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There is a peace that passeth understanding;
There is a joy the world can never know;
There is a light~you will not find it burning
On any land or sea where'er you go.
This joy of mine is not of earthly making,
Though you might find it in the sunset's blush;
Above the noise and din of human striving
There is a Presence and holy hush!
*Ralph Spalding Cushman. "The Presence." A Pocket Prayer and Devotional Guide.
Last week, at Christ Community United Methodist Church, Punta Gorda, FL, for the first time in the history of the church, we observed the Stations of the Cross. Fourteen small crosses made a large circle on the church grounds. We began and ended at a large cross, with an obituary of Jesus on it. We emulated, in our walk, the early pilgrims who traveled to Jerusalem. We followed Christ, in Grace, from Gethsemane to Golgotha. At each Station we prayed in silence, prayed in voice, and shared Scripture. We stepped out of time, into the past, into the future, into the Divine. We pilgrimed in the shadow of the Cross.
The cross casts a backward and forward shadow over the life of Christ and the life of Christianity, for this Way ~ the Way of Christ and the Way of Christ~in~Christianity, is one, pilgrim Way. This Way indicates and makes true our union with God and each other.
A deeper meaning of the cross than often seen is present. This is often missed by persons who see the cross only in historical terms. We can fail by seeing the cross only as something that happened for us back then, not something that happens in and among us right now. The cross says much more. A failure of much Christian proclamation of the cross is not that we claim too much, or claim wrongly, rather, we claim far too little, for we see and live far too little.
Let us look, then, at some words from the contemplative monk and theologian Bruno Barnhardt, who has written indepth on what some refer to as Wisdom Christianity [I have written earlier on Barnhardt and his excellent work in the doctrine of Christ; search this site for those writings]:
"When we look at Trinity and world together, unfocusing our Western eyes through Eastern lenses, we may suddenly glimpse what happened in Jesus Christ, in his cross and resurrection. In the 'fusion' which takes place in the body of the crucified Christ is the power of the cross. The nonduality here, comprehending heaven and earth, God and the universe, God and all humanity, is not the nonduality of the beginning (focus of the Asian traditions), but the nonduality of the end. In the cross of Jesus (that is, in his death and resurrection), God (or Trinity) and the Cosmos become one. This new unity is the 'body of Christ.' At this point, the Asian traditions today bring forward a further contribution: the mandala - a quasi-universal symbol of wholeness, of the unity of all reality. The 'mystery of the cross' - Trinity and creation become one - naturally expresses itself in a mandalic figure."
First, what is nonduality? Nondual awareness is the seeing of apparent opposites as truly one. The cross shows this nondual awareness through touching all four directions, including the union of "heaven" and "earth." Likewise, likely the cross, as in much Christian art of the East, had equal extensions; thus, the cross would form a perfect circle: so, wholeness, like a mandala.
Golgotha becomes the central mountain. In religions often a mountain is esteemed the Center of the world, place for the unification of all in the Eternal Sacred.
Christ suspended is sign of the unifying of all, Christ being the union as God-Man, Son of Man and Son of God. The union was lost in the narrative of the Garden of Eden. This nonduality, symbolized in the cross, integrates the historical of the ongoing life of Christ with the mythical: "mythical" meaning, expressing universal, timeless, symbolic, contemplative~mystical Truth. Here, again, is a nonduality, a fusion often seen as two, but one: history and myth one, not two.
I am here claiming, and throughout this writing, that the cross calls us to a renewed vision, a seeing and loving in which all are in Christ, all Creation made whole in Love, by Grace. I am claiming that this vision is the hope for the end of injustice and war and violence. I am claiming this truly Christian vision is, also, humanistic, in the sense that Jesus Christ offers us the Living Word of the truly human Person in sacralized dignity, in union with all other creatures, all Creation.
The cross expresses a nonduality of the end. The cross looks toward a final union. The prophetic vision is a vision of the reconciliation ~ another term indicating nonduality ~ of all things in Christ. Note, for example, the words from Isaiah, in which opposites are brought into union:
6 In that day the wolf and the lamb will live together;
the leopard will lie down with the baby goat.
The calf and the yearling will be safe with the lion,
and a little child will lead them all.
7 The cow will graze near the bear.
The cub and the calf will lie down together.
The lion will eat hay like a cow.
*Isaiah 11.6-7, NLT
Here, apparent contraries are in harmony. Grace harmonizes all things, making two one.
