photos, except for you in yourself in the forest: beautiful. I am definitely going to recommend to anxious people to HUG A TREE (maybe I won't shout;-))
Thanks for this, Shannon! Yes, a lot has happened...well, or the same internal thing has happened so many times by now, that it's time for something new to happen :) I'd love to hear more about what quietly walking away has been like on your end, if you have more to share...
Sure. For me it has to do with letting go, and a small sense of submission. It is about smaller things specific to my life that are maybe not very impactful, I guess, where it no longer serves me or anyone to argue, to protest, to want things to change. It's kind of just an acceptance of how things are, just witnessing, and then sort of saying,"This is not for me", and quietly walking away. There are lots of social situations where this applies. Or places of commerce, for example. Places where it would be useless or pointless to expend energy fighting, but I can withdraw my support and my investment of both time and energy, and direct my attention elsewhere. I know these things still exist but I do not need to feed them. These are not very original thoughts. But there is a sense of coming home to myself, and in this is the small sense of submission, of giving up a kind of struggle that feels misdirected perhaps. And with that comes a sense of peace.
In a more important area, I have been looking for a church for a while, but I just can't bring myself to it. I realize there is need for a sangha, that a community of like-minded spiritual seekers is recommended. Maybe it's early childhood wounding that gets in the way (I was brought up atheist), but it's like I lose my belief when I get around other worshipers. I like churches best when there are no people in them, though not that horrid Catholic box you posted, or when only a few are saying prayers in peace and quiet and there is no service. This is where I wrestle with submission. What or Who am I submitting to in these things? Like, I just can't submit to a church, maybe because I have no understanding or grounding in what the church is, in a positive way. I am, however, deeply touched by your poetical(!) worship, and your lovely book, "The Sunlilies".
Anyway, thank you for gently asking me if I had more to share. It's still a new phenomenon to post my thoughts publicly. I'm glad this is a safe space and you are so kind!
This is beautiful and helpful, Shannon -- thanks so much for sharing.
*Sighing deeply,* yes -- we can't do without our sangha, can we, at least a little one, and although it sometimes brings me temporary relief to think of the trees and clouds and birds and sun as my sangha -- which is literally and deeply true -- still, we need our own kind, too, the two-leggeds. Yeshua said, "Where two or three are gathered..." I don't know that he made any promises about where two or three thousand, or million, are gathered, and as there seems to be a collective mind that takes over when too many people *imagine* themselves -- with institutional props -- as a single community, when the actual reality is true community can only happen face to face in small numbers. Very small numbers. Intimate numbers. I, too, feel the simultaneous need and desire to submit -- and wariness that submission in an environment of collectivity where people, paid to be in positions of power, are saying "submit to the tradition!" really means submitting to these people, not to the One. (I'm going through a cathartic but painful time of contraction and withdrawal right now, so take everything I say with a grain of salt)...but I am deeply, deeply confident that there is a joyful way forward for all of us lovely misfits, even in the craziness of our times. Especially so!
Hey Graham, it's SO good to read your words as gift again. I hope you'll excuse my crude comparison, but I've just gotta say that your words are like a sacred alarm clock! You wake me up, brother. Thank you
Graham, this morning I walk in a huge, glorious, equinox wind under trees, blue skies, light rain, and rainbows. This evening I listen to your wonderful essay and the birds. And it's all the breathing earth, it's all the temple. It's so good that you are writing to us again.
Beautiful, Penny! Huge, glorious equinox wind, light rain and rainbows -- how immense, how wonderful all this is! I'm so glad to be writing again, and I'm so glad you're still here.
Do you know the two albums of new Native American music made by the late Jewish-Mohawk musician, Robbie Robertson, formerly of The Band? I think they might resonate. All of this does for me.
Oh man, no! Can this be listened to somewhere, like youtube? I'd love to hear it. Also, "Jewish-Mohawk" is officially now the one dual identity of which I am most deeply, deeply jealous. I was just thinking, man, if there's a Messianic Jewish way to be a Zen Native American with light skin, I'd sure like to know...
The first breaths of spring are here. It’s another foggy morning as dew-dripping grass unfurls in the quiet dawn. Sparkling silver drops hang from a thousand webs, intricate patterns hidden in shadow suddenly blaze to life, quivering in the splendor of the day's first breath. My backyard is a jeweled cathedral, pulsing and singing as the wet and the light raise life from the stillness. Every breath, every birdsong and tiny living thing crawling through the rich greenness is breaking into a melody--the rhythmic, holy song of a reborn earth.
My backyard is a doorway to the truth in myth. The realm of the mythic, that first glimpse of the everyday transformed into something larger, more powerful and primal, is perhaps the deepest plane of truth because it bypasses the mind and speaks straight to the soul. It is here that the Spirit teaches us life itself, with sound and breath and light, he teaches us to wait, to sing and to be, simply as we are. Mythic truths everywhere, once you learn to see them. They’re not only found on mountain tops; they are hidden in the commonplace as well. Don’t turn away without seeing, without reaching a little higher and a little further into the startling mysteries that surround us.
To be still and and hear the morning song in the spring is one of the great gifts one can receive from the life-giver. It is a revelation of about who he is, what he likes, how he talks. Not words from a book, but a living song we can join ourselves, here and now. God is drawing us to himself through his own work. Here, in the backyard, the truth is rebirth. All around there is the sound of becoming. Every blade of grass, every bird and gust of wind is becoming what it must. Here is the quiet to pray and ask, what must I become?
A cathedral is a place of worship. To be overcome by beauty, truth and love is to become one with the same force that calls spring out of winter, life out of death. It is worship. Life in the spirit is not a bunch of dire warnings and fearful thoughts; it is freedom to finally put down all the burden of endless thought, a chance to be present and see and hear what is around us. I think sometimes there are many ways to be born again. The experience is simply waiting for discovery. We are surrounded by cathedrals.”
