Re: the last blog on visions
What hangs up many people with the 'pretty' vision of Jesus is the question of EVIL- the ugly head of Satan revealed in the first wilderness story. In fact philosophy tells us that the question of evil is the cause of religions.
No argument with that, but the best answer that I know comes from a vision of C. S. Lewis in a little book called The Great Divorce. (You can read the book in a half hour.)
The protagonist, granted a short leave in Heaven (from the other place), asks George MacDonald about the terrible chasm from which he and the other travelers had emerged. MacDonald shows him a small crack between two blades of grass:
"Do you mean then that Hell-- all that infinite empty town-- is down in some little crack like this?
"Yes, all Hell is smaller than one pebble of your earthly world; but it's smaller than one atom of this world." (page 122 of a copy by Collier Books)
Evil like most things is relative. Things that seem monumental to us mortal creatures are usually of considerably less moment to the eternal. Think eternally!
2 comments:
Hell is what we create for ourselves, in t his world, in this life. Heaven too. We can commune with the Divine or not.
'Evil' is there in all of us, and self-knowledge is the real key. SO many 'religions' are there to inforce social responsibility,a nd nothing more. 'Bee good or else'.. So they tell us hell exists. We live a frightened guilty life. Is that not hell?
Be free to love, to not pass judgement, to live with liberty and compassion, and to be not an 'individual', but a servant of God, follow your heart. He is your Heart.
I've been meaning to ask you about C.S. Lewis -- I love him (I like to stick to my Anglican/Episcopal writers -- perhaps I haven't yet left tribalism behind). I loved the Great Divorce, especially the part with the Bishop who preferred to stay in hell and discuss his paper on the historical Jesus and thus, unwittingly I guess, turned down the opportunity to journey into paradise. Kind of sums up how I feel about the Episcopacy -- maybe I'm moving out of tribalism yet!
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