Father, we have chosen an elastic way of life. We ask people to help us to believe and to trust in the vision which has prompted us to do this. It will help us to be ready to have that vision grow, become more specific in us, to make us better witnesses to you. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, it's evident that just long last we were ready to say something about the nasty witness particularly. However, before I do that, I'd like to add a kind of post-script to what he said last evening as I was made with attitude.

[01:01]

So many things that could be said there, but there's one dimension I don't want to forget or read around. And that is, that a person who has developed a believing or defeated or Christian attitude toward life will manifest this not only by being ready for goodness and looking for it, ready for the happy surprise, filled with wonder, But also, and I think maybe especially, this will be manifested in the way this person handled unexpected bad terms of fortune. I'm happy to try. Most of us make plans. We schedule things. We have things set up. We probably have plans for next week, for this weekend.

[02:03]

And sometimes there's all things we would like very much to do. But we can't control everything. And so it frequently rains on our picnics. Use a symbolic term. Now what do you do when it rains on your picnic? Well, I think the normal, natural human temptation is to gripe, to complain, to kick stone, to curse a little, maybe to drown one's sorrow, if that's possible. But in general, say, well, damn it. You know how to make the best part. Well, this is a moment of opportunity for the David thinker. Because what he learned to say is, well, my plans, my plans have failed.

[03:06]

My plans have gone awry. Now maybe something even better is going to happen. Maybe something even better is going to happen. Well, I better get paid. And very often, Something better does happen. But only if one is looking for it. Only if one is ready for it. Like a picnic in it. Like it rained, that prevented me from becoming foolish and breaking a leg. But given the little eggs, that didn't even happen. Well, maybe I had a heart attack. Or even more important, maybe because it rained, I had to sit down and talk with someone. who I had never really met before. And all of a sudden, something happens that makes me forget all about the technique. This alertness, this openness, this readiness for the unexpected, which is better than what I had planned, I think is a crucial element in developing a life which is filled with the kind of goodness and surprise and happiness that drive up there.

[04:24]

Plastic this I think the court then wait beyond what we might call a formal religion thing watch us about support or even Christian But I'm always impressed by the way in which turn out a friend of planning discovered penicillin Now our scientists know more about this than I think it as I heard the story he was not at all looking for penicillin He was raising, he was developing a culture in which to raise germs. He was trying to keep these germs alive in this culture. For very purpose, I don't know what the purpose was. And then he found that this mold came into this culture and was killing in germ. It was an unwanted thing. Now, most of all, I think we said, oh, damn mold, you know. Here I had a culture and a quirk for days to get it all set up, and in this here, foreign element comes in, and the road, you know, and the septic one of the white the whole thing up, start over again.

[05:30]

I had to clear this time. He said, no, no, wait a minute. He forgot all about it in the original experiment. At this moment, it's killing my quirk. Here, maybe it'll kill quirk elsewhere. And that moment, of course, turned out to be one of the great blessings of humanity. Well, you can see, you know, that this can give one, you know, an experience of life full of adventure, of creativeness. And extremely important also, it ought to be a hallmark of religious people, because they are constantly ready for the divine God's mystery bringing into life. So you see how far you move. that trying to very carefully plan and control the attitude is, how far removed that is from true spirituality. I think it's a pretty funny spirituality when it says, I know exactly what's going to happen.

[06:32]

Nobody ever surprised me. You know, that's maybe stoicism. Nothing to do with Christianity. You know, a Christian is constantly looking for something to happen, not pull back. In the meantime, he makes a tentative plan. Now, coming in then to the Manaphic Witness, which, of course, is not far into this extension and concentration of the basic Christian Witness. To put it in academic terms, I would say the Manaphic Ideal is centered in a witness to the transcendent. When you trip away all the cultural and traditional elements, all the practices which have become characteristic of monasticism, the form of life, the lifestyle, when you get beyond that and come into what you might call the basic instinct

[07:47]

which cause the people to do this sort of thing. I think it is a discovery in a personal way of the reality of the transcendent. Now, I'd say that's kind of technical, right, because you won't get any vocation by saying that you're not open to the transcendent. I don't think people are turned on by the transcendent. However, one can come to understand the kind of side of it in a much more concrete way. But I think you have to begin to be a red book character. And so all forms of the National Committee on the left and leave are various expressions of this discovery, but all but only a partial discovery, and therefore a quest, a seeking, or the transcendent, or the beyond.