I think that part of our image-bearing is to participate as creators ourselves (or more accurately, sub-creators, per Tolkien). So we take wood and make icons, we take grapes and make wine, we take breath and make songs - it's the work we're given to do, and how we participate as sons and not slaves in the divine.
Hey Gracie! Yes, definitely -- *almost* entirely with you -- we are co-creators, called to reshape the matter of Earth into new, artful things that give life to Earth and one another. Transforming grapes into wine, after God transforms rain into grapes, is a beautiful example of that; taking the air and making it into beautiful music even more so. But it seems like taking something which already has its own face -- a tree -- and painting a human face on it, and talking to that human; that seems different from the other examples.
I get what you're saying; it does seem different. For fun I want to push back a little, though - do you keep, and treasure, pictures drawn by your children on paper? If so, why is that different?
I suspect - or I could be projecting my own prejudices - that a big part of the objection is not the icon itself, but the mass-market production of icons, which is so utterly bizarre. The icon destroys the tree, the wine destroys the grape, the song destroys the silence - and while I'm not crazy about grapes, trees and silence are supremely meritorious on their own. For them to be made into something else, they should be lovingly made, created. When we replace hands and throats with machines, we're just making trash (and in mass quantities). If that is the objection, I'm with you a thousand percent.
Gracie -- I'm very glad you're pushing back a little, and I think that's fun, too :) First of all, yes -- mass-market production is, indeed, a part of the objection. But more so, I think it's the idea that I'm supposed to direct my interactive energies toward a two dimensional face that is not only not beautiful, but also conveys a sense of world-weariness -- a sense, even, of quiet contempt for "this fallen earth." If someone approached me at a dinner party with "the iconic face," I would feel that I had done something wrong, and was unwelcome. But *even if* the artificial face were beautiful and life-affirming...the thought that these images convey us toward a reality that is "more real" than the trees and people, etc, we see here and now on "this fallen earth"...that's crazy, man! But I didn't understand how crazy, until I saw almost the whole Orthodox church kneejerk go to livestreaming during covid...instead of meeting in houses, gathering in secret. The whole thing is geared towards virtual reality. As far as my children making their crappy pictures for me on what used to be trees...yes, I love those pictures, and I'd take them over the trees. Because I love my children, who are adorable in their human flesh here and now. And also: If I started talking to, or through, the pictures they gave me to disembodied entities, that would be crazy. And if I watched live streamed images of those crayon pictures, instead of hanging out with my children...well, that's just the natural continuation of the first crazy. But -- as Russel Brand would say -- that's just what I think, tell me what you think in the comments down below!! :)
I was high-church Anglo Catholic before I became Orthodox; we had large icons of the Theotokos and the Forerunner to the left and right of the altar, gesturing toward the holy gifts. We didn't venerate them formally, but they were beautiful (not sad or contemptuous), and they became dear to me. Several years ago I took my kids to a museum, and there was a display of Ethiopian iconography from a thousand years ago - and right away I recognized "my people" and was instantly and viscerally tied to Ethiopians who lived and worshipped a thousand years ago. We are kin, because we have the same family album. That continuity meant so, so much to me. That kind of thing un-atomizes individuals, and is good medicine, I think.
I also have a print of an icon painted by a friend from my parish - it's a Theotokos and baby Jesus called "Tenderness." Mary has tremendous bags under her eyes - and I remember that, with the nursing at night. Baby Jesus has his little hand on her cheek - and I remember that, too, because my youngest son used to gently pat my cheek when he sat on my lap, or when I was nursing him. It was the sweetest time in my life, having little ones. When I look at that icon I see my people - my Theotokos and my Jesus, but also I see the mama I was and the baby my son was, and I treasure it.
And finally, my Anglican church folded like a lawn chair during covid, and it broke my heart; the Orthodox priest who now serves at my new parish, and his bishop above him, continued to serve liturgy in person, livestreamed nothing, and were prepared to go to jail for defying gubernatorial diktat. For me, Orthodoxy was an ark I made it onto, hanging on by my fingernails, while everything around me fell apart.
So yes and amen to the real, and down with livestreaming. Livestreaming is a poor bastard shadow of the real. But I think icons are different - they, and the people they depict, can be real and comfortable and a way to connect to the our family throughout the world and the ages.
Gracie, this is beautiful in every way -- thanks for sharing your heart.
If I experienced icons the same way you did -- and had the same covid experience you did -- I think I would see things quite differently than I do! Alas...even now that the emergency, if it ever was one, is over, we are *still* livestreaming services...
...anyway: Ethiopian icons of a thousand years ago -- good medicine, indeed.
Did you ever see this, on the church forests of Ethiopia? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fGe-CPWZlE) Very, very good medicine...if it seemed that there were any motion in this direction in America, things, again, would be different for me.
And how lovely to think of Mary with bags under her eyes; not to divert the subject into the most trivial point, but I'm immediately curious if this was your friend's interpretation -- as perhaps a mother herself -- or is this a canonical feature that she copied? Not that I am any kind of icon expert -- not by a long shot -- but my overall impression has been of how *bodiless* icons are trying to be.
Well, there are a lot of different ways for people to experience Orthodoxy, and mine has been quite different from yours, but I'm very glad yours has been yours.
For some of us, that kind of experience is out of reach, and we can either keep idealizing and projecting it otherwise, or we can reach out for something else. I'm willing to explore the "reach out for something else option" even if it means a lot of bruises, if it helps others.
But I'm also overjoyed that, for you, there is no need for that -- that's a good thing.
Oh Graham, I am so sad for you. It's shocking to me that anyone - and most especially people who venerate the courage of martyrs AND believe in the real presence of the holy gifts - would STILL be livestreaming. What can they possibly be waiting for? That seems like rank hypocrisy and betrayal, and I am so sorry. In your situation I know I'd be with the trees too. They are for sure much more real than the farce you've been dealing with.
I also tend to hustle outside after liturgy; this Westerner finds the Eastern aesthetic, both liturgically and visually, to be very claustrophobic. (Honk 40 times if you're Orthodox).
