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In reflections on Advent, Lighted Windows, Margaret Silf writes of our being like trees. We have branches above ground and roots below ground.
I liken branches to sense experience. These details pertain to the active life and consciousness. Branches apply to what Silf calls "the exposed edges of ... living." Branches pertain to our jobs, circumstances, and relationships.
The contemplative life is the depth-experience of being in Christ. This is largely underground, below awareness. Contemplative practice is a life utilizing "access routes" to our True Self. This Self is not our personality. This Self is not the accumulation of the branches. This Self is grounded in the Ground; True Self is being-in-Being.
St. Paul speaks of the depth-experience of in-Christ living. He uses the image of roots in Ephesians 3.17: "that the Christ may dwell through the faith in your hearts, in love having been rooted and founded" (YLT). And Colossians 2.7: "being rooted and built up in him, and confirmed in the faith, as you were taught~abounding in it in thanksgiving" (YLT).
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Our spiritual practices educate us in and develop the access routes into the Ground. While most persons live with little to no awareness for below-ground Reality and ignore need for developing access routes, the spiritual Christian grows in awareness of and respect for that Reality. Over time the spiritual Christian becomes more familiar with and adapted to living from the rootage in Love, which evidences in the fruit of overflowing gratitude.
This in-depth-life does not take the spiritual Christian from the active, outer life. She, of all persons, experiences most richly and wonderfully the world of branches.
Suggestion for Reflection
1) What spiritual practices are you educating yourself in and developing to live with more appreciation of your life-in-God?
2) How do you see spiritual practices evidencing in fruitfulness among the branches of your active life?
*See next page for details on OneLife, the author's book, and source materials.
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