[08:51]

Transcendent, of course, is capitalized, and we find out it is identified with God. The transcendent, the ultimate beyond, the ultimate one who is not limited and controlled and in prison in this time and place, The ultimate free one is God. Now, it's clear that this monastic discovery, this monastic vision, as it were, is by no means limited to monks, nor is it limited even to Christians. It is an essentially divinist instinct that cuts across all kinds of religion. However, the monastic tradition is, I think, a development of a specific way of shaping one's life in response to this quest for the transcend.

[10:02]

And here is where then the format of the life, the tradition comes in. And there are all different ways of doing it, but we have a certain configuration certain methodology by which we deal with this basic instinct for the transcendent. I think it's important to keep in mind that the things which are most obvious in monophysism are not the things that are primary. And it is possible to be attracted to monophysism for many other reasons besides seeking the transcendent. One could be attracted because You know, these ways to de-civilize people. You know, because of the orderly life and all kinds of reasons. And it's important to sort these out because, you know, the only one reason is really valid. And I think that's the critical thing. And that's, I think, what Benedict is saying when he says, when the novice comes in, go for one thing only, but to truly seek God.

[11:12]

Reed, does he truly seek the transcendent? Is he looking for something beyond all this? And if this is not fair, no matter how talented or how otherwise adapted he might be, I think we have to counsel him to do nothing else. And if he's looking for this, he might not fit in too well at all in terms of his behavior and whatnot. He might really be A kind of a misfit, but if he hadn't missed, kind of make nothing to say, all the rest will come around. This is the critical thing. Truly seek God, that he is a seeker. He's questing, he's walking, he's got that far away look in his eye. You know? And this is the essential thing, and of course it's not something that you can measure very easily.

[12:14]

And I think if one is looking for it, it's not that hard to find either. Now, when one said that this is a witnessing to the transcendent, one said, of course, first of all, that the word transcendent had very little positive content in it. It says that which is beyond. It doesn't say what is beyond. And so to get a feeling for what the transcendent means, one has to find out or try to describe what it is we are. And so what it is not. The transcendent is not the secular. Now, of course, we know there's a long, you know, dispute about this secular versus the transcendent and so forth and so on.

[13:16]

Let me say clearly, if I can, that secular in this context does not mean that this world is bad. Now, secular means secularist. That is, it is directly opposed, the understanding of the transcendent is directly opposed to the philosophy, to the attitude, not only that this place and this time are good, but as opposed to the point that this place and this time are all there is. That's where the depiction takes place. That's where the transcendent says no. A true understanding of the transcendent and a seeking of it is not a denial of the goodness of this time and this place. That's a phony monastic intuition.

[14:19]

It affirms absolutely the goodness of this light, this time, this place, this earth. However, only as a starting place, only as a staging area for a great journey to the transcendent, a time and place to begin requests Where it takes the issue with the secularist philosophy is where the secular philosophy says this not only is good, but all there is. And I think, you know, there's a real good thing. So what it does, the awareness of the transcendent, the belief in the transcendent does, is to relativize the secular. To relativize the tendency to make the secular absolute, that is, the totality. It says, no, there is more than this.

[15:22]

And it sees the secular, the disworldly, as a good and natural and beneficent reality, precisely however in its potentiality. In other words, it does not consider the fruit to be an enemy of the blossom or the seed. But it does reject the view that there is only a blossom or only a seed. Now, this has to prevail on the implications for how one feels about this time and this place. If I think this is all there is, then, as far as time goes, I'm always going to be in a hurry. There's all the time we have.

