Wake Up Reading

[Recently I picked up On the Soul and the Resurrection, by St. Gregory of Nyssa, a book which contains ancient spiritual wisdom in the form of a conversation on the nature of the soul, resurrection, and how to understand these things in a material world. I was happy and surprised to find how much reading it drew me ‘out of this world’, by which I mean, out of the stream of worldly, political and personal emotional turmoil. I have read spiritual books which urge spiritual seekers to be ‘free of creatures’ in order to truly pursue the Godly life. This can mistakenly sound like maintaining a certain cool, silent aloofness toward others, particularly those not interested in the truth, as we believe ourselves to be. However actually ‘freedom from creatures’ means freedom from involvement with and attention to the machinations of self, others and events, distractions through which inner peace and devotion to God can be lost, temporarily or even for a lifetime.

In reading this book my attention was turned to the deeper realities of life and above the realms of material pleasure and difficulty. It was like waking out of the dream (or nightmare) of this present time. Mesmerized by the ‘creatures’ in front of us (and in our own heads), we can lose touch with the deeper truth of life and reality. By letting ourselves be drawn into the fight and flash, we become useless to others – no matter how many movements or committees we may join. Monday's quotation by Fr. Donald Haggerty speaks eloquently to that.

Between ‘what Is’ and the perception of ‘what is’, is a great barrier, and that barrier is self. Choose What you will serve, or self will keep you busy till you die.]