Also -- "honk 40 times if you're Orthodox" made me laugh out loud. if some people converted to Orthodoxy, just so they'd eventually get how funny that is, i'd say that would be a worthwhile little adventure for them.
Ah, thanks to Gavin Ortlund, I came across this sweet honey of a gem from Augustine: "This is the chief cause of this insane profanity, that the figure resembling the living person, which induces men to worship it, has more influence in the minds of these miserable persons, than the evident fact that it is not living, so that it ought to be despised by the living." Perfect anthem for this whole series. (https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801115.htm)
I'm pretty sure this video -- "Orthodoxwave" -- is attempting to promote, not critique, Orthodoxy, but I think it does an excellent job of encapsulating the sense of "bombardment" I'm talking about in the essay:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWoCkA1E3W8
Good morning, Graham. Your essay and the tidbits of comments I’ve skimmed are so nourishing. I can’t muster the patience to read through them all on a screen, and wish this community could sit in a field somewhere and explore all this.
Your reflections stirred up more than I can write here, so I’ll just share a little: For more than a decade our family tried to pray with no vessel but our own longing to be reintegrated with holy Creation. But with no collective vessel – just books, some like-minded friends and our own will – we found ourselves frustrated, wandering, often lost. I'm grateful for those years, but now we are walking into Orthodoxy, and I find the veneration of icons to be very healing, very nourishing, fostering a pattern of perception and relationship that lasts beyond the momentary prayers I make before them.
Like many people, I also think a new Way is emerging – that God is doing something new in the world – and for me praying in a temple and also praying outside is a practice in working the opposites while the new thing grows beyond anyone’s will or intentions or ideas. We're in a liminal state, and for me, praying in a church feels like praying in an egg, or praying in a womb.
Anyway, your essay was good fodder for family discussion, and my children have this to say…
My son (7): I mostly agree with him, but you should just tell him to take his icons outside.
My daughter (11): I know some people don’t understand the world is as holy as the church, but the church is also just as important as outside. They’re two different spaces for prayer, two different ways of praying. If church was outside, it would be beautiful but in a different way.
Peace,
Joseph
Also, I'm glad-- and not surprised, of course, since we "get" each other, and your beautiful writing also reflects this -- to hear you say: "Like many people, I also think a new Way is emerging – that God is doing something new in the world." I will be interested to see how this openness unfolds for you in Orthodoxy, if you find space and even nourishment for it. I think a large part of why I feel it's time to hit the trail again is because the mentality of "There is nothing new in Orthodoxy, and no need for anything new, either - in fact, whatever is new comes from spiritual pride, if not demonic delusion" is the dominant note I hear struck again and again. There is a reason why "Orthodoxy" is what it sounds like! -- it's correct. And complete. And always has been, according to the story told by those who wish to tell that story, the guardians of Orthodoxy: it's the faith "once and for all delivered to the saints." This is one thing that attracts people away from the ever-shifting sands of Protestantism, especially where it feels like *everything* is new *all* the time (an exhausting, perpetual shallowness, to which I will never return, God help me!) Orthodoxy is so *not* new and so complete and entire, there is not even the sense -- as in Roman Catholicism -- that there is such a thing as doctrinal development. Whatever Orthodoxy is, has been there from the beginning (says the story) -- it only needs to be articulated in new ways, during the era of the Ecumenical Councils (after that, it doesn't even need to be articulated in new ways). This is why, to justify icons -- which certainly were new, if you look at history -- the story is told that St Luke was the first iconographer, and he painted the first icon of Mary, whom he knew personally. This "proves" that icons were not an innovation, or a development, but always there from the beginning. (But for someone who knows and respects history, and knows and respects the Judaisms of the first century, would find this not only implausible, but actually disrespectful to the real Mary, who would have ripped her garments and wept in dust in ashes, had anyone even suggested painting a sacred picture of her....) Anyway -- if you do discover that there is this openness in Orthodoxy to the new thing God is doing in the world, do let us know...I have read a zillion Orthodox books, but have only been to maybe a dozen parishes, and only known a dozen priests...it could be I've just been spending time inside a very insulated part of the Orthodox world...
Joseph, this is beautiful.
And your children sound wonderful and brilliant!
I'm really happy to hear that venerating icons within the encircling womb of the Church has been healing for you, and I'm sure this is one of the reasons, maybe the main one, that they're there (the usual theological apologies for icons, as usual, being beside the real point). Faces -- even images of faces, not real ones -- have their nourishing effect. The stability and childlike brightness of a picture of a face, too; they're nice. I think if my experience of church were generally like what it was like at St Ignatius in Madison (I cherish being there for a liturgy with you) and if icons were generally what Ethiopian or Coptic icons were like (not Russian, not Byzantine), I think my feelings now would probably be different. And anyway, I wouldn't wish my particular mental issues with over-stimulation from the artificial on anyone else! I love what you say about the creative, fruitful tension between praying outside and praying inside for you. I think that is where I'd really like to go, too. But there is a lot that needs to happen (again) to make "inside" much more womblike, earthlike than it is (see the next essay, coming in a couple days). I'm going to make a practice of pushing in the extreme of "outside not inside," having -- the opposite of you -- spent 13 years feeling more and more lost inside of Orthodoxy, cut off from Creation. But it won't be absolute. "Inside shall be out" to sort of misquote a very beautiful William Carlos Williams poem. That's the goal. I am willing to take an institutional "hit" for the team, to work towards moving inside back outside, and outside back in; that's how I see it.
Thank you, Graham. I printed out your comments here and my daughter read them in bed before falling asleep the other night. And that’s my first answer to where I see the openness in Orthodoxy to the new thing God is doing: In your own words, and the folks who find them resonant.
If you were writing about Orthodoxy without your longing for Creation, would it be as compelling? If you were writing about your longing for Creation without your Orthodox background, would it be as compelling? Maybe, but probably not for me. It is the loving tension that draws me in.