[16:26]

For God's sake, we're not even sure of that. We expect to have a normal lifetime, but even that is the cure. And even if we have an extraordinary lifetime, it's still not enough. All with emergency, we need patience about the limitation of time. Well, if one looked upon this as being the third step only in a long journey, well then, it's possible to relax, but not to get caught up in that frenzy. And if this is not the only place there is, then it's not the only chance for succeeding. So the whole meaning of success is modified. It is not necessary to succeed here, and as soon as possible, and according with the term, success has understood here. Now, success has all together a different meaning.

[17:30]

Success means to arrive at this ,, and that may mean not succeeding here at all. as Jesus did not succeed. Jesus, who kind of the secular Jesus, was a great failure. Blocked his friends, blocked the gentles. At the time of his death, no one would think he succeeded. And yet, I think, we consider him the Jonathan success, over all. So one who discovered the transcendent is, first of all, one who had become aware of the interpleteness of the inadequacy of the secular of this time and this place.

[18:35]

So I think the first characteristic of this monastic intuition is a kind of restlessness, a kind of sense of the incompleteness of everything. What becomes aware that there is more? But one does not yet know for sure what the more is. So the quest becomes a seeking for the meaning, the nature of the transcendent. And to do that, One searches out other people who have had the same experience. From the very beginning, the monk has looked for kindred spirits. Am I the only one to feel this way about the world? Well, I heard someone fell across the other mountain. I'll look them up.

[19:37]

How do you feel that again? So there is a very, very traditional, ancient tendency for people who have this vision to come together. And so, I would say then that the first characteristic of the month is that he is looking or searching for something. He is seeking for a fullness beyond. Gradually, with the help of others who perhaps have been at this thing longer, it becomes clear to him what this beyond is. And he is God, of course. But God is really not that much more concrete, meaningful, and more transcendent itself.

[20:39]

So I think the critical thing for us is to kind of close the transcendent in helpful imagery. There are various ways in which men have tried to deal with this question of transcendent. It is a part of mystery. Therefore, one can never have clear, precise, neat descriptions of it. However, one can learn a great deal about it. And I think because it responds to the dissatisfaction and the sense of inadequacy and incompleteness, which is in the human parts, I think a very good name for the transcendent is whole.

[21:46]

It is our true whole. Now, here again, as in the case of God as Father, it's very important that there be some human experience of whole for which one can proceed If one has not had a good experience of home, if one has not wanted to go home for school, for example, it must not be possible. Then this thing needs to be bothered by the place already. Because home means a place that you want to go. A place where there is a sense of belonging. Beard laugh. Right. End of the journey. Don't need to go far. And so, God, his father, personally, and actually assuming that one has had a good experience as a father, if not, I think we should say our mother, our uncle.

[23:10]

I think a child that has never had a good father, maybe no father at all, and that really cannot understand what our father means, then talk about a normal situation, therefore, building on the human experience. And I think we need to modify some of these things in case that we're not going to experience it like. But the manner in which one comes to describe and anticipate this whole is greatly influenced by the sense of deprivation, the sense of inadequacy, the sense of homesickness, which causes one to be looking for home in the first place. Now, there have been a number of traditional images describing the transcendent as a human experience, seeking the transcendent. And I draw here somewhat from an article by Richard Richardson, who talked about three myths of the transcendent.

[24:26]

And I think we recognize them. I'm not going to begin with this article, but I'll just use it as a kind of framework for discussing this question. First of all, the transcendent probably, in its various understanding, was described as a home high above this place of sorrow, a home which is an escape from this veil of tears, therefore essentially in terms of being stuck in some place where there's a great deal of suffering and where one is constantly aware of it, of being home is dead. Well, the veil of tears, very honorable and traditional name in religion and sort of spirituality. Lone, narrow, totally good place. To be released, to go home, need to rise up, to ascend, to go to heaven, to be delivered from, to be snatched out of, and heaven become

[25:38]

The garden of places, a very pleasant place. Wide open spaces, no tear. Every tear shall be wiped away. And also, there is in this image a sense that in going to this pleasant place, one is actually returning to a childhood place. to return to paradise with a very, very ancient theme of consciousness in Christian tradition. And the biblical story of Genesis, which depicts man in an original paradise for which he is objected, is part of this understanding. Man remembered an ancient childhood which accounts for his present yearning. I remember having been someplace that was very nice

[26:41]

Maybe it's the womb. The awareness of the security and the happiness of the womb. I personally think that if you can get your congregation and send you over there to Arlenia to look for it, more power to you. Don't come to me to ask where to look for it. I don't think there's any place in this earth garden of paradise having a theological meaning and maybe it took the idea that God had for us in the beginning and in his mind I often think that the original paradise was something like the front page covered the cover of a seed catalog when I order seeds you know my garden is a big block and I can see those vegetables just like in front of Perkins catalog When God plowed his field, he knew, he saw ahead of all these wonderful fruits, which we are going to become.

