just be it It’s about the work involved in establishing a dedicated practice to feelings of a bigger belonging through practices aimed at increasing feelings of compassion, gratitude and forgiveness

Transreligion

Published on 22/11/10
by randy

Is it possible to move beyond all the division of partisan religion?  I know we’ve had a lot of pull to use the words ‘interfaith’ and ‘intercultural’.  These are expanding notions that deal with the reality of getting along in our universe, a universe that increasingly shows us we can’t survive without getting along. Yet, these are words that seem to move from tolerance and understanding rather than deeper desire to find ‘the common’. In years past, under the directive of Newtonian science, we seemed to think there were answers and positions of being ‘right’.  We had to look at our experience and then follow the map that made the most sense to us.  Yet, today, it’s increasingly evident that two truths found at the base of all religions are being substantiated by contemporary physics.  When we step beyond the distinctive differences of our world religions, universally they agree that 1. Nothing stays the same, all things change, and 2. Nothing is independent, with everything affecting everything.  These truths are the foundation of religion’s premise that all is One.  We could call this ‘common sense’.  The temptation is to act from a dualistic mind, claiming ‘our One’ is the ‘right One’.  We’re continually bombarded with a culture that wants us to deny the Law of Impermanence and the Law of Unity.  We’ve become extremely sophisticated in our methods of persuasion, whether it be in politics, religion, commerce or family.  We somehow believe we matter more when others are ‘pushed’ to our way of seeing things.  Yet, we’re continually shown how real creative work comes from a surrendering of calcified beliefs, opening in a deeper faith to the power of Oneness.

It may be helpful for you to know of my deep love and appreciation for Lutheran and Buddhist teachings. They’ve worked together to deepen my life experience.  Yet, from a transreligion perspective, these are teachings of my direct experience and my lack of experience with Islam, Native American, Hindu, Judaism, and other religions. My ignorance of these other religions should play no bearing on the validity of their core underlying truths, truths claiming God’s omnipresence.  There are multitudes of traditions that expose the sacred nature of all things, the God nature in our universe.  As such, they all direct us to reverence for the very gift of life and the opportunity to participate with minimal harm.

Our contemporary physicists have now made it abundantly clear how little we know.  We see how science can’t reach beyond the limits of perception; it only takes us to the threshold of awareness, that place of not depending upon perception.  Yet, our science progresses through entering the field of intuition, fully surrendered in science to the gift of insight from a still mind.  Our typical logical, sequential mind has surrendered to the effortless unfolding to the divinity of All That Is.  An evolved ‘knowing’ comes from a deeper faith and surrendered obstruction.  We’ve gone beyond fixed belief systems to the direct experience of the Divine, of Oneness.  Rather than ‘pushing’ in a stressful desire to the illusion of what’s been, or abandoning the present moment for the illusion of the future, the emptied mind opens to receiving the Presence of One.  Our deep attachments to smaller belonging circles transform as we transcend to a Bigger Belonging, a Bigger Hope, a deeper reverence for what Is.  Brother David Steindl Rast calls this ‘a great fullness’, playing upon the words to deepen our gratefulness.

So how does this change us?  Suddenly, we’re no longer sucked into bipartisan wrangling.  We move beyond our insecurity and need to persuade others.  Our movement comes from love, the felt sense of our interconnection.  We focus on what’s common in our higher thinking, moving to common sense dialogues.  Judgment diminishes and negative notions of the comparative heart lesson.  We listen more generously, with an open heart, solid in a deeper knowing that there are only deeper questions.  We compassionately ask others to ‘tell us more’,  ‘go further with that’, ‘so how does that feed your hope and joy’, etc.  We reduce our desire to change others to ‘our way’ of seeing things. We step away from our sense of ‘rightness’.

When we touch the realm of ‘transreligion’ we enter the realm of Allah, Jesus, Buddha, Krishna, etc. in truly seeing our enemies as us.  The ‘us vs them’ dichotomy vanishes.  The calibration of human consciousness rises exponentially as we listen more and more, speaking less, but speaking with more care and precision.  We commit to minimizing the harm we do others as we ‘feel’ their Divine.  Our actions move from love, not fear and anger.  We meet new situations with a sense of equanimity, no matter what.  We recognize it’s not in our capacity to ‘resolve’ anything since every thing is moving, the next arising moment now before us.

Can our politics advance to the transpartisan party?  Can we move beyond our simplistic bipartisan mind?  Can our church leadership help us diminish violence by stepping up the Oneness conversation and stepping down the ‘we’re right, you’re wrong’ monologue?  Can we advance into the transreligion movement and help put scientifically based truths on the curriculum of all schools? Can we move beyond the illusion that excessive wealth is ‘not causing harm’?  Today’s politics have placed close to 30% of America’s wealth in the hands of 1% of the people.  The dualistic, competitive mind has caused great harm.

“Divinity is present everywhere but obscured by identification with the mind and the body.

The Eye of the I is the Self of Divinity expressed as Awareness.  The unmanifest, transcendental divinity of Allah/God/Brahman/Krishna becomes manifest as the Self/Atman–the immanent divinity.

Spiritual evolution occurs as the result of removing obstacles and not actually acquiring anything new.  Devotion enables surrender of the mind’s vanities and cherished illusions  so that it progressively becomes more free and more open to the light of Truth.”

from David Hawkins, The Eye of the I  p. 30

“Having a Big Mind means to remain unbiased and open.  It is the mind which does not stamp a fixed value on everything, nor decide on things simply by feelings and sentiments. This does not mean that we become like vegetables, knowing or understanding nothing.  We have to delve more deeply than that into the significance of Big Mind.”

from Kosho Uchiyama Roshi, How to Cook Your Life

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