I suppose I’m not necessarily looking for the new thing God is doing directly within Orthodoxy – meaning I’m not looking for those conversations in church nor in Orthodox books I read. If they happen to come up, of course, I will be glad. But I’m also not sure any of us can consciously perceive very much of it anyway. We get hints, maybe, notice a pattern here or there, but mostly whatever is happening is beyond intellect, intent or will. When I do find myself in conversations about the new thing, they happen more around the fire, with friends who are Orthodox or not, or in intimate, one-on-one conversations, rather than in church spaces. And I’m fine with that. We are in a liminal time, and I think holding the tension of opposites – and there are lots of opposites to hold right now! – is a good road to walk.
In talking about creating a new metaphysics, Vine Deloria says this, which I think is relevant to all this: “We need not be radical in a disruptive sense. The transformation of the manner in which any culture interprets its heritage of remembered human experiences and knowledge cannot be radical if it is to have any effect on the respective human societies. Rather, it must relate to the various human traditions at as many points as possible so that continuity and identity of traditions can be understood. Without this natural development, any new metaphysics would appear abstract and unrelated to people.”
Anyway, it looks like you’ve given us another treasure of an essay, and I look forward to getting to that soon. Thanks for lingering back here with me. I appreciate visiting these liminal spaces with you and your circle of readers.
Peace,
Joseph
I love this, Joseph. I'm much less mature than you are, and so what immediately comes to mind for me is a crazy line that I think went unnoticed in "Waving Farewell" where I imagined some "collective dirtbag Prometheus stealing the holy fire of Byzantium"--very much an image in line with my deeply "scavenger" heart, but what I've always really wanted, and needed, is a "long obedience" as Nietzsche says; or, as you say, "loving tension" -- as a steadfast lifestyle. I do sense that there is a way for me, an uncomplicated one. I just get so tangled up in Orthodoxy. I'll keep this side of the tension going by walking away, holding on to enormous fistfulls of as much Orthodoxy as possible, if I can. All I really want is what I said in my poem "The Way":
To splash rainwater on the arms, the legs
The face—as cold as clouds
With the fragrance of awakening green moss
Everywhere around the rushing stream of clouds
And to chant a psalm or two
With two or three friends—meadowlarks, cypress trees
Precious human bodies born of clay—all sunlilies
Dancing in the breeze of perfect freedom
And eating wild fruits and nuts and roots
And cathartic flickering green herbs
And making prostrations on the bare Earth
And kissing the face of the Earth murmuring Lord Yeshua Messiah
Have mercy on us, your perishing creatures
—The mind shining sunlike in the depths of the heart
Releasing it from prison:
How beautiful it is to follow the Way!
Beautiful, Graham. Your words are the proper ending to this dialogue for now. I receive them with gratitude. May these longings seep into the soil of the world and take root! Peace, Joseph
‘The living things of Earth, which come from God, can awaken new life within us—like a fresh breeze—in a way that artifacts of other peoples' religious imaginations can't.’
You are speaking a language my heart knows, Graham. Thank you.
I read through many of the responses to your essay, and I love the thoughtful debating as this audience works through a form of Socratic dialogue. I will not add to the argument of iconography. I was going to write “though I am not Orthodox” and share more, but caught myself at drawing a lined division. I am a follower of The Way and recognize the Orthodox as my brethren, whether they recognize me or not. I am a servant of the Most High and He has always blessed me in cathedrals of His Creation. I have always heard His voice clearer in the chatter of nature versus the chatter of man. Man is nature as well; I just prefer some nature to others.
And YET, I attend a church that now has cameras and ‘black mirror’ screens in every room. It saddens me to no end. Is nothing sacred? So unnatural! So oblivious to the signs of the time. But I push it aside (with difficulty) and meet my brethren regularly. I am learning to be quieter. I very, very much want to be someone who ‘continues about my business’ in the midst of every storm. Even the technological ones.
Just for fun:
The Lilies-of-the-Field photographed a century ago in Palestine, is Anemone coronaria. Both words come from the Greek. Anemone literally means “daughter of the wind” and coronaria means “crown”. Crowned daughter of the wind. Such holiness! As the scripture says, nothing manmade can even compare to such glory.
I am blessed by reading your journey, Graham, and I can appreciate the gumption it takes to open up sides of your mind that others may not want to see. Keep going about your business, as only you can.
I love all this, Ann -- thanks for sharing!
"Man is nature as well; I just prefer some nature to others" are my feelings about it, also; exactly. I don't quite go as far as Nietzsche's "I found it more dangerous among men than among animals," but I'm pretty far in that direction. I certainly find it the least dangerous to be among the lilies of the field.
"Crowned daughter of the wind" is so, so lovely...
Personally, I'm a sort of Blakean, such that I see a powerful nexus between the spiritual human imagination and the Holy Ghost.
But I'm also aware of the dangers of the imagination, like you saw in the essay on my blog: specter versus presence, muddled romantic vs. lucid romantic. So I think that I have mixed feelings about your thoughts here—because while I agree with you about not building an illusory realm of unreality for ourselves, I also believe that's an abuse of the imagination, not the only thing it can do or what it is made by God to do.
I've also thought in terms of idols vs. windows. Basically, an idol is a self-enclosed specter that cuts us off from God, whereas a window allows our minds to become more translucent to the Light from Above and perceive the shining-forth of that Light through the Creation. So, I would consider icons to be windows that help to enchant the Creation, not a virtual simulation (or idol) that cuts us off from the Creation.
Overall, I believe that artistic creativity has real spiritual value. I love trees about as much as you do—but if the tree was enough, then why do we have symphonies and novels? And for that matter, why do we have your quite poetic writings? It seems to me that we have a co-creative role to play with God in the realm of the spirit, even if that role primarily consists of purifying and elevating consciousness to a point where we can fully perceive what is already there.
Finally, I've also suggested somewhere that there will be no art in the Kingdom of Heaven, because there will be no need for windows when all the walls have tumbled down. But in the meanwhile, we have art and need it, and I tend to think of icons in those terms.