[27:51]

And in a way, the Garden of Eden is that idea, that understanding of what the fruit of all this can be. But it's in the seed of man. Man, he is that draw of attention to God's idea. So I can self-deceive in the inner part of my being and I remember in a certain sense, in patient life, what my possibilities are. So I've gone through the, well, you just say, I've gone through the meat and the bugs and the flight and the harrowing and the digging and now I'm coming to the heart of going back fulfilling that promise. Another image, another myth, is the transcendent and the home, no longer high above this veil of tears, but at the end of history.

[29:02]

At the end of history, no longer cosmological image of moving from one place to another, But I kept a little historical image of moving through history to a homeland. This is more directly biblical than the other. The first one is really very Greek and Hellenistic. This is essentially biblical. The Exodus gave a decisive orientation to history. It brought the pinnacle cycle of the Canaanite another nature religion that wants to use the lights on a great historical adventure. God is present, manifesting at the beginning of history. And then he turns mysterious and seems absent only to show himself again at the end of time when all things will be set around. One makes this journey successfully not just by surviving, not just by hanging in there,

[30:06]

but by making God present, by doing the divine thing, by liberating the slave to care and love. In this view, the whole human project is dominated by promise. There are signs that transcendent everywhere, seeds of hope, seeds of promise. But the full revelation comes only at the end, in the radical future. So this myth is profoundly messianic. And it's really what I've talked about the last two days. They move the journey, looking at constant towards the horizon, learning to run toward that rather than move away from the others. The reference to the biblical Bible, of course, everywhere. I actually look at Jesus for the joy set before him. the thing I'm making for Benedict, running the way of God's command.

[31:17]

There is a third myth, third way of looking at this, and by the way, it's not mutually exclusive by any means, which finds the home not high above this place, a kind of refuge, kind of escape, nor even just at the end of history, although that is also true, but which finds the ultimate home in one's true self, a journey inward, a journey to self-transformation, a journey to personal conversion, a journey toward truth, Now, these are all the same journey, but the attempt to deal with a journey that can never be fully described in a different way.

[32:19]

Fifth journey is one which leads to great personal freedom. In a sense, I discovered the divinity within me. I think we have been far too much afraid of atheism. Anything we might forget that God is present, except in a very carefully distinguished way in his preachers. So I think the spark of divinity is in every being, and especially in man, in need of God. And so I discovered God, the transcendent, not by moving out of myself, hardly even knowing myself, but by getting to know myself and moving toward the truth that is in me. Not through some morbid introspection, but through an understanding of my potentiality.

[33:26]

I discovered myself as able to do divine things, as able to do the Exodus thing. Failure of man is often to have an Excalibur, a miraculous sword, in his scabbard, and just sit there and say, I can't do anything. What can I do about it? My God, I'm only one. What can I do about all these things? I got this gigantic sword and my scabbard didn't trust me. And God, I think, will say at the end, all right, just start moving it. And we'll see what you can do. No, we don't know the divine power that God has given us, the power of loving and thought-love. And so you're discovering that. And instead of being self-ordered introspection, which makes me forget everything else, it sees me in terms of my possibilities of serving, of changing, of doing, of helping.

[34:30]

I can be outside myself, doing the creative and divine thing, far beyond anything I thought possible. Now, my time is up. I want to take the characteristic of monastic life, the vows and some other characteristics, and use them, I think, I hope effectively, to illustrate And all of these qualities that you wish or practices of monasticism do, in fact, derive the deeper meaning of this profound witnessing to the transcendent.

[35:19]

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