The Church is another sign of this nonduality. But we can question whether any church is being the Church when not fulfilling this vision, at least in clear partiality in which a movement toward the vision is occurring in the members. Christian writers have referred to those in Christ as the mystical Church: indicating, in my estimation, that the earthy churches can never be assumed to be being the Church (and, I assume, this implies that to be the Church one can be such by an implicit faith in the Way of Christ, the Mystery of Love). Again, on the dualistic level, such harmony is not seen and cannot occur, however. The cross signs this fusion of two, and many, into one:
For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him.
*Romans 10.12, ESV
In Christ, there is no difference between Jew and Greek, slave and free person, male and female. You are all the same in Christ Jesus.
*Galatians 3.28, NCV
It doesn't matter if you are a Greek or a Jew, or if you are circumcised or not. You may even be a barbarian or a Scythian, and you may be a slave or a free person. Yet Christ is all that matters, and he lives in all of us.
*Galatians 3.11, CEV
Note: Barbarians were people who could not speak Greek and would be in the lower class of society. Scythians were people who were known for their cruelty.
Thankfully, seeing the Bible with a nondual appreciation, which celebrates the divine-human nature of Scripture, we can be honest about the failure of its writers always to present this nondual vision. Why? They were, as we have been, educated in and shaped by a tribal vision ~ a dualistic, in-group awareness, which tends toward separation even in the name of "God," not unification of apparently opposites. So, we can be biblical while esteeming respectfully the awareness-state of the New Testament communities: they, as we, had not arrived at the unification~of~Love, but they do give clear resonances of it. Indeed, they did live it far beyond what their words express, for the Mystery is always more present than we can, at any time, know and express to others. Simply put, Grace is more than we can take in, at least at this point of our human development. So, Grace summons us to see beyond where we now see, but Grace slowly prepares us, too.
Therefore, the end-time vision of the Cross is the unification that is clearly present, but not seen spiritually within and among us. This is the hope, in Christ, of a spiritual Christian and the mystical Church. This is the Mystery of Christ. We, indeed, affirm this in the celebration of the Lord's Supper:
I tell you the truth, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine again until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.
*Mark 14.25, NCV
When we come to the Table of Christ, we affirm the image of a final, end-time banquet. This is a meal of one "kingdom," not "kingdoms." There is one feast, one Christ: we are One. This is a radical "political" Proclamation. Only if we Christians grasped this in the taking of the Feast now.
Again, the Church on earth is a living image of this Kingdom to come, one present and moving toward consummation. In this, the churches image and embody the Christ:
4All of you are part of the same body. There is only one Spirit of God, just as you were given one hope when you were chosen to be God's people. 5We have only one Lord, one faith, and one baptism. 6There is one God who is the Father of all people. Not only is God above all others, but he works by using all of us, and he lives in all of us.
*Ephesians 4.4-6, CEV
Of course, this fusion is evident in the Incarnation; therefore, the Incarnation signifies this Wisdom of union. Ephrem the Syrian (c. 306-373), an ardent defender of Nicene orthodoxy and great poet, in Hymns of the Nativity, uses the image of pigments to describe the nondual~vision of the Incarnation of the Logos:
Glorious is the Wise One Who allied and joined
Divinity with humanity,
one from the height and the other from the depth.
He mingled the natures like pigments
and an image came into being: the God-man.
*Ephrem the Syrian: Hymns. The Classics of Western Spirituality. Trans. Kathleen E. McVey.
Is this nondual theology itself not true to the vision of the contemplative Christian? Is it not integrally biblical for all Christians, all persons? Persons not only can handle this blessing, they are created to enjoy it, and we in the Church are obligated to proclaim this vision as normal to Christian life. We each and all long for the "Garden of Eden," and the vision of the Church is an enjoyment of union with God in Eternity. We can enjoy a foretaste of it in this life, for in this life, Eternity infuses and blesses time with Glory.
In this, be assured, contemplation, which is the vision of nondual Christianity (Wisdom Christianity, if you wish) is not about visions, locutions, foreseeing the future, ... and other such phenomena. These are more than not likely purely psychic in nature: not spiritual in essence. "Mystical" signs can arise from, for example, ascetic deprivations, even as visions can be had from LSD or other drugs; true contemplation arises only from conscious surrender to Grace. We do not manipulate the mind in union~with-Christ, we yield the mind to the operations of Divine Grace.
In this writing I have sought to give a brief introduction to the Gospel presentation of contemplative awareness (nonduality), thus, the contemplative living of the Christ Mystery, and principally under the image of the cross. This Mystery of Love communicated to us, by Grace and through history, Scripture, and metaphor, is the heritage of all Creation.
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For replies and biographical information, and submission to "The Light Shines" daily devotionals ~ a ministry of Christ Community United Methodist Church, Punta Gorda, FL, see next page:
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