I like this, Sethu. That last bit was especially helpful -- "Finally, I've also suggested somewhere that there will be no art in the Kingdom of Heaven, because there will be no need for windows when all the walls have tumbled down. But in the meanwhile, we have art and need it, and I tend to think of icons in those terms." I'm all for the imagination (as I think is clear in my writing)...it's the sacred task of artists -- in many forms -- to rearrange matter to make the energies of God more visible to ourselves and others, not less. In this essay, though, I'm raising the question of whether mass reproduced canonical Byzantine iconography is making God less visible than just leaving the trees alone. I think it does. That's been my experience, anyway -- icons make me feel God is far away, trees make him feel close. I think this has to do with the idea of an icon not just as a means of clarifying consciousness or intensifying spiritual energies, but as a (motionless, unsmiling) face through which to talk to the person depicted.
Benjamin's essay: https://web.mit.edu/allanmc/www/benjamin.pdf
And now some stuff I've bought from Etsy. This is an icon of Magdalene from an artist in Cyprus: https://www.etsy.com/listing/843511247/mary-of-magdala-saint-mary-magdalene?ref=yr_purchases
A Coptic icon of Moses before the Burning Bush: https://www.etsy.com/listing/1067947065/the-burning-bush?ref=yr_purchases
And a rather unorthodox painting of the Resurrection by an Eastern Catholic woman in Ukraine: https://www.etsy.com/listing/563745406/resurrection-original-print-on-natural?ref=yr_purchases
These seem to be made by artists and not mass produced, which I think might be part of the real point: the way that mass production under the Machine alienates the imagination and turns it into a specter.
Also, I'll add that I totally ignore the folk who keep insisting that an icon is something differerent from a work of art. I find that silly. Icons are art, and all good art is iconic—I take this as axiomatic.
Ah, and thanks for the Benjamin essay -- yes, I have read that one. But if anybody here hasn't -- think about it!
I really like your mention of “mass reproduced“, here—I think that may have a lot to do with how an icon is turned into a fetish and a specter. Are you familiar with Walter Benjamin’s essay on this topic?
I’ll send you a link to the essay, as well as some icons I like, once I get back to my computer a little later this evening.
This painting, though, is on another level: https://akiane.com/product/prince-of-peace/
This one works. Probably because Jesus himself was involved in its creation.
Blue eyes, though? I doubt it. . . .
They're green. And I've heard from NDE accounts people saying they were surprised, too, to see his eyes were green...
Ah, you're right: I was looking with a yellow tint on my screen. Between Isaiah 53:2 and the way He could disappear into crowds, it sounds like He looked like pretty much a typical Jew of the time, and so I just figured that His eyes would've been brown. But, hm, that radiant green is what I understand to be the color of the heart chakra and the Holy Ghost.
Yeah, that's what I thought, too -- definitely a reasonable assumption!
But check out this dude's story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmY-Oa1kOHU
Years ago I was given a mug with Van Gogh's "Starry Night " printed on it. I used it, sure, but always felt unsettled; the marketing, the ubiquity, the aesthetic blindness. Well, over in the Orthodox "market place" one can find a mug with the Theotokos of Vladimir printed on it... to be filled with the drink of your choice.
Your quote from Ohiyesa Charles Eastman:
"He who enrobes Himself in filmy veils of cloud, there on the rim of the visible world where our Great-Grandfather Sun kindles his evening camp-fire, He who rides upon the rigorous winds of the north, or breathes forth His spirit upon aromatic southern airs, whose war-canoe is launched upon majestic rivers and inland seas—He needs no lesser cathedral!"
...or, you could just go online and buy a mug.
--------
The heart is deep. We stay in the "shallow end" - the deep is too mysterious.
In the 21st century we are programmed to be led away from our heart, though something mysterious, and natural, draws us. That which draws us (ever so gently) is wind, real wind that blows through trees. We may not recognize the wind that is calling our deep heart to the Messiah if our skin and face our skin and face have not felt a gentle breeze, or a strong, wet, gale at the edge of Mother Superior.
Forgive me Graham, and commenters here- the above relates to the image, though I don't have the words to say it (I'm a bit...simple).
I miss you Graham,
bk
Graham,
Ah, Brad -- soulbrother.
You always understand, because you're as weird as I am. Weird, meaning "That which draws us (ever so gently) is wind, real wind that blows through trees. We may not recognize the wind that is calling our deep heart to the Messiah if our skin and face our skin and face have not felt a gentle breeze, or a strong, wet, gale at the edge of Mother Superior" makes good and perfect and total sense.
The wind! The real wind IS spiritual -- the force that moves the trees!
"Learning to weep, learning to keep vigil, learning to wait for the dawn. Perhaps this is what it means to be human".
How dare you quote Catholics on this site!
Just kidding, Brad, that's so beautiful and I love it -- thanks for sharing.
My copy of Sunlilies arrived yesterday from Cista Mystica, and I sat up reading it last night. Lovely piece of work.
Thank you sir!
You had me at that Black Elk prayer, of course. So much in that simple.
This place hasn't been the same with you gone, Bud.
There is a theory that the Adams Event 42,000 years ago, when the magnetic poles reversed, the increase of UV rays, electric storms and other wild events caused mass extinctions and made sanctuaries of places like caves. Many of the images made in those sanctuaries, in some sense from the sky, where human embellishing of forms already present that recalled bull or bear or horse. One gets more of a sense of a forming of company than of worship.
Both the coming in to sanctuary from out, and the people-ing of the sacred topography appeals to me. I don't know how that relates to icons but the mere fact that something might be "made" from a tree or a stone, even fashioned with a tool also attracts me and feels as capable of being sacred work as it is capable of being desecration.
Maybe its the direction of the company's gaze. Peers would be in a circle, deer, serpent, human, satry all circling from equidistant points the unnamable Ein Sof of our center, maybe? While worshipers line up before the image looking down, several types of hierarchy established at once.
Then again, there is that story of the serpent held up by Moses, surely an older Hebrew way that is buried under later whittling of the animal and weird of it. And there is Yeshua tied to that ancestral animal image aloft.
Vital truth in that sense though of gathering before an iconic company of countenances that do not wish to be Here. The conflation of the World with the Earth may be the great poison of Christianity. That and the aberration of Eternal Seperation/Torture Chamber. Remove those two knives from the body of the Way and so much of the mischief of Christedom can come clean.
Of course I am remembering here your taste for Angkor Wat and suspect you of leaving more room or great feats of sanctuary making and company forming in the end.
Yesterday for the first time ever I stood at ground zero of a new beaver pond-to-be. They are taking large trees down along the creek, in a lowland. two days begun, a grand beaver sanctuary raised in the middle and the water level just beginning to rise. It was as total in its adjustment of the earth as any clearcut but somehow it was magical. The valence was different. I will take photos when the snow stops. SOmething in there 'making' , there un-treeing yet still wilding is related here.
So much to ponder here, Andrew, and so much to rejoice in.
As is our way, we seem to be heading in the same direction -- uphill -- following various streams of life we've found, back to their one source: "Maybe its the direction of the company's gaze. Peers would be in a circle, deer, serpent, human, satry all circling from equidistant points the unnamable Ein Sof of our center, maybe?" --> that's exactly where I have a mind to go next, only switching from maybe to definitely. The difference between a circle of peers and an ecclesiastical phalanx is almost everything, I'm beginning to wonder. I'll mention now also that one of the many things I didn't include for the sake of brevity is I love the ruins of the churches in Cappadocia, where the cave-sense is strong -- the feeling of a cave in living rock, as going down into the womb of the Earth. Chant strange harmonies in there resounding around the womb-walls, and I'm there. Especially if the whole thing is round, like the way the beavers build their own sacred lodges. I'm 100% all for humans making things -- imaginative things, crackling with metaphor and spiritual energy -- from wood, stone, leaf, sky. More than 100%. Eventually -- like in 15 essays -- I hope to finally get to Christopher Alexander and talk, with his help, about how to really make stuff, in a way that's coherent with this beautiful Hebrew aspiration of man as a gardener of the Earth. But the air has to be cleared of a whole lot of religious kitsch first...
Yeah.
Alot of talk this week about Patrick and sainthood and Yeshua in Ireland. I am struggling with it though I have no doubts about the true heart of the speakers like Martin. You know a tree by its fruits and so much misery came to that land in the cargo hold of the church. Seems like the ones I hear on the edges, also good ones and true, need more of reckoning about such things. Black Elk is a guide here certainly. And Fool's Crow and the rest. Plus the living first nations church today.
Jenkinson says Christianity never belonged here. I dunno. I trust Oyihesa was wise enough and of here enough to call it as he saw it, the common ground and welcome home of it all. Maybe it in Force and Empire that it never belonged, and having passed through that could it ever come clean? I don't know. We need a table that as it passes through to remember the murder of G-d/man it passes through in rememberence of all that has happened with enough depth of empathy and consequence that it can't abide with certain remnants and devices now integrated in the word and way.
That table will be animist or it will be nothing. It will be woman-ed or it will be nothing. From the very roots there was something ancestral, something deeply of the land and from the beginning to build up on. Stone. And there was something else present. A wish to defend and preserve and uphold and spread by force. That He called Satan. Mere minutes apart they were born. Mathew 16. Twins even. It was the latter that conquered the world and greyed it with its breath. But the messiah of the former remains with us. Bulgakov I think was onto this when he saw in John 19 that the blood and water of the murdered G-d/man pour down into the chalice that is the mother earth herself. And remain. What is that table? Round no doubt. And Here.
Amen, amen, amen, amen.
Amen.
And Apollo-worshipping "saint" Constantine stares at the sun so long the cross of non-power becomes a weapon for slaying his enemies, and he's called "equal to the apostles." The subversion is real.
I think that guy is one of the worst things that ever happened to the faith, and I do not care who calls him a saint.
Hi Graham, lots of thoughts come to mind thanks for the conversation.
Thank *you*, Kathryn!
"Just quietly walk away". Amen. I am doing that rather regularly. It seems like a pretty good response to so many situations. Anyway, great to have you back. Sounds like a lot has transpired since we last heard from you... Thank you for the photo of the lilies in Palestine! I won't comment on the other photos, except for you in yourself in the forest: beautiful. I am definitely going to recommend to anxious people to HUG A TREE (maybe I won't shout;-))
Thanks for this, Shannon! Yes, a lot has happened...well, or the same internal thing has happened so many times by now, that it's time for something new to happen :) I'd love to hear more about what quietly walking away has been like on your end, if you have more to share...
Sure. For me it has to do with letting go, and a small sense of submission. It is about smaller things specific to my life that are maybe not very impactful, I guess, where it no longer serves me or anyone to argue, to protest, to want things to change. It's kind of just an acceptance of how things are, just witnessing, and then sort of saying,"This is not for me", and quietly walking away. There are lots of social situations where this applies. Or places of commerce, for example. Places where it would be useless or pointless to expend energy fighting, but I can withdraw my support and my investment of both time and energy, and direct my attention elsewhere. I know these things still exist but I do not need to feed them. These are not very original thoughts. But there is a sense of coming home to myself, and in this is the small sense of submission, of giving up a kind of struggle that feels misdirected perhaps. And with that comes a sense of peace.
In a more important area, I have been looking for a church for a while, but I just can't bring myself to it. I realize there is need for a sangha, that a community of like-minded spiritual seekers is recommended. Maybe it's early childhood wounding that gets in the way (I was brought up atheist), but it's like I lose my belief when I get around other worshipers. I like churches best when there are no people in them, though not that horrid Catholic box you posted, or when only a few are saying prayers in peace and quiet and there is no service. This is where I wrestle with submission. What or Who am I submitting to in these things? Like, I just can't submit to a church, maybe because I have no understanding or grounding in what the church is, in a positive way. I am, however, deeply touched by your poetical(!) worship, and your lovely book, "The Sunlilies".
Anyway, thank you for gently asking me if I had more to share. It's still a new phenomenon to post my thoughts publicly. I'm glad this is a safe space and you are so kind!
This is beautiful and helpful, Shannon -- thanks so much for sharing.
*Sighing deeply,* yes -- we can't do without our sangha, can we, at least a little one, and although it sometimes brings me temporary relief to think of the trees and clouds and birds and sun as my sangha -- which is literally and deeply true -- still, we need our own kind, too, the two-leggeds. Yeshua said, "Where two or three are gathered..." I don't know that he made any promises about where two or three thousand, or million, are gathered, and as there seems to be a collective mind that takes over when too many people *imagine* themselves -- with institutional props -- as a single community, when the actual reality is true community can only happen face to face in small numbers. Very small numbers. Intimate numbers. I, too, feel the simultaneous need and desire to submit -- and wariness that submission in an environment of collectivity where people, paid to be in positions of power, are saying "submit to the tradition!" really means submitting to these people, not to the One. (I'm going through a cathartic but painful time of contraction and withdrawal right now, so take everything I say with a grain of salt)...but I am deeply, deeply confident that there is a joyful way forward for all of us lovely misfits, even in the craziness of our times. Especially so!
Hey Graham, it's SO good to read your words as gift again. I hope you'll excuse my crude comparison, but I've just gotta say that your words are like a sacred alarm clock! You wake me up, brother. Thank you
Amen, amen, brother! So glad to hear it!
Graham, this morning I walk in a huge, glorious, equinox wind under trees, blue skies, light rain, and rainbows. This evening I listen to your wonderful essay and the birds. And it's all the breathing earth, it's all the temple. It's so good that you are writing to us again.
Beautiful, Penny! Huge, glorious equinox wind, light rain and rainbows -- how immense, how wonderful all this is! I'm so glad to be writing again, and I'm so glad you're still here.
Do you know the two albums of new Native American music made by the late Jewish-Mohawk musician, Robbie Robertson, formerly of The Band? I think they might resonate. All of this does for me.
Robertson with the Red Road Ensemble is one of my top ten all time albums.
Oh man, no! Can this be listened to somewhere, like youtube? I'd love to hear it. Also, "Jewish-Mohawk" is officially now the one dual identity of which I am most deeply, deeply jealous. I was just thinking, man, if there's a Messianic Jewish way to be a Zen Native American with light skin, I'd sure like to know...
I can totally get behind your ambition. Messianic Celtic Zendian
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRkE5-eyt9iVa4ZXQKkhwPv6Ofm7hVvTy&si=oi_O1IpqMStXHG4i
Mike...thank you! you've expanded and deepened my musical horizon!
THANKS. Also: "Contact from the underworld of redboy" -- what a killer album title.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_l4sNk9CnOiKkA5DcG7od_scTnEZuV8RMs&si=rnLhErpdOcBXgS8z
One more thing.
“Cathedrals
The first breaths of spring are here. It’s another foggy morning as dew-dripping grass unfurls in the quiet dawn. Sparkling silver drops hang from a thousand webs, intricate patterns hidden in shadow suddenly blaze to life, quivering in the splendor of the day's first breath. My backyard is a jeweled cathedral, pulsing and singing as the wet and the light raise life from the stillness. Every breath, every birdsong and tiny living thing crawling through the rich greenness is breaking into a melody--the rhythmic, holy song of a reborn earth.
My backyard is a doorway to the truth in myth. The realm of the mythic, that first glimpse of the everyday transformed into something larger, more powerful and primal, is perhaps the deepest plane of truth because it bypasses the mind and speaks straight to the soul. It is here that the Spirit teaches us life itself, with sound and breath and light, he teaches us to wait, to sing and to be, simply as we are. Mythic truths everywhere, once you learn to see them. They’re not only found on mountain tops; they are hidden in the commonplace as well. Don’t turn away without seeing, without reaching a little higher and a little further into the startling mysteries that surround us.
To be still and and hear the morning song in the spring is one of the great gifts one can receive from the life-giver. It is a revelation of about who he is, what he likes, how he talks. Not words from a book, but a living song we can join ourselves, here and now. God is drawing us to himself through his own work. Here, in the backyard, the truth is rebirth. All around there is the sound of becoming. Every blade of grass, every bird and gust of wind is becoming what it must. Here is the quiet to pray and ask, what must I become?
A cathedral is a place of worship. To be overcome by beauty, truth and love is to become one with the same force that calls spring out of winter, life out of death. It is worship. Life in the spirit is not a bunch of dire warnings and fearful thoughts; it is freedom to finally put down all the burden of endless thought, a chance to be present and see and hear what is around us. I think sometimes there are many ways to be born again. The experience is simply waiting for discovery. We are surrounded by cathedrals.”
- Anonymous
Hi Shari, let’s chat soon ❤️
Some keep the Sabbath going to Church –
I keep it, staying at Home –
With a Bobolink for a Chorister –
And an Orchard, for a Dome –
Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice –
I, just wear my Wings –
And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church,
Our little Sexton – sings.
God preaches, a noted Clergyman –
And the sermon is never long,
So instead of getting to Heaven, at last –
I’m going, all along. - Emily Dickinson
I love that, Shari -- thanks for sharing it with us!
Shari...wow! Thank you so much for sharing this living clarion call to the Real.
“Deep sigh”. Oh boy Graham. Synchronicity is hitting hard.
Good thing we're talkin today!
I think that part of our image-bearing is to participate as creators ourselves (or more accurately, sub-creators, per Tolkien). So we take wood and make icons, we take grapes and make wine, we take breath and make songs - it's the work we're given to do, and how we participate as sons and not slaves in the divine.
Hey Gracie! Yes, definitely -- *almost* entirely with you -- we are co-creators, called to reshape the matter of Earth into new, artful things that give life to Earth and one another. Transforming grapes into wine, after God transforms rain into grapes, is a beautiful example of that; taking the air and making it into beautiful music even more so. But it seems like taking something which already has its own face -- a tree -- and painting a human face on it, and talking to that human; that seems different from the other examples.
I get what you're saying; it does seem different. For fun I want to push back a little, though - do you keep, and treasure, pictures drawn by your children on paper? If so, why is that different?
I suspect - or I could be projecting my own prejudices - that a big part of the objection is not the icon itself, but the mass-market production of icons, which is so utterly bizarre. The icon destroys the tree, the wine destroys the grape, the song destroys the silence - and while I'm not crazy about grapes, trees and silence are supremely meritorious on their own. For them to be made into something else, they should be lovingly made, created. When we replace hands and throats with machines, we're just making trash (and in mass quantities). If that is the objection, I'm with you a thousand percent.
Gracie -- I'm very glad you're pushing back a little, and I think that's fun, too :) First of all, yes -- mass-market production is, indeed, a part of the objection. But more so, I think it's the idea that I'm supposed to direct my interactive energies toward a two dimensional face that is not only not beautiful, but also conveys a sense of world-weariness -- a sense, even, of quiet contempt for "this fallen earth." If someone approached me at a dinner party with "the iconic face," I would feel that I had done something wrong, and was unwelcome. But *even if* the artificial face were beautiful and life-affirming...the thought that these images convey us toward a reality that is "more real" than the trees and people, etc, we see here and now on "this fallen earth"...that's crazy, man! But I didn't understand how crazy, until I saw almost the whole Orthodox church kneejerk go to livestreaming during covid...instead of meeting in houses, gathering in secret. The whole thing is geared towards virtual reality. As far as my children making their crappy pictures for me on what used to be trees...yes, I love those pictures, and I'd take them over the trees. Because I love my children, who are adorable in their human flesh here and now. And also: If I started talking to, or through, the pictures they gave me to disembodied entities, that would be crazy. And if I watched live streamed images of those crayon pictures, instead of hanging out with my children...well, that's just the natural continuation of the first crazy. But -- as Russel Brand would say -- that's just what I think, tell me what you think in the comments down below!! :)
I was high-church Anglo Catholic before I became Orthodox; we had large icons of the Theotokos and the Forerunner to the left and right of the altar, gesturing toward the holy gifts. We didn't venerate them formally, but they were beautiful (not sad or contemptuous), and they became dear to me. Several years ago I took my kids to a museum, and there was a display of Ethiopian iconography from a thousand years ago - and right away I recognized "my people" and was instantly and viscerally tied to Ethiopians who lived and worshipped a thousand years ago. We are kin, because we have the same family album. That continuity meant so, so much to me. That kind of thing un-atomizes individuals, and is good medicine, I think.
I also have a print of an icon painted by a friend from my parish - it's a Theotokos and baby Jesus called "Tenderness." Mary has tremendous bags under her eyes - and I remember that, with the nursing at night. Baby Jesus has his little hand on her cheek - and I remember that, too, because my youngest son used to gently pat my cheek when he sat on my lap, or when I was nursing him. It was the sweetest time in my life, having little ones. When I look at that icon I see my people - my Theotokos and my Jesus, but also I see the mama I was and the baby my son was, and I treasure it.
And finally, my Anglican church folded like a lawn chair during covid, and it broke my heart; the Orthodox priest who now serves at my new parish, and his bishop above him, continued to serve liturgy in person, livestreamed nothing, and were prepared to go to jail for defying gubernatorial diktat. For me, Orthodoxy was an ark I made it onto, hanging on by my fingernails, while everything around me fell apart.
So yes and amen to the real, and down with livestreaming. Livestreaming is a poor bastard shadow of the real. But I think icons are different - they, and the people they depict, can be real and comfortable and a way to connect to the our family throughout the world and the ages.
Gracie, this is beautiful in every way -- thanks for sharing your heart.
If I experienced icons the same way you did -- and had the same covid experience you did -- I think I would see things quite differently than I do! Alas...even now that the emergency, if it ever was one, is over, we are *still* livestreaming services...
...anyway: Ethiopian icons of a thousand years ago -- good medicine, indeed.
Did you ever see this, on the church forests of Ethiopia? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fGe-CPWZlE) Very, very good medicine...if it seemed that there were any motion in this direction in America, things, again, would be different for me.
And how lovely to think of Mary with bags under her eyes; not to divert the subject into the most trivial point, but I'm immediately curious if this was your friend's interpretation -- as perhaps a mother herself -- or is this a canonical feature that she copied? Not that I am any kind of icon expert -- not by a long shot -- but my overall impression has been of how *bodiless* icons are trying to be.
Well, there are a lot of different ways for people to experience Orthodoxy, and mine has been quite different from yours, but I'm very glad yours has been yours.
For some of us, that kind of experience is out of reach, and we can either keep idealizing and projecting it otherwise, or we can reach out for something else. I'm willing to explore the "reach out for something else option" even if it means a lot of bruises, if it helps others.
But I'm also overjoyed that, for you, there is no need for that -- that's a good thing.
Oh Graham, I am so sad for you. It's shocking to me that anyone - and most especially people who venerate the courage of martyrs AND believe in the real presence of the holy gifts - would STILL be livestreaming. What can they possibly be waiting for? That seems like rank hypocrisy and betrayal, and I am so sorry. In your situation I know I'd be with the trees too. They are for sure much more real than the farce you've been dealing with.
I also tend to hustle outside after liturgy; this Westerner finds the Eastern aesthetic, both liturgically and visually, to be very claustrophobic. (Honk 40 times if you're Orthodox).
Also -- "honk 40 times if you're Orthodox" made me laugh out loud. if some people converted to Orthodoxy, just so they'd eventually get how funny that is, i'd say that would be a worthwhile little adventure for them.